Moby Dick

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soils, whereas ambergris is never found except upon the sea. Besides,
amber is a hard, transparent, brittle, odorless substance, used for
mouth-pieces to pipes, for beads and ornaments; but ambergris is soft,
waxy, and so highly fragrant and spicy, that it is largely used in
perfumery, in pastiles, precious candles, hair-powders, and pomatum.
The Turks use it in cooking, and also carry it to Mecca, for the same
purpose that frankincense is carried to St. Peter's in Rome. Some wine
merchants drop a few grains into claret, to flavor it.

Who would think, then, that such fine ladies and gentlemen should regale
themselves with an essence found in the inglorious bowels of a sick
whale! Yet so it is. By some, ambergris is supposed to be the cause, and
by others the effect, of the dyspepsia in the whale. How to cure such
a dyspepsia it were hard to say, unless by administering three or four
boat loads of Brandreth's pills, and then running out of harm's way, as
laborers do in blasting rocks.