Moby sick - Telegraph Dropping his spade, he thrust both hands in, and drew out handfuls of something that looked like ripe Windsor soap, or rich mottled old cheese; very unctuous and savory withal... And this, good friends, is ambergris, worth a gold guinea an ounce to any druggist. Herman Melville's description in Moby-Dick of whalers removing ambergris from the carcass of a sperm whale captures the conflicting nature of this fabled substance - at once both vile and valuable (though the French word is a more romantic term than "whale vomit"). Alerted by its colour and smell, Ken Willman found six pounds of the stuff washed up on Morecambe beach while walking his dog. And, as Melville suggests, it is known as floating gold for a reason: ambergris is an essential ingredient in the world's great perfumes and Mr Kemp's find could be worth £100,000. That's not to be sniffed at.