{"id":"01KJNXJQTBCX36RYQCSBZ8R0ZP","cid":"bafkreifoxcf6bqtuvhmd46nfngjkb6nywkilrjvfw4sonn3vpbb4ozauda","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":44065,"char_start":36117,"chunk_index":5,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1987,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"Van Rensselaers, or Randolphs, or Hardicanutes. And more than all, if\r\njust previous to putting your hand into the tar-pot, you have been\r\nlording it as a country schoolmaster, making the tallest boys stand in\r\nawe of you. The transition is a keen one, I assure you, from a\r\nschoolmaster to a sailor, and requires a strong decoction of Seneca and\r\nthe Stoics to enable you to grin and bear it. But even this wears off\r\nin time.\r\n\r\nWhat of it, if some old hunks of a sea-captain orders me to get a broom\r\nand sweep down the decks? What does that indignity amount to, weighed,\r\nI mean, in the scales of the New Testament? Do you think the archangel\r\nGabriel thinks anything the less of me, because I promptly and\r\nrespectfully obey that old hunks in that particular instance? Who ain’t\r\na slave? Tell me that. Well, then, however the old sea-captains may\r\norder me about—however they may thump and punch me about, I have the\r\nsatisfaction of knowing that it is all right; that everybody else is\r\none way or other served in much the same way—either in a physical or\r\nmetaphysical point of view, that is; and so the universal thump is\r\npassed round, and all hands should rub each other’s shoulder-blades,\r\nand be content.\r\n\r\nAgain, I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of\r\npaying me for my trouble, whereas they never pay passengers a single\r\npenny that I ever heard of. On the contrary, passengers themselves must\r\npay. And there is all the difference in the world between paying and\r\nbeing paid. The act of paying is perhaps the most uncomfortable\r\ninfliction that the two orchard thieves entailed upon us. But _being\r\npaid_,—what will compare with it? The urbane activity with which a man\r\nreceives money is really marvellous, considering that we so earnestly\r\nbelieve money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no\r\naccount can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! how cheerfully we consign\r\nourselves to perdition!\r\n\r\nFinally, I always go to sea as a sailor, because of the wholesome\r\nexercise and pure air of the fore-castle deck. For as in this world,\r\nhead winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if\r\nyou never violate the Pythagorean maxim), so for the most part the\r\nCommodore on the quarter-deck gets his atmosphere at second hand from\r\nthe sailors on the forecastle. He thinks he breathes it first; but not\r\nso. In much the same way do the commonalty lead their leaders in many\r\nother things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it. But\r\nwherefore it was that after having repeatedly smelt the sea as a\r\nmerchant sailor, I should now take it into my head to go on a whaling\r\nvoyage; this the invisible police officer of the Fates, who has the\r\nconstant surveillance of me, and secretly dogs me, and influences me in\r\nsome unaccountable way—he can better answer than any one else. And,\r\ndoubtless, my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of the grand\r\nprogramme of Providence that was drawn up a long time ago. It came in\r\nas a sort of brief interlude and solo between more extensive\r\nperformances. I take it that this part of the bill must have run\r\nsomething like this:\r\n\r\n“_Grand Contested Election for the Presidency of the United States._\r\n“WHALING VOYAGE BY ONE ISHMAEL. “BLOODY BATTLE IN AFFGHANISTAN.”\r\n\r\nThough I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the\r\nFates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when\r\nothers were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short\r\nand easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in farces—though I\r\ncannot tell why this was exactly; yet, now that I recall all the\r\ncircumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives\r\nwhich being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced\r\nme to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the\r\ndelusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill\r\nand discriminating judgment.\r\n\r\nChief among these motives was the overwhelming idea of the great whale\r\nhimself. Such a portentous and mysterious monster roused all my\r\ncuriosity. Then the wild and distant seas where he rolled his island\r\nbulk; the undeliverable, nameless perils of the whale; these, with all\r\nthe attending marvels of a thousand Patagonian sights and sounds,\r\nhelped to sway me to my wish. With other men, perhaps, such things\r\nwould not have been inducements; but as for me, I am tormented with an\r\neverlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and\r\nland on barbarous coasts. Not ignoring what is good, I am quick to\r\nperceive a horror, and could still be social with it—would they let\r\nme—since it is but well to be on friendly terms with all the inmates of\r\nthe place one lodges in.\r\n\r\nBy reason of these things, then, the whaling voyage was welcome; the\r\ngreat flood-gates of the wonder-world swung open, and in the wild\r\nconceits that swayed me to my purpose, two and two there floated into\r\nmy inmost soul, endless processions of the whale, and, mid most of them\r\nall, one grand hooded phantom, like a snow hill in the air.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 2. The Carpet-Bag.\r\n\r\nI stuffed a shirt or two into my old carpet-bag, tucked it under my\r\narm, and started for Cape Horn and the Pacific. Quitting the good city\r\nof old Manhatto, I duly arrived in New Bedford. It was a Saturday night\r\nin December. Much was I disappointed upon learning that the little\r\npacket for Nantucket had already sailed, and that no way of reaching\r\nthat place would offer, till the following Monday.\r\n\r\nAs most young candidates for the pains and penalties of whaling stop at\r\nthis same New Bedford, thence to embark on their voyage, it may as well\r\nbe related that I, for one, had no idea of so doing. For my mind was\r\nmade up to sail in no other than a Nantucket craft, because there was a\r\nfine, boisterous something about everything connected with that famous\r\nold island, which amazingly pleased me. Besides though New Bedford has\r\nof late been gradually monopolising the business of whaling, and though\r\nin this matter poor old Nantucket is now much behind her, yet Nantucket\r\nwas her great original—the Tyre of this Carthage;—the place where the\r\nfirst dead American whale was stranded. Where else but from Nantucket\r\ndid those aboriginal whalemen, the Red-Men, first sally out in canoes\r\nto give chase to the Leviathan? And where but from Nantucket, too, did\r\nthat first adventurous little sloop put forth, partly laden with\r\nimported cobblestones—so goes the story—to throw at the whales, in\r\norder to discover when they were nigh enough to risk a harpoon from the\r\nbowsprit?\r\n\r\nNow having a night, a day, and still another night following before me\r\nin New Bedford, ere I could embark for my destined port, it became a\r\nmatter of concernment where I was to eat and sleep meanwhile. It was a\r\nvery dubious-looking, nay, a very dark and dismal night, bitingly cold\r\nand cheerless. I knew no one in the place. With anxious grapnels I had\r\nsounded my pocket, and only brought up a few pieces of silver,—So,\r\nwherever you go, Ishmael, said I to myself, as I stood in the middle of\r\na dreary street shouldering my bag, and comparing the gloom towards the\r\nnorth with the darkness towards the south—wherever in your wisdom you\r\nmay conclude to lodge for the night, my dear Ishmael, be sure to\r\ninquire the price, and don’t be too particular.\r\n\r\nWith halting steps I paced the streets, and passed the sign of “The\r\nCrossed Harpoons”—but it looked too expensive and jolly there. Further\r\non, from the bright red windows of the “Sword-Fish Inn,” there came\r\nsuch fervent rays, that it seemed to have melted the packed snow and\r\nice from before the house, for everywhere else the congealed frost lay\r\nten inches thick in a hard, asphaltic pavement,—rather weary for me,\r\nwhen I struck my foot against the flinty projections, because from\r\nhard, remorseless service the soles of my boots were in a most\r\nmiserable plight."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXKX9BFFH5D0M0BETYC3TV","peer_label":"ishmael","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:03.341Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKXC5JMFAJ2TSVXB0M2X2","peer_label":"pythagorean 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