In the Sea of Japan a typhoon struck the Pequod, and her sails were torn to rags. At midnight the tips of all three masts burst into pale fire, like three gigantic wax tapers before an altar. The sailors stood frozen with fear. Ahab seized the links of the lightning chain and set his foot upon the kneeling harpooneer, and he spoke to the fire. Oh, thou clear spirit of clear fire, I now know thee, and I now know that thy right worship is defiance. Then the harpoon in his boat caught fire at its point, and a white flame stood on the steel like a serpent's tongue. Starbuck begged him to turn back to Nantucket; it was an omen, he said, God was against him. Ahab snatched the burning harpoon and waved it like a torch among the crew and swore that the first man to touch a rope would be struck through with it. In terror the men fled, and the ship held her course.