All 13 Uses of

inferior
in
Moby Dick

The aorta of a whale is larger in the bore than the main pipe of the water-works at London Bridge, and the water roaring in its passage through that pipe is inferior in impetus and velocity to the blood gushing from the whale's heart.†
Chpt Extr

inferior = (adjective) of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else OR (more rarely as a noun) a person of lower rank or status

It yields the article commonly known as whalebone or baleen; and the oil specially known as "whale oil," an inferior article in commerce.†
Chpt 31-33

At present he ranks simply as senior Harpooneer; and as such, is but one of the captain's more inferior subalterns.†
Chpt 31-33 *

This it is, that for ever keeps God's true princes of the Empire from the world's hustings; and leaves the highest honours that this air can give, to those men who become famous more through their infinite inferiority to the choice hidden handful of the Divine Inert, than through their undoubted superiority over the dead level of the mass.†
Chpt 31-33

inferiority = the state of being of low quality or of lower quality than something else

In strange contrast to the hardly tolerable constraint and nameless invisible domineerings of the captain's table, was the entire care-free license and ease, the almost frantic democracy of those inferior fellows the harpooneers.†
Chpt 34-36

inferior = (adjective) of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else OR (more rarely as a noun) a person of lower rank or status

Then again, Stubb was one of those odd sort of humorists, whose jollity is sometimes so curiously ambiguous, as to put all inferiors on their guard in the matter of obeying them.†
Chpt 46-48

inferiors = People who are of lower rank or status

And though all hands commonly disdained the capture of those inferior creatures; and though the Pequod was not commissioned to cruise for them at all, and though she had passed numbers of them near the Crozetts without lowering a boat; yet now that a Sperm Whale had been brought alongside and beheaded, to the surprise of all, the announcement was made that a Right Whale should be captured that day, if opportunity offered.†
Chpt 73-75

inferior = (adjective) of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else OR (more rarely as a noun) a person of lower rank or status

But before going further, it is important to mention here, that though the harpoon may be pitchpoled in the same way with the lance, yet it is seldom done; and when done, is still less frequently successful, on account of the greater weight and inferior length of the harpoon as compared with the lance, which in effect become serious drawbacks.†
Chpt 82-84

In man or fish, wriggling is a sign of inferiority.†
Chpt 85-87

inferiority = the state of being of low quality or of lower quality than something else

Yet are there those who will still do it; notwithstanding the fact that the oil obtained from such subjects is of a very inferior quality, and by no means of the nature of attar-of-rose.†
Chpt 91-93

inferior = (adjective) of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else OR (more rarely as a noun) a person of lower rank or status

It designates the dark, glutinous substance which is scraped off the back of the Greenland or right whale, and much of which covers the decks of those inferior souls who hunt that ignoble Leviathan.†
Chpt 94-96

And so, such hearts, though summary in each one suffering; still, if the gods decree it, in their life-time aggregate a whole age of woe, wholly made up of instantaneous intensities; for even in their pointless centres, those noble natures contain the entire circumferences of inferior souls.†
Chpt 133-135

Definitions:

(1) (inferior)
of low quality, or of lower quality or rank than something else -- sometimes used as a noun to refer to a person of lower rank or status
(2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
meaning too rare to warrant focus:

Less commonly, specialized senses include:
- anatomy and botany -- a lower position on a body or plant (or pointed downward)
- typography -- a character that drops beneath a printing line (such as with subscript)
- astronomy -- having an orbit relative to the sun that is lower than earth's (making Mercury and Venus inferior planets)