- char_end
- 732929
- char_start
- 725255
- chunk_index
- 102
- chunk_total
- 178
- estimated_tokens
- 1919
- source_file_key
- moby-dick
- text
- sharp—ain’t you all ready there? Well, then, pull ahead, and let’s get
the whale alongside.”
“I think I remember some such story as you were telling,” said Flask,
when at last the two boats were slowly advancing with their burden
towards the ship, “but I can’t remember where.”
“Three Spaniards? Adventures of those three bloody-minded soldadoes?
Did ye read it there, Flask? I guess ye did?”
“No: never saw such a book; heard of it, though. But now, tell me,
Stubb, do you suppose that that devil you was speaking of just now, was
the same you say is now on board the Pequod?”
“Am I the same man that helped kill this whale? Doesn’t the devil live
for ever; who ever heard that the devil was dead? Did you ever see any
parson a wearing mourning for the devil? And if the devil has a
latch-key to get into the admiral’s cabin, don’t you suppose he can
crawl into a porthole? Tell me that, Mr. Flask?”
“How old do you suppose Fedallah is, Stubb?”
“Do you see that mainmast there?” pointing to the ship; “well, that’s
the figure one; now take all the hoops in the Pequod’s hold, and string
along in a row with that mast, for oughts, do you see; well, that
wouldn’t begin to be Fedallah’s age. Nor all the coopers in creation
couldn’t show hoops enough to make oughts enough.”
“But see here, Stubb, I thought you a little boasted just now, that you
meant to give Fedallah a sea-toss, if you got a good chance. Now, if
he’s so old as all those hoops of yours come to, and if he is going to
live for ever, what good will it do to pitch him overboard—tell me
that?
“Give him a good ducking, anyhow.”
“But he’d crawl back.”
“Duck him again; and keep ducking him.”
“Suppose he should take it into his head to duck you, though—yes, and
drown you—what then?”
“I should like to see him try it; I’d give him such a pair of black
eyes that he wouldn’t dare to show his face in the admiral’s cabin
again for a long while, let alone down in the orlop there, where he
lives, and hereabouts on the upper decks where he sneaks so much. Damn
the devil, Flask; so you suppose I’m afraid of the devil? Who’s afraid
of him, except the old governor who daresn’t catch him and put him in
double-darbies, as he deserves, but lets him go about kidnapping
people; aye, and signed a bond with him, that all the people the devil
kidnapped, he’d roast for him? There’s a governor!”
“Do you suppose Fedallah wants to kidnap Captain Ahab?”
“Do I suppose it? You’ll know it before long, Flask. But I am going now
to keep a sharp look-out on him; and if I see anything very suspicious
going on, I’ll just take him by the nape of his neck, and say—Look
here, Beelzebub, you don’t do it; and if he makes any fuss, by the Lord
I’ll make a grab into his pocket for his tail, take it to the capstan,
and give him such a wrenching and heaving, that his tail will come
short off at the stump—do you see; and then, I rather guess when he
finds himself docked in that queer fashion, he’ll sneak off without the
poor satisfaction of feeling his tail between his legs.”
“And what will you do with the tail, Stubb?”
“Do with it? Sell it for an ox whip when we get home;—what else?”
“Now, do you mean what you say, and have been saying all along, Stubb?”
“Mean or not mean, here we are at the ship.”
The boats were here hailed, to tow the whale on the larboard side,
where fluke chains and other necessaries were already prepared for
securing him.
“Didn’t I tell you so?” said Flask; “yes, you’ll soon see this right
whale’s head hoisted up opposite that parmacetti’s.”
In good time, Flask’s saying proved true. As before, the Pequod steeply
leaned over towards the sperm whale’s head, now, by the counterpoise of
both heads, she regained her even keel; though sorely strained, you may
well believe. So, when on one side you hoist in Locke’s head, you go
over that way; but now, on the other side, hoist in Kant’s and you come
back again; but in very poor plight. Thus, some minds for ever keep
trimming boat. Oh, ye foolish! throw all these thunder-heads overboard,
and then you will float light and right.
In disposing of the body of a right whale, when brought alongside the
ship, the same preliminary proceedings commonly take place as in the
case of a sperm whale; only, in the latter instance, the head is cut
off whole, but in the former the lips and tongue are separately removed
and hoisted on deck, with all the well known black bone attached to
what is called the crown-piece. But nothing like this, in the present
case, had been done. The carcases of both whales had dropped astern;
and the head-laden ship not a little resembled a mule carrying a pair
of overburdening panniers.
Meantime, Fedallah was calmly eyeing the right whale’s head, and ever
and anon glancing from the deep wrinkles there to the lines in his own
hand. And Ahab chanced so to stand, that the Parsee occupied his
shadow; while, if the Parsee’s shadow was there at all it seemed only
to blend with, and lengthen Ahab’s. As the crew toiled on, Laplandish
speculations were bandied among them, concerning all these passing
things.
CHAPTER 74. The Sperm Whale’s Head—Contrasted View.
Here, now, are two great whales, laying their heads together; let us
join them, and lay together our own.
Of the grand order of folio leviathans, the Sperm Whale and the Right
Whale are by far the most noteworthy. They are the only whales
regularly hunted by man. To the Nantucketer, they present the two
extremes of all the known varieties of the whale. As the external
difference between them is mainly observable in their heads; and as a
head of each is this moment hanging from the Pequod’s side; and as we
may freely go from one to the other, by merely stepping across the
deck:—where, I should like to know, will you obtain a better chance to
study practical cetology than here?
In the first place, you are struck by the general contrast between
these heads. Both are massive enough in all conscience; but there is a
certain mathematical symmetry in the Sperm Whale’s which the Right
Whale’s sadly lacks. There is more character in the Sperm Whale’s head.
As you behold it, you involuntarily yield the immense superiority to
him, in point of pervading dignity. In the present instance, too, this
dignity is heightened by the pepper and salt colour of his head at the
summit, giving token of advanced age and large experience. In short, he
is what the fishermen technically call a “grey-headed whale.”
Let us now note what is least dissimilar in these heads—namely, the two
most important organs, the eye and the ear. Far back on the side of the
head, and low down, near the angle of either whale’s jaw, if you
narrowly search, you will at last see a lashless eye, which you would
fancy to be a young colt’s eye; so out of all proportion is it to the
magnitude of the head.
Now, from this peculiar sideway position of the whale’s eyes, it is
plain that he can never see an object which is exactly ahead, no more
than he can one exactly astern. In a word, the position of the whale’s
eyes corresponds to that of a man’s ears; and you may fancy, for
yourself, how it would fare with you, did you sideways survey objects
through your ears. You would find that you could only command some
thirty degrees of vision in advance of the straight side-line of sight;
and about thirty more behind it. If your bitterest foe were walking
straight towards you, with dagger uplifted in broad day, you would not
be able to see him, any more than if he were stealing upon you from
behind.