{"id":"01KJNXJVBA04CVDGKR0JB2BX34","cid":"bafkreia3mkwmu2utonav6uciskif5jsrr5743pcqt4g7zeubb7olki2zmu","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":1227670,"char_start":1219690,"chunk_index":172,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":1995,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"somewhere—to something else than common land, more palmy than the\r\npalms. Leeward! the white whale goes that way; look to windward, then;\r\nthe better if the bitterer quarter. But good bye, good bye, old\r\nmast-head! What’s this?—green? aye, tiny mosses in these warped cracks.\r\nNo such green weather stains on Ahab’s head! There’s the difference now\r\nbetween man’s old age and matter’s. But aye, old mast, we both grow old\r\ntogether; sound in our hulls, though, are we not, my ship? Aye, minus a\r\nleg, that’s all. By heaven this dead wood has the better of my live\r\nflesh every way. I can’t compare with it; and I’ve known some ships\r\nmade of dead trees outlast the lives of men made of the most vital\r\nstuff of vital fathers. What’s that he said? he should still go before\r\nme, my pilot; and yet to be seen again? But where? Will I have eyes at\r\nthe bottom of the sea, supposing I descend those endless stairs? and\r\nall night I’ve been sailing from him, wherever he did sink to. Aye,\r\naye, like many more thou told’st direful truth as touching thyself, O\r\nParsee; but, Ahab, there thy shot fell short. Good-bye, mast-head—keep\r\na good eye upon the whale, the while I’m gone. We’ll talk to-morrow,\r\nnay, to-night, when the white whale lies down there, tied by head and\r\ntail.”\r\n\r\nHe gave the word; and still gazing round him, was steadily lowered\r\nthrough the cloven blue air to the deck.\r\n\r\nIn due time the boats were lowered; but as standing in his shallop’s\r\nstern, Ahab just hovered upon the point of the descent, he waved to the\r\nmate,—who held one of the tackle-ropes on deck—and bade him pause.\r\n\r\n“Starbuck!”\r\n\r\n“Sir?”\r\n\r\n“For the third time my soul’s ship starts upon this voyage, Starbuck.”\r\n\r\n“Aye, sir, thou wilt have it so.”\r\n\r\n“Some ships sail from their ports, and ever afterwards are missing,\r\nStarbuck!”\r\n\r\n“Truth, sir: saddest truth.”\r\n\r\n“Some men die at ebb tide; some at low water; some at the full of the\r\nflood;—and I feel now like a billow that’s all one crested comb,\r\nStarbuck. I am old;—shake hands with me, man.”\r\n\r\nTheir hands met; their eyes fastened; Starbuck’s tears the glue.\r\n\r\n“Oh, my captain, my captain!—noble heart—go not—go not!—see, it’s a\r\nbrave man that weeps; how great the agony of the persuasion then!”\r\n\r\n“Lower away!”—cried Ahab, tossing the mate’s arm from him. “Stand by\r\nthe crew!”\r\n\r\nIn an instant the boat was pulling round close under the stern.\r\n\r\n“The sharks! the sharks!” cried a voice from the low cabin-window\r\nthere; “O master, my master, come back!”\r\n\r\nBut Ahab heard nothing; for his own voice was high-lifted then; and the\r\nboat leaped on.\r\n\r\nYet the voice spake true; for scarce had he pushed from the ship, when\r\nnumbers of sharks, seemingly rising from out the dark waters beneath\r\nthe hull, maliciously snapped at the blades of the oars, every time\r\nthey dipped in the water; and in this way accompanied the boat with\r\ntheir bites. It is a thing not uncommonly happening to the whale-boats\r\nin those swarming seas; the sharks at times apparently following them\r\nin the same prescient way that vultures hover over the banners of\r\nmarching regiments in the east. But these were the first sharks that\r\nhad been observed by the Pequod since the White Whale had been first\r\ndescried; and whether it was that Ahab’s crew were all such\r\ntiger-yellow barbarians, and therefore their flesh more musky to the\r\nsenses of the sharks—a matter sometimes well known to affect\r\nthem,—however it was, they seemed to follow that one boat without\r\nmolesting the others.\r\n\r\n“Heart of wrought steel!” murmured Starbuck gazing over the side, and\r\nfollowing with his eyes the receding boat—“canst thou yet ring boldly\r\nto that sight?—lowering thy keel among ravening sharks, and followed by\r\nthem, open-mouthed to the chase; and this the critical third day?—For\r\nwhen three days flow together in one continuous intense pursuit; be\r\nsure the first is the morning, the second the noon, and the third the\r\nevening and the end of that thing—be that end what it may. Oh! my God!\r\nwhat is this that shoots through me, and leaves me so deadly calm, yet\r\nexpectant,—fixed at the top of a shudder! Future things swim before me,\r\nas in empty outlines and skeletons; all the past is somehow grown dim.\r\nMary, girl! thou fadest in pale glories behind me; boy! I seem to see\r\nbut thy eyes grown wondrous blue. Strangest problems of life seem\r\nclearing; but clouds sweep between—Is my journey’s end coming? My legs\r\nfeel faint; like his who has footed it all day. Feel thy heart,—beats\r\nit yet? Stir thyself, Starbuck!—stave it off—move, move! speak\r\naloud!—Mast-head there! See ye my boy’s hand on the hill?—Crazed;—aloft\r\nthere!—keep thy keenest eye upon the boats:—mark well the whale!—Ho!\r\nagain!—drive off that hawk! see! he pecks—he tears the vane”—pointing\r\nto the red flag flying at the main-truck—“Ha! he soars away with\r\nit!—Where’s the old man now? see’st thou that sight, oh Ahab!—shudder,\r\nshudder!”\r\n\r\nThe boats had not gone very far, when by a signal from the mast-heads—a\r\ndownward pointed arm, Ahab knew that the whale had sounded; but\r\nintending to be near him at the next rising, he held on his way a\r\nlittle sideways from the vessel; the becharmed crew maintaining the\r\nprofoundest silence, as the head-beat waves hammered and hammered\r\nagainst the opposing bow.\r\n\r\n“Drive, drive in your nails, oh ye waves! to their uttermost heads\r\ndrive them in! ye but strike a thing without a lid; and no coffin and\r\nno hearse can be mine:—and hemp only can kill me! Ha! ha!”\r\n\r\nSuddenly the waters around them slowly swelled in broad circles; then\r\nquickly upheaved, as if sideways sliding from a submerged berg of ice,\r\nswiftly rising to the surface. A low rumbling sound was heard; a\r\nsubterraneous hum; and then all held their breaths; as bedraggled with\r\ntrailing ropes, and harpoons, and lances, a vast form shot lengthwise,\r\nbut obliquely from the sea. Shrouded in a thin drooping veil of mist,\r\nit hovered for a moment in the rainbowed air; and then fell swamping\r\nback into the deep. Crushed thirty feet upwards, the waters flashed for\r\nan instant like heaps of fountains, then brokenly sank in a shower of\r\nflakes, leaving the circling surface creamed like new milk round the\r\nmarble trunk of the whale.\r\n\r\n“Give way!” cried Ahab to the oarsmen, and the boats darted forward to\r\nthe attack; but maddened by yesterday’s fresh irons that corroded in\r\nhim, Moby Dick seemed combinedly possessed by all the angels that fell\r\nfrom heaven. The wide tiers of welded tendons overspreading his broad\r\nwhite forehead, beneath the transparent skin, looked knitted together;\r\nas head on, he came churning his tail among the boats; and once more\r\nflailed them apart; spilling out the irons and lances from the two\r\nmates’ boats, and dashing in one side of the upper part of their bows,\r\nbut leaving Ahab’s almost without a scar.\r\n\r\nWhile Daggoo and Queequeg were stopping the strained planks; and as the\r\nwhale swimming out from them, turned, and showed one entire flank as he\r\nshot by them again; at that moment a quick cry went up. Lashed round\r\nand round to the fish’s back; pinioned in the turns upon turns in\r\nwhich, during the past night, the whale had reeled the involutions of\r\nthe lines around him, the half torn body of the Parsee was seen; his\r\nsable raiment frayed to shreds; his distended eyes turned full upon old\r\nAhab.\r\n\r\nThe harpoon dropped from his hand.\r\n\r\n“Befooled, befooled!”—drawing in a long lean breath—“Aye, Parsee! I see\r\nthee again.—Aye, and thou goest before; and this, _this_ then is the\r\nhearse that thou didst promise. But I hold thee to the last letter of\r\nthy word. Where is the second hearse? Away, mates, to the ship! those\r\nboats are useless now; repair them if ye can in time, and return to me;\r\nif not, Ahab is enough to die—Down, men! the first thing that but\r\noffers to jump from this boat I stand in, that thing I harpoon. Ye are\r\nnot other men, but my arms and my legs; and so obey me.—Where’s the\r\nwhale?"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3DZQ5YTC2NQ9Q7VBWR","peer_label":"ahab","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKVYKWFDKYWNFAY5N9KE5","peer_label":"starbuck","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKW3Z6GAC3QZ1MZC1PX63","peer_label":"pequod","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whaling_ship","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXM529XJRPQXV0DC58V32N","peer_label":"moby dick","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"whale","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKV8861P977B7BE45JR4K","peer_label":"daggoo","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKXNA6Q7NV244AJQKVXKZ","peer_label":"queequeg","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXKXH2GMRN3K01DR56AKFQ","peer_label":"harpoon","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"weapon","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNFZWDFFAVZN5D4PSG4ZH","peer_label":"parsee","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXPZ2QFETNS15QE0HXAXBD","peer_label":"mast-head","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"ship_part","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXNFN09RCYVQRKRKP9VMN5","peer_label":"sharks","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"animal","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ61BP4WJRF0HC21DJZPF","peer_label":"parsees prophecy","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"prophecy","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ6RJXPN2SWQCPYHRPEWG","peer_label":"ahabs crew","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ8A320RRYMRRF1GM76EV","peer_label":"oars","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"equipment","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ9MQZX94CW5CG3FSM39M","peer_label":"third day of pursuit","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"event_phase","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQQFEJYWCKXX0VTG13NR2","peer_label":"mary starbucks wife","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQWCMCXV1W8N5CCS354SP","peer_label":"ahabs boat","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"boat","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXQ35882S9DR5QVP1XP4AY","peer_label":"whale-boats","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"boat","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXY5DFPE2TM36S7J03TSDD","peer_label":"hawk","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"animal","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXZ0Q8PKZMNKBFC3SXP10N","peer_label":"starbucks son","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}},{"peer":"01KJNXZANKCV3608Z45JCXNCYP","peer_label":"red flag","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"signal","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T00:08:17.757Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.210Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:08:18.780Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}