oe'er I go; yet while I earthly live,
the queenly personality lives in me, and feels her royal rights. But war
is pain, and hate is woe. Come in thy lowest form of love, and I will
kneel and kiss thee; but at thy highest, come as mere supernal power;
and though thou launchest navies of full-freighted worlds, there's that
in here that still remains indifferent. Oh, thou clear spirit, of thy
fire thou madest me, and like a true child of fire, I breathe it back to
thee."

[SUDDEN, REPEATED FLASHES OF LIGHTNING; THE NINE FLAMES LEAP LENGTHWISE
TO THRICE THEIR PREVIOUS HEIGHT; AHAB, WITH THE REST, CLOSES HIS EYES,
HIS RIGHT HAND PRESSED HARD UPON THEM.]

"I own thy speechless, placeless power; said I not so? Nor was it wrung
from me; nor do I now drop these links. Thou canst blind; but I can then
grope. Thou canst consume; but I can then be ashes. Take the homage of
these poor eyes, and shutter-hands. I would not take it. The lightning
flashes through my skull; mine eye-balls ache and ache; my whole beaten
brain seems as beheaded, and rolling on some stunning ground. Oh, oh!
Yet blindfold, yet will I talk to thee. Light though thou be, thou
leapest out of darkness; but I am darkness leaping out of light, leaping
out of thee! The javelins cease; open eyes; see, or not? There burn the
flames! Oh, thou magnanimous! now I do glory in my genealogy. But thou
art but my fiery father; my sweet mother, I know not. Oh, cruel! what
hast thou done with her? There lies my puzzle; but thine is greater.
Thou knowest not how came ye, hence callest thyself unbegotten;
certainly knowest not thy beginning, hence callest thyself unbegun. I
know that of me, which thou knowest not of thyself, oh, thou omnipotent.
There is some unsuffusing thing beyond thee, thou clear spirit, to whom
all thy eternity is but time, all thy creativeness mechanical. Through
thee, thy flaming self, my scorched eyes do dimly see it. Oh, thou
foundling fire, thou hermit immemorial, thou too hast thy incommunicable
riddle, thy unparticipated grief. Here again with haughty agony, I read
my sire. Leap! leap up, and lick the sky! I leap with thee; I burn with
thee; would fain be welded with thee; defyingly I worship thee!"

"The boat! the boat!" cried Starbuck, "look at thy boat, old man!"

Ahab's harpoon, the one forged at Perth's fire, remained firmly lashed
in its conspicuous crotch, so that it projected beyond his whale-boat's
bow; but the sea that had stove its bott