Summary of your 'study carrel' ============================== This is a summary of your Distant Reader 'study carrel'. The Distant Reader harvested & cached your content into a collection/corpus. It then applied sets of natural language processing and text mining against the collection. The results of this process was reduced to a database file -- a 'study carrel'. The study carrel can then be queried, thus bringing light specific characteristics for your collection. These characteristics can help you summarize the collection as well as enumerate things you might want to investigate more closely. This report is a terse narrative report, and when processing is complete you will be linked to a more complete narrative report. Eric Lease Morgan Number of items in the collection; 'How big is my corpus?' ---------------------------------------------------------- 138 Average length of all items measured in words; "More or less, how big is each item?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1579 Average readability score of all items (0 = difficult; 100 = easy) ------------------------------------------------------------------ 79 Top 50 statistically significant keywords; "What is my collection about?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------- 31 Ahab 18 whale 11 Stubb 10 Queequeg 8 Whale 8 Starbuck 8 Sperm 6 Pequod 5 Flask 4 ship 4 head 4 Pip 3 sea 3 man 3 Peleg 3 Leviathan 3 Captain 3 Bildad 2 oil 2 harpooneer 2 captain 2 White 2 Tashtego 2 Jonah 2 Dick 2 CHAPTER 1 work 1 whiteness 1 water 1 time 1 thunder 1 thing 1 tail 1 sperm 1 sir 1 shipmate 1 shark 1 school 1 sail 1 night 1 memory 1 mast 1 look 1 line 1 leg 1 iron 1 idol 1 hand 1 foot 1 fish Top 50 lemmatized nouns; "What is discussed?" --------------------------------------------- 977 whale 721 man 593 ship 503 sea 476 boat 443 time 418 head 321 hand 318 thing 285 way 256 water 255 day 241 eye 226 side 208 deck 185 part 184 line 179 world 176 life 165 sort 162 captain 161 foot 158 night 158 fish 154 crew 147 one 141 air 132 harpooneer 127 place 123 something 122 leg 122 arm 121 year 119 body 118 heart 117 moment 115 sight 115 mate 114 end 113 voyage 113 nothing 111 whaleman 111 sailor 109 sir 105 soul 105 mast 104 face 101 word 101 iron 101 bone Top 50 proper nouns; "What are the names of persons or places?" -------------------------------------------------------------- 491 Ahab 335 ye 291 Whale 250 Stubb 246 Queequeg 210 thou 194 Starbuck 180 Captain 165 Pequod 137 Sperm 125 God 120 CHAPTER 102 Flask 89 White 82 Moby 82 Jonah 81 Dick 80 Nantucket 77 Bildad 73 Peleg 70 Pip 65 Leviathan 55 Mr. 53 Tashtego 48 New 43 whale 43 Lord 39 Aye 38 heaven 38 Right 37 King 37 Cape 35 Greenland 34 Daggoo 33 Thou 32 Steelkilt 31 Pacific 30 leviathan 27 Sir 26 sir 26 Fedallah 25 Parsee 25 Indian 24 white 23 English 22 St. 22 Radney 22 Nantucketer 22 Lakeman 21 ere Top 50 personal pronouns nouns; "To whom are things referred?" ------------------------------------------------------------- 2491 it 2068 i 1881 he 1055 him 891 you 666 they 623 me 471 them 459 we 221 us 203 himself 119 she 98 her 84 thee 84 itself 68 myself 59 themselves 38 ''em 32 ye 26 yourself 24 thyself 22 one 22 ''s 17 mine 17 his 15 ourselves 11 theirs 7 herself 6 yours 5 em 4 ours 2 thy 2 hisself 1 yourselves 1 windward;--for 1 supper?--you 1 smoothe 1 oneself 1 morning.--then 1 mad,--''i 1 if"--and 1 i''m 1 helm!--square 1 either-- 1 aloft!--that Top 50 lemmatized verbs; "What do things do?" --------------------------------------------- 6915 be 1940 have 882 do 612 say 575 see 489 go 456 seem 409 come 369 make 313 look 308 take 303 know 292 stand 279 think 202 give 193 tell 188 find 188 call 182 turn 178 hear 171 get 162 let 153 cry 133 keep 129 hold 126 feel 119 leave 115 bear 112 run 101 speak 101 sail 101 lie 97 strike 96 live 94 pass 92 put 89 remain 89 draw 88 begin 86 carry 85 sit 84 break 82 set 80 rise 79 use 79 roll 77 pull 74 cut 73 follow 70 fall Top 50 lemmatized adjectives and adverbs; "How are things described?" --------------------------------------------------------------------- 1485 not 845 so 780 now 624 then 500 more 494 up 448 there 448 old 413 other 376 only 352 out 346 long 324 great 324 down 321 very 318 here 311 still 277 most 269 last 257 again 249 good 248 little 226 first 223 much 212 well 211 same 207 yet 206 never 205 ever 202 all 200 such 200 own 194 almost 190 far 190 even 182 too 181 away 179 off 171 as 169 white 154 many 145 small 141 once 141 on 140 soon 136 over 134 whale 132 thus 129 high 128 full Top 50 lemmatized superlative adjectives; "How are things described to the extreme?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------- 68 most 68 least 51 good 20 slight 19 large 12 great 10 small 10 near 8 high 6 fine 6 deep 5 strong 5 furth 4 strange 4 old 4 mighty 4 lofty 4 innermost 4 full 4 early 4 bitter 3 true 3 thick 3 queer 3 pure 3 noble 3 minute 3 low 3 long 3 late 3 keen 3 holy 3 dire 3 deadly 3 Most 2 wise 2 wide 2 topmost 2 thin 2 subtle 2 stout 2 stiff 2 sound 2 sad 2 remote 2 quick 2 plain 2 mean 2 lowermost 2 l Top 50 lemmatized superlative adverbs; "How do things do to the extreme?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 209 most 12 well 6 least 1 was.--most 1 soon 1 severest 1 sayest 1 lookest 1 holdest 1 clearest 1 belongest Top 50 Internet domains; "What Webbed places are alluded to in this corpus?" ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Top 50 URLs; "What is hyperlinked from this corpus?" ---------------------------------------------------- Top 50 email addresses; "Who are you gonna call?" ------------------------------------------------- Top 50 positive assertions; "What sentences are in the shape of noun-verb-noun?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5 ahab did not 4 ahab was now 3 whale is not 3 whale was now 2 ahab cried out 2 ahab is all 2 boat was now 2 days went by 2 pequod was as 2 pequod was not 2 pequod was now 2 things called omens 2 whale is often 2 whale was not 1 ahab be not 1 ahab came along 1 ahab gave orders 1 ahab gives chase 1 ahab had never 1 ahab had not 1 ahab had now 1 ahab had purposely 1 ahab had unaccountably 1 ahab has furiously 1 ahab heard nothing 1 ahab is enough 1 ahab is lord 1 ahab is untouched 1 ahab looked up 1 ahab said nothing 1 ahab seemed not 1 ahab standing there 1 ahab stands alone 1 ahab stood apart 1 ahab stood erect 1 ahab stood forth 1 ahab stood up 1 ahab stood upright 1 ahab was fairly 1 ahab was greater 1 ahab was inaccessible 1 ahab was pleased 1 boat did not 1 boat had always 1 boat is partially 1 boat is stove 1 boat seemed striking 1 boat was ahab 1 boat was also 1 boat was central Top 50 negative assertions; "What sentences are in the shape of noun-verb-no|not-noun?" --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 ahab seemed no exception 1 boat has no seat 1 man had no self 1 pequod was not quick 1 queequeg had not at 1 ship had not only 1 ship was not wholly 1 starbuck was no crusader 1 thing is not always 1 thou are no nantucketer 1 times were not content 1 whale are not so 1 whale has no external 1 whale has no famous 1 whale has no proper 1 whale has no taste 1 whale has no tongue 1 whale has no voice 1 whale is not dead 1 whale was not yet Sizes of items; "Measures in words, how big is each item?" ---------------------------------------------------------- 8093 chapter-056 5979 chapter-005 5595 chapter-018 5190 chapter-034 4799 chapter-089 4596 chapter-137 4440 chapter-083 4035 chapter-050 3809 chapter-043 3667 chapter-044 3631 chapter-011 3615 chapter-135 3577 chapter-047 3523 chapter-002 3350 chapter-136 3067 chapter-066 2846 chapter-038 2768 chapter-102 2635 chapter-037 2593 chapter-093 2580 chapter-121 2525 chapter-101 2330 chapter-019 2306 chapter-073 2280 chapter-112 2252 chapter-036 2241 chapter-003 2238 chapter-075 2090 chapter-087 2067 chapter-046 2003 chapter-063 1925 chapter-057 1866 chapter-088 1848 chapter-098 1782 chapter-103 1726 chapter-015 1716 chapter-132 1704 chapter-029 1680 chapter-026 1676 chapter-080 1675 chapter-074 1673 chapter-006 1670 chapter-076 1669 chapter-024 1660 chapter-055 1651 chapter-095 1639 chapter-110 1639 chapter-134 1633 chapter-042 1587 chapter-107 1581 chapter-104 1571 chapter-012 1531 chapter-053 1499 chapter-062 1449 chapter-004 1447 chapter-091 1446 chapter-106 1438 chapter-130 1428 chapter-128 1422 chapter-030 1390 chapter-020 1332 chapter-058 1295 chapter-096 1258 chapter-077 1253 chapter-115 1250 chapter-125 1246 chapter-031 1244 chapter-021 1236 chapter-028 1229 chapter-126 1214 chapter-070 1213 chapter-017 1203 chapter-090 1167 chapter-084 1145 chapter-127 1101 chapter-023 1069 chapter-109 1066 chapter-092 1037 chapter-100 1034 chapter-052 1015 chapter-060 1009 chapter-048 1007 chapter-067 986 chapter-035 985 chapter-094 980 chapter-059 970 chapter-010 956 chapter-114 953 chapter-009 951 chapter-081 945 chapter-108 943 chapter-049 941 chapter-105 938 chapter-022 936 chapter-111 935 chapter-061 918 chapter-082 913 chapter-120 910 chapter-117 894 chapter-072 891 chapter-014 885 chapter-033 880 chapter-078 848 chapter-051 835 chapter-008 819 chapter-086 793 chapter-085 765 chapter-016 757 chapter-007 746 chapter-069 742 chapter-129 736 chapter-013 728 chapter-054 653 chapter-116 652 chapter-079 652 chapter-123 641 chapter-068 594 chapter-131 577 chapter-064 527 chapter-039 524 chapter-118 505 chapter-097 478 chapter-065 478 chapter-119 447 chapter-071 434 chapter-133 431 chapter-113 399 chapter-040 378 chapter-025 318 chapter-045 294 chapter-032 289 chapter-027 282 chapter-041 277 chapter-138 250 chapter-099 195 chapter-001 192 chapter-122 55 chapter-124 Readability of items; "How difficult is each item to read?" ----------------------------------------------------------- 99.0 chapter-041 99.0 chapter-045 98.0 chapter-039 97.0 chapter-040 97.0 chapter-110 97.0 chapter-127 97.0 chapter-129 94.0 chapter-119 94.0 chapter-123 93.0 chapter-134 92.0 chapter-133 91.0 chapter-021 91.0 chapter-101 91.0 chapter-115 91.0 chapter-125 91.0 chapter-137 90.0 chapter-031 90.0 chapter-038 90.0 chapter-075 89.0 chapter-001 89.0 chapter-023 89.0 chapter-032 89.0 chapter-121 88.0 chapter-066 87.0 chapter-002 87.0 chapter-020 87.0 chapter-128 87.0 chapter-138 85.0 chapter-024 85.0 chapter-050 85.0 chapter-102 85.0 chapter-136 84.0 chapter-071 84.0 chapter-111 83.0 chapter-009 83.0 chapter-011 83.0 chapter-019 82.0 chapter-004 82.0 chapter-005 82.0 chapter-018 82.0 chapter-063 82.0 chapter-074 82.0 chapter-120 82.0 chapter-135 81.0 chapter-007 81.0 chapter-008 81.0 chapter-025 81.0 chapter-027 81.0 chapter-093 81.0 chapter-099 81.0 chapter-130 80.0 chapter-003 80.0 chapter-015 80.0 chapter-017 80.0 chapter-054 80.0 chapter-056 80.0 chapter-077 80.0 chapter-083 80.0 chapter-098 79.0 chapter-092 79.0 chapter-112 79.0 chapter-116 79.0 chapter-117 79.0 chapter-118 79.0 chapter-126 78.0 chapter-034 78.0 chapter-049 78.0 chapter-067 78.0 chapter-072 78.0 chapter-105 77.0 chapter-012 77.0 chapter-014 77.0 chapter-095 76.0 chapter-080 76.0 chapter-081 76.0 chapter-103 75.0 chapter-051 75.0 chapter-061 75.0 chapter-104 74.0 chapter-006 74.0 chapter-070 74.0 chapter-073 74.0 chapter-076 74.0 chapter-091 74.0 chapter-096 73.0 chapter-016 73.0 chapter-029 73.0 chapter-036 73.0 chapter-053 73.0 chapter-100 72.0 chapter-026 72.0 chapter-086 72.0 chapter-087 71.0 chapter-013 71.0 chapter-022 71.0 chapter-028 71.0 chapter-058 71.0 chapter-084 71.0 chapter-088 71.0 chapter-094 71.0 chapter-113 71.0 chapter-132 70.0 chapter-010 70.0 chapter-085 69.0 chapter-059 69.0 chapter-060 69.0 chapter-064 69.0 chapter-089 69.0 chapter-090 69.0 chapter-097 68.0 chapter-030 68.0 chapter-047 68.0 chapter-055 68.0 chapter-057 68.0 chapter-068 68.0 chapter-069 68.0 chapter-082 68.0 chapter-114 67.0 chapter-079 66.0 chapter-044 66.0 chapter-052 66.0 chapter-106 64.0 chapter-037 64.0 chapter-043 64.0 chapter-109 63.0 chapter-046 63.0 chapter-065 63.0 chapter-078 61.0 chapter-062 60.0 chapter-107 58.0 chapter-108 57.0 chapter-048 55.0 chapter-035 103.0 chapter-122 102.0 chapter-124 102.0 chapter-131 101.0 chapter-033 101.0 chapter-042 Item summaries; "In a narrative form, how can each item be abstracted?" ----------------------------------------------------------------------- chapter-001 CHAPTER A ETYMOLOGY. (Supplied by a late consumptive usher to a grammar school.) The pale Usher--threadbare in coat, heart, body, and brain; I see him He was ever dusting his old lexicons and grammars, with a queer handkerchief, mockingly embellished with all the gay flags of all the known nations of the world. He loved to dust his old grammars; it somehow mildly reminded him of his mortality. ETYMOLOGY "While you take in hand to school others, and to teach them by what name a whale-fish is to be called in our tongue, leaving out, through ignorance, the letter H, which almost alone maketh up the signification of the word, you deliver that which is not true." --Hackluyt. * * * Sw. and Dan. hval. or rolling; for in Dan. hvalt is arched or vaulted." --Webster''s Dictionary. "WHALE. "WHALE. A.S. Walw-ian, to roll, to wallow." --Richardson''s Dictionary. HVALT, Danish. WHALE, English. PEKEE-NUEE-NUEE, Fegee. PEHEE-NUEE-NUEE, Erromangoan. chapter-002 "And God created great whales." --Genesis. great many Whales and other monsters of the sea, appeared. into the dreadful gulf of this monster''s (whale''s) mouth, are "The great Leviathan that maketh the seas to seethe like boiling pan." quantity of oil will be extracted out of one whale." --Ibid. "The mighty whales which swim in a sea of water, and have a sea of oil "In their way they saw many whales sporting in the ocean, and in "Whales in the sea speak like great whales." --Goldsmith to Johnson. "No, Sir, ''tis a Right Whale," answered Tom; "I saw his spout; he threw Sperm Whale in the Pacific Ocean." By Owen Chace of Nantucket, first Another Version of the whale-ship Globe "It is impossible to meet a whale-ship on the ocean without being voyage." --Currents and Whaling. distended jaws of a large Sperm Whale close to the head of the boat, chapter-003 you see?--Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand reveries--stand that man on his legs, set his feet a-going, and he will robust healthy soul in him, at some time or other crazy to go to sea? in that, a cook being a sort of officer on ship-board--yet, somehow, I No, when I go to sea, I go as a simple sailor, right before the mast, What of it, if some old hunks of a sea-captain orders me to get a broom Well, then, however the old sea-captains may Again, I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of other things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it. merchant sailor, I should now take it into my head to go on a whaling doubtless, my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of the grand By reason of these things, then, the whaling voyage was welcome; the chapter-004 of old Manhatto, I duly arrived in New Bedford. little packet for Nantucket had already sailed, and that no way of very dubious-looking, nay, a very dark and dismal night, bitingly cold Crossed Harpoons"--but it looked too expensive and jolly there. on, from the bright red windows of the "Sword-Fish Inn," there came ice from before the house, for everywhere else the congealed frost lay moment to watch the broad glare in the street, and hear the sounds of Moving on, I at last came to a dim sort of light not far from the As the light looked so dim, and little wooden house itself looked as if it might have been carted here It was a queer sort of place--a gable-ended old house, one side palsied mind--old black-letter, thou reasonest well. says old Dives, in his red silken feet, and see what sort of a place this "Spouter" may be. chapter-005 harpoon--so like a corkscrew now--was flung in Javan seas, and run away further angle of the room stands a dark-looking den--the bar--a rude I told him that I never liked to sleep two in a bed; that if I should No man prefers to sleep two in a bed. The devil fetch that harpooneer, thought I, but stop, couldn''t I steal "Depend upon it, landlord, that harpooneer is a dangerous man." "There," said the landlord, placing the candle on a crazy old sea chest standing at the head of the bed. head-peddling harpooneer, and his door mat. Zealand head in the other, the stranger entered the room, and without looking towards the bed, placed his candle a good way off from me on But thank heaven, at that moment the landlord came into the room light "Good night, landlord," said I, "you may go." chapter-006 Upon waking next morning about daylight, I found Queequeg''s arm thrown sleeves irregularly rolled up at various times--this same arm of his, I could tell that Queequeg was hugging me. think it was trying to crawl up the chimney, as I had seen a little third floor, undressed myself as slowly as possible so as to kill time, several hours I lay there broad awake, feeling a great deal worse than those which I experienced on waking up and seeing Queequeg''s pagan arm goodness, Queequeg, wake!" At length, by dint of much wriggling, and Thinks I, Queequeg, a man like Queequeg you don''t see every day, he and his ways were well next movement was to crush himself--boots in hand, and hat on--under the Queequeg made, staving about with little else but his hat and boots on; morning any Christian would have washed his face; but Queequeg, to my chapter-007 I quickly followed suit, and descending into the bar-room accosted the good thing; the more''s the pity. him, be sure there is more in that man than you perhaps think for. The bar-room was now full of the boarders who had been dropping in the night previous, and whom I had not as yet had a good look at. That man next him looks a few shades could show a cheek like Queequeg? Ledyard, the great New England traveller, and Mungo Park, the Scotch good stories about whaling; to my no small surprise, nearly every man Yes, here were a set of sea-dogs, many of whom without the slightest bashfulness had boarded great whales on the high seas--entire they sat at a social breakfast table--all of the same calling, all of cordially justified his bringing his harpoon into breakfast with him, Enough, that when breakfast was over he withdrew chapter-008 daylight stroll through the streets of New Bedford. But New Bedford beats all Water sailors; but in New Bedford, actual cannibals stand chatting at street No town-bred dandy will compare with a country-bred one--I mean a downright bumpkin dandy--a fellow that, in the dog-days, will mow his country dandy like this takes it into his head to make a distinguished sea-outfit, he orders bell-buttons to his waistcoats; straps to his But think not that this famous town has only harpooneers, cannibals, Still New Bedford is a patrician-like houses; parks and gardens more opulent, than in New In New Bedford, fathers, they say, give whales for dowers to their You must go to New Bedford to see a brilliant wedding; for, they say, art; which in many a district of New Bedford has superinduced bright And the women of New Bedford, they bloom like their own red roses. chapter-009 silent islands of men and women sat steadfastly eyeing several marble tablets, with black borders, masoned into the wall on either side the Shaking off the sleet from my ice-glazed hat and jacket, I seated the trappings of some unceasing grief, that I feel sure that here infidelities in the lines that seem to gnaw upon all Faith, and refuse As well might those tablets stand in the cave of Elephanta as he but embarks for the remotest Indies of this living earth; why the eternal, unstirring paralysis, and deadly, hopeless trance, yet lies But Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these Nantucket voyage, I regarded those marble tablets, and by the murky Yes, there is death in this business of whaling--a Methinks we have hugely mistaken this matter of Life and Death. Methinks my body is but the lees And therefore three cheers for Nantucket; and come a stove boat chapter-010 At the time I now write of, Father Mapple was in the hardy winter of a Like most old fashioned pulpits, it was a very lofty one, and since a architect, it seemed, had acted upon the hint of Father Mapple, and ladder, like those used in mounting a ship from a boat at sea. hands grasping the ornamental knobs of the man-ropes, Father Mapple the pulpit, it had not escaped me that however convenient for a ship, round, and stooping over the pulpit, deliberately drag up the ladder word, to the faithful man of God, this pulpit, I see, is a cenotaphs on either hand of the pulpit, the wall which formed its back Nor was the pulpit itself without a trace of the same sea-taste that likeness of a ship''s bluff bows, and the Holy Bible rested on the Yes, the world''s a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; chapter-011 first chapter of Jonah--"And God had prepared a great fish to swallow up me as a pilot of the living God. As sinful men, it is a lesson to us God, by seeking to flee from Him. He thinks that a ship made by men, then, shipmates, that Jonah sought to flee world-wide from God? looks from Jonah to the bill; while all his sympathetic shipmates now sail ye, sir?'' Thus far the busy captain had not looked up to Jonah, Now Jonah''s Captain, shipmates, was one whose discernment detects crime oscillates in Jonah''s room; and the ship, heeling over towards the Aye, shipmates, Jonah was gone down into the sides God was this conduct in Jonah, is shown in the eventual deliverance of Shipmates, I do not place Jonah before Woe to him who seeks to pour oil upon the waters when God chapter-012 Returning to the Spouter-Inn from the Chapel, I found Queequeg there little negro idol of his; peering hard into its face, and with a to the table, took up a large book there, and placing it on his lap He looked like a man who had never cringed and never thrown over me upon waking in the morning, I thought this indifference But savages are strange beings; at times you do noticed also that Queequeg never consorted at all, or but very little, I''ll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness thought he looked pleased, perhaps a little complimented. After supper, and another social chat and smoke, we went to our room He then went about his evening prayers, took out his idol, and removed How then could I unite with this wild idolator in the will of God. Now, Queequeg is my fellow man. chapter-013 little nappishness remained in us altogether departed, and we felt like head-board with our four knees drawn up close together, and our two indeed out of bed-clothes too, seeing that there was no fire in the so a long time, then you cannot be said to be comfortable any more. if, like Queequeg and me in the bed, the tip of your nose or the crown between you and your snugness and the cold of the outer air. keeping my eyes shut, in order the more to concentrate the snugness of except his eyes be closed; as if darkness were indeed the proper Upon opening my eyes then, and coming out of my own pleasant and Be it said, that though I had felt such a strong repugnance to his smoking in the bed the night before, yet see how For now I liked nothing better than to have Queequeg smoking by me, chapter-014 Queequeg was a native of Kokovoko, an island far away to the West and A Sag Harbor ship visited his father''s bay, and Queequeg sought a seamen, spurned his suit; and not all the King his father''s influence when the ship was gliding by, like a flash he darted out; gained her cutlass over his naked wrists; Queequeg was the son of a King, and Queequeg budged not. wild desire to visit Christendom, the captain at last relented, and told him he might make himself at home. Arrived at last in old Sag Harbor; and seeing what the sailors did there; and then going on to Nantucket, and seeing how they And thus an old idolator at heart, he yet lived among these Christians, He answered, to go to sea again, in his old vocation. I now felt for Queequeg, he was an experienced harpooneer, and as such, chapter-015 As we were going along the people stared; not at Queequeg so heeded them not, going along wheeling the barrow by turns, and Queequeg said I, "Queequeg, you might have known better than that, one would commander was invited to the wedding feast of Queequeg''s sister, a Queequeg, "what you tink now,--Didn''t our people laugh?" while Queequeg, turning his back upon him, lighted his tomahawk pipe "What him say?" said Queequeg, as he mildly turned to me. him bevy small-e fish-e; Queequeg no kill-e so small-e fish-e; Queequeg kill-e big whale!" "Look you," roared the Captain, "I''ll kill-e you, you cannibal, if boat, Queequeg, stripped to the waist, darted from the side with a long water, Queequeg now took an instant''s glance around him, and seeming to From that hour I clove to Queequeg like a barnacle; yea, till poor Queequeg took his last long dive. chapter-016 pieces of wood in Nantucket are carried about like bits of the true to get under the shade in summer time; that one blade of grass makes an belted about, every way inclosed, surrounded, and made an utter island Look now at the wondrous traditional story of how this island was What wonder, then, that these Nantucketers, born on a beach, should launching a navy of great ships on the sea, explored this watery world; And thus have these naked Nantucketers, these sea hermits, issuing from their ant-hill in the sea, overrun and conquered the watery world like and Indian oceans, as the three pirate powers did Poland. add Mexico to Texas, and pile Cuba upon Canada; let the English For the sea following the sea as highwaymen the road, they but plunder other ships, He lives on the sea, as prairie cocks in the prairie; he hides among chapter-017 yellow warehouse on our starboard hand till we opened a white church to side, so that this old top-mast looked not a little like a gallows. "Come on, Queequeg," said I, "all right. making known our desires for a supper and a bed, Mrs. Hussey, concluded repast, turned round to us and said--"Clam or Cod?" a cold clam; is that what you mean, Mrs. Hussey?" time, ain''t it, Mrs Hussey?" but the word "clam," Mrs. Hussey hurried towards an open door leading "Queequeg," said I, "do you think that we can make out a supper for us bethinking me of Mrs. Hussey''s clam and cod announcement, I thought I and in good time a fine cod-chowder was placed before us. Supper concluded, we received a lamp, and directions from Mrs. Hussey with his harpoon in his side; ever since then I allow no boarders to But the chowder; clam or cod to-morrow chapter-018 Old Captain Peleg, many years her chief-mate, before he "Supposing it be the Captain of the Pequod, what dost thou want of eye on Captain Ahab, young man, and thou wilt find that he has only one Now, Bildad, like Peleg, and indeed many other Nantucketers, was a chief-mate, and captain, and finally a ship-owner; Bildad, as I hinted "He says he''s our man, Bildad," said Peleg, "he wants to ship." something of both Captain Peleg and his unaccountable old crony Bildad; "Well, Captain Bildad," interrupted Peleg, "what d''ye say, what lay "Why, blast your eyes, Bildad," cried Peleg, "thou dost not want to The seven hundred and seventy-seventh lay, Captain Peleg." "Captain Peleg," said Bildad steadily, "thy conscience may be drawing "Captain Peleg," said I, "I have a friend with me who wants to ship never thee mind about that, Bildad," said Peleg. chapter-019 As Queequeg''s Ramadan, or Fasting and Humiliation, was to continue all "Queequeg," said I softly through the key-hole:--all silent. the key-hole; but the door opening into an odd corner of the room, the shaft of Queequeg''s harpoon, which the landlady the evening previous "Look here," said the landlady, quickly putting down the vinegar-cruet, went up stairs to go to bed, feeling quite sure by this time Queequeg be sitting there all day and half the night on his hams in a cold room, thought of Queequeg--not four feet off--sitting there in that uneasy day; when, looking over the bedside, there squatted Queequeg, as if he "Queequeg," said I, "get into bed Queequeg that all these Lents, Ramadans, and prolonged ham-squattings one word, Queequeg, said I, rather digressively; hell is an idea first "No more, Queequeg," said I, shuddering; "that will do;" for I knew the chapter-020 carrying his harpoon, Captain Peleg in his gruff voice loudly hailed us "What do you mean by that, Captain Peleg?" said I, now jumping on the "Yea," said Captain Bildad in his hollow voice, sticking his head from Son of darkness," he added, turning to Queequeg, "art thou at present "First Congregational Church," cried Bildad, "what! "Young man," said Bildad sternly, "thou art skylarking with me--explain "Splice, thou mean''st splice hands, cried Peleg, drawing nearer. "Young man, you''d better ship for a missionary, instead of a fore-mast "Now," said Queequeg, quietly hauling in the line, "spos-ee him whale-e "Quick, Bildad," said Peleg, his partner, who, aghast at the close "Quick, I say, you Bildad, and get the ship''s papers. Meanwhile Captain Bildad sat earnestly and steadfastly eyeing Queequeg, Peleg!" said Bildad, lifting his eyes and hands, "thou thyself, thou not think of Death and the Judgment then?" chapter-021 "You mean the ship Pequod, I suppose," said I, trying to gain a little "Aye, the Pequod--that ship there," he said, drawing back his whole arm, I know many chaps that hav''n''t got any,--good luck to ''em; and they are sort in other chaps," abruptly said the stranger, placing a nervous "Ye said true--ye hav''n''t seen Old Thunder "Look ye; when captain Ahab is all right, then of that ship there, the Pequod, then let me tell you, that I know all little, turned and said:--"Ye''ve shipped, have ye? "Look here, friend," said I, "if you have anything important to tell "And it''s said very well, and I like to hear a chap talk up that way; "Morning it is," said I. said nothing to Queequeg of his being behind, but passed on with my calabash; and what Captain Peleg had said of him, when I left the ship chapter-022 A day or two passed, and there was great activity aboard the Pequod. Captain Peleg seldom or never went ashore, but sat in his wigwam On the day following Queequeg''s signing the articles, word was given at always give very long notice in these cases, and the ship did not sail there is no telling how many things to be thought of, before the Pequod the whaling voyage, the numerous articles peculiar to the prosecution a spare captain and duplicate ship. once fairly getting to sea. At one time she would come on board with a board, as she did the last day, with a long oil-ladle in one hand, and when he was going to come on board his ship. aboard every day; meantime, the two Captains, Peleg and Bildad, could At last it was given out that some time next day the ship would chapter-023 Queequeg, "it can''t be shadows; she''s off by sunrise, I guess; come "Lookee here," said Queequeg, shaking himself, "go ''way!" "No, no, no; I wasn''t aware of that," said Elijah, slowly and "Elijah," said I, "you will oblige my friend and me by withdrawing. "He''s cracked, Queequeg," said I, "come on." "Never mind him," said I, "Queequeg, come on." shoulder, said--"Did ye see anything looking like men going towards that "Very dim, very dim," said Elijah. "Those sailors we saw, Queequeg, where can they have gone to?" said I, Queequeg, don''t sit there," said I. perry dood seat," said Queequeg, "my country way; won''t hurt him Queequeg removed himself to just beyond the head of the sleeper, and While narrating these things, every time Queequeg received the tomahawk I was going to ask him some further questions concerning Ahab, when we Starbuck''s astir," said the rigger. chapter-024 Peleg and Bildad, issued from the cabin, and turning to the chief mate, "No need of profane words, however great the hurry, Peleg," said Bildad, "but away with thee, friend Starbuck, and do our bidding." Peleg and Captain Bildad were going it with a high hand on the before they quit the ship for good with the pilot. Meantime, overseeing the other part of the ship, Captain Peleg ripped and turning round, was horrified at the apparition of Captain Peleg in Captain Peleg must have been drinking something to-day. at this juncture, especially Captain Bildad. very loath to leave, for good, a ship bound on so long and perilous a sailed as captain; a man almost as old as he, once more starting to him,--"Captain Bildad--come, old shipmate, we must go. careful!--come, Bildad, boy--say your last. "Come, come, Captain Bildad; stop palavering,--away!" and with that, chapter-025 THE LEE SHORE Some chapters back, one Bulkington was spoken of, a tall, new-landed the man, who in mid-winter just landed from a four years'' dangerous The land seemed scorching to his feet. this six-inch chapter is the stoneless grave of Bulkington. miserably drives along the leeward land. hearthstone, supper, warm blankets, friends, all that''s kind to our mortalities. But in that gale, the port, the land, is that ship''s all the lashed sea''s landlessness again; for refuge''s sake forlornly rushing into peril; her only friend her bitterest foe! Know ye, now, Bulkington? Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally intolerable truth; that all deep, earnest thinking is but the intrepid But as in landlessness alone resides the highest truth, shoreless, than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee, even if that were safety! who would craven crawl to land! Bulkington! ocean-perishing--straight up, leaps thy apotheosis! chapter-026 and as this business of whaling has somehow come to be regarded among whale-ship at least among the cleanliest things of this tidy earth. slippery decks of a whale-ship are comparable to the unspeakable But, though the world scouts at us whale hunters, yet does it out whaling ships from Dunkirk, and politely invite to that town some in one aggregate, than the high and mighty business of whaling. whale-ship, which originally showed them the way, and first interpreted those shores as pestiferously barbarous; but the whale-ship touched The whale-ship is the true mother of that now mighty colony. commercial homage to the whale-ship, that cleared the way for the Japan, is ever to become hospitable, it is the whale-ship alone to whom Good again; but then all confess that somehow whaling is not I account that man more honorable than that great captain of chapter-027 But after embattling his facts, an advocate who It is well known that at the coronation of kings and queens, even modern ones, a certain curious process of seasoning them for their Certain I am, however, that a king''s head is solemnly oiled at his coronation, even as a head of salad. though, that they anoint it with a view of making its interior run well, as they anoint machinery? concerning the essential dignity of this regal process, because in his hair, and palpably smells of that anointing. who uses hair-oil, unless medicinally, that man has probably got a But the only thing to be considered here, is this--what kind of oil is used at coronations? Certainly it cannot be olive oil, nor macassar What then can it possibly be, but sperm oil in its unmanufactured, unpolluted state, the sweetest of all oils? queens with coronation stuff! chapter-028 He was a long, earnest man, and though born on an like a revivified Egyptian, this Starbuck seemed prepared to endure for will have no man in my boat," said Starbuck, "who is not afraid of a encountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is a far more careful a man as you''ll find anywhere in this fishery." But we shall man like Stubb, or almost any other whale hunter. Starbuck was no crusader after perils; in him courage was not a this business of whaling, courage was one of the great staple outfits superstitiousness, as has been said; the courage of this Starbuck which it was not in reasonable nature that a man so organized, and with such men may have mean and meagre faces; but man, in the ideal, is so noble bear me out in it, thou just spirit of equality, which hast spread one chapter-029 according to local usage, was called a Cape-Cod-man. whale-boat as if the most deadly encounter were but a dinner, and his Long usage had, for this Stubb, converted the jaws of death For, like his nose, his short, black The third mate was Flask, a native of Tisbury, in Martha''s Vineyard. Now these three mates--Starbuck, Stubb, and Flask, were momentous men. And since in this famous fishery, each mate or headsman, like a Gothic Knight of old, is always accompanied by his boat-steerer or harpooneer, down who the Pequod''s harpooneers were, and to what headsman each of hunted in the wake of the great whales of the sea; the unerring harpoon the Air. Tashtego was Stubb the second mate''s squire. Ahasuerus Daggoo, was the Squire of little Flask, who looked like a before the mast employed in the American whale fishery, are Americans Islanders in the Pequod, Isolatoes too, I call such, not chapter-030 seen of Captain Ahab. gazed aft to mark if any strange face were visible; for my first vague aspect of the three chief officers of the ship, the mates, which was Three better, more likely sea-officers and men, each in his own Captain Ahab stood upon his quarter-deck. He looked like a man cut away from the stake, when Ahab become that way branded, and then it came upon him, not in the of Nantucket, had never ere this laid eye upon wild Ahab. Captain Ahab should be tranquilly laid out--which might hardly come to the old Gay-Head Indian once; "but like his dismasted craft, he shipped shroud; Captain Ahab stood erect, looking straight out beyond the Ere long, from his first visit in the air, he withdrew into his cabin. when the ship had sailed from home, nothing but the dead wintry Ahab, now; and thus chase away, for that one interval, the clouds that chapter-031 ENTER AHAB; TO HIM, STUBB For sleeping man, ''twas hard to choose between such winsome days hours of eve came on; then, memory shot her crystals as the clear ice old captain like me to be descending this narrow scuttle, to go to my "Am I a cannon-ball, Stubb," said Ahab, "that thou wouldst wad me that scornful old man, Stubb was speechless a moment; then said excitedly, "No, sir; not yet," said Stubb, emboldened, "I will not tamely be too; aye, take him fore and aft, he''s about the queerest old man Stubb finds the old man''s hammock clothes all rumpled and tumbled, and the A hot old man! after hold for, every night, as Dough-Boy tells me he suspects; what''s that for, I should like to know? Damn me, but all things are queer, come to think of ''em. Coming afoul of that old man has a sort chapter-032 When Stubb had departed, Ahab stood for a while leaning over the Lighting the pipe at the binnacle lamp and planting the stool on the weather side of the deck, he sat and smoked. In old Norse times, the thrones of the sea-loving Danish kings were one look at Ahab then, seated on that tripod of bones, without and a king of the sea, and a great lord of Leviathans was Ahab. now, he soliloquized at last, withdrawing the tube, "this smoking no ignorantly smoking to windward all the while; to windward, and with pipe? pipe? pipe? pipe? This thing that is meant for sereneness, to send up mild white vapors among mild white hairs, not among torn iron-grey locks like I''ll smoke no more--" He tossed the still lighted pipe into the sea. waves; the same instant the ship shot by the bubble the sinking pipe With slouched hat, Ahab lurchingly paced the planks. chapter-033 ivory leg, well I dreamed he kicked me with it; and when I tried to insult, that kick from Ahab. kick?'' By the lord, Flask, I had no sooner said that, than he turned second thoughts, ''I guess I won''t kick you, old fellow.'' ''Wise Stubb,'' said he, ''wise Stubb;'' and kept muttering it all the time, a sort of foot for it, when he roared out, ''Stop that kicking!'' ''Halloa,'' says I, ''what''s the matter now, old fellow?'' ''Look ye here,'' says he; ''let''s Captain Ahab kicked ye, didn''t he?'' ''Yes, he did,'' were kicked by a great man, and with a beautiful ivory leg, Stubb. kicked by old Ahab, and made a wise man of. Now, what do you think of that dream, Flask?" But it''s made a wise man of me, Flask. you can do, Flask, is to let that old man alone; never speak to him, "What d''ye think of that now, Flask? chapter-034 some small degree, with cetology, or the science of whales. Of the names in this list of whale authors, only those following Owen subject of the Greenland or right-whale, he is the best existing living sperm whale before you, and at the same time, in the remotest both in their time surgeons to English South-Sea whale-ships, and both still remains a moot point whether a whale be a fish. ground that the whale is a fish, and call upon holy Jonah to back me. whale is a spouting fish with a horizontal tail. As the type of the FOLIO I present the Sperm Whale; of the OCTAVO, hunted by the Dutch and English in the Arctic seas; it is the whale Long-John, has been seen almost in every sea and is commonly the whale in his baleen, the Fin-back resembles the right whale, but is of a less great sperm whale. chapter-035 Concerning the officers of the whale-craft, this seems as good a place and more ago, the command of a whale ship was not wholly lodged in the senior Harpooneer; and as such, is but one of the captain''s more harpooneers the success of a whaling voyage largely depends, and since in the American Fishery he is not only an important officer in the boat, but under certain circumstances (night watches on a whaling ground) the command of the ship''s deck is also his; therefore the grand Now, the grand distinction drawn between officer and man at sea, is Hence, in whale-ships and merchantmen alike, the mates have their quarters with the captain; and And though of all men the moody captain of the Pequod was the least terrorem, or otherwise; yet even Captain Ahab was by no means But Ahab, my Captain, still moves before me in all his Nantucket chapter-036 It is noon; and Dough-Boy, the steward, thrusting his pale loaf-of-bread face from the cabin-scuttle, announces dinner to his lord deck, and in an even, unexhilarated voice, saying, "Dinner, Mr. Starbuck," disappears into the cabin. likewise takes up the old burden, and with a rapid "Dinner, Mr. Flask," then, independent, hilarious little Flask enters King Ahab''s presence, very officers the next moment go down to their customary dinner in that private dinner-table of invited guests, that man''s unchallenged power Over his ivory-inlaid table, Ahab presided like a mute, maned sea-lion knife and fork, between which the slice of beef was locked, Ahab For hereby Flask''s dinner was badly vengeance, was to go aft at dinner-time, and get a peep at Flask Now, Ahab and his three mates formed what may be called the first table But, though these barbarians dined in the cabin, and nominally lived chapter-037 Now, as the business of standing mast-heads, ashore or afloat, is a I take it, that the earliest standers of mast-heads were the old look-outs of a modern ship sing out for a sail, or a whale just bearing Nelson, also, on a capstan of gun-metal, stands his mast-head in that in the early times of the whale fishery, ere ships were regularly then to the one proper mast-head, that of a whale-ship at sea. three mast-heads are kept manned from sun-rise to sun-set; the seamen admirable volume, all standers of mast-heads are furnished with a crow''s-nest of the Glacier, which was the name of Captain Sleet''s mast-head in this crow''s nest of his, he tells us that he always had a whale-ships'' standing orders, "Keep your weather eye open, and sing out himself upon the mast-head of some luckless disappointed whale-ship, Very often do the captains of such ships take those absent-minded young chapter-038 with one hand grasping a shroud, he ordered Starbuck to send everybody the men; till Stubb cautiously whispered to Flask, that Ahab must have me a white-headed whale with a wrinkled brow and a crooked jaw; whosoever of ye raises me that white-headed whale, with three holes that same white whale, he shall have this gold ounce, my boys!" "It''s a white whale, I say," resumed Ahab, as he threw down the "Captain Ahab," said Tashtego, "that white whale must be the same that "Moby Dick?" shouted Ahab. "Corkscrew!" cried Ahab, "aye, Queequeg, the harpoons lie all twisted "Captain Ahab," said Starbuck, who, with Stubb and Flask, had thus far "Who told thee that?" cried Ahab; then pausing, "Aye, Starbuck; aye, my excited old man: "A sharp eye for the White Whale; a sharp lance for face about, Mr. Starbuck; wilt thou not chase the white whale? chapter-039 SUNSET The cabin; by the stern windows; Ahab sitting alone, and gazing out. Yonder, by the ever-brimming goblet''s rim, the warm waves blush like The gold brow plumbs the blue. This Iron Crown of Lombardy. ''Tis iron--that I know--not gold. edge galls me so, my brain seems to beat against the solid metal; aye, with the high perception, I lack the low, enjoying power; damned, most Good (waving his hand, he moves from the window.) Or, if you will, like so many ant-hills of powder, they all match itself must needs be wasting! What I''ve dared, I''ve willed; and what I''ve willed, I''ll do! They think me mad--Starbuck does; but I''m demoniac, I am madness maddened! That wild madness that''s only calm to The prophecy was that I should be dismembered; purpose is laid with iron rails, whereon my soul is grooved to run. angle to the iron way! chapter-040 I, the ineffable thing has tied me to him; tows me with a cable I have yet, to hate with touch of pity! The hated whale has the round watery world to swim in, as the His heaven-insulting purpose, God I would up heart, were it not like lead. [A burst of revelry from the forecastle.] Oh, God! to sail with such a heathen crew that have small touch of Whelped somewhere by the sharkish sea. that revelry is Foremost through the sparkling sea shoots on the gay, embattled, Oh, life! an hour like this, with soul beat down and held to knowledge,--as wild, untutored things are forced to feed--Oh, life! ''tis now that I do feel the latent horror in thee! but ''tis not me! but ''tis not me! that horror''s out of me! and with the soft feeling of the human in me, yet will I try to fight chapter-041 CHAPTER XXXIX. FIRST NIGHT-WATCH FORE-TOP (Stubb solus, and mending a brace.) hem! clear my throat!--I''ve been thinking over it ever since, and that ha, ha''s the final consequence. laugh''s the wisest, easiest answer to all that''s queer; and come what I heard not all his talk with Starbuck; but to my poor eye Starbuck then looked something as I the other evening felt. gift, might readily have prophesied it--for when I clapped my eye upon Well, Stubb, wise Stubb--that''s my title--well, Stubb, what of it, Stubb? coming, but be it what it will, I''ll go to it laughing. lirra, skirra! Crying its eyes out?--Giving a party to the last arrived harpooneers, I dare say, gay as lirra, skirra! We''ll drink to-night with hearts as light, To love, as gay and fleeting Mr. Starbuck? Aye, aye, sir--(Aside) he''s my superior, he has his too, if I''m not mistaken.--Aye, aye, sir, just through with this job--coming. chapter-042 d''ye hear, bell-boy? bell eight, thou Pip! We sing; they sleep--aye, lie down there, like ground-tier Aye; girls and a green!--then I''ll hop with ye; yea, turn grasshopper! (The half of them dance to the tambourine; some go below; some sleep Bang it, bell-boy! Hold up thy hoop, Pip, till I jump through it! I wonder whether those jolly lads bethink them of what they are dancing Dance on, lads, you''re young; I was boys, it''ll be douse sail soon. Thou showest thy black brow, Seeva! (Reclining and shaking his cap.) sky--lurid-like, ye see, all else pitch black. OLD MANX SAILOR. OLD MANX SAILOR. OLD MANX SAILOR. Why then, God, mad''st thou the ring? white whale, me jingle all over like my tambourine--that anaconda of an old man swore Oh, thou big white God aloft there somewhere in yon darkness, have mercy on this small black boy down here; preserve him chapter-043 secluded White Whale had haunted those uncivilized seas mostly such a meridian, a Sperm Whale of uncommon magnitude and malignity, more, as it were, to the perils of the Sperm Whale fishery at large, encounter between Ahab and the whale had hitherto been popularly piling their terrors upon Moby Dick; those things had gone far to shake And as the sea surpasses the land in this matter, so the whale fishery the widest watery spaces, the outblown rumors of the White Whale did in of the Sperm Whale fishery, when it was oftentimes hard to induce long as the Sperm Whale was not for mortal man. with the White Whale in the minds of the superstitiously inclined, was the fishery; yet, in most instances, such seemed the White Whale''s The White Whale swam be--what the White Whale was to them, or how to their unconscious chapter-044 What the white whale was to Ahab, has been hinted; what, at times, he Though in many natural objects, whiteness refiningly enhances beauty, grand old kings of Pegu placing the title "Lord of the White Elephants" snow-white charger; and the great Austrian Empire, Csarian, heir to white like wool; yet for all these accumulated associations, with noble horse, that it was his spiritual whiteness chiefly, which so accessory and strange glory which invests it in the White Steed and that whiteness which invests him, a thing expressed by the name he thing he will by whiteness, no man can deny that in its profoundest whiteness--though for the time either wholly or in great part stripped kings (which will not wholly account for it) that makes the White Tower view his ship sailing through a midnight sea of milky whiteness--as if great principle of light, for ever remains white or colorless in chapter-045 It was the middle-watch; a fair moonlight; the seamen were standing in the scuttle-butt near the taffrail. buckets to fill the scuttle-butt. Standing for the most part on the hallowed precincts of the quarter-deck they were careful not to speak From hand to hand the buckets went in the did you hear that noise, Cabaco? did you hear that noise, Cabaco? Take the bucket, will ye, Archy? There it is again--under the hatches--don''t you hear it--a cough--it sounded like a cough. Pass along that return bucket. There again--there it is!--it sounds like two or three sleepers turning have done, shipmate, will ye? Say what ye will, shipmate; I''ve sharp ears. Aye, you are the chap, ain''t ye, that heard the hum of the old the chap. Hark ye, Cabaco, there is somebody down in the after-hold that has not yet been seen on deck; and I the bucket! the bucket! chapter-046 voyages of various ships, sperm whales had been captured or seen. lines and courses upon the deeply marked chart of his forehead. cabin, Ahab thus pondered over his charts. to mind the regular, ascertained seasons for hunting him in particular sperm whale''s resorting to given waters, that many hunters believe elaborate migratory charts of the sperm whale.[7] the number of days in which whales, sperm or right, have been seen. feeding-grounds, could Ahab hope to encounter his prey; but in crossing art, so place and time himself on his way, as even then not to be Though the gregarious sperm whales have their regular seasons particular set time or place were attained, when all possibilities the deadly encounters with the white whale had taken place; there the And have I not tallied the whale, Ahab would mutter to For, at such times, crazy Ahab, the scheming, unappeasedly steadfast hunter of the white whale; this Ahab that had chapter-047 particulars in the habits of sperm whales, the foregoing chapter, in Secondly: It is well known in the Sperm Whale Fishery, however ignorant historical instances where a particular whale in the ocean has been at and sink a large ship; and what is more, the Sperm Whale has done it. boats, and gave chase to a shoal of sperm whales. dining with a party of whaling captains, on board a Nantucket ship in the way by a portly sperm whale, that begged a few moments'' An uncommon large whale, the body of which was larger than the ship me, of the great power and malice at times of the sperm whale. running sperm whale have, in a calm, been transferred to the ship, and the sperm whale, once struck, is allowed time to rally, he then acts, time I fancied that the sperm whale had been always unknown in the sperm whale in the Mediterranean. chapter-048 Though, consumed with the hot fire of his purpose, Ahab in all his White Whale might have possibly extended itself in some degree to all To accomplish his object Ahab must use tools; and of all tools used in will were Ahab''s, so long as Ahab kept his magnet at Starbuck''s brain; During that long interval Starbuck insanity of Ahab respecting Moby Dick was noways more significantly hailed the announcement of his quest; yet all sailors of all sorts are passion in the end, it is above all things requisite that temporary Nor was Ahab unmindful of another thing. mankind disdain all base considerations; but such times are evanescent. Had they been strictly held to their one final I will not strip these men, thought Ahab, of Pequod''s voyage, Ahab was now entirely conscious that, in so doing, he atmospheric influence which it was possible for his crew to be chapter-049 Queequeg and I were mildly employed weaving what is called a sword-mat, long yarns of the warp, using my own hand for the shuttle, and as between the threads, and idly looking off upon the water, carelessly necessity; and here, thought I, with my own hand I ply my own shuttle Queequeg''s impulsive, indifferent sword, sometimes hitting the woof sword, thought I, which thus finally shapes and fashions both warp and Thus we were weaving and weaving away when I started at a sound so of free will dropped from my hand, and I stood gazing up at the clouds whalemen''s look-outs perched as high in the air; but from few of those "There go flukes!" was now the cry from Tashtego; and the whales Tashtego reporting that the whales had gone down heading to So look the long line of man-of-war''s men about chapter-050 strangers, Ahab cried out to the white-turbaned old man at their head, sailors, goat-like, leaped down the rolling ship''s side into the tossed stern, loudly hailed Starbuck, Stubb, and Flask, to spread themselves "Spread yourselves," cried Ahab; "give way, all four boats. across Stubb''s bow; and when for a minute or so the two boats were periodically started the boat along the water like a horizontal burst horizon; while at the other end of the boat Ahab, with one arm, like a as in a thousand boat lowerings ere the White Whale had torn him. fixed, while the boat''s five oars were seen simultaneously peaked. "Every man look out along his oars!" cried Starbuck. plunging in the boat''s stern like a crazed colt from the prairie. ivory Pequod bearing down upon her boats with outstretched sails, like The boats were pulled more apart; Starbuck giving chase to three whales ship nor boat to be seen. chapter-051 There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more speaking of, comes over a man only in some time of extreme tribulation; There is nothing like the perils of whaling to "Queequeg," said I, when they had dragged me, the last man, to the water; "Queequeg, my fine friend, does this sort of thing often should like to see a boat''s crew backing water up to a whale face squall, and considering that Starbuck, notwithstanding, was famous for this uncommonly prudent Starbuck''s boat; and finally considering in what a devil''s chase I was implicated, touching the White Whale: taking "Queequeg," said I, "come along, you shall be life that I had done the same thing. good as the days that Lazarus lived after his resurrection; a supplementary clean gain of so many months or weeks as the case might chapter-052 AHAB''S BOAT AND CREW. "I don''t know that, my little man; I never yet saw him kneel." Among whale-wise people it has often been argued whether, considering is right for a whaling captain to jeopardize that life in the active man to enter a whale-boat in the hunt? Ahab well knew that although his friends at home would think little of his entering a boat in certain comparatively harmless vicissitudes of his orders in person, yet for Captain Ahab to have a boat actually Captain Ahab to be supplied with five extra men, as that same boat''s crew, he well knew that such generous conceits never entered the heads own hands for what was thought to be one of the spare boats, and even observed how often he stood up in that boat with his solitary knee Now, with the subordinate phantoms, what wonder remained soon waned chapter-053 Days, weeks passed, and under easy sail, the ivory Pequod had slowly moonlight night, when all the waves rolled by like scrolls of silver; silence, not a solitude: on such a silent night a silvery jet was seen nights, it was his wont to mount to the main-mast head, and stand a of so many sails, made the buoyant, hovering deck to feel like air Ahab''s face that night, you would have thought that in him also two glances shot, yet the silvery jet was no more seen that night. beckoning us on from before, the solitary jet would at times be In tempestuous times like these, after everything the ship by the perilous seas that burstingly broke over its bows, Few or no words were spoken; and the silent ship, as if manned by man''s aspect, when one night going down into the cabin to mark how the chapter-054 fore-mast-head, I had a good view of that sight so remarkable to a tyro in the far ocean fisheries--a whaler at sea, and long absent from home. was to see her long-bearded look-outs at those three mast-heads. though, when the ship slowly glided close under our stern, we six men from the mast-heads of one ship to those of the other; yet, those first mere mention of the White Whale''s name to another ship, Ahab for Pequod, bound round the world! and this time three years, if I am not at home, "Swim away from me, do ye?" murmured Ahab, gazing over into the water. But turning to the steersman, who thus far had been holding the ship in Were this world an endless plain, and by sailing eastward we could for ever reach new distances, and discover sights more sweet and strange tormented chase of that demon phantom that, some time or other, swims chapter-055 here of the peculiar usages of whaling-vessels when meeting each other illimitable Pine Barrens and Salisbury Plains of the sea, two whaling For the long absent ship, the outward-bounder, perhaps, has letters on ship would receive the latest whaling intelligence from the whaling vessels crossing each other''s track on the cruising-ground of English whalers, such meetings do not very often occur, and when more whales than all the English, collectively, in ten years. is a harmless little foible in the English whale-hunters, which the 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 NOUN--A social meeting of two (or more) Whale-ships, generally visits by boats'' crews: the two captains remaining, for the time, on In a pirate, man-of-war, or slave ship, when the from the sides of the two ships, this standing captain is all alive to chapter-056 gentlemen, in square-sail brigs and three-masted ships, well-nigh as Steelkilt--but, gentlemen, you shall hear. gentlemen, at all events Steelkilt was a tall and noble animal with a heart, and a soul in him, gentlemen, which had made Steelkilt "Now, gentlemen, sweeping a ship''s deck at sea is a piece of household Any man who has gone sailor in a whale-ship will "''Canallers!'' cried Don Pedro, ''We have seen many whale-ships in our "''Sink the ship?'' cried Steelkilt. "Steelkilt glanced round him a moment, and then said:--''I tell you what man on deck, when the time to make the rush should come. man, with a bandaged head, arrested them--Radney the chief mate. "The ship''s company being reduced to but a handful, the captain called "Some ten days after the French ships sailed, the whale-boat arrived, "Where Steelkilt now is, gentlemen, none know; but upon the island of chapter-057 something like the true form of the whale as he actually appears to the world right in this matter, by proving such pictures of the whale all only in most popular pictures of the whale, but in many scientific the book-binder''s whale winding like a vine-stalk round the stock of a call this book-binder''s fish an attempt at a whale; because it was so will at times meet with very curious touches at the whale, where all plates of whales extracted from a Dutch book of voyages, A.D. 1671, whales, like great rafts of logs, are represented lying among be a "Picture of a Physeter or Spermaceti whale, drawn by scale from naturalist, published a scientific systemized whale book, wherein are gives what he calls a picture of the Sperm Whale. between a young sucking whale and a full-grown Platonian Leviathan; out precisely what the whale really looks like. chapter-058 OF THE LESS ERRONEOUS PICTURES OF WHALES, AND THE TRUE PICTURES OF WHALING SCENES I know of only four published outlines of the great Sperm Whale; Beale''s drawings of this whale are good, excepting the middle figure in His frontispiece, boats attacking Sperm Whales, though no admirably correct and life-like in its general effect. Sperm Whale drawings in J. Of the Right Whale, the best outline pictures are in Scoresby; but they but one picture of whaling scenes, and this is a sad deficiency, can derive anything like a truthful idea of the living whale as seen by attacks on the Sperm and Right Whale. details of this whale, but let that pass; since, for the life of me, I In the second engraving, the boat is in the act of drawing alongside they have of their whaling scenes. the very heart of the Leviathanic life, with a Right Whale alongside; chapter-059 OF WHALES IN PAINT; IN TEETH; IN WOOD; IN SHEET-IRON; IN Harbor, you will come across lively sketches of whales and whaling-scenes, graven by the fishermen themselves on Sperm other like skrimshander articles, as the whalemen call the numerous Your true whale-hunter is as much a savage as an Iroquois. For, with but a bit of broken sea-shell or a shark''s tooth, that his one poor jack-knife, he will carve you a bit of bone sculpture, not At some old gable-roofed country houses you will see brass whales hung But these knocking whales old-fashioned churches you will see sheet-iron whales placed there for profiles of whales defined along the undulating ridges. else so chance-like are such observations of the hills, that your great whales in the starry heavens, and boats in pursuit of them; as spurs, would I could mount that whale and leap the topmost skies, to chapter-060 of brit, the minute, yellow substance, upon which the Right Whale [11] That part of the sea known among whalemen as the "Brazil Banks" remarkable meadow-like appearance, caused by the vast drifts of brit But it was only the sound they made as they parted the brit which at of their kind in the sea; and though taking a broad general view of the Wherein differ the sea and the land, that a miracle upon one is not a precisely the same manner the live sea swallows up ships and crews. But not only is the sea such a foe to man who is an alien to it, but it Consider the subtleness of the sea; how its most dreaded creatures more, the universal cannibalism of the sea; all whose creatures prey earth; consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a chapter-061 sphere a strange spectre was seen by Daggoo from the main-mast-head. In the distance, a great white mass lazily rose, and rising higher and It seemed not a whale; and yet is this Moby Dick? ideas of mildness and repose with the first sight of the particular whale he pursued; however this was, or whether his eagerness betrayed The four boats were soon on the water; Ahab''s in advance, and all exclaimed--"Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to "The great live squid, which they say, few whale-ships ever beheld, and with the sight of this object, certain it is, that a glimpse of it whale his only food. For though other species of whales find their food above water, and may be seen by man in the act of feeding, the by them to the bed of the ocean; and that the sperm whale, unlike other chapter-062 entirely superseded hemp as a material for whale-lines; for, though not spirally coiled away in the tub, not like the worm-pipe of a still In the English boats two tubs are used instead of one; the same line the boat, and do not strain it so much; whereas, the American tub, thickness; for the bottom of the whale-boat is like critical ice, which American line-tub, the boat looks as if it were pulling off with a lower end of the line in any way attached to the boat, and were the Before lowering the boat for the chase, the upper end of the line is Thus the whale-line folds the whole boat in its complicated coils, For, when the line is darting out, to be seated then in the boat, is live enveloped in whale-lines. And if you be a philosopher, though seated in the whale-boat, you would chapter-063 STUBB KILLS A WHALE bow of his hoisted boat, "then you quick see him ''parm whale." Suddenly bubbles seemed bursting beneath my closed eyes; like vices my forty fathoms off, a gigantic Sperm Whale lay rolling in the water like vapory jet, the whale looked like a portly burgher smoking his pipe of So seated like Ontario Indians on the gunwales of the whale rose again, and being now in advance of the smoker''s boat, and And still puffing at his pipe, Stubb cheered on his crew to the time--but start her; start her like thunder-claps, that''s all," cried wet the line!" cried Stubb to the tub oarsman (him seated by the tub) who, snatching off his hat, dashed the sea-water The boat now flew through the boiling water like a shark all Stubb and Tashtego here changed places--stem for stern--a towards the whale, all hands began pulling the boat up to him, while chapter-064 According to the invariable usage of the fishery, the whale-boat pushes off from the ship, with the headsman or whale-killer as temporary steersman, and the harpooneer or whale-fastener pulling the foremost the chase, the harpooneer is expected to pull his oar meanwhile to the fish, all at once the exhausted harpooneer hears the exciting No wonder, taking the whole fleet of whalemen successful; no wonder that so many hapless harpooneers are madly cursed blood-vessels in the boat; no wonder that some sperm whalemen are owners, whaling is but a losing concern; for it is the harpooneer that that is, when the whale starts to run, the boat-header and harpooneer first to last; he should both dart the harpoon and the lance, and no much the speed of the whale as the before described exhaustion of the To insure the greatest efficiency in the dart, the harpooneers of this chapter-065 productive subjects, grow the chapters. Thereby the weapon is instantly at hand to its hurler, who the crotch, respectively called the first and second irons. the line; the object being this: to dart them both, if possible, one instantly after the other into the same whale; so that if, in the receiving the first iron, it becomes impossible for the harpooneer, however lightning-like in his movements, to pitch the second iron into Nevertheless, as the second iron is already connected with the (mentioned in a preceding chapter) making this feat, in most instances, Furthermore: you must know that when the second iron is thrown skittishly curvetting about both boat and whale, entangling the lines, one unusually strong, active, and knowing whale; when owing to these such an audacious enterprise, eight or ten loose second irons may be supplied with several harpoons to bend on to the line should the first chapter-066 Stubb''s whale had been killed some distance from the ship. reliable hold which the ship has upon the whale when moored alongside, "Cook," said Stubb, rapidly lifting a rather reddish morsel to his that to be good, a whale-steak must be tough? "Cook," cried Stubb, collaring him, "I wont have that swearing. "Well done, old Fleece!" cried Stubb, "that''s Christianity; go on." "Now, cook," said Stubb, resuming his supper at the capstan; "Stand and don''t know yet how to cook a whale-steak?" rapidly bolting another "Come back, cook;--here, hand me those tongs;--now take that bit of steak "Cook," said Stubb, squaring himself once more; "do you belong to the Drop your tongs, cook, and hear my orders. "All ''dention," said the old black, with both hands placed as desired, "Well then, cook; you see this whale-steak of yours was so very bad, Well, for the future, when you cook another whale-steak for chapter-067 THE WHALE AS A DISH like Stubb, eat him by his own light, as you may say; this seems so Whale was esteemed a great delicacy in France, and commanded large Porpoises, indeed, are to this day considered fine eating. like Stubb, nowadays partake of cooked whales; but the Esquimaux are We all know how they live upon whales, and have rare long ago were accidentally left in Greenland by a whaling vessel--that these men actually lived for several months on the mouldy scraps of whales which had been left ashore after trying out the blubber. But what further depreciates the whale as a civilized dish, is his Look at his hump, which would be as fine eating as the e. that a man should eat a newly murdered thing of the sea, and eat it too by its own light. But Stubb, he eats the whale by its own light, does he? chapter-068 When in the Southern Fishery, a captured Sperm Whale, after long and weary toil, is brought alongside late at night, it is not, as a general that, until that time, anchor-watches shall be kept; that is, two and not answer at all; because such incalculable hosts of sharks gather diminished, by vigorously stirring them up with sharp whaling-spades, a present case with the Pequod''s sharks; though, to be sure, any man on deck, no small excitement was created among the sharks; for sea, these two mariners, darting their long whaling-spades, kept up an incessant murdering of the sharks,[15] by striking the keen steel deep one of these sharks almost took poor Queequeg''s hand off, when he tried [15] The whaling-spade used for cutting-in is made of the very best steel; is about the bigness of a man''s spread hand; and in general "Queequeg no care what god made him shark," said the savage, chapter-069 It was a Saturday night, and such a Sabbath as followed! swayed up to the main-top and firmly lashed to the lower mast-head, the to the windlass, and the huge lower block of the tackles was swung over the whale; to this block the great blubber hook, weighing some one whale, while every gasping heave of the windlass is answered by a the disengaged semicircular end of the first strip of blubber. line called the "scarf," simultaneously cut by the spades of Starbuck out a considerable hole in the lower part of the swaying mass. this hole, the end of the second alternating great tackle is then tackle is peeling and hoisting a second strip from the whale, the other coiling away the long blanket-piece as if it were a great live mass of and lowering simultaneously; both whale and windlass heaving, the scarfing, the ship straining, and all hands swearing occasionally, by chapter-070 The question is, what and where is the skin of the whale? whale''s body but that same blubber; and the outermost enveloping layer True, from the unmarred dead body of the whale, you may scrape off with have several such dried bits, which I use for marks in my whale-books. admit, invests the entire body of the whale, is not so much to be as in the case of a very large Sperm Whale, will yield the bulk of one quarters of the stuff of the whale''s skin. hieroglyphics upon one Sperm Whale in particular, I was much struck Like those mystic rocks, too, the mystic-marked whale remains little resemble the Sperm Whale in this particular. For the whale is indeed wrapt up in his blubber this cosy blanketing of his body, that the whale is enabled to keep fire; whereas, like man, the whale has lungs and warm blood. like the great whale, retain, O man! chapter-071 beheaded whale flashes like a marble sepulchre; though changed in hue, splashed by the insatiate sharks, and the air above vexed with The vast white headless phantom floats further and further from the ship, and every rod that it so floats, great mass of death floats on and on, till lost in infinite The sea-vultures all in pious mourning, the air-sharks all punctiliously in black or In life but few of them would have helped the whale, I ween, Oh, horrible vultureism of earth! Desecrated as the body is, a vengeful ghost survives and hovers over it to scare. the swarming fowls, nevertheless still shows the white mass floating in Thus, while in life the great whale''s body may have been a real terror to his foes, in his death his ghost becomes a powerless panic to a Are you a believer in ghosts, my friend? There are other ghosts than chapter-072 on the contrary, where his head and body seem to join, there, in that demanded but ten minutes to behead a sperm whale? whale it is hoisted on deck to be deliberately disposed of. full grown leviathan this is impossible; for the sperm whale''s head The Pequod''s whale being decapitated and the body stripped, the head was hoisted against the ship''s side--about half way out of the sea, so the enormous downward drag from the lower mast-head, and every yard-arm blood-dripping head hung to the Pequod''s waist like the giant Stubb''s long spade--still remaining there after the whale''s intense a calm, it seemed the Sphynx''s in the desert. and venerable head," muttered Ahab, "which, though ungarnished with a Thou saw''st the murdered mate when tossed by pirates from the midnight deck; for hours O head! "Three points on the starboard bow, sir, and bringing down her breeze chapter-073 By and by, through the glass the stranger''s boats and manned mast-heads the stranger in question waved his hand from his boat''s stern in token himself and boat''s crew remained untainted, and though his ship was interval of some few yards between itself and the ship, the Jeroboam''s Pulling an oar in the Jeroboam''s boat, was a man of a singular told of the Jeroboam, and a certain man among her crew, some time captain and told him if Gabriel was sent from the ship, not a man of "I fear not thy epidemic, man," said Ahab from the bulwarks to Captain "Hast thou seen the White Whale?" demanded Ahab, when the boat drifted "Think, think of thy whale-boat, stoven and sunk! Every whale-ship takes out a goodly number of letters for various insert the letter there, and in that way, hand it to the boat, without Ship Jeroboam;--why it''s Macey, and he''s dead!" chapter-074 In the tumultuous business of cutting-in and attending to a whale, particular friend Queequeg, whose duty it was, as harpooneer, to monkey-rope, attached to a strong strip of canvas belted round his I have hinted that I would often jerk poor Queequeg from between the whale-spades, wherewith they slaughtered as many sharks as they could But poor Queequeg, I suppose, straining and gasping there with that great iron hook--poor Queequeg, I suppose, only prayed hands him a cup of tepid ginger and water! Do I smell ginger?" suspiciously asked Stubb, coming near. astonished steward slowly saying, "Ginger? is ginger the sort of fuel you use, Dough-boy, to the devil is ginger, I say, that you offer this cup to our poor Queequeg, there, this instant off the whale. ginger on board; and bade me never give the harpooneers any spirits, was handed to Queequeg; the second was Aunt Charity''s gift, and that chapter-075 STUBB AND FLASK KILL A RIGHT WHALE; AND THEN HAVE A It must be borne in mind that all this time we have a Sperm Whale''s the Crozetts without lowering a boat; yet now that a Sperm Whale had boats, Stubb''s and Flask''s, were detached in pursuit. "Wants with it?" said Flask, coiling some spare line in the boat''s bow, "did you never hear that the ship which but once has a Sperm Whale''s Whale''s on the larboard; did you never hear, Stubb, that that ship can Flask, I take that Fedallah to be the devil in Stubb, do you suppose that that devil you was speaking of just now, was "How old do you suppose Fedallah is, Stubb?" "Do you suppose Fedallah wants to kidnap Captain Ahab?" case of a sperm whale; only, in the latter instance, the head is cut Meantime, Fedallah was calmly eyeing the right whale''s head, and ever chapter-076 THE SPERM WHALE''S HEAD--CONTRASTED VIEW Here, now, are two great whales, laying their heads together; let us Of the grand order of folio leviathans, the Sperm Whale and the Right There is more character in the Sperm Whale''s head. head, and low down, near the angle of either whale''s jaw, if you Now, from this peculiar sideway position of the whale''s eyes, it is eyes corresponds to that of a man''s ears; and you may fancy, for the whale''s eyes, effectually divided as they are by many cubic feet of whale''s eyes is a thing always to be borne in mind in the fishery; and So long as a man''s eyes are open in the light, the act of seeing But the ear of the whale is full as curious as the eye. over the sperm whale''s head, so that it may lie bottom up; then, chapter-077 THE RIGHT WHALE''S HEAD--CONTRASTED VIEW Crossing the deck, let us now have a good long look at the Right As in general shape the noble Sperm Whale''s head may be compared to a rounded); so, at a broad view, the Right Whale''s head bears a rather Southern fishers the "bonnet" of the Right Whale; fixing your eyes whale-bone, say three hundred on a side, which depending from the upper part of the head or crown bone, form those Venetian blinds which have "whiskers" inside of the whale''s mouth;[17] another, "hogs'' bristles;" standing in the Right Whale''s mouth, look around you afresh. To sum up, then; in the Right Whale''s there is no of a lower jaw, like the Sperm Whale''s. there any of those blinds of bone; no huge lower lip; and scarcely Again, the Right Whale has two external This Right Whale I take to have been a chapter-078 Ere quitting, for the nonce, the Sperm Whale''s head, I would have you, You observe that in the ordinary swimming position of the Sperm Whale, mouth is entirely under the head, much in the same way, indeed, as observe that the whale has no external nose; and that what nose he has--his spout hole--is on the top of his head; you observe that his eyes front of the Sperm Whale''s head is a dead, blind wall, without a single now to consider that only in the extreme, lower, backward sloping part It is as though the forehead of the Sperm Whale were paved capable, at will, of distension or contraction; and as the Sperm Whale, envelop; considering the unique interior of his head; it has wall, and this most buoyant thing within; there swims behind it all a For unless you own the whale, you are but a provincial and chapter-079 THE GREAT HEIDELBURGH TUN Regarding the Sperm whale''s head as a solid oblong, you may, on an inclined plane, sideways divide it into two quoins,[18] whereof the forming the expanded vertical apparent forehead of the whale. middle of the forehead horizontally subdivide this upper quoin, and The upper part, known as the Case, may be regarded as the great Heidelburgh Tun of the Sperm Whale. mystically carved in front, so the whale''s vast plaited forehead forms vintages; namely, the highly-prized spermaceti, in its absolutely pure, I know not with what fine and costly material the Heidelburgh Tun was line of a fine pelisse, forming the inner surface of the Sperm Whale''s It will have been seen that the Heidelburgh Tun of the Sperm Whale has been elsewhere set forth--the head embraces one third of the whole As in decapitating the whale, the operator''s instrument is brought Whale''s great Heidelburgh Tun is tapped. chapter-080 this cautious search is over, a stout iron-bound bucket, precisely like Inserting this pole into the bucket, Tashtego downward guides the to the seamen at the whip, up comes the bucket again, all bubbling like end, Tashtego has to ram his long pole harder and harder, and deeper one-handed hold on the great cabled tackles suspending the head; or poor Tashtego--like the twin reciprocating bucket in a veritable well, dropped head-foremost down into this great Tun of At this instant, while Daggoo, on the summit of the head, was clearing holding on to the heavy tackles, so that if the head should drop, he slowly descending head, Queequeg with his keen sword had made side dropping his sword, had thrust his long arm far inwards and upwards, in the good old way--head foremost. As for the great head itself, that Now, had Tashtego perished in that head, it had been a very precious chapter-081 To scan the lines of his face, or feel the bumps on the head of this Physiognomically regarded, the Sperm Whale is an anomalous creature. A nose to the whale would have been impertinent. be had of the Sperm Whale, is that of the full front of his head. In thought, a fine human brow is like the east when troubled with the creatures, nay in man himself, very often the brow is but a mere strip But in the great Sperm Whale, this high and mighty god-like dignity inherent in the brow is so immensely distinct feature is revealed; no nose, eyes, ears, or mouth; no face; Genius in the Sperm Whale? Has the Sperm Whale ever written a And this reminds me that had the great Sperm Whale because the crocodile is tongueless; and the Sperm Whale has no tongue, Sperm Whale shall lord it. the Sperm Whale''s brow? chapter-082 If the Sperm Whale be physiognomically a Sphinx, to the phrenologist In the full-grown creature the skull will measure at least twenty feet deny that the Sperm Whale has any other brain than that palpable If you unload his skull of its spermy heaps and then take a rear view resemblance to the human skull, beheld in the same situation, and from to the human magnitude) among a plate of men''s skulls, and you would But if from the comparative dimensions of the whale''s proper brain, you your spine than your skull, whoever you are. Apply this spinal branch of phrenology to the Sperm Whale. the bottom of the spinal canal will measure ten inches across, being cavity, the spinal cord remains of an undecreasing girth, almost equal unreasonable to survey and map out the whale''s spine phrenologically? sperm whale''s hump. this high hump the organ of firmness or indomitableness in the Sperm chapter-083 soon evinced his complete ignorance of the White Whale; immediately boats that soon followed him, had considerably the start of the way; so did this old whale heave his aged bulk, and now and then partly arm," cried cruel Flask, pointing to the whale-line near him. German boats last lowered; but from the great start he had had, Derick''s boat still led the chase, though every moment neared by his free his white-ash, and while, in consequence, Derick''s boat was nigh barbs; and darted over the head of the German harpooneer, their three The three boats, in the first fury of the whale''s headlong "Stand by, men; he stirs," cried Starbuck, as the three lines suddenly boats, and soon the whale broke water within two ship''s lengths of the ground--so the last long dying spout of the whale. Be it said, however, that the Sperm Whale is far less liable to this chapter-084 THE HONOR AND GLORY OF WHALING great demi-gods and heroes, prophets of all sorts, who one way or other the eternal honor of our calling be it said, that the first whale knows the fine story of Perseus and Andromeda; how the lovely to be indirectly derived from it--is that famous story of St. George and dragon of the sea," saith Ezekiel; hereby, plainly meaning a whale; in of those times, when the true form of the whale was unknown to artists; and considering that as in Perseus'' case, St. George''s whale might have with a whale like their great patron), let them never eye a Nantucketer Hercules and the whale is considered to be derived from the still more ancient Hebrew story of Jonah and the whale; and vice vers; certainly Was not this Vishnoo a whaleman, then? Perseus, St. George, Hercules, Jonah, and Vishnoo! What club but the whaleman''s can head off like chapter-085 Reference was made to the historical story of Jonah and the whale in historical story of Jonah and the whale. of their times, equally doubted the story of Hercules and the whale, One old Sag-Harbor whaleman''s chief reason for questioning the Hebrew Jonah''s whale with two spouts in his head--a peculiarity only true with whale mentioned in the book of Jonah merely meant a life-preserver--an this, if I remember right: Jonah was swallowed by the whale in the Mediterranean Sea, and after three days he was vomited up somewhere within three days'' journey of Nineveh, a city on the Tigris, very much But was there no other way for the whale to land the prophet within Good Hope at so early a day would wrest the honor of the discovery of But all these foolish arguments of old Sag-Harbor only evinced his Voyages, speaks of a Turkish Mosque built in honor of Jonah, in which chapter-086 his boat, and one morning not long after the German ship Jungfrau Nevertheless, the boats pursued, and Stubb''s was foremost. imperative to lance the flying whale, or be content to lose him. haul the boat up to his flank was impossible, he swam so fast and none exceed that fine manuvre with the lance called pitchpoling. is only indispensable with an inveterate running whale; its grand fact and feature is the wonderful distance to which the long lance is small rope called a warp, of considerable length, by which it can be hauled back to the hand after darting. the harpoon may be pitchpoled in the same way with the lance, yet it is general thing, therefore, you must first get fast to a whale, before flying boat; wrapt in fleecy foam, the towing whale is forty feet Then holding the lance full spread of his spout-hole there, and from that live punch-bowl quaff the chapter-087 before--the great whales should have been spouting all over the sea, and whale, watching these sprinklings and spoutings--that all this should gills, the finny tribes in general breathe the air which at all times the Sperm Whale''s mouth is buried at least eight feet beneath the rising to the surface, the Sperm Whale will continue there for a period Sperm Whale only breathes about one seventh or Sunday of his time. It has been said that the whale only breathes through his spout-hole; air or the upward exclusion of water, therefore the whale has no voice; Now, the spouting canal of the Sperm Whale, chiefly intended as it is of the Sperm Whale is the mere vapor of the exhaled breath, or whether And as for this whale spout, you might almost stand the whale always carries a small basin of water on his head, as under a precise nature of the whale spout. chapter-088 Reckoning the largest sized Sperm Whale''s tail to begin at that point expansion in the full grown whale, the tail will considerably exceed whale, his tail is the sole means of propulsion. the sense of touch is concentrated in the tail; for in this respect the deeps, his entire flukes with at least thirty feet of his body are else to be described--this peaking of the whale''s flukes is perhaps the elephant, I then testified of the whale, pronouncing him the most elephant, so far as some aspects of the tail of the one and the trunk Leviathan, so, compared with Leviathan''s tail, his trunk is but the the elephant stands in much the same respect to the whale that a dog other motions of the whale in his general body, full of strangeness, know not even the tail of this whale, how understand his head? chapter-089 and gain the far coast of Japan, in time for the great whaling season all the known Sperm Whale cruising grounds of the world, previous to transferred to foreign wharves; the world-wandering whale-ship carries Whale, which, dividing at top, falls over in two branches, like the the Sperm Whale presents a thick curled bush of white mist, continually something like the spouts of the whales; only they did not so way whatever whales he could reach by short darts, for there was no whales are close round you than you can possibly chase at one time. not that as we advanced into the herd, our whale''s way greatly whales--now and then visiting our becalmed boat from the margin of the for the final spring, the unborn whale lies bent like a Tartar''s bow. [20] The sperm whale, as with all other species of the Leviathan, but First, the whales forming the margin of our lake chapter-090 Now, though such great bodies are at times encountered, yet, as must suspicious sights are seen, my lord whale keeps a wary eye on his High times, indeed, if unprincipled young rakes like him are But supposing the invader of domestic bliss to betake himself away at Now, as the harem of whales is called by the fishermen a school, so is man who first thus entitled this sort of Ottoman whale, must have read The same secludedness and isolation to which the schoolmaster whale betakes himself in his advancing years, is true of all aged Sperm The schools composing none but young and vigorous males, previously mentioned, offer a strong contrast to the harem schools. those female whales are characteristically timid, the young males, or Another point of difference between the male and female schools is member of the harem school, and her companions swim around her with chapter-091 necessitates some account of the laws and regulations of the whale Likewise a fish is technically fast when it bears a waif, or any possession of a whale previously chased or killed by another party. her; yet abandon her he did, so that she became a loose-fish; and harpoons, and line, they belonged to the defendants; the whale, because it was a Loose-Fish at the time of the final capture; and the harpoons matter, the two great principles laid down in the twin whaling laws the above cited case; these two laws touching Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish, Russian serfs and Republican slaves but Fast-Fish, whereof possession mansion with a door-plate for a waif; what is that but a Fast-Fish? starvation; what is that ruinous discount but a Fast-Fish? But if the doctrine of Fast-Fish be pretty generally applicable, the Loose-Fish? Loose-Fish? Loose-Fish? What is the great globe itself but a Loose-Fish? chapter-092 and the Queen be respectfully presented with the tail. strange anomaly touching the general law of Fast and Loose-Fish, it is Because the Lord Warden is busily employed at times in fobbing his laying it upon the whale''s head, he says--"Hands off! heads all round; meanwhile ruefully glancing from the whale to the hard heart of the learned gentleman with the copy of Blackstone. "But the duke had nothing to do with taking this fish?" In a word, the whale was seized and sold, and his Grace the Duke of It will readily be seen that in this case the alleged right of the Duke But why should the King have the head, and the Queen the tail? author, one William Prynne, thus discourseth: "Ye tail is ye Queen''s, There are two royal fish so styled by the English law writers--the whale way as the whale, the King receiving the highly dense and elastic head chapter-093 Stubb now called his boat''s crew, and pulled off for the stranger. "Well, then, my Bouton-de-Rose-bud, have you seen the White Whale?" Sounding him carefully, Stubb further perceived that the Guernsey-man was to tell the Captain what he pleased, but as coming from Stubb; and small and dark, but rather delicate looking man for a sea-captain, with "He says, Monsieur," said the Guernsey-man, in French, turning to his blasted whale they had brought alongside." "What now?" said the Guernsey-man to Stubb. "What now?" said the Guernsey-man, when the captain had returned to had best drop all four boats, and pull the ship away from these whales, By this time Stubb was over the side, and getting into his boat, hailed boats, then, were engaged in towing the ship one way, Stubb Presently a breeze sprang up; Stubb feigned to cast off from the whale; the Pequod slid in between him and Stubb''s whale. chapter-094 Now this ambergris is a very curious substance, and so important as an the precise origin of ambergris remained, like amber itself, a problem though at times found on the sea-coast, is also dug up in some far inland soils, whereas ambergris is never found except upon the sea. cause, and by others the effect, of the dyspepsia in the whale. Now that the incorruption of this most fragrant ambergris should be Greenland whaling ships in London, more than two centuries ago. those whalemen did not then, and do not now, try out their oil at sea latter name is the one used by the learned Fogo Von Slack, in his great place for the blubber of the Dutch whale fleet to be tried out, without Nor indeed can the whale possibly be otherwise than I say, that the motion of a Sperm Whale''s flukes above What then shall I liken the Sperm Whale to for chapter-095 Now, in the whale ship, it is not every one that goes in the boats. In outer aspect, Pip and Dough-Boy made a match, like a black pony and The first time Stubb lowered with him, Pip evinced much nervousness; "Damn him, cut!" roared Stubb; and so the whale was lost and Pip was jump from a boat, Pip, except--but all the rest was indefinite, as the the boat, Pip, or by the Lord, I wont pick you up if you jump; mind But we are all in the hands of the Gods; and Pip jumped again. to run, Pip was left behind on the sea, like a hurried traveller''s ocean was between Pip and Stubb. But had Stubb really abandoned the poor little negro to his fate? But it so happened, that those boats, without seeing Pip, suddenly fishery; and in the sequel of the narrative, it will then be seen what chapter-096 A SQUEEZE OF THE HAND when the proper time arrived, this same sperm was carefully manipulated It was our business to squeeze these lumps back it for only a few minutes, my fingers felt like eels, and began, as it sperm, I washed my hands and my heart of it; I almost began to credit all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as Would that I could keep squeezing that sperm for ever! to squeeze case eternally. akin to it, in the business of preparing the sperm whale for the First comes white-horse, so called, which is obtained from the tapering After being severed from the whale, the white-horse is first cut tubs of sperm, after a prolonged squeezing, and subsequent decanting. The gaff is something like a boat-hook. chapter-097 post-mortemizing of the whale; and had you strolled forward nigh the there, lying along lengthwise in the lee scuppers. a Kentuckian is tall, nigh a foot in diameter at the base, and jet-black as Yojo, the ebony idol of Queequeg. is; or, rather, in old times, its likeness was. Such an idol as that Such an idol as that set forth in the 15th chapter of the first book of Kings. Look at the sailor, called the mincer, who now comes along, and forecastle deck, he now proceeds cylindrically to remove its dark pelt, This done he turns the pelt inside out, like a pantaloon leg; gives it a good stretching, so as slits for arm-holes at the other end, he lengthwise slips himself That office consists in mincing the horse-pieces of blubber for the intent on bible leaves; what a candidate for an archbishoprick, what a mates to the mincer. chapter-098 Removing this hatch we expose the great try-pots, two in It was in the left hand try-pot of the Pequod, Removing the fire-board from the front of the try-works, the bare masonry of that side is exposed, penetrated by the two iron mouths of It was about nine o''clock at night that the Pequod''s try-works were that in a whaling voyage the first fire in the try-works has to be fed pots, or stirred up the fires beneath, till the snaky flames darted, watch, when not otherwise employed, looking into the red heat of the out of them, like the flames from the furnace; as to and fro, in their ship groaned and dived, and yet steadfastly shot her red hell further guided the way of this fire-ship on the sea. Look not too long in the face of the fire, O man! redness makes all things look ghastly. chapter-099 CHAPTER XCVII. THE LAMP Had you descended from the Pequod''s try-works to the Pequod''s illuminated shrine of canonized kings and counsellors. There they lay score of lamps flashing upon his hooded eyes. In merchantmen, oil for the sailor is more scarce than the milk of But the whaleman, as he Aladdin''s lamp, and lays him down in it; so that in the pitchiest night the ship''s black hull still houses an illumination. See with what entire freedom the whaleman takes his handful of lamps--often but old bottles and vials, though--to the copper cooler at the try-works, and replenishes them there, as mugs of ale at a vat. burns, too, the purest of oil, in its unmanufactured, and, therefore, goes and hunts for his oil, so as to be sure of its freshness and genuineness, even as the traveller on the prairie hunts up his own chapter-100 headsman of old to the garments in which the beheaded was killed) his of decanting off his oil into the casks and striking them down into the across the slippery deck, like so many land slides, till at last and down go the casks to their final rest in the sea. with freshets of blood and oil; on the sacred quarter-deck enormous masses of the whale''s head are profanely piled; great rusty casks lie entire ship seems great leviathan himself; while on all hands the din self-same ship; and were it not for the tell-tale boats and try-works, of the whale remains clinging to the side, that ley quickly great hatch is scrubbed and placed upon the try-works, completely fight another whale, and go through the whole weary thing again. spouted up, and away we sail to fight some other world, and go through chapter-101 gold coin there, he still wore the same aspect of nailed firmness, only in the Milky Way. Now this doubloon was of purest, virgin gold, raked somewhere out of but if we lift them, the bright sun meets our glance half way, to Look you, Doubloon, your zodiac here is the life of man in one round But stop; here comes little King-Post; dodge round the try-works, now, "I see nothing here, but a round thing made of gold, and whoever raises He luffs up before the doubloon; halloa, and goes round on the other the sun stands in some one of these signs. Now, in what sign will the sun then be? tattooing--looks like the signs of the Zodiac himself. of the doubloon; he takes it for an old button off some king''s sign and bows himself; there is a sun on the coin--fire worshipper, This way comes Pip--poor boy! chapter-102 held up a white arm of sperm whale bone, terminating in a wooden head "Man my boat!" cried Ahab, impetuously, and tossing about the oars near like whalemen--to clamber up a ship''s side from a boat on the open sea; putting out his ivory leg, and crossing the ivory arm (like two "The White Whale," said the Englishman, pointing his ivory arm towards from the bottom of the sea a bouncing great whale, with a milky-white devil of a boat''s crew for a pull on a whale-line); seeing all this, I will tell you the rest (by the way, captain--Dr. Bunger, ship''s surgeon: But I had no hand in shipping that ivory arm there; that thing is "What became of the White Whale?" now cried Ahab, who thus far had been "Oh!" cried the one-armed captain, "Oh, yes! to the other, why in that case the arm is yours; only let the whale near to Ahab''s arm. chapter-103 merchant of that city, the original of the famous whaling house of 1775, this great whaling house was in existence, my numerous the first English ships that ever regularly hunted the Sperm Whale; the Amelia''s example was soon followed by other ships, English and In 1819, the same house fitted out a discovery whale ship English whalers I know of--not all though--were such famous, hospitable ships; that passed round the beef, and the bread, and the can, and the The abounding good cheer of these English whalers is The English were preceded in the whale fishery by the Hollanders, merchant-ship scrimps her crew; but not so the English whaler. in the English, this thing of whaling good cheer is not normal and cooper in the fishery, as every whale ship must carry its cooper. whale fishery. boat''s head, and take good aim at flying whales; this would seem chapter-104 Hitherto, in descriptively treating of the Sperm Whale, I have chiefly to, a small cub Sperm Whale was once bodily hoisted to the deck for his to my late royal friend Tranquo, king of Tranque, one of the Arsacides. Chief among these latter was a great Sperm Whale, which, after an Now, amid the green, life-restless loom of that Arsacidean wood, the great, white, worshipped skeleton lay lounging--a gigantic idler! Now, when with royal Tranquo I visited this wondrous whale, and saw the before this skeleton--brushed the vines aside--broke through the ribs--and their yard-sticks--the great skull echoed--and seizing that lucky chance, Constable has in his possession the skeleton of a Sperm Whale, but of In both cases, the stranded whales to which these two skeletons King Tranquo seizing his because he wanted it; and Sir Clifford''s whale has been articulated throughout; so that, like a great enter into a congenial admeasurement of the whale. chapter-105 MEASUREMENT OF THE WHALE''S SKELETON statement, touching the living bulk of this leviathan, whose skeleton Greenland whale of sixty feet in length; according to my careful calculation, I say, a Sperm Whale of the largest magnitude, between eighty-five and ninety feet in length, and something less than forty feet in its fullest circumference, such a whale will weigh at least In length, the Sperm Whale''s skeleton at Tranque measured seventy-two feet; so that when fully invested and extended in life, he must have been ninety feet long; for in the whale, the skeleton loses about one feet of plain back-bone. of the middle ribs, which measured eight feet and some inches. the Tranque ribs, one of the middle ones, occupied that part of the sixteen feet; whereas, the corresponding rib measured but little more middle one, is in width something less than three feet, and in depth chapter-106 From his mighty bulk the whale affords a most congenial theme whereon Ere entering upon the subject of Fossil Whales, I present my Whales hitherto discovered belong to the Tertiary period, which is the precisely answer to any known species of the present time, they are yet Detached broken fossils of pre-adamite whales, fragments of their bones repeated in this book, that the skeleton of the whale furnishes but When I stand among these mighty Leviathan skeletons, skulls, tusks, the existing breeds of sea-monsters; but at the same time bearing on unspeakable terrors of the whale, which, having been before all time, that by a secret Power bestowed by God upon the Temple, no Whale can the Sea, and wound the Whales when they light upon ''em. was cast forth by the Whale at the Base of the Temple." In this Afric Temple of the Whale I leave you, reader, and if you be a chapter-107 DOES THE WHALE''S MAGNITUDE DIMINISH?--WILL HE PERISH? present day superior in magnitude to those whose fossil remains are prior to man), but of the whales found in that Tertiary system, those large sized modern whale. that Sperm Whales have been captured near a hundred feet long at the But may it not be, that while the whales of the present hour are an Pliny tells us of whales that embraced acres of living bulk, and No. The whale of to-day is look-outs at the mast-heads of the whale-ships, now penetrating even at last be exterminated from the waters, and the last whale, like the different nature of the whale-hunt peremptorily forbids so inglorious Forty men in one ship hunting the Sperm Whale But though for some time past a number of these whales, not less than great numbers, much more may the great whale outlast all hunting, since chapter-108 AHAB''S LEG boat that his ivory leg had received a half-splintering shock. wrench, that though it still remained entire, and to all appearances lusty, yet Ahab did not deem it entirely trustworthy. pervading, mad recklessness, Ahab did at times give careful heed to the equally, thought Ahab; since both the ancestry and posterity of Grief miseries shall still fertilely beget to themselves an eternally For, thought Ahab, while even the highest earthly felicities bottom, all heart-woes, a mystic significance, and, in some men, an particulars concerning Ahab, always had it remained a mystery to some, Captain Peleg''s bruited reason for this thing appeared by no means adequate; though, indeed, as touching all Ahab''s deeper part, every to him; to that timid circle the above hinted casualty--remaining, as it with earthly Ahab, yet, in this present matter of his leg, he took This done, the carpenter received orders to have the leg completed that chapter-109 the high, humane abstraction; the Pequod''s carpenter was no duplicate; Like all sea-going ship carpenters, and more especially those belonging the generic remark above, this carpenter of the Pequod was singularly was his vice-bench; a long rude ponderous table furnished with several the carpenter claps it into one of his ever-ready vices, and right-whale bone, and cross-beams of sperm whale ivory, the carpenter big vice of wood, the carpenter symmetrically supplies the carpenter drills his ears. Another has the toothache: the carpenter out operation; whirling round the handle of his wooden vice, the carpenter Thus, this carpenter was prepared at all points, and alike indifferent nothing was this man more remarkable, than for a certain impersonal Was it that this old carpenter had been a to use the carpenter for a screw-driver, all they had to do was to open him a great part of the time soliloquizing; but only like an chapter-110 (Carpenter standing before his vice-bench, and by the light of two lanterns busily filing the ivory joist for the leg, which joist is time, I could turn him out as neat a leg now as ever (sneezes) (sneezes) with washes and lotions, just like live legs. gentlemanlike sort of business thou art in here, carpenter;--or would''st Look ye, carpenter, I dare say thou callest thyself a right good thy work, if, when I come to mount this leg thou makest, I shall is, carpenter, my old lost leg; the flesh and blood one, I mean. Look, put thy live leg here in the place where mine once thou now standest; aye, and standing there in thy spite? now so long dissolved; then, why mayest not thou, carpenter, feel the What was that now about one leg standing in three It looks like a real live leg, filed down to chapter-111 AHAB AND STARBUCK IN THE CABIN inconsiderable oil came up with the water; the casks below must have And so Starbuck found Ahab with a The oil in the hold is leaking, sir. "Either do that, sir, or waste in one day more oil than we may make "I was speaking of the oil in the hold, sir." my conscience is in this ship''s keel.--On deck!" "Captain Ahab," said the reddening mate, moving further into the cabin, Ahab seized a loaded musket from the rack (forming part of most Captain that is lord over the Pequod.--On deck!" of Starbuck; thou wouldst but laugh; but let Ahab beware of Ahab; beware of thyself, old man." murmured Ahab, as Starbuck disappeared. "What''s that he said--Ahab beware of Ahab--there''s something there!" Then unconsciously using the "Thou art but too good a fellow, Starbuck," he said lowly to the mate; Starbuck, Ahab thus acted. chapter-112 long-lingering days, till there seemed but little left of him but his saw creeping over the face of poor Queequeg, as he quietly lay in his chanced to see certain little canoes of dark wood, like the rich to him, being a whaleman, that like a whale-boat these coffin-canoes on deck began to drive the coffin away, Queequeg, to every one''s Leaning over in his hammock, Queequeg long regarded the coffin with an Queequeg in his coffin with little but his composed countenance in Now, Queequeg, die; and I''ll beat ye your Queequeg dies game!--mind ye but base little Pip, he died a coward; During all this, Queequeg lay with closed eyes, as if in a dream. that his coffin was proved a good fit, Queequeg suddenly rallied; soon generally speaking, a sick savage is almost half-well again in a day. when one morning turning away from surveying poor Queequeg--"Oh, chapter-113 When gliding by the Bashee isles we emerged at last upon the great youth was answered; that serene ocean rolled eastwards from me a There is, one knows not what sweet mystery about this sea, whose gently awful stirrings seem to speak of some hidden soul beneath; like those And meet it is, that over these sea-pastures, wide-rolling watery like slumberers in their beds; the ever-rolling waves but made so by To any meditative Magian rover, this serene Pacific, once beheld, must ever after be the sea of his adoption. It rolls the midmost waters of Pacific zones the world''s whole bulk about; makes all coasts one bay to swells, you needs must own the seductive god, bowing your head to Pan. But few thoughts of Pan stirred Ahab''s brain, as standing like an iron swelled like overladen brooks; in his very sleep, his ringing cry ran chapter-114 blistered old blacksmith, had not removed his portable forge to the boat-spades, pike-heads, harpoons, and lances, and jealously watching as if toil were life itself, and the heavy beating of his hammer the tell, the blacksmith himself did ignorantly conduct this burglar into that fatal cork, forth flew the fiend, and shrivelled up his home. of her young-armed old husband''s hammer; whose reverberations, muffled Hadst thou taken this old blacksmith to thyself ere his full ruin came useless old man standing, till the hideous rot of life should make him The blows of the basement hammer every day grew Wild, the Watery, the Unshored; therefore, to the death-longing eyes of terrors, and wonderful, new-life adventures; and from the hearts of infinite Pacifics, the thousand mermaids sing to them--"Come hither, broken-hearted; here is another life without the guilt of intermediate Come hither! fall of eve, the blacksmith''s soul responded, Aye, I come! chapter-115 mid-day, Perth was standing between his forge and anvil, the latter placed upon an iron-wood log, with one hand holding a pike-head in the Perth, withdrawing his iron from the fire, began hammering it upon the "Because I am scorched all over, Captain Ahab," answered Perth, resting "Welding an old pike-head, sir; there were seams and dents in it." "And can''st thou make it all smooth, again, blacksmith, after such hard "And I suppose thou can''st smoothe almost any seams and dents; never with both hands on Perth''s shoulders; "look ye here--here--can ye smoothe out a seam like this, blacksmith," sweeping one hand across his Why, Captain Ahab, thou hast here, then, the "I know it, old man; these stubbs will weld together like glue from the Ahab stayed his hand, and said he would weld his own iron. This done, pole, iron, and rope--like the chapter-116 sociably mixing with the soft waves themselves, that like hearth-stone These are the times, when in his whale-boat the rover softly feels a certain filial, confident, land-like feeling towards the sea; that he mystic mood; so that fact and fancy, half-way meeting, interpenetrate, But if these secret golden keys did seem to open in him his own secret golden treasuries, yet did his breath ye,--though long parched by the dead drought of the earthy life,--in ye, men yet may roll, like young horses in new morning clover; and for some few fleeting moments, feel the cool dew of the life immortal on them. threads of life are woven by warp and woof: calms crossed by storms, a storm for every calm. Our souls are like And that same day, too, gazing far down from his boat''s side into that Let faith oust fact; let fancy oust memory; I look deep golden light:-- chapter-117 It was a Nantucket ship, the Bachelor, which had just wedged in her sailing round among the widely-separated ships on the ground, previous The three men at her mast-head wore long streamers of narrow red the same seas numerous other vessels had gone entire months without his spare coffee-pot and filled it; that the harpooneers had headed the filled with sperm, except the captain''s pantaloons pockets, and those As this glad ship of good luck bore down upon the moody Pequod, the ship''s elevated quarter-deck, so that the whole rejoicing drama was And Ahab, he too was standing on his quarter-deck, shaggy and black, as to things to come--their two captains in themselves impersonated the "Hast seen the White Whale?" gritted Ahab in reply. along, will ye (merry''s the play); a full ship and homeward-bound." a full ship and homeward bound, thou sayest; well, then, call me an filled with Nantucket soundings. chapter-118 THE DYING WHALE whales were seen and four were slain; and one of them by Ahab. crimson fight were done: and floating in the lovely sunset sea and sky, sun and whale both stilly died together; then, such a sweetness and air, that it almost seemed as if far over from the deep green convent valleys of the Manilla isles, the Spanish land-breeze, wantonly turned whales dying--the turning sunwards of the head, and so expiring--that strange spectacle, beheld of such a placid evening, somehow to Ahab here, far water-locked; beyond all hum of human weal or woe; in these most candid and impartial seas; where to traditions no rocks Niger''s unknown source; here, too, life dies sunwards full of faith; thy separate throne somewhere in the heart of these unverdured seas; has this thy whale sunwards turned his dying head, and then gone round vain, oh whale, dost thou seek intercedings with yon all-quickening chapter-119 The four whales slain that evening had died wide apart; one, far to Ahab and all his boat''s crew seemed asleep but the Parsee; who round the whale, and tapped the light cedar planks with their tails. Have I not said, old man, that neither hearse nor "And who are hearsed that die on the sea?" "But I said, old man, that ere thou couldst die on this voyage, two hearses must verily be seen by thee on the sea; the first not made by a strange sight that, Parsee:--a hearse and its plumes "Believe it or not, thou canst not die till it be seen, old man." "Take another pledge, old man," said the Parsee, as his eyes lighted up like fire-flies in the gloom,--"Hemp only can kill thee." slumbering crew arose from the boat''s bottom, and ere noon the dead whale was brought to the ship. chapter-120 The season for the Line at length drew near; and every day when Ahab, high noon; and Ahab, seated in the bows of his high-hoisted boat, was astrological-looking instrument placed to his eye, he remained in that posture for some moments to catch the precise instant when the sun and with face thrown up like Ahab''s, was eyeing the same sun with him; Or canst thou tell where some other thing besides me is the objects on the unknown, thither side of thee, thou sun!" impotence thou insultest the sun! Curse thee, thou vain toy; and cursed be all the things that cast man''s eyes aloft to that heaven, whose live vividness but scorches him, as these old eyes are even now Curse thee, thou Aye," lighting from the boat to the deck, "thus I trample on thee, As the frantic old man thus spoke and thus trampled with his live and chapter-121 "Avast Stubb," cried Starbuck, "let the Typhoon sing, and strike his look through my eyes if thou hast none of thine own." "Here!" cried Starbuck, seizing Stubb by the shoulder, and pointing his "Old Thunder!" said Ahab, groping his way along the bulwarks to his the rods!" cried Starbuck to the crew, suddenly admonished "Avast!" cried Ahab; "let''s have fair play here, though we be the "Look aloft!" cried Starbuck. tri-pointed lightning-rod-end with three tapering white flames, each of "What thinkest thou now, man; I heard thy cry; it was not flame but lights the way to the White Whale! to this hour I bear the scar; I now know thee, thou clear spirit, and I clear spirit, of thy fire thou madest me, and like a true child of Through thee, thy flaming self, my scorched eyes do dimly the boat!" cried Starbuck, "look at thy boat, old man!" chapter-122 CHAPTER CXX. THE DECK TOWARDS THE END OF THE FIRST NIGHT WATCH Ahab standing by the helm. Starbuck approaching him. "We must send down the main-top-sail yard, sir. The band is working loose, and the lee lift is half-stranded. Shall I strike it, sir?" "Strike nothing; lash it. If I had sky-sail poles, I''d sway them up "Sir?--in God''s name!--sir?" "The anchors are working, sir. Shall I get them inboard?" "Strike nothing, and stir nothing, but lash everything. The wind rises, but it has not got up to my table-lands yet. Quick, and see to it.--By masts and keels! he takes me for the hunch-backed skipper of some coasting smack. Send down my main-top-sail yard! Ho, gluepots! Loftiest trucks were made for wildest winds, and this brain-truck of mine now sails amid the cloud-scud. Shall I strike that? Oh, none but cowards send down their brain-trucks in tempest time. chapter-123 Stubb and Flask mounted on them, and passing additional lashings over "No, Stubb; you may pound that knot there as much as you please, but that whatever ship Ahab sails in, that ship should pay something extra Besides, supposing we are loaded with powder afire in this drenching spray here? Aquarius, or the water-bearer, Flask; might fill pitchers at your coat lightning-rod in the storm, and standing close by a mast that hasn''t got any lightning-rod at all in a storm? a hundred carries rods, and Ahab,--aye, man, and all of us,--were in no lightning-rod running up the corner of his hat, like a militia don''t ye be sensible, Flask? any man with half an eye can be sensible." anchors here, Flask, seems like tying a man''s hands behind him. long-togs so, Flask; but seems to me, a long tailed coat ought always chapter-124 CHAPTER CXXII. MIDNIGHT ALOFT--THUNDER AND LIGHTNING The Main-top-sail yard.--Tashtego passing new lashings around it. Stop that thunder! Plenty too much thunder up here. the use of thunder? We don''t want thunder; we want rum; give us a glass of rum. chapter-125 During the most violent shocks of the Typhoon, the man at the Pequod''s In a severe gale like this, while the ship is but a tossed shuttle-cock storm-trysail was set further aft; so that the ship soon went through ship as near her course as possible, watching the compass meanwhile, the wind seemed coming round astern; aye! The cabin lamp--taking long swings this way and that--was burning fitfully, and casting fitful shadows upon the old man''s bolted door,--a honest, upright man; but out of Starbuck''s heart, at that instant when to report a fair wind to him. shall this crazed old man be tamely suffered to drag a whole ship''s murderer of thirty men and more, if this ship come to any deadly harm; and come to deadly harm, my soul swears this ship will, if Ahab have hope to wrest this old man''s living boy!--But if I wake thee not to death, old man, chapter-126 Next morning the not-yet-subsided sea rolled in long slow billows of eye the bright sun''s rays produced ahead; and when she profoundly settled by the stern, he turned behind, and saw the sun''s rearward Thrusting his head half way into the binnacle, Ahab caught one glimpse compasses pointed East, and the Pequod was as infallibly going West. Mr. Starbuck, last night''s thunder turned our compasses--that''s compasses, the old man, with the sharp of his extended hand, now took "Men," said he, steadily turning upon the crew, as the mate handed him the things he had demanded, "my men, the thunder turned old Ahab''s needles; but out of this bit of steel Ahab can make one of his own, With a blow from the top-maul Ahab knocked off the steel head of the and moving to the binnacle, slipped out the two reversed needles there, The sun is East, and that compass swears it!" chapter-127 reel and angular log attached hung, long untouched, just beneath the The Manxman took the reel, and holding it high up, by the projecting stood with the angular log hanging downwards, till Ahab advanced to Manxman, who was intently eyeing both him and the line, made bold to "Sir, I mistrust it; this line looks far gone, long heat and wet have Or, truer perhaps, life holds thee; not thou it." "I hold the spool, sir. "In the little rocky Isle of Man, sir." dragging line astern, and then, instantly, the reel began to whirl. sea parts the log-line. And look ye, let the carpenter make another log, and mend thou the line. These lines run whole, and whirling out: come in broken, and Where sayest thou Pip was, boy?" "Bell-boy, sir; ship''s-crier; ding, dong, ding! Here, boy; Ahab''s cabin shall be Pip''s Oh, sir, let old Perth chapter-128 unfrequented waters, descrying no ships, and ere long, sideways Below in his hammock, Ahab did not hear of this till grey dawn, when he human look of their round heads and semi-intelligent faces, seen sun-rise this man went from his hammock to his mast-head at the fore; The life-buoy--a long slender cask--was dropped from the stern, where it The lost life-buoy was now to be replaced; Starbuck was directed to see "A life-buoy of a coffin!" cried Starbuck, starting. "Rig it, carpenter; do not look at me so--the coffin, "And shall I nail down the lid, sir?" moving his hand as with a hammer. "And shall I caulk the seams, sir?" moving his hand as with a "And shall I then pay over the same with pitch, sir?" moving his hand Make a life-buoy of the coffin, and for lonely widow old women ashore, when I kept my job-shop in the chapter-129 The coffin laid upon two line-tubs between the vice-bench and the open hatchway; the Carpenter calking its seams; the string of twisted his frock.--Ahab comes slowly from the cabin-gangway and hears Pip Life buoy, sir. Oh, look, sir! Art not thou the leg-maker? Look, did not this stump come from thy Aye, sir; I patched up this thing here as a coffin for Queequeg; but Then tell me; art thou not an arrant, all-grasping, inter-meddling, next day coffins to clap them in, and yet again life-buoys out of those Thou art as unprincipled as the gods, and as much of a Hark ye, dost thou not ever sing working about a Sing, sir? all things makes the sounding-board is this--there''s naught beneath. Hast thou ever helped carry a bier, and heard the coffin knock against Faith, sir, I''ve---sort of Equator cuts yon old man, too, right in his middle. life-buoy of a coffin! chapter-130 Have ye seen a whale-boat adrift?" captain himself, having stopped his vessel''s way, was seen descending leave that boat to its fate till near midnight, but, for the time, to last seen; though she then paused to lower her spare boats to pull all in that missing boat wore off that Captain''s best coat; mayhap, his pious whale-ships cruising after one missing whale-boat in the height conjure"--here exclaimed the stranger Captain to Ahab, who thus far had Captain''s sons among the number of the missing boat''s crew; but among the number of the other boat''s crews, at the same time, but on the missing boy; a little lad, but twelve years old, whose father with the boy, Captain Ahab--though but a child, and nestling safely at home now--a strangers: then brace forward again, and let the ship sail as before." boat, and returned to his ship. chapter-131 (Ahab moving to go on deck; Pip catches him by the hand to follow.) "Lad, lad, I tell thee thou must not follow Ahab now. coming when Ahab would not scare thee from him, yet would not have thee There is that in thee, poor lad, which I feel too curing to my Do thou abide below here, where they shall serve thee, as if thou wert the captain. Aye, lad, thou shalt sit here in my own "They tell me, sir, that Stubb did once desert poor little Pip, whose "If thou speakest thus to me much more, Ahab''s purpose keels up in him. Listen, and thou wilt often hear my ivory foot upon the deck, and still thee; and if it come to that,--God for ever save thee, let what will (Ahab goes; Pip steps one step forward.) up again, captains, and let''s drink shame upon all cowards! chapter-132 deck, ever conscious that the old man''s despot eye was on them. even as Ahab''s eyes so awed the crew''s, the inscrutable Parsee''s glance Nor, at any time, by night or day could the mariners now step up the stood, however the days and nights were added on, that he had not swung single hail, they stood far parted in the starlight; Ahab in his from aft--"Man the mast-heads!"--and all through the day, till after that end yet in his hand and standing beside the pin, he looked round rope, sir--I give it into thy hands, Starbuck." Then arranging his royal mast, Ahab gazed abroad upon the sea for miles and miles,--ahead, Now, the first time Ahab was perched aloft; ere he had been there ten incommodiously close round the manned mast-heads of whalemen in these being posted at the mizen-mast-head, stood directly behind Ahab, though Ahab''s hat was never restored; the wild hawk flew on chapter-133 THE PEQUOD MEETS THE DELIGHT The intense Pequod sailed on; the rolling waves and days went by; the life-buoy-coffin still lightly swung; and another ship, most miserably whaling-ships, cross the quarter-deck at the height of eight or nine Upon the stranger''s shears were beheld the shattered, white ribs, and some few splintered planks, of what had once been a whale-boat; but you "Hast seen the White Whale?" fin, where the White Whale most feels his accursed life!" hammock--"I bury but one of five stout men, who were alive only were buried before they died; you sail upon their tomb." Then turning God"--advancing towards the hammock with Up helm!" cried Ahab like lightning to his men. But the suddenly started Pequod was not quick enough to escape the As Ahab now glided from the dejected Delight, the strange life-buoy look yonder, men!" cried a foreboding voice in her wake. chapter-134 man-like sea heaved with long strong lingering swells as Samson''s oblivious were ye of old Ahab''s close-coiled woe! Starbuck saw the old man; saw him how he heavily leaned over the side; for forty years has Ahab Aye and yes, Starbuck, out of those forty years I have not whole oceans away, from that young girl-wife I wedded past fifty, and which, for a thousand lowerings old Ahab has furiously, foamingly stand close to me, Starbuck; let me look into a human eye; it is better than to gaze into sea or sky; better than to the magic glass, man; I see my wife and my child in thine eye. the far away home I see in that eye! grand old heart, after all! youth; even as thine, sir, are the wife and child of thy loving, Come, my Captain, study out the course, and let us away! chapter-135 up the sea air as a sagacious ship''s dog will, in drawing nigh to some "And did none of ye see it before?" cried Ahab, hailing the perched men "I saw him almost that same instant, sir, that Captain Ahab did, and I "He is heading straight to leeward, sir," cried Stubb, "right away from "An hour," said Ahab, standing rooted in his boat''s stern; and he gazed its bow, by anticipation, was made to face the whale''s head while yet pearl-white of the inside of the jaw was within six inches of Ahab''s helpless Ahab''s head was seen, like a tossed bubble which the least and was now so nigh, that Ahab in the water hailed her;--Sail on the--but Dragged into Stubb''s boat with blood-shot, blinded eyes, the white time, lying all crushed in the bottom of Stubb''s boat, like one trodden a fresh hand to the fore-mast head, and see it manned till chapter-136 of the chase had by this time worked them bubblingly up, like old wine other thing for the whale-spout, as the event itself soon proved; for immeasureable bravadoes the White Whale tossed himself salmon-like to cried Ahab, "thy hour "Lower away," he cried, so soon as he had reached his boat--a spare one, Ahab''s boat was central; and cheering his men, he told boats were plain as the ship''s three masts to his eye; the White Whale concreted perils,--Ahab''s yet unstricken boat seemed drawn up towards from the sea, the White Whale dashed his broad forehead against its nor man, nor fiend, can so much as graze old Ahab in his own proper and "Aye, sir," said Stubb--"caught among the tangles of your line--I thought iron, men, the white whale''s--no, no, no,--blistered fool; this hand did hands to the rigging of the boats--collect the oars--harpooneers! chapter-137 "D''ye see him?" cried Ahab; but the whale was not yet in sight. to-night, when the white whale lies down there, tied by head and tail." In an instant the boat was pulling round close under the stern. there!--keep thy keenest eye upon the boats:--mark well the whale!--Ho! The boats had not gone very far, when by a signal from the mast-heads--a downward pointed arm, Ahab knew that the whale had sounded; but "Give way!" cried Ahab to the oarsmen, and the boats darted forward to mast-heads; while the oarsmen were rocking in the two staved boats sledge-hammering seas, the before whale-smitten bow-ends of two planks The hearse!--the second hearse!" cried Ahab from the boat; off the other bow, but within a few yards of Ahab''s boat, where, for a form folded in the flag of Ahab, went down with his ship, which, like chapter-138 the Fates ordained to take the place of Ahab''s bowsman, when that bowsman assumed the vacant post; the same, who, when on the last day So, floating on the margin of the ensuing scene, and in full sight of it, when the half-spent suction of the sunk ship reached me, I When I reached contracting towards the button-like black bubble at the axis of that slowly wheeling circle, like another Ixion I did revolve. that vital centre, the black bubble upward burst; and now, liberated by with great force, the coffin life-buoy shot lengthwise from the sea, fell over, and floated by my side. Buoyed up by that coffin, for almost one whole day and night, I floated on a soft and dirge-like main. the savage sea-hawks sailed with sheathed beaks. On the second day, a sail drew near, nearer, and picked me up at last.