Study Questions
1. What does Queequeg say the sighting of the squid means?

2. Where is the Pequod?

3. What color is the whale and why is that significant?

4. How far was Stubb’s whaleboat towed by the whale?

5. What is the “gold watch” Stubb seeks?

6. What is the primary cause of unsuccessful whaling voyages?

7. How does Ahab feel about this successful hunt?

8. Who is Fleece and what does Stubb demand of him?

9. What moral advice does Fleece give the sharks?

10. What wish does Fleece express that could be considered foreshadowing?

Answers
1. Queequeg says the squid is a sign that a sperm whale will soon be sighted.

2. The Pequod is in the Indian Ocean.

3. The whale is black, the opposite of the whale Ahab seeks.

4. “Whole Atlantics and Pacifics seemed passed” describes the distance.

5. The watch is a metaphor for the “innermost life” of the whale.

6. Inefficiency regarding the many tasks of the harpooner and his subsequent exhaustion cause unsuccessful whale hunts.

7. Ahab feels impatience and despair since Moby Dick remains to be killed.

8. Fleece is the old black cook who prepares a whale steak for Stubb and then is told to quiet the sharks.

9. He tells them to share, to help the weaker sharks, to be civilized, to control their shark natures.

10. He wishes “whale eat” Stubb.