112 
MOBY DICK; OR 
prevail, habitually, the silent steersman would watch the cabin- 
scuttle; and ere long the old man would emerge, gripping at the iron 
banister, to help his crippled way. Some considerating touch of 
humanity was in him ; for at times like these, he usually abstained from 
patrolling the quarter deck; because to his wearied mates, seeking re- 
pose within six inches of his ivory heel, such would have been the 
reverberating crack and din of that bony step, that their dreams would 
have been of the crunching teeth of sharks. But once, the mood was 
on him too deep for common regardings; and as with heavy, lumber- 
like pace he was measuring the ship from taffrail to mainmast, Stubb, 
the odd second mate came up from below, and with a certain unassured, 
deprecating humorousness, hinted that if Captain Ahab was pleased 
to walk the planks, then, no one could say nay; hut there might be 
some way of muffling the noise; hinting something indistinctly and 
hesitatingly about a globe of tow, and the insertion into it, of the 
ivory heel. Ah! Stubb, thou didst not know Ahab then. 
“Am I a cannon-ball, Stubb,” said Ahab, “that thou wouldst wad 
me that fashion? But go thy ways; I had forgot. Below to thy 
nightly grave ; where such as ye sleep between shrouds, to use ye to the 
filling one at last — Down, dog, and kennel !” 
Starting at the unforeseen concluding exclamation of the so suddenly 
scornful old man, Stubb was speechless a moment; then said excitedly, 
“I am not used to be spoken to that way, sir ; I do but less than half 
like it, sir.” 
“Avast!” gritted Ahab between his set teeth, and violently moving 
away, as if to avoid some passionate temptation. 
“No, sir; not yet,” said Stubb, emboldened; “I will not tamely 
be called a dog, sir.” 
“Then be called ten times a donkey, and a mule, and an ass, and 
begone, or I’ll clear the world of thee !” 
As he said this, Ahab advanced upon him with such overbearing ter- 
rors in his aspect, that Stubb involuntarily retreated. 
“I was never served so before without giving a hard blow for it,” 
muttered Stubb, as he found himself descending the cabin scuttle. “It’s 
very queer. Stop, Stubb; somehow, now, I don’t well know whether 
to go back and strike him, or — what’s that ? — down here on my knees 
and pray for him ? Yes, that was the thought coming up in me ; but 
