Then one of the harpoonersran out along the back ropes, which keep the jib boom down, taking his stand beneath the bowsprit with the harpoon ready.
I was then informed by one of the harpooners that no other fuel was ever used for boiling blubber at any time, there being always amply sufficient for the purpose.
It fell a dead calm, and the harpooners amused themselves by dredging up great masses of the weed, and turning out the many strange creatures abiding therein.
When I found Patrick Cairns among the harpooners my research was nearing its end.
I therefore spent some days in the East-end, devised an Arctic expedition, put forth tempting terms for harpooners who would serve under Captain Basil--and behold the result!
I saw these advertisements about harpoonersand high wages, so I went to the shipping agents, and they sent me here.
Amongst the harpooners were often found men who had themselves commanded ships and whose stars, no doubt, would again be in the ascendancy.
The specksioneer and all the harpooners except the mate get on to the whale or into the mollie boats in attendance; they have spikes on their boots to keep them from slipping; and they remove the blubber and bone with their knives and spades.
Two harpooners attended the try-pots, replenishing them with minced blubber from the hopper at the port side, and bailing out the sufficiently boiled oil into the great cooling tank on the starboard.
The harpooners and other petty officers were grouped in the waist, earnestly discussing the pros and cons of attack upon whales.
The crew was made up of stout, active men in the prime of life, nearly all of whom had been more or less accustomed to the whale-fishing, and some of the harpooners were giants in muscular development and breadth of shoulder, if not in height.
Willis Cox, under the boathouse, had dropped his book in his lap and was dozing in his chair; the two harpooners had gone below.
Willis Cox was reading, under the boathouse; and two of the harpooners played idly at some game of cards in the lee of the rail beside him.
Dan'l sent Brander to rummage through the steerage where the harpooners slept; and at Faith's suggestion, Hitch and Loum went aloft to the mastheads to make sure there was no secret cache there.
The captain, of course, the officers and the harpooners were usually skilled and efficient hands.
The harpooners say that three-year-old bulls are the most liable to attack a boat, especially if it is allowed to overrun them when fast to a harpoon line.
The old skippers and harpooners can spin many a yarn of lost crews and boats gone under the ice through a fatal moment’s delay in cutting free from the diving walrus.
The harpooners and their assistants cut the blubber into long stripes, which are hoisted into the ship, cut into smaller pieces, and thrown into the hold, from whence they are again brought upon deck to be pared and barrelled up.
One of the harpooners shot him; but a squall coming on, we did not bring the carcass on board.
Meanwhile one of the harpooners had brought out a number of knives, with which all hands were soon busy skinning the blubber from the bodies.
He brought with him a weapon which I have not hitherto mentioned, because none of the harpooners could be induced to use it, and consequently it had not been much in evidence.
We met with no "luck" for some time, and the faces of the harpooners grew daily longer, the great heat of those sultry waters trying all tempers sorely.
Not feeling at all sure of how the other harpooners would take my stepping over their heads, I respectfully demurred to the compliment offered me, stating my reasons.
This method of whaling being quite new to our whalemen, it was necessary, at great cost, to hire American officers and harpooners to instruct them in the ways of dealing with these highly active and dangerous cetacea.
Then one of the harpooners ran out along the backropes, which keep the jib-boom down, taking his stand beneath the bowsprit with the harpoon ready.
Two harpooners attended the try-pots, replenishing them with minced blubber from the hopper at the port side, and baling out the sufficiently boiled oil into the great cooling tank on the starboard.
Several of the officers and harpooners were allowed a few hours off, as their special duty of dealing with the head at daylight would be so arduous as to need all their energies.
In the evening the harpooners were invited down into the cabin, to receive their instructions for the season; and afterwards the steward served out a glass of grog to all hands, to drink "a good voyage and a full ship.
The harpooners and the elder men now began to consult what was best to be done.
He instantly ordered the smaller boats to be lowered, and worked through and over the ice to the pools, with harpooners ready to strike any whale which might rise in them.
First, the harpooners secured to their feet what we called spurs, that is, spikes of iron, to prevent them from slipping off the back of the whale, on which they now descended.
As the huge mass is turned round and round by the kent-tackle, the harpooners continue cutting off the slips, till the whole coat of fat is removed.
Two of the four harpoonerswere below in their bunks, asleep.
The mates stood about him, the harpooners a little to one side; and Mark leaned on the rail at the other side of the deck, watching, smiling.
And one of the harpooners backed away toward the waist of the ship, watchful and wary, taking no part in the affair.
And the harpooners from the steerage, and the men from forecastle and fore deck came stumbling and crowding aft.
The two harpooners were there; and one of them was that black whom Joel had brought from the Martin Wilkes, and in whom he placed some faith.
He had no wish to encounter theharpooners in their narrow quarters.
So swiftly had the tumult of the battle arisen that all these things had come to pass before the harpooners asleep in the steerage could wake and reach the deck.
There was a seldom used door that opened from the main cabin into a passage which led in turn to the steerage where the harpooners slept.
One of the harpooners made a blunder; the fish saw the boat, took the alarm, and again fled.
Like dislodged trucks, the heads of the harpooners aloft shook on their bull-like necks.
Urgent signals for assistance were displayed by each boat, and in a few minutes one of the harpooners was obliged to slip the end of his line.
The harpooners not unfrequently fall into the whale's mouth, when it is exposed by the removal of a surface of blubber; where they might easily be drowned, but for the prompt assistance which is always at hand.
The boats had proceeded some time together, when they separated in pursuit of two whales, not far distant from each other; when, by a singular coincidence, the harpooners each struck his fish at the same moment.
The harpooners are annoyed by the surge, and repeatedly drenched in water; and are likewise subject to be wounded by the breaking of ropes or hooks of tackles, and even by strokes from each other's knives.
During a fresh gale of wind in the season of 1809, one of the Resolution's harpooners struck a sucking whale.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "harpooners" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
