Of the Less Erroneous Pictures of Whales, and the True Pictures of Whaling Scenes

Chapter 56 continues the examination of whale pictures explicitly linked to “the previous chapter,” but shifts from exposing distortions toward identifying what successful representation can achieve. Rather than advancing a shipboard episode, it teaches readers how to look at whales and whaling. The narrator initially ranks published outlines, distinguishing accurate contours from poor engraving and inadequate scale. His governing criterion then expands: a convincing picture must communicate “the living whale as seen by his living hunters.” This formulation makes truth relational and active, not merely anatomical. At this point, the chapter supplies a visual education in the hunt, using pictures to connect the whale’s physical form with the danger, movement, and labor surrounding it.

The chapter’s central technique is extended verbal description of pictures, transforming static engravings into unfolding scenes. In Garnery’s first image, the narrator isolates an oarsman within “that one single incomputable flash of time,” making a suspended pose feel precariously alive. His inventory of floating equipment, swimming men, and the approaching ship then widens the scene without losing its urgency. In the second engraving, violent foreground movement gains force through contrast with a becalmed background. Similes translate unfamiliar sights into recognizable energies: the whale resembles a rock-slide, while its wake threatens the boat like a steamer’s paddle-wheels. Such descriptions enact the animated representation the narrator praises, rather than simply asserting its value.

The narrator’s judgments distinguish factual precision from a broader artistic truth. Garnery’s engravings can be “in some details not the most correct” yet remain the finest presentations because their action conveys the hunt’s force. Conversely, experienced observers can produce pictures that are technically informative but imaginatively vacant. The comparison between a whale’s profile and a pyramid’s profile mocks outlines that suppress living movement. Scoresby’s painstaking snow crystals invite the further joke that each needs “a sworn affidavit,” satirizing precision when it displaces the subject’s vitality. Yet the narrator acknowledges Scoresby’s distinction and his own inability to draw as well as Garnery. His authority combines confident discrimination with concessions that prevent accuracy and artistry from becoming simple opposites.

The closing discussion broadens whaling beyond spectacular confrontation. Durand’s quiet Pacific scene places drooping sails beside drooping palm leaves, briefly aligning human work with the surrounding stillness. The other engraving compresses several activities into one image: processing a whale, preparing a boat, pursuing distant animals, and responding to threatening weather. Its rearing-horse comparison gives the small craft an almost bodily agitation, while the smoke evokes “a village of smithies,” presenting whaling as industrial labor as well as combat. Across these examples, the chapter’s preferred pictures preserve relationships among animals, people, tools, ships, and sea. Their truth lies in showing a whole changing situation, including repose and exertion, rather than extracting an isolated specimen.