{"id":"01KFNR88CFMHS2ETGY0DEZYRR7","cid":"bafkreihrexmmjk67c6ev4o3timhr6ksqnhezsdbjiki3kpryh5xs3wgxsm","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":8860,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:03.432Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":8790,"text":"“Aye, aye, sir,” cheerily cried little King-Post, sweeping round his\r\ngreat steering oar. “Lay back!” addressing his crew.\r\n“There!—there!—there again! There she blows right ahead, boys!—lay\r\nback!”\r\n\r\n“Never heed yonder yellow boys, Archy.”\r\n\r\n“Oh, I don’t mind ’em, sir,” said Archy; “I knew it all before now.\r\nDidn’t I hear ’em in the hold? And didn’t I tell Cabaco here of it?\r\nWhat say ye, Cabaco? They are stowaways, Mr. Flask.”\r\n\r\n“Pull, pull, my fine hearts-alive; pull, my children; pull, my little\r\nones,” drawlingly and soothingly sighed Stubb to his crew, some of whom\r\nstill showed signs of uneasiness. “Why don’t you break your backbones,\r\nmy boys? What is it you stare at? Those chaps in yonder boat? Tut! They\r\nare only five more hands come to help us—never mind from where—the more\r\nthe merrier. Pull, then, do pull; never mind the brimstone—devils are\r\ngood fellows enough. So, so; there you are now; that’s the stroke for a\r\nthousand pounds; that’s the stroke to sweep the stakes! Hurrah for the\r\ngold cup of sperm oil, my heroes! Three cheers, men—all hearts alive!\r\nEasy, easy; don’t be in a hurry—don’t be in a hurry. Why don’t you snap\r\nyour oars, you rascals? Bite something, you dogs! So, so, so,\r\nthen:—softly, softly! That’s it—that’s it! long and strong. Give way\r\nthere, give way! The devil fetch ye, ye ragamuffin rapscallions; ye are\r\nall asleep. Stop snoring, ye sleepers, and pull. Pull, will ye? pull,\r\ncan’t ye? pull, won’t ye? Why in the name of gudgeons and ginger-cakes\r\ndon’t ye pull?—pull and break something! pull, and start your eyes out!\r\nHere!” whipping out the sharp knife from his girdle; “every mother’s\r\nson of ye draw his knife, and pull with the blade between his teeth.\r\nThat’s it—that’s it. Now ye do something; that looks like it, my\r\nsteel-bits. Start her—start her, my silver-spoons! Start her,\r\nmarling-spikes!”\r\n\r\nStubb’s exordium to his crew is given here at large, because he had\r\nrather a peculiar way of talking to them in general, and especially in\r\ninculcating the religion of rowing. But you must not suppose from this\r\nspecimen of his sermonizings that he ever flew into downright passions\r\nwith his congregation. Not at all; and therein consisted his chief\r\npeculiarity. He would say the most terrific things to his crew, in a\r\ntone so strangely compounded of fun and fury, and the fury seemed so\r\ncalculated merely as a spice to the fun, that no oarsman could hear\r\nsuch queer invocations without pulling for dear life, and yet pulling\r\nfor the mere joke of the thing. Besides he all the time looked so easy\r\nand indolent himself, so loungingly managed his steering-oar, and so\r\nbroadly gaped—open-mouthed at times—that the mere sight of such a\r\nyawning commander, by sheer force of contrast, acted like a charm upon\r\nthe crew. Then again, Stubb was one of those odd sort of humorists,\r\nwhose jollity is sometimes so curiously ambiguous, as to put all\r\ninferiors on their guard in the matter of obeying them.\r\n\r\nIn obedience to a sign from Ahab, Starbuck was now pulling obliquely\r\nacross Stubb’s bow; and when for a minute or so the two boats were\r\npretty near to each other, Stubb hailed the mate.\r\n\r\n“Mr. Starbuck! larboard boat there, ahoy! a word with ye, sir, if ye\r\nplease!”\r\n\r\n“Halloa!” returned Starbuck, turning round not a single inch as he\r\nspoke; still earnestly but whisperingly urging his crew; his face set\r\nlike a flint from Stubb’s.\r\n\r\n“What think ye of those yellow boys, sir!”\r\n\r\n“Smuggled on board, somehow, before the ship sailed. (Strong, strong,\r\nboys!)” in a whisper to his crew, then speaking out loud again: “A sad\r\nbusiness, Mr. Stubb! (seethe her, seethe her, my lads!) but never mind,\r\nMr. Stubb, all for the best. Let all your crew pull strong, come what\r\nwill. (Spring, my men, spring!) There’s hogsheads of sperm ahead, Mr.\r\nStubb, and that’s what ye came for. (Pull, my boys!) Sperm, sperm’s the\r\nplay! This at least is duty; duty and profit hand in hand.”\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR84DWNMZE862AT9EMY2FD","peer_label":"48","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR84DWNMZE862AT9EMY2FD","peer_label":"48","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":"01KFNR88DES0AE5VN9JRPRBTPV","peer_label":"Chunk 2","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KFNR88A9DSW9ANBX8A3YZMC8","peer_label":"Chunk 0","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:04.022Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:16.562Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}