CHAPTER 13. Wheelbarrow.

Next morning, Monday, after disposing of the embalmed head to a barber, for a block, I
settled my own and comrade’s bill; using, however, my comrade’s money. The grinning
landlord, as well as the boarders, seemed amazingly tickled at the sudden friendship which had
sprung up between me and Queequeg—especially as Peter Coffin’s cock and bull stories about
him had previously so much alarmed me concerning the very person whom I now companied
with.
We borrowed a wheelbarrow, and embarking our things, including my own poor carpet-bag,
and Queequeg’s canvas sack and hammock, away we went down to “the Moss,” the little
Nantucket packet schooner moored at the wharf. As we were going along the people stared;
not at Queequeg so much—for they were used to seeing cannibals like him in their streets,—
but at seeing him and me upon such confidential terms. But we heeded them not, going along
wheeling the barrow by turns, and Queequeg now and then stopping to adjust the sheath on
his harpoon barbs. I asked him why he carried such a troublesome thing with him ashore, and
whether all whaling ships did not find their own harpoons. To this, in substance, he replied, that
though what I hinted was true enough, yet he had a particular affection for his own harpoon,
because it was of assured stuff, well tried in many a mortal combat, and deeply intimate with

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the hearts of whales. In short, like many inland reapers and mowers, who go into the farmers’
meadows armed with their own scythes—though in no wise obliged to furnish them—even so,
Queequeg, for his own private reasons, preferred his own harpoon.
Shifting the barrow from my hand to his, he told me a funny story about the first
wheelbarrow he had ever seen. It was in Sag Harbor. The owners of his ship, it seems, had lent
him one, in which to carry his heavy chest to his boarding house. Not to seem ignorant about
the thing—though in truth he was entirely so, concerning the precise way in which to manage
the barrow—Queequeg puts his chest upon it; lashes it fast; and then shoulders the barrow and
marches up the wharf. “Why,” said I, “Queequeg, you might have known better than that, one
would think. Didn’t the people laugh?”
Upon this, he told me another story. The people of his island of Rokovoko, it seems, at their
wedding feasts express the fragrant water of young cocoanuts into a large stained calabash like
a punchbowl; and this punchbowl always forms the great central ornament on the braided mat
where the feast is held. Now a certain grand merchant ship once touched at Rokovoko, and its
commander—from all accounts, a very stately punctilious gentleman, at least for a sea captain
—this commander was invited to the wedding feast of Queequeg’s sister, a pretty young
princess just turned of ten. Well; when all the wedding guests were assembled at the bride’s
bamboo cottage, this Captain marches in, and being assigned the post of honor, placed himself
over against the punchbowl, and between the High Priest and his majesty the King, Queequeg’s
father. Grace being said,—for those people have their grace as well as we—though Queequeg
told me that unlike us, who at such times look downwards to our platters, they, on the
contrary, copying the ducks, glance upwards to the great Giver of all feasts—Grace, I say, being
said, the High Priest opens the banquet by the immemorial ceremony of the island; that is,
dipping his consecrated and consecrating fingers into the bowl before the blessed beverage
circulates. Seeing himself placed next the Priest, and noting the ceremony, and thinking himself
—being Captain of a ship—as having plain precedence over a mere island King, especially in the
King’s own house—the Captain coolly proceeds to wash his hands in the punchbowl;—taking it I
suppose for a huge finger-glass. “Now,” said Queequeg, “what you tink now?—Didn’t our
people laugh?”
At last, passage paid, and luggage safe, we stood on board the schooner. Hoisting sail, it
glided down the Acushnet river. On one side, New Bedford rose in terraces of streets, their ice-
covered trees all glittering in the clear, cold air. Huge hills and mountains of casks on casks were
piled upon her wharves, and side by side the world-wandering whale ships lay silent and safely
moored at last; while from others came a sound of carpenters and coopers, with blended
noises of fires and forges to melt the pitch, all betokening that new cruises were on the start;
that one most perilous and long voyage ended, only begins a second; and a second ended, only
begins a third, and so on, for ever and for aye. Such is the endlessness, yea, the intolerableness
of all earthly effort.
Gaining the more open water, the bracing breeze waxed fresh; the little Moss tossed the
quick foam from her bows, as a young colt his snortings. How I snuffed that Tartar air!—how I
spurned that turnpike earth!—that common highway all over dented with the marks of slavish
heels and hoofs; and turned me to admire the magnanimity of the sea which will permit no
records.

35
 At the same foam-fountain, Queequeg seemed to drink and reel with me. His dusky nostrils
swelled apart; he showed his filed and pointed teeth. On, on we flew; and our offing gained, the
Moss did homage to the blast; ducked and dived her bows as a slave before the Sultan.
Sideways leaning, we sideways darted; every ropeyarn tingling like a wire; the two tall masts
buckling like Indian canes in land tornadoes. So full of this reeling scene were we, as we stood
by the plunging bowsprit, that for some time we did not notice the jeering glances of the
passengers, a lubber-like assembly, who marvelled that two fellow beings should be so
companionable; as though a white man were anything more dignified than a whitewashed
negro. But there were some boobies and bumpkins there, who, by their intense greenness,
must have come from the heart and centre of all verdure. Queequeg caught one of these young
saplings mimicking him behind his back. I thought the bumpkin’s hour of doom was come.
Dropping his harpoon, the brawny savage caught him in his arms, and by an almost miraculous
dexterity and strength, sent him high up bodily into the air; then slightly tapping his stern in
mid-somerset, the fellow landed with bursting lungs upon his feet, while Queequeg, turning his
back upon him, lighted his tomahawk pipe and passed it to me for a puff.
“Capting! Capting!” yelled the bumpkin, running towards that officer; “Capting, Capting,
here’s the devil.”
“Hallo, you sir,” cried the Captain, a gaunt rib of the sea, stalking up to Queequeg, “what in
thunder do you mean by that? Don’t you know you might have killed that chap?”
“What him say?” said Queequeg, as he mildly turned to me.
“He say,” said I, “that you came near kill-e that man there,” pointing to the still shivering
greenhorn.
“Kill-e,” cried Queequeg, twisting his tattooed face into an unearthly expression of disdain,
“ah! him bevy small-e fish-e; Queequeg no kill-e so small-e fish-e; Queequeg kill-e big whale!”
“Look you,” roared the Captain, “I’ll kill-e you, you cannibal, if you try any more of your tricks
aboard here; so mind your eye.”
But it so happened just then, that it was high time for the Captain to mind his own eye. The
prodigious strain upon the main-sail had parted the weather-sheet, and the tremendous boom
was now flying from side to side, completely sweeping the entire after part of the deck. The
poor fellow whom Queequeg had handled so roughly, was swept overboard; all hands were in a
panic; and to attempt snatching at the boom to stay it, seemed madness. It flew from right to
left, and back again, almost in one ticking of a watch, and every instant seemed on the point of
snapping into splinters. Nothing was done, and nothing seemed capable of being done; those
on deck rushed towards the bows, and stood eyeing the boom as if it were the lower jaw of an
exasperated whale. In the midst of this consternation, Queequeg dropped deftly to his knees,
and crawling under the path of the boom, whipped hold of a rope, secured one end to the
bulwarks, and then flinging the other like a lasso, caught it round the boom as it swept over his
head, and at the next jerk, the spar was that way trapped, and all was safe. The schooner was
run into the wind, and while the hands were clearing away the stern boat, Queequeg, stripped
to the waist, darted from the side with a long living arc of a leap. For three minutes or more he
was seen swimming like a dog, throwing his long arms straight out before him, and by turns
revealing his brawny shoulders through the freezing foam. I looked at the grand and glorious

36
fellow, but saw no one to be saved. The greenhorn had gone down. Shooting himself
perpendicularly from the water, Queequeg, now took an instant’s glance around him, and
seeming to see just how matters were, dived down and disappeared. A few minutes more, and
he rose again, one arm still striking out, and with the other dragging a lifeless form. The boat
soon picked them up. The poor bumpkin was restored. All hands voted Queequeg a noble
trump; the captain begged his pardon. From that hour I clove to Queequeg like a barnacle; yea,
till poor Queequeg took his last long dive.
Was there ever such unconsciousness? He did not seem to think that he at all deserved a
medal from the Humane and Magnanimous Societies. He only asked for water—fresh water—
something to wipe the brine off; that done, he put on dry clothes, lighted his pipe, and leaning
against the bulwarks, and mildly eyeing those around him, seemed to be saying to himself
—“It’s a mutual, joint-stock world, in all meridians. We cannibals must help these Christians.”

CHAPTER 14. Nantucket.

Nothing more happened on the passage worthy the mentioning; so, after a fine run, we
safely arrived in Nantucket.
Nantucket! Take out your map and look at it. See what a real corner of the world it occupies;
how it stands there, away off shore, more lonely than the Eddystone lighthouse. Look at it—a
mere hillock, and elbow of sand; all beach, without a background. There is more sand there
than you would use in twenty years as a substitute for blotting paper. Some gamesome wights
will tell you that they have to plant weeds there, they don’t grow naturally; that they import
Canada thistles; that they have to send beyond seas for a spile to stop a leak in an oil cask; that
pieces of wood in Nantucket are carried about like bits of the true cross in Rome; that people
there plant toadstools before their houses, to get under the shade in summer time; that one
blade of grass makes an oasis, three blades in a day’s walk a prairie; that they wear quicksand
shoes, something like Laplander snow-shoes; that they are so shut up, belted about, every way
inclosed, surrounded, and made an utter island of by the ocean, that to their very chairs and
tables small clams will sometimes be found adhering, as to the backs of sea turtles. But these
extravaganzas only show that Nantucket is no Illinois.
Look now at the wondrous traditional story of how this island was settled by the red-men.
Thus goes the legend. In olden times an eagle swooped down upon the New England coast, and
carried off an infant Indian in his talons. With loud lament the parents saw their child borne out
of sight over the wide waters. They resolved to follow in the same direction. Setting out in their
canoes, after a perilous passage they discovered the island, and there they found an empty
ivory casket,—the poor little Indian’s skeleton.
What wonder, then, that these Nantucketers, born on a beach, should take to the sea for a
livelihood! They first caught crabs and quohogs in the sand; grown bolder, they waded out with
nets for mackerel; more experienced, they pushed off in boats and captured cod; and at last,
launching a navy of great ships on the sea, explored this watery world; put an incessant belt of

37
circumnavigations round it; peeped in at Behring’s Straits; and in all seasons and all oceans
declared everlasting war with the mightiest animated mass that has survived the flood; most
monstrous and most mountainous! That Himmalehan, salt-sea Mastodon, clothed with such
portentousness of unconscious power, that his very panics are more to be dreaded than his
most fearless and malicious assaults!
And thus have these naked Nantucketers, these sea hermits, issuing from their ant-hill in the
sea, overrun and conquered the watery world like so many Alexanders; parcelling out among
them the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans, as the three pirate powers did Poland. Let
America add Mexico to Texas, and pile Cuba upon Canada; let the English overswarm all India,
and hang out their blazing banner from the sun; two thirds of this terraqueous globe are the
Nantucketer’s. For the sea is his; he owns it, as Emperors own empires; other seamen having
but a right of way through it. Merchant ships are but extension bridges; armed ones but floating
forts; even pirates and privateers, though following the sea as highwaymen the road, they but
plunder other ships, other fragments of the land like themselves, without seeking to draw their
living from the bottomless deep itself. The Nantucketer, he alone resides and riots on the sea;
he alone, in Bible language, goes down to it in ships; to and fro ploughing it as his own special
plantation. There is his home; there lies his business, which a Noah’s flood would not interrupt,
though it overwhelmed all the millions in China. He lives on the sea, as prairie cocks in the
prairie; he hides among the waves, he climbs them as chamois hunters climb the Alps. For years
he knows not the land; so that when he comes to it at last, it smells like another world, more
strangely than the moon would to an Earthsman. With the landless gull, that at sunset folds her
wings and is rocked to sleep between billows; so at nightfall, the Nantucketer, out of sight of
land, furls his sails, and lays him to his rest, while under his very pillow rush herds of walruses
and whales.

CHAPTER 15. Chowder.

It was quite late in the evening when the little Moss came snugly to anchor, and Queequeg
and I went ashore; so we could attend to no business that day, at least none but a supper and a
bed. The landlord of the Spouter-Inn had recommended us to his cousin Hosea Hussey of the
Try Pots, whom he asserted to be the proprietor of one of the best kept hotels in all Nantucket,
and moreover he had assured us that Cousin Hosea, as he called him, was famous for his
chowders. In short, he plainly hinted that we could not possibly do better than try pot-luck at
the Try Pots. But the directions he had given us about keeping a yellow warehouse on our
starboard hand till we opened a white church to the larboard, and then keeping that on the
larboard hand till we made a corner three points to the starboard, and that done, then ask the
first man we met where the place was: these crooked directions of his very much puzzled us at
first, especially as, at the outset, Queequeg insisted that the yellow warehouse—our first point
of departure—must be left on the larboard hand, whereas I had understood Peter Coffin to say
it was on the starboard. However, by dint of beating about a little in the dark, and now and

38
then knocking up a peaceable inhabitant to inquire the way, we at last came to something
which there was no mistaking.
Two enormous wooden pots painted black, and suspended by asses’ ears, swung from the
cross-trees of an old top-mast, planted in front of an old doorway. The horns of the cross-trees
were sawed off on the other side, so that this old top-mast looked not a little like a gallows.
Perhaps I was over sensitive to such impressions at the time, but I could not help staring at this
gallows with a vague misgiving. A sort of crick was in my neck as I gazed up to the two
remaining horns; yes, two of them, one for Queequeg, and one for me. It’s ominous, thinks I. A
Coffin my Innkeeper upon landing in my first whaling port; tombstones staring at me in the
whalemen’s chapel; and here a gallows! and a pair of prodigious black pots too! Are these last
throwing out oblique hints touching Tophet?
I was called from these reflections by the sight of a freckled woman with yellow hair and a
yellow gown, standing in the porch of the inn, under a dull red lamp swinging there, that looked
much like an injured eye, and carrying on a brisk scolding with a man in a purple woollen shirt.
“Get along with ye,” said she to the man, “or I’ll be combing ye!”
“Come on, Queequeg,” said I, “all right. There’s Mrs. Hussey.”
And so it turned out; Mr. Hosea Hussey being from home, but leaving Mrs. Hussey entirely
competent to attend to all his affairs. Upon making known our desires for a supper and a bed,
Mrs. Hussey, postponing further scolding for the present, ushered us into a little room, and
seating us at a table spread with the relics of a recently concluded repast, turned round to us
and said—“Clam or Cod?”
“What’s that about Cods, ma’am?” said I, with much politeness.
“Clam or Cod?” she repeated.
“A clam for supper? a cold clam; is that what you mean, Mrs. Hussey?” says I, “but that’s a
rather cold and clammy reception in the winter time, ain’t it, Mrs. Hussey?”
But being in a great hurry to resume scolding the man in the purple Shirt, who was waiting
for it in the entry, and seeming to hear nothing but the word “clam,” Mrs. Hussey hurried
towards an open door leading to the kitchen, and bawling out “clam for two,” disappeared.
“Queequeg,” said I, “do you think that we can make out a supper for us both on one clam?”
However, a warm savory steam from the kitchen served to belie the apparently cheerless
prospect before us. But when that smoking chowder came in, the mystery was delightfully
explained. Oh, sweet friends! hearken to me. It was made of small juicy clams, scarcely bigger
than hazel nuts, mixed with pounded ship biscuit, and salted pork cut up into little flakes; the
whole enriched with butter, and plentifully seasoned with pepper and salt. Our appetites being
sharpened by the frosty voyage, and in particular, Queequeg seeing his favourite fishing food
before him, and the chowder being surpassingly excellent, we despatched it with great
expedition: when leaning back a moment and bethinking me of Mrs. Hussey’s clam and cod
announcement, I thought I would try a little experiment. Stepping to the kitchen door, I uttered
the word “cod” with great emphasis, and resumed my seat. In a few moments the savoury
steam came forth again, but with a different flavor, and in good time a fine cod-chowder was
placed before us.

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 We resumed business; and while plying our spoons in the bowl, thinks I to myself, I wonder
now if this here has any effect on the head? What’s that stultifying saying about chowder-
headed people? “But look, Queequeg, ain’t that a live eel in your bowl? Where’s your
harpoon?”
Fishiest of all fishy places was the Try Pots, which well deserved its name; for the pots there
were always boiling chowders. Chowder for breakfast, and chowder for dinner, and chowder
for supper, till you began to look for fish-bones coming through your clothes. The area before
the house was paved with clam-shells. Mrs. Hussey wore a polished necklace of codfish
vertebra; and Hosea Hussey had his account books bound in superior old shark-skin. There was
a fishy flavor to the milk, too, which I could not at all account for, till one morning happening to
take a stroll along the beach among some fishermen’s boats, I saw Hosea’s brindled cow
feeding on fish remnants, and marching along the sand with each foot in a cod’s decapitated
head, looking very slip-shod, I assure ye.
Supper concluded, we received a lamp, and directions from Mrs. Hussey concerning the
nearest way to bed; but, as Queequeg was about to precede me up the stairs, the lady reached
forth her arm, and demanded his harpoon; she allowed no harpoon in her chambers. “Why
not?” said I; “every true whaleman sleeps with his harpoon—but why not?” “Because it’s
dangerous,” says she. “Ever since young Stiggs coming from that unfort’nt v’y’ge of his, when
he was gone four years and a half, with only three barrels of ile, was found dead in my first floor
back, with his harpoon in his side; ever since then I allow no boarders to take sich dangerous
weepons in their rooms at night. So, Mr. Queequeg” (for she had learned his name), “I will just
take this here iron, and keep it for you till morning. But the chowder; clam or cod to-morrow
for breakfast, men?”
“Both,” says I; “and let’s have a couple of smoked herring by way of variety.”

CHAPTER 16. The Ship.

In bed we concocted our plans for the morrow. But to my surprise and no small concern,
Queequeg now gave me to understand, that he had been diligently consulting Yojo—the name
of his black little god—and Yojo had told him two or three times over, and strongly insisted
upon it everyway, that instead of our going together among the whaling-fleet in harbor, and in
concert selecting our craft; instead of this, I say, Yojo earnestly enjoined that the selection of
the ship should rest wholly with me, inasmuch as Yojo purposed befriending us; and, in order to
do so, had already pitched upon a vessel, which, if left to myself, I, Ishmael, should infallibly
light upon, for all the world as though it had turned out by chance; and in that vessel I must
immediately ship myself, for the present irrespective of Queequeg.
I have forgotten to mention that, in many things, Queequeg placed great confidence in the
excellence of Yojo’s judgment and surprising forecast of things; and cherished Yojo with
considerable esteem, as a rather good sort of god, who perhaps meant well enough upon the
whole, but in all cases did not succeed in his benevolent designs.

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 Now, this plan of Queequeg’s, or rather Yojo’s, touching the selection of our craft; I did not
like that plan at all. I had not a little relied upon Queequeg’s sagacity to point out the whaler
best fitted to carry us and our fortunes securely. But as all my remonstrances produced no
effect upon Queequeg, I was obliged to acquiesce; and accordingly prepared to set about this
business with a determined rushing sort of energy and vigor, that should quickly settle that
trifling little affair. Next morning early, leaving Queequeg shut up with Yojo in our little
bedroom—for it seemed that it was some sort of Lent or Ramadan, or day of fasting,
humiliation, and prayer with Queequeg and Yojo that day; how it was I never could find out, for,
though I applied myself to it several times, I never could master his liturgies and XXXIX Articles
—leaving Queequeg, then, fasting on his tomahawk pipe, and Yojo warming himself at his
sacrificial fire of shavings, I sallied out among the shipping. After much prolonged sauntering
and many random inquiries, I learnt that there were three ships up for three-years’ voyages—
The Devil-dam, the Tit-bit, and the Pequod. Devil-Dam, I do not know the origin of; Tit-bit is
obvious; Pequod, you will no doubt remember, was the name of a celebrated tribe of
Massachusetts Indians; now extinct as the ancient Medes. I peered and pryed about the Devil-
dam; from her, hopped over to the Tit-bit; and finally, going on board the Pequod, looked
around her for a moment, and then decided that this was the very ship for us.
You may have seen many a quaint craft in your day, for aught I know;—square-toed luggers;
mountainous Japanese junks; butter-box galliots, and what not; but take my word for it, you
never saw such a rare old craft as this same rare old Pequod. She was a ship of the old school,
rather small if anything; with an old-fashioned claw-footed look about her. Long seasoned and
weather-stained in the typhoons and calms of all four oceans, her old hull’s complexion was
darkened like a French grenadier’s, who has alike fought in Egypt and Siberia. Her venerable
bows looked bearded. Her masts—cut somewhere on the coast of Japan, where her original
ones were lost overboard in a gale—her masts stood stiffly up like the spines of the three old
kings of Cologne. Her ancient decks were worn and wrinkled, like the pilgrim-worshipped flag-
stone in Canterbury Cathedral where Becket bled. But to all these her old antiquities, were
added new and marvellous features, pertaining to the wild business that for more than half a
century she had followed. Old Captain Peleg, many years her chief-mate, before he
commanded another vessel of his own, and now a retired seaman, and one of the principal
owners of the Pequod,—this old Peleg, during the term of his chief-mateship, had built upon
her original grotesqueness, and inlaid it, all over, with a quaintness both of material and device,
unmatched by anything except it be Thorkill-Hake’s carved buckler or bedstead. She was
apparelled like any barbaric Ethiopian emperor, his neck heavy with pendants of polished ivory.
She was a thing of trophies. A cannibal of a craft, tricking herself forth in the chased bones of
her enemies. All round, her unpanelled, open bulwarks were garnished like one continuous jaw,
with the long sharp teeth of the sperm whale, inserted there for pins, to fasten her old hempen
thews and tendons to. Those thews ran not through base blocks of land wood, but deftly
travelled over sheaves of sea-ivory. Scorning a turnstile wheel at her reverend helm, she
sported there a tiller; and that tiller was in one mass, curiously carved from the long narrow
lower jaw of her hereditary foe. The helmsman who steered by that tiller in a tempest, felt like
the Tartar, when he holds back his fiery steed by clutching its jaw. A noble craft, but somehow a
most melancholy! All noble things are touched with that.

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 Now when I looked about the quarter-deck, for some one having authority, in order to
propose myself as a candidate for the voyage, at first I saw nobody; but I could not well
overlook a strange sort of tent, or rather wigwam, pitched a little behind the main-mast. It
seemed only a temporary erection used in port. It was of a conical shape, some ten feet high;
consisting of the long, huge slabs of limber black bone taken from the middle and highest part
of the jaws of the right-whale. Planted with their broad ends on the deck, a circle of these slabs
laced together, mutually sloped towards each other, and at the apex united in a tufted point,
where the loose hairy fibres waved to and fro like the top-knot on some old Pottowottamie
Sachem’s head. A triangular opening faced towards the bows of the ship, so that the insider
commanded a complete view forward.
And half concealed in this queer tenement, I at length found one who by his aspect seemed
to have authority; and who, it being noon, and the ship’s work suspended, was now enjoying
respite from the burden of command. He was seated on an old-fashioned oaken chair, wriggling
all over with curious carving; and the bottom of which was formed of a stout interlacing of the
same elastic stuff of which the wigwam was constructed.
There was nothing so very particular, perhaps, about the appearance of the elderly man I
saw; he was brown and brawny, like most old seamen, and heavily rolled up in blue pilot-cloth,
cut in the Quaker style; only there was a fine and almost microscopic net-work of the minutest
wrinkles interlacing round his eyes, which must have arisen from his continual sailings in many
hard gales, and always looking to windward;—for this causes the muscles about the eyes to
become pursed together. Such eye-wrinkles are very effectual in a scowl.
“Is this the Captain of the Pequod?” said I, advancing to the door of the tent.
“Supposing it be the captain of the Pequod, what dost thou want of him?” he demanded.
“I was thinking of shipping.”
“Thou wast, wast thou? I see thou art no Nantucketer—ever been in a stove boat?”
“No, Sir, I never have.”
“Dost know nothing at all about whaling, I dare say—eh?
“Nothing, Sir; but I have no doubt I shall soon learn. I’ve been several voyages in the
merchant service, and I think that—”
“Merchant service be damned. Talk not that lingo to me. Dost see that leg?—I’ll take that leg
away from thy stern, if ever thou talkest of the marchant service to me again. Marchant service
indeed! I suppose now ye feel considerable proud of having served in those marchant ships. But
flukes! man, what makes thee want to go a whaling, eh?—it looks a little suspicious, don’t it,
eh?—Hast not been a pirate, hast thou?—Didst not rob thy last Captain, didst thou?—Dost not
think of murdering the officers when thou gettest to sea?”
I protested my innocence of these things. I saw that under the mask of these half humorous
innuendoes, this old seaman, as an insulated Quakerish Nantucketer, was full of his insular
prejudices, and rather distrustful of all aliens, unless they hailed from Cape Cod or the Vineyard.
“But what takes thee a-whaling? I want to know that before I think of shipping ye.”
“Well, sir, I want to see what whaling is. I want to see the world.”
“Want to see what whaling is, eh? Have ye clapped eye on Captain Ahab?”

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 “Who is Captain Ahab, sir?”
“Aye, aye, I thought so. Captain Ahab is the Captain of this ship.”
“I am mistaken then. I thought I was speaking to the Captain himself.”
“Thou art speaking to Captain Peleg—that’s who ye are speaking to, young man. It belongs to
me and Captain Bildad to see the Pequod fitted out for the voyage, and supplied with all her
needs, including crew. We are part owners and agents. But as I was going to say, if thou
wantest to know what whaling is, as thou tellest ye do, I can put ye in a way of finding it out
before ye bind yourself to it, past backing out. Clap eye on Captain Ahab, young man, and thou
wilt find that he has only one leg.”
“What do you mean, sir? Was the other one lost by a whale?”
“Lost by a whale! Young man, come nearer to me: it was devoured, chewed up, crunched by
the monstrousest parmacetty that ever chipped a boat!—ah, ah!”
I was a little alarmed by his energy, perhaps also a little touched at the hearty grief in his
concluding exclamation, but said as calmly as I could, “What you say is no doubt true enough,
sir; but how could I know there was any peculiar ferocity in that particular whale, though
indeed I might have inferred as much from the simple fact of the accident.”
“Look ye now, young man, thy lungs are a sort of soft, d’ye see; thou dost not talk shark a
bit. Sure, ye’ve been to sea before now; sure of that?”
“Sir,” said I, “I thought I told you that I had been four voyages in the merchant—”
“Hard down out of that! Mind what I said about the marchant service—don’t aggravate me—
I won’t have it. But let us understand each other. I have given thee a hint about what whaling is;
do ye yet feel inclined for it?”
“I do, sir.”
“Very good. Now, art thou the man to pitch a harpoon down a live whale’s throat, and then
jump after it? Answer, quick!”
“I am, sir, if it should be positively indispensable to do so; not to be got rid of, that is; which I
don’t take to be the fact.”
“Good again. Now then, thou not only wantest to go a-whaling, to find out by experience
what whaling is, but ye also want to go in order to see the world? Was not that what ye said? I
thought so. Well then, just step forward there, and take a peep over the weather-bow, and
then back to me and tell me what ye see there.”
For a moment I stood a little puzzled by this curious request, not knowing exactly how to take
it, whether humorously or in earnest. But concentrating all his crow’s feet into one scowl,
Captain Peleg started me on the errand.
Going forward and glancing over the weather bow, I perceived that the ship swinging to her
anchor with the flood-tide, was now obliquely pointing towards the open ocean. The prospect
was unlimited, but exceedingly monotonous and forbidding; not the slightest variety that I
could see.
“Well, what’s the report?” said Peleg when I came back; “what did ye see?”

43
 “Not much,” I replied—“nothing but water; considerable horizon though, and there’s a squall
coming up, I think.”
“Well, what does thou think then of seeing the world? Do ye wish to go round Cape Horn to
see any more of it, eh? Can’t ye see the world where you stand?”
I was a little staggered, but go a-whaling I must, and I would; and the Pequod was as good a
ship as any—I thought the best—and all this I now repeated to Peleg. Seeing me so determined,
he expressed his willingness to ship me.
“And thou mayest as well sign the papers right off,” he added—“come along with ye.” And so
saying, he led the way below deck into the cabin.
Seated on the transom was what seemed to me a most uncommon and surprising figure. It
turned out to be Captain Bildad, who along with Captain Peleg was one of the largest owners of
the vessel; the other shares, as is sometimes the case in these ports, being held by a crowd of
old annuitants; widows, fatherless children, and chancery wards; each owning about the value
of a timber head, or a foot of plank, or a nail or two in the ship. People in Nantucket invest their
money in whaling vessels, the same way that you do yours in approved state stocks bringing in
good interest.
Now, Bildad, like Peleg, and indeed many other Nantucketers, was a Quaker, the island
having been originally settled by that sect; and to this day its inhabitants in general retain in an
uncommon measure the peculiarities of the Quaker, only variously and anomalously modified
by things altogether alien and heterogeneous. For some of these same Quakers are the most
sanguinary of all sailors and whale-hunters. They are fighting Quakers; they are Quakers with a
vengeance.
So that there are instances among them of men, who, named with Scripture names—a
singularly common fashion on the island—and in childhood naturally imbibing the stately
dramatic thee and thou of the Quaker idiom; still, from the audacious, daring, and boundless
adventure of their subsequent lives, strangely blend with these unoutgrown peculiarities, a
thousand bold dashes of character, not unworthy a Scandinavian sea-king, or a poetical Pagan
Roman. And when these things unite in a man of greatly superior natural force, with a globular
brain and a ponderous heart; who has also by the stillness and seclusion of many long night-
watches in the remotest waters, and beneath constellations never seen here at the north, been
led to think untraditionally and independently; receiving all nature’s sweet or savage
impressions fresh from her own virgin voluntary and confiding breast, and thereby chiefly, but
with some help from accidental advantages, to learn a bold and nervous lofty language—that
man makes one in a whole nation’s census—a mighty pageant creature, formed for noble
tragedies. Nor will it at all detract from him, dramatically regarded, if either by birth or other
circumstances, he have what seems a half wilful overruling morbidness at the bottom of his
nature. For all men tragically great are made so through a certain morbidness. Be sure of this, O
young ambition, all mortal greatness is but disease. But, as yet we have not to do with such an
one, but with quite another; and still a man, who, if indeed peculiar, it only results again from
another phase of the Quaker, modified by individual circumstances.
Like Captain Peleg, Captain Bildad was a well-to-do, retired whaleman. But unlike Captain
Peleg—who cared not a rush for what are called serious things, and indeed deemed those self-

44
same serious things the veriest of all trifles—Captain Bildad had not only been originally
educated according to the strictest sect of Nantucket Quakerism, but all his subsequent ocean
life, and the sight of many unclad, lovely island creatures, round the Horn—all that had not
moved this native born Quaker one single jot, had not so much as altered one angle of his vest.
Still, for all this immutableness, was there some lack of common consistency about worthy
Captain Bildad. Though refusing, from conscientious scruples, to bear arms against land
invaders, yet himself had illimitably invaded the Atlantic and Pacific; and though a sworn foe to
human bloodshed, yet had he in his straight-bodied coat, spilled tuns upon tuns of leviathan
gore. How now in the contemplative evening of his days, the pious Bildad reconciled these
things in the reminiscence, I do not know; but it did not seem to concern him much, and very
probably he had long since come to the sage and sensible conclusion that a man’s religion is
one thing, and this practical world quite another. This world pays dividends. Rising from a little
cabin-boy in short clothes of the drabbest drab, to a harpooneer in a broad shad-bellied
waistcoat; from that becoming boat-header, chief-mate, and captain, and finally a ship owner;
Bildad, as I hinted before, had concluded his adventurous career by wholly retiring from active
life at the goodly age of sixty, and dedicating his remaining days to the quiet receiving of his
well-earned income.
Now, Bildad, I am sorry to say, had the reputation of being an incorrigible old hunks, and in
his sea-going days, a bitter, hard task-master. They told me in Nantucket, though it certainly
seems a curious story, that when he sailed the old Categut whaleman, his crew, upon arriving
home, were mostly all carried ashore to the hospital, sore exhausted and worn out. For a pious
man, especially for a Quaker, he was certainly rather hard-hearted, to say the least. He never
used to swear, though, at his men, they said; but somehow he got an inordinate quantity of
cruel, unmitigated hard work out of them. When Bildad was a chief-mate, to have his drab-
coloured eye intently looking at you, made you feel completely nervous, till you could clutch
something—a hammer or a marling-spike, and go to work like mad, at something or other,
never mind what. Indolence and idleness perished before him. His own person was the exact
embodiment of his utilitarian character. On his long, gaunt body, he carried no spare flesh, no
superfluous beard, his chin having a soft, economical nap to it, like the worn nap of his broad-
brimmed hat.
Such, then, was the person that I saw seated on the transom when I followed Captain Peleg
down into the cabin. The space between the decks was small; and there, bolt-upright, sat old
Bildad, who always sat so, and never leaned, and this to save his coat tails. His broad-brim was
placed beside him; his legs were stiffly crossed; his drab vesture was buttoned up to his chin;
and spectacles on nose, he seemed absorbed in reading from a ponderous volume.
“Bildad,” cried Captain Peleg, “at it again, Bildad, eh? Ye have been studying those Scriptures,
now, for the last thirty years, to my certain knowledge. How far ye got, Bildad?”
As if long habituated to such profane talk from his old shipmate, Bildad, without noticing his
present irreverence, quietly looked up, and seeing me, glanced again inquiringly towards Peleg.
“He says he’s our man, Bildad,” said Peleg, “he wants to ship.”
“Dost thee?” said Bildad, in a hollow tone, and turning round to me.
“I dost,” said I unconsciously, he was so intense a Quaker.

45
 “What do ye think of him, Bildad?” said Peleg.
“He’ll do,” said Bildad, eyeing me, and then went on spelling away at his book in a mumbling
tone quite audible.
I thought him the queerest old Quaker I ever saw, especially as Peleg, his friend and old
shipmate, seemed such a blusterer. But I said nothing, only looking round me sharply. Peleg
now threw open a chest, and drawing forth the ship’s articles, placed pen and ink before him,
and seated himself at a little table. I began to think it was high time to settle with myself at
what terms I would be willing to engage for the voyage. I was already aware that in the whaling
business they paid no wages; but all hands, including the captain, received certain shares of the
profits called lays, and that these lays were proportioned to the degree of importance
pertaining to the respective duties of the ship’s company. I was also aware that being a green
hand at whaling, my own lay would not be very large; but considering that I was used to the
sea, could steer a ship, splice a rope, and all that, I made no doubt that from all I had heard I
should be offered at least the 275th lay—that is, the 275th part of the clear net proceeds of the
voyage, whatever that might eventually amount to. And though the 275th lay was what they
call a rather long lay, yet it was better than nothing; and if we had a lucky voyage, might pretty
nearly pay for the clothing I would wear out on it, not to speak of my three years’ beef and
board, for which I would not have to pay one stiver.
It might be thought that this was a poor way to accumulate a princely fortune—and so it was,
a very poor way indeed. But I am one of those that never take on about princely fortunes, and
am quite content if the world is ready to board and lodge me, while I am putting up at this grim
sign of the Thunder Cloud. Upon the whole, I thought that the 275th lay would be about the fair
thing, but would not have been surprised had I been offered the 200th, considering I was of a
broad-shouldered make.
But one thing, nevertheless, that made me a little distrustful about receiving a generous
share of the profits was this: Ashore, I had heard something of both Captain Peleg and his
unaccountable old crony Bildad; how that they being the principal proprietors of the Pequod,
therefore the other and more inconsiderable and scattered owners, left nearly the whole
management of the ship’s affairs to these two. And I did not know but what the stingy old
Bildad might have a mighty deal to say about shipping hands, especially as I now found him on
board the Pequod, quite at home there in the cabin, and reading his Bible as if at his own
fireside. Now while Peleg was vainly trying to mend a pen with his jack-knife, old Bildad, to my
no small surprise, considering that he was such an interested party in these proceedings; Bildad
never heeded us, but went on mumbling to himself out of his book, “Lay not up for yourselves
treasures upon earth, where moth—”
“Well, Captain Bildad,” interrupted Peleg, “what d’ye say, what lay shall we give this young
man?”
“Thou knowest best,” was the sepulchral reply, “the seven hundred and seventy-seventh
wouldn’t be too much, would it?—‘where moth and rust do corrupt, but lay—’”
Lay, indeed, thought I, and such a lay! the seven hundred and seventy-seventh! Well, old
Bildad, you are determined that I, for one, shall not lay up many layshere below, where moth
and rust do corrupt. It was an exceedingly long lay that, indeed; and though from the

46
magnitude of the figure it might at first deceive a landsman, yet the slightest consideration will
show that though seven hundred and seventy-seven is a pretty large number, yet, when you
come to make a teenth of it, you will then see, I say, that the seven hundred and seventy-
seventh part of a farthing is a good deal less than seven hundred and seventy-seven gold
doubloons; and so I thought at the time.
“Why, blast your eyes, Bildad,” cried Peleg, “thou dost not want to swindle this young man!
he must have more than that.”
“Seven hundred and seventy-seventh,” again said Bildad, without lifting his eyes; and then
went on mumbling—“for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
“I am going to put him down for the three hundredth,” said Peleg, “do ye hear that, Bildad!
The three hundredth lay, I say.”
Bildad laid down his book, and turning solemnly towards him said, “Captain Peleg, thou hast
a generous heart; but thou must consider the duty thou owest to the other owners of this ship
—widows and orphans, many of them—and that if we too abundantly reward the labors of this
young man, we may be taking the bread from those widows and those orphans. The seven
hundred and seventy-seventh lay, Captain Peleg.”
“Thou Bildad!” roared Peleg, starting up and clattering about the cabin. “Blast ye, Captain
Bildad, if I had followed thy advice in these matters, I would afore now had a conscience to lug
about that would be heavy enough to founder the largest ship that ever sailed round Cape
Horn.”
“Captain Peleg,” said Bildad steadily, “thy conscience may be drawing ten inches of water, or
ten fathoms, I can’t tell; but as thou art still an impenitent man, Captain Peleg, I greatly fear lest
thy conscience be but a leaky one; and will in the end sink thee foundering down to the fiery
pit, Captain Peleg.”
“Fiery pit! fiery pit! ye insult me, man; past all natural bearing, ye insult me. It’s an all-fired
outrage to tell any human creature that he’s bound to hell. Flukes and flames! Bildad, say that
again to me, and start my soul-bolts, but I’ll—I’ll—yes, I’ll swallow a live goat with all his hair
and horns on. Out of the cabin, ye canting, drab-coloured son of a wooden gun—a straight
wake with ye!”
As he thundered out this he made a rush at Bildad, but with a marvellous oblique, sliding
celerity, Bildad for that time eluded him.
Alarmed at this terrible outburst between the two principal and responsible owners of the
ship, and feeling half a mind to give up all idea of sailing in a vessel so questionably owned and
temporarily commanded, I stepped aside from the door to give egress to Bildad, who, I made
no doubt, was all eagerness to vanish from before the awakened wrath of Peleg. But to my
astonishment, he sat down again on the transom very quietly, and seemed to have not the
slightest intention of withdrawing. He seemed quite used to impenitent Peleg and his ways. As
for Peleg, after letting off his rage as he had, there seemed no more left in him, and he, too, sat
down like a lamb, though he twitched a little as if still nervously agitated. “Whew!” he whistled
at last—“the squall’s gone off to leeward, I think. Bildad, thou used to be good at sharpening a
lance, mend that pen, will ye. My jack-knife here needs the grindstone. That’s he; thank ye,

47
Bildad. Now then, my young man, Ishmael’s thy name, didn’t ye say? Well then, down ye go
here, Ishmael, for the three hundredth lay.”
“Captain Peleg,” said I, “I have a friend with me who wants to ship too—shall I bring him
down to-morrow?”
“To be sure,” said Peleg. “Fetch him along, and we’ll look at him.”
“What lay does he want?” groaned Bildad, glancing up from the book in which he had again
been burying himself.
“Oh! never thee mind about that, Bildad,” said Peleg. “Has he ever whaled it any?” turning to
me.
“Killed more whales than I can count, Captain Peleg.”
“Well, bring him along then.”
And, after signing the papers, off I went; nothing doubting but that I had done a good
morning’s work, and that the Pequod was the identical ship that Yojo had provided to carry
Queequeg and me round the Cape.
But I had not proceeded far, when I began to bethink me that the Captain with whom I was
to sail yet remained unseen by me; though, indeed, in many cases, a whale-ship will be
completely fitted out, and receive all her crew on board, ere the captain makes himself visible
by arriving to take command; for sometimes these voyages are so prolonged, and the shore
intervals at home so exceedingly brief, that if the captain have a family, or any absorbing
concernment of that sort, he does not trouble himself much about his ship in port, but leaves
her to the owners till all is ready for sea. However, it is always as well to have a look at him
before irrevocably committing yourself into his hands. Turning back I accosted Captain Peleg,
inquiring where Captain Ahab was to be found.
“And what dost thou want of Captain Ahab? It’s all right enough; thou art shipped.”
“Yes, but I should like to see him.”
“But I don’t think thou wilt be able to at present. I don’t know exactly what’s the matter with
him; but he keeps close inside the house; a sort of sick, and yet he don’t look so. In fact, he ain’t
sick; but no, he isn’t well either. Any how, young man, he won’t always see me, so I don’t
suppose he will thee. He’s a queer man, Captain Ahab—so some think—but a good one. Oh,
thou’lt like him well enough; no fear, no fear. He’s a grand, ungodly, god-like man, Captain
Ahab; doesn’t speak much; but, when he does speak, then you may well listen. Mark ye, be
forewarned; Ahab’s above the common; Ahab’s been in colleges, as well as ’mong the
cannibals; been used to deeper wonders than the waves; fixed his fiery lance in mightier,
stranger foes than whales. His lance! aye, the keenest and the surest that out of all our isle! Oh!
he ain’t Captain Bildad; no, and he ain’t Captain Peleg; he’s Ahab, boy; and Ahab of old, thou
knowest, was a crowned king!”
“And a very vile one. When that wicked king was slain, the dogs, did they not lick his blood?”
“Come hither to me—hither, hither,” said Peleg, with a significance in his eye that almost
startled me. “Look ye, lad; never say that on board the Pequod. Never say it anywhere. Captain
Ahab did not name himself. ’Twas a foolish, ignorant whim of his crazy, widowed mother, who
died when he was only a twelvemonth old. And yet the old squaw Tistig, at Gayhead, said that

48
the name would somehow prove prophetic. And, perhaps, other fools like her may tell thee the
same. I wish to warn thee. It’s a lie. I know Captain Ahab well; I’ve sailed with him as mate years
ago; I know what he is—a good man—not a pious, good man, like Bildad, but a swearing good
man—something like me—only there’s a good deal more of him. Aye, aye, I know that he was
never very jolly; and I know that on the passage home, he was a little out of his mind for a spell;
but it was the sharp shooting pains in his bleeding stump that brought that about, as any one
might see. I know, too, that ever since he lost his leg last voyage by that accursed whale, he’s
been a kind of moody—desperate moody, and savage sometimes; but that will all pass off. And
once for all, let me tell thee and assure thee, young man, it’s better to sail with a moody good
captain than a laughing bad one. So good-bye to thee—and wrong not Captain Ahab, because
he happens to have a wicked name. Besides, my boy, he has a wife—not three voyages wedded
—a sweet, resigned girl. Think of that; by that sweet girl that old man has a child: hold ye then
there can be any utter, hopeless harm in Ahab? No, no, my lad; stricken, blasted, if he be, Ahab
has his humanities!”
As I walked away, I was full of thoughtfulness; what had been incidentally revealed to me of
Captain Ahab, filled me with a certain wild vagueness of painfulness concerning him. And
somehow, at the time, I felt a sympathy and a sorrow for him, but for I don’t know what, unless
it was the cruel loss of his leg. And yet I also felt a strange awe of him; but that sort of awe,
which I cannot at all describe, was not exactly awe; I do not know what it was. But I felt it; and
it did not disincline me towards him; though I felt impatience at what seemed like mystery in
him, so imperfectly as he was known to me then. However, my thoughts were at length carried
in other directions, so that for the present dark Ahab slipped my mind.

CHAPTER 17. The Ramadan.

As Queequeg’s Ramadan, or Fasting and Humiliation, was to continue all day, I did not
choose to disturb him till towards night-fall; for I cherish the greatest respect towards
everybody’s religious obligations, never mind how comical, and could not find it in my heart to
undervalue even a congregation of ants worshipping a toad-stool; or those other creatures in
certain parts of our earth, who with a degree of footmanism quite unprecedented in other
planets, bow down before the torso of a deceased landed proprietor merely on account of the
inordinate possessions yet owned and rented in his name.
I say, we good Presbyterian Christians should be charitable in these things, and not fancy
ourselves so vastly superior to other mortals, pagans and what not, because of their half-crazy
conceits on these subjects. There was Queequeg, now, certainly entertaining the most absurd
notions about Yojo and his Ramadan;—but what of that? Queequeg thought he knew what he
was about, I suppose; he seemed to be content; and there let him rest. All our arguing with him
would not avail; let him be, I say: and Heaven have mercy on us all—Presbyterians and Pagans
alike—for we are all somehow dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly need mending.

49
 Towards evening, when I felt assured that all his performances and rituals must be over, I
went up to his room and knocked at the door; but no answer. I tried to open it, but it was
fastened inside. “Queequeg,” said I softly through the key-hole:—all silent. “I say, Queequeg!
why don’t you speak? It’s I—Ishmael.” But all remained still as before. I began to grow alarmed.
I had allowed him such abundant time; I thought he might have had an apoplectic fit. I looked
through the key-hole; but the door opening into an odd corner of the room, the key-hole
prospect was but a crooked and sinister one. I could only see part of the foot-board of the bed
and a line of the wall, but nothing more. I was surprised to behold resting against the wall the
wooden shaft of Queequeg’s harpoon, which the landlady the evening previous had taken from
him, before our mounting to the chamber. That’s strange, thought I; but at any rate, since the
harpoon stands yonder, and he seldom or never goes abroad without it, therefore he must be
inside here, and no possible mistake.
“Queequeg!—Queequeg!”—all still. Something must have happened. Apoplexy! I tried to
burst open the door; but it stubbornly resisted. Running down stairs, I quickly stated my
suspicions to the first person I met—the chamber-maid. “La! la!” she cried, “I thought
something must be the matter. I went to make the bed after breakfast, and the door was
locked; and not a mouse to be heard; and it’s been just so silent ever since. But I thought, may
be, you had both gone off and locked your baggage in for safe keeping. La! la, ma’am!—
Mistress! murder! Mrs. Hussey! apoplexy!”—and with these cries, she ran towards the kitchen,
I following.
Mrs. Hussey soon appeared, with a mustard-pot in one hand and a vinegar-cruet in the
other, having just broken away from the occupation of attending to the castors, and scolding
her little black boy meantime.
“Wood-house!” cried I, “which way to it? Run for God’s sake, and fetch something to pry
open the door—the axe!—the axe! he’s had a stroke; depend upon it!”—and so saying I was
unmethodically rushing up stairs again empty-handed, when Mrs. Hussey interposed the
mustard-pot and vinegar-cruet, and the entire castor of her countenance.
“What’s the matter with you, young man?”
“Get the axe! For God’s sake, run for the doctor, some one, while I pry it open!”
“Look here,” said the landlady, quickly putting down the vinegar-cruet, so as to have one
hand free; “look here; are you talking about prying open any of my doors?”—and with that she
seized my arm. “What’s the matter with you? What’s the matter with you, shipmate?”
In as calm, but rapid a manner as possible, I gave her to understand the whole case.
Unconsciously clapping the vinegar-cruet to one side of her nose, she ruminated for an instant;
then exclaimed—“No! I haven’t seen it since I put it there.” Running to a little closet under the
landing of the stairs, she glanced in, and returning, told me that Queequeg’s harpoon was
missing. “He’s killed himself,” she cried. “It’s unfort’nate Stiggs done over again—there goes
another counterpane—God pity his poor mother!—it will be the ruin of my house. Has the poor
lad a sister? Where’s that girl?—there, Betty, go to Snarles the Painter, and tell him to paint me
a sign, with—“no suicides permitted here, and no smoking in the parlor;”—might as well kill
both birds at once. Kill? The Lord be merciful to his ghost! What’s that noise there? You, young
man, avast there!”

50
 And running up after me, she caught me as I was again trying to force open the door.
“I don’t allow it; I won’t have my premises spoiled. Go for the locksmith, there’s one about a
mile from here. But avast!” putting her hand in her side-pocket, “here’s a key that’ll fit, I guess;
let’s see.” And with that, she turned it in the lock; but, alas! Queequeg’s supplemental bolt
remained unwithdrawn within.
“Have to burst it open,” said I, and was running down the entry a little, for a good start, when
the landlady caught at me, again vowing I should not break down her premises; but I tore from
her, and with a sudden bodily rush dashed myself full against the mark.
With a prodigious noise the door flew open, and the knob slamming against the wall, sent
the plaster to the ceiling; and there, good heavens! there sat Queequeg, altogether cool and
self-collected; right in the middle of the room; squatting on his hams, and holding Yojo on top
of his head. He looked neither one way nor the other way, but sat like a carved image with
scarce a sign of active life.
“Queequeg,” said I, going up to him, “Queequeg, what’s the matter with you?”
“He hain’t been a sittin’ so all day, has he?” said the landlady.
But all we said, not a word could we drag out of him; I almost felt like pushing him over, so as
to change his position, for it was almost intolerable, it seemed so painfully and unnaturally
constrained; especially, as in all probability he had been sitting so for upwards of eight or ten
hours, going too without his regular meals.
“Mrs. Hussey,” said I, “he’s alive at all events; so leave us, if you please, and I will see to this
strange affair myself.”
Closing the door upon the landlady, I endeavored to prevail upon Queequeg to take a chair;
but in vain. There he sat; and all he could do—for all my polite arts and blandishments—he
would not move a peg, nor say a single word, nor even look at me, nor notice my presence in
the slightest way.
I wonder, thought I, if this can possibly be a part of his Ramadan; do they fast on their hams
that way in his native island. It must be so; yes, it’s part of his creed, I suppose; well, then, let
him rest; he’ll get up sooner or later, no doubt. It can’t last for ever, thank God, and his
Ramadan only comes once a year; and I don’t believe it’s very punctual then.
I went down to supper. After sitting a long time listening to the long stories of some sailors
who had just come from a plum-pudding voyage, as they called it (that is, a short whaling-
voyage in a schooner or brig, confined to the north of the line, in the Atlantic Ocean only); after
listening to these plum-puddingers till nearly eleven o’clock, I went up stairs to go to bed,
feeling quite sure by this time Queequeg must certainly have brought his Ramadan to a
termination. But no; there he was just where I had left him; he had not stirred an inch. I began
to grow vexed with him; it seemed so downright senseless and insane to be sitting there all day
and half the night on his hams in a cold room, holding a piece of wood on his head.
“For heaven’s sake, Queequeg, get up and shake yourself; get up and have some supper.
You’ll starve; you’ll kill yourself, Queequeg.” But not a word did he reply.
Despairing of him, therefore, I determined to go to bed and to sleep; and no doubt, before a
great while, he would follow me. But previous to turning in, I took my heavy bearskin jacket,

51
and threw it over him, as it promised to be a very cold night; and he had nothing but his
ordinary round jacket on. For some time, do all I would, I could not get into the faintest doze. I
had blown out the candle; and the mere thought of Queequeg—not four feet off—sitting there
in that uneasy position, stark alone in the cold and dark; this made me really wretched. Think of
it; sleeping all night in the same room with a wide awake pagan on his hams in this dreary,
unaccountable Ramadan!
But somehow I dropped off at last, and knew nothing more till break of day; when, looking
over the bedside, there squatted Queequeg, as if he had been screwed down to the floor. But
as soon as the first glimpse of sun entered the window, up he got, with stiff and grating joints,
but with a cheerful look; limped towards me where I lay; pressed his forehead again against
mine; and said his Ramadan was over.
Now, as I before hinted, I have no objection to any person’s religion, be it what it may, so
long as that person does not kill or insult any other person, because that other person don’t
believe it also. But when a man’s religion becomes really frantic; when it is a positive torment
to him; and, in fine, makes this earth of ours an uncomfortable inn to lodge in; then I think it
high time to take that individual aside and argue the point with him.
And just so I now did with Queequeg. “Queequeg,” said I, “get into bed now, and lie and
listen to me.” I then went on, beginning with the rise and progress of the primitive religions,
and coming down to the various religions of the present time, during which time I labored to
show Queequeg that all these Lents, Ramadans, and prolonged ham-squattings in cold,
cheerless rooms were stark nonsense; bad for the health; useless for the soul; opposed, in
short, to the obvious laws of Hygiene and common sense. I told him, too, that he being in other
things such an extremely sensible and sagacious savage, it pained me, very badly pained me, to
see him now so deplorably foolish about this ridiculous Ramadan of his. Besides, argued I,
fasting makes the body cave in; hence the spirit caves in; and all thoughts born of a fast must
necessarily be half-starved. This is the reason why most dyspeptic religionists cherish such
melancholy notions about their hereafters. In one word, Queequeg, said I, rather digressively;
hell is an idea first born on an undigested apple-dumpling; and since then perpetuated through
the hereditary dyspepsias nurtured by Ramadans.
I then asked Queequeg whether he himself was ever troubled with dyspepsia; expressing the
idea very plainly, so that he could take it in. He said no; only upon one memorable occasion. It
was after a great feast given by his father the king, on the gaining of a great battle wherein fifty
of the enemy had been killed by about two o’clock in the afternoon, and all cooked and eaten
that very evening.
“No more, Queequeg,” said I, shuddering; “that will do;” for I knew the inferences without
his further hinting them. I had seen a sailor who had visited that very island, and he told me
that it was the custom, when a great battle had been gained there, to barbecue all the slain in
the yard or garden of the victor; and then, one by one, they were placed in great wooden
trenchers, and garnished round like a pilau, with breadfruit and cocoanuts; and with some
parsley in their mouths, were sent round with the victor’s compliments to all his friends, just as
though these presents were so many Christmas turkeys.
After all, I do not think that my remarks about religion made much impression upon
Queequeg. Because, in the first place, he somehow seemed dull of hearing on that important
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subject, unless considered from his own point of view; and, in the second place, he did not
more than one third understand me, couch my ideas simply as I would; and, finally, he no doubt
thought he knew a good deal more about the true religion than I did. He looked at me with a
sort of condescending concern and compassion, as though he thought it a great pity that such a
sensible young man should be so hopelessly lost to evangelical pagan piety.
At last we rose and dressed; and Queequeg, taking a prodigiously hearty breakfast of
chowders of all sorts, so that the landlady should not make much profit by reason of his
Ramadan, we sallied out to board the Pequod, sauntering along, and picking our teeth with
halibut bones.

CHAPTER 18. His Mark.

As we were walking down the end of the wharf towards the ship, Queequeg carrying his
harpoon, Captain Peleg in his gruff voice loudly hailed us from his wigwam, saying he had not
suspected my friend was a cannibal, and furthermore announcing that he let no cannibals on
board that craft, unless they previously produced their papers.
“What do you mean by that, Captain Peleg?” said I, now jumping on the bulwarks, and
leaving my comrade standing on the wharf.
“I mean,” he replied, “he must show his papers.”
“Yes,” said Captain Bildad in his hollow voice, sticking his head from behind Peleg’s, out of
the wigwam. “He must show that he’s converted. Son of darkness,” he added, turning to
Queequeg, “art thou at present in communion with any Christian church?”
“Why,” said I, “he’s a member of the first Congregational Church.” Here be it said, that many
tattooed savages sailing in Nantucket ships at last come to be converted into the churches.
“First Congregational Church,” cried Bildad, “what! that worships in Deacon Deuteronomy
Coleman’s meeting-house?” and so saying, taking out his spectacles, he rubbed them with his
great yellow bandana handkerchief, and putting them on very carefully, came out of the
wigwam, and leaning stiffly over the bulwarks, took a good long look at Queequeg.
“How long hath he been a member?” he then said, turning to me; “not very long, I rather
guess, young man.”
“No,” said Peleg, “and he hasn’t been baptized right either, or it would have washed some of
that devil’s blue off his face.”
“Do tell, now,” cried Bildad, “is this Philistine a regular member of Deacon Deuteronomy’s
meeting? I never saw him going there, and I pass it every Lord’s day.”
“I don’t know anything about Deacon Deuteronomy or his meeting,” said I; “all I know is, that
Queequeg here is a born member of the First Congregational Church. He is a deacon himself,
Queequeg is.”

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 “Young man,” said Bildad sternly, “thou art skylarking with me—explain thyself, thou young
Hittite. What church dost thee mean? answer me.”
Finding myself thus hard pushed, I replied. “I mean, sir, the same ancient Catholic Church to
which you and I, and Captain Peleg there, and Queequeg here, and all of us, and every mother’s
son and soul of us belong; the great and everlasting First Congregation of this whole
worshipping world; we all belong to that; only some of us cherish some queer crotchets no
ways touching the grand belief; in that we all join hands.”
“Splice, thou mean’st splice hands,” cried Peleg, drawing nearer. “Young man, you’d better
ship for a missionary, instead of a fore-mast hand; I never heard a better sermon. Deacon
Deuteronomy—why Father Mapple himself couldn’t beat it, and he’s reckoned something.
Come aboard, come aboard; never mind about the papers. I say, tell Quohog there—what’s
that you call him? tell Quohog to step along. By the great anchor, what a harpoon he’s got
there! looks like good stuff that; and he handles it about right. I say, Quohog, or whatever your
name is, did you ever stand in the head of a whale-boat? did you ever strike a fish?”
Without saying a word, Queequeg, in his wild sort of way, jumped upon the bulwarks, from
thence into the bows of one of the whale-boats hanging to the side; and then bracing his left
knee, and poising his harpoon, cried out in some such way as this:—
“Cap’ain, you see him small drop tar on water dere? You see him? well, spose him one whale
eye, well, den!” and taking sharp aim at it, he darted the iron right over old Bildad’s broad brim,
clean across the ship’s decks, and struck the glistening tar spot out of sight.
“Now,” said Queequeg, quietly hauling in the line, “spos-ee him whale-e eye; why, dad whale
dead.”
“Quick, Bildad,” said Peleg, his partner, who, aghast at the close vicinity of the flying
harpoon, had retreated towards the cabin gangway. “Quick, I say, you Bildad, and get the ship’s
papers. We must have Hedgehog there, I mean Quohog, in one of our boats. Look ye, Quohog,
we’ll give ye the ninetieth lay, and that’s more than ever was given a harpooneer yet out of
Nantucket.”
So down we went into the cabin, and to my great joy Queequeg was soon enrolled among
the same ship’s company to which I myself belonged.
When all preliminaries were over and Peleg had got everything ready for signing, he turned
to me and said, “I guess, Quohog there don’t know how to write, does he? I say, Quohog, blast
ye! dost thou sign thy name or make thy mark?”
But at this question, Queequeg, who had twice or thrice before taken part in similar
ceremonies, looked no ways abashed; but taking the offered pen, copied upon the paper, in the
proper place, an exact counterpart of a queer round figure which was tattooed upon his arm; so
that through Captain Peleg’s obstinate mistake touching his appellative, it stood something like
this:—
Quohog. his X mark.
Meanwhile Captain Bildad sat earnestly and steadfastly eyeing Queequeg, and at last rising
solemnly and fumbling in the huge pockets of his broad-skirted drab coat, took out a bundle of
tracts, and selecting one entitled “The Latter Day Coming; or No Time to Lose,” placed it in

54
Queequeg’s hands, and then grasping them and the book with both his, looked earnestly into
his eyes, and said, “Son of darkness, I must do my duty by thee; I am part owner of this ship,
and feel concerned for the souls of all its crew; if thou still clingest to thy Pagan ways, which I
sadly fear, I beseech thee, remain not for aye a Belial bondsman. Spurn the idol Bell, and the
hideous dragon; turn from the wrath to come; mind thine eye, I say; oh! goodness gracious!
steer clear of the fiery pit!”
Something of the salt sea yet lingered in old Bildad’s language, heterogeneously mixed with
Scriptural and domestic phrases.
“Avast there, avast there, Bildad, avast now spoiling our harpooneer,” cried Peleg. “Pious
harpooneers never make good voyagers—it takes the shark out of ’em; no harpooneer is worth
a straw who aint pretty sharkish. There was young Nat Swaine, once the bravest boat-header
out of all Nantucket and the Vineyard; he joined the meeting, and never came to good. He got
so frightened about his plaguy soul, that he shrinked and sheered away from whales, for fear of
after-claps, in case he got stove and went to Davy Jones.”
“Peleg! Peleg!” said Bildad, lifting his eyes and hands, “thou thyself, as I myself, hast seen
many a perilous time; thou knowest, Peleg, what it is to have the fear of death; how, then,
can’st thou prate in this ungodly guise. Thou beliest thine own heart, Peleg. Tell me, when this
same Pequod here had her three masts overboard in that typhoon on Japan, that same voyage
when thou went mate with Captain Ahab, did’st thou not think of Death and the Judgment
then?”
“Hear him, hear him now,” cried Peleg, marching across the cabin, and thrusting his hands far
down into his pockets,—“hear him, all of ye. Think of that! When every moment we thought
the ship would sink! Death and the Judgment then? What? With all three masts making such an
everlasting thundering against the side; and every sea breaking over us, fore and aft. Think of
Death and the Judgment then? No! no time to think about Death then. Life was what Captain
Ahab and I was thinking of; and how to save all hands—how to rig jury-masts—how to get into
the nearest port; that was what I was thinking of.”
Bildad said no more, but buttoning up his coat, stalked on deck, where we followed him.
There he stood, very quietly overlooking some sailmakers who were mending a top-sail in the
waist. Now and then he stooped to pick up a patch, or save an end of tarred twine, which
otherwise might have been wasted.

CHAPTER 19. The Prophet.

“Shipmates, have ye shipped in that ship?”

55
investing his neck. A confluent small-pox had in all directions flowed over his face, and left it like
the complicated ribbed bed of a torrent, when the rushing waters have been dried up.
“Have ye shipped in her?” he repeated.
“You mean the ship Pequod, I suppose,” said I, trying to gain a little more time for an
uninterrupted look at him.
“Aye, the Pequod—that ship there,” he said, drawing back his whole arm, and then rapidly
shoving it straight out from him, with the fixed bayonet of his pointed finger darted full at the
object.
“Yes,” said I, “we have just signed the articles.”
“Anything down there about your souls?”
“About what?”
“Oh, perhaps you hav’n’t got any,” he said quickly. “No matter though, I know many chaps
that hav’n’t got any,—good luck to ’em; and they are all the better off for it. A soul’s a sort of a
fifth wheel to a wagon.”
“What are you jabbering about, shipmate?” said I.
“He’s got enough, though, to make up for all deficiencies of that sort in other chaps,”
abruptly said the stranger, placing a nervous emphasis upon the word he.
“Queequeg,” said I, “let’s go; this fellow has broken loose from somewhere; he’s talking
about something and somebody we don’t know.”
“Stop!” cried the stranger. “Ye said true—ye hav’n’t seen Old Thunder yet, have ye?”
“Who’s Old Thunder?” said I, again riveted with the insane earnestness of his manner.
“Captain Ahab.”
“What! the captain of our ship, the Pequod?”
“Aye, among some of us old sailor chaps, he goes by that name. Ye hav’n’t seen him yet, have
ye?”
“No, we hav’n’t. He’s sick they say, but is getting better, and will be all right again before
long.”
“All right again before long!” laughed the stranger, with a solemnly derisive sort of laugh.
“Look ye; when Captain Ahab is all right, then this left arm of mine will be all right; not before.”
“What do you know about him?”
“What did they tell you about him? Say that!”
“They didn’t tell much of anything about him; only I’ve heard that he’s a good whale-hunter,
and a good captain to his crew.”
“That’s true, that’s true—yes, both true enough. But you must jump when he gives an order.
Step and growl; growl and go—that’s the word with Captain Ahab. But nothing about that thing
that happened to him off Cape Horn, long ago, when he lay like dead for three days and nights;
nothing about that deadly skrimmage with the Spaniard afore the altar in Santa?—heard
nothing about that, eh? Nothing about the silver calabash he spat into? And nothing about his
losing his leg last voyage, according to the prophecy. Didn’t ye hear a word about them matters

56
and something more, eh? No, I don’t think ye did; how could ye? Who knows it? Not all
Nantucket, I guess. But hows’ever, mayhap, ye’ve heard tell about the leg, and how he lost it;
aye, ye have heard of that, I dare say. Oh yes, that every one knows a’most—I mean they know
he’s only one leg; and that a parmacetti took the other off.”
“My friend,” said I, “what all this gibberish of yours is about, I don’t know, and I don’t much
care; for it seems to me that you must be a little damaged in the head. But if you are speaking
of Captain Ahab, of that ship there, the Pequod, then let me tell you, that I know all about the
loss of his leg.”
“All about it, eh—sure you do?—all?”
“Pretty sure.”
With finger pointed and eye levelled at the Pequod, the beggar-like stranger stood a
moment, as if in a troubled reverie; then starting a little, turned and said:—“Ye’ve shipped,
have ye? Names down on the papers? Well, well, what’s signed, is signed; and what’s to be, will
be; and then again, perhaps it won’t be, after all. Anyhow, it’s all fixed and arranged a’ready;
and some sailors or other must go with him, I suppose; as well these as any other men, God pity
’em! Morning to ye, shipmates, morning; the ineffable heavens bless ye; I’m sorry I stopped
ye.”
“Look here, friend,” said I, “if you have anything important to tell us, out with it; but if you
are only trying to bamboozle us, you are mistaken in your game; that’s all I have to say.”
“And it’s said very well, and I like to hear a chap talk up that way; you are just the man for
him—the likes of ye. Morning to ye, shipmates, morning! Oh! when ye get there, tell ’em I’ve
concluded not to make one of ’em.”
“Ah, my dear fellow, you can’t fool us that way—you can’t fool us. It is the easiest thing in
the world for a man to look as if he had a great secret in him.”
“Morning to ye, shipmates, morning.”
“Morning it is,” said I. “Come along, Queequeg, let’s leave this crazy man. But stop, tell me
your name, will you?”
“Elijah.”
Elijah! thought I, and we walked away, both commenting, after each other’s fashion, upon
this ragged old sailor; and agreed that he was nothing but a humbug, trying to be a bugbear.
But we had not gone perhaps above a hundred yards, when chancing to turn a corner, and
looking back as I did so, who should be seen but Elijah following us, though at a distance.
Somehow, the sight of him struck me so, that I said nothing to Queequeg of his being behind,
but passed on with my comrade, anxious to see whether the stranger would turn the same
corner that we did. He did; and then it seemed to me that he was dogging us, but with what
intent I could not for the life of me imagine. This circumstance, coupled with his ambiguous,
half-hinting, half-revealing, shrouded sort of talk, now begat in me all kinds of vague
wonderments and half-apprehensions, and all connected with the Pequod; and Captain Ahab;
and the leg he had lost; and the Cape Horn fit; and the silver calabash; and what Captain Peleg
had said of him, when I left the ship the day previous; and the prediction of the squaw Tistig;
and the voyage we had bound ourselves to sail; and a hundred other shadowy things.

57
 I was resolved to satisfy myself whether this ragged Elijah was really dogging us or not, and
with that intent crossed the way with Queequeg, and on that side of it retraced our steps. But
Elijah passed on, without seeming to notice us. This relieved me; and once more, and finally as
it seemed to me, I pronounced him in my heart, a humbug.

CHAPTER 20. All Astir.

A day or two passed, and there was great activity aboard the Pequod. Not only were the old
sails being mended, but new sails were coming on board, and bolts of canvas, and coils of
rigging; in short, everything betokened that the ship’s preparations were hurrying to a close.
Captain Peleg seldom or never went ashore, but sat in his wigwam keeping a sharp look-out
upon the hands: Bildad did all the purchasing and providing at the stores; and the men
employed in the hold and on the rigging were working till long after night-fall.
On the day following Queequeg’s signing the articles, word was given at all the inns where
the ship’s company were stopping, that their chests must be on board before night, for there
was no telling how soon the vessel might be sailing. So Queequeg and I got down our traps,
resolving, however, to sleep ashore till the last. But it seems they always give very long notice in
these cases, and the ship did not sail for several days. But no wonder; there was a good deal to
be done, and there is no telling how many things to be thought of, before the Pequod was fully
equipped.
Every one knows what a multitude of things—beds, sauce-pans, knives and forks, shovels and
tongs, napkins, nut-crackers, and what not, are indispensable to the business of housekeeping.
Just so with whaling, which necessitates a three-years’ housekeeping upon the wide ocean, far
from all grocers, costermongers, doctors, bakers, and bankers. And though this also holds true
of merchant vessels, yet not by any means to the same extent as with whalemen. For besides
the great length of the whaling voyage, the numerous articles peculiar to the prosecution of the
fishery, and the impossibility of replacing them at the remote harbors usually frequented, it
must be remembered, that of all ships, whaling vessels are the most exposed to accidents of all
kinds, and especially to the destruction and loss of the very things upon which the success of
the voyage most depends. Hence, the spare boats, spare spars, and spare lines and harpoons,
and spare everythings, almost, but a spare Captain and duplicate ship.
At the period of our arrival at the Island, the heaviest storage of the Pequod had been almost
completed; comprising her beef, bread, water, fuel, and iron hoops and staves. But, as before
hinted, for some time there was a continual fetching and carrying on board of divers odds and
ends of things, both large and small.
Chief among those who did this fetching and carrying was Captain Bildad’s sister, a lean old
lady of a most determined and indefatigable spirit, but withal very kindhearted, who seemed
resolved that, if she could help it, nothing should be found wanting in the Pequod, after once
fairly getting to sea. At one time she would come on board with a jar of pickles for the
steward’s pantry; another time with a bunch of quills for the chief mate’s desk, where he kept

58
his log; a third time with a roll of flannel for the small of some one’s rheumatic back. Never did
any woman better deserve her name, which was Charity—Aunt Charity, as everybody called
her. And like a sister of charity did this charitable Aunt Charity bustle about hither and thither,
ready to turn her hand and heart to anything that promised to yield safety, comfort, and
consolation to all on board a ship in which her beloved brother Bildad was concerned, and in
which she herself owned a score or two of well-saved dollars.
But it was startling to see this excellent hearted Quakeress coming on board, as she did the
last day, with a long oil-ladle in one hand, and a still longer whaling lance in the other. Nor was
Bildad himself nor Captain Peleg at all backward. As for Bildad, he carried about with him a long
list of the articles needed, and at every fresh arrival, down went his mark opposite that article
upon the paper. Every once in a while Peleg came hobbling out of his whalebone den, roaring at
the men down the hatchways, roaring up to the riggers at the mast-head, and then concluded
by roaring back into his wigwam.
During these days of preparation, Queequeg and I often visited the craft, and as often I asked
about Captain Ahab, and how he was, and when he was going to come on board his ship. To
these questions they would answer, that he was getting better and better, and was expected
aboard every day; meantime, the two captains, Peleg and Bildad, could attend to everything
necessary to fit the vessel for the voyage. If I had been downright honest with myself, I would
have seen very plainly in my heart that I did but half fancy being committed this way to so long
a voyage, without once laying my eyes on the man who was to be the absolute dictator of it, so
soon as the ship sailed out upon the open sea. But when a man suspects any wrong, it
sometimes happens that if he be already involved in the matter, he insensibly strives to cover
up his suspicions even from himself. And much this way it was with me. I said nothing, and tried
to think nothing.
At last it was given out that some time next day the ship would certainly sail. So next
morning, Queequeg and I took a very early start.

CHAPTER 21. Going Aboard.

It was nearly six o’clock, but only grey imperfect misty dawn, when we drew nigh the wharf.
“There are some sailors running ahead there, if I see right,” said I to Queequeg, “it can’t be
shadows; she’s off by sunrise, I guess; come on!”
“Avast!” cried a voice, whose owner at the same time coming close behind us, laid a hand
upon both our shoulders, and then insinuating himself between us, stood stooping forward a
little, in the uncertain twilight, strangely peering from Queequeg to me. It was Elijah.
“Going aboard?”
“Hands off, will you,” said I.
“Lookee here,” said Queequeg, shaking himself, “go ’way!”
“Ain’t going aboard, then?”

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 “Yes, we are,” said I, “but what business is that of yours? Do you know, Mr. Elijah, that I
consider you a little impertinent?”
“No, no, no; I wasn’t aware of that,” said Elijah, slowly and wonderingly looking from me to
Queequeg, with the most unaccountable glances.
“Elijah,” said I, “you will oblige my friend and me by withdrawing. We are going to the Indian
and Pacific Oceans, and would prefer not to be detained.”
“Ye be, be ye? Coming back afore breakfast?”
“He’s cracked, Queequeg,” said I, “come on.”
“Holloa!” cried stationary Elijah, hailing us when we had removed a few paces.
“Never mind him,” said I, “Queequeg, come on.”
But he stole up to us again, and suddenly clapping his hand on my shoulder, said—“Did ye
see anything looking like men going towards that ship a while ago?”
Struck by this plain matter-of-fact question, I answered, saying, “Yes, I thought I did see four
or five men; but it was too dim to be sure.”
“Very dim, very dim,” said Elijah. “Morning to ye.”
Once more we quitted him; but once more he came softly after us; and touching my shoulder
again, said, “See if you can find ’em now, will ye?
“Find who?”
“Morning to ye! morning to ye!” he rejoined, again moving off. “Oh! I was going to warn ye
against—but never mind, never mind—it’s all one, all in the family too;—sharp frost this
morning, ain’t it? Good-bye to ye. Shan’t see ye again very soon, I guess; unless it’s before the
Grand Jury.” And with these cracked words he finally departed, leaving me, for the moment, in
no small wonderment at his frantic impudence.
At last, stepping on board the Pequod, we found everything in profound quiet, not a soul
moving. The cabin entrance was locked within; the hatches were all on, and lumbered with coils
of rigging. Going forward to the forecastle, we found the slide of the scuttle open. Seeing a
light, we went down, and found only an old rigger there, wrapped in a tattered pea-jacket. He
was thrown at whole length upon two chests, his face downwards and inclosed in his folded
arms. The profoundest slumber slept upon him.
“Those sailors we saw, Queequeg, where can they have gone to?” said I, looking dubiously at
the sleeper. But it seemed that, when on the wharf, Queequeg had not at all noticed what I
now alluded to; hence I would have thought myself to have been optically deceived in that
matter, were it not for Elijah’s otherwise inexplicable question. But I beat the thing down; and
again marking the sleeper, jocularly hinted to Queequeg that perhaps we had best sit up with
the body; telling him to establish himself accordingly. He put his hand upon the sleeper’s rear,
as though feeling if it was soft enough; and then, without more ado, sat quietly down there.
“Gracious! Queequeg, don’t sit there,” said I.
“Oh! perry dood seat,” said Queequeg, “my country way; won’t hurt him face.”

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 “Face!” said I, “call that his face? very benevolent countenance then; but how hard he
breathes, he’s heaving himself; get off, Queequeg, you are heavy, it’s grinding the face of the
poor. Get off, Queequeg! Look, he’ll twitch you off soon. I wonder he don’t wake.”
Queequeg removed himself to just beyond the head of the sleeper, and lighted his
tomahawk pipe. I sat at the feet. We kept the pipe passing over the sleeper, from one to the
other. Meanwhile, upon questioning him in his broken fashion, Queequeg gave me to
understand that, in his land, owing to the absence of settees and sofas of all sorts, the king,
chiefs, and great people generally, were in the custom of fattening some of the lower orders for
ottomans; and to furnish a house comfortably in that respect, you had only to buy up eight or
ten lazy fellows, and lay them round in the piers and alcoves. Besides, it was very convenient on
an excursion; much better than those garden-chairs which are convertible into walking-sticks;
upon occasion, a chief calling his attendant, and desiring him to make a settee of himself under
a spreading tree, perhaps in some damp marshy place.
While narrating these things, every time Queequeg received the tomahawk from me, he
flourished the hatchet-side of it over the sleeper’s head.
“What’s that for, Queequeg?”
“Perry easy, kill-e; oh! perry easy!”
He was going on with some wild reminiscences about his tomahawk-pipe, which, it seemed,
had in its two uses both brained his foes and soothed his soul, when we were directly attracted
to the sleeping rigger. The strong vapor now completely filling the contracted hole, it began to
tell upon him. He breathed with a sort of muffledness; then seemed troubled in the nose; then
revolved over once or twice; then sat up and rubbed his eyes.
“Holloa!” he breathed at last, “who be ye smokers?”
“Shipped men,” answered I, “when does she sail?”
“Aye, aye, ye are going in her, be ye? She sails to-day. The Captain came aboard last night.”
“What Captain?—Ahab?”
“Who but him indeed?”
I was going to ask him some further questions concerning Ahab, when we heard a noise on
deck.
“Holloa! Starbuck’s astir,” said the rigger. “He’s a lively chief mate, that; good man, and a
pious; but all alive now, I must turn to.” And so saying he went on deck, and we followed.
It was now clear sunrise. Soon the crew came on board in twos and threes; the riggers
bestirred themselves; the mates were actively engaged; and several of the shore people were
busy in bringing various last things on board. Meanwhile Captain Ahab remained invisibly
enshrined within his cabin.

CHAPTER 22. Merry Christmas.

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 At length, towards noon, upon the final dismissal of the ship’s riggers, and after the Pequod
had been hauled out from the wharf, and after the ever-thoughtful Charity had come off in a
whale-boat, with her last gift—a night-cap for Stubb, the second mate, her brother-in-law, and
a spare Bible for the steward—after all this, the two Captains, Peleg and Bildad, issued from the
cabin, and turning to the chief mate, Peleg said:
“Now, Mr. Starbuck, are you sure everything is right? Captain Ahab is all ready—just spoke to
him—nothing more to be got from shore, eh? Well, call all hands, then. Muster ’em aft here—
blast ’em!”
“No need of profane words, however great the hurry, Peleg,” said Bildad, “but away with
thee, friend Starbuck, and do our bidding.”
How now! Here upon the very point of starting for the voyage, Captain Peleg and Captain
Bildad were going it with a high hand on the quarter-deck, just as if they were to be joint-
commanders at sea, as well as to all appearances in port. And, as for Captain Ahab, no sign of
him was yet to be seen; only, they said he was in the cabin. But then, the idea was, that his
presence was by no means necessary in getting the ship under weigh, and steering her well out
to sea. Indeed, as that was not at all his proper business, but the pilot’s; and as he was not yet
completely recovered—so they said—therefore, Captain Ahab stayed below. And all this
seemed natural enough; especially as in the merchant service many captains never show
themselves on deck for a considerable time after heaving up the anchor, but remain over the
cabin table, having a farewell merry-making with their shore friends, before they quit the ship
for good with the pilot.
But there was not much chance to think over the matter, for Captain Peleg was now all alive.
He seemed to do most of the talking and commanding, and not Bildad.
“Aft here, ye sons of bachelors,” he cried, as the sailors lingered at the main-mast. “Mr.
Starbuck, drive ’em aft.”
“Strike the tent there!”—was the next order. As I hinted before, this whalebone marquee
was never pitched except in port; and on board the Pequod, for thirty years, the order to strike
the tent was well known to be the next thing to heaving up the anchor.
“Man the capstan! Blood and thunder!—jump!”—was the next command, and the crew
sprang for the handspikes.
Now in getting under weigh, the station generally occupied by the pilot is the forward part of
the ship. And here Bildad, who, with Peleg, be it known, in addition to his other officers, was
one of the licensed pilots of the port—he being suspected to have got himself made a pilot in
order to save the Nantucket pilot-fee to all the ships he was concerned in, for he never piloted
any other craft—Bildad, I say, might now be seen actively engaged in looking over the bows for
the approaching anchor, and at intervals singing what seemed a dismal stave of psalmody, to
cheer the hands at the windlass, who roared forth some sort of a chorus about the girls in
Booble Alley, with hearty good will. Nevertheless, not three days previous, Bildad had told them
that no profane songs would be allowed on board the Pequod, particularly in getting under
weigh; and Charity, his sister, had placed a small choice copy of Watts in each seaman’s berth.
Meantime, overseeing the other part of the ship, Captain Peleg ripped and swore astern in
the most frightful manner. I almost thought he would sink the ship before the anchor could be

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got up; involuntarily I paused on my handspike, and told Queequeg to do the same, thinking of
the perils we both ran, in starting on the voyage with such a devil for a pilot. I was comforting
myself, however, with the thought that in pious Bildad might be found some salvation, spite of
his seven hundred and seventy-seventh lay; when I felt a sudden sharp poke in my rear, and
turning round, was horrified at the apparition of Captain Peleg in the act of withdrawing his leg
from my immediate vicinity. That was my first kick.
“Is that the way they heave in the marchant service?” he roared. “Spring, thou sheep-head;
spring, and break thy backbone! Why don’t ye spring, I say, all of ye—spring! Quohog! spring,
thou chap with the red whiskers; spring there, Scotch-cap; spring, thou green pants. Spring, I
say, all of ye, and spring your eyes out!” And so saying, he moved along the windlass, here and
there using his leg very freely, while imperturbable Bildad kept leading off with his psalmody.
Thinks I, Captain Peleg must have been drinking something to-day.
At last the anchor was up, the sails were set, and off we glided. It was a short, cold Christmas;
and as the short northern day merged into night, we found ourselves almost broad upon the
wintry ocean, whose freezing spray cased us in ice, as in polished armor. The long rows of teeth
on the bulwarks glistened in the moonlight; and like the white ivory tusks of some huge
elephant, vast curving icicles depended from the bows.
Lank Bildad, as pilot, headed the first watch, and ever and anon, as the old craft deep dived
into the green seas, and sent the shivering frost all over her, and the winds howled, and the
cordage rang, his steady notes were heard,—
“Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood,
Stand dressed in living green.
So to the Jews old Canaan stood,
While Jordan rolled between.”
Never did those sweet words sound more sweetly to me than then. They were full of hope
and fruition. Spite of this frigid winter night in the boisterous Atlantic, spite of my wet feet and
wetter jacket, there was yet, it then seemed to me, many a pleasant haven in store; and meads
and glades so eternally vernal, that the grass shot up by the spring, untrodden, unwilted,
remains at midsummer.
At last we gained such an offing, that the two pilots were needed no longer. The stout sail-
boat that had accompanied us began ranging alongside.
It was curious and not unpleasing, how Peleg and Bildad were affected at this juncture,
especially Captain Bildad. For loath to depart, yet; very loath to leave, for good, a ship bound on
so long and perilous a voyage—beyond both stormy Capes; a ship in which some thousands of
his hard earned dollars were invested; a ship, in which an old shipmate sailed as captain; a man
almost as old as he, once more starting to encounter all the terrors of the pitiless jaw; loath to
say good-bye to a thing so every way brimful of every interest to him,—poor old Bildad lingered
long; paced the deck with anxious strides; ran down into the cabin to speak another farewell
word there; again came on deck, and looked to windward; looked towards the wide and
endless waters, only bounded by the far-off unseen Eastern Continents; looked towards the
land; looked aloft; looked right and left; looked everywhere and nowhere; and at last,
mechanically coiling a rope upon its pin, convulsively grasped stout Peleg by the hand, and

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holding up a lantern, for a moment stood gazing heroically in his face, as much as to say,
“Nevertheless, friend Peleg, I can stand it; yes, I can.”
As for Peleg himself, he took it more like a philosopher; but for all his philosophy, there was a
tear twinkling in his eye, when the lantern came too near. And he, too, did not a little run from
cabin to deck—now a word below, and now a word with Starbuck, the chief mate.
But, at last, he turned to his comrade, with a final sort of look about him,—“Captain Bildad—
come, old shipmate, we must go. Back the main-yard there! Boat ahoy! Stand by to come close
alongside, now! Careful, careful!—come, Bildad, boy—say your last. Luck to ye, Starbuck—luck
to ye, Mr. Stubb—luck to ye, Mr. Flask—good-bye and good luck to ye all—and this day three
years I’ll have a hot supper smoking for ye in old Nantucket. Hurrah and away!”
“God bless ye, and have ye in His holy keeping, men,” murmured old Bildad, almost
incoherently. “I hope ye’ll have fine weather now, so that Captain Ahab may soon be moving
among ye—a pleasant sun is all he needs, and ye’ll have plenty of them in the tropic voyage ye
go. Be careful in the hunt, ye mates. Don’t stave the boats needlessly, ye harpooneers; good
white cedar plank is raised full three per cent. within the year. Don’t forget your prayers, either.
Mr. Starbuck, mind that cooper don’t waste the spare staves. Oh! the sail-needles are in the
green locker! Don’t whale it too much a’ Lord’s days, men; but don’t miss a fair chance either,
that’s rejecting Heaven’s good gifts. Have an eye to the molasses tierce, Mr. Stubb; it was a little
leaky, I thought. If ye touch at the islands, Mr. Flask, beware of fornication. Good-bye, good-
bye! Don’t keep that cheese too long down in the hold, Mr. Starbuck; it’ll spoil. Be careful with
the butter—twenty cents the pound it was, and mind ye, if—”
“Come, come, Captain Bildad; stop palavering,—away!” and with that, Peleg hurried him
over the side, and both dropt into the boat.
Ship and boat diverged; the cold, damp night breeze blew between; a screaming gull flew
overhead; the two hulls wildly rolled; we gave three heavy-hearted cheers, and blindly plunged
like fate into the lone Atlantic.

CHAPTER 23. The Lee Shore.

Some chapters back, one Bulkington was spoken of, a tall, newlanded mariner, encountered
in New Bedford at the inn.
When on that shivering winter’s night, the Pequod thrust her vindictive bows into the cold
malicious waves, who should I see standing at her helm but Bulkington! I looked with
sympathetic awe and fearfulness upon the man, who in mid-winter just landed from a four
years’ dangerous voyage, could so unrestingly push off again for still another tempestuous
term. The land seemed scorching to his feet. Wonderfullest things are ever the unmentionable;
deep memories yield no epitaphs; this six-inch chapter is the stoneless grave of Bulkington. Let
me only say that it fared with him as with the storm-tossed ship, that miserably drives along the
leeward land. The port would fain give succor; the port is pitiful; in the port is safety, comfort,

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hearthstone, supper, warm blankets, friends, all that’s kind to our mortalities. But in that gale,
the port, the land, is that ship’s direst jeopardy; she must fly all hospitality; one touch of land,
though it but graze the keel, would make her shudder through and through. With all her might
she crowds all sail off shore; in so doing, fights ’gainst the very winds that fain would blow her
homeward; seeks all the lashed sea’s landlessness again; for refuge’s sake forlornly rushing into
peril; her only friend her bitterest foe!
Know ye now, Bulkington? Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally intolerable truth; that
all deep, earnest thinking is but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence
of her sea; while the wildest winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous,
slavish shore?
But as in landlessness alone resides highest truth, shoreless, indefinite as God—so, better is it
to perish in that howling infinite, than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee, even if that were
safety! For worm-like, then, oh! who would craven crawl to land! Terrors of the terrible! is all
this agony so vain? Take heart, take heart, O Bulkington! Bear thee grimly, demigod! Up from
the spray of thy ocean-perishing—straight up, leaps thy apotheosis!

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