正午时分，珀斯须发纠结，腰间裹着一件硬刺刺的鲨鱼皮围裙，站在熔炉和铁砧之间——铁砧搁在一截铁木圆木上——一只手将一柄鱼叉头按在煤火中，另一只手拉着风箱。这时，亚哈船长沿路走来，手里提着一只看上去锈迹斑斑的小皮袋。还在离熔炉有些距离时，忧郁的亚哈停下了脚步；终于，珀斯从火中抽出铁件，开始在铁砧上锤打——那红热的铁块迸起一团团盘旋飞舞的火星，有些直飞到亚哈近旁。
“珀斯，这些便是你‘卡里妈妈的小鸡’么？它们总在你身后飞；也是吉鸟，但并非对人人皆然；——瞧，它们灼人；而你——你活在它们中间竟毫发无伤。”
“因为我浑身早已灼透了，亚哈船长，”珀斯拄锤歇了片刻答道，“我已烧无可烧；你难再灼伤一处旧疤。”
“罢了，罢了；休要再提。你萎缩的嗓音于我听来，太平静，太清醒的哀伤。我自己既不在天堂，便不耐他人任何非疯即苦的悲戚。你该发疯，铁匠；说说，你怎不发疯？你怎能不发疯而忍受？莫非上天仍恨你，教你发不得疯？——你方才在打什么？”
“焊一柄旧鱼叉头，先生；上头有缝有坑。”
“铁匠，经这般狠用，你还能将它全抚平么？”
“我想可以，先生。”
“我猜你几乎什么缝什么坑都能抚平；不论铁多硬，铁匠？”
“是，先生，我想能；只除了一处。”
“那你看好了，”亚哈激动地上前，双手按在珀斯肩头，“看好了——这——铁匠，你抚得平这样的缝么，”他一掌抹过自己肋状的额头，“你若能，铁匠，我甘把头搁你砧上，受你最重的锤落两眉之间。答我！这缝你抚得平？”
“噢！正是那一处，先生！我岂没说只除了一处？”
“是，铁匠，正是那一处；是，老兄，它抚不平；因你虽只在我皮肉见它，它已深入颅骨——那尽是皱褶！但丢开儿戏；今日不再打钩叉。看好了！”他晃着皮袋，仿佛满装金币。“我也要打一柄鱼叉；一柄千副恶鬼之轭也拆不开的，珀斯；要像鲸自身鳍骨般扎进鲸身的东西。料在此，”他将袋掷上铁砧。“看，铁匠，这些是赛马钢蹄鞋拔下的钉头。”
“马蹄钉头，先生？哎呀，亚哈船长，你这可是咱们铁匠经手最硬最韧的料了。”
“我知，老兄；这些钉头焊起如凶徒骨熔之胶。快！给我打鱼叉。先打十二根杆做叉柄；再如拖缆之纱与股，绞、扭、锤，将十二根合而为一。快！我来拉风箱。”
十二根杆打成，亚哈亲手将每根绕一长重铁栓旋试。“有疵！”弃了最后一根。“重打，珀斯。”
既毕，珀斯正要十二根焊作一根，亚哈止其手，说要自己焊铁。于是他喘着匀净的哼声锤向铁砧，珀斯一根接一根递过炽杆，受压的熔炉窜起笔直烈焰，那帕西人悄然走过，俯首向火，似在咒或祈于这劳役。但亚哈抬头时，他侧身溜开。
“那把火柴在那躲躲闪闪作甚？”斯塔布自前舱望道。“那帕西嗅火如引信；自身也嗅如火枪药池。”
终而叉柄成一整杆，受了末次火；珀斯为淬它，将整杆嘶嘶插入近旁水桶，滚烫蒸汽直扑亚哈俯脸。
“珀斯，你要烙我？”他痛得缩了一瞬，“莫非我方才打的竟是我自家的烙铁？”
“求上帝不是；但我怕些什么，亚哈船长。这叉莫非为白鲸？”
“为那白色恶鬼！但倒钩现在来；你得自个儿打，老兄。这是我的剃刀——顶好钢；拿去，把倒钩磨得如冰海针雪般利。”
老铁匠盯了剃刀片刻，似不忍用。
“拿去，老兄，我用不着；因我如今不剃、不食、不祷，直至——但拿去——干活！”
终锻作箭形，由珀斯焊上柄，钢尖不久成于铁端；铁匠欲给倒钩末火待淬，唤亚哈移水桶近前。
“不，不——不用水淬；我要真正死淬。嗬，那里！塔什特戈、魁魁格、达古！异教徒们怎说！肯给我覆住这钩的血么？”高举其钩。一片黑点头应，肯。异教徒肉上戳三孔，白鲸之钩遂淬。
“吾不以父之名洗汝，而以魔之名！”亚哈癫狂嚎道，那恶铁灼噬洗礼之血。
乃自舱下集闲杆，择一仍带皮山胡桃，亚哈将端接入铁座。新拖缆一圈解开，数寻牵至绞盘，绷至极紧。足踏其上，绳鸣如琴弦，遂急俯视，见无散股，亚哈呼：“好！绑扎来。”
绳一端散股，分展之纱皆辫织绕叉座；杆遂硬捣入座；自下端绳沿杆半长而固，以线绞缠。毕，杆、铁、绳——如三命运——不可分，亚哈执器忧郁行去；象牙腿声与山胡桃杆声，皆空响于每板。然未入舱，闻一轻、异、半嘲、极哀之声。噢，皮普！你凄笑，你闲而不歇之眼；你诸般怪态，非无意混此忧郁船之黑悲剧，且嘲之！
With matted beard, and swathed in a bristling shark-skin apron, about
mid-day, Perth was standing between his forge and anvil, the latter
placed upon an iron-wood log, with one hand holding a pike-head in the
coals, and with the other at his forge’s lungs, when Captain Ahab came
along, carrying in his hand a small rusty-looking leathern bag. While
yet a little distance from the forge, moody Ahab paused; till at last,
Perth, withdrawing his iron from the fire, began hammering it upon the
anvil—the red mass sending off the sparks in thick hovering flights,
some of which flew close to Ahab.
“Are these thy Mother Carey’s chickens, Perth? they are always flying
in thy wake; birds of good omen, too, but not to all;—look here, they
burn; but thou—thou liv’st among them without a scorch.”
“Because I am scorched all over, Captain Ahab,” answered Perth, resting
for a moment on his hammer; “I am past scorching; not easily can’st
thou scorch a scar.”
“Well, well; no more. Thy shrunk voice sounds too calmly, sanely woeful
to me. In no Paradise myself, I am impatient of all misery in others
that is not mad. Thou should’st go mad, blacksmith; say, why dost thou
not go mad? How can’st thou endure without being mad? Do the heavens
yet hate thee, that thou can’st not go mad?—What wert thou making
there?”
“Welding an old pike-head, sir; there were seams and dents in it.”
“And can’st thou make it all smooth again, blacksmith, after such hard
usage as it had?”
“I think so, sir.”
“And I suppose thou can’st smoothe almost any seams and dents; never
mind how hard the metal, blacksmith?”
“Aye, sir, I think I can; all seams and dents but one.”
“Look ye here, then,” cried Ahab, passionately advancing, and leaning
with both hands on Perth’s shoulders; “look ye here—_here_—can ye
smoothe out a seam like this, blacksmith,” sweeping one hand across his
ribbed brow; “if thou could’st, blacksmith, glad enough would I lay my
head upon thy anvil, and feel thy heaviest hammer between my eyes.
Answer! Can’st thou smoothe this seam?”
“Oh! that is the one, sir! Said I not all seams and dents but one?”
“Aye, blacksmith, it is the one; aye, man, it is unsmoothable; for
though thou only see’st it here in my flesh, it has worked down into
the bone of my skull—_that_ is all wrinkles! But, away with child’s
play; no more gaffs and pikes to-day. Look ye here!” jingling the
leathern bag, as if it were full of gold coins. “I, too, want a harpoon
made; one that a thousand yoke of fiends could not part, Perth;
something that will stick in a whale like his own fin-bone. There’s the
stuff,” flinging the pouch upon the anvil. “Look ye, blacksmith, these
are the gathered nail-stubbs of the steel shoes of racing horses.”
“Horse-shoe stubbs, sir? Why, Captain Ahab, thou hast here, then, the
best and stubbornest stuff we blacksmiths ever work.”
“I know it, old man; these stubbs will weld together like glue from the
melted bones of murderers. Quick! forge me the harpoon. And forge me
first, twelve rods for its shank; then wind, and twist, and hammer
these twelve together like the yarns and strands of a tow-line. Quick!
I’ll blow the fire.”
When at last the twelve rods were made, Ahab tried them, one by one, by
spiralling them, with his own hand, round a long, heavy iron bolt. “A
flaw!” rejecting the last one. “Work that over again, Perth.”
This done, Perth was about to begin welding the twelve into one, when
Ahab stayed his hand, and said he would weld his own iron. As, then,
with regular, gasping hems, he hammered on the anvil, Perth passing to
him the glowing rods, one after the other, and the hard pressed forge
shooting up its intense straight flame, the Parsee passed silently, and
bowing over his head towards the fire, seemed invoking some curse or
some blessing on the toil. But, as Ahab looked up, he slid aside.
“What’s that bunch of lucifers dodging about there for?” muttered
Stubb, looking on from the forecastle. “That Parsee smells fire like a
fusee; and smells of it himself, like a hot musket’s powder-pan.”
At last the shank, in one complete rod, received its final heat; and as
Perth, to temper it, plunged it all hissing into the cask of water near
by, the scalding steam shot up into Ahab’s bent face.
“Would’st thou brand me, Perth?” wincing for a moment with the pain;
“have I been but forging my own branding-iron, then?”
“Pray God, not that; yet I fear something, Captain Ahab. Is not this
harpoon for the White Whale?”
“For the white fiend! But now for the barbs; thou must make them
thyself, man. Here are my razors—the best of steel; here, and make the
barbs sharp as the needle-sleet of the Icy Sea.”
For a moment, the old blacksmith eyed the razors as though he would
fain not use them.
“Take them, man, I have no need for them; for I now neither shave, sup,
nor pray till—but here—to work!”
Fashioned at last into an arrowy shape, and welded by Perth to the
shank, the steel soon pointed the end of the iron; and as the
blacksmith was about giving the barbs their final heat, prior to
tempering them, he cried to Ahab to place the water-cask near.
“No, no—no water for that; I want it of the true death-temper. Ahoy,
there! Tashtego, Queequeg, Daggoo! What say ye, pagans! Will ye give me
as much blood as will cover this barb?” holding it high up. A cluster
of dark nods replied, Yes. Three punctures were made in the heathen
flesh, and the White Whale’s barbs were then tempered.
“Ego non baptizo te in nomine patris, sed in nomine diaboli!”
deliriously howled Ahab, as the malignant iron scorchingly devoured the
baptismal blood.
Now, mustering the spare poles from below, and selecting one of
hickory, with the bark still investing it, Ahab fitted the end to the
socket of the iron. A coil of new tow-line was then unwound, and some
fathoms of it taken to the windlass, and stretched to a great tension.
Pressing his foot upon it, till the rope hummed like a harp-string,
then eagerly bending over it, and seeing no strandings, Ahab exclaimed,
“Good! and now for the seizings.”
At one extremity the rope was unstranded, and the separate spread yarns
were all braided and woven round the socket of the harpoon; the pole
was then driven hard up into the socket; from the lower end the rope
was traced half-way along the pole’s length, and firmly secured so,
with intertwistings of twine. This done, pole, iron, and rope—like the
Three Fates—remained inseparable, and Ahab moodily stalked away with
the weapon; the sound of his ivory leg, and the sound of the hickory
pole, both hollowly ringing along every plank. But ere he entered his
cabin, light, unnatural, half-bantering, yet most piteous sound was
heard. Oh, Pip! thy wretched laugh, thy idle but unresting eye; all thy
strange mummeries not unmeaningly blended with the black tragedy of the
melancholy ship, and mocked it!
