Yet I don’t stop to plug my leak; for who can find it in the deep-loaded hull; or how hope to plug it, even if found, in this life’s howling gale? Starbuck! I’ll not have the Burtons hoisted.”

“What will the owners say, sir?”

“Let the owners stand on Nantucket beach and outyell the Typhoons. What cares Ahab? Owners, owners? Thou art always prating to me, Starbuck, about those miserly owners, as if the owners were my conscience.

But look ye, the only real owner of anything is its commander; and hark ye, my conscience is in this ship’s keel. — On deck!”

“Captain Ahab,” said the reddening mate, moving further into the cabin, with a daring so strangely