As to them mermaids frightening away the whales, it's all a superstition.

The natives on Queen Charlotte's island have a superstition that there is an island down north of them, called No Man's island--for no man, as they say, was ever seen on it--where there is a subterranean sea peopled by these mermaids; and that these mermaids have built them a palace, where they hold their revels and do all sorts of strange things, even to decoying navigators into it.

That story won't do.

Don't believe a word of it, Mr.
Toodleburg." That morning about ten o'clock the lookout aloft called, "Whale, O!" The glad announcement sent a thrill of joy over every one on board.

The crew turned out with cheerful faces, and every one looked eagerly in the direction pointed to by the man aloft.
"Where away ?" was the quick enquiry from the deck.
"Off the larboard bow--three miles.