though Queequeg told me that unlike us, who at such times look
downwards to our platters, they, on the contrary, copying the ducks,
glance upwards to the great Giver of all feasts--Grace, I say,
being said, the High Priest opens the banquet by the immemorial ceremony
of the island; that is, dipping his consecrated and consecrating
fingers into the bowl before the blessed beverage circulates.
Seeing himself placed next the Priest, and noting the ceremony,
and thinking himself--being Captain of a ship--as having plain
precedence over a mere island King, especially in the King's own house--
the Captain coolly proceeds to wash his hands in the punch bowl;--
taking it I suppose for a huge finger-glass. "Now," said Queequeg,
"what you tink now?--Didn't our people laugh?"

At last, passage paid, and luggage safe, we stood on board the schooner.
Hoisting sail, it glided down the Acushnet river. On one side,
New Bedford rose in terraces of streets, their ice-covered trees all
glittering in the clear, cold air. Huge hills and mountains of casks
on casks were piled upon her wharves, and side by side the world-wandering
whale ships lay silent and safely moored at last; while from others came
a sound of carpenters and coopers, with blended noises of fires and forges
to melt the pitch, all betokening that new cruises were on the start;
that one most perilous and long voyage ended, only begins a second;
and a second ended, only begins a third, and so on, for ever and for aye.
Such is the endlessness, yea, the intolerableness of all earthly effort.

Gaining the more open water, the bracing breeze waxed fresh; the little
Moss tossed the quick foam from her bows, as a young colt his snortings.
How I snuffed that Tartar air!--how I spurned that turnpike earth!--
that common highway all over dented with the marks of slavish heels
and hoofs; and turned me to admire the magnanimity of the sea which will