English Sailor

PORTUGUESE SAILOR. How the sea rolls swashing ’gainst the side! Stand by for reefing, hearties! the winds are just crossing swords, pell-mell they’ll go lunging presently.

DANISH SAILOR. Crack, crack, old ship! so long as thou crackest, thou holdest! Well done! The mate there holds ye to it stiffly. He’s no more afraid than the isle fort at Cattegat, put there to fight the Baltic with storm-lashed guns, on which the sea-salt cakes!

4TH NANTUCKET SAILOR. He has his orders, mind ye that. I heard old Ahab tell him he must always kill a squall, something as they burst a waterspout with a pistol—fire your ship right into it!

ENGLISH SAILOR. Blood! but that old man’s a grand old cove! We are the lads to hunt him up his whale!

ALL. Aye! aye!

DAGGOO (springing). Swallow thine, mannikin! White skin, white liver!

SPANISH SAILOR (meeting him). Knife thee heartily! big frame, small spirit!

ALL. A row! a row! a row!

TASHTEGO (with a whiff). A row a’low, and a row aloft—Gods and men—both brawlers! Humph!

BELFAST SAILOR. A row! arrah a row! The Virgin be blessed, a row! Plunge in with ye!

ENGLISH SAILOR. Fair play! Snatch the Spaniard’s knife! A ring, a ring!