Chapter 78: Cistern and Buckets

Summary
This Chapter begins with the men harvesting from the Heidelberg Tun of the whale. The Heidelberg Tun is so called because of its vastness and the sheer amount of spermacetti that is found within it. An actual Heidelberg Tun, shown above, is an enormous barrel for holding ale and other liquids.The men harvest the oil from this by having one man stand atop the entrance to it and lower in a bucket, then pull it out when it is filled. This is a slow, tedious process, and it goes well until they are about halfway finished with the harvesting. Tashtego, the one doing the brunt of the work, falls headfirst into the Tun of the whale. Daggoo, another crewman, attempts to push the bucket back down and pull Tashtego out, but it doesn't work. Suddenly, the ropes holding the whale aloft break, and Tashtego is plunged into the water. The men fear that he is lost, but then Queequeg jumps down into the water. He cuts a hole into the side of the whale and pulls Tashtego out and swims back to the surface, saving Tashtego.

Quotes
"Midwifery should be taught in the same course with fencing and boxing, riding and rowing."
This is just a humorous sentence, which I threw in simply because it made me laugh the first time I read it. The way that it likens the saving of Tashtego to the deliverance of a baby simply rendered itself too funny to not laugh, and I felt the need to share this.
"In this business he proceeds very heedfully, like a treasure-hunter in some old house, sounding the walls to find where the gold is masoned in."
This I chose because it is a great descriptive phrase to show the way in which Tashtego finds the best spot to pull the spermacetti from the Tun.
"Only one sweeter end can readily be recalled—the delicious death of an Ohio honey-hunter, who seeking honey in the crotch of a hollow tree, found such exceeding store of it, that leaning too far over, it sucked him in, so that he died embalmed."
These little side stories are what make this novel as great as it is.

Vocab
Obstetrics: A branch of medicine and surgery related to childbirth

Allusions
"he seems some Turkish Muezzin calling the good people to prayers from the top of a tower."
The Muezzin is a man who calls Muslims to prayer from the minaret, or top, of a mosque.
"Almost in the same instant, with a thunder-boom, the enormous mass dropped into the sea, like Niagara’s Table-Rock into the whirlpool"
Table rock was a limestone ledge which hung over Niagara Falls until 1850 at which point it snapped off and fell into Niagara Gorge.

*Do you think that you have the level of bravery that it took for Queequeg to risk his own life to save Tashtego? Why do you think he was willing to do this for his shipmate?

Chapter 15: Chowder

 

Summary

Beginning the chapter, Ishmael and Queequegs' ship docks at Nantucket, and they go ashore. They make their way to a tavern recommended them by Mr Coffin, the Try Pots. There the innkeeper, Mrs Hussey, fixes them a meal of chowders, both clam and cod. After their meal she shows them to a room, but demands before they enter that Queequeg relinquish his harpoon for the night. This is highly unorthodox, as one seldom sees a harpooner without their harpoon, but Queequeg relents nonetheless. Ishmael asks why the innkeeper has this stipulation for sleeping in her inn, and she replies that a previous boarder, Stiggs, came back from a voyage some years ago, and he died by his own harpoon in his room. 

Quotes

"It’s ominous, thinks I. A Coffin my Innkeeper upon landing in my first whaling port; tombstones staring at me in the whalemen’s chapel; and here a gallows!"

This shows that Ishmael is seeing the foreshadowing, and he is not entirely blind to the way the plot of his own story is unfolding. It also reinforces the ominous feel of the book so far.

"It was made of small juicy clams, scarcely bigger than hazel nuts, mixed with pounded ship biscuit, and salted pork cut up into little flakes; the whole enriched with butter, and plentifully seasoned with pepper and salt."

This sentence is one that rather defines the book itself. It is wonderfully written, going into detail about the smallest thing. This descriptive writing almost allows the reader to see what Ishmael is seeing, smell what he is smelling.

"There was a fishy flavor to the milk, too, which I could not at all account for, till one morning happening to take a stroll along the beach among some fishermen’s boats, I saw Hosea’s brindled cow feeding on fish remnants, and marching along the sand with each foot in a cod’s decapitated head, looking very slip-shod, I assure ye."

Same as the last sentence, I chose this one because I simply love the way that Melville writes, throwing in quirks and twists in every part of his story, keeping it interesting no matter what the subject material is.

*What must it be like, to live the life of an innkeeper? To see the trickle, the constant flow of people, the constant flood of information passing in and subsequently out of your very own doors? How exciting, yet somehow at the same time dull, must their daily routines be?

Vocab

Brindled: Streaked with grey or brown, or patched with any sort of dark color.

Oblique: Not parallel or perpendicular to an implied line.

Repast: A meal, occurring at any time of the day

Slip-Shod: Very unstable, liable to fall at any moment