{"id":"01KJNXJV6VAXFEAXSJ72VJM6KF","cid":"bafkreicqkrk5wqiql2lrfmqrz3g6cg4mtubpio24l3sqdbqdhld6sm74pm","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":740195,"char_start":732196,"chunk_index":103,"chunk_total":178,"estimated_tokens":2000,"source_file_key":"moby-dick","text":"magnitude of the head.\r\n\r\nNow, from this peculiar sideway position of the whale’s eyes, it is\r\nplain that he can never see an object which is exactly ahead, no more\r\nthan he can one exactly astern. In a word, the position of the whale’s\r\neyes corresponds to that of a man’s ears; and you may fancy, for\r\nyourself, how it would fare with you, did you sideways survey objects\r\nthrough your ears. You would find that you could only command some\r\nthirty degrees of vision in advance of the straight side-line of sight;\r\nand about thirty more behind it. If your bitterest foe were walking\r\nstraight towards you, with dagger uplifted in broad day, you would not\r\nbe able to see him, any more than if he were stealing upon you from\r\nbehind. In a word, you would have two backs, so to speak; but, at the\r\nsame time, also, two fronts (side fronts): for what is it that makes\r\nthe front of a man—what, indeed, but his eyes?\r\n\r\nMoreover, while in most other animals that I can now think of, the eyes\r\nare so planted as imperceptibly to blend their visual power, so as to\r\nproduce one picture and not two to the brain; the peculiar position of\r\nthe whale’s eyes, effectually divided as they are by many cubic feet of\r\nsolid head, which towers between them like a great mountain separating\r\ntwo lakes in valleys; this, of course, must wholly separate the\r\nimpressions which each independent organ imparts. The whale, therefore,\r\nmust see one distinct picture on this side, and another distinct\r\npicture on that side; while all between must be profound darkness and\r\nnothingness to him. Man may, in effect, be said to look out on the\r\nworld from a sentry-box with two joined sashes for his window. But with\r\nthe whale, these two sashes are separately inserted, making two\r\ndistinct windows, but sadly impairing the view. This peculiarity of the\r\nwhale’s eyes is a thing always to be borne in mind in the fishery; and\r\nto be remembered by the reader in some subsequent scenes.\r\n\r\nA curious and most puzzling question might be started concerning this\r\nvisual matter as touching the Leviathan. But I must be content with a\r\nhint. So long as a man’s eyes are open in the light, the act of seeing\r\nis involuntary; that is, he cannot then help mechanically seeing\r\nwhatever objects are before him. Nevertheless, any one’s experience\r\nwill teach him, that though he can take in an undiscriminating sweep of\r\nthings at one glance, it is quite impossible for him, attentively, and\r\ncompletely, to examine any two things—however large or however small—at\r\none and the same instant of time; never mind if they lie side by side\r\nand touch each other. But if you now come to separate these two\r\nobjects, and surround each by a circle of profound darkness; then, in\r\norder to see one of them, in such a manner as to bring your mind to\r\nbear on it, the other will be utterly excluded from your contemporary\r\nconsciousness. How is it, then, with the whale? True, both his eyes, in\r\nthemselves, must simultaneously act; but is his brain so much more\r\ncomprehensive, combining, and subtle than man’s, that he can at the\r\nsame moment of time attentively examine two distinct prospects, one on\r\none side of him, and the other in an exactly opposite direction? If he\r\ncan, then is it as marvellous a thing in him, as if a man were able\r\nsimultaneously to go through the demonstrations of two distinct\r\nproblems in Euclid. Nor, strictly investigated, is there any\r\nincongruity in this comparison.\r\n\r\nIt may be but an idle whim, but it has always seemed to me, that the\r\nextraordinary vacillations of movement displayed by some whales when\r\nbeset by three or four boats; the timidity and liability to queer\r\nfrights, so common to such whales; I think that all this indirectly\r\nproceeds from the helpless perplexity of volition, in which their\r\ndivided and diametrically opposite powers of vision must involve them.\r\n\r\nBut the ear of the whale is full as curious as the eye. If you are an\r\nentire stranger to their race, you might hunt over these two heads for\r\nhours, and never discover that organ. The ear has no external leaf\r\nwhatever; and into the hole itself you can hardly insert a quill, so\r\nwondrously minute is it. It is lodged a little behind the eye. With\r\nrespect to their ears, this important difference is to be observed\r\nbetween the sperm whale and the right. While the ear of the former has\r\nan external opening, that of the latter is entirely and evenly covered\r\nover with a membrane, so as to be quite imperceptible from without.\r\n\r\nIs it not curious, that so vast a being as the whale should see the\r\nworld through so small an eye, and hear the thunder through an ear\r\nwhich is smaller than a hare’s? But if his eyes were broad as the lens\r\nof Herschel’s great telescope; and his ears capacious as the porches of\r\ncathedrals; would that make him any longer of sight, or sharper of\r\nhearing? Not at all.—Why then do you try to “enlarge” your mind?\r\nSubtilize it.\r\n\r\nLet us now with whatever levers and steam-engines we have at hand, cant\r\nover the sperm whale’s head, that it may lie bottom up; then, ascending\r\nby a ladder to the summit, have a peep down the mouth; and were it not\r\nthat the body is now completely separated from it, with a lantern we\r\nmight descend into the great Kentucky Mammoth Cave of his stomach. But\r\nlet us hold on here by this tooth, and look about us where we are. What\r\na really beautiful and chaste-looking mouth! from floor to ceiling,\r\nlined, or rather papered with a glistening white membrane, glossy as\r\nbridal satins.\r\n\r\nBut come out now, and look at this portentous lower jaw, which seems\r\nlike the long narrow lid of an immense snuff-box, with the hinge at one\r\nend, instead of one side. If you pry it up, so as to get it overhead,\r\nand expose its rows of teeth, it seems a terrific portcullis; and such,\r\nalas! it proves to many a poor wight in the fishery, upon whom these\r\nspikes fall with impaling force. But far more terrible is it to behold,\r\nwhen fathoms down in the sea, you see some sulky whale, floating there\r\nsuspended, with his prodigious jaw, some fifteen feet long, hanging\r\nstraight down at right-angles with his body, for all the world like a\r\nship’s jib-boom. This whale is not dead; he is only dispirited; out of\r\nsorts, perhaps; hypochondriac; and so supine, that the hinges of his\r\njaw have relaxed, leaving him there in that ungainly sort of plight, a\r\nreproach to all his tribe, who must, no doubt, imprecate lock-jaws upon\r\nhim.\r\n\r\nIn most cases this lower jaw—being easily unhinged by a practised\r\nartist—is disengaged and hoisted on deck for the purpose of extracting\r\nthe ivory teeth, and furnishing a supply of that hard white whalebone\r\nwith which the fishermen fashion all sorts of curious articles,\r\nincluding canes, umbrella-stocks, and handles to riding-whips.\r\n\r\nWith a long, weary hoist the jaw is dragged on board, as if it were an\r\nanchor; and when the proper time comes—some few days after the other\r\nwork—Queequeg, Daggoo, and Tashtego, being all accomplished dentists,\r\nare set to drawing teeth. With a keen cutting-spade, Queequeg lances\r\nthe gums; then the jaw is lashed down to ringbolts, and a tackle being\r\nrigged from aloft, they drag out these teeth, as Michigan oxen drag\r\nstumps of old oaks out of wild wood lands. There are generally\r\nforty-two teeth in all; in old whales, much worn down, but undecayed;\r\nnor filled after our artificial fashion. The jaw is afterwards sawn\r\ninto slabs, and piled away like joists for building houses.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 75. The Right Whale’s Head—Contrasted View.\r\n\r\nCrossing the deck, let us now have a good long look at the Right\r\nWhale’s head.\r\n\r\nAs in general shape the noble Sperm Whale’s head may be compared to a\r\nRoman war-chariot (especially in front, where it is so broadly\r\nrounded); so, at a broad view, the Right Whale’s head bears a rather\r\ninelegant resemblance to a gigantic galliot-toed shoe. Two hundred\r\nyears ago an old Dutch voyager likened its shape to that of a\r\nshoemaker’s last."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJNXEDHZCC8DR4EPSQD0QP4P","peer_label":"moby-dick","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJNXECF9R1EZKS5Z7J8A8ZSB","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"}],"ver":1,"created_at":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.067Z","ts":"2026-03-02T00:01:19.067Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KJ6WPT018SDDANE6N7Q8E428"}}