{"id":"01KJNXJQWJ87QGCAFYFDQC9AXH","cid":"bafkreidsa7swtmppngnbyaafolb3rce7uxdujssjtlyrtoojpwb44poccy","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":335513,"char_start":327519,"chunk_index":46,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1999,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"swims in hilarious shoals, which upon the broad sea keep tossing\r\nthemselves to heaven like caps in a Fourth-of-July crowd. Their\r\nappearance is generally hailed with delight by the mariner. Full of\r\nfine spirits, they invariably come from the breezy billows to windward.\r\nThey are the lads that always live before the wind. They are accounted\r\na lucky omen. If you yourself can withstand three cheers at beholding\r\nthese vivacious fish, then heaven help ye; the spirit of godly\r\ngamesomeness is not in ye. A well-fed, plump Huzza Porpoise will yield\r\nyou one good gallon of good oil. But the fine and delicate fluid\r\nextracted from his jaws is exceedingly valuable. It is in request among\r\njewellers and watchmakers. Sailors put it on their hones. Porpoise meat\r\nis good eating, you know. It may never have occurred to you that a\r\nporpoise spouts. Indeed, his spout is so small that it is not very\r\nreadily discernible. But the next time you have a chance, watch him;\r\nand you will then see the great Sperm whale himself in miniature.\r\n\r\nBOOK III. (_Duodecimo_), CHAPTER II. (_Algerine Porpoise_).—A pirate.\r\nVery savage. He is only found, I think, in the Pacific. He is somewhat\r\nlarger than the Huzza Porpoise, but much of the same general make.\r\nProvoke him, and he will buckle to a shark. I have lowered for him many\r\ntimes, but never yet saw him captured.\r\n\r\nBOOK III. (_Duodecimo_), CHAPTER III. (_Mealy-mouthed Porpoise_).—The\r\nlargest kind of Porpoise; and only found in the Pacific, so far as it\r\nis known. The only English name, by which he has hitherto been\r\ndesignated, is that of the fishers—Right-Whale Porpoise, from the\r\ncircumstance that he is chiefly found in the vicinity of that Folio. In\r\nshape, he differs in some degree from the Huzza Porpoise, being of a\r\nless rotund and jolly girth; indeed, he is of quite a neat and\r\ngentleman-like figure. He has no fins on his back (most other porpoises\r\nhave), he has a lovely tail, and sentimental Indian eyes of a hazel\r\nhue. But his mealy-mouth spoils all. Though his entire back down to his\r\nside fins is of a deep sable, yet a boundary line, distinct as the mark\r\nin a ship’s hull, called the “bright waist,” that line streaks him from\r\nstem to stern, with two separate colours, black above and white below.\r\nThe white comprises part of his head, and the whole of his mouth, which\r\nmakes him look as if he had just escaped from a felonious visit to a\r\nmeal-bag. A most mean and mealy aspect! His oil is much like that of\r\nthe common porpoise.\r\n\r\n  * * * * * *\r\n\r\nBeyond the DUODECIMO, this system does not proceed, inasmuch as the\r\nPorpoise is the smallest of the whales. Above, you have all the\r\nLeviathans of note. But there are a rabble of uncertain, fugitive,\r\nhalf-fabulous whales, which, as an American whaleman, I know by\r\nreputation, but not personally. I shall enumerate them by their\r\nfore-castle appellations; for possibly such a list may be valuable to\r\nfuture investigators, who may complete what I have here but begun. If\r\nany of the following whales, shall hereafter be caught and marked, then\r\nhe can readily be incorporated into this System, according to his\r\nFolio, Octavo, or Duodecimo magnitude:—The Bottle-Nose Whale; the Junk\r\nWhale; the Pudding-Headed Whale; the Cape Whale; the Leading Whale; the\r\nCannon Whale; the Scragg Whale; the Coppered Whale; the Elephant Whale;\r\nthe Iceberg Whale; the Quog Whale; the Blue Whale; etc. From Icelandic,\r\nDutch, and old English authorities, there might be quoted other lists\r\nof uncertain whales, blessed with all manner of uncouth names. But I\r\nomit them as altogether obsolete; and can hardly help suspecting them\r\nfor mere sounds, full of Leviathanism, but signifying nothing.\r\n\r\nFinally: It was stated at the outset, that this system would not be\r\nhere, and at once, perfected. You cannot but plainly see that I have\r\nkept my word. But I now leave my cetological System standing thus\r\nunfinished, even as the great Cathedral of Cologne was left, with the\r\ncrane still standing upon the top of the uncompleted tower. For small\r\nerections may be finished by their first architects; grand ones, true\r\nones, ever leave the copestone to posterity. God keep me from ever\r\ncompleting anything. This whole book is but a draught—nay, but the\r\ndraught of a draught. Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 33. The Specksnyder.\r\n\r\nConcerning the officers of the whale-craft, this seems as good a place\r\nas any to set down a little domestic peculiarity on ship-board, arising\r\nfrom the existence of the harpooneer class of officers, a class unknown\r\nof course in any other marine than the whale-fleet.\r\n\r\nThe large importance attached to the harpooneer’s vocation is evinced\r\nby the fact, that originally in the old Dutch Fishery, two centuries\r\nand more ago, the command of a whale ship was not wholly lodged in the\r\nperson now called the captain, but was divided between him and an\r\nofficer called the Specksnyder. Literally this word means Fat-Cutter;\r\nusage, however, in time made it equivalent to Chief Harpooneer. In\r\nthose days, the captain’s authority was restricted to the navigation\r\nand general management of the vessel; while over the whale-hunting\r\ndepartment and all its concerns, the Specksnyder or Chief Harpooneer\r\nreigned supreme. In the British Greenland Fishery, under the corrupted\r\ntitle of Specksioneer, this old Dutch official is still retained, but\r\nhis former dignity is sadly abridged. At present he ranks simply as\r\nsenior Harpooneer; and as such, is but one of the captain’s more\r\ninferior subalterns. Nevertheless, as upon the good conduct of the\r\nharpooneers the success of a whaling voyage largely depends, and since\r\nin the American Fishery he is not only an important officer in the\r\nboat, but under certain circumstances (night watches on a whaling\r\nground) the command of the ship’s deck is also his; therefore the grand\r\npolitical maxim of the sea demands, that he should nominally live apart\r\nfrom the men before the mast, and be in some way distinguished as their\r\nprofessional superior; though always, by them, familiarly regarded as\r\ntheir social equal.\r\n\r\nNow, the grand distinction drawn between officer and man at sea, is\r\nthis—the first lives aft, the last forward. Hence, in whale-ships and\r\nmerchantmen alike, the mates have their quarters with the captain; and\r\nso, too, in most of the American whalers the harpooneers are lodged in\r\nthe after part of the ship. That is to say, they take their meals in\r\nthe captain’s cabin, and sleep in a place indirectly communicating with\r\nit.\r\n\r\nThough the long period of a Southern whaling voyage (by far the longest\r\nof all voyages now or ever made by man), the peculiar perils of it, and\r\nthe community of interest prevailing among a company, all of whom, high\r\nor low, depend for their profits, not upon fixed wages, but upon their\r\ncommon luck, together with their common vigilance, intrepidity, and\r\nhard work; though all these things do in some cases tend to beget a\r\nless rigorous discipline than in merchantmen generally; yet, never mind\r\nhow much like an old Mesopotamian family these whalemen may, in some\r\nprimitive instances, live together; for all that, the punctilious\r\nexternals, at least, of the quarter-deck are seldom materially relaxed,\r\nand in no instance done away. Indeed, many are the Nantucket ships in\r\nwhich you will see the skipper parading his quarter-deck with an elated\r\ngrandeur not surpassed in any military navy; nay, extorting almost as\r\nmuch outward homage as if he wore the imperial purple, and not the\r\nshabbiest of pilot-cloth.\r\n\r\nAnd though of all men the moody captain of the Pequod was the least\r\ngiven to that sort of shallowest assumption; and though the only homage\r\nhe ever exacted, was implicit, instantaneous obedience; though he\r\nrequired no man to remove the shoes from his feet ere stepping upon the\r\nquarter-deck; and though there were times when, owing to peculiar\r\ncircumstances connected with events hereafter to be "},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXKW8ZMHF9GR0N2T6VN53V","peer_label":"sperm 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