{"id":"01KJNXJQX2CG3N1H0FTVR0V9N4","cid":"bafkreihj4fbs5maphy57selkrcorhcbgohwterpqizli6jxhgqq7cvst5i","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":342650,"char_start":334727,"chunk_index":47,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1981,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"externals, 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 detailed, he\r\naddressed them in unusual terms, whether of condescension or _in\r\nterrorem_, or otherwise; yet even Captain Ahab was by no means\r\nunobservant of the paramount forms and usages of the sea.\r\n\r\nNor, perhaps, will it fail to be eventually perceived, that behind\r\nthose forms and usages, as it were, he sometimes masked himself;\r\nincidentally making use of them for other and more private ends than\r\nthey were legitimately intended to subserve. That certain sultanism of\r\nhis brain, which had otherwise in a good degree remained unmanifested;\r\nthrough those forms that same sultanism became incarnate in an\r\nirresistible dictatorship. For be a man’s intellectual superiority what\r\nit will, it can never assume the practical, available supremacy over\r\nother men, without the aid of some sort of external arts and\r\nentrenchments, always, in themselves, more or less paltry and base.\r\nThis it is, that for ever keeps God’s true princes of the Empire from\r\nthe world’s hustings; and leaves the highest honors that this air can\r\ngive, to those men who become famous more through their infinite\r\ninferiority to the choice hidden handful of the Divine Inert, than\r\nthrough their undoubted superiority over the dead level of the mass.\r\nSuch large virtue lurks in these small things when extreme political\r\nsuperstitions invest them, that in some royal instances even to idiot\r\nimbecility they have imparted potency. But when, as in the case of\r\nNicholas the Czar, the ringed crown of geographical empire encircles an\r\nimperial brain; then, the plebeian herds crouch abased before the\r\ntremendous centralization. Nor, will the tragic dramatist who would\r\ndepict mortal indomitableness in its fullest sweep and direct swing,\r\never forget a hint, incidentally so important in his art, as the one\r\nnow alluded to.\r\n\r\nBut Ahab, my Captain, still moves before me in all his Nantucket\r\ngrimness and shagginess; and in this episode touching Emperors and\r\nKings, I must not conceal that I have only to do with a poor old\r\nwhale-hunter like him; and, therefore, all outward majestical trappings\r\nand housings are denied me. Oh, Ahab! what shall be grand in thee, it\r\nmust needs be plucked at from the skies, and dived for in the deep, and\r\nfeatured in the unbodied air!\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 34. The Cabin-Table.\r\n\r\nIt is noon; and Dough-Boy, the steward, thrusting his pale\r\nloaf-of-bread face from the cabin-scuttle, announces dinner to his lord\r\nand master; who, sitting in the lee quarter-boat, has just been taking\r\nan observation of the sun; and is now mutely reckoning the latitude on\r\nthe smooth, medallion-shaped tablet, reserved for that daily purpose on\r\nthe upper part of his ivory leg. From his complete inattention to the\r\ntidings, you would think that moody Ahab had not heard his menial. But\r\npresently, catching hold of the mizen shrouds, he swings himself to the\r\ndeck, and in an even, unexhilarated voice, saying, “Dinner, Mr.\r\nStarbuck,” disappears into the cabin.\r\n\r\nWhen the last echo of his sultan’s step has died away, and Starbuck,\r\nthe first Emir, has every reason to suppose that he is seated, then\r\nStarbuck rouses from his quietude, takes a few turns along the planks,\r\nand, after a grave peep into the binnacle, says, with some touch of\r\npleasantness, “Dinner, Mr. Stubb,” and descends the scuttle. The second\r\nEmir lounges about the rigging awhile, and then slightly shaking the\r\nmain brace, to see whether it will be all right with that important\r\nrope, he likewise takes up the old burden, and with a rapid “Dinner,\r\nMr. Flask,” follows after his predecessors.\r\n\r\nBut the third Emir, now seeing himself all alone on the quarter-deck,\r\nseems to feel relieved from some curious restraint; for, tipping all\r\nsorts of knowing winks in all sorts of directions, and kicking off his\r\nshoes, he strikes into a sharp but noiseless squall of a hornpipe right\r\nover the Grand Turk’s head; and then, by a dexterous sleight, pitching\r\nhis cap up into the mizentop for a shelf, he goes down rollicking so\r\nfar at least as he remains visible from the deck, reversing all other\r\nprocessions, by bringing up the rear with music. But ere stepping into\r\nthe cabin doorway below, he pauses, ships a new face altogether, and,\r\nthen, independent, hilarious little Flask enters King Ahab’s presence,\r\nin the character of Abjectus, or the Slave.\r\n\r\nIt is not the least among the strange things bred by the intense\r\nartificialness of sea-usages, that while in the open air of the deck\r\nsome officers will, upon provocation, bear themselves boldly and\r\ndefyingly enough towards their commander; yet, ten to one, let those\r\nvery officers the next moment go down to their customary dinner in that\r\nsame commander’s cabin, and straightway their inoffensive, not to say\r\ndeprecatory and humble air towards him, as he sits at the head of the\r\ntable; this is marvellous, sometimes most comical. Wherefore this\r\ndifference? A problem? Perhaps not. To have been Belshazzar, King of\r\nBabylon; and to have been Belshazzar, not haughtily but courteously,\r\ntherein certainly must have been some touch of mundane grandeur. But he\r\nwho in the rightly regal and intelligent spirit presides over his own\r\nprivate dinner-table of invited guests, that man’s unchallenged power\r\nand dominion of individual influence for the time; that man’s royalty\r\nof state transcends Belshazzar’s, for Belshazzar was not the greatest.\r\nWho has but once dined his friends, has tasted what it is to be Cæsar.\r\nIt is a witchery of social czarship which there is no withstanding.\r\nNow, if to this consideration you superadd the official supremacy of a\r\nship-master, then, by inference, you will derive the cause of that\r\npeculiarity of sea-life just mentioned.\r\n\r\nOver his ivory-inlaid table, Ahab presided like a mute, maned sea-lion\r\non the white coral beach, surrounded by his warlike but still\r\ndeferential cubs. In his own proper turn, each officer waited to be\r\nserved. They were as little children before Ahab; and yet, in Ahab,\r\nthere seemed not to lurk the smallest social arrogance. With one mind,\r\ntheir intent eyes all fastened upon the old man’s knife, as he carved\r\nthe chief dish before him. I do not suppose that for the world they\r\nwould have profaned that moment with the slightest observation, even\r\nupon so neutral a topic as the weather. No! And when reaching out his\r\nknife and fork, between which the slice of beef was locked, Ahab\r\nthereby motioned Starbuck’s plate towards him, the mate received his\r\nmeat as though receiving alms; and cut it tenderly; and a little\r\nstarted if, perchance, the knife grazed against the plate; and chewed\r\nit noiselessly; and swallowed it, not without circumspection. For, like\r\nthe Coronation banquet at Frankfort, where the German Emperor\r\nprofoundly dines with the seven Imperial Electors, so these cabin meals\r\nwere somehow solemn meals, eaten in awful silence; and yet at table old\r\nAhab forbade not conversation; only he himself was dumb. What a relief\r\nit was to choking Stubb, when a rat made a sudden racket in the hold\r\nbelow. And poor little Flask, he was the youngest son, and little boy\r\nof this weary family party."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"}],"ver":1,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:15.682Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:01:15.682Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KJ6WPT018SDDANE6N7Q8E428"}}