In the passage describing the shipmates’ squeezing of the sperm, Melville uses alliteration to emphasize the sensorial element of the process. Ishmael describes the pleasure he is overcome with when squeezing the sperm:
Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers’ hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally.
The high frequency of alliteration—the "squeezed" "sperm," the “gentle globules,” the “abounding, affectionate” feelings—gives the passage a musical tone that reflects the sense of communal harmony and pleasure that Ishmael describes. The use of sibilance (the repetition of /s/ sounds) viscerally invokes the slipperiness of the sperm, helping to make the imagery more evocative while putting an emphasis on the sensorial nature of the experience being described.
Indeed, it is arguably the sensuality of this passage that is most significant. Ishmael’s description of the process borders both on the spiritual and sexual, with the squeezing of the sperm and the subsequent squeezing of his shipmates’ hands throwing Ishmael into a euphoric trance—a state reflected in the richness and melodiousness of the prose. The physical sensuality of the experience may also hint at the passage having homoerotic undertones. Such an interpretation may be further suggested by a later reference to the “inexpressible sperm,” a description that perhaps also hints at the unspoken homoerotic desire that Ishmael—and possibly his shipmates—feel in this moment.
