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- CHAPTER 108. Ahab and the Carpenter.
The Deck—First Night Watch.
(_Carpenter standing before his vice-bench, and by the light of two
lanterns busily filing the ivory joist for the leg, which joist is
firmly fixed in the vice. Slabs of ivory, leather straps, pads, screws,
and various tools of all sorts lying about the bench. Forward, the red
flame of the forge is seen, where the blacksmith is at work._)
Drat the file, and drat the bone! That is hard which should be soft,
and that is soft which should be hard. So we go, who file old jaws and
shinbones. Let’s try another. Aye, now, this works better (_sneezes_).
Halloa, this bone dust is (_sneezes_)—why it’s (_sneezes_)—yes it’s
(_sneezes_)—bless my soul, it won’t let me speak! This is what an old
fellow gets now for working in dead lumber. Saw a live tree, and you
don’t get this dust; amputate a live bone, and you don’t get it
(_sneezes_). Come, come, you old Smut, there, bear a hand, and let’s
have that ferule and buckle-screw; I’ll be ready for them presently.
Lucky now (_sneezes_) there’s no knee-joint to make; that might puzzle
a little; but a mere shinbone—why it’s easy as making hop-poles; only I
should like to put a good finish on. Time, time; if I but only had the
time, I could turn him out as neat a leg now as ever (_sneezes_)
scraped to a lady in a parlor. Those buckskin legs and calves of legs
I’ve seen in shop windows wouldn’t compare at all. They soak water,
they do; and of course get rheumatic, and have to be doctored
(_sneezes_) with washes and lotions, just like live legs. There; before
I saw it off, now, I must call his old Mogulship, and see whether the
length will be all right; too short, if anything, I guess. Ha! that’s
the heel; we are in luck; here he comes, or it’s somebody else, that’s
certain.
AHAB (_advancing_). (_During the ensuing scene, the carpenter continues
sneezing at times._)
Well, manmaker!
Just in time, sir. If the captain pleases, I will now mark the length.
Let me measure, sir.
Measured for a leg! good. Well, it’s not the first time. About it!
There; keep thy finger on it. This is a cogent vice thou hast here,
carpenter; let me feel its grip once. So, so; it does pinch some.
Oh, sir, it will break bones—beware, beware!
No fear; I like a good grip; I like to feel something in this slippery
world that can hold, man. What’s Prometheus about there?—the
blacksmith, I mean—what’s he about?
He must be forging the buckle-screw, sir, now.
Right. It’s a partnership; he supplies the muscle part. He makes a
fierce red flame there!
Aye, sir; he must have the white heat for this kind of fine work.
Um-m. So he must. I do deem it now a most meaning thing, that that old
Greek, Prometheus, who made men, they say, should have been a
blacksmith, and animated them with fire; for what’s made in fire must
properly belong to fire; and so hell’s probable. How the soot flies!
This must be the remainder the Greek made the Africans of. Carpenter,
when he’s through with that buckle, tell him to forge a pair of steel
shoulder-blades; there’s a pedlar aboard with a crushing pack.
Sir?
Hold; while Prometheus is about it, I’ll order a complete man after a
desirable pattern. Imprimis, fifty feet high in his socks; then, chest
modelled after the Thames Tunnel; then, legs with roots to ’em, to stay
in one place; then, arms three feet through the wrist; no heart at all,
brass forehead, and about a quarter of an acre of fine brains; and let
me see—shall I order eyes to see outwards? No, but put a sky-light on
top of his head to illuminate inwards. There, take the order, and away.
Now, what’s he speaking about, and who’s he speaking to, I should like
to know? Shall I keep standing here? (_aside_).
’Tis but indifferent architecture to make a blind dome; here’s one. No,
no, no; I must have a lantern.
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