{"id":"01KFNR89RPXFFVS6JJ034TR9H4","cid":"bafkreiekh6dj2n3l5zq7skry3ogdmbr6gkvnxd6z67mt2mlovdbn52mwzq","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":11678,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:04.725Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":11614,"text":"he in that the staid Starbuck, his official superior, quietly resigned\r\nto him for the time the sole management of affairs. One small, helping\r\ncause of all this liveliness in Stubb, was soon made strangely\r\nmanifest. Stubb was a high liver; he was somewhat intemperately fond of\r\nthe whale as a flavorish thing to his palate.\r\n\r\n“A steak, a steak, ere I sleep! You, Daggoo! overboard you go, and cut\r\nme one from his small!”\r\n\r\nHere be it known, that though these wild fishermen do not, as a general\r\nthing, and according to the great military maxim, make the enemy defray\r\nthe current expenses of the war (at least before realizing the proceeds\r\nof the voyage), yet now and then you find some of these Nantucketers\r\nwho have a genuine relish for that particular part of the Sperm Whale\r\ndesignated by Stubb; comprising the tapering extremity of the body.\r\n\r\nAbout midnight that steak was cut and cooked; and lighted by two\r\nlanterns of sperm oil, Stubb stoutly stood up to his spermaceti supper\r\nat the capstan-head, as if that capstan were a sideboard. Nor was Stubb\r\nthe only banqueter on whale’s flesh that night. Mingling their\r\nmumblings with his own mastications, thousands on thousands of sharks,\r\nswarming round the dead leviathan, smackingly feasted on its fatness.\r\nThe few sleepers below in their bunks were often startled by the sharp\r\nslapping of their tails against the hull, within a few inches of the\r\nsleepers’ hearts. Peering over the side you could just see them (as\r\nbefore you heard them) wallowing in the sullen, black waters, and\r\nturning over on their backs as they scooped out huge globular pieces of\r\nthe whale of the bigness of a human head. This particular feat of the\r\nshark seems all but miraculous. How at such an apparently unassailable\r\nsurface, they contrive to gouge out such symmetrical mouthfuls, remains\r\na part of the universal problem of all things. The mark they thus leave\r\non the whale, may best be likened to the hollow made by a carpenter in\r\ncountersinking for a screw.\r\n\r\nThough amid all the smoking horror and diabolism of a sea-fight, sharks\r\nwill be seen longingly gazing up to the ship’s decks, like hungry dogs\r\nround a table where red meat is being carved, ready to bolt down every\r\nkilled man that is tossed to them; and though, while the valiant\r\nbutchers over the deck-table are thus cannibally carving each other’s\r\nlive meat with carving-knives all gilded and tasselled, the sharks,\r\nalso, with their jewel-hilted mouths, are quarrelsomely carving away\r\nunder the table at the dead meat; and though, were you to turn the\r\nwhole affair upside down, it would still be pretty much the same thing,\r\nthat is to say, a shocking sharkish business enough for all parties;\r\nand though sharks also are the invariable outriders of all slave ships\r\ncrossing the Atlantic, systematically trotting alongside, to be handy\r\nin case a parcel is to be carried anywhere, or a dead slave to be\r\ndecently buried; and though one or two other like instances might be\r\nset down, touching the set terms, places, and occasions, when sharks do\r\nmost socially congregate, and most hilariously feast; yet is there no\r\nconceivable time or occasion when you will find them in such countless\r\nnumbers, and in gayer or more jovial spirits, than around a dead sperm\r\nwhale, moored by night to a whaleship at sea. If you have never seen\r\nthat sight, then suspend your decision about the propriety of\r\ndevil-worship, and the expediency of conciliating the devil.\r\n\r\nBut, as yet, Stubb heeded not the mumblings of the banquet that was\r\ngoing on so nigh him, no more than the sharks heeded the smacking of\r\nhis own epicurean lips.\r\n\r\n“Cook, cook!—where’s that old Fleece?” he cried at length, widening his\r\nlegs still further, as if to form a more secure base for his supper;\r\nand, at the same time darting his fork into the dish, as if stabbing\r\nwith his lance; “cook, you cook!—sail this way, cook!”\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR84CD3NQN7DPAPRQS03X8","peer_label":"64","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR84CD3NQN7DPAPRQS03X8","peer_label":"64","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":"01KFNR89SJW4NWNK54KNTX8A13","peer_label":"Chunk 2","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KFNR89RYB8R16906GNF60TEH","peer_label":"Chunk 0","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:05.416Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:16.473Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}