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CHAPTER 70 . The Sphynx . It should not have been omitted that previous to completely stripping the body of the leviathan , he was beheaded . Now , the beheading of the Sperm Whale is a scientific anatomical feat , upon which experienced whale surgeons very much pride themselves : and not without reason . Consider that the whale has nothing that can properly be called a neck ; on the contrary , where his head and body seem to join , there , in that very place , is the thickest part of him . Remember , also , that the surgeon must operate from above , some eight or ten feet intervening between him and his subject , and that subject almost hidden in a discoloured , rolling , and oftentimes tumultuous and bursting sea . Bear in mind , too , that under these untoward circumstances he has to cut many feet deep in the flesh ; and in that subterraneous manner , without so much as getting one single peep into the ever - contracting gash thus made , he must skilfully steer clear of all adjacent , interdicted parts , and exactly divide the spine at a critical point hard by its insertion into the skull . Do you not marvel , then , at Stubb’s boast , that he demanded but ten minutes to behead a sperm whale ? When first severed , the head is dropped astern and held there by a cable till the body is stripped . That done , if it belong to a small whale it is hoisted on deck to be deliberately disposed of . But , with a full grown leviathan this is impossible ; for the sperm whale’s head embraces nearly one third of his entire bulk , and completely to suspend such a burden as that , even by the immense tackles of a whaler , this were as vain a thing as to attempt weighing a Dutch barn in jewellers ’ scales . The Pequod’s whale being decapitated and the body stripped , the head was hoisted against the ship’s side — about half way out of the sea , so that it might yet in great part be buoyed up by its native element . And there with the strained craft steeply leaning over to it , by reason of the enormous downward drag from the lower mast - head , and every yard - arm on that side projecting like a crane over the waves ; there , that blood - dripping head hung to the Pequod’s waist like the giant Holofernes’s from the girdle of Judith .
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