From Seamen’s Bethel, a chapel in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Melville writes “In this same New Bedford there stands a Whaleman’s Chapel, and few are the moody fishermen, shortly bound for the Indian Ocean or Pacific, who fail to make a Sunday visit to the spot.”

The walls upstairs are covered with these. I found them very moving. Looking back, I see that they are described by Melville, or Ishmael, in Chapter 7. In Chapter 9, Father Mapple delivers his sermon.