{"id":"01KJNXJV85JNW1SKDJQCKM8RM3","cid":"bafkreie3mu3cgpppmdmotmljefv72yeuk6ehwop52sxsl6nuqnljoa2tlu","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":958835,"char_start":950850,"chunk_index":134,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1997,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"himself, leaning against the bulwarks. “The old man seems to read\r\nBelshazzar’s awful writing. I have never marked the coin inspectingly.\r\nHe goes below; let me read. A dark valley between three mighty,\r\nheaven-abiding peaks, that almost seem the Trinity, in some faint\r\nearthly symbol. So in this vale of Death, God girds us round; and over\r\nall our gloom, the sun of Righteousness still shines a beacon and a\r\nhope. If we bend down our eyes, the dark vale shows her mouldy soil;\r\nbut if we lift them, the bright sun meets our glance half way, to\r\ncheer. Yet, oh, the great sun is no fixture; and if, at midnight, we\r\nwould fain snatch some sweet solace from him, we gaze for him in vain!\r\nThis coin speaks wisely, mildly, truly, but still sadly to me. I will\r\nquit it, lest Truth shake me falsely.”\r\n\r\n“There now’s the old Mogul,” soliloquized Stubb by the try-works, “he’s\r\nbeen twigging it; and there goes Starbuck from the same, and both with\r\nfaces which I should say might be somewhere within nine fathoms long.\r\nAnd all from looking at a piece of gold, which did I have it now on\r\nNegro Hill or in Corlaer’s Hook, I’d not look at it very long ere\r\nspending it. Humph! in my poor, insignificant opinion, I regard this as\r\nqueer. I have seen doubloons before now in my voyagings; your doubloons\r\nof old Spain, your doubloons of Peru, your doubloons of Chili, your\r\ndoubloons of Bolivia, your doubloons of Popayan; with plenty of gold\r\nmoidores and pistoles, and joes, and half joes, and quarter joes. What\r\nthen should there be in this doubloon of the Equator that is so killing\r\nwonderful? By Golconda! let me read it once. Halloa! here’s signs and\r\nwonders truly! That, now, is what old Bowditch in his Epitome calls the\r\nzodiac, and what my almanac below calls ditto. I’ll get the almanac and\r\nas I have heard devils can be raised with Daboll’s arithmetic, I’ll try\r\nmy hand at raising a meaning out of these queer curvicues here with the\r\nMassachusetts calendar. Here’s the book. Let’s see now. Signs and\r\nwonders; and the sun, he’s always among ’em. Hem, hem, hem; here they\r\nare—here they go—all alive:—Aries, or the Ram; Taurus, or the Bull and\r\nJimimi! here’s Gemini himself, or the Twins. Well; the sun he wheels\r\namong ’em. Aye, here on the coin he’s just crossing the threshold\r\nbetween two of twelve sitting-rooms all in a ring. Book! you lie there;\r\nthe fact is, you books must know your places. You’ll do to give us the\r\nbare words and facts, but we come in to supply the thoughts. That’s my\r\nsmall experience, so far as the Massachusetts calendar, and Bowditch’s\r\nnavigator, and Daboll’s arithmetic go. Signs and wonders, eh? Pity if\r\nthere is nothing wonderful in signs, and significant in wonders!\r\nThere’s a clue somewhere; wait a bit; hist—hark! By Jove, I have it!\r\nLook you, Doubloon, your zodiac here is the life of man in one round\r\nchapter; and now I’ll read it off, straight out of the book. Come,\r\nAlmanack! To begin: there’s Aries, or the Ram—lecherous dog, he begets\r\nus; then, Taurus, or the Bull—he bumps us the first thing; then Gemini,\r\nor the Twins—that is, Virtue and Vice; we try to reach Virtue, when lo!\r\ncomes Cancer the Crab, and drags us back; and here, going from Virtue,\r\nLeo, a roaring Lion, lies in the path—he gives a few fierce bites and\r\nsurly dabs with his paw; we escape, and hail Virgo, the Virgin! that’s\r\nour first love; we marry and think to be happy for aye, when pop comes\r\nLibra, or the Scales—happiness weighed and found wanting; and while we\r\nare very sad about that, Lord! how we suddenly jump, as Scorpio, or the\r\nScorpion, stings us in the rear; we are curing the wound, when whang\r\ncome the arrows all round; Sagittarius, or the Archer, is amusing\r\nhimself. As we pluck out the shafts, stand aside! here’s the\r\nbattering-ram, Capricornus, or the Goat; full tilt, he comes rushing,\r\nand headlong we are tossed; when Aquarius, or the Water-bearer, pours\r\nout his whole deluge and drowns us; and to wind up with Pisces, or the\r\nFishes, we sleep. There’s a sermon now, writ in high heaven, and the\r\nsun goes through it every year, and yet comes out of it all alive and\r\nhearty. Jollily he, aloft there, wheels through toil and trouble; and\r\nso, alow here, does jolly Stubb. Oh, jolly’s the word for aye! Adieu,\r\nDoubloon! But stop; here comes little King-Post; dodge round the\r\ntry-works, now, and let’s hear what he’ll have to say. There; he’s\r\nbefore it; he’ll out with something presently. So, so; he’s beginning.”\r\n\r\n“I see nothing here, but a round thing made of gold, and whoever raises\r\na certain whale, this round thing belongs to him. So, what’s all this\r\nstaring been about? It is worth sixteen dollars, that’s true; and at\r\ntwo cents the cigar, that’s nine hundred and sixty cigars. I won’t\r\nsmoke dirty pipes like Stubb, but I like cigars, and here’s nine\r\nhundred and sixty of them; so here goes Flask aloft to spy ’em out.”\r\n\r\n“Shall I call that wise or foolish, now; if it be really wise it has a\r\nfoolish look to it; yet, if it be really foolish, then has it a sort of\r\nwiseish look to it. But, avast; here comes our old Manxman—the old\r\nhearse-driver, he must have been, that is, before he took to the sea.\r\nHe luffs up before the doubloon; halloa, and goes round on the other\r\nside of the mast; why, there’s a horse-shoe nailed on that side; and\r\nnow he’s back again; what does that mean? Hark! he’s muttering—voice\r\nlike an old worn-out coffee-mill. Prick ears, and listen!”\r\n\r\n“If the White Whale be raised, it must be in a month and a day, when\r\nthe sun stands in some one of these signs. I’ve studied signs, and know\r\ntheir marks; they were taught me two score years ago, by the old witch\r\nin Copenhagen. Now, in what sign will the sun then be? The horse-shoe\r\nsign; for there it is, right opposite the gold. And what’s the\r\nhorse-shoe sign? The lion is the horse-shoe sign—the roaring and\r\ndevouring lion. Ship, old ship! my old head shakes to think of thee.”\r\n\r\n“There’s another rendering now; but still one text. All sorts of men in\r\none kind of world, you see. Dodge again! here comes Queequeg—all\r\ntattooing—looks like the signs of the Zodiac himself. What says the\r\nCannibal? As I live he’s comparing notes; looking at his thigh bone;\r\nthinks the sun is in the thigh, or in the calf, or in the bowels, I\r\nsuppose, as the old women talk Surgeon’s Astronomy in the back country.\r\nAnd by Jove, he’s found something there in the vicinity of his thigh—I\r\nguess it’s Sagittarius, or the Archer. No: he don’t know what to make\r\nof the doubloon; he takes it for an old button off some king’s\r\ntrowsers. But, aside again! here comes that ghost-devil, Fedallah; tail\r\ncoiled out of sight as usual, oakum in the toes of his pumps as usual.\r\nWhat does he say, with that look of his? Ah, only makes a sign to the\r\nsign and bows himself; there is a sun on the coin—fire worshipper,\r\ndepend upon it. Ho! more and more. This way comes Pip—poor boy! would\r\nhe had died, or I; he’s half horrible to me. He too has been watching\r\nall of these interpreters—myself included—and look now, he comes to\r\nread, with that unearthly idiot face. Stand away again and hear him.\r\nHark!”\r\n\r\n“I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look.”\r\n\r\n“Upon my soul, he’s been studying Murray’s Grammar! Improving his mind,\r\npoor fellow! But what’s that he says now—hist!”\r\n\r\n“I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look.”\r\n\r\n“Why, he’s getting it by heart—hist! again.”\r\n\r\n“I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look.”\r\n\r\n“Well, that’s funny.”\r\n\r\n“And I, you, and he; and we, ye, and they, are all bats; and I’m a\r\ncrow, especially when I stand a’top of this pine tree here. Caw! caw!\r\ncaw! caw! caw! caw! Ain’t I a crow? And where’s the scare-crow? There\r\nhe stands; two bones stuck into a pair of old trowsers, and two more\r\npoked into the sleeves of an old jacket.”\r\n\r\n“Wonder if he means me?—complimentary!—poor lad!—I could go hang\r\nmyself. Any way, for the present, I’ll quit Pip’s vicinity."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"}],"ver":1,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.109Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.109Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KJ6WPT018SDDANE6N7Q8E428"}}