322 
MOBY DICK; OR 
to a strung necklace of dwarfed skulls, all bearing rudimental re- 
semblance to the skull proper. It is a German conceit, that the 
vertebrae are absolutely undeveloped skulls. But the curious ex- 
ternal resemblance, I take it the Germans were not the first men to per- 
ceive. A foreign friend once pointed it out to me, in the skeleton of 
a foe he had slain, and with the vertebrae of which he was inlaying, 
in a sort of basso-relievo, the beaked prow of his canoe. Now, I 
consider that the phrenologists have omitted an important thing in not 
pushing their investigations from the cerebellum through the spinal 
canal; for I believe that much of a man’s character will be found 
betokened in his backbone. I would rather feel your spine than your 
skull, whoever’ you are. A thin joist of a spine never yet upheld a 
full and noble soul. I rejoice in my spine, as in the firm audacious 
staff of that flag which I fling half out to the world. 
Apply this spinal branch of phrenology to the Sperm Whale. His 
cranial cavity is continuous with the first neck vertebra; and in that 
vertebra the bottom of the spinal canal will measure ten inches 
across, being eight in height, and of a triangular figure with the 
base downwards. As it passes through the remaining vertebrae the 
canal tapers in size, but for a considerable distance remains of large 
capacity. Now, of course, this canal is filled with much the same 
strangely fibrous substance — the spinal cord — as the brain ; and directly 
communicates with the brain. And what is still more, for many 
feet after emerging from the brain’s cavity, the spinal cord remains 
of an undecreasing girth, almost equal to that of the brain. Under 
all these circumstances, would it be unreasonable to survey and map 
out the whale’s spine phrenologically ? For, viewed in this light, 
the wonderful comparative smallness of his brain proper is more than 
compensated by the wonderful comparative magnitude of his spinal 
cord. 
But leaving this hint to operate as it may with the phrenologists, 
I would merely assume the spinal theory for a moment, in referenec to 
the Sperm Whale’s hump. This august hump, if I mistake not, rises 
over one of the larger vertebras, and is, therefore, in some sort, the 
outer convex mould of it. From its relative situation then, I should 
call this high hump the organ of firmness or indomitableness in the 
