Moby Dick

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horizontally swooping upon them. And though the other boats, unharmed,
still hovered hard by; still they dared not pull into the eddy to
strike, lest that should be the signal for the instant destruction of
the jeopardized castaways, Ahab and all; nor in that case could they
themselves hope to escape. With straining eyes, then, they remained on
the outer edge of the direful zone, whose centre had now become the old
man's head.

Meantime, from the beginning all this had been descried from the ship's
mast heads; and squaring her yards, she had borne down upon the scene;
and was now so nigh, that Ahab in the water hailed her!--"Sail on
the"--but that moment a breaking sea dashed on him from Moby Dick, and
whelmed him for the time. But struggling out of it again, and chancing
to rise on a towering crest, he shouted,--"Sail on the whale!--Drive him
off!"

The Pequod's prows were pointed; and breaking up the charmed circle, she