{"id":"01KJNXJVA8YRD0Z58VC9SXPNNH","cid":"bafkreieqlowzxnjhyyj6vhkc4z77xdu7oax4xfjk5qvieo7ibkngebf7pu","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":1149680,"char_start":1141799,"chunk_index":161,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1971,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"now’s the very dreaded symbol of grim death, by a mere hap, made the\r\nexpressive sign of the help and hope of most endangered life. A\r\nlife-buoy of a coffin! Does it go further? Can it be that in some\r\nspiritual sense the coffin is, after all, but an immortality-preserver!\r\nI’ll think of that. But no. So far gone am I in the dark side of earth,\r\nthat its other side, the theoretic bright one, seems but uncertain\r\ntwilight to me. Will ye never have done, Carpenter, with that accursed\r\nsound? I go below; let me not see that thing here when I return again.\r\nNow, then, Pip, we’ll talk this over; I do suck most wondrous\r\nphilosophies from thee! Some unknown conduits from the unknown worlds\r\nmust empty into thee!”\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 128. The Pequod Meets The Rachel.\r\n\r\nNext day, a large ship, the Rachel, was descried, bearing directly down\r\nupon the Pequod, all her spars thickly clustering with men. At the time\r\nthe Pequod was making good speed through the water; but as the\r\nbroad-winged windward stranger shot nigh to her, the boastful sails all\r\nfell together as blank bladders that are burst, and all life fled from\r\nthe smitten hull.\r\n\r\n“Bad news; she brings bad news,” muttered the old Manxman. But ere her\r\ncommander, who, with trumpet to mouth, stood up in his boat; ere he\r\ncould hopefully hail, Ahab’s voice was heard.\r\n\r\n“Hast seen the White Whale?”\r\n\r\n“Aye, yesterday. Have ye seen a whale-boat adrift?”\r\n\r\nThrottling his joy, Ahab negatively answered this unexpected question;\r\nand would then have fain boarded the stranger, when the stranger\r\ncaptain himself, having stopped his vessel’s way, was seen descending\r\nher side. A few keen pulls, and his boat-hook soon clinched the\r\nPequod’s main-chains, and he sprang to the deck. Immediately he was\r\nrecognised by Ahab for a Nantucketer he knew. But no formal salutation\r\nwas exchanged.\r\n\r\n“Where was he?—not killed!—not killed!” cried Ahab, closely advancing.\r\n“How was it?”\r\n\r\nIt seemed that somewhat late on the afternoon of the day previous,\r\nwhile three of the stranger’s boats were engaged with a shoal of\r\nwhales, which had led them some four or five miles from the ship; and\r\nwhile they were yet in swift chase to windward, the white hump and head\r\nof Moby Dick had suddenly loomed up out of the water, not very far to\r\nleeward; whereupon, the fourth rigged boat—a reserved one—had been\r\ninstantly lowered in chase. After a keen sail before the wind, this\r\nfourth boat—the swiftest keeled of all—seemed to have succeeded in\r\nfastening—at least, as well as the man at the mast-head could tell\r\nanything about it. In the distance he saw the diminished dotted boat;\r\nand then a swift gleam of bubbling white water; and after that nothing\r\nmore; whence it was concluded that the stricken whale must have\r\nindefinitely run away with his pursuers, as often happens. There was\r\nsome apprehension, but no positive alarm, as yet. The recall signals\r\nwere placed in the rigging; darkness came on; and forced to pick up her\r\nthree far to windward boats—ere going in quest of the fourth one in the\r\nprecisely opposite direction—the ship had not only been necessitated to\r\nleave that boat to its fate till near midnight, but, for the time, to\r\nincrease her distance from it. But the rest of her crew being at last\r\nsafe aboard, she crowded all sail—stunsail on stunsail—after the\r\nmissing boat; kindling a fire in her try-pots for a beacon; and every\r\nother man aloft on the look-out. But though when she had thus sailed a\r\nsufficient distance to gain the presumed place of the absent ones when\r\nlast seen; though she then paused to lower her spare boats to pull all\r\naround her; and not finding anything, had again dashed on; again\r\npaused, and lowered her boats; and though she had thus continued doing\r\ntill daylight; yet not the least glimpse of the missing keel had been\r\nseen.\r\n\r\nThe story told, the stranger Captain immediately went on to reveal his\r\nobject in boarding the Pequod. He desired that ship to unite with his\r\nown in the search; by sailing over the sea some four or five miles\r\napart, on parallel lines, and so sweeping a double horizon, as it were.\r\n\r\n“I will wager something now,” whispered Stubb to Flask, “that some one\r\nin that missing boat wore off that Captain’s best coat; mayhap, his\r\nwatch—he’s so cursed anxious to get it back. Who ever heard of two\r\npious whale-ships cruising after one missing whale-boat in the height\r\nof the whaling season? See, Flask, only see how pale he looks—pale in\r\nthe very buttons of his eyes—look—it wasn’t the coat—it must have been\r\nthe—”\r\n\r\n“My boy, my own boy is among them. For God’s sake—I beg, I\r\nconjure”—here exclaimed the stranger Captain to Ahab, who thus far had\r\nbut icily received his petition. “For eight-and-forty hours let me\r\ncharter your ship—I will gladly pay for it, and roundly pay for it—if\r\nthere be no other way—for eight-and-forty hours only—only that—you\r\nmust, oh, you must, and you _shall_ do this thing.”\r\n\r\n“His son!” cried Stubb, “oh, it’s his son he’s lost! I take back the\r\ncoat and watch—what says Ahab? We must save that boy.”\r\n\r\n“He’s drowned with the rest on ’em, last night,” said the old Manx\r\nsailor standing behind them; “I heard; all of ye heard their spirits.”\r\n\r\nNow, as it shortly turned out, what made this incident of the Rachel’s\r\nthe more melancholy, was the circumstance, that not only was one of the\r\nCaptain’s sons among the number of the missing boat’s crew; but among\r\nthe number of the other boat’s crews, at the same time, but on the\r\nother hand, separated from the ship during the dark vicissitudes of the\r\nchase, there had been still another son; as that for a time, the\r\nwretched father was plunged to the bottom of the cruellest perplexity;\r\nwhich was only solved for him by his chief mate’s instinctively\r\nadopting the ordinary procedure of a whale-ship in such emergencies,\r\nthat is, when placed between jeopardized but divided boats, always to\r\npick up the majority first. But the captain, for some unknown\r\nconstitutional reason, had refrained from mentioning all this, and not\r\ntill forced to it by Ahab’s iciness did he allude to his one yet\r\nmissing boy; a little lad, but twelve years old, whose father with the\r\nearnest but unmisgiving hardihood of a Nantucketer’s paternal love, had\r\nthus early sought to initiate him in the perils and wonders of a\r\nvocation almost immemorially the destiny of all his race. Nor does it\r\nunfrequently occur, that Nantucket captains will send a son of such\r\ntender age away from them, for a protracted three or four years’ voyage\r\nin some other ship than their own; so that their first knowledge of a\r\nwhaleman’s career shall be unenervated by any chance display of a\r\nfather’s natural but untimely partiality, or undue apprehensiveness and\r\nconcern.\r\n\r\nMeantime, now the stranger was still beseeching his poor boon of Ahab;\r\nand Ahab still stood like an anvil, receiving every shock, but without\r\nthe least quivering of his own.\r\n\r\n“I will not go,” said the stranger, “till you say _aye_ to me. Do to me\r\nas you would have me do to you in the like case. For _you_ too have a\r\nboy, Captain Ahab—though but a child, and nestling safely at home now—a\r\nchild of your old age too—Yes, yes, you relent; I see it—run, run, men,\r\nnow, and stand by to square in the yards.”\r\n\r\n“Avast,” cried Ahab—“touch not a rope-yarn”; then in a voice that\r\nprolongingly moulded every word—“Captain Gardiner, I will not do it.\r\nEven now I lose time. Good-bye, good-bye. God bless ye, man, and may I\r\nforgive myself, but I must go. Mr. Starbuck, look at the binnacle\r\nwatch, and in three minutes from this present instant warn off all\r\nstrangers: then brace forward again, and let the ship sail as before.”\r\n\r\nHurriedly turning, with averted face, he descended into his cabin,\r\nleaving the strange captain transfixed at this unconditional and utter\r\nrejection of his so earnest suit."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3Z6GAC3QZ1MZC1PX63","peer_label":"pequod","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3DZQ5YTC2NQ9Q7VBWR","peer_label":"ahab","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMCVDEJKHKKZMBE0FHW7H","peer_label":"rachel","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM37BGJ4EBHZ5Q1YQPREQ","peer_label":"pip","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM529XJRPQXV0DC58V32N","peer_label":"moby dick","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whale","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKV7VCG1M1V2KKXZJD4A9","peer_label":"stubb","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKV9JR5QVCDKHMH41830J","peer_label":"flask","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMXE4JFX8X8DC53YPZT3V","peer_label":"carpenter","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMVYK4TYCF3W66VFNSJAT","peer_label":"captain gardiner","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMVZ5RK3KPH94AQ34CZKE","peer_label":"chapter 128 the pequod meets the rachel","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"document_section","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN7VF4B30P7CYH5GPA7PT","peer_label":"nantucket","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMW5ZKCE9S5S2KJ94NG1X","peer_label":"mr starbuck","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMZ95ZMN7E3Z4GSM8DKMZ","peer_label":"captain gardiners son","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMW3508ATJNSDG7CPKXM2","peer_label":"missing whale-boat rachels","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whale_boat","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXMVYKG853PA69ZCQSFM66","peer_label":"old manxman","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXN7EWFXZWA3A6HZEEMNEY","peer_label":"captain gardiners plea","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:04:24.042Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.176Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:05:05.946Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}