467 
THE WHITE WHALE 
As in the hurricane that sweeps the plain, men fly the neighbourhood 
of some lone, gigantic elm, whose height and strength hut render it so 
much the more unsafe, because so much the more a mark for thunder- 
bolts; so at those last words of Ahab’s many of the mariners did run 
from him in a terror of dismay. 
CHAPTER CXIX 
THE DECK TOWARDS THE END OF THE FIRST NIGHT WATCH 
( Ahab standing by the helm. StarbucJc approaching him.) 
“We must send down the maintopsail yard, sir. The band is work- 
ing loose, and the lee lift is half stranded. Shall I strike it, sir?” 
“Strike nothing ; lash it. If I had skysail poles, I’d sway them up 
now.” 
“Sir ? — in God’s name ! — sir ?” 
“Well.” 
“The anchors are working, sir. Shall I get them inboard ?” 
“Strike nothing, and stir nothing, but lash everything. The wind 
rises, but it has not got up to my tablelands yet. Quick, and see to it. 
— By masts and keels! he takes me for the hunch-backed skipper of 
some coasting smack. Send down my maintopsail yard! Ho, glue- 
pots! Loftiest trucks were made for wildest winds, and this brain- 
truck of mine now sails amid the cloud-scud. Shall I strike that? 
Oh, none but cowards send down their brain-trucks in tempest time. 
What a hooroosh aloft there! I would e’en take it for sublime, did 
I not know that the colic is a noisy malady. Oh, take medicine, take 
medicine !” 
CHAPTER CXX 
MIDNIGHT THE FORECASTLE BULWARKS 
( Stubb and Flash mounted on them, and passing additional lashings 
over the anchors there hanging.) 
“No, Stubb; you may pound that knot there as much as you please, 
