Zomby Dick or, The Undead Whale

by Melville, Herman

  Stumbling in exhaustion, I descended from the Pequod’s try-works to the Pequod’s forecastle, gripping tightly a bottle full and slippery with spermaceti oil, and a dripping wick; my watch was over and I required sleep. If you are unfamiliar with life aboard a whaleship, upon descending into the forecastle, for one single moment you would have almost thought you were standing in some illuminated shrine of canonized kings and counsellors. There we lay in our triangular oaken vaults, each mariner a chiselled muteness; a score of lamps flashing upon our hooded eyes.

  In merchant vessels, oil for the sailor is more scarce than the milk of queens. To dress in the dark, and eat in the dark, and stumble in darkness to his pallet, this is his usual lot. But the whaleman, as he seeks the food of light, so he lives in light. He makes of his berth an Aladdin’s lamp, and lays him down in it; so that in the pitchiest night, the ship’s black hull still houses an illumination.

  Lighting my lamp, I lay staring up at the whorls in the wood of the berth above me; and, unable to sleep for a time, watched the flickering play of light and shadow there as the lamps swayed from the ship’s movement. The shadows jumped and danced, as if the lamps were the musicians of some Fey orchestra, the light and darkness the dance partners swaying to their eldritch melody; the clatter from above becoming a comforting percussive accompaniment. Thus lulled, I soon fell into sleep and was sucked down to dreaming.

  Again was I there on deck, belted into the monkey rope, feet planted firmly, sharks boiling about the carcase of the dead whale below, their ravenous gnashing terrible to behold. The monkey rope jerked me near off my feet into that threshing many-toothed maw and, glancing down, I saw that it was not Queequeg perched there on the whale but Ahab!

  Ahab had become horrible to behold, for he was unclothed and nakedly capered there on that slick back, lightning-scarred from crown to sole, his whalebone leg making horrible meaty chunking sound as he drove it savagely into the whale’s back. A gaping bloodless gash lay livid and purple, high on his thigh. Where his navel should have been, the gold doubloon glinted, hinting at some portent I was too shocked to grasp, for Ahab had his hand on the monkey rope and made to jerk me off the ship into the sharky water! I stood struck dumb, stunned; was yanked two steps forward even as my fingers frantically scrabbled at the belt. The knot was at the back, and in that way of dreams, I knew it had been tightly tied by Pip, who was ever clever at that sailor’s art.

  Closer and closer did Ahab yank me with his prodigious strength till I felt the taffrail strike my chest, hard enough to take my breath. I turned to shout, “Help me! Queequeg! For God’s sake!” but upon looking over my shoulder, I saw all the ship’s company lumbering there, stumbling toward me with arms graspingly upraised; they moaned and hissed for my blood, and at their front was my dear friend, Queequeg, his eyes horridly white and unblinking, his swirling facial tattoos horribly twisted by the fearsome snarl on his face. Panic clawed its way up from my bowels to my brain.

  As I was desperately grabbing for the empty sheath of Little Blackie, with a final yank did Ahab pull me from the ship, even as he jumped from the carcase of the whale down through the shark-frothed waters into the deep. Then the weightlessness of falling through air; then the hard softness of striking the cold sea, and then again weightless was I pulled down into frigid blackness, my fingers still ineffectually scrabbling at the belt strapping me to raving Ahab; the lamp-lit Pequod receding in a circle of light above, the pressure building and building and building as I sank. Then, there in the round diminishing circle of light from above, a figure swam down towards me. Ah!, thought I, Queequeg has somehow thrown off the plague and comes to save me! But as the figure swam swiftly down, I saw not Queequeg, but his little god, Yojo, stroking towards me, his wooden face split in black-toothed grin. With a sidelong glance, Yojo swam past me to deeper darkness, toward Ahab, where he did wrench the gold doubloon from Ahab’s navel, then, swimming upwards to me, still blackly grinning, he began to painfully screw the doubloon into my own navel.

  I woke screaming.

  Chapter

  Pitchpoling

  To make them run easily and swiftly, the axles of carriages are anointed with grease; and for much the same purpose, some whalers perform an analogous operation upon their boat; they grease the bottom. Nor is it to be doubted that as such a procedure can do no harm, it may possibly be of no contemptible advantage; considering that oil and water are hostile; that oil is a sliding thing, and that the object in view is to make the boat slide bravely. Queequeg believed strongly in anointing his boat, and took more than customary pains in that occupation; crawling under its bottom, where it hung over the side, and rubbing in the unctuousness as though diligently seeking to insure a crop of hair from the craft’s bald keel. He seemed to be working in obedience to some particular presentiment. Nor did it remain unwarranted by the event.

  Towards noon whales were raised; but so soon as the ship sailed down to them, they turned and fled with swift precipitancy. Nevertheless, the boats pursued, and Stubb’s was foremost. By great exertion, Tashtego at last succeeded in planting one iron; but the stricken whale, without at all sounding, still continued his horizontal flight, with added fleetness. Such unintermitted strainings upon the planted iron must sooner or later inevitably extract it. It became imperative to lance the flying whale, or be content to lose him. But to haul the boat up to his flank was impossible, he swam so fast and furious. What then remained?

  Of all the wondrous devices and dexterities, the sleights of hand and countless subtleties, to which the veteran whaleman is so often forced, none exceed that fine manoeuvre with the lance called pitchpoling. It is only indispensable with an inveterate running whale; its grand fact and feature is the wonderful distance to which the long lance is accurately darted from a violently rocking, jerking boat, under extreme headway. Steel and wood included, the entire spear is some ten or twelve feet in length; the staff is much slighter than that of the harpoon, and also of a lighter material—pine. It is furnished with a small rope called a warp, of considerable length, by which it can be hauled back to the hand after darting.

  But before going further, it is important to mention here, that though the harpoon may be pitchpoled in the same way with the lance, yet it is seldom done; and when done, is still less frequently successful, on account of the greater weight and inferior length of the harpoon as compared with the lance, which in effect become serious drawbacks. As a general thing, therefore, you must first get fast to a whale, before any pitchpoling comes into play.

  Look now at Stubb; a man who from his humorous, deliberate coolness and equanimity in the direst emergencies, was specially qualified to excel in pitchpoling. Handling the long lance lightly, glancing twice or thrice along its length to see if it be exactly straight, Stubb whistlingly gathers up the coil of the warp in one hand, so as to secure its free end in his grasp, leaving the rest unobstructed. Then holding the lance full before his waistband’s middle, he levels it at the whale; when, covering him with it, he steadily depresses the butt-end in his hand, thereby elevating the point till the weapon stands fairly balanced upon his palm, fifteen feet in the air. He reminds you somewhat of a juggler, balancing a long staff on his chin. Next moment with a rapid, nameless impulse, in a superb lofty arch the bright steel spans the foaming distance and quivers in the life spot of the whale. Instead of sparkling water, he now spouts red blood.

  “That drove the spigot out of him!” cried Stubb. “ ’Tis July’s immortal Fourth; all fountains must run wine today! Would now, it were old Orleans whiskey, or old Ohio, or unspeakable old Monongahela! Then, Tashtego, lad, I’d have ye hold a canakin to the jet, and we’d drink round it! Yea, verily, hearts alive, we’d brew choice punch in the spread of his spout-hole there, and from that live punch-bowl quaff the living stuff.”

  Again and again to such gamesome talk, the dexterous dart is repeated, the spear returning to its master like a greyho
und held in skilful leash. The agonized whale goes into his flurry; the tow-line is slackened, and the pitchpoler dropping astern, folds his hands, and mutely watches the monster die.[1]

  [1]Similar technique was used by my Militia band when plagued by ennui of simpler zomby slaughter. There must be not too many zombies for this activity to be amusing; it requires at least two Militia participants, but many more often join in. One or more play the role of bait, standing at one end of an open space, downwind to entice the zombies thither. The companions of the bait are hid upwind, concealed from zomby olfactories.

  The bait simply runs about, yelling and screaming (though not too close to the edges of the open space, for zombies appear anywhere); when the zombies raise up their arms like stupefied marionettes lurching to the bait, then do the pitchpolers come from their blind and strive to launch spears, lances, or other such skewering implements—all secured with thin rope for easy retrieval as in the whaling practice.

  It is exceeding difficult to kill a zomby thus, for unless he is speared directly through the skull or in some way beheaded, he will suffer no injury lest it be to a leg, in which case he will become a Byron, that is, somewhat drogued,——a technique soon to be elucidated. Once the fun has been had, or upon the appearance of more of the undead, the game is ended when all players converge on the remaining zombies and relieve them for ever of their hungers.

  Chapter

  Whale Tails

  Other poets have warbled the praises of the soft eye of the antelope, and the lovely plumage of the bird that never alights; less celestial, I celebrate a tail. Reckoning the largest sized Sperm Whale’s tail to begin at that point of the trunk where it tapers to about the girth of a man, it comprises upon its upper surface alone, an area of at least fifty square feet. The compact round body of its root expands into two broad, firm, flat palms or flukes, gradually shoaling away to less than an inch in thickness. At the crotch or junction, these flukes slightly overlap, then sideways recede from each other like wings, leaving a wide vacancy between. In no living thing are the lines of beauty more exquisitely defined than in the crescentic borders of these flukes. At its utmost expansion in the full grown whale, the tail will considerably exceed twenty feet across.

  The entire member seems a dense webbed bed of welded sinews; but cut into it, and you find that three distinct strata compose it:—upper, middle, and lower. The fibres in the upper and lower layers are long and horizontal; those of the middle one, very short, and running crosswise between the outside layers. This triune structure, as much as anything else, imparts power to the tail. To the student of old Roman walls, the middle layer will furnish a curious parallel to the thin course of tiles always alternating with the stone in those wonderful relics of the antique, and which undoubtedly contribute so much to the great strength of the masonry.

  But as if this vast local power in the tendinous tail were not enough, the whole bulk of the leviathan is knit over with a warp and woof of muscular fibres and filaments, which passing on either side the loins and running down into the flukes, insensibly blend with them, and largely contribute to their might; so that in the tail the confluent measureless force of the whole whale seems concentrated to a point. Could annihilation occur to matter, this were the thing to do it. Had I such a tail at my command, I would have it dash the mushroom life from a dozen zomby skulls with one fell blow!

  Nor does this—its amazing strength, at all tend to cripple the graceful flexion of its motions; where infantileness of ease undulates through a Titanism of power. On the contrary, those motions derive their most appalling beauty from it. Real strength never impairs beauty or harmony, but it often bestows it; and in everything imposingly beautiful, strength has much to do with the magic. Take away the tied tendons that all over seem bursting from the marble in the carved Hercules, and its charm would be gone.

  Such is the subtle elasticity of the organ I treat of, that whether wielded in sport, or in earnest, or in anger, whatever be the mood it be in, its flexions are invariably marked by exceeding grace. Therein no Fairy’s arm can transcend it.

  Five great motions are peculiar to it. First, when used as a fin for progression; Second, when used as a mace in battle; Third, in sweeping; Fourth, in lobtailing; Fifth, in peaking flukes.[1]

  [1]Likewise are there five distinct motions to the zomby: First: Unmoving quiescence when cold. Second: Shambling when traveling without nearby victims. Third: investigating a noise or smell, moving faster. Fourth: Arms upraised and moving quickly when victims are sensed close by. Fifth: Most horrendous and frightful of all, when close upon its victim, the zomby becomes a slavering, gnashing, ravening, flailing, all-consuming, demoniac monster that makes the bravest heart quake in bowel-voiding terror.

  First: Being horizontal in its position, the Leviathan’s tail acts in a different manner from the tails of all other sea creatures. It never wriggles. In man or fish, wriggling is a sign of inferiority. To the whale, his tail is the sole means of propulsion. Scroll-wise coiled forwards beneath the body, and then rapidly sprung backwards, it is this which gives that singular darting, leaping motion to the monster when furiously swimming. His side-fins only serve to steer by.

  Second: It is a little significant, that while one sperm whale only fights another sperm whale with his head and jaw, nevertheless, in his conflicts with man, he chiefly and contemptuously uses his tail. In striking at a boat, he swiftly curves away his flukes from it, and the blow is only inflicted by the recoil. If it be made in the unobstructed air, especially if it descend to its mark, the stroke is then simply irresistible. No ribs of man or boat can withstand it. Your only salvation lies in eluding it; but if it comes sideways through the opposing water, then partly owing to the light buoyancy of the whale boat, and the elasticity of its materials, a cracked rib or a dashed plank or two, a sort of stitch in the side, is generally the most serious result. These submerged side blows are so often received in the fishery, that they are accounted mere child’s play. Some one strips off a frock, and the hole is stopped.

  Third: I cannot demonstrate it, but it seems to me, that in the whale the sense of touch is concentrated in the tail; for in this respect there is a delicacy in it only equalled by the daintiness of the elephant’s trunk. This delicacy is chiefly evinced in the action of sweeping, when in maidenly gentleness the whale with a certain soft slowness moves his immense flukes from side to side upon the surface of the sea; and if he feel but a sailor’s whisker, woe to that sailor, whiskers and all. What tenderness there is in that preliminary touch! Had this tail any prehensile power, I should straightway bethink me of Darmonodes’ elephant that so frequented the flower-market, and with low salutations presented nosegays to damsels, and then caressed their zones. A pity it is that the whale does not possess this prehensile virtue in his tail; for I have heard of yet another elephant, that when wounded in the fight, curved round his trunk and extracted the dart.

  Fourth: Stealing unawares upon the whale in the fancied security of the middle of solitary seas, you find him unbent from the vast corpulence of his dignity, and kitten-like, he plays on the ocean as if it were a hearth. But still you see his power in his play. The broad palms of his tail are flirted high into the air; then smiting the surface, the thunderous concussion resounds for miles. You would almost think a great gun had been discharged; and if you noticed the light wreath of vapour from the spiracle at his other extremity, you would think that that was the smoke from the touch-hole.

  Fifth: As in the ordinary floating posture of the leviathan the flukes lie considerably below the level of his back, they are then completely out of sight beneath the surface; but when he is about to plunge into the deeps, his entire flukes with at least thirty feet of his body are tossed erect in the air, and so remain vibrating a moment, till they downwards shoot out of view. Excepting the sublime breach—somewhere else to be described—this peaking of the whale’s f
lukes is perhaps the grandest sight to be seen in all animated nature.

  Out of the bottomless profundities the gigantic tail seems spasmodically snatching at the highest heaven. So in dreams, have I seen majestic Satan thrusting forth his tormented colossal claw from the flame Baltic of Hell. But in gazing at such scenes, it is all in all what mood you are in; if in the Dantean, the devils will occur to you; if in that of Isaiah, the archangels. Standing at the mast-head of my ship during a sunrise that crimsoned sky and sea, I once saw a large herd of whales in the east, all heading towards the sun, and for a moment vibrating in concert with peaked flukes. As it seemed to me at the time, such a grand embodiment of adoration of the gods was never beheld, even in Persia, the home of the fire worshippers.

  The more I consider this mighty tail, the more do I deplore my inability to express it. At times there are gestures in it, which, though they would well grace the hand of man, remain wholly inexplicable. In an extensive herd, so remarkable are these mystic gestures, that I have heard hunters who have declared them akin to Free-Mason signs and symbols; that the whale, indeed, by these methods intelligently conversed with the world. Nor are there wanting other motions of the whale in his general body, full of strangeness, and unaccountable to his most experienced assailant. Dissect him how I may, then, I but go skin deep; I know him not, and never will.

  Chapter

  The

  Grand Armada

  Time out of mind the piratical proas of the Malays, lurking among the low shaded coves and islets of Sumatra, have sallied out upon the vessels sailing through the straits of Sunda to board ships bound for the China seas, fiercely demanding tribute at the point of their spears. Though by the repeated bloody chastisements they have received at the hands of European cruisers, the audacity of these corsairs has of late been somewhat repressed; yet, even at the present day, we occasionally hear of English and American vessels, which, in those waters, have been remorselessly boarded and pillaged.