{"id":"01KFNR8730CG5FT3KCM173M6PK","cid":"bafkreiagm5uqw2smrld7aah2uoyc2rdjxz6fgdg2vsl2lh4uepq423ebba","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":5022,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:01.923Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 0","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":4962,"text":"\r\nCHAPTER 26. Knights and Squires.\r\n\r\nThe chief mate of the Pequod was Starbuck, a native of Nantucket, and a\r\nQuaker by descent. He was a long, earnest man, and though born on an\r\nicy coast, seemed well adapted to endure hot latitudes, his flesh being\r\nhard as twice-baked biscuit. Transported to the Indies, his live blood\r\nwould not spoil like bottled ale. He must have been born in some time\r\nof general drought and famine, or upon one of those fast days for which\r\nhis state is famous. Only some thirty arid summers had he seen; those\r\nsummers had dried up all his physical superfluousness. But this, his\r\nthinness, so to speak, seemed no more the token of wasting anxieties\r\nand cares, than it seemed the indication of any bodily blight. It was\r\nmerely the condensation of the man. He was by no means ill-looking;\r\nquite the contrary. His pure tight skin was an excellent fit; and\r\nclosely wrapped up in it, and embalmed with inner health and strength,\r\nlike a revivified Egyptian, this Starbuck seemed prepared to endure for\r\nlong ages to come, and to endure always, as now; for be it Polar snow\r\nor torrid sun, like a patent chronometer, his interior vitality was\r\nwarranted to do well in all climates. Looking into his eyes, you seemed\r\nto see there the yet lingering images of those thousand-fold perils he\r\nhad calmly confronted through life. A staid, steadfast man, whose life\r\nfor the most part was a telling pantomime of action, and not a tame\r\nchapter of sounds. Yet, for all his hardy sobriety and fortitude, there\r\nwere certain qualities in him which at times affected, and in some\r\ncases seemed well nigh to overbalance all the rest. Uncommonly\r\nconscientious for a seaman, and endued with a deep natural reverence,\r\nthe wild watery loneliness of his life did therefore strongly incline\r\nhim to superstition; but to that sort of superstition, which in some\r\norganizations seems rather to spring, somehow, from intelligence than\r\nfrom ignorance. Outward portents and inward presentiments were his. And\r\nif at times these things bent the welded iron of his soul, much more\r\ndid his far-away domestic memories of his young Cape wife and child,\r\ntend to bend him still more from the original ruggedness of his nature,\r\nand open him still further to those latent influences which, in some\r\nhonest-hearted men, restrain the gush of dare-devil daring, so often\r\nevinced by others in the more perilous vicissitudes of the fishery. “I\r\nwill have no man in my boat,” said Starbuck, “who is not afraid of a\r\nwhale.” By this, he seemed to mean, not only that the most reliable and\r\nuseful courage was that which arises from the fair estimation of the\r\nencountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is a far more\r\ndangerous comrade than a coward.\r\n\r\n“Aye, aye,” said Stubb, the second mate, “Starbuck, there, is as\r\ncareful a man as you’ll find anywhere in this fishery.” But we shall\r\nere long see what that word “careful” precisely means when used by a\r\nman like Stubb, or almost any other whale hunter.\r\n\r\nStarbuck was no crusader after perils; in him courage was not a\r\nsentiment; but a thing simply useful to him, and always at hand upon\r\nall mortally practical occasions. Besides, he thought, perhaps, that in\r\nthis business of whaling, courage was one of the great staple outfits\r\nof the ship, like her beef and her bread, and not to be foolishly\r\nwasted. Wherefore he had no fancy for lowering for whales after\r\nsun-down; nor for persisting in fighting a fish that too much persisted\r\nin fighting him. For, thought Starbuck, I am here in this critical\r\nocean to kill whales for my living, and not to be killed by them for\r\ntheirs; and that hundreds of men had been so killed Starbuck well knew.\r\nWhat doom was his own father’s? Where, in the bottomless deeps, could\r\nhe find the torn limbs of his brother?\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 0"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR84D74WTRW5EZ09NBH2JH","peer_label":"26","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR84D74WTRW5EZ09NBH2JH","peer_label":"26","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"partOf"},{"peer":"01KFNR81RMVAX2BBMMBW51V97D","peer_label":"Moby Dick; Or, The Whale","peer_type":"novel","predicate":"partOf"},{"peer":"01KFNR0H0Q791Y1SMZWEQ09FGV","peer_label":"Moby Dick","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KFNR8712PTE1ASP85TPSV91A","peer_label":"Chunk 1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:02.742Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:15.217Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}