{"id":"01KG8AP3V58PTF81N0BWTFJN4F","cid":"bafkreifovfloa7ul6klogvou6onvzungznc5b44kpwzfd7y2uxbcoc3o5m","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":1250,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:49:30.764Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 5","source_file":"01KG89J198KE6FY8WPVJQQRCZ6","start_line":1186,"text":"partly based upon the aggregated opinions of many aged persons with\r\nwhom I conversed upon the subject. The picture represents a Cape-Horner\r\nin a great hurricane; the half-foundered ship weltering there with its\r\nthree dismantled masts alone visible; and an exasperated whale,\r\npurposing to spring clean over the craft, is in the enormous act of\r\nimpaling himself upon the three mast-heads.\r\n\r\nThe opposite wall of this entry was hung all over with a heathenish\r\narray of monstrous clubs and spears. Some were thickly set with\r\nglittering teeth resembling ivory saws; others were tufted with knots\r\nof human hair; and one was sickle-shaped, with a vast handle sweeping\r\nround like the segment made in the new-mown grass by a long-armed\r\nmower. You shuddered as you gazed, and wondered what monstrous cannibal\r\nand savage could ever have gone a death-harvesting with such a hacking,\r\nhorrifying implement. Mixed with these were rusty old whaling lances\r\nand harpoons all broken and deformed. Some were storied weapons. With\r\nthis once long lance, now wildly elbowed, fifty years ago did Nathan\r\nSwain kill fifteen whales between a sunrise and a sunset. And that\r\nharpoon—so like a corkscrew now—was flung in Javan seas, and run away\r\nwith by a whale, years afterwards slain off the Cape of Blanco. The\r\noriginal iron entered nigh the tail, and, like a restless needle\r\nsojourning in the body of a man, travelled full forty feet, and at last\r\nwas found imbedded in the hump.\r\n\r\nCrossing this dusky entry, and on through yon low-arched way—cut\r\nthrough what in old times must have been a great central chimney with\r\nfireplaces all round—you enter the public room. A still duskier place\r\nis this, with such low ponderous beams above, and such old wrinkled\r\nplanks beneath, that you would almost fancy you trod some old craft’s\r\ncockpits, especially of such a howling night, when this corner-anchored\r\nold ark rocked so furiously. On one side stood a long, low, shelf-like\r\ntable covered with cracked glass cases, filled with dusty rarities\r\ngathered from this wide world’s remotest nooks. Projecting from the\r\nfurther angle of the room stands a dark-looking den—the bar—a rude\r\nattempt at a right whale’s head. Be that how it may, there stands the\r\nvast arched bone of the whale’s jaw, so wide, a coach might almost\r\ndrive beneath it. Within are shabby shelves, ranged round with old\r\ndecanters, bottles, flasks; and in those jaws of swift destruction,\r\nlike another cursed Jonah (by which name indeed they called him),\r\nbustles a little withered old man, who, for their money, dearly sells\r\nthe sailors deliriums and death.\r\n\r\nAbominable are the tumblers into which he pours his poison. Though true\r\ncylinders without—within, the villanous green goggling glasses\r\ndeceitfully tapered downwards to a cheating bottom. Parallel meridians\r\nrudely pecked into the glass, surround these footpads’ goblets. Fill to\r\n_this_ mark, and your charge is but a penny; to _this_ a penny more;\r\nand so on to the full glass—the Cape Horn measure, which you may gulp\r\ndown for a shilling.\r\n\r\nUpon entering the place I found a number of young seamen gathered about\r\na table, examining by a dim light divers specimens of _skrimshander_. I\r\nsought the landlord, and telling him I desired to be accommodated with\r\na room, received for answer that his house was full—not a bed\r\nunoccupied. “But avast,” he added, tapping his forehead, “you haint no\r\nobjections to sharing a harpooneer’s blanket, have ye? I s’pose you are\r\ngoin’ a-whalin’, so you’d better get used to that sort of thing.”\r\n\r\nI told him that I never liked to sleep two in a bed; that if I should\r\never do so, it would depend upon who the harpooneer might be, and that\r\nif he (the landlord) really had no other place for me, and the\r\nharpooneer was not decidedly objectionable, why rather than wander\r\nfurther about a strange town on so bitter a night, I would put up with\r\nthe half of any decent man’s blanket.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 5"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AK7FP6P1V67V3ATJHHZ83","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J198KE6FY8WPVJQQRCZ6","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AP3VB9MYFW6ASH082Y21Q","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AP3V5Q092D3W8VHJFPEXT","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:49:32.005Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:49:39.133Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}