Editing Moby-Dick (section)

==Plot==
{{Long plot|date=February 2025}}
{{see also|List of Moby-Dick characters}}
[[File:Moby Dick p510 illustration.jpg|thumb|[[Moby Dick (whale)|Moby Dick]] attacking a [[whaling]] boat]]
[[File:Queequeg.JPG|thumb|The illustration of [[Queequeg]] in a 1902 edition]]
[[File:Moby Dick final chase.jpg|thumb|Moby Dick in a 1902 edition]]
[[Ishmael (Moby-Dick)|Ishmael]] narrates his December travels from [[Manhattan Island]] to [[New Bedford, Massachusetts]], with plans to sign up for a whaling voyage as a [[green hand (whaling)|green hand]]. The [[inn]] where he arrives is overcrowded, so he must share a bed with a tattooed cannibal [[Polynesia]]n named [[Queequeg]], a harpooneer whose father was king of the fictional island of [[Rokovoko]]. The next morning, Ishmael and Queequeg attend [[Father Mapple]]'s sermon on [[Book of Jonah|Jonah]], then head for [[Nantucket, Massachusetts|Nantucket]]. Ishmael signs up with the Quaker ship-owners [[Captain Bildad|Bildad]] and [[Captain Peleg|Peleg]] for a voyage on their whaler ''[[Pequod (Moby-Dick)|Pequod]]''. Peleg describes [[Captain Ahab]]: "He's a grand, ungodly, god-like man" who nevertheless "has his humanities". They hire Queequeg the following morning and a man named [[Elijah]] prophesies a dire fate should Ishmael and Queequeg join Ahab. Shadowy figures board the ship while provisions are loaded, and on a cold Christmas Day, the ''Pequod'' departs the harbor.

Ishmael begins the journey with an extensive discussion of [[Cetology of Moby-Dick|cetology]], his system for the zoological classification and natural history of the whale. He then introduces each of the crew members — the chief mate 30-year-old [[List of Moby-Dick characters#Crewmates|Starbuck]], a Nantucket [[Quaker]] and realist; his harpooneer Queequeg; second mate [[List of Moby-Dick characters#Crewmates|Stubb]], a cheerful man from [[Cape Cod]]; Stubb's proud harpooneer [[Tashtego]], a [[Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head|pure-blooded Indian]] from [[Aquinnah|Gay Head]]; the third mate [[List of Moby-Dick characters#Crewmates|Flask]] from [[Martha's Vineyard]]; and Flask's harpooneer [[List of Moby-Dick characters#Harpooneers|Daggoo]], a tall African.

When Ahab finally appears on the [[quarterdeck]], he announces he seeks revenge on the white whale that took his leg from the knee down, leaving him with a [[prosthesis]] fashioned from a whale's [[mandible|jawbone]]. Ahab will give the first man to sight Moby Dick a [[doubloon]], which he nails to the mast. Starbuck objects that he has not come for vengeance but for profit, but Ahab's purpose exercises a mysterious spell on Ishmael: "Ahab's quenchless feud seemed mine." 

Traveling from [[Nantucket]] to the [[Azores Islands]], Ahab then turns southwest and sails along the coast of South America. But instead of rounding [[Cape Horn]] at its tip, he heads northeast towards the [[equator|equatorial]] [[Pacific Ocean|Pacific Ocean]] to sail around the [[Cape of Good Hope]] in southern Africa and into the [[Indian Ocean]]. 

As the ship is en route to Africa, [[Tashtego]] sights a [[sperm whale]] on the horizon. The five shadowy figures from earlier appear on deck and are revealed as a special crew specially selected by Ahab. Their leader is a [[Parsi|Parsee]] named [[List of Moby-Dick characters#Harpooneers|Fedallah]] who serves as Ahab's harpooneer. A pursuit of the whale ensues but is unsuccessful.

Southeast of the [[Cape of Good Hope]], the ''Pequod'' makes the first of nine sea-encounters, or "[[Gam (nautical term)|gam]]s", with other ships: Ahab hails the ''Goney'' (Albatross) to ask whether they have seen the White Whale, but the trumpet through which her captain tries to speak falls into the sea before he can answer. Ishmael explains that because of Ahab's absorption with Moby Dick, he sails on without the customary "gam", which Ishmael defines as a "social meeting of two (or more) Whale-ships", in which the two captains remain on one ship and the chief mates on the other. In the second gam off the Cape of Good Hope with the ''Town-Ho'', the concealed story of a "judgment of God" is revealed, but only to the crew: a defiant sailor who struck an oppressive officer was flogged, and when the punishing officer later led the chase for Moby Dick, he fell from the boat and was killed by the whale.

Ishmael digresses on pictures of whales, [[Plankton|brit]], squid and—after four boats are lowered in vain because Daggoo mistook a [[giant squid]] for the white whale—whale-lines. The next day, in the [[Indian Ocean]], Stubb kills a sperm whale, and that night Fleece, the ''Pequod''{{'}}s black cook, prepares him a rare whale steak. Fleece, at Stubb's request, delivers a sermon to the sharks that fight each other to feast on the whale's carcass, tied to the ship, saying that their nature is to be voracious, but they must overcome it. The whale is prepared, beheaded, and barrels of oil are tried out. Standing at the head of the whale, Ahab begs it to speak of the depths of the sea. The ''Pequod'' next encounters the ''Jeroboam'', which not only lost its chief mate to Moby Dick, but also is now plagued by an [[Endemic (epidemiology)|endemic]] infection.

The whale carcass still lies in the water. Queequeg mounts it, tied to Ishmael's belt by a monkey-rope as if they were [[Conjoined twins|Siamese twins]]. Stubb and Flask later kill a [[right whale]] whose head is fastened to a [[yardarm]] opposite the sperm whale's head. Ishmael compares the two heads in a philosophical way: the right whale is [[John Locke|Locke]]an, [[Stoicism|stoic]], and the sperm whale is [[Immanuel Kant|Kant]]ean, [[Platonism|platonic]]. Tashtego cuts into the head of the sperm whale and retrieves buckets of [[spermaceti]]. He falls into the head, which in turn falls off the yardarm into the sea. Queequeg dives after him and frees Tashtego with his sword.

The ''Pequod'' next gams with the ''Jungfrau'' from Bremen. Both ships sight whales simultaneously, with the ''Pequod'' winning the contest. The three harpooneers dart their harpoons, and Flask delivers the mortal strike with a lance. The carcass sinks, and Queequeg barely manages to escape. The ''Pequod''{{'}}s next gam is with the French whaler ''Bouton de Rose'', whose crew is ignorant of the [[ambergris]] in the gut of the diseased whale in their possession. Stubb talks them out of continuing, but Ahab orders him away. Days later, [[Pip (Moby-Dick character)|Pip]], a little African American cabin-boy, jumps in panic from Stubb's whale boat and the whale must be cut loose because Pip is entangled in the line; a few days later Pip again jumps in panic, is left alone in the sea, and has gone [[insanity|insane]] by the time they find him.

The crew spends time processing various harvested whale parts — liquifying [[congeal|congealed]] spermaceti, boiling [[blubber]], decanting warm oil into casks, stowing them in [[cargo]], and scrubbing the [[deck (ship)|decks]]. 

Ishmael discusses the symbolism in the coin hammered to the main mast, which shows three [[Andes]] summits: one with a flame, another a tower, the third a crowing cock. Ahab looks at the doubloon and interprets the mountains as his volcanic energy, firmness, and victory; Starbuck takes the high peaks as the [[Trinity]]; Stubb focuses on the zodiacal arch over the mountains; and Flask sees no meaning. The Manxman mutters in front of the mast, and Pip declines when he is told to look.

The ''Pequod'' next gams with the ''Samuel Enderby'' of London, captained by Boomer, who lost his right arm to the whale but still carries it no ill will. His ship's surgeon, Dr. Bunger, describes the animal not as malicious, but awkward. Ahab puts an end to the gam by rushing back to his ship. 

Ishmael then discusses the [[evolution]] of whales, specifically discussing a [[glen]] in [[Tranqui Island|Tranque]] of the [[Malaita|Arsacides Islands]] full of carved whale bones and fossilized whales where one can see the decreasing size of their skeletons over time, and he considers the possibility of whale [[extinction]].

Leaving the ''Samuel Enderby'', Ahab wrenches his ivory leg and orders the carpenter to fashion him another. Meanwhile Queequeg, sweating all day below deck, develops a chill and severe fever. The carpenter makes a coffin for the Polynesian, anticipating a [[burial at sea]]. Queequeg tries it for size as Pip sobs and beats his tambourine, standing by and calling himself a coward while he praises his companion. Queequeg suddenly rallies and returns to good health and uses his coffin as a spare seachest.

The ''Pequod'' sails northeast toward [[Formosa]] and into the Pacific Ocean. Ahab, with one nostril, smells the musk from the [[Philippines|Bashee]] isles, and with the other, the salt of the waters where Moby Dick swims. Ahab goes to Perth, the blacksmith, with a bag of racehorse shoenail stubs to be forged into the shank of a special harpoon, and with his [[razor]]s for Perth to melt and fashion into a [[harpoon]] barb. Ahab tempers the barb in blood from Queequeg, Tashtego, and Daggoo.

The ''Pequod'' gams next with the ''Bachelor'', a Nantucket ship heading home full of sperm oil. Every now and then, the ''Pequod'' lowers for whales with success. On one of those nights in the whaleboat, Fedallah prophesies that neither [[hearse]] nor coffin can be Ahab's, that before he dies, Ahab must see two hearses — one not made by mortal hands and the other made of American wood — that Fedallah will precede his captain in death, and finally that only [[hemp]] can kill Ahab.

As the ''Pequod'' approaches the equator, Ahab scolds his quadrant for telling him only where he is and not where he will be, and dashes it to the deck. That evening, a [[typhoon]] attacks the ship and lightning strikes the mast, setting the doubloon and Ahab's harpoon aglow. Ahab delivers a speech on the fire, seeing the lightning as a portent of Moby Dick. Starbuck sees the lightning as a [[omen|warning]], and feels tempted to shoot the sleeping Ahab with his [[musket]]. The next morning, when he finds that the lightning disoriented the compass, Ahab makes a new one out of a lance, a maul, and a sailmaker's needle. He orders the [[chip log|log]] be heaved, but the weathered line snaps, leaving the ship with no way to fix its location.

The ''Pequod'' is now heading southeast toward Moby Dick. A man falls overboard from the mast. The life buoy is thrown, but both sink. Queequeg now proposes that his coffin be used as a new [[buoy]] and Starbuck has it sealed and waterproofed. The next morning, the ship meets in another truncated gam with the ''Rachel'', commanded by Captain Gardiner from Nantucket. The ''Rachel'' is seeking survivors from one of her whaleboats which had gone after Moby Dick. Among the missing is Gardiner's young son, but Ahab refuses to join the search.

Ahab now spends twenty-four hours a day on deck while Fedallah shadows him. One day, a sea hawk grabs Ahab's slouched hat and flies off with it. Next, the ''Pequod'', in a ninth and final gam, meets the ''Delight'', badly damaged and with five of her crew left dead by Moby Dick. Her captain shouts that the harpoon which can kill the white whale has yet to be forged, to which Ahab flourishes his special lance and once more orders the ship forward. Ahab speaks to Starbuck about his wife and child, calling himself a fool for spending 40 years whaling, and says he can see his own child in Starbuck. Starbuck tries to persuade Ahab to return to Nantucket to meet their families, but Ahab refuses.

On the first day of the chase, Ahab smells the whale, climbs the mast, and sights Moby Dick. He claims the doubloon for himself, and orders all boats to lower except for Starbuck's. The whale bites Ahab's boat in two, tosses the captain into the sea and scatters his crew. On the second day of the chase, Ahab leaves Starbuck in charge of the ''Pequod''. Moby Dick smashes the three boats hunting him to splinters. Ahab is rescued, but his ivory leg and Fedallah are lost. Starbuck begs Ahab to stop, but the captain vows revenge.

On the third and final day of the chase, Ahab sights Moby Dick at noon as sharks appear between the ship and the whale in anticipation of the ensuing carnage. Ahab lowers his boat for the final time, leaving Starbuck again on board. Moby Dick breaches and destroys two boats. Fedallah's corpse, still entangled in the fouled lines, is lashed to the whale's back, making Moby Dick the "hearse not made by human hands" Fedallah had prophesied earlier.

Ahab plants his harpoon in the whale's flank and Moby Dick destroys the ''Pequod'', tossing its men into the sea. Ishmael is unable to return to the boat and is left behind in the water. Ahab then realizes the destroyed ship is the second hearse of American wood from Fedallah's prophecy.

Moby Dick returns within a few yards of Ahab's boat and a harpoon is darted from the ship but its line tangles. As Ahab stoops to free it, the line loops around his neck, ensaring him against his nemesis and completing Fedallah's augury. As the mortally stricken whale swims away, the captain is drawn with him out of sight. Queequeg's coffin comes to the surface as the only thing to escape the vortex when the ''Pequod'' sinks. Ishmael floats on it for a day and a night until the ''Rachel'', still looking for its lost seamen, rescues him.