CHAPTER 64

  Stubb's Supper

  Stubb's whale had been killed some distance from the ship. It was

a calm; so, forming a tandem of three boats, we commenced slow

business of towing the trophy to the Pequod. And now, as we eighteen

men with our thirty-six arms, and one hundred and eighty thumbs and

fingers, slowly toiled hour after hour upon that inert, sluggish

corpse in the sea; and it seemed hardly to budge at all, except at

long intervals; good evidence was hereby furnished of the enormousness

of the mass we moved. For, upon the great canal of Hang-Ho, or

whatever they call it, in China, four or five laborers on the

foot-path will draw a bulky freighted junk at the rate of a mile an

hour; but this grand argosy we towed heavily forged along, as if laden

with piglead in bulk.

  Darkness came on; but three lights up and down in the Pequod's

main-rigging dimly guided our way; till drawing nearer we saw Ahab

dropping one of several more lanterns over the bulwarks. Vacantly

eyeing the heaving whale for a moment, he issued the usual orders

for securing it for the night, and then handing his lantern to a

seaman, went his way into the cabin, and did not come forward again

until morning.

  Though, in overseeing the pursuit of this whale, Captain Ahab had

evinced his customary activity, to call it so; yet now that the

creature was dead, some vague dissatisfaction, or impatience, or

despair, seemed working in him; as if the sight of that dead body

reminded him that Moby Dick was yet to be slain; and though a thousand

other whales were brought to his ship, all that would not one jot

advance his grand, monomaniac object. Very soon you would have thought

from the sound on the Pequod's decks, that all hands were preparing to

cast anchor in the deep; for heavy chains are being dragged along

the deck, and thrust rattling out of the port-holes. But by those

clanking links, the vast corpse itself, not the ship, is to be moored.

Tied by the head to the stern, and by the tall to the bows, the

whale now lies with its black hull close to the vessel's, and seen

through the darkness of the night, which obscured the spars and

rigging aloft, the two- ship and whale, seemed yoked together like

colossal bullocks, whereof one reclines while the other remains

standing.*

  *A little item may as well be related here. The strongest and most

reliable hold which the ship has upon the whale when moored alongside,

is by the flukes or tail; and as from its greater density that part is

relatively heavier than any other (excepting the side-fins), its

flexibility even in death, causes it to sink low beneath the

surface; so that with the hand you cannot get at it from the boat,

in order to put the chain round it. But this difficulty is ingeniously

overcome: a small, strong line is prepared with a wooden float at

its outer end, and a weight in its middle, while the other end is

secured to the ship. By adroit management the wooden float is made

to rise on the other side of the mass, so that now having girdled

the whale, the chain is readily made to follow suit; and being slipped

along the body, is at last locked fast round the smallest part of

the tail, at the point of junction with its broad flukes or lobes.

  If moody Ahab was now all quiescence, at least so far as could be

known on deck, Stubb, his second mate, flushed with conquest, betrayed

an unusual but still good-natured excitement. Such an unwonted

bustle was he in that the staid Starbuck, his official superior,

quietly resigned to him for the time the sole management of affairs.

One small, helping cause of all this liveliness in Stubb, was soon

made strangely manifest. Stubb was a high liver; he was somewhat

intemperately fond of the whale as a flavorish thing to his palate.

  "A steak, a steak, ere I sleep! You, Daggoo! overboard you go, and

cut me one from his small!"

  Here be it known, that though these wild fishermen do not, as a

general thing, and according to the great military maxim, make the

enemy defray the current expenses of the war (at least before

realizing the proceeds of the voyage), yet now and then you find

some of these Nantucketers who have a genuine relish for that

particular part of the Sperm Whale designated by Stubb; comprising the

tapering extremity of the body.

  About midnight that steak was cut and cooked; and lighted by two

lanterns of sperm oil, Stubb stoutly stood up to his spermaceti supper

at the capstan-head, as if that capstan were a sideboard. Nor was

Stubb the only banqueter on whale's flesh that night. Mingling their

mumblings with his own mastications, thousands on thousands of sharks,

swarming round the dead leviathan, smackingly feasted on its

fatness. The few sleepers below in their bunks were often startled

by the sharp slapping of their tails against the hull, within a few

inches of the sleepers' hearts. Peering over the side you could just

see them (as before you heard them) wallowing in the sullen, black

waters, and turning over on their backs as they scooped out huge

globular pieces of the whale of the bigness of a human head. This

particular feat of the shark seems all but miraculous. How at such

an apparently unassailable surface, they contrive to gouge out such

symmetrical mouthfuls, remains a part of the universal problem of

all things. The mark they thus leave on the whale, may best be likened

to the hollow made by a carpenter in countersinking for a screw.

  Though amid all the smoking horror and diabolism of a sea-fight,

sharks will be seen longingly gazing up to the ship's decks, like

hungry dogs round a table where red meat is being carved, ready to

bolt down every killed man that is tossed to them; and though, while

the valiant butchers over the deck-table are thus cannibally carving

each other's live meat with carving-knives all gilded and tasselled,

the sharks, also, with their jewel-hilted mouths, are quarrelsomely

carving away under the table at the dead meat; and though, were you to

turn the whole affair upside down, it would still be pretty much the

same thing, that is to say, a shocking sharkish business enough for

all parties; and though sharks also are the invariable outriders of

all slave ships crossing the Atlantic, systematically trotting

alongside, to be handy in case a parcel is to be carried anywhere,

or a dead slave to be decently buried; and though one or two other

like instances might be set down, touching the set terms, places,

and occasions, when sharks do most socially congregate, and most

hilariously feast; yet is there no conceivable time or occasion when

you will find them in such countless numbers, and in gayer or more

jovial spirits, than around a dead sperm whale, moored by night to a

whaleship at sea. If you have never seen that sight, then suspend your

decision about the propriety of devil-worship, and the expediency of

conciliating the devil.

  But, as yet, Stubb heeded not the mumblings of the banquet that

was going on so nigh him, no more than the sharks heeded the

smacking of his own epicurean lips.

  "Cook, cook!- where's that old Fleece?" he cried at length, widening

his legs still further, as if to form a more secure base for his

supper; and, at the same time darting his fork into the dish, as if

stabbing with his lance; "cook, you cook!- sail this way, cook!"

  The old black, not in any very high glee at having been previously

roused from his warm hammock at a most unseasonable hour, came

shambling along from his galley, for, like many old blacks, there

was something the matter with his knee-pans, which he did not keep

well scoured like his other pans; this old Fleece, as they called him,

came shuffling and limping along, assisting his step with his tongs,

which, after a clumsy fashion, were made of straightened iron hoops;

this old Ebony floundered along, and in obedience to the word of

command, came to a dead stop on the opposite side of Stubb's

sideboard; when, with both hands folded before him, and resting on his

two-legged cane, he bowed his arched back still further over, at the

same time sideways inclining his head, so as to bring his best ear

into play.

  "Cook," said Stubb, rapidly lifting a rather reddish morsel to his

mouth, "don't you think this steak is rather overdone? You've been

beating this steak too much, cook; it's too tender. Don't I always say

that to be good, a whale-steak must be tough? There are those sharks

now over the side, don't you see they prefer it tough and rare? What a

shindy they are kicking up! Cook, go and talk to 'em; tell 'em they

are welcome to help themselves civilly, and in moderation, but they

must keep quiet. Blast me, if I can hear my own voice. Away, cook, and

deliver my message. Here, take this lantern," snatching one from his

sideboard; "now then, go and preach to them!"

  Sullenly taking the offered lantern, old Fleece limped across the

deck to the bulwarks; and then, with one hand drooping his light low

over the sea, so as to get a good view of his congregation, with the

other hand he solemnly flourished his tongs, and leaning far over

the side in a mumbling voice began addressing the sharks, while Stubb,

softly crawling behind, overheard all that was said.

  "Fellow-critters: I'se ordered here to say dat you must stop dat dam

noise dare. You hear? Stop dat dam smackin' ob de lips! Massa Stubb

say dat you can fill your dam bellies up to de hatchings, but by

Gor! you must stop dat dam racket!"

  "Cook," here interposed Stubb, accompanying the word with a sudden

slap on the shoulder,- "cook! why, damn your eyes, you mustn't swear

that way when you're preaching. That's no way to convert sinners,

cook!"

  "Who dat? Den preach to him yourself," sullenly turning to go.

  "No, cook; go on, go on."

  "Well, den, Belubed fellow-critters:"-

  "Right!" exclaimed Stubb, approvingly, "coax 'em to it, try that,"

and Fleece continued.

  "Do you is all sharks, and by natur wery woracious, yet I zay to

you, fellow-critters, dat dat woraciousness- 'top dat dam slappin'

ob de tail! How you tink to hear, 'spose you keep up such a dam

slapping and bitin' dare?"

  "Cook," cried Stubb, collaring him, "I won't have that swearing.

Talk to 'em gentlemanly."

  Once more the sermon proceeded.

  "Your woraciousness, fellow-critters. I don't blame ye so much

for; dat is natur, and can't be helped; but to gobern dat wicked

natur, dat is de pint. You is sharks, sartin; but if you gobern de

shark in you, why den you be angel; for all angel is not'ing more

dan de shark well goberned. Now, look here, bred'ren, just try wonst

to be cibil, a helping yourselbs from dat whale. Don't be tearin' de

blubber out your neighbour's mout, I say. Is not one shark dood

right as toder to dat whale? And, by Gor, none on you has de right

to dat whale; dat whale belong to some one else. I know some o' you

has berry brig mout, brigger dan oders; but then de brig mouts

sometimes has de small bellies; so dat de brigness of de mout is not

to swaller wid, but to bit off de blubber for de small fry ob

sharks, dat can't get into de scrouge to help demselves."

  "Well done, old Fleece!" cried Stubb, "that's Christianity; go on."

  "No use goin' on; de dam willains will keep a scougin' and

slappin' each oder, Massa Stubb; dey don't hear one word; no use

a-preaching to such dam g'uttons as you call 'em, till dare bellies is

full, and dare bellies is bottomless; and when dey do get 'em full,

dey wont hear you den; for den dey sink in the sea, go fast to sleep

on de coral, and can't hear noting at all, no more, for eber and

eber."

  "Upon my soul, I am about of the same opinion; so give the

benediction, Fleece, and I'll away to my supper."

  Upon this, Fleece, holding both hands over the fishy mob, raised his

shrill voice, and cried-

  "Cussed fellow-critters! Kick up de damndest row as ever you can;

fill your dam bellies 'till dey bust- and den die."

  "Now, cook," said Stubb, resuming his supper at the capstan;

"stand just where you stood before, there, over against me, and pay

particular attention."

  "All 'dention," said Fleece, again stooping over upon his tongs in

the desired position.

  "Well," said Stubb, helping himself freely meanwhile; "I shall now

go back to the subject of this steak. In the first place, how old

are you, cook?"

  "What dat do wid de 'teak, " said the old black, testily.

  "Silence! How old are you, cook?"

  "'Bout ninety, dey say," he gloomily muttered.

  "And you have lived in this world hard upon one hundred years, cook,

and don't know yet how to cook a whale-steak?" rapidly bolting another

mouthful at the last word, so that morsel seemed a continuation of the

question. "Where were you born, cook?"

  "'Hind de hatchway, in ferry-boat, goin' ober de Roanoke."

  "Born in a ferry-boat! That's queer, too. But I want to know what

country you were born in, cook!"

  "Didn't I say de Roanoke country?" he cried sharply.

  "No, you didn't, cook; but I'll tell you what I'm coming to, cook.

You must go home and be born over again; you don't know how to cook

a whale-steak yet."

  "Bress my soul, if I cook noder one," he growled, angrily, turning

round to depart.

  "Come back here, cook;- here, hand me those tongs;- now take that

bit of steak there, and tell me if you think that steak cooked as it

should be? Take it, I say"- holding the tongs towards him- "take it,

and taste it."

  Faintly smacking his withered lips over it for a moment, the old

negro muttered, "Best cooked 'teak I eber taste; joosy, berry joosy."

  "Cook," said Stubb, squaring himself once more; "do you belong to

the church?"

  "Passed one once in Cape-Down," said the old man sullenly.

  "And you have once in your life passed a holy church in Cape-Town,

where you doubtless overheard a holy parson addressing his hearers

as his beloved fellow-creatures, have you, cook! And yet you come

here, and tell me such a dreadful lie as you did just now, eh?" said

Stubb. "Where do you expect to go to, cook?"

  "Go to bed berry soon," he mumbled, half-turning as he spoke.

  "Avast! heave to! I mean when you die, cook. It's an awful question.

Now what's your answer?"

  "When dis old brack man dies," said the negro slowly, changing his

whole air and demeanor, "he hisself won't go nowhere; but some bressed

angel will come and fetch him."

  "Fetch him? How? In a coach and four, as they fetched Elijah? And

fetch him where?"

  "Up dere," said Fleece, holding his tongs straight over his head,

and keeping it there very solemnly.

  "So, then, you expect to go into our main-top, do you, cook, when

you are dead? But don't you know the higher you climb, the colder it

gets? Main-top, eh?"

  "Didn't say dat t'all," said Fleece, again in the sulks.

  "You said up there, didn't you? and now look yourself, and see where

your tongs are pointing. But, perhaps you expect to get into heaven by

crawling through the lubber's hole, cook; but, no, no, cook, you don't

get there, except you go the regular way, round by the rigging. It's a

ticklish business, but must be done, or else it's no go. But none of

us are in heaven yet. Drop your tongs, cook, and hear my orders. Do ye

hear? Hold your hat in one hand, and clap t'other a'top of your heart,

when I'm giving my orders, cook. What! that your heart, there?- that's

your gizzard! Aloft! aloft!- that's it- now you have it. Hold it there

now, and pay attention."

  "All 'dention," said the old black, with both hands placed as

desired, vainly wriggling his grizzled head, as if to get both ears in

front at one and the same time.

  "Well then, cook, you see this whale-steak of yours was so very bad,

that have put it out of sight as soon as possible; you see that, don't

you? Well, for the future, when you cook another whale-steak for my

private table here, the capstan, I'll tell you what to do so as not to

spoil it by overdoing. Hold the steak in one hand, and show a live

coal to it with the other; that done, dish it; d'ye hear? And now

to-morrow, cook, when we are cutting in the fish, be sure you stand by

to get the tips of his fins; have them put in pickle. As for the

ends of the flukes, have them soused, cook. There, now ye may go."

  But Fleece had hardly got three paces off, when he was recalled.

  "Cook, give me cutlets for supper to-morrow night in the

mid-watch. D'ye hear? away you sail then.- Halloa! stop! make a bow

before you go.- Avast heaving again! Whale-balls for breakfast-

don't forget."

  "Wish, by gor! whale eat him, 'stead of him eat whale. I'm bressed

if he ain't more of shark dan Massa Shark hisself," muttered the old

man, limping away; with which sage ejaculation he went to his hammock.