We had been sitting in this crouching manner for some time, when all at once I thought I would open my eyes; for when between sheets, whether by day or by night, and whether asleep or awake, I have a way of always keeping my eyes shut, in order the more to concentrate the snugness of being in bed. Because no man can ever feel his own identity aright except his eyes be closed; as if darkness were indeed the proper element of our essences, though light be more congenial to our clayey part. Upon opening my eyes then, and coming out of my own pleasant and self-created darkness into the imposed and coarse outer gloom of the unilluminated twelve-o’clock-at-night, I experienced a disagreeable revulsion. Nor did I at all object to the hint from Queequeg that perhaps it were best to strike a light, seeing that we were so wide awake; and besides he felt a strong desire to have a few quiet puffs from his Tomahawk. Be it said, that though I had felt such a strong repugnance to his smoking in the bed the night before, yet see how elastic our stiff prejudices grow when love once comes to bend them. For now I liked nothing better than to have Queequeg smoking by me, even in bed, because he seemed to be full of such serene household joy then. I no more felt unduly concerned for the landlord’s policy of insurance. I was only alive to the condensed confidential comfortableness of sharing a pipe and a blanket with a real friend. With our shaggy jackets drawn about our shoulders, we now passed the Tomahawk from one to the other, till slowly there grew over us a blue hanging tester of smoke, illuminated by the flame of the new-lit lamp.
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Moby-Dick — Chapter 18: The Ship (part 2/2)
[Illustration: ] VENUS
The best and bravest of the Grecian band (A warlike circle) round Tydides stand. Such was their look as lions bathed in blood, Or foaming boars, the terror of the wood. Heaven’s empress mingles with the mortal crowd, And shouts, in Stentor’s sounding voice, aloud; Stentor the strong, endued with brazen lungs,[158] Whose throats surpass’d the force of fifty tongues.
[Illustration: ] OTUS AND EPHIALTES HOLDING MARS CAPTIVE
“O heroes! worthy such a dauntless train, Whose godlike virtue we but urge in vain, (Exclaim’d the king), who raise your eager bands With great examples, more than loud commands. Ah! would the gods but breathe in all the rest Such souls as burn in your exalted breast, Soon should our arms with just success be crown’d, And Troy’s proud walls lie smoking on the ground.”
“Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian.”
He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. “I beg your pardon. I thought—”
“O great in action, and in council wise! With ours, thy care and ardour are the same, Nor need I to commend, nor aught to blame. Sage as thou art, and learn’d in human kind, Forgive the transport of a martial mind. Haste to the fight, secure of just amends; The gods that make, shall keep the worthy, friends.”
This was strange and unexpected intelligence; what could it mean? Had my eyes deceived me? And was I really as mad as the whole world would believe me to be if I disclosed the object of my suspicions? I hastened to return home, and Elizabeth eagerly demanded the result.
“That is exactly what I should have supposed of you,” said Elizabeth.
What wonder, then, that these Nantucketers, born on a beach, should take to the sea for a livelihood! They first caught crabs and quohogs in the sand; grown bolder, they waded out with nets for mackerel; more experienced, they pushed off in boats and captured cod; and at last, launching a navy of great ships on the sea, explored this watery world; put an incessant belt of circumnavigations round it; peeped in at Behring’s Straits; and in all seasons and all oceans declared everlasting war with the mightiest animated mass that has survived the flood; most monstrous and most mountainous! That Himmalehan, salt-sea Mastodon, clothed with such portentousness of unconscious power, that his very panics are more to be dreaded than his most fearless and malicious assaults!
I have forgotten to mention that, in many things, Queequeg placed great confidence in the excellence of Yojo’s judgment and surprising forecast of things; and cherished Yojo with considerable esteem, as a rather good sort of god, who perhaps meant well enough upon the whole, but in all cases did not succeed in his benevolent designs.
“I do, sir.”
He dropped and fell away from himself for a moment; then lifting his face to them again, showed a deep joy in his eyes, as he cried out with a heavenly enthusiasm,—“But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the main-truck higher than the kelson is low? Delight is to him—a far, far upward, and inward delight—who against the proud gods and commodores of this earth, ever stands forth his own inexorable self. Delight is to him whose strong arms yet support him, when the ship of this base treacherous world has gone down beneath him. Delight is to him, who gives no quarter in the truth, and kills, burns, and destroys all sin though he pluck it out from under the robes of Senators and Judges. Delight,—top-gallant delight is to him, who acknowledges no law or lord, but the Lord his God, and is only a patriot to heaven. Delight is to him, whom all the waves of the billows of the seas of the boisterous mob can never shake from this sure Keel of the Ages. And eternal delight and deliciousness will be his, who coming to lay him down, can say with his final breath—O Father!—chiefly known to me by Thy rod—mortal or immortal, here I die. I have striven to be Thine, more than to be this world’s, or mine own. Yet this is nothing: I leave eternity to Thee; for what is man that he should live out the lifetime of his God?”
“They go to America,” murmured Lord Henry.
“Give me, great Jove! to punish lawless lust, And lay the Trojan gasping in the dust: Destroy the aggressor, aid my righteous cause, Avenge the breach of hospitable laws! Let this example future times reclaim, And guard from wrong fair friendship’s holy name,” He said, and poised in air the javelin sent, Through Paris’ shield the forceful weapon went, His corslet pierces, and his garment rends, And glancing downward, near his flank descends. The wary Trojan, bending from the blow, Eludes the death, and disappoints his foe: But fierce Atrides waved his sword, and strook Full on his casque: the crested helmet shook; The brittle steel, unfaithful to his hand, Broke short: the fragments glitter’d on the sand. The raging warrior to the spacious skies Raised his upbraiding voice and angry eyes: “Then is it vain in Jove himself to trust? And is it thus the gods assist the just? When crimes provoke us, Heaven success denies; The dart falls harmless, and the falchion flies.” Furious he said, and towards the Grecian crew (Seized by the crest) the unhappy warrior drew; Struggling he followed, while the embroider’d thong That tied his helmet, dragg’d the chief along. Then had his ruin crown’d Atrides’ joy, But Venus trembled for the prince of Troy: Unseen she came, and burst the golden band; And left an empty helmet in his hand. The casque, enraged, amidst the Greeks he threw; The Greeks with smiles the polish’d trophy view. Then, as once more he lifts the deadly dart, In thirst of vengeance, at his rival’s heart; The queen of love her favour’d champion shrouds (For gods can all things) in a veil of clouds. Raised from the field the panting youth she led, And gently laid him on the bridal bed, With pleasing sweets his fainting sense renews, And all the dome perfumes with heavenly dews. Meantime the brightest of the female kind, The matchless Helen, o’er the walls reclined; To her, beset with Trojan beauties, came, In borrow’d form, the laughter-loving dame.
We then turned over the book together, and I endeavored to explain to him the purpose of the printing, and the meaning of the few pictures that were in it. Thus I soon engaged his interest; and from that we went to jabbering the best we could about the various outer sights to be seen in this famous town. Soon I proposed a social smoke; and, producing his pouch and tomahawk, he quietly offered me a puff. And then we sat exchanging puffs from that wild pipe of his, and keeping it regularly passing between us.
“Merchant service be damned. Talk not that lingo to me. Dost see that leg?—I’ll take that leg away from thy stern, if ever thou talkest of the marchant service to me again. Marchant service indeed! I suppose now ye feel considerable proud of having served in those marchant ships. But flukes! man, what makes thee want to go a whaling, eh?—it looks a little suspicious, don’t it, eh?—Hast not been a pirate, hast thou?—Didst not rob thy last Captain, didst thou?—Dost not think of murdering the officers when thou gettest to sea?”
Two enormous wooden pots painted black, and suspended by asses’ ears, swung from the cross-trees of an old top-mast, planted in front of an old doorway. The horns of the cross-trees were sawed off on the other side, so that this old top-mast looked not a little like a gallows. Perhaps I was over sensitive to such impressions at the time, but I could not help staring at this gallows with a vague misgiving. A sort of crick was in my neck as I gazed up to the two remaining horns; yes, two of them, one for Queequeg, and one for me. It’s ominous, thinks I. A Coffin my Innkeeper upon landing in my first whaling port; tombstones staring at me in the whalemen’s chapel; and here a gallows! and a pair of prodigious black pots too! Are these last throwing out oblique hints touching Tophet?