Moby-Dick; or, The Whale · Moby-Dick, ch. 17 · block 10

In as calm, but rapid a manner as possible, I gave her to understand the whole case. Unconsciously clapping the vinegar-cruet to one side of her nose, she ruminated for an instant; then exclaimed—“No! I haven’t seen it since I put it there.” Running to a little closet under the landing of the stairs, she glanced in, and returning, told me that Queequeg’s harpoon was missing. “He’s killed himself,” she cried. “It’s unfort’nate Stiggs done over again—there goes another counterpane—God pity his poor mother!—it will be the ruin of my house. Has the poor lad a sister? Where’s that girl?—there, Betty, go to Snarles the Painter, and tell him to paint me a sign, with—‘no suicides permitted here, and no smoking in the parlor;’—might as well kill both birds at once. Kill? The Lord be merciful to his ghost! What’s that noise there? You, young man, avast there!”

Herman Melville · 1851
Project Gutenberg #15, credited to Eugene F. Irey; updated 10 June 2026. Based on the first American edition, Harper & Brothers, 1851, according to the source catalog.
Mapped print edition: Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; or, The Whale (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1851; First American edition).
Passage ¶665: p. 93 (Scanned p. 93)
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Gloss address: 17.10 · chapter.paragraph · global ¶665
Frozen text and counting rules: g1-582503627a093f94.
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