Fedallah—a tall, dark-skinned man with one tooth jutting out from his lips and his hair braided and wrapped around his head like a turban—jumps into action. He and his crew lower Ahab's boat while Ahab takes control of the helm. As they work, the other boats also spring into action and are lowered into the water.

As Queequeg launches his harpoon toward a whale, the boat flips over. Ishmael, Starbuck, and their companions are flung off the boat but soon succeed in climbing back aboard. They become disoriented in the storm and fog and spend the entire night wandering, lost at sea. In the calm light of daybreak, the Pequod locates them and helps the tired men back aboard. 

Ishmael is rattled by this near-death experience and is stunned to notice that none of the other sailors seem shaken by their close encounter with death; following his safe return to the ship, Ishmael sits down to write a will, unsettled by the bleak reality of life as a whaler.

Every night, Fedellah observes a shining column of water that appears only at midnight. Try as they might, the Pequod is unable to reach it. While approaching the Cape of Good Hope, the weather grows colder and the sea becomes hazardous.