Moby Dick

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to board the stranger, had not the threatening wind forbade. But taking
advantage of his windward position, he again seized his trumpet, and
knowing by her aspect that the stranger vessel was a Nantucketer and
shortly bound home, he loudly hailed--"Ahoy there! This is the Pequod,
bound round the world! Tell them to address all future letters to the
Pacific ocean! and this time three years, if I am not at home, tell them
to address them to--"

At that moment the two wakes were fairly crossed, and instantly, then,
in accordance with their singular ways, shoals of small harmless fish,
that for some days before had been placidly swimming by our side, darted
away with what seemed shuddering fins, and ranged themselves fore and
aft with the stranger's flanks. Though in the course of his continual
voyagings Ahab must often before have noticed a similar sight, yet, to
any monomaniac man, the veriest trifles capriciously carry meanings.

"Swim away from me, do ye?" murmured Ahab, gazing over into the water.