- description
- # Troglodytes or “_holders_”
## Overview
This is a section from the novel *White-Jacket* by Herman Melville, extracted from the file [white_jacket.txt](arke:01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY). It describes a group of sailors called "Troglodytes" or "_holders_," who live and work deep within the ship. The section appears in Chapter III, "[CHAPTER III. A GLANCE AT THE PRINCIPAL DIVISIONS, INTO WHICH A MAN-OF-WAR’S CREW IS DIVIDED.](arke:01KG8AJPBDD8KW998HV70PRFQT)"
## Context
This section is part of a larger chapter that provides an overview of the various divisions within a man-of-war's crew. *White-Jacket* is included in the [Melville Complete Works](arke:01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW) collection. This section follows "[The Waisters](arke:01KG8AKV4V2VJTDCAN7S8HMRNP)" and precedes "[The Endless Subdivision of Duties and the New Sailor's Experience](arke:01KG8AKV4ZR6S9P1K8FJS72N6E)" within the chapter.
## Contents
The section describes the "Troglodytes" or "_holders_" as men who live deep within the ship, three decks down, among the water-tanks, casks, and cables. They are compared to Cornwall miners, pale as ghosts from lack of sunlight. The text emphasizes their isolation and lack of interaction with the outside world, comparing their experience to Jonah in the whale's belly. They are depicted as a lazy and torpid group, strangers to others on the ship, and only emerging during times of crisis, like the "mysterious old men of Paris, during the massacre of the Three Days of September."
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- Troglodytes or “_holders_”
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- text
- Three decks down—spar-deck, gun-deck, and berth-deck—and we come to a
parcel of Troglodytes or “_holders_,” who burrow, like rabbits in
warrens, among the water-tanks, casks, and cables. Like Cornwall
miners, wash off the soot from their skins, and they are all pale as
ghosts. Unless upon rare occasions, they seldom come on deck to sun
themselves. They may circumnavigate the world fifty times, and they see
about as much of it as Jonah did in the whale’s belly. They are a lazy,
lumpish, torpid set; and when going ashore after a long cruise, come
out into the day like terrapins from their caves, or bears in the
spring, from tree-trunks. No one ever knows the names of these fellows;
after a three years’ voyage, they still remain strangers to you. In
time of tempests, when all hands are called to save ship, they issue
forth into the gale, like the mysterious old men of Paris, during the
massacre of the Three Days of September: every one marvels who they
are, and whence they come; they disappear as mysteriously; and are seen
no more, until another general commotion.
- title
- Troglodytes or “_holders_”