As both steel and curse sank to the socket, as if sucked into
a morass, Moby Dick sideways writhed; spasmodically rolled
his nigh flank against the bow, and, without staving a hole
in it, so suddenly canted the boat over, that had it not been
for the elevated part of the gunwale to which he then clung,
Ahab would once more have been tossed into the sea.
As it was, three of the oarsmen--who foreknew not the precise
instant of the dart, and were therefore unprepared for its effects--
these were flung out; but so fell, that, in an instant two
of them clutched the gunwale again, and rising to its level on
a combing wave, hurled themselves bodily inboard again; the third
man helplessly dropping astern, but still afloat and swimming.
Almost simultaneously, with a mighty volition of ungraduated,
instantaneous swiftness, the White Whale darted through the
weltering sea. But when Ahab cried out to the steersman to take
new turns with the line, and hold it so; and commanded the crew
to turn round on their seats, and tow the boat up to the mark;
the moment the treacherous line felt that double strain and tug,
it snapped in the empty air!
"What breaks in me? Some sinew cracks!--'tis whole again; oars! oars!
Burst in upon him!"
Hearing the tremendous rush of the sea-crashing boat, the whale
wheeled round to present his blank forehead at bay; but in
that evolution, catching sight of the nearing black hull of the ship;
seemingly seeing in it the source of all his persecutions;
bethinking it--it may be--a larger and nobler foe; of a sudden,
he bore down upon its advancing prow, smiting his jaws amid fiery
showers of foam.
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