I do not know where I can find a better place than just here, to make
mention of one or two other things, which to me seem important, as in
printed form establishing in all respects the reasonableness of the
whole story of the White Whale, more especially the catastrophe. For
this is one of those disheartening instances where truth requires
full as much bolstering as error. So ignorant are most landsmen of
some of the plainest and most palpable wonders of the world, that
without some hints touching the plain facts, historical and
otherwise, of the fishery, they might scout at Moby Dick as a
monstrous fable, or still worse and more detestable, a hideous and
intolerable allegory.
First: Though most men have some vague flitting ideas of the general
perils of the grand fishery, yet they have nothing like a fixed,
vivid conception of those perils, and the frequency with which they
recur. One reason perhaps is, that not one in fifty of the actual
disasters and deaths by casualties in the fishery, ever finds a
public record at home, however transient and immediately forgotten
that record.
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