THE WHITE WHALE 361 
began to crowd a little, and tumble against each other, as if lifted by 
half-spent billows from afar; then the lake itself began faintly to 
heave and swell; the submarine bridal-chambers and nurseries van- 
ished; in more and more contracting orbits the whales in the more 
central circles began to swim in thickening clusters. Yes, the long 
calm was departing. A low advancing hum was soon heard ; and then 
like to the tumultuous masses of block-ice when the great river Hudson 
breaks up in spring, the entire host of whales came tumbling upon 
their inner centre, as if to pile themselves up in one common mountain. 
Instantly Starbuck and Queequeg changed places ; Starbuck taking the 
stem. 
“Oars! Oars!” he intensely whispered, seizing the helm — “gripe 
your oars, and clutch your souls, now! My God, men, stand by! 
Shove him off, you Queequeg — the whale there! — prick him! — hit 
him! Stand up — stand up, and stay so! Spring, men — pull, men; 
never mind their backs — scrape them ! — scrape away !” 
The boat was now all but jammed between two vast black bulks, 
leaving a narrow Dardanelles between their long lengths. But by 
desperate endeavour we at last shot into a temporary opening ; then giv- 
ing way rapidly, and at the same time earnestly watching for another 
outlet. After many similar hair-breadth escapes, we at last swiftly 
glided into what had just been one of the outer circles, but now 
crossed by random whales, all violently making for one centre. This 
lucky salvation was cheaply purchased by the loss of Queequeg’ s hat, 
who, while standing in the bows to prick the fugitive whales, had his 
hat taken clean from his head by the air-eddy made by the tossing of a 
pair of broad flukes close by. 
Riotous- and disordered as the universal commotion now was, it 
soon resolved itself into what seemed a systematic movement; for hav- 
ing clumped together at last in one dense body, they then renewed their 
onward flight with augmented fleetness. Further pursuit was useless; 
but the boats still lingered in their wake to* pick up what drugged 
whales might be dropped astern, and likewise to secure one which 
Flask had killed and waifed. The waif is a «pennoned pole, two or 
three of which are carried by every boat ; and which, when additional 
game is at hand, are inserted upright into the floating body of a dead 
