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Twice a day: the “chiquito” that made up for the hardships of the whaler

Twice a day: the “chiquito” that made up for the hardships of the whaler

Placeres magazine edition No 31, grateful for the opportunity

The dancing, the singing, and the occasional fights announced that the pisco was flowing. While consulting some books about pisco, I came across the works of Herman Melville (1819–1891), one of the great American writers of the nineteenth century and the author of Moby-Dick (1851). Melville sailed for more than a year and a half on a
whaling ship and, beginning in 1844, started writing novels inspired by his experiences on board.

There are two works in which he mentions pisco as part of the routines of the whalemen at sea, also reflecting
the presence of the Peruvian distillate along the coasts of the South Pacific. One is The Encantadas, published in installments in
1854 and collected in The Piazza Tales in 1856. There, pisco intervenes indirectly in the rescue of a Peruvian woman
from Paita, Piura, in “Sketch Eighth: Norfolk Isle and the Chola Widow.”

The other is Omoo, published in 1847 and set in the South Seas. In it, Melville recounts life aboard a whaler and describes a custom intended to keep the crew content: twice a day they received a quantity of pisco that the steward served at the foot of the windlass, in small tin measures called tots,
rendered in some versions as “chiquito.” It is in Omoo that pisco appears most frequently. In a
In a footnote, Melville explains that the liquor takes its name from an important city in Peru where it is manufactured in large quantities;
he further notes that it was known all along the western coast of South America, from where it was exported
to Australia, and that it was a cheap drink.

In another passage, the narrator has just come aboard the whaler Julia. The captain offers him a glass of pisco and then begins the process of signing him on to the crew. Later, when describing the miserable conditions of the ship
—poor food, disease, and the lack of fresh provisions—Melville points out that there was something which, in the sailors’ judgment,
compensated for those deficiencies: “the regular allowance of pisco.” The phrase is revealing. Pisco does not appear
as an exceptional luxury, but as a habitual part of the sailors’ life and a compensation for the hard conditions of navigation
duras condiciones de navegación.

In Chapter XII, Melville returns to this custom: the crew regularly received, twice a day, a
certain quantity of pisco that the steward distributed at the windlass, using small tin measures
called tots. He also recounts that the Sydney, Australia, whalers kept up the old custom of carrying
carrying pisco as part of the regular voyage provisions. This detail has special documentary value. Melville does not merely note that pisco was drunk in Peru: he evidences its international circulation and its incorporation into the stores
of the whalers who sailed the Pacific.

The tot, moreover, acquired a cultural significance. For a sailor, getting his beloved “chiquito” could justify .
almost any price. It was much more than a simple measure: it represented a custom deeply rooted in the seafaring world.
Melville also describes the Saturday-night bottles: two bottles went down to the forecastle,
one for each watch, and the oldest sailor in each group had the privilege of dividing it and doing the honors.

Thus two forms of consumption appear: the ordinary ration of pisco, twice a day, and the extraordinary collective consumption
Saturday-night bottles, associated with the weekly celebration. Even the sick sailors received
their respective tots in a “convivial” manner—that is, with a social character as well, and not merely medicinal.
Herman Melville’s accounts offer, in short, a singular testimony to the presence of pisco in the daily life of the whalemen and to its circulation along the Pacific routes during the nineteenth century. A small “tot” that ended
up becoming part of international seafaring culture. Enjoy pisco responsibly.

Til next time!

By Livio Pastorino Wagner Sommelier, Specialist, and Pisco Taster Registration: CRDO-PISCO 2020 RCO-034-2011
@elmagozurdo

Source: Herman Melville,
Complete Works, Volume II

Placeres magazine No. 31 septiembre 06 del 2026

Pisco & music

 

Where pisco is the only protagonist!
#lapiscoteca #piscosour #winelover #pisco #pasionporlacata #bar #elpiscoesdelperu #vino #vinosdelperu #pisco #piscolover #Lima #Peru #Moquegua #Tacna #Arequipa #Ica #piscopunch #piscosour #piscotonic #capitan #chilcanodepisco

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