Description acceptable. A passage discussing this scientific field dismisses a “rabble of uncertain, fugitive, half-fabulous” figures in this field as “mere sounds...signifying nothing.” An amateur enthusiast of this scientific field compares his work on it to the unfinished Cathedral of Cologne and mocks the work of William Scoresby. That man concludes two specimens in this field to be “Stoic” and “Platonian” as he studies them while they are tied to the left and right sides of him. This field uses a classification system of (*) Folio, Octavo, and Duodecimo in a chapter that gives an anti-Linnaean description of their subjects. That chapter titled for this scientific field digresses from Stubb’s recollection of a dream of his captain’s pegleg. For 10 points, Ishmael delves into what branch of marine biology in many discursive chapters of Moby-Dick? ■END■
ANSWER: cetology [or whaleology or whalelore; accept the study of whales or whale biology; prompt on marine biology]
<HG, American Literature>
= Average correct buzz position