More Books at Sea

Melville's ruminations on books and Providence reminded me of a neat trick he pulled in Moby Dick. After discussing in learned detail the various methods of classification of whales of the ancient and modern authorities, Melville presented his own idiosyncratic system that only a true lover of books could invent:

Now, then, come the grand divisions of the entire whale host.

First: According to magnitude I divide the whales into three primary BOOKS (subdivisible into CHAPTERS), and these shall comprehend them all, both small and large.

I. THE FOLIO WHALE; II. THE OCTAVO WHALE; III. THE DUODECIMO WHALE.

As the type of the FOLIO I present the Sperm Whale; of the OCTAVO, the Grampus; of the DUODECIMO, the Porpoise.

FOLIOS. Among these I here include the following chapters:--I. The Sperm Whale; II. the Right Whale; III. the Fin Back Whale; IV. the Humpbacked Whale; V. the Razor Back Whale; VI. the Sulphur Bottom Whale.

. . . .

OCTAVOES. These embrace the whales of middling magnitude, among which at present may be numbered:--I. the Grampus; II. the Black Fish; III. the Narwhale; IV. the Killer; V. the Thrasher.

. . . .

DUODECIMOES.--These include the smaller whales. I. The Huzza Porpoise; II. The Algerine Porpoise; III. The Mealy-mouthed Porpoise.

For those in the know who can distinguish among the bound paper varieties of folios, octavoes and duodecimoes, Melville includes this helpful footnote concerning the absence of the Quarto from his classification system: "Why this [Octavo] book of whales is not denominated the Quarto is very plain. Because, while the whales of this order, though smaller than those of the former order, nevertheless retain a proportionate likeness to them in figure, yet the bookbinder's Quarto volume in its diminished form does not preserve the shape of the Folio volume, but the Octavo volume does." I'm a footnote enthusiast, and I really appreciate Melville thinking through his system enough to include this little gem.