)
'Twas not so hard a task. I thought to find one stubborn, at the least;
but my one cogged circle fits into all their various wheels,
and they revolve. Or, if you will, like so many ant-hills of powder,
they all stand before me; and I their match. Oh, hard! that to
fire others, the match itself must needs be wasting! What I've dared,
I've willed; and what I've willed, I'll do! They think me mad--
Starbuck does; but I'm demoniac, I am madness maddened!
That wild madness that's only calm to comprehend itself!
The prophecy was that I should be dismembered; and--Aye! I lost
this leg. I now prophesy that I will dismember my dismemberer.
Now, then, be the prophet and the fulfiller one. That's more than ye,
ye great gods, ever were. I laugh and hoot at ye, ye cricket-players,
ye pugilists, ye deaf Burkes and blinded Bendigoes! I will not
say as schoolboys do to bullies--Take some one of your own size;
don't pommel me! No, ye've knocked me down, and I am up again;
but ye have run and hidden. Come forth from behind your cotton bags!
I have no long gun to reach ye. Come, Ahab's compliments to ye;
come and see if ye can swerve me. Swerve me? ye cannot swerve me,
else ye swerve yourselves! man has ye there.
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