514 : 
MOBY DICK; OR 
“My body, man, not thee. Give me something for a cane — there, 
that shivered lance will do. Muster the men. Surely I have not 
seen him yet. By heaven, it cannot be! — missing? — quick! call 
them all.” 
The old man’s hinted thought was true. Upon mustering the com- 
pany, the Par see was not there. 
“The Parsee!” cried Stubb — “he must have been caught in ” 
“The black vomit wrench thee! — run all of ye above, alow, cabin, 
forecastle — find him — not gone — not gone!” 
But quickly they returned to him with the tidings that the Parsee 
was nowhere to be found. 
“Aye, sir,” said Stubb — “caught among the tangles of your line — I 
thought I saw him dragged under.” 
“My line ? my line ? Gone ? — gone ? What means that little word ? 
—What death-knell rings in it, that old Ahab shakes as if he were 
the belfry. The harpoon, too ! — toss over the litter there, — d’ye see it ? 
— the forged iron, men, the white whale’s — no, no, no, — blistered fool ! 
this hand did dart it! — ’tis in the fish! — Aloft there! Keep him 
nailed — Quick ! — all hands to the rigging of the boats — collect the oars 
— harpooneers! the irons, the irons! — hoist the royals higher — a pull 
on all the sheets ! — helm there ! steady, steady for your life ! I’ll ten 
times girdle the unmeasured globe; yea and dive straight through it, 
but I’ll slay him yet !” 
“Great God ! but for one single instant show thyself,” cried Starbuck ; 
“never, never wilt thou capture him, old man. — In Jesus’ name no 
more of this, that’s worse than devil’s madness. Two days chased; 
twice stove to splinters; thy very leg once more snatched from under 
thee; thy evil shadow gone — all good angels mobbing thee with warn- 
ings: — what more wouldst thou have? — Shall we keep chasing this 
murderous fish till he swamps the last man? Shall we be dragged 
by him to the bottom of the sea? Shall we be towed by him to the 
infernal world ? Oh, oh ! — Impiety and blasphemy to hunt him 
more !” 
“Starbuck, of late I’ve felt strangely moved to thee ; ever since that 
hour we both saw — thou know’st what, in one another’s eyes. But 
in this matter of the whale, be the front of thy face to me as the palm 
