ASEBL Journal – Volume 13 Issue 1, January 2018
spermaceti or whale oil and the ambergris, from which perfume is made.“ You must go to New Bedford to see a brilliant wedding; for, they say, they have reservoirs of oil in every house, and every night recklessly burn their lengths in spermaceti candles”( Melville 73). He goes on about the use of sperm whale oil for British coronations,“... what kind of oil is used at coronations? Certainly it cannot be olive oil, nor Macassar oil, nor castor oil, nor bear’ s oil, nor train oil, nor cod-liver oil. What then can it possibly be, but sperm oil in its unmanufactured, unpolluted state, the sweetest of all oils? Think of that, ye loyal Britons! we whalemen supply your kings and queens with coronation stuff!”( Melville 154). About the tongue of a whale,“ particular tongue now before us; at a passing glance I should say it was a six-barreler; that is, it will yield you about that amount of oil”( Melville 378). Melville compares the large front of the head that contains most of the oil in a sperm whale to the“ Heidelberg Tun” which is a wine cask in the Heidelberg Castle that holds 57,000 gallons of wine( Melville 382). Melville comments on ambergris, which was used to enhance the smell of perfume. It was obtained from the intestines of sick whales!“ It is of a hue between yellow and ash color. And this, good friends, is ambergris, worth a gold guinea an ounce to any druggist... Who would think, then, that such fine ladies and gentlemen should regale themselves with an essence found in the inglorious bowels of a sick whale! Yet so it is. By some, ambergris is supposed to be the cause, and by others the effect, of the dyspepsia in the whale. How to cure such a dyspepsia it were hard to say, unless by administering three or four boat loads of Brandreth’ s pills, and then running out of harm’ s way, as laborers do in blasting rocks”( Melville 451). Also, in reference to a whale carcass which“... is disengaged and hoisted on deck for the purpose of extracting the ivory teeth, and furnishing a supply of that hard white whalebone with which the fishermen fashion all sorts of curious articles, including canes, umbrella-stocks, and handles to riding-whips”( Melville 375). And, this was said of some of the fat of the whale:“ It is a most refreshing, convivial, beautiful object to behold. As its name imports, it is of an exceedingly rich, mottled tint, with a bestreaked snowy and golden ground, dotted with spots of the deepest crimson and purple. It is plums of rubies, in pictures of citron. Spite of reason, it is hard to keep yourself from eating it. Plum pudding”( Melville 460).
Whalers also killed and ate porpoises, which are really small whales. In 1776 Linnaeus made a distinction between whales and a fish, and Ishmael states:“ A well-fed, plump Huzza Porpoise will yield you one good gallon of good oil. But the fine and delicate fluid extracted from his jaws is exceedingly valuable. It is in request among jewellers and watchmakers. Sailors put it on their hones. Porpoise meat is good eating, you know. It may never have occurred to you that a porpoise spouts. Indeed, his spout is so small that it is not very readily discernible. But the next time you have a chance, watch him; and you will then see the great sperm whale himself in miniature”( Melville 183).
People at the time did not know the number of whales worldwide; they thought the number was limitless.“ You may now sometimes sail for weeks and months together, without being greeted by a single spout; and then be suddenly saluted by what sometimes seems thousands on thousands”( Melville 424). Chapter 105 is titled: Does The Whale’ s Magnitude Diminish? Will He Perish?( Melville 501).“ We account the whale immortal in his species, however perishable in his individuality... if ever the
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