{"id":"01KJNXJR04NHABFNBGHTJGFWKW","cid":"bafkreifgl2ksposycspizfrm4szwxfurpddjo7ynx5skhohdm5zrbkunnq","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":584024,"char_start":576198,"chunk_index":81,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1957,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"might have been. The three men were then cut down, all hands were\r\nturned to, and, sullenly worked by the moody seamen, the iron pumps\r\nclanged as before.\r\n\r\n“Just after dark that day, when one watch had retired below, a clamor\r\nwas heard in the forecastle; and the two trembling traitors running up,\r\nbesieged the cabin door, saying they durst not consort with the crew.\r\nEntreaties, cuffs, and kicks could not drive them back, so at their own\r\ninstance they were put down in the ship’s run for salvation. Still, no\r\nsign of mutiny reappeared among the rest. On the contrary, it seemed,\r\nthat mainly at Steelkilt’s instigation, they had resolved to maintain\r\nthe strictest peacefulness, obey all orders to the last, and, when the\r\nship reached port, desert her in a body. But in order to insure the\r\nspeediest end to the voyage, they all agreed to another thing—namely,\r\nnot to sing out for whales, in case any should be discovered. For,\r\nspite of her leak, and spite of all her other perils, the Town-Ho still\r\nmaintained her mast-heads, and her captain was just as willing to lower\r\nfor a fish that moment, as on the day his craft first struck the\r\ncruising ground; and Radney the mate was quite as ready to change his\r\nberth for a boat, and with his bandaged mouth seek to gag in death the\r\nvital jaw of the whale.\r\n\r\n“But though the Lakeman had induced the seamen to adopt this sort of\r\npassiveness in their conduct, he kept his own counsel (at least till\r\nall was over) concerning his own proper and private revenge upon the\r\nman who had stung him in the ventricles of his heart. He was in Radney\r\nthe chief mate’s watch; and as if the infatuated man sought to run more\r\nthan half way to meet his doom, after the scene at the rigging, he\r\ninsisted, against the express counsel of the captain, upon resuming the\r\nhead of his watch at night. Upon this, and one or two other\r\ncircumstances, Steelkilt systematically built the plan of his revenge.\r\n\r\n“During the night, Radney had an unseamanlike way of sitting on the\r\nbulwarks of the quarter-deck, and leaning his arm upon the gunwale of\r\nthe boat which was hoisted up there, a little above the ship’s side. In\r\nthis attitude, it was well known, he sometimes dozed. There was a\r\nconsiderable vacancy between the boat and the ship, and down between\r\nthis was the sea. Steelkilt calculated his time, and found that his\r\nnext trick at the helm would come round at two o’clock, in the morning\r\nof the third day from that in which he had been betrayed. At his\r\nleisure, he employed the interval in braiding something very carefully\r\nin his watches below.\r\n\r\n“‘What are you making there?’ said a shipmate.\r\n\r\n“‘What do you think? what does it look like?’\r\n\r\n“‘Like a lanyard for your bag; but it’s an odd one, seems to me.’\r\n\r\n“‘Yes, rather oddish,’ said the Lakeman, holding it at arm’s length\r\nbefore him; ‘but I think it will answer. Shipmate, I haven’t enough\r\ntwine,—have you any?’\r\n\r\n“But there was none in the forecastle.\r\n\r\n“‘Then I must get some from old Rad;’ and he rose to go aft.\r\n\r\n“‘You don’t mean to go a begging to _him!_’ said a sailor.\r\n\r\n“‘Why not? Do you think he won’t do me a turn, when it’s to help\r\nhimself in the end, shipmate?’ and going to the mate, he looked at him\r\nquietly, and asked him for some twine to mend his hammock. It was given\r\nhim—neither twine nor lanyard were seen again; but the next night an\r\niron ball, closely netted, partly rolled from the pocket of the\r\nLakeman’s monkey jacket, as he was tucking the coat into his hammock\r\nfor a pillow. Twenty-four hours after, his trick at the silent\r\nhelm—nigh to the man who was apt to doze over the grave always ready\r\ndug to the seaman’s hand—that fatal hour was then to come; and in the\r\nfore-ordaining soul of Steelkilt, the mate was already stark and\r\nstretched as a corpse, with his forehead crushed in.\r\n\r\n“But, gentlemen, a fool saved the would-be murderer from the bloody\r\ndeed he had planned. Yet complete revenge he had, and without being the\r\navenger. For by a mysterious fatality, Heaven itself seemed to step in\r\nto take out of his hands into its own the damning thing he would have\r\ndone.\r\n\r\n“It was just between daybreak and sunrise of the morning of the second\r\nday, when they were washing down the decks, that a stupid Teneriffe\r\nman, drawing water in the main-chains, all at once shouted out, ‘There\r\nshe rolls! there she rolls!’ Jesu, what a whale! It was Moby Dick.\r\n\r\n“‘Moby Dick!’ cried Don Sebastian; ‘St. Dominic! Sir sailor, but do\r\nwhales have christenings? Whom call you Moby Dick?’\r\n\r\n“‘A very white, and famous, and most deadly immortal monster, Don;—but\r\nthat would be too long a story.’\r\n\r\n“‘How? how?’ cried all the young Spaniards, crowding.\r\n\r\n“‘Nay, Dons, Dons—nay, nay! I cannot rehearse that now. Let me get more\r\ninto the air, Sirs.’\r\n\r\n“‘The chicha! the chicha!’ cried Don Pedro; ‘our vigorous friend looks\r\nfaint;—fill up his empty glass!’\r\n\r\n“No need, gentlemen; one moment, and I proceed.—Now, gentlemen, so\r\nsuddenly perceiving the snowy whale within fifty yards of the\r\nship—forgetful of the compact among the crew—in the excitement of the\r\nmoment, the Teneriffe man had instinctively and involuntarily lifted\r\nhis voice for the monster, though for some little time past it had been\r\nplainly beheld from the three sullen mast-heads. All was now a phrensy.\r\n‘The White Whale—the White Whale!’ was the cry from captain, mates, and\r\nharpooneers, who, undeterred by fearful rumours, were all anxious to\r\ncapture so famous and precious a fish; while the dogged crew eyed\r\naskance, and with curses, the appalling beauty of the vast milky mass,\r\nthat lit up by a horizontal spangling sun, shifted and glistened like a\r\nliving opal in the blue morning sea. Gentlemen, a strange fatality\r\npervades the whole career of these events, as if verily mapped out\r\nbefore the world itself was charted. The mutineer was the bowsman of\r\nthe mate, and when fast to a fish, it was his duty to sit next him,\r\nwhile Radney stood up with his lance in the prow, and haul in or\r\nslacken the line, at the word of command. Moreover, when the four boats\r\nwere lowered, the mate’s got the start; and none howled more fiercely\r\nwith delight than did Steelkilt, as he strained at his oar. After a\r\nstiff pull, their harpooneer got fast, and, spear in hand, Radney\r\nsprang to the bow. He was always a furious man, it seems, in a boat.\r\nAnd now his bandaged cry was, to beach him on the whale’s topmost back.\r\nNothing loath, his bowsman hauled him up and up, through a blinding\r\nfoam that blent two whitenesses together; till of a sudden the boat\r\nstruck as against a sunken ledge, and keeling over, spilled out the\r\nstanding mate. That instant, as he fell on the whale’s slippery back,\r\nthe boat righted, and was dashed aside by the swell, while Radney was\r\ntossed over into the sea, on the other flank of the whale. He struck\r\nout through the spray, and, for an instant, was dimly seen through that\r\nveil, wildly seeking to remove himself from the eye of Moby Dick. But\r\nthe whale rushed round in a sudden maelstrom; seized the swimmer\r\nbetween his jaws; and rearing high up with him, plunged headlong again,\r\nand went down.\r\n\r\n“Meantime, at the first tap of the boat’s bottom, the Lakeman had\r\nslackened the line, so as to drop astern from the whirlpool; calmly\r\nlooking on, he thought his own thoughts. But a sudden, terrific,\r\ndownward jerking of the boat, quickly brought his knife to the line. He\r\ncut it; and the whale was free. But, at some distance, Moby Dick rose\r\nagain, with some tatters of Radney’s red woollen shirt, caught in the\r\nteeth that had destroyed him. All four boats gave chase again; but the\r\nwhale eluded them, and finally wholly disappeared.\r\n\r\n“In good time, the Town-Ho reached her port—a savage, solitary\r\nplace—where no civilized creature resided."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXM8JGECTDAAV8GKGH5V7N","peer_label":"steelkilt","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM7QCXH6BBGBC1DF6A35A","peer_label":"radney","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM529XJRPQXV0DC58V32N","peer_label":"moby dick","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whale","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMT8WGN5WTPGQ84Z7NGC3","peer_label":"don pedro","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMCR48C7MQ7NF5Q3VG8W6","peer_label":"town-ho","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMVZ1H8F9XB3EWGZPZCMD","peer_label":"captain of the town-ho","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN8YP0RMGJ12M1XXFK6E3","peer_label":"the port town-hos destination","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"place","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN8KQY7SQVRT3SZ4WNT1E","peer_label":"crews pact town-ho","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"agreement","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMXE87N4MZ3E4MDR7N16J","peer_label":"crew of the town-ho","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMZWQ0AEHQ1ER3P715PE7","peer_label":"steelkilts revenge plan","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"plan","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMXGHTTG48ATXQ4BKVNK8","peer_label":"don sebastian","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN8R5G1N923K2PBAM4VN8","peer_label":"whale boat town-hos","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"object","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMWF7FAKE6PS5F0N92X6S","peer_label":"teneriffe man","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNA773JS4EYG26014K4P3","peer_label":"iron ball steelkilts weapon","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"weapon","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNFP5J8QQRJ0F7J671KBF","peer_label":"resuming_head_of_watch","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNFARJX7NYZF4ST4KJVY7","peer_label":"chicha","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"drink","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN8Q4Z6PR0W86Q0B7PFF6","peer_label":"maelstrom moby dicks attack","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"event","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:03.744Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:15.780Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:08:06.724Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}