.. < chapter lxxvi 24  THE BATTERING-RAM >

     Ere quitting, for the nonce, the
Sperm Whale's head, I would have you, as a sensible physiologist, simply
--particularly remark its front aspect, in all its compacted collectedness.  I
would have you investigate it now with the sole view of forming to yourself
some unexaggerated, intelligent estimate of whatever battering-ram power may
be lodged there.  Here is a vital point; for you must either satisfactorily
settle this matter with yourself, or for ever remain an infidel as to one of
the most appalling,
.. 

but not the less true events, perhaps anywhere to be found in all recorded
history.  You observe that in the ordinary swimming position of the Sperm
Whale, the front of his head presents an almost wholly vertical plane to the
water; you observe that the lower part of that front slopes considerably
backwards, so as to furnish more of a retreat for the long socket which
receives the boom-like lower jaw; you observe that the mouth is entirely
under the head, much in the same way, indeed, as though your own mouth were
entirely under your chin.  Moreover you observe that the whale has no external
nose; and that what nose he has --his spout hole --is on the top of his head;
you observe that his eyes and ears are at the sides of his head, nearly one
third of his entire length from the front.  Wherefore, you must now have
perceived that the front of the Sperm Whale's head is a dead, blind wall,
without a single organ or tender prominence of any sort whatsoever.
Furthermore, you are now to consider that only in the extreme, lower, backward
sloping part of the front of the head, is there the slightest vestige of bone;

     and not till you get near twenty feet from the forehead do you come to the
full cranial development.  So that this whole enormous boneless mass is as one
wad.  Finally, though, as will soon be revealed, its contents partly comprise
the most delicate oil; yet, you are now to be apprised of the nature of the
substance which so impregnably invests all that apparent effeminacy.  In some
previous place I have described to you how the blubber wraps the body of the
whale, as the rind wraps an orange.  Just so with the head; but with this
difference: about the head this envelope, though not so thick, is of a
boneless toughness,  inestimable by any man who has not handled it.  The
severest pointed harpoon, the sharpest lance darted by the strongest human
arm, impotently rebounds from it.  It is as though the forehead of the Sperm
Whale were paved with horses' hoofs.  I do not think that any sensation lurks
in it.  Bethink yourself also of another thing.  When two large, loaded
Indiamen chance to crowd and crush towards each other in the docks, what do
the sailors do?  They do not suspend between them, at the point of coming
contact, any merely hard substance,
.. 

like iron or wood.  No, they hold there a large, round wad of tow and cork,
enveloped in the thickest and toughest of ox-hide.  That bravely and uninjured
takes the jam which would have snapped all their oaken handspikes and iron
crowbars.  By itself this sufficiently illustrates the obvious fact I drive
at.  But supplementary to this, it has hypothetically occurred to me, that
as ordinary fish possess what is called a swimming bladder in them, capable,
at will, of distension or contraction; and as the Sperm Whale, as far as I
know, has no such provision in him; considering, too, the otherwise
inexplicable manner in which he now depresses his head altogether beneath the
surface, and anon swims with it high elevated out of the water; considering
the unobstructed elasticity of its envelop; considering the unique interior
of his head; it has hypothetically occurred to me, I say, that those mystical
lung-celled honeycombs there may possibly have some hitherto unknown and
unsuspected connexion with the outer air, so as to be susceptible to
atmospheric distension and contraction.  If this be so, fancy the
irresistibleness of that might, to which the most impalpable and destructive
of all elements contributes.  Now, mark.  Unerringly impelling this dead,
impregnable, uninjurable wall, and this most buoyant thing within; there
swims behind it all a mass of tremendous life, only to be adequately
estimated as piled wood is --by the cord; and all obedient to one volition, as
the smallest insect.  So that when I shall hereafter detail to you all the
specialities and concentrations of potency everywhere lurking in this
expansive monster; when I shall show you some of his more inconsiderable
braining feats; I trust you will have renounced all ignorant incredulity,
and be ready to abide by this; that though the Sperm Whale stove a passage
through the Isthmus of Darien, and mixed the Atlantic with the Pacific, you
would not elevate one hair of your eye-brow.  For unless you own the whale,
you are but a provincial and sentimentalist in Truth.  But clear Truth is a
thing for salamander giants only to encounter; how small the chances for the
provincials then?  What befel the weakling youth lifting the dread goddess's
veil at Sais?
..