{"id":"01KFNR89KVJP55F03QTRF0TXZV","cid":"bafkreiaekylae7yhtnzy3mcx7wloiykbvorereoze5o7u4rx6qplvywoqi","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":15367,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:04.765Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 41","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":15309,"text":"the whales, who sometimes come to deadly battle, and all for love. They\r\nfence with their long lower jaws, sometimes locking them together, and\r\nso striving for the supremacy like elks that warringly interweave their\r\nantlers. Not a few are captured having the deep scars of these\r\nencounters,—furrowed heads, broken teeth, scolloped fins; and in some\r\ninstances, wrenched and dislocated mouths.\r\n\r\nBut supposing the invader of domestic bliss to betake himself away at\r\nthe first rush of the harem’s lord, then is it very diverting to watch\r\nthat lord. Gently he insinuates his vast bulk among them again and\r\nrevels there awhile, still in tantalizing vicinity to young Lothario,\r\nlike pious Solomon devoutly worshipping among his thousand concubines.\r\nGranting other whales to be in sight, the fishermen will seldom give\r\nchase to one of these Grand Turks; for these Grand Turks are too lavish\r\nof their strength, and hence their unctuousness is small. As for the\r\nsons and the daughters they beget, why, those sons and daughters must\r\ntake care of themselves; at least, with only the maternal help. For\r\nlike certain other omnivorous roving lovers that might be named, my\r\nLord Whale has no taste for the nursery, however much for the bower;\r\nand so, being a great traveller, he leaves his anonymous babies all\r\nover the world; every baby an exotic. In good time, nevertheless, as\r\nthe ardour of youth declines; as years and dumps increase; as\r\nreflection lends her solemn pauses; in short, as a general lassitude\r\novertakes the sated Turk; then a love of ease and virtue supplants the\r\nlove for maidens; our Ottoman enters upon the impotent, repentant,\r\nadmonitory stage of life, forswears, disbands the harem, and grown to\r\nan exemplary, sulky old soul, goes about all alone among the meridians\r\nand parallels saying his prayers, and warning each young Leviathan from\r\nhis amorous errors.\r\n\r\nNow, as the harem of whales is called by the fishermen a school, so is\r\nthe lord and master of that school technically known as the\r\nschoolmaster. It is therefore not in strict character, however\r\nadmirably satirical, that after going to school himself, he should then\r\ngo abroad inculcating not what he learned there, but the folly of it.\r\nHis title, schoolmaster, would very naturally seem derived from the\r\nname bestowed upon the harem itself, but some have surmised that the\r\nman who first thus entitled this sort of Ottoman whale, must have read\r\nthe memoirs of Vidocq, and informed himself what sort of a\r\ncountry-schoolmaster that famous Frenchman was in his younger days, and\r\nwhat was the nature of those occult lessons he inculcated into some of\r\nhis pupils.\r\n\r\nThe same secludedness and isolation to which the schoolmaster whale\r\nbetakes himself in his advancing years, is true of all aged Sperm\r\nWhales. Almost universally, a lone whale—as a solitary Leviathan is\r\ncalled—proves an ancient one. Like venerable moss-bearded Daniel Boone,\r\nhe will have no one near him but Nature herself; and her he takes to\r\nwife in the wilderness of waters, and the best of wives she is, though\r\nshe keeps so many moody secrets.\r\n\r\nThe schools composing none but young and vigorous males, previously\r\nmentioned, offer a strong contrast to the harem schools. For while\r\nthose female whales are characteristically timid, the young males, or\r\nforty-barrel-bulls, as they call them, are by far the most pugnacious\r\nof all Leviathans, and proverbially the most dangerous to encounter;\r\nexcepting those wondrous grey-headed, grizzled whales, sometimes met,\r\nand these will fight you like grim fiends exasperated by a penal gout.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 41"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR84AAHSNQ4BFJ0ASPHB53","peer_label":"76","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR84AAHSNQ4BFJ0ASPHB53","peer_label":"76","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":"01KFNR89MCCXA7158BN3SXA46E","peer_label":"Chunk 42","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KFNR89M32BNY7VZT8GH2D1G7","peer_label":"Chunk 40","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:05.248Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:17.661Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}