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1. How it is I know not; but there is no place like a bed for confidential disclosures between friends. Man and wife, they say, there open the very bottom of their souls to each other; and some old couples often lie and chat over old times till nearly morning. Thus, then, in our hearts’ honeymoon, lay I and Queequeg—a cosy, loving pair.
This passage comes at the end of Chapter 10,
when Ishmael is forced to share a bed with the tattooed “savage”
Queequeg at the Spouter-Inn. At first horrified, Ishmael is quickly
impressed by Queequeg’s dignity and kindness. The homoerotic overtones
of their sharing a bed and staying up much of the night smoking
and talking suggests a profound, close bond born of mutual dependence
and a world in which merit, rather than race or wealth, determines
a man’s status. The men aboard the
