Herman Melville

“ Is Love a harm? Can Truth betray to pain? Sweet Isabel, how can hurt come in the path to God? Now, when I know thee all, now did I forget thee, fail to acknowledge thee, and love thee before the wide world’s whole brazen width—could I do that; then might’st thou ask thy question reasonably and say—Tell me, Pierre, does not the suffocating in thee of poor Bell’s holy claims, does not that involve for thee unending misery? ”

“ It is well to parenthesize here, that of the fatal accidents in the Sperm-Whale Fishery, this kind is perhaps almost as frequent as any. Sometimes, nothing is injured but the man who is thus annihilated; oftener the boat's bow is knocked off, or the thigh-board, on which the headsman stands, is torn from its place and accompanies the body. But strangest of all is the circumstance, that in more instances than one, when the body has been recovered, not a single mark of violence is discernible the man being stark dead. ”

“ We have both a quarter-deck to our craft and a gun-deck; subterranean shot-lockers and gunpowder magazines; and the Articles of War form our domineering code.
Oh, shipmates and world-mates, all round! we the people suffer many abuses. Our gun-deck is full of complaints. In vain from Lieutenants do we appeal to the Captain; in vain—while on board our world-frigate—to the indefinite Navy Commissioners, so far out of sight aloft. Yet the worst of our evils we blindly inflict upon ourselves; our officers cannot remove them, even if they would. From the last ills no being can save another ”

“ Old age is always wakeful; as if, the longer linked with life, the less man has to do with aught that looks like death. Among sea-commanders, the old greybeards will oftenest leave their berths to visit the night-cloaked deck. It was so with Ahab; only that now, of late, he seemed so much to live in the open air, that truly speaking, his visits were more to the cabin, than from the cabin to the planks. "It feels like going down into one's tomb,"—he would mutter to himself—"for an old captain like me to be descending this narrow scuttle, to go to my grave-dug berth." ”

“ The inglorious circumstances of our somewhat premature departure from Tamai filled the sagacious doctor, and myself, with sundry misgivings for the future.
Under Zeke’s protection, we were secure from all impertinent interference in our concerns on the part of the natives. But as friendless wanderers over the island, we ran the risk of being apprehended as runaways, and, as such, sent back to Tahiti. The truth is that the rewards constantly offered for the apprehension of deserters from ships induce some of the natives to eye all strangers suspiciously. ”

“ As the night wore on, and the ship, with a very light wind, glided nigher and nigher the mark, Paul called upon Israel to produce his bucket for final inspection. Thinking some of the spikes too large, he had them filed down a little. He saw to the lanterns and combustibles. Like Peter the Great, he went into the smallest details, while still possessing a genius competent to plan the aggregate. But oversee as one may, it is impossible to guard against carelessness in subordinates. One’s sharp eyes can’t see behind one’s back. ”

“ As the sail drew nigh, its failing to glisten white led us to doubt whether it was indeed a whale-boat. Presently, it showed yellow; and Samoa declared, that it must be the sail of some island craft. True. The stranger proving a large double-canoe, like those used by the Polynesians in making passages between distant islands.
The Upoluan was now clamorous for a meeting, to which Jarl was averse. Deliberating a moment, I directed the muskets to be loaded; then setting the sail the wind on our quarter—we headed away for the canoe, now sailing at right angles with our previous course. ”

“ Toby was now in ecstasies, especially as the young savages continued to reiterate their answer with great energy, as though desirous of impressing us with the idea that being among the Happars, we ought to consider ourselves perfectly secure.
Although I had some lingering doubts, I feigned great delight with Toby at this announcement, while my companion broke out into a pantomimic abhorrence of Typee, and immeasurable love for the particular valley in which we were; our guides all the while gazing uneasily at one another, as if at a loss to account for our conduct. ”

“ But look, look—what’s this?” suddenly rising, and pointing, with his long pipe, towards a gilt notification swinging among colored fly-papers from the ceiling, like a tavern sign, “No Trust?” “No trust means distrust; distrust means no confidence. Barber,” turning upon him excitedly, “what fell suspiciousness prompts this scandalous confession? My life!” stamping his foot, “if but to tell a dog that you have no confidence in him be matter for affront to the dog, what an insult to take that way the whole haughty race of man by the beard! By my heart, sir! ”

“ HAPPY is the dumb man in the hour of passion. He makes no impulsive threats, and therefore seldom falsifies himself in the transition from choler to calm.
Proceeding into the thoroughfare, after leaving the Apostles’, it was not very long ere Glen and Frederic concluded between themselves, that Lucy could not so easily be rescued by threat or force. The pale, inscrutable determinateness, and flinchless intrepidity of Pierre, now began to domineer upon them; for any social unusualness or greatness is sometimes most impressive in the retrospect. ”

“ Hence it comes that the skulkers and scoundrels of all sorts in a man-of-war are chiefly composed not of regular seamen, but of these “dock-lopers” of landsmen, men who enter the Navy to draw their grog and murder their time in the notorious idleness of a frigate. But if so idle, why not reduce the number of a man-of-war’s crew, and reasonably keep employed the rest? It cannot be done. In the first place, the magnitude of most of these ships requires a large number of hands to brace the heavy yards, hoist the enormous top-sails, and weigh the ponderous anchor. ”

“ Now, all I can say is, that in all my excursions through the valley of Typee, I never saw any of these alleged enormities. If any of them are practised upon the Marquesas Islands they must certainly have come to my knowledge while living for months with a tribe of savages, wholly unchanged from their original primitive condition, and reputed the most ferocious in the South Seas.
The fact is, that there is a vast deal of unintentional humbuggery in some of the accounts we have from scientific men concerning the religious institutions of Polynesia. ”

“ Mix with the men in an American armed ship, mark how many foreigners there are, though it is against the law to enlist them. Nearly one third of the petty officers of the Neversink were born east of the Atlantic. Why is this? Because the same principle that operates in hindering Americans from hiring themselves out as menial domestics also restrains them, in a great measure, from voluntarily assuming a far worse servitude in the Navy. “Sailors wanted for the Navy” is a common announcement along the wharves of our sea-ports. They are always “wanted.” ”

“ They hate us:—good;—they always have; yet still we’ve reigned, son after sire. Sometimes they slay us, Babbalanja; pour out our marrow, as I this wine; but they spill no kinless blood. ’Twas justly held of old, that but to touch a monarch, was to strike at Oro.—Truth. The palest vengeance is a royal ghost; and regicides but father slaves. Thrones, not scepters, have been broken. Mohi, what of the past? Has it not ever proved so?”
“Pardon, my lord; the times seem changed. ’Tis held, that demi-gods no more rule by right divine. In Vivenza’s land, they swear the last kings now reign in Mardi.” ”

“ There is nothing like the sea for a fellow like me, Redburn; a desperate man can not get any further than the wharf, you know; and the next step must be a long jump. But come, let’s see what they have to eat here, and then for a cigar and a stroll. I feel better already. Never say die, is my motto.”
We went to supper; after that, sallied out; and walking along the quay of Prince’s Dock, heard that the ship Highlander had that morning been advertised to sail in two days’ time.
“Good!” exclaimed Harry ”

“ The fresh morning air and the cool flowing waters put both soul and body in a glow, and after a half-hour employed in this recreation, we sauntered back to the house—Tinor and Marheyo gathering dry sticks by the way for firewood; some of the young men laying the cocoa-nut trees under contribution as they passed beneath them; while Kory-Kory played his outlandish pranks for my particular diversion, and Fayaway and I, not arm in arm to be sure, but sometimes hand in hand, strolled along, with feelings of perfect charity for all the world, and especial good-will towards each other. ”

“ Commonly, after seeing the harpooneers furnished with all things they demanded, he would escape from their clutches into his little pantry adjoining, and fearfully peep out at them through the blinds of its door, till all was over.
It was a sight to see Queequeg seated over against Tashtego, opposing his filed teeth to the Indian's; crosswise to them, Daggoo seated on the floor, for a bench would have brought his hearse-plumed head to the low carlines; at every motion of his colossal limbs, making the low cabin framework to shake, as when an African elephant goes passenger in a ship. ”

“ When old Marheyo received his share of the spoils, immediate preparations were made for a midnight banquet; calabashes of poee-poee were filled to the brim; green bread-fruit were roasted; and a huge cake of “amar” was cut up with a sliver of bamboo, and laid out on an immense banana leaf.
At this supper we were lighted by several of the native tapers, held in the hands of young girls. These tapers are most ingeniously made. There is a nut abounding in the valley, called by the Typees “armor,” closely resembling our common horse-chestnut. ”

“ Telling these things to Old Plain Talk, that man of some knowledge of the world shook his old head, and told China Aster that, though he hoped it might prove otherwise, yet it seemed to him that all he had communicated about Orchis worked together for bad omens as to his future forbearance—especially, he added with a grim sort of smile, in view of his joining the sect of Come-Outers; for, if some men knew what was their inmost natures, instead of coming out with it, they would try their best to keep it in, which, indeed, was the way with the prudent sort. ”

“ The mutineer was the bowsman of the mate, and when fast to a fish, it was his duty to sit next him, while Radney stood up with his lance in the prow, and haul in or slacken the line, at the word of command. Moreover, when the four boats were lowered, the mate’s got the start; and none howled more fiercely with delight than did Steelkilt, as he strained at his oar. After a stiff pull, their harpooneer got fast, and, spear in hand, Radney sprang to the bow. He was always a furious man, it seems, in a boat. And now his bandaged cry was, to beach him on the whale’s topmost back. ”

“ To a ship, the American merchantmen adopt the former plan; the owners, of course, paying the landlord’s bill; which, in a large crew remaining at Liverpool more than six weeks, as we of the Highlander did, forms no inconsiderable item in the expenses of the voyage. Other ships, however—the economical Dutch and Danish, for instance, and sometimes the prudent Scotch—feed their luckless tars in dock, with precisely the same fare which they give them at sea; taking their salt junk ashore to be cooked, which, indeed, is but scurvy sort of treatment, since it is very apt to induce the scurvy. ”

“ Pierre! I have seen her in some dream. She is fair-haired—blue eyes—she is not quite so tall as I, yet a very little slighter.”
Pierre started. “Thou hast seen Lucy Tartan, at Saddle Meadows?”
“Is Lucy Tartan the name?—Perhaps, perhaps;—but also, in the dream, Pierre; she came, with her blue eyes turned beseechingly on me; she seemed as if persuading me from thee;—methought she was then more than thy cousin;—methought she was that good angel, which some say, hovers over every human soul; and methought—oh, methought that I was thy other,—thy other angel, Pierre. ”

“ This comes of having thirteen in the mess. I hope he arn’t dangerous, men? Poor Shenly! But, blast it, it warn’t till White-Jacket there comed into the mess that these here things began. I don’t believe there’ll be more nor three of us left by the time we strike soundings, men. But how is he now? Have you been down to see him, any on ye? Damn you, you Jonah! I don’t see how you can sleep in your hammock, knowing as you do that by making an odd number in the mess you have been the death of one poor fellow, and ruined Baldy for life, and here’s poor Shenly keeled up. ”

“ Go on, then: vault over your premises.”
“If it be, then, my lord, that—”
“My very worshipful lord,” interposed Mohi, “is not our philosopher getting off soundings; and may it not be impious to meddle with these things?”
“Were it so, old man, he should have known it. The king of Odo is something more than you mortals.”
“But are we the great gods themselves,” cried Yoomy, “that we discourse of these things.”
“No, minstrel,” said Babbalanja; “and no need have the great gods to discourse of things perfectly comprehended by them, and by themselves ordained. ”