Moby-Dick surfacing in fiction 1857-1887

During Melville's lifetime there were several short stories or novels by other writers referencing his Moby-Dick, though nothing like the explosion of such instances after the turn of the century. There's no indication he knew of any of these, yet someone must have brought at least Jules Verne to his attention, surely?

Spencer, Edward. "'Who Struck Billy Patterson?'" Graham's Illustrated Magazine 51(5). November 1857. 418.

Not less interesting is it, nor less important, at least, to him who would become a ‘Professor of Human Nature”—and such should every writer of fiction, who aims at truth and artistic completeness, strive to become—to observe the enormity of psychological distortion that characterizes every one who has given himself up to the pursuit of a ‘fixed idea,” or who is become the victim of some mental diœsthesia. How much the novelist may profit by close study of the soul’s workings, and moral deflections under the influence of any such fanaticism—I use the word in its most comprehensive sense—every reader of fiction will readily discover. Take, for instance, Hawthorne, and notice how entirely the interest he throws around his creations depends upon their pursuit of one object. The Maule family, the Pyncheons, Hollingsworth, Ethan Brande, Hester, all follow out the idea in one undeviating straight line. Edgar Poe also fascinates us, especially by his masterly handling of this species of morbidity. The German Hoffmann, wildest of the wild in fancy, casts his weird spell about us by means of the same processes; Herman Melville is a Grand-Master of the Order—witness Captain Ahab; we trace it in all of Dickens’ writings; it gives character to Lady Macbeth; clothes Hamlet in his sombre garb; flashes in gray Lear’s distraught eyes; engorges the ‘‘dusk Moor’s” heart; peoples Faust’s soul with destructive longings—makes up, in fact, half of the world’s dear loves in literature.

Morford, Henry. The Days of Shoddy: A Novel of the Great Rebellion in 1861. T. B. Peterson & Bros., 1863. 385.

Something  of  the causes  of  that  blending  of  strength  and  weakness,  may  have been  found  in  her  paternal  blood  of  the  Howlands  of  New England,  used  to  fighting  the  descendants  of  Moby  Dick  on the  far  Pacific,  where  nerve  and  readiness  were  life,—and in  the  soft,  calm,  yielding  blood  of  her  mother's  Quaker family.

Verne, Jules. "Vingt mille lieues sous les mers." Magasin d'éducation et de récréation 121. 1869.

On vit réapparaître dans les journaux—à court de copie—tous les êtres imaginaires et gigantesques, depuis la baleine blanche, le terrible « Moby Dick » des régions hyperboréennes, jusqu'au Kraken démesuré, dont les tentacules peuvent enlacer un bâtimeait de cinq cents tonneaux et l'entraîner dans les abîmes de l'Océan.

Verne, Jules. "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea." Baltimore Bulletin. January 25, 1873: 1 col 5, .

There appeared in the papers caricatures of every gigantic and imaginary creature, from the white whale, the terrible "Moby Dick" of hyperborean regions, to the immense kraken whose tentacles could entangle a ship of five hundred tons, and hurry it into the abyss of the ocean. 

Guernsey, Clare F. The Merman and the Figure-Head: A Christmas Story. Lippincott, 1871. 71.

The whale was so astonished that he had to go to the top of the water and blow. "My dear sir," said he, diving down again, "you are under some strange mistake. That is nothing but wood, that figure on the ship, as sure as my name is Moby Dick."

Barnacle, Bill [Charles Martin Newell]. Leaves from an Old Log: Péhe-Nú-e, The Tiger Whale of the Pacific. D. Lothrop, 1877. 12.

For many years he frequented the island of Mocha, where he shattered many a boat, and killed and maimed many of their crews; and at that time the savage old cachalot became entitled to his most euphonious appellation, that of Mocha Dick, or, as rendered by some authors, Moby Dick.

Sheffield, Stephen Paul. "The Burmah Treasure: A Novel. Chapter XXII. The Phantom Island." Chicago Daily News. June 23, 1887: 4.

"If that ain't Moby Dick may I never live to see Wyndham again," Israel Pendersen said. "I have pulled up to that critter afore now and I never want to ag'in; just as leave not see him, too. There don't any good luck come to the ship that falls in with Moby Dick." […]

Herman Melville makes the superstition connected with "Moby Dick" the basis of one of his wonderful nautical romances; but all heroes have their day, and the famous "white whale," as he was frequently termed, was actually slain a few years ago in the Indian ocean by a captain in the employ of the well-known whaling firm of Williams & Havens of New London, Conn.

Sheffield, Stephen Paul. "The Burmah Treasure: A Novel. Chapter XXIII. 'All Hands Take in Sail.'" Chicago Daily News. June 27, 1887: 4.

Both Petersein and Bentley had sailed as harpooners on whaling ships in former times and were consequently familiar with all the somber legends concerning "Moby Dick," which they related for the benefit of their uninstructed comrades, with such embellishments as imagination suggested.