The Chase—Second Day — Moby-Dick

At daybreak mast-heads man again; Ahab orders all sail on a faster-than-thought whale while Ishmael digresses on Nantucket commanders reading a whale's wake like pilots reading coasts until the ship tears on like a cannon-ball plough.

Stubb feels deck tingle; false spout then true breach seven miles off; Moby Dick salmon-like tosses to heaven; Ahab cries breach your last, keeps Starbuck on ship, and lowers a spare boat head-and-head until the whale churns among boats with open jaws, tangles three lines, and after Ahab knife-cuts snarled steel drags Stubb and Flask boats into a maelstrom of cedar chips.

White Whale forehead-smash capsizes Ahab's boat; he clings to broken half with Starbuck's help, ivory leg snapped; carpenter notes ferrule failed; Ahab says no living bone more him than dead lost; muster finds Parsee missing, caught in Ahab's line; Starbuck cries impiety to hunt more; Ahab calls himself Fates' lieutenant, says Moby Dick will rise third day to spout his last, and promises ten girdles of the globe.

At dusk the whale still rides leeward; hammers and grindstone rig spare boats and sharpen weapons till nearly daylight while the carpenter builds another leg and slouched Ahab stands scuttle facing east for the earliest sun.