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while the oarsmen were rocking in the two staved boats which had but just been hoisted to the side, and were busily at work in repairing them. One after the other, through the port-holes, as he sped, he also caught flying glimpses of Stubb and Flask, busying themselves on deck among bundles of new irons and lances. As he saw all this; as he heard the hammers in the broken boats; far other hammers seemed driving a nail into his heart. But he rallied. And now marking that the vane or flag was gone from the main-mast-head, he shouted to Tashtego, who had just gained that perch, to descend again for another flag, and a hammer and nails, and so nail it to the mast.
那些槳手則在那兩只被擊壞了的。剛被吊在船側的小艇里，晃來晃去，忙著把那兩只小艇修理好。亞哈一面駛著，一面望著舷窗，看到了里面一個個的人，他也倏地瞥到了斯塔布和弗拉斯克，正在甲板上那些新刀新槍堆里忙著。當他看到了這一切情形，又聽到錘子在敲著破船的聲音時，似乎有一些更其不同的錘子正在把一枚釘子直敲進他的心里。可是，他把精神一振，這才注意到主桅頂上那面風信旗已經不見了，于是，他對剛剛爬了上去的塔斯蒂哥高聲叫嚷，要他再下去拿另一面旗，隨手帶上錘子和幾枚釘子，把旗子給釘在桅桿上。
Whether fagged by the three days' running chase, and the resistance to his swimming in the knotted hamper he bore; or whether it was some latent deceitfulness and malice in him: whichever was true, the White Whale's way now began to abate, as it seemed, from the boat so rapidly nearing him once more; though indeed the whale's last start had not been so long a one as before. And still as Ahab glided over the waves the unpitying sharks accompanied him; and so pertinaciously stuck to the boat; and so continually bit at the plying oars, that the blades became jagged and crunched, and left small splinters in the sea, at almost every dip.
這條白鯨究竟是由于遭到三天連續迅猛追擊而疲累了，和身上背了七纏八纏的繩索而妨礙了它的游速，還是它懷有奸詐和惡意，看來都兼而有之，總之，它的游速這會兒好像開始放慢下來了，因為那只小艇再次劃得很快，眼看就要靠近它，而且事實上，那條鯨的沖動也不像以前那么持久了。另一方面，亞哈這樣沖過波濤劃去，那些毫無同情之心的鯊魚卻對他緊跟不舍；那么頑固地釘住小艇；還不住地嚙著劃槳，弄得槳葉都變得參差不齊，簡直是每劃一下，就在海上撇下一些碎板。
