{"id":"01KJNXJR04X2QF4FWZ2G0VNJ73","cid":"bafkreibfvz3ufis3wrzmre4wqhs577hcommqbve3jtogxyn3evgv6n22ki","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":576970,"char_start":569052,"chunk_index":80,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1980,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"something down the crack, closed it, and turned the key upon them—ten\r\nin number—leaving on deck some twenty or more, who thus far had\r\nremained neutral.\r\n\r\n“All night a wide-awake watch was kept by all the officers, forward and\r\naft, especially about the forecastle scuttle and fore hatchway; at\r\nwhich last place it was feared the insurgents might emerge, after\r\nbreaking through the bulkhead below. But the hours of darkness passed\r\nin peace; the men who still remained at their duty toiling hard at the\r\npumps, whose clinking and clanking at intervals through the dreary\r\nnight dismally resounded through the ship.\r\n\r\n“At sunrise the Captain went forward, and knocking on the deck,\r\nsummoned the prisoners to work; but with a yell they refused. Water was\r\nthen lowered down to them, and a couple of handfuls of biscuit were\r\ntossed after it; when again turning the key upon them and pocketing it,\r\nthe Captain returned to the quarter-deck. Twice every day for three\r\ndays this was repeated; but on the fourth morning a confused wrangling,\r\nand then a scuffling was heard, as the customary summons was delivered;\r\nand suddenly four men burst up from the forecastle, saying they were\r\nready to turn to. The fetid closeness of the air, and a famishing diet,\r\nunited perhaps to some fears of ultimate retribution, had constrained\r\nthem to surrender at discretion. Emboldened by this, the Captain\r\nreiterated his demand to the rest, but Steelkilt shouted up to him a\r\nterrific hint to stop his babbling and betake himself where he\r\nbelonged. On the fifth morning three others of the mutineers bolted up\r\ninto the air from the desperate arms below that sought to restrain\r\nthem. Only three were left.\r\n\r\n“‘Better turn to, now?’ said the Captain with a heartless jeer.\r\n\r\n“‘Shut us up again, will ye!’ cried Steelkilt.\r\n\r\n“‘Oh certainly,’ said the Captain, and the key clicked.\r\n\r\n“It was at this point, gentlemen, that enraged by the defection of\r\nseven of his former associates, and stung by the mocking voice that had\r\nlast hailed him, and maddened by his long entombment in a place as\r\nblack as the bowels of despair; it was then that Steelkilt proposed to\r\nthe two Canallers, thus far apparently of one mind with him, to burst\r\nout of their hole at the next summoning of the garrison; and armed with\r\ntheir keen mincing knives (long, crescentic, heavy implements with a\r\nhandle at each end) run amuck from the bowsprit to the taffrail; and if\r\nby any devilishness of desperation possible, seize the ship. For\r\nhimself, he would do this, he said, whether they joined him or not.\r\nThat was the last night he should spend in that den. But the scheme met\r\nwith no opposition on the part of the other two; they swore they were\r\nready for that, or for any other mad thing, for anything in short but a\r\nsurrender. And what was more, they each insisted upon being the first\r\nman on deck, when the time to make the rush should come. But to this\r\ntheir leader as fiercely objected, reserving that priority for himself;\r\nparticularly as his two comrades would not yield, the one to the other,\r\nin the matter; and both of them could not be first, for the ladder\r\nwould but admit one man at a time. And here, gentlemen, the foul play\r\nof these miscreants must come out.\r\n\r\n“Upon hearing the frantic project of their leader, each in his own\r\nseparate soul had suddenly lighted, it would seem, upon the same piece\r\nof treachery, namely: to be foremost in breaking out, in order to be\r\nthe first of the three, though the last of the ten, to surrender; and\r\nthereby secure whatever small chance of pardon such conduct might\r\nmerit. But when Steelkilt made known his determination still to lead\r\nthem to the last, they in some way, by some subtle chemistry of\r\nvillany, mixed their before secret treacheries together; and when their\r\nleader fell into a doze, verbally opened their souls to each other in\r\nthree sentences; and bound the sleeper with cords, and gagged him with\r\ncords; and shrieked out for the Captain at midnight.\r\n\r\n“Thinking murder at hand, and smelling in the dark for the blood, he\r\nand all his armed mates and harpooneers rushed for the forecastle. In a\r\nfew minutes the scuttle was opened, and, bound hand and foot, the still\r\nstruggling ringleader was shoved up into the air by his perfidious\r\nallies, who at once claimed the honor of securing a man who had been\r\nfully ripe for murder. But all these were collared, and dragged along\r\nthe deck like dead cattle; and, side by side, were seized up into the\r\nmizzen rigging, like three quarters of meat, and there they hung till\r\nmorning. ‘Damn ye,’ cried the Captain, pacing to and fro before them,\r\n‘the vultures would not touch ye, ye villains!’\r\n\r\n“At sunrise he summoned all hands; and separating those who had\r\nrebelled from those who had taken no part in the mutiny, he told the\r\nformer that he had a good mind to flog them all round—thought, upon the\r\nwhole, he would do so—he ought to—justice demanded it; but for the\r\npresent, considering their timely surrender, he would let them go with\r\na reprimand, which he accordingly administered in the vernacular.\r\n\r\n“‘But as for you, ye carrion rogues,’ turning to the three men in the\r\nrigging—‘for you, I mean to mince ye up for the try-pots;’ and, seizing\r\na rope, he applied it with all his might to the backs of the two\r\ntraitors, till they yelled no more, but lifelessly hung their heads\r\nsideways, as the two crucified thieves are drawn.\r\n\r\n“‘My wrist is sprained with ye!’ he cried, at last; ‘but there is still\r\nrope enough left for you, my fine bantam, that wouldn’t give up. Take\r\nthat gag from his mouth, and let us hear what he can say for himself.’\r\n\r\n“For a moment the exhausted mutineer made a tremulous motion of his\r\ncramped jaws, and then painfully twisting round his head, said in a\r\nsort of hiss, ‘What I say is this—and mind it well—if you flog me, I\r\nmurder you!’\r\n\r\n“‘Say ye so? then see how ye frighten me’—and the Captain drew off with\r\nthe rope to strike.\r\n\r\n“‘Best not,’ hissed the Lakeman.\r\n\r\n“‘But I must,’—and the rope was once more drawn back for the stroke.\r\n\r\n“Steelkilt here hissed out something, inaudible to all but the Captain;\r\nwho, to the amazement of all hands, started back, paced the deck\r\nrapidly two or three times, and then suddenly throwing down his rope,\r\nsaid, ‘I won’t do it—let him go—cut him down: d’ye hear?’\r\n\r\n“But as the junior mates were hurrying to execute the order, a pale\r\nman, with a bandaged head, arrested them—Radney the chief mate. Ever\r\nsince the blow, he had lain in his berth; but that morning, hearing the\r\ntumult on the deck, he had crept out, and thus far had watched the\r\nwhole scene. Such was the state of his mouth, that he could hardly\r\nspeak; but mumbling something about _his_ being willing and able to do\r\nwhat the captain dared not attempt, he snatched the rope and advanced\r\nto his pinioned foe.\r\n\r\n“‘You are a coward!’ hissed the Lakeman.\r\n\r\n“‘So I am, but take that.’ The mate was in the very act of striking,\r\nwhen another hiss stayed his uplifted arm. He paused: and then pausing\r\nno more, made good his word, spite of Steelkilt’s threat, whatever that\r\nmight 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."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXM6FCG0BJ3W501CTKVB7S","peer_label":"officers","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM72GYCSR95YN7V5FVKPX","peer_label":"mincing knives","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"weapon","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM72FVVG8WHZK5T74QYR5","peer_label":"canallers","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM6Y674B0ADX7PDYHDYPV","peer_label":"captains summons","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM6EV5JX7X5D558VSYQHK","peer_label":"captain","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM713GQZZCCBAP76WK6Q4","peer_label":"loyal crew","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM7QEE7AZJNW97A4MVNHR","peer_label":"mutineers","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM7SW9YBH5S36XMNZSFD4","peer_label":"chief mate","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"role","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM72KS80DTNE7A8GYDAMJ","peer_label":"forecastle","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"location","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM7QCXH6BBGBC1DF6A35A","peer_label":"radney","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM8JGECTDAAV8GKGH5V7N","peer_label":"steelkilt","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM86KAHYB2WSQGDQNGTNC","peer_label":"ships run","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"location","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:02:23.346Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:15.780Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:02:25.585Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}