Ahab still stood like an anvil, receiving every shock, but without the least quivering of his own.

“I will not go,” said the stranger, “till you say aye to me. Do to me as you would have me do to you in the like case. For you too have a boy, Captain Ahab — though but a child, and nestling safely at home now — a child of your old age too — Yes, yes, you relent; I see it — run, run, men, now, and stand by to square in the yards.”

“Avast,” cried Ahab — “touch not a rope-yarn”; then in a voice that prolongingly moulded every word — “Captain Gardiner, I will not do it.

Even now I lose time. Good-bye, good-bye. God bless ye, man, and may I forgive myself, but I must go.