The living member--
that makes the living insult, my little man. And thinks I to myself
all the while, mind, while I was stubbing my silly toes against
that cursed pyramid--so confoundedly contradictory was it all,
all the while, I say, I was thinking to myself, 'what's his leg now,
but a cane-. a whale-bone cane. Yes,' thinks I, 'it was only
a playful cudgelling--in fact, only a whaleboning that he gave me--
not a base kick. Besides,' thinks I, 'look at it once; why, the end
of it--the foot part--what a small sort of end it is; whereas, if a
broad footed farmer kicked me, there's a devilish broad insult.
But this insult is whittled down to a point only.' But now comes
the greatest joke of the dream, Flask. While I was battering away
at the pyramid, a sort of badger-haired old merman, with a hump
on his back, takes me by the shoulders, and slews me round.
'What are you 'bout?' says he. Slid! man, but I was frightened.
Such a phiz! But, somehow, next moment I was over the fright.
'What am I about?' says I at last. 'And what business is that of yours,
I should like to know, Mr. Humpback? Do you want a kick?'
By the lord, Flask, I had no sooner said that, than he turned
round his stern to me, bent over, and dragging up a lot of seaweed
he had for a clout--what do you think, I saw?--why thunder alive,
man, his stern was stuck full of marlinspikes, with the points out.
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