{"id":"01KJNXJV9KN2917FXBBK1J499Z","cid":"bafkreifbzbf2cgv6vukqycqhij5tw6gl4nyrbvhjm2h5kej32fc2fly4we","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":1092429,"char_start":1084440,"chunk_index":153,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1998,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"ghosts of Gomorrah, ran shuddering through the air.\r\n\r\nStarted from his slumbers, Ahab, face to face, saw the Parsee; and\r\nhooped round by the gloom of the night they seemed the last men in a\r\nflooded world. “I have dreamed it again,” said he.\r\n\r\n“Of the hearses? Have I not said, old man, that neither hearse nor\r\ncoffin can be thine?”\r\n\r\n“And who are hearsed that die on the sea?”\r\n\r\n“But I said, old man, that ere thou couldst die on this voyage, two\r\nhearses must verily be seen by thee on the sea; the first not made by\r\nmortal hands; and the visible wood of the last one must be grown in\r\nAmerica.”\r\n\r\n“Aye, aye! a strange sight that, Parsee:—a hearse and its plumes\r\nfloating over the ocean with the waves for the pall-bearers. Ha! Such a\r\nsight we shall not soon see.”\r\n\r\n“Believe it or not, thou canst not die till it be seen, old man.”\r\n\r\n“And what was that saying about thyself?”\r\n\r\n“Though it come to the last, I shall still go before thee thy pilot.”\r\n\r\n“And when thou art so gone before—if that ever befall—then ere I can\r\nfollow, thou must still appear to me, to pilot me still?—Was it not so?\r\nWell, then, did I believe all ye say, oh my pilot! I have here two\r\npledges that I shall yet slay Moby Dick and survive it.”\r\n\r\n“Take another pledge, old man,” said the Parsee, as his eyes lighted up\r\nlike fire-flies in the gloom—“Hemp only can kill thee.”\r\n\r\n“The gallows, ye mean.—I am immortal then, on land and on sea,” cried\r\nAhab, with a laugh of derision;—“Immortal on land and on sea!”\r\n\r\nBoth were silent again, as one man. The grey dawn came on, and the\r\nslumbering crew arose from the boat’s bottom, and ere noon the dead\r\nwhale was brought to the ship.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 118. The Quadrant.\r\n\r\nThe season for the Line at length drew near; and every day when Ahab,\r\ncoming from his cabin, cast his eyes aloft, the vigilant helmsman would\r\nostentatiously handle his spokes, and the eager mariners quickly run to\r\nthe braces, and would stand there with all their eyes centrally fixed\r\non the nailed doubloon; impatient for the order to point the ship’s\r\nprow for the equator. In good time the order came. It was hard upon\r\nhigh noon; and Ahab, seated in the bows of his high-hoisted boat, was\r\nabout taking his wonted daily observation of the sun to determine his\r\nlatitude.\r\n\r\nNow, in that Japanese sea, the days in summer are as freshets of\r\neffulgences. That unblinkingly vivid Japanese sun seems the blazing\r\nfocus of the glassy ocean’s immeasurable burning-glass. The sky looks\r\nlacquered; clouds there are none; the horizon floats; and this\r\nnakedness of unrelieved radiance is as the insufferable splendors of\r\nGod’s throne. Well that Ahab’s quadrant was furnished with coloured\r\nglasses, through which to take sight of that solar fire. So, swinging\r\nhis seated form to the roll of the ship, and with his\r\nastrological-looking instrument placed to his eye, he remained in that\r\nposture for some moments to catch the precise instant when the sun\r\nshould gain its precise meridian. Meantime while his whole attention\r\nwas absorbed, the Parsee was kneeling beneath him on the ship’s deck,\r\nand with face thrown up like Ahab’s, was eyeing the same sun with him;\r\nonly the lids of his eyes half hooded their orbs, and his wild face was\r\nsubdued to an earthly passionlessness. At length the desired\r\nobservation was taken; and with his pencil upon his ivory leg, Ahab\r\nsoon calculated what his latitude must be at that precise instant. Then\r\nfalling into a moment’s revery, he again looked up towards the sun and\r\nmurmured to himself: “Thou sea-mark! thou high and mighty Pilot! thou\r\ntellest me truly where I _am_—but canst thou cast the least hint where\r\nI _shall_ be? Or canst thou tell where some other thing besides me is\r\nthis moment living? Where is Moby Dick? This instant thou must be\r\neyeing him. These eyes of mine look into the very eye that is even now\r\nbeholding him; aye, and into the eye that is even now equally beholding\r\nthe objects on the unknown, thither side of thee, thou sun!”\r\n\r\nThen gazing at his quadrant, and handling, one after the other, its\r\nnumerous cabalistical contrivances, he pondered again, and muttered:\r\n“Foolish toy! babies’ plaything of haughty Admirals, and Commodores,\r\nand Captains; the world brags of thee, of thy cunning and might; but\r\nwhat after all canst thou do, but tell the poor, pitiful point, where\r\nthou thyself happenest to be on this wide planet, and the hand that\r\nholds thee: no! not one jot more! Thou canst not tell where one drop of\r\nwater or one grain of sand will be to-morrow noon; and yet with thy\r\nimpotence thou insultest the sun! Science! Curse thee, thou vain toy;\r\nand cursed be all the things that cast man’s eyes aloft to that heaven,\r\nwhose live vividness but scorches him, as these old eyes are even now\r\nscorched with thy light, O sun! Level by nature to this earth’s horizon\r\nare the glances of man’s eyes; not shot from the crown of his head, as\r\nif God had meant him to gaze on his firmament. Curse thee, thou\r\nquadrant!” dashing it to the deck, “no longer will I guide my earthly\r\nway by thee; the level ship’s compass, and the level dead-reckoning, by\r\nlog and by line; _these_ shall conduct me, and show me my place on the\r\nsea. Aye,” lighting from the boat to the deck, “thus I trample on thee,\r\nthou paltry thing that feebly pointest on high; thus I split and\r\ndestroy thee!”\r\n\r\nAs the frantic old man thus spoke and thus trampled with his live and\r\ndead feet, a sneering triumph that seemed meant for Ahab, and a\r\nfatalistic despair that seemed meant for himself—these passed over the\r\nmute, motionless Parsee’s face. Unobserved he rose and glided away;\r\nwhile, awestruck by the aspect of their commander, the seamen clustered\r\ntogether on the forecastle, till Ahab, troubledly pacing the deck,\r\nshouted out—“To the braces! Up helm!—square in!”\r\n\r\nIn an instant the yards swung round; and as the ship half-wheeled upon\r\nher heel, her three firm-seated graceful masts erectly poised upon her\r\nlong, ribbed hull, seemed as the three Horatii pirouetting on one\r\nsufficient steed.\r\n\r\nStanding between the knight-heads, Starbuck watched the Pequod’s\r\ntumultuous way, and Ahab’s also, as he went lurching along the deck.\r\n\r\n“I have sat before the dense coal fire and watched it all aglow, full\r\nof its tormented flaming life; and I have seen it wane at last, down,\r\ndown, to dumbest dust. Old man of oceans! of all this fiery life of\r\nthine, what will at length remain but one little heap of ashes!”\r\n\r\n“Aye,” cried Stubb, “but sea-coal ashes—mind ye that, Mr.\r\nStarbuck—sea-coal, not your common charcoal. Well, well; I heard Ahab\r\nmutter, ‘Here some one thrusts these cards into these old hands of\r\nmine; swears that I must play them, and no others.’ And damn me, Ahab,\r\nbut thou actest right; live in the game, and die in it!”\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 119. The Candles.\r\n\r\nWarmest climes but nurse the cruellest fangs: the tiger of Bengal\r\ncrouches in spiced groves of ceaseless verdure. Skies the most\r\neffulgent but basket the deadliest thunders: gorgeous Cuba knows\r\ntornadoes that never swept tame northern lands. So, too, it is, that in\r\nthese resplendent Japanese seas the mariner encounters the direst of\r\nall storms, the Typhoon. It will sometimes burst from out that\r\ncloudless sky, like an exploding bomb upon a dazed and sleepy town.\r\n\r\nTowards evening of that day, the Pequod was torn of her canvas, and\r\nbare-poled was left to fight a Typhoon which had struck her directly\r\nahead. When darkness came on, sky and sea roared and split with the\r\nthunder, and blazed with the lightning, that showed the disabled masts\r\nfluttering here and there with the rags which the first fury of the\r\ntempest had left for its after sport.\r\n\r\nHolding by a shroud, Starbuck was standing on the quarter-deck; at\r\nevery flash of the lightning glancing aloft, to see what additional\r\ndisaster might have befallen the intricate hamper there; while Stubb\r\nand Flask were directing the men in the higher hoisting and "},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXM529XJRPQXV0DC58V32N","peer_label":"moby 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