Any way, for the present, I'll quit Pip's vicinity.
I can stand the rest, for they have plain wits; but he's too
crazy-witty for my sanity. So, so, I leave him muttering."
"Here's the ship's navel, this doubloon here, and they are all one fire
to unscrew it. But, unscrew your navel, and what's the consequence?
Then again, if it stays here, that is ugly, too, for when aught's
nailed to the mast it's a sign that things grow desperate.
Ha! ha! old Ahab! the White Whale; he'll nail ye! This is a pine tree.
My father, in old Tolland county, cut down a pine tree once, and found
a silver ring grown over in it; some old darkey's wedding ring.
How did it get there? And so they'll say in the resurrection,
when they come to fish up this old mast, and find a doubloon lodged in it,
with bedded oysters for the shaggy bark. Oh, the gold! the precious,
precious gold!--the green miser'll hoard ye soon! Hish! hish!
God goes 'mong the worlds blackberrying. Cook! ho, cook! and cook us!
Jenny! hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, Jenny, Jenny! and get your hoe-cake done!"
CHAPTER 100
Leg and Arm
The Pequod of Nantucket, Meets the Samuel Enderby, of London
"Ship, ahoy! Hast seen the White Whale?"
So cried Ahab, once more hailing a ship showing English colors,
bearing down under the stern.
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