"
Again and again to such gamesome talk, the dexterous dart is repeated,
the spear returning to its master like a greyhound 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.
CHAPTER 85
The Fountain
That for six thousand years--and no one knows how many millions
of ages before--the great whales should have been spouting all over
the sea, and sprinkling and mistifying the gardens of the deep,
as with so many sprinkling or mistifying pots; and that for some
centuries back, thousands of hunters should have been close by
the fountain of the whale, watching these sprinklings and spoutings--
that all this should be, and yet, that down to this blessed minute
(fifteen and a quarter minutes past one o'clock P.M. of this
sixteenth day of December, A.D. 1851), it should still remain
a problem, whether these spoutings are, after all, really water,
or nothing but vapor--this is surely a noteworthy thing.
Let us, then, look at this matter, along with some interesting
items contingent. Every one knows that by the peculiar
cunning of their gills, the finny tribes in general breathe
the air which at all times is combined with the element
in which they swim; hence, a herring or a cod might live
a century, and never once raise its head above the surface.
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