Moby Dick

[Old Thunder]

There weekly arrive in this town scores of green Vermonters and New Hampshire men, all athirst for gain and glory in the fishery.

 

[Old Thunder]

They are mostly young, of stalwart frames; fellows who have felled forests, and now seek to drop the axe and snatch the whale-lance.

 

[Old Thunder]

Many are as green as the Green Mountains whence they came.

 

[Old Thunder]

In some things you would think them but a few hours old.

 

[Old Thunder]

Look there! that chap strutting round the corner.

 

[Old Thunder]

He wears a beaver hat and swallow-tailed coat, girdled with a sailor-belt and sheath-knife.

 

[Old Thunder]

Here comes another with a sou'-wester and a bombazine* cloack.

*Cotton fabric; the Indian city Bombay had become known for it.

 

[Old Thunder]

No town-bred dandy will compare with a country-bred one -- I mean a downright bumpkin dandy -- a fellow that, in the dog-days, will mow his two acres in buckskin gloves for fear of tanning his hands.

 

[Old Thunder]

Now when a country dandy like this takes it into his head to make a distinguished reputation, and joins the great whale-fishery, you should see the comical things he does upon reaching the seaport.

 

[Old Thunder]

In bespeaking his sea-outfit, he orders bell-buttons to his waistcoats; straps to his canvas trowsers.