{"id":"01KJNXJQZAQJ6EJ0AYZEZ30XN8","cid":"bafkreib246wllkya3kftmqzlubyir4bp2blok5mw76osg22rz7woo22rym","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":534154,"char_start":526226,"chunk_index":74,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1982,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"as though they deemed our ship some drifting, uninhabited craft; a\r\nthing appointed to desolation, and therefore fit roosting-place for\r\ntheir homeless selves. And heaved and heaved, still unrestingly heaved\r\nthe black sea, as if its vast tides were a conscience; and the great\r\nmundane soul were in anguish and remorse for the long sin and suffering\r\nit had bred.\r\n\r\nCape of Good Hope, do they call ye? Rather Cape Tormentoso, as called\r\nof yore; for long allured by the perfidious silences that before had\r\nattended us, we found ourselves launched into this tormented sea, where\r\nguilty beings transformed into those fowls and these fish, seemed\r\ncondemned to swim on everlastingly without any haven in store, or beat\r\nthat black air without any horizon. But calm, snow-white, and\r\nunvarying; still directing its fountain of feathers to the sky; still\r\nbeckoning us on from before, the solitary jet would at times be\r\ndescried.\r\n\r\nDuring all this blackness of the elements, Ahab, though assuming for\r\nthe time the almost continual command of the drenched and dangerous\r\ndeck, manifested the gloomiest reserve; and more seldom than ever\r\naddressed his mates. In tempestuous times like these, after everything\r\nabove and aloft has been secured, nothing more can be done but\r\npassively to await the issue of the gale. Then Captain and crew become\r\npractical fatalists. So, with his ivory leg inserted into its\r\naccustomed hole, and with one hand firmly grasping a shroud, Ahab for\r\nhours and hours would stand gazing dead to windward, while an\r\noccasional squall of sleet or snow would all but congeal his very\r\neyelashes together. Meantime, the crew driven from the forward part of\r\nthe ship by the perilous seas that burstingly broke over its bows,\r\nstood in a line along the bulwarks in the waist; and the better to\r\nguard against the leaping waves, each man had slipped himself into a\r\nsort of bowline secured to the rail, in which he swung as in a loosened\r\nbelt. Few or no words were spoken; and the silent ship, as if manned by\r\npainted sailors in wax, day after day tore on through all the swift\r\nmadness and gladness of the demoniac waves. By night the same muteness\r\nof humanity before the shrieks of the ocean prevailed; still in silence\r\nthe men swung in the bowlines; still wordless Ahab stood up to the\r\nblast. Even when wearied nature seemed demanding repose he would not\r\nseek that repose in his hammock. Never could Starbuck forget the old\r\nman’s aspect, when one night going down into the cabin to mark how the\r\nbarometer stood, he saw him with closed eyes sitting straight in his\r\nfloor-screwed chair; the rain and half-melted sleet of the storm from\r\nwhich he had some time before emerged, still slowly dripping from the\r\nunremoved hat and coat. On the table beside him lay unrolled one of\r\nthose charts of tides and currents which have previously been spoken\r\nof. His lantern swung from his tightly clenched hand. Though the body\r\nwas erect, the head was thrown back so that the closed eyes were\r\npointed towards the needle of the tell-tale that swung from a beam in\r\nthe ceiling.*\r\n\r\n*The cabin-compass is called the tell-tale, because without going to\r\nthe compass at the helm, the Captain, while below, can inform himself\r\nof the course of the ship.\r\n\r\nTerrible old man! thought Starbuck with a shudder, sleeping in this\r\ngale, still thou steadfastly eyest thy purpose.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 52. The Albatross.\r\n\r\nSouth-eastward from the Cape, off the distant Crozetts, a good cruising\r\nground for Right Whalemen, a sail loomed ahead, the Goney (Albatross)\r\nby name. As she slowly drew nigh, from my lofty perch at the\r\nfore-mast-head, I had a good view of that sight so remarkable to a tyro\r\nin the far ocean fisheries—a whaler at sea, and long absent from home.\r\n\r\nAs if the waves had been fullers, this craft was bleached like the\r\nskeleton of a stranded walrus. All down her sides, this spectral\r\nappearance was traced with long channels of reddened rust, while all\r\nher spars and her rigging were like the thick branches of trees furred\r\nover with hoar-frost. Only her lower sails were set. A wild sight it\r\nwas to see her long-bearded look-outs at those three mast-heads. They\r\nseemed clad in the skins of beasts, so torn and bepatched the raiment\r\nthat had survived nearly four years of cruising. Standing in iron hoops\r\nnailed to the mast, they swayed and swung over a fathomless sea; and\r\nthough, when the ship slowly glided close under our stern, we six men\r\nin the air came so nigh to each other that we might almost have leaped\r\nfrom the mast-heads of one ship to those of the other; yet, those\r\nforlorn-looking fishermen, mildly eyeing us as they passed, said not\r\none word to our own look-outs, while the quarter-deck hail was being\r\nheard from below.\r\n\r\n“Ship ahoy! Have ye seen the White Whale?”\r\n\r\nBut as the strange captain, leaning over the pallid bulwarks, was in\r\nthe act of putting his trumpet to his mouth, it somehow fell from his\r\nhand into the sea; and the wind now rising amain, he in vain strove to\r\nmake himself heard without it. Meantime his ship was still increasing\r\nthe distance between. While in various silent ways the seamen of the\r\nPequod were evincing their observance of this ominous incident at the\r\nfirst mere mention of the White Whale’s name to another ship, Ahab for\r\na moment paused; it almost seemed as though he would have lowered a\r\nboat to board the stranger, had not the threatening wind forbade. But\r\ntaking advantage of his windward position, he again seized his trumpet,\r\nand knowing by her aspect that the stranger vessel was a Nantucketer\r\nand shortly bound home, he loudly hailed—“Ahoy there! This is the\r\nPequod, bound round the world! Tell them to address all future letters\r\nto the Pacific ocean! and this time three years, if I am not at home,\r\ntell them to address them to ——”\r\n\r\nAt that moment the two wakes were fairly crossed, and instantly, then,\r\nin accordance with their singular ways, shoals of small harmless fish,\r\nthat for some days before had been placidly swimming by our side,\r\ndarted away with what seemed shuddering fins, and ranged themselves\r\nfore and aft with the stranger’s flanks. Though in the course of his\r\ncontinual voyagings Ahab must often before have noticed a similar\r\nsight, yet, to any monomaniac man, the veriest trifles capriciously\r\ncarry meanings.\r\n\r\n“Swim away from me, do ye?” murmured Ahab, gazing over into the water.\r\nThere seemed but little in the words, but the tone conveyed more of\r\ndeep helpless sadness than the insane old man had ever before evinced.\r\nBut turning to the steersman, who thus far had been holding the ship in\r\nthe wind to diminish her headway, he cried out in his old lion\r\nvoice,—“Up helm! Keep her off round the world!”\r\n\r\nRound the world! There is much in that sound to inspire proud feelings;\r\nbut whereto does all that circumnavigation conduct? Only through\r\nnumberless perils to the very point whence we started, where those that\r\nwe left behind secure, were all the time before us.\r\n\r\nWere this world an endless plain, and by sailing eastward we could for\r\never reach new distances, and discover sights more sweet and strange\r\nthan any Cyclades or Islands of King Solomon, then there were promise\r\nin the voyage. But in pursuit of those far mysteries we dream of, or in\r\ntormented chase of that demon phantom that, some time or other, swims\r\nbefore all human hearts; while chasing such over this round globe, they\r\neither lead us on in barren mazes or midway leave us whelmed.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 53. The Gam.\r\n\r\nThe ostensible reason why Ahab did not go on board of the whaler we had\r\nspoken was this: the wind and sea betokened storms. But even had this\r\nnot been the case, he would not after all, perhaps, have boarded\r\nher—judging by his subsequent conduct on similar occasions—if so it had\r\nbeen that, by the process of hailing, he had obtained a negative answer\r\nto the question he put."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXM6ADM8X2DF2EHM0V7AM6","peer_label":"cape of good hope","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"geographic_feature","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3Z6GAC3QZ1MZC1PX63","peer_label":"pequod","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKVYKWFDKYWNFAY5N9KE5","peer_label":"starbuck","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3DZQ5YTC2NQ9Q7VBWR","peer_label":"ahab","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKZTEDRAVQY55ZXTCS226","peer_label":"pacific ocean","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"ocean","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXR3BAZWJHTVVFN9NKYJVT","peer_label":"chapter 53 the gam","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"document_section","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXPYN86PXFQEA4QW5KXJQR","peer_label":"monomania","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"psychological_state","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXP6X4BT03CQH52AA4FEQF","peer_label":"chapter 52 the albatross","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"document_section","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNGJAMSTWVN1V46FT5R8G","peer_label":"cape tormentoso","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"geographic_feature","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXP71WMQ49K4FD653ZS726","peer_label":"strange captain","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXPZ23AVRHFH6EJ2ZZ1HY9","peer_label":"cabin-compass","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"navigational_instrument","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ4ZTM9JZARSCYKHJXY7Z","peer_label":"goney","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ26Z5878ARPVEF4F5V8W","peer_label":"right whalemen","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"occupation_group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ0E1811H35RV4HYY0EPD","peer_label":"white whale","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"animal_character","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ62G8E46P7QQ00ER992F","peer_label":"demon phantom","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ6RJCJ8TDEJA0PNPY0T8","peer_label":"nantucketer","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"ship_type","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ849E0RHA67V3EC9MDK3","peer_label":"cyclades","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"geographic_feature","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQWYGTHHPFFYQNE03YB7Y","peer_label":"islands of king solomon","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"geographic_feature","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXR63TRZ7WHNQWG4FKBKX0","peer_label":"human_hearts","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNFMZXNZ71F2TEADTEKK0","peer_label":"tell-tale","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"navigational_instrument","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQC5KH6GX47Y67G3RVBA4","peer_label":"gam","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"maritime_custom","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXP8V6VSQ2EK55RTX5EY4B","peer_label":"crozetts","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"geographic_feature","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:11.750Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:15.754Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:08:13.142Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}