BEN BLUFF was a whaler, and many a day
Had chased the huge fish about Baffin’s old Bay,
But time brought a change his diversion to spoil,
And that was when Gas took the shine out of Oil.
He turn’d up his nose at the fumes of the Coke,
And swore the whole scheme was a bottle of smoke:
As to London he briefly delivered his mind,
“Sparma-city,” said he—but the City declined.
So Ben cut his line in a sort of a huff,
As soon as his whales had brought profits enough,
And hard by the Docks settled down for his life,
But, true to his text, went to Wales for a wife.
A big one she was, without figure or waist,
More bulky than lovely, but that was his taste;
In fat she was lapp’d from her sole to her crown,
And, turn’d into oil, would have lighted a town.
But Ben like a Whaler was charm’d with the match,
And thought, very truly, his spouse a great catch;
A flesh-and-blood emblem of Plenty and Peace,
And would not have changed her for Helen of Greece.
For Greenland was green in his memory still;
He’d quitted his trade, but retain’d the good-will;
And often, when soften’d by bumbo and flip,
Would cry—till he blubber’d—about his old ship.
No craft like the Grampus could work through a floe,
What knots she could run, and what tons she could stow.
And then that rich smell he preferr’d to the rose,
By just nosing the whole without holding his nose!
Now Ben he resolved, one fine Saturday night,
A snug Arctic Circle of friends to invite,
Old Tars in the trade, who related old tales,
And drank, and blew clouds that were “very like whales.”
Of course with their grog there was plenty of chat,
Of canting, and flinching, and cutting up fat;
And how Gun Harpoons into fashion had got,
And if they were meant for the Gun-whale or not?
At last they retired, and left Ben to his rest,
By fancies cetaceous, and drink, well possess’d,
When, lo! as he lay by his partner in bed,
He heard something blow through two holes in its head.
“A start!” mutter’d Ben, in the Grampus afloat,
And made but one jump from the deck to the boat!
“Huzza! pull away for the blubber and bone—
I look on that whale as already my own!”
Then groping about by the light of the moon,
He soon laid his hand on his trusty harpoon;
A moment he poised it, to send it more pat,
And then made a plunge to imbed it in fat!
“Starn all!” he sang out, “as you care for your lives—
Starn all, as you hope to return to your wives—
Stand by for the flurry! she throws up the foam!
Well done, my old iron, I’ve sent you right home!”
And scarce had he spoken, when lo! bolt upright
The Leviathan rose in a great sheet of white,
And swiftly advanced for a fathom or two,
As only a fish out of water could do.
“Starn all!” echoed Ben, with a movement aback,
But too slow to escape from the creature’s attack;
If flippers it had, they were furnish’d with nails,—
“You willin, I’ll teach you that Women an’t Whales!”
“Avast!” shouted Ben, with a sort of a screech,
“I’ve heard a Whale spouting, but here is a speech!”
“A-spouting, indeed!—very pretty,” said she;
“But it’s you I’ll blow up, not the froth of the sea!
“To go to pretend to take me for a fish!
You great Polar Bear—but I know what you wish—
You’re sick of a wife, that your hankering baulks,—
You want to go back to some young Esquimax!”
“O dearest,” cried Ben, frighten’d out of his life,
“Don’t think I would go for to murder a wife
I must long have bewailed”—“But she only cried Stuff!
Don’t name it, you brute, you’ve be-whaled me enough!”
“Lord, Polly!” said Ben, “such a deed could I do?
I’d rather have murder’d all Wapping than you!
Come, forgive what is passed.” “O you monster!” she cried,
“It was none of your fault that it passed of one side!”
However, at last she inclined to forgive;
“But, Ben, take this warning as long as you live—
If the love of harpooning so strong must prevail,
Take a whale for a wife, not a wife for a whale.”