— it looks a little suspicious, don’t it, eh? — Hast not been a pirate, hast thou? — Didst not rob thy last Captain, didst thou? — Dost not think of murdering the officers when thou gettest to sea?”

I protested my innocence of these things. I saw that under the mask of these half humorous innuendoes, this old seaman, as an insulated Quakerish Nantucketer, was full of his insular prejudices, and rather distrustful of all aliens, unless they hailed from Cape Cod or the Vineyard.

“But what takes thee a-whaling?

I want to know that before I think of shipping ye.”

“Well, sir, I want to see what whaling is. I want to see the world.”