The prospect was unlimited, but exceedingly monotonous and forbidding; not the slightest variety that I could see.

“Well, what’s the report?” said Peleg when I came back; “what did ye see?”

“Not much,” I replied — “nothing but water; considerable horizon though, and there’s a squall coming up, I think.”

“Well, what does thou think then of seeing the world? Do ye wish to go round Cape Horn to see any more of it, eh?

Can’t ye see the world where you stand?”

I was a little staggered, but go a-whaling I must, and I would; and the Pequod was as good a ship as any — I thought the best — and all