{"id":"01KFNR8B9NFHAGXAAMZQ8FFYH4","cid":"bafkreia7iuiihul2zcbow7etisogktgonkh5lxofas2szwvq4dnrh6mkxa","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":21669,"extracted_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:06.422Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KFNR0Z394A878Y5AQ63MQEM2","start_line":21603,"text":"flood;—and I feel now like a billow that’s all one crested comb,\r\nStarbuck. I am old;—shake hands with me, man.”\r\n\r\nTheir hands met; their eyes fastened; Starbuck’s tears the glue.\r\n\r\n“Oh, my captain, my captain!—noble heart—go not—go not!—see, it’s a\r\nbrave man that weeps; how great the agony of the persuasion then!”\r\n\r\n“Lower away!”—cried Ahab, tossing the mate’s arm from him. “Stand by\r\nthe crew!”\r\n\r\nIn an instant the boat was pulling round close under the stern.\r\n\r\n“The sharks! the sharks!” cried a voice from the low cabin-window\r\nthere; “O master, my master, come back!”\r\n\r\nBut Ahab heard nothing; for his own voice was high-lifted then; and the\r\nboat leaped on.\r\n\r\nYet the voice spake true; for scarce had he pushed from the ship, when\r\nnumbers of sharks, seemingly rising from out the dark waters beneath\r\nthe hull, maliciously snapped at the blades of the oars, every time\r\nthey dipped in the water; and in this way accompanied the boat with\r\ntheir bites. It is a thing not uncommonly happening to the whale-boats\r\nin those swarming seas; the sharks at times apparently following them\r\nin the same prescient way that vultures hover over the banners of\r\nmarching regiments in the east. But these were the first sharks that\r\nhad been observed by the Pequod since the White Whale had been first\r\ndescried; and whether it was that Ahab’s crew were all such\r\ntiger-yellow barbarians, and therefore their flesh more musky to the\r\nsenses of the sharks—a matter sometimes well known to affect\r\nthem,—however it was, they seemed to follow that one boat without\r\nmolesting the others.\r\n\r\n“Heart of wrought steel!” murmured Starbuck gazing over the side, and\r\nfollowing with his eyes the receding boat—“canst thou yet ring boldly\r\nto that sight?—lowering thy keel among ravening sharks, and followed by\r\nthem, open-mouthed to the chase; and this the critical third day?—For\r\nwhen three days flow together in one continuous intense pursuit; be\r\nsure the first is the morning, the second the noon, and the third the\r\nevening and the end of that thing—be that end what it may. Oh! my God!\r\nwhat is this that shoots through me, and leaves me so deadly calm, yet\r\nexpectant,—fixed at the top of a shudder! Future things swim before me,\r\nas in empty outlines and skeletons; all the past is somehow grown dim.\r\nMary, girl! thou fadest in pale glories behind me; boy! I seem to see\r\nbut thy eyes grown wondrous blue. Strangest problems of life seem\r\nclearing; but clouds sweep between—Is my journey’s end coming? My legs\r\nfeel faint; like his who has footed it all day. Feel thy heart,—beats\r\nit yet? Stir thyself, Starbuck!—stave it off—move, move! speak\r\naloud!—Mast-head there! See ye my boy’s hand on the hill?—Crazed;—aloft\r\nthere!—keep thy keenest eye upon the boats:—mark well the whale!—Ho!\r\nagain!—drive off that hawk! see! he pecks—he tears the vane”—pointing\r\nto the red flag flying at the main-truck—“Ha! he soars away with\r\nit!—Where’s the old man now? see’st thou that sight, oh Ahab!—shudder,\r\nshudder!”\r\n\r\nThe boats had not gone very far, when by a signal from the mast-heads—a\r\ndownward pointed arm, Ahab knew that the whale had sounded; but\r\nintending to be near him at the next rising, he held on his way a\r\nlittle sideways from the vessel; the becharmed crew maintaining the\r\nprofoundest silence, as the head-beat waves hammered and hammered\r\nagainst the opposing bow.\r\n\r\n“Drive, drive in your nails, oh ye waves! to their uttermost heads\r\ndrive them in! ye but strike a thing without a lid; and no coffin and\r\nno hearse can be mine:—and hemp only can kill me! Ha! ha!”\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFNR85GMZ5CEWAKR35G2W28B","peer_label":"135","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KFNR85GMZ5CEWAKR35G2W28B","peer_label":"135","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":"01KFNR8B9VFHXE6WDTBDE2XT0E","peer_label":"Chunk 3","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KFNR8B99X36HZ6AGZC7E05FB","peer_label":"Chunk 1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-23T15:41:06.886Z","ts":"2026-01-23T15:41:18.917Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}