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 vapor 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
lies 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 flukes
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.
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