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Oh ! the sail - needles are in the green locker ! Don’t whale it too much a ’ Lord’s days , men ; but don’t miss a fair chance either , that’s rejecting Heaven’s good gifts . Have an eye to the molasses tierce , Mr . Stubb ; it was a little leaky , I thought . If ye touch at the islands , Mr . Flask , beware of fornication . Good - bye , good - bye ! Don’t keep that cheese too long down in the hold , Mr . Starbuck ; it’ll spoil . Be careful with the butter — twenty cents the pound it was , and mind ye , if — ” “ Come , come , Captain Bildad ; stop palavering , — away ! ” and with that , Peleg hurried him over the side , and both dropt into the boat . Ship and boat diverged ; the cold , damp night breeze blew between ; a screaming gull flew overhead ; the two hulls wildly rolled ; we gave three heavy - hearted cheers , and blindly plunged like fate into the lone Atlantic . CHAPTER 23 . The Lee Shore . Some chapters back , one Bulkington was spoken of , a tall , newlanded mariner , encountered in New Bedford at the inn . When on that shivering winter’s night , the Pequod thrust her vindictive bows into the cold malicious waves , who should I see standing at her helm but Bulkington ! I looked with sympathetic awe and fearfulness upon the man , who in mid - winter just landed from a four years ’ dangerous voyage , could so unrestingly push off again for still another tempestuous term . The land seemed scorching to his feet . Wonderfullest things are ever the unmentionable ; deep memories yield no epitaphs ; this six - inch chapter is the stoneless grave of Bulkington . Let me only say that it fared with him as with the storm - tossed ship , that miserably drives along the leeward land . The port would fain give succor ; the port is pitiful ; in the port is safety , comfort , hearthstone , supper , warm blankets , friends , all that’s kind to our mortalities . But in that gale , the port , the land , is that ship’s direst jeopardy ; she must fly all hospitality ; one touch of land , though it but graze the keel , would make her shudder through and through . With all her might she crowds all sail off shore ; in so doing , fights ’ gainst the very winds that fain would blow her homeward ; seeks all the lashed sea’s landlessness again ; for refuge’s sake forlornly rushing into peril ; her only friend her bitterest foe ! Know ye now , Bulkington ? Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally intolerable truth ; that all deep , earnest thinking is but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea ; while the wildest winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous , slavish shore ? But as in landlessness alone resides highest truth , shoreless , indefinite as God — so , better is it to perish in that howling infinite , than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee , even if that were safety ! For worm - like , then , oh ! who would craven crawl to land ! Terrors of the terrible ! is all this agony so vain ? Take heart , take heart , O Bulkington ! Bear thee grimly , demigod ! Up from the spray of thy ocean - perishing — straight up , leaps thy apotheosis !
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