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1That mortal man should feed upon the creature that feeds his lamp, and, like Stubb, eat him by his own light, as you may
2say; this seems so outlandish a thing that one must needs go a little into the history and philosophy of it. It is upon
3record, that three centuries ago the tongue of the Right Whale was esteemed a great delicacy in France, and commanded
4large prices there. Also, that in Henry VIIIth's time, a certain cook of the court obtained a handsome reward for
5inventing an admirable sauce to be eaten with barbacued porpoises, which, you remember, are a species of whale.
6Porpoises, indeed, are to this day considered fine eating. The meat is made into balls about the size of billiard balls,
7and being well seasoned and spiced might be taken for turtle-balls or veal balls. The old monks of Dunfermline were very
8fond of them. They had a great porpoise grant from the crown. The fact is, that among his hunters at least, the whale
9would by all hands be considered a noble dish, were there not so much of him; but when you come to sit down before a
10meat-pie nearly one hundred feet long, it takes away your appetite. Only the most unprejudiced of men like Stubb,
11nowadays partake of cooked whales; but the Esquimaux are not so fastidious. We all know how they live upon whales, and
12have rare old vintages of prime old train oil. Zogranda, one of their most famous doctors, recommends strips of blubber
13for infants, as being exceedingly juicy and nourishing. And this reminds me that certain Englishmen, who long ago were
14accidentally left in Greenland by a whaling vessel--that these men actually lived for several months on the mouldy
15scraps of whales which had been left ashore after trying out the blubber. Among the Dutch whalemen these scraps are
16called "fritters"; which, indeed, they greatly resemble, being brown and crisp, and smelling something like old
17Amsterdam housewives' dough-nuts or oly-cooks, when fresh. They have such an eatable look that the most self-denying
18stranger can hardly keep his hands off. But what further depreciates the whale as a civilized dish, is his exceeding
19richness. He is the great prize ox of the sea, too fat to be delicately good. Look at his hump, which would be as fine
20eating as the buffalo's (which is esteemed a rare dish), were it not such a solid pyramid of fat. But the spermaceti
21itself, how bland and creamy that is; like the transparent, half-jellied, white meat of a cocoanut in the third month of
22its growth, yet far too rich to supply a substitute for butter. Nevertheless, many whalemen have a method of absorbing
23it into some other substance, and then partaking of it. In the long try watches of the night it is a common thing for
24the seamen to dip their ship-biscuit into the huge oil-pots and let them fry there awhile. Many a good supper have I
25thus made. In the case of a small Sperm Whale the brains are accounted a fine dish. The casket of the skull is broken
26into with an axe, and the two plump, whitish lobes being withdrawn (precisely resembling two large puddings), they are
27then mixed with flour, and cooked into a most delectable mess, in flavor somewhat resembling calves' head, which is
28quite a dish among some epicures; and every one knows that some young bucks among the epicures, by continually dining
29upon calves' brains, by and by get to have a little brains of their own, so as to be able to tell a calf's head from
30their own heads; which, indeed, requires uncommon discrimination. And that is the reason why a young buck with an
31intelligent looking calf's head before him, is somehow one of the saddest sights you can see. The head looks a sort of
32reproachfully at him, with an "Et tu Brute!" expression. It is not, perhaps, entirely because the whale is so
33excessively unctuous that landsmen seem to regard the eating of him with abhorrence; that appears to result, in some
34way, from the consideration before mentioned: i.e. that a man should eat a newly murdered thing of the sea, and eat it
35too by its own light. But no doubt the first man that ever murdered an ox was regarded as a murderer; perhaps he was
36hung; and if he had been put on his trial by oxen, he certainly would have been; and he certainly deserved it if any
37murderer does. Go to the meat-market of a Saturday night and see the crowds of live bipeds staring up at the long rows
38of dead quadrupeds. Does not that sight take a tooth out of the cannibal's jaw? Cannibals? who is not a cannibal? I tell
39you it will be more tolerable for the Fejee that salted down a lean missionary in his cellar against a coming famine; it
40will be more tolerable for that provident Fejee, I say, in the day of judgment, than for thee, civilized and enlightened
41gourmand, who nailest geese to the ground and feastest on their bloated livers in thy paté-de-foie-gras. But Stubb, he
42eats the whale by its own light, does he? and that is adding insult to injury, is it? Look at your knife-handle, there,
43my civilized and enlightened gourmand dining off that roast beef, what is that handle made of?--what but the bones of
44the brother of the very ox you are eating? And what do you pick your teeth with, after devouring that fat goose? With a
45feather of the same fowl. And with what quill did the Secretary of the Society for the Suppression of Cruelty to Ganders
46formally indite his circulars? It is only within the last month or two that that society passed a resolution to
47patronize nothing but steel pens.
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