 the overlapping
sleeves of which were rolled up on his wrists. A deep, settled, fanatic delirium
was in his eyes.
    So soon as this figure had been first descried, Stubb had exclaimed - »That
's he! that 's he! - the long-togged scaramouch the Town-Ho's company told us
of!« Stubb here alluded to a strange story told of the Jeroboam, and a certain
man among her crew, some time previous when the Pequod spoke the Town-Ho.
According to this account and what was subsequently learned, it seemed that the
scaramouch in question had gained a wonderful ascendency over almost everybody
in the Jeroboam. His story was this: -
    He had been originally nurtured among the crazy society of Neskyeuna
Shakers, where he had been a great prophet; in their cracked, secret meetings
having several times descended from heaven by the way of a trap-door, announcing
the speedy opening of the seventh vial, which he carried in his vest-pocket; but
which, instead of containing gunpowder, was supposed to be charged with
laudanum. A strange, apostolic whim having seized him, he had left Neskyeuna for
Nantucket, where, with that cunning peculiar to craziness, he assumed a steady
common-sense exterior, and offered himself as a green-hand candidate for the
Jeroboam's whaling voyage. They engaged him; but straightway upon the ship's
getting out of sight of land, his insanity broke out in a freshet. He announced
himself as the archangel Gabriel, and commanded the captain to jump overboard.
He published his manifesto, whereby he set himself forth as the deliverer of the
isles of the sea and vicar-general of all Oceanica. The unflinching earnestness
with which he declared these things; - the dark, daring play of his sleepless,
excited imagination, and all the preternatural terrors of real delirium, united
to invest this Gabriel in the minds of the majority of the ignorant crew with an
atmosphere of sacredness. Moreover, they were afraid of him. As such a man,
however, was not of much practical use in the ship, especially as he refused to
work except when he pleased, the incredulous captain would fain have been rid of
him; but apprised that that individual's intention was to land him in the first
convenient port, the archangel forthwith opened all his seals and vials -
devoting the ship and all hands to unconditional perdition, in case this
intention was carried out. So strongly did he work upon his disciples among the
crew, that at last in a body they went to the captain and
