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Aside from those more obvious considerations touching Moby Dick, which could not but occasionally awaken in any man's soul some alarm, there was another thought, or rather vague, nameless horror concerning him, which at times by its intensity completely overpowered all the rest; and yet so mystical and well nigh ineffable was it, that I almost despair of putting it in a comprehensible form.
There appeared in the papers caricatures of every gigantic and imaginary creature, from the white whale, the terrible "Moby Dick" of sub-arctic regions, to the immense kraken, whose tentacles could entangle a ship of five hundred tons and hurry it into the abyss of the ocean. The legends of ancient times were even revived.
I have here two pledges that I shall yet slay Moby Dick and survive it." "Take another pledge, old man," said the Parsee, as his eyes lighted up like fire-flies in the gloom "Hemp only can kill thee." "The gallows, ye mean. I am immortal then, on land and on sea," cried Ahab, with a laugh of derision; "Immortal on land and on sea!" Both were silent again, as one man.
It was hardly to be doubted, that several vessels reported to have encountered, at such or such a time, or on such or such a meridian, a Sperm Whale of uncommon magnitude and malignity, which whale, after doing great mischief to his assailants, had completely escaped them; to some minds it was not an unfair presumption, I say, that the whale in question must have been no other than Moby Dick.
However, he always recognised the immense influence the voyage had had upon his career, and in regard to its results has said in 'Moby Dick,
Granting that the White Whale fully incites the hearts of this my savage crew, and playing round their savageness even breeds a certain generous knight-errantism in them, still, while for the love of it they give chase to Moby Dick, they must also have food for their more common, daily appetites.
As with a low sucking sound it slowly disappeared again, Starbuck still gazing at the agitated waters where it had sunk, with a wild voice exclaimed "Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to have seen thee, thou white ghost!" "What was it, Sir?" said Flask. "The great live squid, which, they say, few whale-ships ever beheld, and returned to their ports to tell of it."
It seemed that somewhat late on the afternoon of the day previous, while three of the stranger's boats were engaged with a shoal of whales, which had led them some four or five miles from the ship; and while they were yet in swift chase to windward, the white hump and head of Moby Dick had suddenly loomed up out of the water, not very far to leeward; whereupon, the fourth rigged boat a reserved one had been instantly lowered in chase.
For the peculiar snow-white brow of Moby Dick, and his snow-white hump, could not but be unmistakable. And have I not tallied the whale, Ahab would mutter to himself, as after poring over his charts till long after midnight he would throw himself back in reveries tallied him, and shall he escape? His broad fins are bored, and scalloped out like a lost sheep's ear!
A hump like a snow-hill! It is Moby Dick!" Fired by the cry which seemed simultaneously taken up by the three look-outs, the men on deck rushed to the rigging to behold the famous whale they had so long been pursuing.
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