Chương Chương 53 · The Gam.

The ostensible reason why Ahab did not go on board of the whaler we had

spoken was this: the wind and sea betokened storms. But even had this

not been the case, he would not after all, perhaps, have boarded

her—judging by his subsequent conduct on similar occasions—if so it had

been that, by the process of hailing, he had obtained a negative answer

to the question he put. For, as it eventually turned out, he cared not

to consort, even for five minutes, with any stranger captain, except he

could contribute some of that information he so absorbingly sought. But

all this might remain inadequately estimated, were not something said

here of the peculiar usages of whaling-vessels when meeting each other

in foreign seas, and especially on a common cruising-ground.

If two strangers crossing the Pine Barrens in New York State, or the

equally desolate Salisbury Plain in England; if casually encountering

each other in such inhospitable wilds, these twain, for the life of

them, cannot well avoid a mutual salutation; and stopping for a moment

to interchange the news; and, perhaps, sitting down for a while and

resting in concert: then, how much more natural that upon the

illimitable Pine Barrens and Salisbury Plains of the sea, two whaling

vessels descrying each other at the ends of the earth—off lone

Fanning’s Island, or the far away King’s Mills; how much more natural,

I say, that under such circumstances these ships should not only

interchange hails, but come into still closer, more friendly and

sociable contact. And especially would this seem to be a matter of

course, in the case of vessels owned in one seaport, and whose

captains, officers, and not a few of the men are personally known to

each other; and consequently, have all sorts of dear domestic things to

talk about.

For the long absent ship, the outward-bounder, perhaps, has letters on

board; at any rate, she will be sure to let her have some papers of a

date a year or two later than the last one on her blurred and

thumb-worn files. And in return for that courtesy, the outward-bound

ship would receive the latest whaling intelligence from the

cruising-ground to which she may be destined, a thing of the utmost

importance to her. And in degree, all this will hold true concerning

whaling vessels crossing each other’s track on the cruising-ground

itself, even though they are equally long absent from home. For one of

them may have received a transfer of letters from some third, and now

far remote vessel; and some of those letters may be for the people of

the ship she now meets. Besides, they would exchange the whaling news,

and have an agreeable chat. For not only would they meet with all the

sympathies of sailors, but likewise with all the peculiar

congenialities arising from a common pursuit and mutually shared

privations and perils.

Nor would difference of country make any very essential difference;

that is, so long as both parties speak one language, as is the case

with Americans and English. Though, to be sure, from the small number

of English whalers, such meetings do not very often occur, and when

they do occur there is too apt to be a sort of shyness between them;

for your Englishman is rather reserved, and your Yankee, he does not

fancy that sort of thing in anybody but himself. Besides, the English

whalers sometimes affect a kind of metropolitan superiority over the

American whalers; regarding the long, lean Nantucketer, with his

nondescript provincialisms, as a sort of sea-peasant. But where this

superiority in the English whalemen does really consist, it would be

hard to say, seeing that the Yankees in one day, collectively, kill

more whales than all the English, collectively, in ten years. But this

is a harmless little foible in the English whale-hunters, which the

Nantucketer does not take much to heart; probably, because he knows

that he has a few foibles himself.

So, then, we see that of all ships separately sailing the sea, the

whalers have most reason to be sociable—and they are so. Whereas, some

merchant ships crossing each other’s wake in the mid-Atlantic, will

oftentimes pass on without so much as a single word of recognition,

mutually cutting each other on the high seas, like a brace of dandies

in Broadway; and all the time indulging, perhaps, in finical criticism

upon each other’s rig. As for Men-of-War, when they chance to meet at

sea, they first go through such a string of silly bowings and

scrapings, such a ducking of ensigns, that there does not seem to be

much right-down hearty good-will and brotherly love about it at all. As

touching Slave-ships meeting, why, they are in such a prodigious hurry,

they run away from each other as soon as possible. And as for Pirates,

when they chance to cross each other’s cross-bones, the first hail

is—“How many skulls?”—the same way that whalers hail—“How many

barrels?” And that question once answered, pirates straightway steer

apart, for they are infernal villains on both sides, and don’t like to

see overmuch of each other’s villanous likenesses.

But look at the godly, honest, unostentatious, hospitable, sociable,

free-and-easy whaler! What does the whaler do when she meets another

whaler in any sort of decent weather? She has a “_Gam_,” a thing so

utterly unknown to all other ships that they never heard of the name

even; and if by chance they should hear of it, they only grin at it,

and repeat gamesome stuff about “spouters” and “blubber-boilers,” and

such like pretty exclamations. Why it is that all Merchant-seamen, and

also all Pirates and Man-of-War’s men, and Slave-ship sailors, cherish

such a scornful feeling towards Whale-ships; this is a question it

would be hard to answer. Because, in the case of pirates, say, I should

like to know whether that profession of theirs has any peculiar glory

about it. It sometimes ends in uncommon elevation, indeed; but only at

the gallows. And besides, when a man is elevated in that odd fashion,

he has no proper foundation for his superior altitude. Hence, I

conclude, that in boasting himself to be high lifted above a whaleman,

in that assertion the pirate has no solid basis to stand on.

But what is a _Gam?_ You might wear out your index-finger running up

and down the columns of dictionaries, and never find the word. Dr.

Johnson never attained to that erudition; Noah Webster’s ark does not

hold it. Nevertheless, this same expressive word has now for many years

been in constant use among some fifteen thousand true born Yankees.

Certainly, it needs a definition, and should be incorporated into the

Lexicon. With that view, let me learnedly define it.

GAM. NOUN—_A social meeting of two_ (_or more_) _Whaleships, generally

on a cruising-ground; when, after exchanging hails, they exchange

visits by boats’ crews: the two captains remaining, for the time, on

board of one ship, and the two chief mates on the other._

There is another little item about Gamming which must not be forgotten

here. All professions have their own little peculiarities of detail; so

has the whale fishery. In a pirate, man-of-war, or slave ship, when the

captain is rowed anywhere in his boat, he always sits in the stern

sheets on a comfortable, sometimes cushioned seat there, and often

steers himself with a pretty little milliner’s tiller decorated with

gay cords and ribbons. But the whale-boat has no seat astern, no sofa

of that sort whatever, and no tiller at all. High times indeed, if

whaling captains were wheeled about the water on castors like gouty old

aldermen in patent chairs. And as for a tiller, the whale-boat never

admits of any such effeminacy; and therefore as in gamming a complete

boat’s crew must leave the ship, and hence as the boat steerer or

harpooneer is of the number, that subordinate is the steersman upon the

occasion, and the captain, having no place to sit in, is pulled off to

his visit all standing like a pine tree. And often you will notice that

being conscious of the eyes of the whole visible world resting on him

from the sides of the two ships, this standing captain is all alive to

the importance of sustaining his dignity by maintaining his legs. Nor

is this any very easy matter; for in his rear is the immense projecting

steering oar hitting him now and then in the small of his back, the

after-oar reciprocating by rapping his knees in front. He is thus

completely wedged before and behind, and can only expand himself

sideways by settling down on his stretched legs; but a sudden, violent

pitch of the boat will often go far to topple him, because length of

foundation is nothing without corresponding breadth. Merely make a

spread angle of two poles, and you cannot stand them up. Then, again,

it would never do in plain sight of the world’s riveted eyes, it would

never do, I say, for this straddling captain to be seen steadying

himself the slightest particle by catching hold of anything with his

hands; indeed, as token of his entire, buoyant self-command, he

generally carries his hands in his trowsers’ pockets; but perhaps being

generally very large, heavy hands, he carries them there for ballast.

Nevertheless there have occurred instances, well authenticated ones

too, where the captain has been known for an uncommonly critical moment

or two, in a sudden squall say—to seize hold of the nearest oarsman’s

hair, and hold on there like grim death.