THE WHITE WHALE 
151 
CHAPTER XXXYI 
SUNSET 
(The cabin ; by the stern windows. Ahab sitting alone , and gazing out.) 
I leave a white and turbid wake; pale waters, paler cheeks, where’er 
I sail. The envious billows sidelong swell to whelm my track; let 
them; but first I pass. 
Yonder, by the ever-brimming goblet’s rim, the warm waves blush 
like wine. The gold brow plumbs the blue. The diver sun — long 
dived from noon, — goes down; my soul mounts up! she wearies with 
her endless hill. Is, then, the crown too heavy that I wear ? this Iron 
Crown of Lombardy. Yet is it bright with many a gem ; I, the wearer, 
see not its far flashings; but darkly feel that I wear that, that daz- 
zlingly confounds. ’Tis iron — that I know — not gold. ‘Tis split, too 
— that I feel; the jagged edge galls me so, my brain seems to beat 
against the solid metal. 
Dry heat upon my brow ? Oh ! time was, when as the sunrise nobly 
spurred me, so the sunset soothed. Ho more. This lovely light, it 
lights not me ; all loveliness i’s anguish to me, since I can ne’er enjoy. 
Gifted with the high perception, I lack the low, enjoying power; 
damned, most subtly -and most malignantly ! damned in the midst of 
Paradise ! Good-night — good-night ! ( waving his hand he moves from 
the window). 
’Twas not so hard a task. I thought to find one stubborn, at the 
least; but my one cogged circle fits into all their various wheels, and 
they revolve. Or, if you will, like so many ant-hills of powder, they 
all stand before me ; and I their match. Oh, hard ! that to fire others, 
the match itself must needs be wasting ! What I’ve dared, I’ve willed ; 
and what I’ve willed, I’ll do! They think me mad — Starbuck does; 
but I’m demoniac, I am madness maddened! That wild madness 
that’s only calm to comprehend itself ! The prophecy was- that I should 
be dismembered; and — Aye! I lost this leg. I now prophesy that I 
will dismember my dismemberer.. How, then, be the prophet and the 
fulfiller one. That’s more than ye, ye great gods, ever were. I laugh 
and hoot at ye, ye cricket players, ye pugilists, ye deaf Burkes and 
