CHAPTER 109

  Ahab and Starbuck in the Cabin

  According to usage they were pumping the ship next morning; and

lo! no inconsiderable oil came up with the water; the casks below must

have sprung a bad leak. Much concern was shown; and Starbuck went down

into the cabin to report this unfavorable affair.*

  *In Sperm-whalemen with any considerable quantity of oil on board,

it is a regular semiweekly duty to conduct a hose into the hold, and

drench the casks with sea-water; which afterwards, at varying

intervals, is removed by the ship's pumps. Hereby the casks are sought

to be kept damply tight; while by the changed character of the

withdrawn water, the mariners readily detect any serious leakage in

the precious cargo.

  Now, from the South and West the Pequod was drawing nigh to

Formosa and the Bashee Isles, between which lies one of the tropical

outlets from the China waters into the Pacific. And so Starbuck

found Ahab with a general chart of the oriental archipelagoes spread

before him; and another separate one representing the long eastern

coasts of the Japanese islands- Niphon, Matsmai, and Sikoke. With

his snow-white new ivory leg braced against the screwed leg of his

table, and with a long pruning-hook of a jack-knife in his hand, the

wondrous old man, with his back to the gangway door, was wrinkling his

brow, and tracing his old courses again.

  "Who's there?" hearing the footstep at the door, but not turning

round to it. "On deck! Begone!"

  "Captain Ahab mistakes; it is I. The oil in the hold is leaking,

sir. We must up Burtons and break out."

  "Up Burtons and break out? Now that we are nearing Japan; heave-to

here for a week to tinker a parcel of old hoops?"

  "Either do that, sir, or waste in one day more oil than we may

make good in a year. What we come twenty thousand miles to get is

worth saving, sir."

  "So it is, so it is; if we get it."

  "I was speaking of the oil in the hold, sir."

  "And I was not speaking or thinking of that at all. Begone! Let it

leak! I'm all aleak myself. Aye! leaks in leaks! not only full of

leaky casks, but those leaky casks are in a leaky ship; and that's a

far worse plight than the Pequod's, man. Yet I don't stop to plug my

leak; for who can find it in the deep-loaded hull; or how hope to plug

it, even if found, in this life's howling ale? Starbuck! I'll not have

the Burtons hoisted."

  "What will the owners say, sir?"

  "Let the owners stand on Nantucket beach and outyell the Typhoons.

What cares Ahab? Owners, owners? Thou art always prating to me,

Starbuck, about those miserly owners, as if the owners were my

conscience. But look ye, the only real owner of anything is its

commander; and hark ye, my conscience is in this ship's keel.- On

deck!"

  "Captain Ahab," said the reddening mate, moving further into the

cabin, with a daring so strangely respectful and cautious that it

almost seemed not only every way seeking to avoid the slightest

outward manifestation of itself, but within also seemed more than half

distrustful of itself; "A better man than I might well pass over in

thee what he would quickly enough resent in a younger man; aye, and in

a happier, Captain Ahab."

  "Devils! Dost thou then so much as dare to critically think of

me?- On deck!"

  "Nay, sir, not yet; I do entreat. And I do dare, sir- to be

forbearing! Shall we not understand each other better than hitherto,

Captain Ahab?"

  Ahab seized a loaded musket from the rack (forming part of most

South-Sea-men's cabin furniture), and pointing it towards Starbuck,

exclaimed: "There is one God that is Lord over the earth, and one

Captain that is lord over the Pequod.- On deck!"

  For an instant in the flashing eyes of the mate, and his fiery

cheeks, you would have almost thought that he had really received

the blaze of the levelled tube. But, mastering his emotion, he half

calmly rose, and as he quitted the cabin, paused for an instant and

said: "Thou hast outraged, not insulted me, sir; but for that I ask

thee not to beware of Starbuck; thou wouldst but laugh; but let Ahab

beware of Ahab; beware of thyself, old man."

  "He waxes brave, but nevertheless obeys; most careful bravery that!"

murmured Ahab, as Starbuck disappeared. "What's that he said- Ahab

beware of Ahab- there's something there!" Then unconsciously using the

musket for a staff, with an iron brow he paced to and fro in the

little cabin; but presently the thick plaits of his forehead

relaxed, and returning the gun to the rack, he went to the deck.

  "Thou art but too good a fellow, Starbuck," he said lowly to the

mate; then raising his voice to the crew: "Furl the t'gallant-sails,

and close-reef the top-sails, fore and aft; back the main-yard; up

Burtons, and break out in the main-hold."

  It were perhaps vain to surmise exactly why it was, that as

respecting Starbuck, Ahab thus acted. It may have been a flash of

honesty in him; or mere prudential policy which, under the

circumstance, imperiously forbade the slightest symptom of open

disaffection, however transient, in the important chief officer of his

ship. However it was, his orders were executed; and the Burtons were

hoisted.