In “The Monkey-rope,” Ishmael finds himself in a uniquely perilous variation of this practice. On the Pequod, Stubb demands that the monkey-rope be tied to the crew-mate on deck as well as the harpooneer overboard. In this case, Ishmael tends to Queequeg, knowing that “should poor Queequeg sink to rise no more, then both usage and honor demanded, that instead of cutting the cord, it should drag me down in his wake.” In short, Stubb increases the security of the harpooneer by marrying his fate to the fate of the party responsible for him. The practice encourages (requires) the attendant crew-mate to do the moral and just thing by removing his ability to do otherwise.

Interestingly, at the end of the chapter, Stubb revolts against a similar move pulled by Aunt Charity — Bildad’s sister, who provisioned the Pequod before its voyage. Encouraging (requiring) temperance by removing access to alcohol, Charity deems to make a moral crew. When Queequeg returns to the deck after a long and hard labor, shivering with the cold of the sea, the steward brings him a warm ginger tea, as provisioned for the task by Charity. Sensing “some sneaking Temperance Society movement about this business,” Stubb overrides Charity’s restrictions by fetching the alcohol himself.

“The Monkey-rope” raises interesting questions of law and custom. Societies perhaps need laws and restrictions to set an accountably moral tone, but at what point do laws actually inhibit man’s moral development by inhibiting his choice? Can an act be moral if the actor has no choice to do otherwise?

Chapter 72: The Monkey-rope

Cannibals, cutting spades, sharks snapping free,
All tossed in the sea
With Queequeg and me.

Great consternation aloft and between,
Begun at the scene
And taken to mean

That islands exist only in our dreams,
Not reality,
And Fate can’t prevent a slip.

Think it insurance, the danger is spread
To many a head,
And thus was I wed.

A monkey-rope fashioned and tied to my belt,
And tied to his belt,
Security felt

By none and by all simultaneously,
Bonded famously.
We feel one another’s slips.

Stubb instituted this perilous plot
To rally our lot,
Though moral or not,

Just as Aunt Charity’s temperance would do,
Encouraging through
Restrictive milieu.

But false institutions never lent
To our betterment.
We’re tied by the bonds of men
To defend
The one at the risk of ten.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 12, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 5, 2011

I had an octogenarian noticing as I reread Chapter 27, “Knights and Squires.” The chapter — the second of three chapters introducing the mates, harpooneers, and captain of the Pequod — formally introduces us to the Pequod’s second- and third- mates, Stubb and Flask, respectively. In describing Stubb and his squire/harpooneer, Tashtego, Ishmael frequently refers to air — Stubb’s breezy personality, his lightness of spirt, the smoke from his pipe protecting him from a miasma of ponderous thoughts, not to mention a reference to Tashtego as “Prince of the Powers of the Air.” Flask and Daggoo (particularly Daggoo), appear in references to earth — stout, unmovable, like a lion or giraffe. In the next chapter, Ahab comes across strongly as associated with fire, which fits the later introduction of Fedallah (frequently referred to as devilish and smelling of brimstone) as his harpooneer. Flipping back to Chapter 26, Ishmael describes Starbuck, surely enough, with strong water imagery.

I’m not sure what significance we can assign to this choice in Ishmael’s storytelling, if any at all. Does Ishmael seek to lend an elemental mythos to his tale? Is this another attempt to establish a pre-Christian spirituality in the story? Or does Ishmael want to establish himself and Queequeg, members of Starbuck’s crew, as true spirits of water — ponderous, reverent, and observant? Perhaps Ishmael only wants to further his point about American dominance over the world. All of the above? None of the above?

Chapter 27: Knights and Squires

Bumbling nobility paired with strength
Provides a might without right, Oh!
Led underestimating the majesty,
The gravity facing us.

How could I breathe
A little of each nightmare
Sighed in all dying breaths?

God of the air
Medicated with camphor,
Block miasma of empathy.

Stout, Earthly travesty led with ignorance,
The dirt in its fearlessness.
Never to feel the depths, even
Face to face, all sublimity wasted, Oh!

Nothing to move
The mountain of your violence,
Even battering waves!

Man of the world,
Yet braced against the influx
Of our tremulous days.

Rally the backs,
The strength of every island
Pitched at banners of eloquence.

Only the wretch,
The touch of something deeper,
Will be graceful on high.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 19, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea January 9, 2010

Ishmael and Queequeg are brought together by a lack of available beds at The Spouter-Inn. Peter Coffin, rascal that he his, pairs the two up with hilarious and touching results. The two men have a lot of bridges to build — religion, race, personal space/boundaries, the disparate patterns of disparate cultural upbringings — and watching the push and pull of these negotiations of friendship is a slice of light and joy and (strangely) hope through an often dark and bleak book. Awesome as the rest of the book is, that was a little hard for me to let go of my first time through.

“The Counterpane” is also an excellent example of Melville’s regular practice of talking about one thing while really talking about another. There is certainly a counterpane (patchwork quilt) on the bed that umbrellas Ishmael and Queequeg as they sleep (and later, just hang around and smoke), but the real counterpane in this chapter is Queequeg himself.  Queequeg’s tattooed body is a sort of patchwork quilt in appearance. We later find that his tattoos are a written narrative of the universe and “a mystical treatise on the art of attaining truth,” though no one save the prophet who inscribed them can decipher their meaning, not even Queequeg.  Queequeg’s skin is a text of heritage, history and culture layered over the text of his race.

“The Counterpane” begins the morning after Ishmael and Queequeg spend their first night together as bedfellows. Ishmael wakes to find Queequeg hugging him “in the most loving and affectionate manner.” Ishmael is immediately reminded of a moment from his childhood involving lots of references to light and dark. He is trying to climb into the dark, sooty chimney (ala William Blake) when he is caught by his evil stepmother. As punishment, he has to spend the remainder of the day in bed. Being the lightest day of the year, summer solstice, this is quite a stretch of time, but beg as he might, his stepmother insists. He eventually falls asleep and wakes, “and the before sun-lit room was now wrapped in outer darkness.” Worse still, Ishmael finds himself hand in hand with a dark phantom:

For what seemed ages piled on ages, I lay there, frozen with the most awful fears, not daring to drag away my hand; yet ever thinking that if I could but stir it one single inch, the horrid spell would be broken.

But Ishmael doesn’t want the spell to be broken, either with the phantom limb or with Queequeg. He submits himself to the embrace of the Other and I think finds a synthesis in the resulting friendship. Ishmael and Queequeg are sewn into the larger community of the crew and into the larger narrative of the Pequod. Counterpanes nested within counterpanes.

Chapter 4: The Counterpane

Now he’s hugging me
Oh, so lovingly;
I woke up in Queequeg’s embrace!
Like a brother, pagan other
In my bed.

It reminds me of when I was but a child
I once fell asleep
And woke with a phantom’s limb
Hand in hand with me.

He’s considerate,
Though not literate –
Politeness must be innate!
Like a patchwork of decorum
And disgrace.

And for all of my high civil breeding,
I have to admit
I stared on quite rudely
Through Queequeg’s strange toilet.

So he shaves his face
With a harpoon blade –
A savagely civilized art!
He’s a darkness, with a
Civilizing heart.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea July 19, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea October 1, 2008