"
"He's drowned with the rest on 'em, last night," said the old Manx
sailor standing behind them; "I heard; all of ye heard their spirits."
Now, as it shortly turned out, what made this incident of the Rachel's
the more melancholy, was the circumstance, that not only was one
of the Captain's sons among the number of the missing boat's crew;
but among the number of the other boats' crews, at the same time,
but on the other hand, separated from the ship during the dark
vicissitudes of the chase, there had been still another son;
as that for a time, the wretched father was plunged to the bottom
of the cruellest perplexity; which was only solved for him
by his chief mate's instinctively adopting the ordinary procedure
of a whaleship in such emergencies, that is, when placed between
jeopardized but divided boats, always to pick up the majority first.
But the captain, for some unknown constitutional reason,
had refrained from mentioning all this, and not till forced to it
by Ahab's iciness did he allude to his one yet missing boy;
a little lad, but twelve years old, whose father with the earnest
but unmisgiving hardihood of a Nantucketer's paternal love,
had thus early sought to initiate him in the perils and wonders
of a vocation almost immemorially the destiny of all his race.
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