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 company, the
Parsee 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 dragging 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--harpooners! 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 will thou capture him, old man--In Jesus' name no more of
this, that's worse than devil's madness.
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