Stubb’s Pipe and Disposition
The chapter attributes Stubb’s easy-going, fearless temperament largely to his constant smoking. His pipe is described as one of the regular features of his face, alongside his nose. He keeps a row of pipes ready loaded in a rack and smokes them in succession before sleeping, then reloads them for the next night. This habitual smoking is presented as a “disinfecting agent” against the “nameless miseries” of the world, much like how people use camphorated handkerchiefs during cholera outbreaks. The chapter suggests that his pipe helped create his “almost impious good-humor” and enabled him to cheerfully bear life’s burdens.
Third Mate Flask
Flask, a native of Tisbury in Martha’s Vineyard, is described as a short, stout, ruddy young fellow who is highly pugnacious concerning whales. He seems to take personal offense at the great leviathans, viewing it as a point of honor to destroy them. Unlike the more reverent sailors, Flask displays an “ignorant, unconscious fearlessness” that makes him treat whales as merely a species of magnified mouse or water-rat requiring minimal effort to kill. He pursued the fishery “for the fun of it,” viewing three years’ voyage around Cape Horn as merely a “jolly joke.” His nickname aboard the Pequod is “King-Post,” comparing him to the short, square timber used in Arctic whaling ships to brace against ice.
Headsmen and Knight-Squire Analogy
The three mates of the Pequod are described as “momentous men” who command the ship’s boats as headsmen. In Captain Ahab’s anticipated battle against the whales, these headsmen would serve as captains of companies. Armed with their long whaling spears, they are compared to “a picked trio of lancers,” while the harpooneers serve as javelin-throwers. The chapter establishes the knight-squire relationship that exists in whaling: each headsman is accompanied by a boat-steerer or harpooneer who provides fresh lances when needed and maintains a close intimacy with his commander. This parallel to Gothic knights of old provides the framework for introducing the harpooneers that follow.
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