{"id":"01KFNR88EE9ZGGH6115HPTNY4T","cid":"bafkreibgma3l5e2axthza3736iy7j73w27g66yw4uajqvsfa3p4ifvbjdy","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":7305,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:03.421Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 0","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":7255,"text":"CHAPTER 41. Moby Dick.\r\n\r\nI, Ishmael, was one of that crew; my shouts had gone up with the rest;\r\nmy oath had been welded with theirs; and stronger I shouted, and more\r\ndid I hammer and clinch my oath, because of the dread in my soul. A\r\nwild, mystical, sympathetical feeling was in me; Ahab’s quenchless feud\r\nseemed mine. With greedy ears I learned the history of that murderous\r\nmonster against whom I and all the others had taken our oaths of\r\nviolence and revenge.\r\n\r\nFor some time past, though at intervals only, the unaccompanied,\r\nsecluded White Whale had haunted those uncivilized seas mostly\r\nfrequented by the Sperm Whale fishermen. But not all of them knew of\r\nhis existence; only a few of them, comparatively, had knowingly seen\r\nhim; while the number who as yet had actually and knowingly given\r\nbattle to him, was small indeed. For, owing to the large number of\r\nwhale-cruisers; the disorderly way they were sprinkled over the entire\r\nwatery circumference, many of them adventurously pushing their quest\r\nalong solitary latitudes, so as seldom or never for a whole twelvemonth\r\nor more on a stretch, to encounter a single news-telling sail of any\r\nsort; the inordinate length of each separate voyage; the irregularity\r\nof the times of sailing from home; all these, with other circumstances,\r\ndirect and indirect, long obstructed the spread through the whole\r\nworld-wide whaling-fleet of the special individualizing tidings\r\nconcerning Moby Dick. It was hardly to be doubted, that several vessels\r\nreported to have encountered, at such or such a time, or on such or\r\nsuch a meridian, a Sperm Whale of uncommon magnitude and malignity,\r\nwhich whale, after doing great mischief to his assailants, had\r\ncompletely escaped them; to some minds it was not an unfair\r\npresumption, I say, that the whale in question must have been no other\r\nthan Moby Dick. Yet as of late the Sperm Whale fishery had been marked\r\nby various and not unfrequent instances of great ferocity, cunning, and\r\nmalice in the monster attacked; therefore it was, that those who by\r\naccident ignorantly gave battle to Moby Dick; such hunters, perhaps,\r\nfor the most part, were content to ascribe the peculiar terror he bred,\r\nmore, as it were, to the perils of the Sperm Whale fishery at large,\r\nthan to the individual cause. In that way, mostly, the disastrous\r\nencounter between Ahab and the whale had hitherto been popularly\r\nregarded.\r\n\r\nAnd as for those who, previously hearing of the White Whale, by chance\r\ncaught sight of him; in the beginning of the thing they had every one\r\nof them, almost, as boldly and fearlessly lowered for him, as for any\r\nother whale of that species. But at length, such calamities did ensue\r\nin these assaults—not restricted to sprained wrists and ankles, broken\r\nlimbs, or devouring amputations—but fatal to the last degree of\r\nfatality; those repeated disastrous repulses, all accumulating and\r\npiling their terrors upon Moby Dick; those things had gone far to shake\r\nthe fortitude of many brave hunters, to whom the story of the White\r\nWhale had eventually come.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 0"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR84DQHQD30H34NJMFZQMH","peer_label":"41","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR84DQHQD30H34NJMFZQMH","peer_label":"41","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":"01KFNR88DP3YVEVMFH76S9993X","peer_label":"Chunk 1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:03.932Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:16.554Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}