The Whale’s Skin Debate
The narrator has given considerable attention to the question of whale skin and has engaged in debates with experienced whalemen and naturalists. Though his original opinion remains unchanged, he acknowledges it is merely an opinion.
Blubber as the Whale’s Outer Layer
Blubber possesses a consistency similar to firm, close-grained beef but is tougher, more elastic, and compact. Its thickness ranges from eight to fifteen inches. Since no other dense enveloping layer can be found on the whale’s body besides blubber, the narrator argues that the outermost layer of any animal, if dense enough, must constitute the skin.
The Whale’s Thin Isinglass Coating
From an unmarred dead whale, one can scrape off an infinitely thin, transparent substance resembling the thinnest shreds of isinglass. Before drying, this substance is flexible and soft like satin, but after drying it contracts, thickens, and becomes brittle. The narrator uses dried pieces of this material as markers in his whale-books. However, this coating should be considered “the skin of the skin” rather than the whale’s proper skin, since it would be ridiculous to claim that the massive whale’s true skin is thinner than a newborn infant’s.
Whale Size Estimation From Blubber Yield
When a large Sperm Whale’s skin yields one hundred barrels of oil, and considering that oil represents only three-fourths of the coat’s substance by weight, one can estimate the enormous size of the creature. At ten barrels per ton, this represents ten tons for just three-quarters of the whale’s skin material.
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