Now the Various Species of Whales

“Now the various species of whales need some sort of

popular comprehensive classification

if only an easy outline one for the present, 

hereafter to be filled in all its departments by subsequent laborers. 

As no better man advances to take this matter in hand, 

I hereupon offer my own poor endeavors. 

I promise nothing complete; 

because any human thing supposed to be complete, 

must for that very reason infallibly be faulty. 

I shall not pretend to a minute anatomical description of the various species, 

or - in this place at least - to much of any description. 

My object here is simply to project the draught of

a systematization of cetology. 

I am the architect, not the builder." 

(Moby Dick chap. 32 p. 131)

~ Heman Melville