And now, while both elastic gunwales were springing in and out, as the whale dallied with the doomed craft in this devilish way; and from his body being submerged beneath the boat, he could not be darted at from the bows, for the bows were almost inside of him, as it were; and while the other boats involuntarily paused, as before a quick crisis impossible to withstand, then it was that monomaniac Ahab, furious with this tantalizing vicinity of his foe, which placed him all alive and helpless in the very jaws he hated; frenzied with all this, he seized the long bone with his naked hands, and wildly strove to wrench it from its gripe. As now he thus vainly strove, the jaw slipped from him; the frail gunwales bent in, collapsed, and snapped, as both jaws, like an enormous shears, sliding further aft, bit the craft completely in twain, and locked themselves fast again in the sea, midway between the two floating wrecks. These floated aside, the broken ends drooping, the crew at the stern-wreck clinging to the gunwales, and striving to hold fast to the oars to lash them across.
且说在大鲸这样可怕地逗弄这只命数已定的小艇的同时，那有弹性的艇舷便不住地弹进弹出；可是，因为大鲸的身体还在艇底下，无法在艇头用标枪刺它，因为艇头可说是差不多都在它嘴巴里，而其它小艇则因突然碰上一种无法对付的巨变，都不期而然地停了下来。正是这个偏热狂的亚哈，眼看如此迫近自己的宿仇，却硬是无可奈何地身陷在他所痛恨的这个仇敌的嘴巴里，不禁愤怒万分。这一切使他一阵狂乱，光着双手，抓住那只长长的下颚，发狂似地想把它揪住，免得被它卡在里面。正当他此时在这样自负地奋斗时，那下颚打他手里一滑，滑脱了，那只嘴巴象一把巨剪似的，往后一闪，把这只小艇咬成两段，脆薄的船舷顿时弯卷起来，豁地一声断了，那只鲸却把嘴巴一闭，闭得紧紧地打两片漂浮的残艇中间游去了。残板在旁边漂，残破的零星东西也下沉了，在破艇梢上的水手，都紧扳着艇舷，设法抓住桨子，用绳子把桨子横缚在艇舷上。
At that preluding moment, ere the boat was yet snapped, Ahab, the first to perceive the whale's intent, by the crafty upraising of his head, a movement that loosed his hold for the time; at that moment his hand had made one final effort to push the boat out of the bite. But only slipping further into the whale's mouth, and tilting over sideways as it slipped, the boat had shaken off his hold on the jaw; spilled him out of it, as he leaned to the push; and so he fell flat-faced upon the sea.
就在这只小艇将断未断、眼看就要出事的时分，亚哈第一个看出了这条大鲸的意图，他灵巧地把头往上一腾，这个动作使他暂时把手一松；就在这时，他一只手使起最后一把劲，想把小艇从它口里给推出来。不料却使小艇更往鲸嘴滑了进去，而且这一滑，小艇也斜倒了，小艇把他揪着鲸嘴的手给震脱了；他连忙俯身想再推一下，却一下子教他从那嘴里给喷了出来，仰面跌在海上。