Is calling Queequeg a "cannibal" meant to imply he literally consumed human flesh?

Question

Ishmael and other characters repeated refer to Queequeg as a cannibal, which in modern parlance means that he consumes human flesh. However, the novel doesn't ever say that outright, rather, Ishmael just seems to use the word to indicate that Queequeg was just non-native from a distant land that practices a bizarre religion.Is there any indication that Queequeg was a cannibal in the modern sense?

Answer 1

Yes, Queequeg was, in fact, a cannibal. In chapter 17, we learn that cannibalism was a common practice in his tribe after Ishmael asks him if he has ever suffered from dyspepsia (indigestion) to which he casually responds explaining that "...after a great feast given by his father the king, on the gaining of a great battle wherein fifty of the enemy had been killed by about two o’clock in the afternoon, and all cooked and eaten that very evening." Following this Ishmael reveals that he also heard from a sailor that the tribe from which Queequeg is from is cannibalistic. You may have skipped over this part in the novel.