Mr. Starbuck's orders. Oh, look, sir!
Beware the hatchway!"
"Thank ye, man. Thy coffin lies handy to the vault."
"Sir? The hatchway? oh! So it does, sir, so it does."
"Art not thou the leg-maker? Look, did not this stump come
from thy shop?"
"I believe it did, sir; does the ferrule stand, sir?"
"Well enough. But art thou not also the undertaker?"
"Aye, sir; I patched up this thing here as a coffin for Queequeg;
but they've set me now to turning it into something else."
"Then tell me; art thou not an arrant, all-grasping, intermeddling,
monopolizing, heathenish old scamp, to be one day making legs,
and the next day coffins to clap them in, and yet again life-buoys
out of those same coffins? Thou art as unprincipled as the gods,
and as much of a jack-of-all-trades."
"But I do not mean anything, sir. I do as I do."
"The gods again. Hark ye, dost thou not ever sing working about
a coffin? The Titans, they say, hummed snatches when chipping out
the craters for volcanoes; and the grave-digger in the play sings,
spade in hand. Dost thou never?"
"Sing, sir? Do I sing? Oh, I'm indifferent enough, sir, for that;
but the reason why the grave-digger made music must have been because
there was none in his spade, sir.
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