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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables Explained
+
+Author: Henry Lee
+
+Release Date: July 9, 2011 [EBook #36677]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Jeannie Howse, Anna Hall, Bryan Ness and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE SEA SERPENT, AS FIRST SEEN FROM H.M.S. 'DÆDALUS.'
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+
+
+  (_International Fisheries Exhibition_ LONDON, 1883)
+
+
+  SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED
+
+  BY
+
+  HENRY LEE, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.
+
+  SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM
+  AND
+  AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT'
+
+  ILLUSTRATED
+
+  LONDON
+  WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED
+  INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION
+  AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.
+  1883
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+As I commence this little history of two sea monsters there comes to my
+mind a remark made to me by my friend, Mr. Samuel L. Clemens--"Mark
+Twain"--which illustrates a feeling that many a writer must have
+experienced when dealing with a subject that has been previously well
+handled. Expressing to me one day the gratification he felt in having
+made many pleasant acquaintances in England, he added, with dry humour,
+and a grave countenance, "Yes! I owe your countrymen no grudge or
+ill-will. I freely forgive them, though one of them did me a grievous
+wrong, an irreparable injury! It was Shakspeare: if he had not written
+those plays of his, I should have done so! They contain _my_ thoughts,
+_my_ sentiments! He forestalled me!"
+
+In treating of the so-called "sea-serpent," I have been anticipated by
+many able writers. Mr. Gosse, in his delightful book, 'The Romance of
+Natural History,' published in 1862, devoted a chapter to it; and
+numerous articles concerning it have appeared in various papers and
+periodicals.
+
+But, for the information from which those authors have drawn their
+inferences, and on which they have founded their opinions, they have
+been greatly indebted, as must be all who have seriously to consider
+this subject, to the late experienced editor of the _Zoologist_, Mr.
+Edward Newman, a man of wonderful power of mind, of great judgment, a
+profound thinker, and an able writer. At a time when, as he said, "the
+shafts of ridicule were launched against believers and unbelievers in
+the sea-serpent in a very pleasing and impartial manner," he, in the
+true spirit of philosophical inquiry, in 1847, opened the columns of his
+magazine to correspondence on this topic, and all the more recent
+reports of marine monsters having been seen are therein recorded. To
+him, therefore, the fullest acknowledgments are due.
+
+The great cuttles, also, have been the subject of articles in various
+magazines, notably one by Mr. W. Saville Kent, F.L.S., in the 'Popular
+Science Review' of April, 1874, and a chapter in my little book on the
+Octopus, published in 1873, is also devoted to them. In writing of them
+as the living representatives of the kraken, and as having been
+frequently mistaken for the "sea-serpent," my deductions have been drawn
+from personal knowledge, and an intimate acquaintance with the habits,
+form, and structure of the animals described. It was only by watching
+the movements of specimens of the "common squid" (_Loligo vulgaris_),
+and the "little squid" (_L. media_), which lived in the tanks of the
+Brighton Aquarium, that I recognised in their peculiar habit of
+occasionally swimming half-submerged, with uplifted caudal extremity,
+and trailing arms, the fact that I had before me the "sea-serpent" of
+many a well-authenticated anecdote. A mere knowledge of their form and
+anatomy after death had never suggested to me that which became at once
+apparent when I saw them in life.
+
+It is a pleasure to me to acknowledge gratefully the kindness I have
+met with in connection with the illustrations of this book. The
+proprietors of the _Illustrated London News_ not only gave me permission
+to copy, in reduced size, their two pictures of the _Dædalus_ incident,
+but presented to me electrotype copies of all others small enough for
+these pages--namely, "Jonah and the Monster," Egede's "Sea-Serpent," and
+the Whale as seen from the _Pauline_. Equally kind have been the
+proprietors of the _Field_. To them I am greatly indebted for their
+permission to copy the beautiful woodcuts of the "Octopus at Rest," "The
+Sepia seizing its Prey," and the arms of the Newfoundland squids, and
+also for "electros" of the two curious Japanese engravings, all of which
+originally appeared in their paper. From the _Graphic_ I have had
+similar permission to copy any cuts that might be thought suitable, and
+the illustrations of the sea-serpent, as seen from Her Majesty's yacht
+_Osborne_ and the _City of Baltimore_, are from that journal. Messrs.
+Nisbet most courteously allowed me to have a copy of the block of the
+_Enaliosaurus_ swimming, which was one of the numerous pictures in Mr.
+Gosse's book, published by them, already referred to. And last, not
+least, I have to thank Miss Ellen Woodward, daughter of my friend, Dr.
+Henry Woodward, F.R.S., for enabling me to better explain the movements
+and appearances of the squids when swimming, and when raising their
+bodies out of water in an erect position, by carefully drawing them from
+my rough sketches.
+
+                                        HENRY LEE.
+
+  SAVAGE CLUB;
+    _July 21st, 1883_.
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+_Frontispiece._--The Sea Serpent as first seen from H.M.S. _Dædalus_.
+
+  FIG.                                                              PAGE
+
+   1. Beak and Arms of a Decapod Cuttle                               16
+
+   2. The Octopus (_Octopus vulgaris_)                                18
+
+   3. The Cuttle (_Sepia officinalis_)                                21
+
+   4. Hooked Tentacles of _Onychoteuthis_                             23
+
+   5. Japanese fisherman attacked by a Cuttle                         29
+
+   6. Arms of a great Cuttle exhibited in a Japanese fish-shop        29
+
+   7. Facsimile of De Montfort's "_Poulpe colossal_"                  32
+
+   8. Gigantic Calamary caught by the French despatch vessel
+      _Alecton_, near Teneriffe                                       39
+
+   9. Tentacle of a great Calamary (_Architeuthis princeps_)
+      taken in Conception Bay, Newfoundland                           43
+
+  10. Head and Tentacles of a great Calamary (_Architeuthis
+      princeps_) taken in Logie Bay, Newfoundland                     44
+
+  11. Jonah and the Sea Monster                                       55
+
+  12. Sea Serpent seizing a man on board ship                         58
+
+  13. Gigantic Lobster dragging a man from a ship                     58
+
+  14. Pontoppidan's "Sea Serpent"                                     63
+
+  15. The Animal drawn by Mr. Bing as having been seen by Egede       66
+
+  16. The Animal which Egede probably saw                             67
+
+  17. The Sea Serpent of the Wernerian Society (_facsimile_)          69
+
+  18. A Calamary swimming at the surface of the sea                   77
+
+  19. The Sea Serpent passing under the quarter of H.M.S.
+      _Dædalus_                                                       81
+
+  20. The Sea Serpent and Sperm Whale as seen from the _Pauline_      91
+
+  21. The Sea Serpent as seen from the _City of Baltimore_            93
+
+  22. The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht _Osborne_. Phase 1      94
+
+  23. The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht _Osborne_. Phase 2      94
+
+  24. Skeleton of the _Plesiosaurus_, restored by Mr. Conybeare       98
+
+  25. The Sea Serpent on the Enaliosaurian hypothesis                100
+
+
+
+
+SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED.
+
+
+
+
+THE KRAKEN.
+
+
+In the legends and traditions of northern nations, stories of the
+existence of a marine animal of such enormous size that it more
+resembled an island than an organised being frequently found a place. It
+is thus described in an ancient manuscript (about A.D. 1180), attributed
+to the Norwegian King Sverre; and the belief in it has been alluded to
+by other Scandinavian writers from an early period to the present day.
+It was an obscure and mysterious sea-monster, known as the Kraken, whose
+form and nature were imperfectly understood, and it was peculiarly the
+object of popular wonder and superstitious dread.
+
+Eric Pontoppidan, the younger, Bishop of Bergen, and member of the
+Royal Academy of Sciences at Copenhagen, is generally, but unjustly,
+regarded as the inventor of the semi-fabulous Kraken, and is constantly
+misquoted by authors who have never read his work,[1] and who, one after
+another, have copied from their predecessors erroneous statements
+concerning him. More than half a century before him, Christian Francis
+Paullinus,[2] a physician and naturalist of Eisenach, who evinced in his
+writings an admiration of the marvellous rather than of the useful, had
+described as resembling Gesner's 'Heracleoticon,' a monstrous animal
+which occasionally rose from the sea on the coasts of Lapland and
+Finmark, and which was of such enormous dimensions, that a regiment of
+soldiers could conveniently manoeuvre on its back. About the same date,
+but a little earlier, Bartholinus, a learned Dane, told how, on a
+certain occasion, the Bishop of Midaros found the Kraken quietly
+reposing on the shore, and mistaking the enormous creature for a huge
+rock, erected an altar upon it and performed mass. The Kraken
+respectfully waited till the ceremony was concluded, and the reverend
+prelate safe on shore, and then sank beneath the waves.
+
+  [1] 'Natural History of Norway.' A.D. 1751.
+
+  [2] Born 1643; died 1712.
+
+And a hundred and fifty years before Bartholinus and Paullinus wrote,
+Olaus Magnus,[3] Archbishop of Upsala, in Sweden, had related many
+wondrous narratives of sea-monsters,--tales which had gathered and
+accumulated marvels as they had been passed on from generation to
+generation in oral history, and which he took care to bequeath to his
+successors undeprived of any of their fascination. According to him, the
+Kraken was not so polite to the laity as to the Bishop, for when some
+fishermen lighted a fire on its back, it sank beneath their feet, and
+overwhelmed them in the waters.
+
+  [3] Olaus Magnus has sometimes been mistaken for his brother and
+  predecessor in the archiepiscopal see, Johan Magnus, author of a
+  book entitled 'Gothorum, Suevorumque Historia.' Olaus was the last
+  Roman Catholic archbishop of the Swedish church, and when the
+  Reformation, supported by Gustavus Vasa, gained the ascendancy in
+  Sweden, he remained true to his faith, and retired to Rome, where
+  he wrote his work, 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Romæ,
+  1555. An English translation of this book was published by J.
+  Streater, in 1658. It does not contain the illustrations.
+
+Pontoppidan was not a fabricator of falsehoods; but, in collecting
+evidence relating to the "great beasts" living in "the great and wide
+sea," was influenced, as he tells us, by "a desire to extend the popular
+knowledge of the glorious works of a beneficent Creator." He gave too
+much credence to contemporary narratives and old traditions of floating
+islands and sea monsters, and to the superstitious beliefs and
+exaggerated statements of ignorant fishermen: but if those who ridicule
+him had lived in his day and amongst his people, they would probably
+have done the same; for even Linnæus was led to believe in the Kraken,
+and catalogued it in the first edition of his 'Systema Naturæ,' as
+'_Sepia Microcosmos_.' He seems to have afterwards had cause to
+discredit his information respecting it, for he omitted it in the next
+edition. The Norwegian bishop was a conscientious and painstaking
+investigator, and the tone of his writings is neither that of an
+intentional deceiver nor of an incautious dupe. He diligently
+endeavoured to separate the truth from the cloud of error and fiction by
+which it was obscured; and in this he was to a great extent successful,
+for he correctly identifies, from the vague and perplexing descriptions
+submitted to him, the animal whose habits and structure had given rise
+to so many terror-laden narratives and extravagant traditions.
+
+The following are some of his remarks on the subject of this gigantic
+and ill-defined animal. Although I have greatly abbreviated them, I have
+thought it right to quote them at considerable length, that the modest
+and candid spirit in which they were written may be understood:[4]
+
+     "Amongst the many things," he says, "which are in the ocean, and
+     concealed from our eyes, or only presented to our view for a few
+     minutes, is the Kraken. This creature is the largest and most
+     surprising of all the animal creation, and consequently well
+     deserves such an account as the nature of the thing, according to
+     the Creator's wise ordinances, will admit of. Such I shall give at
+     present, and perhaps much greater light on this subject may be
+     reserved for posterity.
+
+     "Our fishermen unanimously affirm, and without the least variation
+     in their accounts, that when they row out several miles to sea,
+     particularly in the hot summer days, and by their situation (which
+     they know by taking a view of different points of land) expect to
+     find eighty or a hundred fathoms of water, it often happens that
+     they do not find above twenty or thirty, and sometimes less. At
+     these places they generally find the greatest plenty of fish,
+     especially cod and ling. Their lines, they say, are no sooner out
+     than they may draw them up with the hooks all full of fish. By this
+     they know that the Kraken is at the bottom. They say this creature
+     causes those unnatural shallows mentioned above, and prevents their
+     sounding. These the fishermen are always glad to find, looking upon
+     them as a means of their taking abundance of fish. There are
+     sometimes twenty boats or more got together and throwing out their
+     lines at a moderate distance from each other; and the only thing
+     they then have to observe is whether the depth continues the same,
+     which they know by their lines, or whether it grows shallower, by
+     their seeming to have less water. If this last be the case they
+     know that the Kraken is raising himself nearer the surface, and
+     then it is not time for them to stay any longer; they immediately
+     leave off fishing, take to their oars, and get away as fast as they
+     can. When they have reached the usual depth of the place, and find
+     themselves out of danger, they lie upon their oars, and in a few
+     minutes after they see this enormous monster come up to the surface
+     of the water; he there shows himself sufficiently, though his whole
+     body does not appear, which, in all likelihood, no human eye ever
+     beheld. Its back or upper part, which seems to be in appearance
+     about an English mile and a half in circumference (some say more,
+     but I chuse the least for greater certainty), looks at first like a
+     number of small islands surrounded with something that floats and
+     fluctuates like sea-weeds. Here and there a larger rising is
+     observed like sand-banks, on which various kinds of small fishes
+     are seen continually leaping about till they roll off into the
+     water from the sides of it; at last several bright points or horns
+     appear, which grow thicker and thicker the higher they rise above
+     the surface of the water, and sometimes they stand up as high and
+     as large as the masts of middle-sized vessels. It seems these are
+     the creature's arms, and it is said if they were to lay hold of the
+     largest man of war they would pull it down to the bottom. After
+     this monster has been on the surface of the water a short time it
+     begins slowly to sink again, and then the danger is as great as
+     before; because the motion of his sinking causes such a swell in
+     the sea, and such an eddy or whirlpool, that it draws everything
+     down with it, like the current of the river Male.
+
+     "As this enormous sea-animal in all probability may be reckoned of
+     the Polype, or of the Starfish kind, as shall hereafter be more
+     fully proved, it seems that the parts which are seen rising at its
+     pleasure, and are called arms, are properly the tentacula, or
+     feeling instruments, called horns, as well as arms. With these they
+     move themselves, and likewise gather in their food.
+
+     "Besides these, for this last purpose the great Creator has also
+     given this creature a strong and peculiar scent, which it can emit
+     at certain times, and by means of which it beguiles and draws other
+     fish to come in heaps about it. This animal has another strange
+     property, known by the experience of many old fishermen. They
+     observe that for some months the Kraken or Krabben is continually
+     eating, and in other months he always voids his excrements. During
+     this evacuation the surface of the water is coloured with the
+     excrement, and appears quite thick and turbid. This muddiness is
+     said to be so very agreeable to the smell or taste of other fishes,
+     or to both, that they gather together from all parts to it, and
+     keep for that purpose directly over the Kraken; he then opens his
+     arms or horns, seizes and swallows his welcome guests, and converts
+     them after due time, by digestion, into a bait for other fish of
+     the same kind. I relate what is affirmed by many; but I cannot give
+     so certain assurances of this particular, as I can of the existence
+     of this surprising creature; though I do not find anything in it
+     absolutely contrary to Nature. As we can hardly expect to examine
+     this enormous sea-animal alive, I am the more concerned that nobody
+     embraced that opportunity which, according to the following account
+     once did, and perhaps never more may offer, of seeing it entire
+     when dead."
+
+  [4] 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii., p. 210.
+
+The lost opportunity which the worthy prelate thus lamented, with the
+true feeling of a naturalist, was made known to him by the Rev. Mr.
+Friis, Consistorial Assessor, Minister of Bodoen in Nordland, and Vicar
+of the college for promoting Christian knowledge, and was to the
+following effect:
+
+     "In the year 1680, a Krake (perhaps a young and foolish one) came
+     into the water that runs between the rocks and cliffs in the parish
+     of Alstaboug, though the general custom of that creature is to keep
+     always several leagues from land, and therefore of course they must
+     die there. It happened that its extended long arms or antennæ,
+     which this creature seems to use like the snail in turning about,
+     caught hold of some trees standing near the water, which might
+     easily have been torn up by the roots; but beside this, as it was
+     found afterwards, he entangled himself in some openings or clefts
+     in the rock, and therein stuck so fast, and hung so unfortunately,
+     that he could not work himself out, but perished and putrefied on
+     the spot. The carcass, which was a long while decaying, and filled
+     great part of that narrow channel, made it almost impassable by its
+     intolerable stench.
+
+     "The Kraken has never been known to do any great harm, except,"
+     the Author quaintly says, "they have taken away the lives of those
+     who consequently could not bring the tidings. I have heard but one
+     instance mentioned, which happened a few years ago, near
+     Fridrichstad, in the diocess of Aggerhuus. They say that two
+     fishermen accidentally, and to their great surprise, fell into such
+     a spot on the water as has been before described, full of a thick
+     slime almost like a morass. They immediately strove to get out of
+     this place, but they had not time to turn quick enough to save
+     themselves from one of the Kraken's horns, which crushed the head
+     of the boat, so that it was with great difficulty they saved their
+     lives on the wreck, though the weather was as calm as possible; for
+     these monsters, like the sea-snake, never appear at other times."
+
+Pontoppidan then reviews the stories of floating islands which suddenly
+appear, and as suddenly vanish, commonly credited, and especially
+mentioned by Luke Debes in his 'Description of Faroe.'
+
+     "These islands in the boisterous ocean could not be imagined," he
+     says, "to be of the nature of real floating islands, because they
+     could not possibly stand against the violence of the waves in the
+     ocean, which break the largest vessels, and therefore our sailors
+     have concluded this delusion could come from no other than the
+     great deceiver, the devil."
+
+This accusation, the good bishop, in his desire to be strictly
+impartial, will not admit on such hear-say evidence, but is determined
+to, literally, "give the devil his due;" for he warns his readers that
+"we ought not to charge that apostate spirit without a cause; for," he
+adds, "I rather think that this devil who so suddenly makes and unmakes
+these floating islands, is nothing else but the Kraken."
+
+Referring to a monster described by Pliny, he repeats his belief that
+"This sea-animal belongs to the Polype, or Star-fish species;" but he
+becomes very much "mixed" between the _Cephalopoda_ and the _Asteridæ_,
+between the pedal segments, or arms, of the cuttle radiating from its
+head, and the rays of a Star-fish radiating from a central portion of
+the body. He evidently inclines strongly towards a particular Star-fish,
+the rays of which continually divide and subdivide themselves, or, as he
+describes it, "which shoots its rays into branches like those of trees,"
+and to which he gave the name of "Medusa's Head," a title by which, in
+its Greek form, _Gorgonocephalus_, it is still known to zoologists.
+"These Medusa's Heads," he says, "are supposed by some seafaring people
+here, to be the young of the Sea-Krake; perhaps they are its smallest
+ovula." After considering other reports concerning the Kraken, he
+arrives at the following definite opinion:
+
+     "We learn from all this that the Polype or Starfish have amongst
+     their various species some that are much larger than others; and,
+     according to all appearance, amongst the very largest inhabitants
+     of the ocean. If the axiom be true that greatness or littleness
+     makes no change in the species, then this Krake must be of the
+     Polypus kind, notwithstanding its enormous size."
+
+His diagnosis is correct; but it is stated with a modesty which his
+detractors would do well to imitate; and his concluding words on this
+subject place him in a light very different from that in which he is
+popularly regarded:
+
+     "I do not in the least insist on this conjecture being true," he
+     writes, "but willingly submit my suppositions in this and every
+     other dubious matter to the judgment of those who are better
+     experienced. If I was an admirer of uncertain reports and fabulous
+     stories, I might here add much more concerning this and other
+     Norwegian sea-monsters, whose existence I will not take upon me to
+     deny, but do not chuse, by a mixture of uncertain relations to make
+     such account appear doubtful as I myself believe to be true and
+     well attested. I shall therefore quit the subject here, and leave
+     it to future writers on this plan to complete what I have
+     imperfectly sketched out, by further experience, which is always
+     the best instructor."
+
+It is easy to recognise in Pontoppidan's description of the Kraken, the
+form and habits of one of the "Cuttle-fishes," so-called. The appearance
+of its numerous arms, with which it gathers in its food, and which grow
+thicker and thicker as they rise above the surface, is just what would
+take place in the case of one of the pelagic species of these mollusks
+raising its head out of the sea. The rendering of the water turbid and
+thick by the emission of a substance which the narrator supposed to be
+fæcal matter, is exactly that which occurs when a cuttle discharges the
+contents of the remarkable organ known as its ink-bag; and the strong
+and peculiar scent mentioned as appertaining to it, is actually
+characteristic of its inky secretion. The musky odour referred to, is
+more perceptible in some species than in others. In one of the Octopods
+(_Eledone moschatus_), it is so strong, that the specific name of the
+animal is derived from it.
+
+The ancient Greeks and Romans, who were well acquainted with the
+various kinds of cuttles and regarded them all as excellent food, and
+even as delicacies of the table, applied the word "polypus" especially
+to the octopus. But Pontoppidan evidently uses it as descriptive of all
+the cephalopods. It must not be forgotten, however, that when he wrote,
+science was only slowly recovering from neglect of many centuries'
+duration. In the enlightened times of Greece and Rome, natural history
+flourished, and as in our day, attracted and occupied the attention of
+the man of science, and afforded recreation to the man of business and
+the politician. Aristotle wrote 322 years before the birth of Christ,
+and his works are monuments of practical wisdom. When we consider the
+period during which he lived, and the isolated nature of his labours,
+and compare them with the information which he possessed, we are
+astonished at his sagacity and the great scope and general accuracy of
+his knowledge. Pliny, 240 years later, lived in times more favourable
+for the cultivation of science; but with all his advantages made little
+improvement on the work of the great master. And then, later still, the
+sun of learning set; and there came over Europe the long night of the
+dark ages which succeeded Roman greatness, during which science was
+degraded and ignorance prevailed; and it is not till the middle of the
+sixteenth century, that the zoologist finds much to interest and
+instruct him. When we further reflect, that until within the past five
+and twenty years--till our large aquaria were constructed--Aristotle's
+knowledge of the habits and life-history of marine animals, and amongst
+them the cephalopods, was incomparably greater and more perfect than
+that possessed by any man who had lived since he recorded his
+observations, we cannot help feeling that in some departments of
+knowledge there is still lost ground to be recovered.
+
+In the old days of the Cæsars, a Greek or Roman house-wife who was
+accustomed to see the cuttle, the squid, and the octopus daily exposed
+for sale in the markets, would of course have laughed at the idea of
+mistaking the one for the other; but there are comparatively few persons
+in our own country, at the present day, except those who have made
+marine zoology their study, whose ideas on the subject are not
+exceedingly hazy. This want of technical knowledge is not confined to
+the masses; but is common, if not general, amongst those who have been
+well educated, and is frequently apparent even in leaders in the daily
+papers--the productions, for the most part, of men of receptive minds,
+trained discrimination, and great general knowledge. As the subject is
+one in which I have long felt especial interest, I venture to hope that
+I may succeed in making clear the difference between the eight-footed
+octopus and its ten-footed relatives, and thus enable the reader to
+identify the member of the family from which we are to strip the dress
+and "make up" in which it masqueraded as the Kraken, and cause it to
+appear in its true and natural form.
+
+One of the great primary groups or divisions of the animal kingdom is
+that of the soft-bodied mollusca; which includes the cuttle, the oyster,
+the snail, &c. It has been separated into five "classes," of which the
+one we have especially to notice is the _Cephalopoda_,[5] or
+"head-footed,"--the animals belonging to it having their feet, or the
+organs which correspond with the foot of other molluscs, so attached to
+the head as to form a circle or coronet round the mouth. Some of these
+have the foot divided into eight segments, and are therefore called the
+_Octopoda_:[6] others have, in addition to the eight feet, lobes, or
+arms, two longer tentacular appendages, making ten in all, and are
+consequently called the _Decapoda_.
+
+  [5] From the Greek words _cephale_, the head; and _poda_, feet.
+
+  [6] From _octo_, eight; and _pous_ (_poda_), feet.
+
+Of the ten-footed section of the cephalopods, there are four "families;"
+two only of which exist in Britain--the _Teuthidæ_, and the _Sepiidæ_.
+The _Teuthidæ_ are the Calamaries, popularly known as "Squids," and are
+represented by the long-bodied _Loligo vulgaris_, that has internally
+along its back a gristly, translucent stiffener, shaped like a
+quill-pen; from which and its ink it derives its names of "calamary"
+(from "_calamus_," a "pen"), "pen-and-ink fish," and "sea-clerk." The
+_Sepiidæ_ are generally known as the Cuttles proper. As a type of them
+we may take the common "cuttle-fish," _Sepia officinalis_, the owner of
+the hard, calcareous shell often thrown up on the shore, and known as
+"cuttle-bone," or "sea-biscuit."
+
+It must here be remarked, that as these head-footed mollusks are not
+"fish," any more than lobsters, crabs, oysters, mussels, &c., which
+fishmongers call "shell-fish," are "fish," the word "fish" is
+misleading, and should be abandoned; and secondly, that the names
+"cuttle" and "squid," as distinctive appellations, are unsatisfactory.
+The word "cuttle" is derived from "cuddle," to hug, or embrace--in
+allusion to the manner in which the animal seizes its prey, and enfolds
+it in its arms; and "squid" is derived from "squirt," in reference to
+its habit of squirting water or ink. But as all the known members of the
+class, except the pearly nautilus, _Nautilus pompilius_, have these
+habits in common, the distinguishing terms are hardly apposite. As,
+however, they are conventionally accepted and understood, I prefer to
+use them. As with other mollusks, so with the cephalopods, some have
+shells, and some are naked or have only rudimentary shells. The
+Argonaut, or paper nautilus, has been regarded as the analogue of the
+snail, which, like it, secretes an _external_ shell for the protection
+of its soft body; and the octopus as that of the garden slug, which,
+having organs like those of the snail, as the octopus has organs like
+those of the shell-bearing argonaut, has no shell. The cuttles and
+squids may be compared to some of the sea-slugs, as _Aplysia_ and
+_Bullæa_, and to some land-slugs, as _Parmacella_ and _Limax_, which
+have an _internal_ shell.
+
+The argonaut and the other families of the cephalopods do not come
+within the scope of this treatise; we will therefore confine our
+attention to the three above mentioned. Of the anatomy and homology of
+the _Octopus_, _Sepia_, and _Calamary_ we need say no more than will
+suffice to show in what manner they resemble each other, and wherein
+they differ, in order that we may the more clearly perceive to which of
+them the story of the Kraken probably owes its origin.
+
+The octopus, the sepia, and the calamary are all constructed on one
+fundamental plan. A bag of fleshy muscular skin, called the mantle-sac,
+contains the organs of the body, heart, stomach, liver, intestines, a
+pair of gills by which oxygen is absorbed from the water for the
+purification of the blood, and an excurrent tube by which the water thus
+deprived of its life-sustaining gas is expelled. The outrush of water
+with more or less force, from this "syphon-tube," is also the principal
+source of locomotion when the animal is swimming, as it propels it
+backward--not by the striking of the expelled fluid against the
+surrounding water, as is generally supposed; but by the unbalanced
+pressure of the fluid acting inside the body in the direction in which
+the creature goes. Into this syphon-tube, or funnel, opens, by a special
+duct, the ink-bag; and from it is squirted at will the intensely black
+fluid therein secreted. I doubt very much the correctness of the
+statement mentioned by Pontoppidan and others, that the cuttle ejects
+its ink with a desire to lie hidden and in ambush for its intended prey,
+or with the intention to attract fish within its reach by their
+partiality for the musky odour of this secretion. It may be so, but
+during the long period that I had these animals under close observation
+at the Brighton Aquarium, I never witnessed such an incident. I believe
+that the emission of the ink is a symptom of fear, and is only employed
+as a means of concealment from a suspected enemy. I have found, that
+when first taken, the _Sepia_, of all its kind, is the most sensitively
+timid. Its keen, unwinking eye watches for and perceives the slightest
+movement of its captor; and if even most cautiously looked at from
+above, its ink is belched forth in eddying volumes, rolling over and
+over like the smoke which follows the discharge of a great gun from a
+ship's port, and mixes with marvellous rapidity with the surrounding
+water. But, like all of its class, the _Sepia_ is very intelligent. It
+soon learns to discriminate between friend and foe, and ultimately
+becomes very tame, and ceases to shoot its ink, unless it be teased and
+excited. By means of the communication between the ink-bag and the
+locomotor tube, it happens that when the ink is ejected, a stream of
+water is forcibly emitted with it, and thus the very effort for escape
+serves the double purpose of propelling the creature away from danger,
+and discolouring the water in which it moves. Oppian has well described
+this--
+
+    "The endangered cuttle thus evades his fears,
+    And native hoards of fluids safely wears.
+    A pitchy ink peculiar glands supply
+    Whose shades the sharpest beam of light defy.
+    Pursued, he bids the sable fountains flow,
+    And, wrapt in clouds, eludes the impending foe.
+    The fish retreats unseen, while self-born night
+    With pious shade befriends her parent's flight."
+
+Professor Owen has remarked that the ejection of the ink of the
+cephalopods serves by its colour as a means of defence, as corresponding
+secretions in some of the mammalia by their odour.
+
+It is worthy of notice that the pearly nautilus and the allied fossil
+forms are without this means of concealment, which their strong external
+shells render unnecessary for their protection.
+
+From the sac-like body containing the various organs, protrudes a head,
+globose in shape, and containing a brain, and furnished with a pair of
+strong, horny mandibles, which bite vertically, like the beak of a
+parrot. By these the flesh of prey is torn and partly masticated, and
+within them lies the tongue, covered with recurved and retractile teeth,
+like that of its distant relatives, the whelk, limpet, &c., by which the
+food is conducted to the gullet. Around this head is, as I have said,
+the organ which is equivalent to the foot in other molluscs--that by
+which the slug and the snail crawl--only that the head is placed in the
+centre, instead of in the front of it, and it is divided into segments,
+which radiate from this central head. These segments are very flexible,
+and capable of movement in every direction, and are thus developed into
+arms, prehensile limbs, by which their owner can seize and hold its
+living prey. That this may be more perfectly accomplished, these arms
+are studded along their inner surface with rows of sucking discs, in
+each of which, by means of a retractile piston, a vacuum can be
+produced. The consequent pressure of the outer atmosphere or water,
+causes them to adhere firmly to any substance to which they are applied,
+whether stone, fish, crustacean, or flesh of man.
+
+But, although in all these highly-organised head-footed mollusks the
+same general build prevails, it is admirably modified in each of them to
+suit certain habits and necessities. Thus the octopus, being a shore
+dweller, its soft and pliant, but very tough body, having merely a very
+small and rudimentary indication of an internal shell (just a little
+"style") is exactly adapted for wedging itself amongst crevices of
+rocks. A large, rigid, cellular float, or "sepiostaire," such as _Sepia_
+possesses, or a long, horny pen such as _Loligo_ has, would be in the
+way, and worse than useless in such places as the octopus inhabits. Its
+eight long powerful arms or feet are precisely fitted for clambering
+over rocks and stones, and as its food of course consists principally of
+the living things most abundant in such localities, namely, the
+shore-crabs, its great flexible suckers, devoid of hooks or horny
+armature, are exactly adapted to firm and air-tight attachment to the
+smooth shells of the crustacea.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 1.--BEAK AND ARMS OF A DECAPOD CUTTLE.
+
+_a_, the eight shorter arms; _t_, the tentacles; _f_, the funnel, or
+locomotor tube.]
+
+Unlike the octopus, which is capable only of short flights through the
+water, the "cuttles" and "squids," such as _Sepia_ and _Loligo_, are all
+free swimmers. For them it is necessary for accuracy of natation that
+their soft, and in the squids long bodies, should be supported by such a
+framework as they possess. In _Sepia_, the mantle-sac is flattened
+horizontally all along its lateral edges so as to form a pair of fins,
+which nearly surround the trunk. These fins could never be used, as they
+are, to enable the animal to poise itself delicately in the water by
+means of their beautiful undulations, which I have often watched with
+delight, if their attached edges were not kept in a straight line on
+either side. Then, these ten-footed or ten-armed genera have not,
+because they need them not, eight long, strong and highly mobile arms
+like those of the octopus, nor have they large suckers upon them.
+Whereas a great length of reach is an advantage to the octopus, animals
+which are purely swimmers, and which hunt and overtake their prey by
+speed, would be impeded by having to drag after them a bundle of stout,
+lengthy appendages trailing heavily astern. Their eight pedal arms are
+short and comparatively weak, though strong enough, in individuals such
+as are regarded on our own coasts as fullgrown, to seize and hold a fish
+or crustacean as strong as a good sized shore-crab. But, as compensation
+for the shortness of the eight arms, they are provided with two others
+more than three times the length of the short ones. These are so slender
+that they generally lie coiled up in a spiral cone in two pockets, one
+on each side, just below the eye, when the animal is quiescent, and are
+only seen when it takes its food. These long, slender tentacular arms
+are expanded at their extremity, and the inner surface of their enlarged
+part is studded with suckers--some of them larger in size than those on
+the eight shorter arms. As the food of these swimmers consists, of
+course, chiefly of fish, their sucking disks are curiously modified for
+the better retention of a slippery captive. A horny ring with a sharply
+serrated edge is imbedded in the outer circumference of each of them,
+and when a vacuum is formed, the keen, saw-like teeth are pressed into
+the skin or scales of the unfortunate prisoner, and deprive it of the
+slightest chance of escape.
+
+The manner in which the eight-armed and ten-armed cephalopods capture
+their prey is similar in principle and plan, but differs in action in
+accordance with their mode of life. The ordinary habit of the octopus is
+either to rest suspended to the side of a rock to which it clings with
+the suckers of several of its arms, or to remain lurking in some
+favourite cranny; its body thrust for protection and concealment well
+back in the interior of the recess; its bright eyes keenly on the watch;
+three or four of its limbs firmly attached to the walls of its hiding
+place--the others gently waving, gliding, and feeling about in the
+water, as if to maintain its vigilance, and keep itself always on the
+alert, and in readiness to pounce on any unfortunate wayfarer that may
+pass near its den. To a shore-crab that comes within its reach the
+slightest contact with one of those lithe arms is fatal. Instantaneously
+as pull of trigger brings down a bird, or touch of electric wire
+explodes a torpedo or a mining fuse, the pistons of the series of
+suckers are simultaneously drawn inward, the air is removed from the
+pneumatic holders, and a vacuum created in each: the crab tries to
+escape, but in a second is completely pinioned: not a movement, not a
+struggle is possible; each leg, each claw is grasped all over by
+suckers, enfolded in them, stretched out to its fullest extent by them;
+the back of the carapace is completely covered by the tenacious disks,
+brought together by the adaptable contractions of the limb, and ranged
+in close order, shoulder to shoulder, touching each other; and the
+pressure of the air is so great that nothing can effect the relaxation
+of their retentive power but the destruction of the air-pump that works
+them, or the closing of the throttle-valve by which they are connected
+with it. Meanwhile the abdominal plates of the captive crab are dragged
+towards the mouth; the black tip of the hard horny beak is seen for a
+single instant protruding from the circular orifice in the centre of the
+radiation of the arms; and, the next, has crushed through the shell, and
+is buried deep in the flesh of the victim.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 2.--THE OCTOPUS (_Octopus vulgaris_).]
+
+Unlike the skulking, hiding octopus, its ten-armed relative, the
+_Sepia_ loves the daylight and the freedom of the upper water. Its
+predatory acts are not those of a concealed and ambushed brigand lying
+in wait behind a rock, or peeping furtively from within the gloomy
+shadow of a cave; but it may better be compared to the war-like Comanche
+vidette seated gracefully on his horse, and scanning from some elevated
+knoll a wide expanse of prairie, in readiness to swoop upon a weak or
+unarmed foe. Poised near the surface of the water, like a hawk in the
+air, the _Sepia_ moves gently to and fro by graceful undulations of its
+lateral fins,--an exquisite play of colour occasionally taking place
+over its beautifully barred and mottled back. When thus tranquil, its
+eight pedal arms are usually brought close together, and droop in front
+of its head, like the trunk of an elephant, shortened; its two longer
+tentacular arms being coiled up within their pouches and unseen. Only
+when some small fish approaches it does it arouse itself. Then, its eyes
+dilate, and its colours become more bright and vivid. It carefully takes
+aim, advancing or retreating to such a distance as will just allow the
+two hidden tentacles to reach the quarry when they shall be shot out.
+Next, the two highest or central feet are lifted up, and the three
+others on each side are spread aside, so that they may be all out of the
+way of the two concealed tentacles, presently to be launched forth; and
+then, in a moment--so instantaneously that the eye of an observer, be he
+ever so watchful, can hardly see the act--this pair of tentacles, side
+by side, are projected and withdrawn, as if in a flash. The fish or
+shrimp has vanished, the suckers of the dilated ends of the tentacles
+having adhered to it, and left it, as they re-entered their pouches,
+within the fatal "cuddle," or embrace, where it is torn to pieces by the
+devouring beak.[7] This action of the tentacles of the decapods is the
+most rapid motion that I know of in the whole animal kingdom--not
+excepting even that of the tongue of the toad and the lizard. These long
+tentacles are not used when the food is within reach of the shorter
+arms.
+
+  [7] See an excellent article in the _Field_, Sept. 2, 1876, on the
+  'Ten Footed Cuttle' (_Sepia officinalis_), by the late Mr. W. A.
+  Lloyd, an earnest and accomplished aquatic zoologist; eccentric,
+  but in all that relates to the construction and management of an
+  aquarium a master of his craft. It was his wish that in any future
+  edition of my little book on the Octopus, or other writings on the
+  cephalopods, I should use the woodcuts which illustrated his
+  articles on Sepia and Octopus. By the kind permission of the
+  proprietors of the _Field_, I reproduce them in suitable size for
+  these pages.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 3.--THE CUTTLE (_Sepia officinalis_).]
+
+The calamaries or squids of our British Seas seize their prey in the
+same manner as _Sepia_, and the description of one will suffice for
+both. But there exist two groups of them, which are armed with curved
+and sharp-pointed hooks or claws, either in addition to, or instead
+of suckers. In the one group (_Onychoteuthis_), the hooks are
+restricted to the extremities of the pair of tentacles, in the other
+(_Enoploteuthis_), both the tentacles and the shorter arms have hooks.
+Professor Owen, in his description of these hook-armed calamaries in the
+_Cyclopædia of Anatomy_, notices also another structure which adds
+greatly to their prehensile power (Fig. 4.). "At the extremity of the
+long tentacles a cluster of small, simple, unarmed suckers may be
+observed at the base of the expanded part. When these latter suckers are
+applied to one another the tentacles are securely locked together at
+that part, and the united strength of both the elongated peduncles can
+be applied to drag towards the mouth any resisting object which has been
+grappled by the terminal hooks. There is no mechanical contrivance which
+surpasses this structure; art has remotely imitated it in the
+fabrication of the obstetrical forceps, in which either blade can be
+used separately, or, by the inter-locking of a temporary blade, be made
+to act in combination."
+
+The cephalopods obtain and eat their food very much like the rapacious
+birds. They are the falcons of the sea. Some of them, like
+_Onychoteuthis_, strike their prey with talons and suckers also, others
+lay hold of it with suckers alone; but they all tear the flesh with
+their beaks, and swallow and digest their food in the same manner as the
+hawk or vulture.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 4.--HOOKED TENTACLES OF _Onychoteuthis_.]
+
+The _Sepia_, the owner of the broad, flattened bone, has a decided
+predilection for the vicinity of the shore, and for comparatively
+shallow water. It there attaches its grape-like eggs to some convenient
+stone or growing alga, and delights occasionally to sink to the bottom,
+and there to rest half covered by the sand, a habit for which the form
+of its body is well adapted. But the calamaries--they of the horny
+pen--prefer the wide waters of the open ocean; and although they, too,
+especially the smaller species, are common upon the coasts, they are
+frequently met with far out at sea, and away from any land. The
+elongated and almost arrow-like shape of their bodies enables them to
+glide through the water with great rapidity, and the momentum exerted by
+a vigorous out-rush from their syphon-tube is sometimes so great that
+when the opposite pressure thus produced is so exerted as to cause them
+to take an upward direction they leap out of the water to so great a
+height as to fall on the decks of ships; and are, therefore, called by
+sailors, "flying squids." Their spawn is very different from that of
+either octopus, or sepia. It consists of dozens of semi-transparent,
+gelatinous, slender, cylindrical sheaths, about four or five inches
+long, each containing many ova imbedded in it (making a total number of
+about 40,000 embryos), all springing from a common centre and resembling
+a mop without a handle. I have never seen any of these "sea-mops"
+attached to anything, and the pelagic habits of the calamaries render it
+probable that they are left floating on the surface of the sea.
+
+Having made ourselves acquainted with the structure and habits of these
+three divisions of the eight-footed and ten-footed mollusks, let us take
+evidence as to the size to which they are respectively known to attain,
+and the degree in which they may be regarded as dangerous to man.
+
+An octopus from our own coasts having arms two feet in length may be
+considered a rather large specimen; and Dr. J. E. Gray, who was always
+most kindly ready to place at the disposal of any sincere inquirer the
+vast store of knowledge laid up in his wonderful memory, told me that
+"there is not one in the British Museum which exceeds this size, or
+which would not go into a quart pot--body, arms and all." The largest
+British specimen I have hitherto seen had arms 2 ft. 6 in. long. We have
+sufficient evidence, however, that it exceeds this in the South of
+France, and along the Spanish and Italian coasts of the Mediterranean;
+and my deceased friend John Keast Lord tells us in his book, 'The
+Naturalist in British Columbia,' that he saw and measured, in
+Vancouver's Island, an octopus which had arms five feet long.
+
+I have often been asked whether an octopus of the ordinary size can
+really be dangerous to bathers. Decidedly, "Yes," in certain situations.
+The holding power of its numerous suckers is enormous. It is almost
+impossible forcibly to detach it from its adhesion to a rock or the flat
+bottom of a tank; and if a large one happened to fix one or more of its
+strong, tough arms on the leg of a swimmer whilst the others held firmly
+to a rock, I doubt if the man could disengage himself under water by
+mere strength, before being exhausted. Fortunately the octopus can be
+made to relax its hold by grasping it tightly round the "throat" (if I
+may so call it), and it may be well that this should be known.
+
+That men are occasionally drowned by these creatures is, unhappily, a
+fact too well attested. I have elsewhere[8] related several instances of
+this having occurred. Omitting those, I will give two or three others
+which have since come under my notice. Sir Grenville Temple, in his
+'Excursions in the Mediterranean Sea,' tells how a Sardinian captain,
+whilst bathing at Jerbeh, was seized and drowned by an octopus. When his
+body was found, his limbs were bound together by the arms of the animal;
+and this took place in water only four feet deep.
+
+  [8] See 'The Octopus; or, the Devil-fish of Fiction and of Fact.'
+  1873. Chapman and Hall.
+
+Mr. J. K. Lord's account of the formidable strength of these creatures
+in Oregon is confirmed by an incident recorded in the _Weekly Oregonian_
+(the principal paper of Oregon) of October 6th, 1877. A few days before
+that date an Indian woman, whilst bathing, was held beneath the surface
+by an octopus, and drowned. The body was discovered on the following day
+in the horrid embrace of the creature. Indians dived down and with their
+knives severed the arms of the octopus and recovered the corpse.
+
+Mr. Clemens Laming, in his book, 'The French in Algiers,' writes:--"The
+soldiers were in the habit of bathing in the sea every evening, and from
+time to time several of them disappeared--no one knew how. Bathing was,
+in consequence, strictly forbidden; in spite of which several men went
+into the water one evening. Suddenly one of them screamed for help, and
+when several others rushed to his assistance they found that an octopus
+had seized him by the leg by four of its arms whilst it clung to the
+rock with the rest. The soldiers brought the 'monster' home with them,
+and out of revenge they boiled it alive and ate it. This adventure
+accounted for the disappearance of the other soldiers."
+
+The Rev. W. Wyatt Gill, who for more than a quarter of a century has
+resided as a missionary amongst the inhabitants of the Hervey Islands,
+and with whom I had the pleasure of conversing on this subject when he
+was in England in 1875, described in the _Leisure Hour_ of April 20th,
+1872, another mode of attack by which an octopus might deprive a man of
+life. A servant of his went diving for "poulpes" (octopods), leaving his
+son in charge of the canoe. After a short time he rose to the surface,
+his arms free, but his nostrils and mouth completely covered by a large
+octopus. If his son had not promptly torn the living plaister from off
+his face he must have been suffocated--a fate which actually befell some
+years previously a man who foolishly went diving alone.
+
+In _Appleton's American Journal of Science and Art_, January 31st,
+1874, a correspondent describes an attack by an octopus on a diver who
+was at work on the wreck of a sunken steamer off the coast of Florida.
+The man, a powerful Irishman, was helpless in its grasp, and would have
+been drowned if he had not been quickly brought to the surface; for when
+dragged on to the raft from which he had descended, he fainted, and his
+companions were unable to pull the creature from its hold upon him until
+they had dealt it a sharp blow across its baggy body.
+
+A similar incident occurred to the government diver of the colony of
+Victoria, Australia. Whilst pursuing his avocation in the estuary of the
+river Moyne he was seized by an octopus. He killed it by striking it
+with an iron bar, and brought to shore with him a portion of it with the
+arms more than three feet long.
+
+Mr. Laurence Oliphant, in his 'China and Japan,' describes a Japanese
+show, which consisted of "a series of groups of figures carved in wood,
+the size of life, and as cleverly coloured as Madame Tussaud's
+wax-works. One of these was a group of women bathing in the sea. One of
+them had been caught in the folds of a cuttle-fish; the others, in
+alarm, were escaping, leaving their companion to her fate. The
+cuttle-fish was represented on a huge scale, its eyes, eyelids, and
+mouth being made to move simultaneously by a man inside the head."
+
+An attack of this kind is most artistically represented in a small
+Japanese ivory-carving in the possession of Mr. Bartlett, of the
+Zoological Gardens.[9]
+
+  [9] This carving was figured in illustration of an interesting
+  paper by Professor Owen, C.B., F.R.S., &c., "On some new and rare
+  Cephalopoda," in the Transactions of the Zoological Society, April
+  20, 1880.
+
+The Japanese are well acquainted with the octopus; for it is commonly
+depicted on their ornaments, and forms no unimportant item in their
+fisheries.
+
+I have recently had an opportunity of inspecting a most curious
+Japanese book, in the possession of my friend Mr. W. B. Tegetmeier,
+which is chiefly devoted to the representations of the fisheries and
+fish-curing processes of the country. It is in three volumes, and is
+entitled, 'Land and Sea Products,' by Ki Kone. It is evidently ancient,
+for it is slightly worm-eaten, but the plates, each 12 inches by 8
+inches, are full of vigour. Two of these illustrate in a very
+interesting manner the subject before us, and by the kindness of Mr.
+Tegetmeier I am able to give facsimiles of them, which appeared with an
+article by him on this book, in the _Field_ of March 14th, 1874. Fig. 5
+represents a fisherman in a boat out at sea: a gigantic octopus has
+thrown one of its arms over the side of the boat; the man, who is alone,
+has started forward from the stern of the boat, and has succeeded, by
+means of a large knife attached to a long handle, in lopping off the
+dangerous limb of his enemy. As Mr. Tegetmeier says, "From the extreme
+matter of fact manner in which all these engravings are made, and the
+total absence of exaggeration in any other representation, I cannot but
+regard the relative sizes of the man, the boat, and the octopus, as
+correctly given, in which case we have evidence of the existence of
+gigantic cephalopods in Japanese waters." The only doubt I have is
+whether the fisherman correctly described his assailant as an octopus,
+and whether it was not a calamary. Fig. 6 is a vivid picture of a
+fishmonger's shop in a market, under the awning of which may be seen two
+arms of a gigantic cuttle hung up for sale as food. These are evidently
+of most unusual size, judging from the action of the lookers on; the one
+to the left, with a tall stand or case on his back, like a Parisian
+cocoa-vendor, is holding out his hand in mute astonishment; whilst the
+attention of the smaller personage in the right-hand corner is directed
+to the suspended arms of the cuttle by the man nearest to him, who is
+pointing to them with upraised hand. In another plate in this most
+interesting work a Japanese mode of fishing for cuttles is delineated. A
+man in a boat is tossing crabs, one at a time, into the sea, and when a
+cuttle rises at the bait he spears it with a trident and tosses it into
+the boat.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 5.--JAPANESE FISHERMAN ATTACKED BY A CUTTLE.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 6.--ARMS OF A GREAT CUTTLE EXHIBITED IN A JAPANESE
+FISHMONGER'S SHOP.]
+
+The octopus, therefore, though not abundant on our own coasts, is found
+in every sea in the temperate zone; and in so far as that it secretes an
+ink with which it can render the water turbid, and has many radiating
+arms with which it can seize and drown a man, it possesses certain
+attributes of the Kraken; but we have no authentic knowledge of its ever
+attaining to greater dimensions than I have stated, nor does it bask on
+the surface of the sea. It is not amongst the _Octopidæ_ therefore that
+we must look for a solution of the mystery.
+
+The basking condition is fulfilled by the _Sepia_; and its flattened
+back, supported and rendered hard and firm to the touch by the
+calcareous _sepiostaire_ beneath the skin, is broader in proportion than
+that of the octopus or the squid. Thus _Sepia_ might pass as a
+microscopic miniature of the great Scandinavian monster. But it lacks
+the character of size. We have no reason to believe that any true
+_Sepia_ exists, as the family is now understood, that has a body more
+than eighteen inches long. If it were otherwise it would be more likely
+to be known of this family than of its relatives, for its lightly
+constructed and well known "cuttle-bone" would float on the surface for
+many weeks after the death of its owner, and large specimens of it would
+be seen and recognised from passing ships.
+
+As we can find no species of the _Octopidæ_ or _Sepiidæ_ which can
+furnish a pretext for the stories told of the Kraken, we must try to
+ascertain how far a similitude to it may be traced in the third family
+we have discussed, the _Teuthidæ_.
+
+The belief in the existence of gigantic cuttles is an ancient one.
+Aristotle mentions it, and Pliny tells of an enormous polypus which at
+Carteia, in Grenada--an old and important Roman colony near
+Gibraltar--used to come out of the sea at night, and carry off and
+devour salted tunnies from the curing depots on the shore; and adds that
+when it was at last killed, the head of it (they used to call the body
+the head, because in swimming it goes in advance) was found to weigh 700
+lbs. Ælian records a similar incident, and describes his monster as
+crushing in its arms the barrels of salt fish to get at the contents.
+These two must have been octopods if they were anything; the word
+"polypus" thus especially designates it, and moreover, the free-swimming
+cuttles and squids would be helpless if stranded on the shore. Some of
+the old writers seem to have aimed rather at making their histories
+sensational than at carefully investigating the credibility or the
+contrary of the highly coloured reports brought to them. These were, of
+course, gross exaggerations, but there was generally a substratum of
+truth in them. They were based on the rare occurrence of specimens,
+smaller certainly, but still enormous, of some known species, and in
+most cases the worst that can be said of their authors is that they were
+culpably careless and foolishly credulous.
+
+Unhappily so lenient a judgment cannot be passed on some comparatively
+recent writers. Denys de Montfort, half a century later than
+Pontoppidan, not only professed to believe in the Kraken, but also in
+the existence of another gigantic animal distinct from it; a colossal
+_poulpe_, or octopus, compared with which Pliny's was a mere pigmy. In a
+drawing fitter to decorate the outside of a showman's caravan at a fair
+than seriously to illustrate a work on natural history,[10] he depicted
+this tremendous cuttle as throwing its arms over a three masted vessel,
+snapping off its masts, tearing down the yards, and on the point of
+dragging it to the bottom, if the crew had not succeeded in cutting off
+its immense limbs with cutlasses and hatchets. De Montfort had good
+opportunities of obtaining information, for he was at one time an
+assistant in the geological department of the Museum of Natural History,
+in Paris; and wrote a work on conchology,[11] besides that already
+referred to. But it appears to have been his deliberate purpose to
+cajole the public; for it is reported that he exclaimed to M. Defrance:
+"If my entangled ship is accepted, I will make my 'colossal poulpe'
+overthrow a whole fleet." Accordingly we find him gravely declaring[12]
+that one of the great victories of the British navy was converted into a
+disaster by the monsters which are the subject of his history. He boldly
+asserted that the six men-of-war captured from the French by Admiral
+Rodney in the West Indies on the 12th of April, 1782, together with four
+British ships detached from his fleet to convoy the prizes, were all
+suddenly engulphed in the waves on the night of the battle under such
+circumstances as showed that the catastrophe was caused by colossal
+cuttles, and not by a gale or any ordinary casualty.
+
+  [10] 'Histoire Naturelle générale et particulière des Mollusques,'
+  vol. ii., p. 256.
+
+  [11] 'Conchyliologie Systématique.'
+
+  [12] 'Hist. Nat. des Moll.,' vol. ii., pp. 358 to 368.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 7.--FACSIMILE OF DE MONTFORT'S "_Poulpe colossal_."]
+
+Unfortunately for De Montfort, the inexorable logic of facts not only
+annihilates his startling theory, but demonstrates the reckless falsity
+of his plausible statements. The captured vessels did not sink on the
+night of the action, but were all sent to Jamaica to refit, and arrived
+there safely. Five months afterwards, however, a convoy of nine
+line-of-battle ships (amongst which were Rodney's prizes), one frigate,
+and about a hundred merchantmen, were dispersed, whilst on their voyage
+to England, by a violent storm, during which some of them unfortunately
+foundered. The various accidents which preceded the loss of these
+vessels was related in evidence to the Admiralty by the survivors, and
+official documents prove that De Montfort's fleet-destroying _poulpe_
+was an invention of his own, and had no part whatever in the disaster
+that he attributed to it.
+
+I have been told, but cannot vouch for the truth of the report, that De
+Montfort's propensity to write that which was not true culminated in his
+committing forgery, and that he died in the galleys. But he records a
+statement of Captain Jean Magnus Dens, said to have been a respectable
+and veracious man, who, after having made several voyages to China as a
+master trader, retired from a seafaring life and lived at Dunkirk. He
+told De Montfort that in one of his voyages, whilst crossing from St.
+Helena to Cape Negro, he was becalmed, and took advantage of the
+enforced idleness of the crew to have the vessel scraped and painted.
+Whilst three of his men were standing on planks slung over the side, an
+enormous cuttle rose from the water, and threw one of its arms around
+two of the sailors, whom it tore away, with the scaffolding on which
+they stood. With another arm it seized the third man, who held on
+tightly to the rigging, and shouted for help. His shipmates ran to his
+assistance, and succeeded in rescuing him by cutting away the creature's
+arm with axes and knives, but he died delirious on the following night.
+The captain tried to save the other two sailors by killing the animal,
+and drove several harpoons into it; but they broke away, and the men
+were carried down by the monster.
+
+The arm cut off was said to have been twenty-five feet long, and as
+thick as the mizen-yard, and to have had on it suckers as big as
+saucepan-lids. I believe the old sea-captain's narrative of the incident
+to be true; the dimensions given by De Montfort are wilfully and
+deliberately false. The belief in the power of the cuttle to sink a ship
+and devour her crew is as widely spread over the surface of the globe,
+as it is ancient in point of time. I have been told by a friend that he
+saw in a shop in China a picture of a cuttle embracing a junk,
+apparently of about 300 tons burthen, and helping itself to the sailors,
+as one picks gooseberries off a bush.
+
+Traditions of a monstrous cuttle attacking and destroying ships are
+current also at the present day in the Polynesian Islands. Mr. Gill, the
+missionary previously quoted, tells us[13] that the natives of Aitutaki,
+in the Hervey group, have a legend of a famous explorer, named Rata, who
+built a double canoe, decked and rigged it, and then started off in
+quest of adventures. At the prow was stationed the dauntless Nganaoa,
+armed with a long spear and ready to slay all monsters. One day when
+speeding pleasantly over the ocean, the voice of the ever vigilant
+Nganaoa was heard: "O Rata! yonder is a terrible enemy starting up from
+ocean depths." It proved to be an octopus (query, squid?) of
+extraordinary dimensions. Its huge tentacles encircled the vessel in
+their embrace, threatening its instant destruction. At this critical
+moment Nganaoa seized his spear, and fearlessly drove it through the
+head of the creature. The tentacles slowly relaxed, and the dead monster
+floated off on the surface of the ocean.
+
+  [13] _Leisure Hour_, October, 1875, p. 636.
+
+Passing from the early records of the appearance of cuttles of unusual
+size, and the current as well as the traditional belief in their
+existence by the inhabitants of many countries, let us take the
+testimony of travellers and naturalists who have a right to be regarded
+as competent observers. In so doing we must bear in mind that until
+Professor Owen propounded the very clear and convenient classification
+now universally adopted, the squids, as well as the eight-footed
+_Octopidæ_, were all grouped under the title of _Sepia_.
+
+Pernetty, describing a voyage made by him in the years 1763-4,[14]
+mentions gigantic cuttles met with in the Southern Seas.
+
+  [14] 'Voyage aux Iles Malouines.'
+
+Shortly afterwards, during the first week in March 1769, Banks and
+Solander, the scientific fellow-voyagers with Lieutenant Cook
+(afterwards the celebrated Captain Cook), in H.M.S. _Endeavour_, found
+in the North Pacific, in latitude 38° 44Ž S. and longitude 110° 33Ž W.,
+a large calamary which had just been killed by the birds, and was
+floating in a mangled condition on the water. Its arms were furnished,
+instead of suckers, with a double row of very sharp talons, which
+resembled those of a cat, and, like them, were retractable into a sheath
+of skin from which they might be thrust at pleasure. Of this cuttle they
+say, with evident pleasurable remembrance of a savoury meal, they made
+one of the best soups they ever tasted. Professor Owen tells us, in the
+paper already referred to, that when he was curator of the Hunterian
+Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and preparing, in 1829, his
+first catalogue thereof, he was struck with the number of oceanic
+invertebrates which Hunter had obtained. He learned from Mr. Clift that
+Hunter had supplied Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks with stoppered
+bottles containing alcohol, in which to preserve the new marine animals
+that he might meet with during the circumnavigatory voyage about to be
+undertaken by Cook. Thinking it probable that Banks might have stowed
+some parts of this great hook-armed squid in one of these bottles for
+his anatomical friend, he searched for, and found in a bottle marked
+"J. B.," portions of its arms, the beak with tongue, a heart ventricle,
+&c., and, amongst the dry preparations, the terminal part of the body,
+with an attached pair of rhomboidal fins. The remainder had furnished
+Cook and his companions Banks and Solander with a welcome change of diet
+in the commander's cabin of the _Endeavour_. As the inner surface of the
+arms of the squid, as well as the terminals of its tentacles, were
+studded with hooks, Professor Owen named it _Enoploteuthis Cookii_. He
+estimates the diameter of the tail fin at 15 inches, the length of its
+body 3 feet, of its head 10 inches, of the shorter arms 16 inches, and
+of the longer tentacles about the same as its body--thus giving a total
+length of about 6 ft. 9 in. Although individuals of other species, of
+larger dimensions, are known to have existed, this is the largest
+specimen of the hook-armed calamaries that has been scientifically
+examined. It would have been a formidable antagonist to a man under
+circumstances favourable to the exertion of its strength, and the use of
+its prehensile and lacerating talons.
+
+Peron,[15] the well-known French zoologist, mentions having seen at sea,
+in 1801, not far from Van Diemen's Land, at a very little distance from
+his ship, _Le Géographe_, a "Sepia," of the size of a barrel, rolling
+with noise on the waves; its arms, between 6 and 7 feet long, and 6 or 7
+inches in diameter at the base, extended on the surface, and writhing
+about like great snakes. He recognised in this, and no doubt correctly,
+one of the calamaries. The arms that he saw were evidently the animal's
+shorter ones, as under such circumstances, with neither enemy to combat
+nor prey to seize at the moment, the longer tentacles would remain
+concealed.
+
+  [15] 'Voyage de Découvertes aux Terres Australes.'
+
+Quoy and Gaimard[16] report that in the Atlantic Ocean, near the
+Equator, they found the remains of an enormous calamary, half eaten by
+the sharks and birds, which could not have weighed less, when entire,
+than 200 lbs. A portion of this was secured, and is preserved in the
+Museum of Natural History, Paris.
+
+  [16] 'Voyage de l'Uranie: Zoologie,' vol. i., part 2, p. 411. 1824.
+
+Captain Sander Rang[17] records having fallen in with, in mid-ocean, a
+species distinct from the others, of a dark red colour, having short
+arms, and a body the size of a hogshead.
+
+  [17] 'Manuel des Mollusques,' p. 86.
+
+In a manuscript by Paulsen (referred to by Professor Steenstrup, at a
+meeting of Scandinavian naturalists at Copenhagen in 1847) is a
+description of a large calamary, cast ashore on the coast of Zeeland,
+which the latter named _Architeuthis monachus_. Its body measured 21
+feet, and its tentacles 18 feet, making a total of 39 feet.
+
+In 1854 another was stranded at the Skag in Jutland, which Professor
+Steenstrup believed to belong to the same genus as the preceding, but to
+be of a different species, and called it _Architeuthis dux_. The body
+was cut in pieces by the fishermen for bait, and furnished many
+wheelbarrow loads. Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys[18] says Dr. Mörch informed him
+that the beak of this animal was nine inches long. He adds that another
+huge cephalopod was stranded in 1860 or 1861, between Hillswick and
+Scalloway, on the west of Shetland. From a communication received by
+Professor Allman, it appears that its tentacles were 16 feet long, the
+pedal arms about half that length, and the mantle sac 7 feet. The
+largest suckers examined by Professor Allman were three-quarters of an
+inch in diameter.
+
+  [18] 'British Conchology,' vol. v., p. 124.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 8.--GIGANTIC CALAMARY CAUGHT BY THE FRENCH DESPATCH
+VESSEL 'ALECTON,' NEAR TENERIFFE.]
+
+We have also the statement of the officers and crew of the French
+despatch steamer, _Alecton_, commanded by Lieutenant Bouyer, describing
+their having met with a great calamary on the 30th of November, 1861,
+between Madeira and Teneriffe. It was seen about noon on that day
+floating on the surface of the water, and the vessel was stopped with a
+view to its capture. Many bullets were aimed at it, but they passed
+through its soft flesh without doing it much injury, until at length
+"the waves were observed to be covered with foam and blood." It had
+probably discharged the contents of its ink-bag; for a strong odour of
+musk immediately became perceptible--a perfume which I have already
+mentioned as appertaining to the ink of many of the cephalopoda, and
+also as being one of the reputed attributes of the Kraken. Harpoons were
+thrust into it, but would not hold in the yielding flesh; and the animal
+broke adrift from them, and, diving beneath the vessel, came up on the
+other side. The crew wished to launch a boat that they might attack it
+at closer quarters, but the commander forbade this, not feeling
+justified in risking the lives of his men. A rope with a running knot
+was, however, slipped over it, and held fast at the junction of the
+broad caudal fin; but when an attempt was made to hoist it on deck the
+enormous weight caused the rope to cut through the flesh, and all but
+the hinder part of the body fell back into the sea and disappeared. M.
+Berthelot, the French consul at Teneriffe, saw the fin and posterior
+portion of the animal on board the _Alecton_ ten days afterwards, and
+sent a report of the occurrence to the Paris Academy of Sciences. The
+body of this great squid, which, like Rang's specimen, was of a deep-red
+colour, was estimated to have been from 16 feet to 18 feet long, without
+reckoning the length of its formidable arms.[19]
+
+  [19] In the accompanying illustration, the size of the squid is
+  exaggerated, but not so much as has been supposed.
+
+These are statements made by men who, by their intelligence, character,
+and position, are entitled to respect and credence; and whose evidence
+would be accepted without question or hesitation in any court of law.
+There is, moreover, a remarkable coincidence of particulars in their
+several accounts, which gives great importance to their combined
+testimony.
+
+But, fortunately, we are not left dependent on documentary evidence
+alone, nor with the option of accepting or rejecting, as caprice or
+prejudice may prompt us, the narratives of those who have told us they
+have seen what we have not. Portions of cuttles of extraordinary size
+are preserved in several European museums. In the collection of the
+Faculty of Sciences at Montpellier is one six feet long, taken by
+fishermen at Cette, which Professor Steenstrup has identified as
+_Ommastrephes pteropus_. One of the same species, which was formerly in
+the possession of M. Eschricht, who received it from Marseilles, may be
+seen in the museum at Copenhagen. The body of another, analogous to
+these, is exhibited in the Museum of Trieste: it was taken on the coast
+of Dalmatia. At the meeting of the British Association at Plymouth in
+1841, Colonel Smith exhibited drawings of the beak and other parts of a
+very large calamary preserved at Haarlem; and M. P. Harting, in 1860,
+described in the Memoirs of the Royal Scientific Academy of Amsterdam
+portions of two extant in other collections in Holland, one of which he
+believes to be Steenstrup's _Architeuthis dux_, a species which he
+regards as identical with _Ommastrephes todarus_ of D'Orbigny.
+
+Still there remained a residuum of doubt in the minds of naturalists
+and the public concerning the existence of gigantic cuttles until,
+towards the close of the year 1873, two specimens were encountered on
+the coast of Newfoundland, and a portion of one and the whole of the
+other, were brought ashore, and preserved for examination by competent
+zoologists.
+
+The circumstances under which the first was seen, as sensationally
+described by the Rev. M. Harvey, Presbyterian minister of St. John's,
+Newfoundland, in a letter to Principal Dawson, of McGill College, were,
+briefly and soberly, as follows:--Two fishermen were out in a small punt
+on the 26th of October, 1873, near the eastern end of Belle Isle,
+Conception Bay, about nine miles from St. John's. Observing some object
+floating on the water at a short distance, they rowed towards it,
+supposing it to be the _débris_ of a wreck. On reaching it one of them
+struck it with his "gaff," when immediately it showed signs of life, and
+shot out its two tentacular arms, as if to seize its antagonists. The
+other man, named Theophilus Picot, though naturally alarmed, severed
+both arms with an axe as they lay on the gunwale of the boat, whereupon
+the animal moved off, and ejected a quantity of inky fluid which
+darkened the surrounding water for a considerable distance. The men went
+home, and, as fishermen will, magnified their lost "fish." They
+"estimated" the body to have been 60 feet in length, and 10 feet across
+the tail fin; and declared that when the "fish" attacked them "it reared
+a parrot-like beak which was as big as a six-gallon keg."
+
+All this, in the excitement of the moment, Mr. Harvey appears to have
+been willing to believe, and related without the expression of a doubt.
+Fortunately, he was able to obtain from the fishermen a portion of one
+of the tentacular arms which they had chopped off with the axe, and by
+so doing rendered good service to science. This fragment (Fig. 9), as
+measured by Mr. Alexander Murray, provincial geologist of Newfoundland,
+and Professor Verrill, of Yale College, Connecticut, is 17 feet long and
+3œ feet in circumference. It is now in St. John's Museum. By careful
+calculation of its girth, the breadth and circumference of the expanded
+sucker-bearing portion at its extremity, and the diameter of the
+suckers, Professor Verrill has computed its dimensions to have been as
+follows:--Length of body 10 feet; diameter of body 2 feet 5 inches. Long
+tentacular arms 32 feet; head 2 feet; total length about 44 feet. The
+upper mandible of the beak, instead of being "as large as a six-gallon
+keg" would be about 3 inches long, and the lower mandible 1œ inch
+long. From the size of the large suckers relatively to those of another
+specimen to be presently described, he regards it as probable that this
+individual was a female.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 9.--TENTACLE OF A GREAT CALAMARY (_Architeuthis
+princeps_) TAKEN IN CONCEPTION BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, OCT. 26, 1873.]
+
+In November, 1873--about three weeks after the occurrence in Conception
+Bay--another calamary somewhat smaller than the preceding, but of the
+same species, also came into Mr. Harvey's possession. Three fishermen,
+when hauling their herring-net in Logie Bay, about three miles from St.
+John's, found the huge animal entangled in its folds. With great
+difficulty they succeeded in despatching it and bringing it ashore,
+having been compelled to cut off its head before they could get it into
+their boat.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 10.--HEAD AND TENTACLES OF A GREAT CALAMARY
+(_Architeuthis princeps_) TAKEN IN LOGIE BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, NOV. 1873.]
+
+The body of this specimen was over 7 feet long; the caudal fin 22
+inches broad; the two long tentacular arms 24 feet in length; the eight
+shorter arms each 6 feet long, the largest of the latter being 10 inches
+in circumference at the base; total length of this calamary 32 feet.
+Professor Verrill considers that this and the Conception Bay squid are
+both referable to one species--Steenstrup's _Architeuthis dux_.
+
+Excellent woodcuts from photographs of these two specimens were given in
+the _Field_ of December 13th, 1873, and January 31st, 1874,
+respectively, and I am indebted to the proprietors of that journal for
+their kind and courteous permission to copy them in reduced size for the
+illustration of this little work.
+
+For the preservation of both of the above described specimens we have to
+thank Mr. Harvey, and he produces additional evidence of other gigantic
+cuttles having been previously seen on the coast of Newfoundland. He
+mentions two especially, which, as stated by the Rev. Mr. Gabriel, were
+cast ashore in the winter of 1870-71, near Lamaline on the south coast
+of the island, which measured respectively 40 feet and 47 feet in
+length; and he also tells of another stranded two years later, the total
+length of which was 80 feet.
+
+In the _American Journal of Science and Arts_, of March 1875, Professor
+Verrill gives particulars and authenticated testimony of several other
+examples of great calamaries, varying in total length from 30 feet to 52
+feet, which have been taken in the neighbourhood of Newfoundland since
+the year 1870. One of these was found floating, apparently dead, near
+the Grand Banks in October 1871, by Captain Campbell, of the schooner
+_B. D. Hoskins_, of Gloucester, Mass. It was taken on board, and part of
+it used for bait. The body is stated to have been 15 feet long, and the
+pedal or shorter arms between 9 feet and 10 feet. The beak was forwarded
+to the Smithsonian Institution.
+
+Another instance given by Professor Verrill is of a great squid found
+alive in shallow water in Coomb's Cove, Fortune Bay, in the year 1872.
+Its measurements, taken by the Hon. T. R. Bennett, of English Harbour,
+Newfoundland, were, length of body 10 feet; length of tentacle 42 feet;
+length of one of the ordinary arms 6 feet: the cups on the tentacles
+were serrated. Professor Verrill also mentions a pair of jaws and two
+suckers in the Smithsonian Institution, as having been received from the
+Rev. A. Munn, with a statement that they were taken from a calamary
+which went ashore in Bonavista Bay, and which measured 32 feet in total
+length.
+
+On the 22nd of September, 1877, another gigantic squid was stranded at
+Catalina, on the north shore of Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, during a
+heavy equinoctial gale. It was alive when first seen, but died soon
+after the ebbing of the tide, and was left high and dry upon the beach.
+Two fishermen took possession of it, and the whole settlement gathered
+to gaze in astonishment at the monster. Formerly it would have been
+converted into manure, or cut up as food for dogs, but, thanks to the
+diffusion of intelligence, there were some persons in Catalina who knew
+the importance of preserving such a rarity, and who advised the
+fishermen to take it to St. John's. After being exhibited there for two
+days, it was packed in half-a-ton of ice in readiness for transmission
+to Professor Verrill, in the hope that it would be placed in the Peabody
+or Smithsonian Museum; but at the last moment its owners violated their
+agreement, and sold it to a higher bidder. The final purchase was made
+for the New York Aquarium, where it arrived on the 7th of October,
+immersed in methylated spirit in a large glass tank. Its measurements
+were as follows:--length of body 10 feet; length of tentacles 30 feet;
+length of shorter arm 11 feet; circumference of body 7 feet; breadth of
+caudal fin 2 feet 9 inches; diameter of largest tentacular sucker 1
+inch; number of suckers on each of the shorter arms 250.
+
+The appearance of so many of these great squids on the shores of
+Newfoundland during the term of seven years, and after so long a period
+of popular uncertainty as to their very existence had previously
+elapsed, might lead one to suppose that the waters of the North Atlantic
+Ocean which wash the north-eastern coasts of the American Continent
+were, at any rate, temporarily, their principal habitat, especially as a
+smaller member of their family, _Ommastrephes sagittatus_, is there
+found in such extraordinary numbers that it furnishes the greater part
+of the bait used in the Newfoundland cod fisheries. But that they are by
+no means confined to this locality is proved by recent instances, as
+well as by those already cited.
+
+Dr. F. Hilgendorf records[20] observations of a huge squid exhibited for
+money at Yedo, Japan, in 1873, and of another of similar size, which he
+saw exposed for sale in the Yedo fish market.
+
+  [20] 'Sitzungsberichte der Gesellschaft naturforschender Freunde zu
+  Berlin,' pp. 65-67, quoted by Professor Owen, _op. cit._
+
+When the French expedition was sent to the Island of St. Paul, in 1874,
+for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus, which occurred on the
+9th of December in that year, it was fortunately accompanied by an able
+zoologist, M. Ch. Velain. He reports[21] that on the 2nd of November a
+tidal wave cast upon the north shore of the island a great calamary
+which measured in total length nearly 23 feet, namely: length of body 7
+feet; length of tentacles 16 feet. There are several points of interest
+connected with its generic characters, and M. Velain's grounds for
+regarding it as being of a previously unknown species, but they are too
+technical for discussion here. This specimen was photographed as it lay
+upon the beach by M. Cazin, the photographer to the expedition.
+
+  [21] 'Comptes Rendus,' t. 80, 1875, p. 998.
+
+The following account of the still more recent capture of a large squid
+off the west coast of Ireland was given in the _Zoologist_ of June 1875,
+by Sergeant Thomas O'Connor, of the Royal Irish Constabulary:--
+
+     "On the 26th of April, 1875, a very large calamary was met with on
+     the north-west of Boffin Island, Connemara. The crew of a 'curragh'
+     (a boat made like the 'coracle,' with wooden ribs covered with
+     tarred canvas) observed to seaward a large floating mass,
+     surrounded by gulls. They pulled out to it, believing it to be
+     wreck, but to their astonishment found it was an enormous
+     cuttle-fish, lying perfectly still, as if basking on the surface of
+     the water. Paddling up with caution, they lopped off one of its
+     arms. The animal immediately set out to sea, rushing through the
+     water at a tremendous pace. The men gave chase, and, after a hard
+     pull in their frail canvas craft, came up with it, five miles out
+     in the open Atlantic, and severed another of its arms and the head.
+     These portions are now in the Dublin Museum. The shorter arms
+     measure, each, eight feet in length, and fifteen inches round the
+     base: the tentacular arms are said to have been thirty feet long.
+     The body sank."
+
+Finally, there is in our own national collection, preserved in spirit
+in a tall glass jar, a single arm of a huge cephalopod, which, by the
+kindness and courtesy of the officers of the department, I was permitted
+to examine and measure when I first described it, in May, 1873. It is 9
+feet long, and 12 inches in circumference at the base, tapering
+gradually to a fine point. It has about 300 suckers, pedunculated, or
+set on tubular footstalks, placed alternately in two rows, and having
+serrated, horny rings, but no hooks; the diameter of the largest of
+these rings is half an inch; the smallest is not larger than a pin's
+head. This is one of the eight shorter, or pedal, and not one of the
+long, or tentacular, arms of the calamary to which it belonged. The
+relative length of the arms to that of the body and tentacles varies in
+different genera of the _Teuthidæ_, and it is not impossible that this
+may be the case even in individuals of the same species. But, judging
+from the proportions of known examples, I estimate the length of the
+tentacles at 36 feet, and that of the body at from 10 to 11 feet: total
+length 47 feet. The beak would probably have been about 5 inches long
+from hinge socket to point, and the diameter of the largest suckers of
+the tentacles about 1 inch. So much for De Montfort's "suckers as big as
+saucepan-lids." From a well defined fold of skin which spreads out from
+each margin of that surface of the arm over which the suckers are
+situated, Professor Owen has given to this calamary the generic name of
+_Plectoteuthis_, with the specific title of _grandis_ to indicate its
+enormous size. No history relating to this interesting specimen has been
+preserved. No one knows its origin, nor when it was received, but Dr.
+Gray told me that he believed it came from the east coast of South
+America. It has, however, long formed part of the stores of the British
+Museum, and, although previously open to public view, was more recently
+for many years kept in the basement chambers of the old building in
+Bloomsbury, which were irreverently called by the initiated "the spirit
+vaults and bottle department," because fishes, mollusca, &c., preserved
+in spirits were there deposited. I hope the public will have greater
+facility of access to it in the new Museum.
+
+Here, then, in our midst, and to be seen by all who ask permission to
+inspect it, is, and has long been, a limb of a great cephalopod capable
+of upsetting a boat, or of hauling a man out of her, or of clutching one
+engaged in scraping a ship's side, and dragging him under water, as
+described by the old master-mariner Magnus Dens. The tough, supple
+tentacles, shot forth with lightning rapidity, would be long enough to
+reach him at a distance of a dozen yards, and strong enough to drag him
+within the grasp of the eight shorter arms, a helpless victim to the
+mandibles of a beak sufficiently powerful to tear him in pieces and
+crush some of his smaller bones. For, once within that dreadful embrace,
+his escape, unaided, would be impossible. The clinging power of this
+_Plectoteuthis_ is so enormously augmented by the additional surface
+given by the expanded folds to the under side of the arms, that I doubt
+if even one of the smaller whales, such as the "White Whale," or the
+"Pilot Whale," could extricate itself from their combined hold, if those
+eight supple, clammy, adhesive arms, each 9 feet long, and 5 inches in
+diameter at the base on the flat under surface, and armed with a battery
+of 2400 suckers, were once fairly lapped around it.
+
+Ought it to surprise us, then, that an uneducated seafaring population,
+such as the fishermen of Fridrichstad, mentioned by Pontoppidan,
+absolutely ignorant of the habits and affinities, and even unacquainted
+with the real external form of such a creature, should exaggerate its
+dimensions and invest it with mystery? All that they knew of it was that
+whilst their friends and neighbours, whom we will call Eric Paulsen,
+Hans Ohlsen, and Olaf Bruhn were out fishing one calm day, a shapeless
+"something" rose just above the surface of the tranquil sea not far from
+their boat. They could see that there was much more of its bulk under
+water, but how far it extended they could not ascertain. Mistrusting its
+appearance, and with foreboding of danger, they were about to get up
+their anchor, when, suddenly, from thirty feet away, a rope was shot on
+board which fastened itself on Hans; he was dragged from amongst them
+towards the strange floating mass; there was a commotion; from the
+foaming sea upreared themselves, as it seemed to Eric and Olaf, several
+writhing serpents, which twined themselves around Hans; and as they
+gazed, helpless, in horror and bewilderment, the monster sank, and with
+a mighty swirl the waters closed for ever over their unfortunate
+companion. The men would naturally hasten home, and describe the
+dreadful incident--their imagination excited by its mysterious nature;
+the tale would spread through the district, losing nothing by
+repetition, and within a week the fabled Kraken would be the result.
+
+The existence, in almost every sea, of calamaries capable of playing
+their part in such a scene has been fully proved, and this vexed
+question of marine zoology set at rest for ever. The "much greater light
+on this subject," which, as Pontoppidan sagaciously foresaw, was
+"reserved for posterity," has been thrown upon it by the discoveries of
+the last few years; and the "further experience which is always the best
+instructor," and which he correctly anticipated would be possessed by
+the "future writers," to whom he bequeathed the completion of his
+"sketch," has been obtained. Viewed by their aid, and seen in the
+clearer atmosphere of our present knowledge, the great sea-monster which
+loomed so indefinitely vast in the mist of ignorance and superstition,
+stands revealed in its true form and proportions--its magnitude reduced,
+its outline distinct, and its mystery gone--and we recognise in the
+supposed Kraken, as the Norwegian bishop rightly conjectured that we
+should, an animal "of the Polypus (or cuttle) kind, and amongst the
+largest inhabitants of the ocean."
+
+
+
+
+THE GREAT SEA SERPENT.
+
+
+The belief in the existence of sea-serpents of formidable dimensions is
+of great antiquity. Aristotle, writing about B.C. 340, says[22]:--"The
+serpents of Libya are of an enormous size. Navigators along that coast
+report having seen a great quantity of bones of oxen, which they
+believe, without doubt, to have been devoured by the serpents. These
+serpents pursued them when they left the shore, and upset one of their
+triremes"--a vessel of a large class, having three banks of oars.
+
+  [22] 'History of Animals,' book 8, chap. 28.
+
+Pliny tells us[23] that a squadron sent by Alexander the Great on a
+voyage of discovery, under the command of Onesicritus and Nearchus,
+encountered, in the neighbourhood of some islands in the Persian Gulf,
+sea-serpents thirty feet long, which filled the fleet with terror.
+
+  [23] 'Naturalis Historiæ,' Lib. vi., cap. 23.
+
+Valerius Maximus,[24] quoting Livy, describes the alarm into which,
+during the Punic wars, the Romans, under Attilius Regulus (who was
+afterwards so cruelly put to death by the Carthaginians), were thrown by
+an aquatic, though not marine, serpent which had its lair on the banks
+of the Bagrados, near Ithaca. It is said to have swallowed many of the
+soldiers, after crushing them in its folds, and to have kept the army
+from crossing the river, till at length, being invulnerable by ordinary
+weapons, it was destroyed by heavy stones hurled by balistas, catapults,
+and other military engines used in those days for casting heavy
+missiles, and battering the walls of fortified towns. According to the
+historian, the annoyance caused by it to the army did not cease with its
+death, for the water was polluted with its gore, and the air with the
+noxious fumes from its corrupted carcase, to such a degree that the
+Romans were obliged to remove their camp. They, however secured the
+animal's skin and skull, which were preserved in a temple at Rome till
+the time of the Numantine war. This combat has been described, to the
+same effect, by Florus (lib. ii.), Seneca (litt. 82), Silvius Italicus
+(l. vi.), Aulus Gellius (lib. vi., cap. 3), Orosius, Zonaras, &c., and
+is referred to by Pliny (lib. viii., cap. 14) as an incident known to
+every one. Diodorus Siculus also tells of a great serpent, sixty feet
+long, which lived chiefly in the water, but landed at frequent intervals
+to devour the cattle in its neighbourhood. A party was collected to
+capture it; but their first attempt failed, and the monster killed
+twenty of them. It was afterwards taken in a strong net, carried alive
+to Alexandria, and presented to King Ptolemy II., the founder of the
+Alexandrian Library and Museum, who was a great collector of zoological
+and other curiosities. This snake was probably one of the great boas.
+
+  [24] 'De Factis, Dictisque Memorabilibus,' Lib. i., cap. 8, 1st
+  century.
+
+The "_Serpens marinus_" is figured and referred to by many other
+writers, but as they evidently allude to the Conger and the Murena, we
+will pass over their descriptions.
+
+The sea-serpents mentioned by Aristotle, Pliny, and Diodorus were,
+doubtless, real sea-snakes, true marine ophidians, which are more common
+in tropical seas than is generally supposed. They are found most
+abundantly in the Indian Ocean; but they have an extensive geographical
+range, and between forty and fifty species of them are known. They are
+all highly poisonous, and some are so ferocious that they more
+frequently attack than avoid man. The greatest length to which they are
+authentically known to attain is about twelve feet. The form and
+structure of these _hydrophides_ are modified from those of land
+serpents, to suit their aquatic habits. The tail is compressed
+vertically, flattened from the sides, so as to form a fin like the tail
+of an eel, by which they propel themselves; but instead of tapering to a
+point, it is rounded off at the end, like the blade of a paper-knife, or
+the scabbard of a cavalry sabre. Like other lung-breathing animals which
+live in water, they are also provided with a respiratory apparatus
+adapted to their circumstances and requirements--their nostrils, which
+are very small, being furnished, like those of the seal, manatee, &c.,
+with a valve opening at will to admit air, and closing perfectly to
+exclude water.
+
+Leaving these water-snakes of the tropics, we come, next in order of
+date, upon some very remarkable evidence that there was current amongst
+a community where we should little expect to find it, the idea of a
+marine monster corresponding in many respects with some of the
+descriptions given several centuries later of the sea-serpent. In an
+interesting article on the Catacombs of Rome in the _Illustrated London
+News_ of February 3rd, 1872, allusion is made by the author to the
+collection of sarcophagi or coffins of the early Christians, removed
+from the Catacombs, and preserved in the museum of the Lateran Palace,
+where they were arranged by the late Padre Marchi for Pope Pius IX.
+There are more than twenty of these, sculptured with various
+designs--the Father and the Son, Adam and Eve and the Serpent, the
+Sacrifice of Abraham, Moses striking the Rock, Daniel and the Lions, and
+other Scripture themes. Amongst them also is Jonah and the "whale." A
+facsimile of this sculpture (Fig. 11) is one of the illustrations of the
+article referred to. It will be seen that Jonah is being swallowed feet
+foremost, or possibly being ejected head first, by an enormous sea
+monster, having the chest and fore-legs of a horse, a long arching neck,
+with a mane at its base, near the shoulders, a head like nothing in
+nature, but having hair upon and beneath the cheeks, the hinder portion
+of the body being that of a serpent of prodigious length, undulating in
+several vertical curves. This sculpture appears to have been cut between
+the beginning and the middle of the third century, about A.D. 230, but
+it probably represents a tradition of far greater antiquity.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 11.--JONAH AND THE SEA MONSTER.
+
+_From the Catacombs of Rome._]
+
+We will now consider the accounts given by Scandinavian historians, of
+the sea-serpent having been seen in northern waters. Here, I suppose, I
+ought to indulge in the usual flippant sneer at Bishop Pontoppidan. I
+know that in abstaining from doing so I am sadly out of the fashion; but
+I venture to think that the dead lion has been kicked at too often
+already, and undeservedly. Whether there be, or be not, a huge marine
+animal, not necessarily an ophidian, answering to some of the
+descriptions of the sea-serpent--so called--Pontoppidan did not invent
+the stories told of its appearance. Long before he was born the monster
+had been described and figured; and for centuries previously the
+Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, and Fins had believed in its existence as
+implicitly as in the tenets of their religious creed. Olaus Magnus,
+Archbishop of Upsala, in Sweden, wrote of it in A.D. 1555 as
+follows:[25]--
+
+     "They who in works of navigation on the coasts of Norway employ
+     themselves in fishing or merchandize do all agree in this strange
+     story, that there is a serpent there which is of a vast magnitude,
+     namely 200 foot long, and moreover, 20 foot thick; and is wont to
+     live in rocks and caves toward the sea-coast about Berge: which
+     will go alone from his holes on a clear night in summer, and devour
+     calves, lambs, and hogs, or else he goes into the sea to feed on
+     polypus (octopus), locusts (lobsters), and all sorts of sea-crabs.
+     He hath commonly hair hanging from his neck a cubit long, and sharp
+     scales, and is black, and he hath flaming, shining eyes. This snake
+     disquiets the shippers; and he puts up his head on high like a
+     pillar, and catcheth away men, and he devours them; and this
+     happeneth not but it signifies some wonderful change of the kingdom
+     near at hand; namely, that the princes shall die, or be banished;
+     or some tumultuous wars shall presently follow. There is also
+     another serpent of an incredible magnitude in an island called Moos
+     in the diocess of Hammer; which, as a comet portends a change in
+     all the world, so that portends a change in the kingdom of Norway,
+     as it was seen anno 1522; that lifts himself high above the waters,
+     and rolls himself round like a sphere.[26] This serpent was thought
+     to be fifty cubits long by conjecture, by sight afar off: there
+     followed this the banishment of King Christiernus, and a great
+     persecution of the Bishops; and it shewed also the destruction of
+     the country."
+
+  [25] 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Lib. xxi. cap. 43.
+
+  [26] "Coils itself in spherical convolutions" is a better
+  translation of the original Latin.
+
+The Gothic Archbishop, amongst other signs and omens, also attributes
+this power of divination to the small red ants which are sometimes so
+troublesome in houses, and declares that they also portended the
+downfall, A.D. 1523, of the abominably cruel Danish king, Christian II.,
+above mentioned. His curious work is full of wild improbabilities and
+odd superstitions, most of which he states with a calm air of
+unquestioning assent; but as he wrote in the time of our Henry VIII.,
+long before the belief in witches and warlocks, fairies and banshees,
+had died out in our own country, we can hardly throw stones at him on
+that score. It is a most amusing and interesting history, and gives a
+wonderful insight of the habits and customs of the northern nations in
+his day.
+
+Amongst his illustrations of the sea monsters he describes are the two
+of which I give facsimiles on the next page. In Fig. 12 a sea-serpent is
+seen writhing in many coils upon the surface of the water, and having in
+its mouth a sailor, whom it has seized from the deck of a ship. The poor
+fellow is trying to grasp the ratlins of the shrouds, but is being
+dragged from his hold and lifted over the bulwarks by the monster. His
+companions, in terror, are endeavouring to escape in various directions.
+One is climbing aloft by the stay, in the hope of getting out of reach
+in that way, whilst two others are hurrying aft to obtain the shelter of
+a little castle or cabin projecting over the stern. I am strongly of the
+opinion that this is but the fallacious representation of an actual
+occurrence. Read by the light of recent knowledge, these old pictures
+convey to a practised eye a meaning as clear as that of hieroglyphics to
+an Egyptologist, and my translation of this is the following: The crew
+of a ship have witnessed the dreadful sight of a serpent-like form
+issuing from the sea, rising over the bulwarks of their vessel, seizing
+one of their messmates from amongst them, and dragging him overboard and
+under water. Awe-stricken by the mysterious disappearance of their
+comrade, and too frightened and anxious for their own safety to be able,
+during the short space of time occupied by an affair, which all happened
+in a few seconds, to observe accurately their terrible assailant, they
+naturally conjecture that it must have been a snake. It was probably a
+gigantic calamary, such as we now know exist, and the dead carcases of
+which have been found in the locality where the event depicted is
+supposed to have taken place. The presumed body of the serpent was one
+of the arms of the squid, and the two rows of suckers thereto belonging
+are indicated in the illustration by the medial line traversing its
+whole length (intended to represent a dorsal fin) and the double row of
+transverse septa, one on each side of it.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 12.--A SEA SERPENT SEIZING A MAN ON BOARD SHIP.
+
+_After_ OLAUS MAGNUS.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 13.--A GIGANTIC LOBSTER DRAGGING A MAN FROM A SHIP.
+
+_After_ OLAUS MAGNUS.]
+
+In Fig. 13 an enormous lobster is in the act of similarly dragging
+overboard from a vessel a man whom it has seized by the arm with one of
+its great claws. From the crude image of a lobster having eight minor
+claws and two larger ones, to that of a cuttle having eight minor arms
+and two longer ones, the transition is not great; and I believe that
+this also is a pictorial misrepresentation of a casualty by the attack
+of a calamary similar to that above described, possibly another view of
+the same incident. The idea is that of a sea animal capable of suddenly
+seizing and grasping a man, and we must remember that we have evidence,
+in the writings of Pontoppidan and others, that, even two centuries
+later than Olaus Magnus, the Norsemen's knowledge of the cuttles was
+exceedingly vague and indistinct. Any one who has seen, as I frequently
+have at the Brighton Aquarium, and as they doubtless had whilst
+lobster-catching, the threatening and ferocious manner in which a
+lobster will brandish, and, if I may use the term, "gnash" its claws at
+an intruding hand, even if held above the surface of the water, can well
+imagine a party of fishermen discussing such a tragic occurrence as the
+foregoing, and differing in opinion as to the identity of the creature
+which had caused the catastrophe, some maintaining that it must have
+been a sea-serpent, and others shaking their heads and asserting that
+nothing but a colossal lobster could have done it.
+
+Pontoppidan, in writing his history of Norway, of course had before him
+the statements of Olaus Magnus; but, though their author was an
+archbishop, he did not accept them with the childlike simplicity
+generally ascribed to him. Quoting, and, singularly enough, misquoting,
+the Swedish prelate as referring to a sea-serpent, when he is
+describing, incorrectly, one of the _Acalephæ_, or sea-nettles,
+Pontoppidan says:--
+
+     "I have never heard of this sort, and should hardly believe the
+     good Olaus if he did not say that he affirmed this from his own
+     experience. The disproportion makes me think there must be some
+     error of the press.... He mixes truth and fable together according
+     to the relations of others; but this was excusable in that dark age
+     when that author wrote. Notwithstanding all this, we, in the
+     present more enlightened age, are much obliged to him for his
+     industry and judicious observations."
+
+Of the sea-serpent Pontoppidan writes:--
+
+     "I have questioned its existence myself, till that suspicion was
+     removed by full and sufficient evidence from creditable and
+     experienced fishermen and sailors in Norway, of which there are
+     hundreds who can testify that they have annually seen them. All
+     these persons agree very well in the general description; and
+     others who acknowledge that they only know it by report or by what
+     their neighbours have told them, still relate the same particulars.
+     In all my inquiry about these affairs I have hardly spoke with any
+     intelligent person born in the manor of Nordland who was not able
+     to give a pertinent answer, and strong assurances of the existence
+     of this fish; and some of our north traders that come here every
+     year with their merchandize think it a very strange question when
+     they are seriously asked whether there be any such creature: they
+     think it as ridiculous as if the question was put to them whether
+     there be such fish as eel or cod."
+
+The worthy Bishop of Bergen did his best to sift truth from fable, but
+he could not always succeed in separating them. Many stupendous
+falsehoods were brought to him, and some of them passed through his
+sieve in spite of his care. Of these are the accounts of the "spawning
+times" of the sea-serpent, its dislike of certain scents, &c. We must
+pass over all this, and confine ourselves to the evidence offered by him
+of its having been seen.
+
+The first witness he adduces is Captain Lawrence de Ferry, of the
+Norwegian navy, and first pilot in Bergen, who, premising that he had
+doubted a great while whether there were any such creature till he had
+ocular demonstration of it, made the following statement, addressed
+formally and officially to the procurator of Bergen:--
+
+     "Mr. JOHN REUTZ--
+
+     "The latter end of August, in the year 1746, as I was on a voyage,
+     on my return from Trundhiem, on a very calm and hot day, having a
+     mind to put in at Molde, it happened that when we were arrived with
+     my vessel within six English miles of the aforesaid Molde, being at
+     a place called Jule-Næss, as I was reading in a book, I heard a
+     kind of a murmuring voice from amongst the men at the oars, who
+     were eight in number, and observed that the man at the helm kept
+     off from the land. Upon this I inquired what was the matter, and
+     was informed that there was a sea-snake before us. I then ordered
+     the man at the helm to keep to the land again, and to come up with
+     this creature of which I had heard so many stories. Though the
+     fellows were under some apprehension, they were obliged to obey my
+     orders. In the meantime the sea-snake passed by us, and we were
+     obliged to tack the vessel about in order to get nearer to it. As
+     the snake swam faster than we could row, I took my gun, that was
+     ready charged, and fired at it; on this he immediately plunged
+     under the water. We rowed to the place where it sunk down (which in
+     the calm might be easily observed) and lay upon our oars, thinking
+     it would come up again to the surface; however it did not. Where
+     the snake plunged down, the water appeared thick and red; perhaps
+     some of the shot might wound it, the distance being very little.
+     The head of this snake, which it held more than two feet above the
+     surface of the water, resembled that of a horse. It was of a
+     greyish colour, and the mouth was quite black, and very large. It
+     had black eyes, and a long white mane, that hung down from the neck
+     to the surface of the water. Besides the head and neck, we saw
+     seven or eight folds, or coils, of this snake, which were very
+     thick, and as far as we could guess there was about a fathom
+     distance between each fold. I related this affair in a certain
+     company, where there was a person of distinction present who
+     desired that I would communicate to him an authentic detail of all
+     that happened; and for this reason two of my sailors, who were
+     present at the same time and place where I saw this monster,
+     namely, Nicholas Pedersen Kopper, and Nicholas Nicholsen
+     Anglewigen, shall appear in court, to declare on oath the truth of
+     every particular herein set forth; and I desire the favour of an
+     attested copy of the said descriptions.
+
+     "I remain, Sir, your obliged servant,
+
+     "L. DE FERRY.
+
+     "Bergen, 21st February, 1751.
+
+     "After this the before-named witnesses gave their corporal oaths,
+     and, with their finger held up according to law, witnessed and
+     confirmed the aforesaid letter or declaration, and every particular
+     set forth therein to be strictly true. A copy of the said
+     attestation was made out for the said Procurator Reutz, and granted
+     by the Recorder. That this was transacted in our court of justice
+     we confirm with our hand and seals. _Actum Bergis die et loco, ut
+     supra._
+
+     "A. C. DASS (_Chief Advocate_).
+
+     "H. C. GARTNER (_Recorder_)."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 14.--PONTOPPIDAN'S "SEA SERPENT."]
+
+The figure of the sea-serpent (Fig. 14) given by Pontoppidan was drawn,
+he tells us, under the inspection of a clergyman, Mr. Hans Strom, from
+descriptions given of it by two of his neighbours, Messrs. Reutz and
+Teuchsen, of Herroe; and was declared to agree in every particular with
+that seen by Captain de Ferry, and another subsequently observed by
+Governor Benstrup. The supposed coils of the serpent's body present
+exactly the appearance of eight porpoises following each other in line.
+This is a well-known habit of some of the smaller cetacea. They are
+often met with at sea thus proceeding in close single file, part only of
+their rotund forms being visible as they raise their backs above the
+surface of the water to inhale air through their "blow-holes." Under
+these circumstances they have been described by naturalists and seamen
+as resembling a long string of casks or buoys, often extending for
+sixty, eighty, or a hundred yards. This is just such a spectacle as that
+described by Olaus Magnus--his "long line of spherical convolutions,"
+and also as one reported to Pontoppidan as being descriptive of the
+sea-serpent:--
+
+     "'I have been informed,' he says, 'by some of our sea-faring men
+     that a cable[27] would not be long enough to measure the length of
+     some of them when they are observed on the surface of the water in
+     an even line. They say those round lumps or folds sometimes lie one
+     after another as far as a man can see. I confess, if this be true,
+     that we must suppose most probably that it is not one snake, but
+     two or more of these creatures lying in a line that exhibit this
+     phenomenon.' In a foot-note he adds: 'If any one enquires how many
+     folds may be counted on a sea-snake, the answer is that the number
+     is not always the same, but depends upon the various sizes of them:
+     five and twenty is the greatest number that I find well attested.'
+     Adam Olearius, in his Gottorf Museum, writes of it thus: 'A person
+     of distinction from Sweden related here at Gottorf that he had
+     heard the burgomaster of Malmoe, a very worthy man, say that as he
+     was once standing on the top of a very high hill, towards the North
+     Sea, he saw in the water, which was very calm, a snake, which
+     appeared at that distance to be as thick as a pipe of wine, and had
+     twenty-five folds. Those kind of snakes only appear at certain
+     times, and in calm weather.'"
+
+  [27] Six hundred feet.
+
+I believe that in every case so far cited from Pontoppidan, as well as
+that given by Olaus Magnus, the supposed coils or protuberances of the
+serpent's body, were only so many porpoises swimming in line in
+accordance with their habit before mentioned. If an upraised head, like
+that of a horse, was seen preceding them, it was either unconnected with
+them, or it certainly was not that of a snake; for no serpent could
+throw its body into those vertical undulations. The form of the vertebræ
+in the ophidians renders such a movement impossible. All their flexions
+are horizontal; the curving of their body is from side to side, not up
+and down.
+
+The sea-monster seen by Egede was of an entirely different kind; and
+his account of it--let sceptics deride it as they may--is worthy of
+attention and careful consideration. The Rev. Hans Egede, known as "The
+Apostle of Greenland," was superintendent of the Christian missions to
+that country. He was a truthful, pious, and single-minded man,
+possessing considerable powers of observation, and a genuine love of
+natural history. He wrote two books on the products, people, and natural
+history of Greenland,[28] and his statements therein are modest,
+accurate, and free from exaggeration. His illustrations are little, if
+at all, superior in style of art to the two Japanese wood-cuts shown on
+page 29, but they bear the same unmistakable signs of fidelity which
+characterise those of the Japanese.
+
+  [28] 'Des alten Grönlands neue Perlustration,' 8vo., Frankfurt,
+  1730, and 'Det Gamle Grönlands nye perlustratione eller Naturel
+  Historie.' 4to., Copenhagen, 1741.
+
+In his 'Journal of the Missions to Greenland' this author tell us that--
+
+     "On the 6th of July, 1734, there appeared a very large and
+     frightful sea monster, which raised itself so high out of the water
+     that its head reached above our main-top. It had a long, sharp
+     snout, and spouted water like a whale; and very broad flappers. The
+     body seemed to be covered with scales, and the skin was uneven and
+     wrinkled, and the lower part was formed like a snake. After some
+     time the creature plunged backwards into the water, and then turned
+     its tail up above the surface, a whole ship-length from the head.
+     The following evening we had very bad weather."
+
+The high character of the narrator would lead us to accept his
+statement that he had seen something previously unknown to him (he does
+not say it was a sea-serpent) even if we could not explain or understand
+what it was that he saw. Fortunately, however, the sketch made by Mr.
+Bing, one of his brother missionaries, has enabled us to do this. We
+must remember that in his endeavour to portray the incident he was
+dealing with an animal with the nature of which he was unacquainted, and
+which was only partially, and for a very short time, within his view. He
+therefore delineated rather the impression left on his mind than the
+thing itself. But although he invested it with a character that did not
+belong to it, his drawing is so far correct that we are able to
+recognise at a glance the distorted portrait of an old acquaintance, and
+to say unhesitatingly that Egede's sea-monster was one of the great
+calamaries which have since been occasionally met with, but which have
+only been believed in and recognised within the last few years. That
+which Mr. Egede believed to be the creature's head was the tail part of
+the cuttle, which goes in advance as the animal swims, and the two side
+appendages represent very efficiently the two lobes of the caudal fin.
+In propelling itself to the surface the squid raised this portion of its
+body out of the water to a considerable height, an occurrence which I
+have often witnessed, and which I have elsewhere described (see pp. 23
+and 27). The supposed tail, which was turned up at some distance from
+the other visible portion of the body, after the latter had sunk back
+into the sea, was one of the shorter arms of the cuttle, and the suckers
+on its under side are clearly and conspicuously marked. Egede was, of
+course, in error in making the "spout" of water to issue from the mouth
+of his monster. The out-pouring jet, which he, no doubt, saw, came from
+the locomotor tube, and the puff of spray which would accompany it as
+the orifice of the tube rose to the surface of the water is sketched
+with remarkable truthfulness. In quoting Egede, Pontoppidan gives a copy
+(so-called) of this engraving, but his artist embellished it so much as
+to deprive it of its original force and character, and of the honestly
+drawn points which furnish proofs of its identity.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 15--THE ANIMAL DRAWN BY MR. BING AS HAVING BEEN SEEN
+BY HANS EGEDE.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 16.--THE ANIMAL WHICH EGEDE PROBABLY SAW.]
+
+Pontoppidan records other supposed appearances of the sea-serpent, but
+from the date of his history I know of no other account of such an
+occurrence until that of an animal "apparently belonging to this class,"
+which was stranded on the Island of Stronsa, one of the Orkneys, in the
+year 1808:--
+
+     "According to the narrative, it was first seen entire, and measured
+     by respectable individuals. It measured fifty-six feet in length,
+     and twelve in circumference. The head was small, not being a foot
+     long from the snout to the first vertebra; the neck was slender,
+     extending to the length of fifteen feet. All the witnesses agree in
+     assigning it blow-holes, though they differ as to the precise
+     situation. On the shoulders something like a bristly mane commenced
+     which extended to near the extremity of the tail. It had three
+     pairs of fins or paws connected with the body; the anterior were
+     the largest, measuring more than four feet in length, and their
+     extremities were something like toes partially webbed. The skin was
+     smooth and of a greyish colour; the eye was of the size of a
+     seal's. When the decaying carcass was broken up by the waves,
+     portions of it were secured (such as the skull, the upper bones of
+     the swimming paws, &c.) by Mr. Laing, a neighbouring proprietor,
+     and some of the vertebræ were preserved and deposited in the Royal
+     University Museum, Edinburgh, and in the Museum of the Royal
+     College of Surgeons, London. An able paper," says Dr. Robert
+     Hamilton, in his account of it,[29] "on these latter fragments and
+     on the wreck of the animal was read by the late Dr. Barclay to the
+     Wernerian Society, and will be found in Vol. I. of its
+     Transactions, to which we refer. We have supplied a wood-cut of the
+     sketch" (of which I give a _facsimile_ here) "which was taken at
+     the time, and which, from the many affidavits proffered by
+     respectable individuals, as well as from other circumstances
+     narrated, leaves no manner of doubt as to the existence of some
+     such animal."
+
+  [29] Jardine's Naturalists' Library: 'Marine Amphibia,' p. 314.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 17.--THE "SEA SERPENT" OF THE WERNERIAN SOCIETY.
+(_Facsimile._)]
+
+Well! one would think so. It looks convincing, and there is a savour of
+philosophy about it that might lull the suspicions of a doubting
+zoologist. What more could be required? We have accurate measurements
+and a sketch taken of the animal as it lay upon the shore, minute
+particulars of its outward form, characteristic portions of its skeleton
+preserved in well-known museums, and any amount of affidavits
+forthcoming from most respectable individuals if confirmation be
+required. And yet,
+
+    "'Tis true, 'tis pity;
+    And pity 'tis 'tis true,"
+
+the whole fabric of circumstances crumbled at the touch of science.
+When the two vertebræ in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons
+were examined by Sir Everard Home he pronounced them to be those of a
+great shark of the genus _Selache_, and as being undistinguishable from
+those of the species called the "basking shark," of which individuals
+from thirty to thirty-five feet in length have been from time to time
+captured or stranded on our coasts. Professor Owen has confirmed this.
+Any one who feels inclined to dispute the identification by this
+distinguished comparative anatomist of a bone which he has seen and
+handled can examine these vertebræ for himself. If they had not been
+preserved, this incident would have been cited for all time as among the
+most satisfactorily authenticated instances on record of the appearance
+of the sea-serpent. As it is, it furnishes a valuable warning of the
+necessity for the most careful scrutiny of the evidence of well-meaning
+persons to whom no intentional deception or exaggeration can be imputed.
+
+In 1809, Mr. Maclean, the minister of Eigg, in the Western Isles of
+Scotland, informed Dr. Neill, the secretary of the Wernerian Society,
+that he had seen, off the Isle of Canna, a great animal which chased his
+boat as he hurried ashore to escape from it; and that it was also seen
+by the crews of thirteen fishing-boats, who were so terrified by it that
+they fled from it to the nearest creek for safety. His description of it
+is exceedingly vague, but is strongly indicative of a great calamary.
+
+In 1817 a large marine animal, supposed to be a serpent, was seen at
+Gloucester Harbour, near Cape Ann, Massachusetts, about thirty miles
+from Boston. The Linnæan Society of New England investigated the matter,
+and took much trouble to obtain evidence thereon. The depositions of
+eleven credible witnesses were certified on oath before magistrates, one
+of whom had himself seen the creature, and who confirmed the statements.
+All agreed that the animal had the appearance of a serpent, but
+estimated its length, variously, at from fifty to a hundred feet. Its
+head was in shape like that of a turtle, or snake, but as large as the
+head of a horse. There was no appearance of a mane. Its mode of
+progressing was by vertical undulations; and five of the witnesses
+described it as having the hunched protuberances mentioned by Captain de
+Ferry and others. Of this, I can offer no zoological explanation. The
+testimony given was apparently sincere, but it was received with
+mistrust; for, as Mr. Gosse says, "owing to a habit prevalent in the
+United States of supposing that there is somewhat of wit in gross
+exaggeration or hoaxing invention, we do naturally look with a lurking
+suspicion on American statements when they describe unusual or disputed
+phenomena."
+
+On the 15th of May, 1833, a party of British officers, consisting of
+Captain Sullivan, Lieutenants Maclachlan and Malcolm of the Rifle
+Brigade, Lieutenant Lister of the Artillery, and Mr. Ince of the
+Ordnance, whilst crossing Margaret's Bay in a small yacht, on their way
+from Halifax to Mahone Bay, "saw, at a distance of a hundred and fifty
+to two hundred yards, the head and neck of some denizen of the deep,
+precisely like those of a common snake in the act of swimming, the head
+so far elevated and thrown forward by the curve of the neck, as to
+enable them to see the water under and beyond it. The creature rapidly
+passed, leaving a regular wake, from the commencement of which to the
+fore part, which was out of water, they judged its length to be about
+eighty feet." They "set down the head at about six feet in length
+(considerably larger than that of a horse), and that portion of the neck
+which they saw at the same." "There could be no mistake--no delusion,"
+they say; "and we were all perfectly satisfied that we had been favoured
+with a view of the true and veritable sea-serpent." This account was
+published in the _Zoologist_, in 1847 (p. 1715), and at that date all
+the officers above named were still living.
+
+The next incident of the kind in point of date that we find recorded
+carries us back to the locality of which Pontoppidan wrote, and in which
+was seen the animal vouched for by Captain de Ferry. In 1847 there
+appeared in a London daily paper a long account translated from the
+Norse journals of fresh appearances of the sea-serpent. The statement
+made was, that it had recently been frequently seen in the neighbourhood
+of Christiansand and Molde. In the large bight of the sea at
+Christiansand it had been seen every year, only in the warmest weather,
+and when the sea was perfectly calm, and the surface of the water
+unruffled. The evidence of three respectable persons was taken, namely,
+Nils Roe, a workman at Mr. William Knudtzon's, who saw it twice there,
+John Johnson, merchant, and Lars Johnöen, fisherman at Smolen. The
+latter said he had frequently seen it, and that one afternoon in the
+dog-days, as he was sitting in his boat, he saw it twice in the course
+of two hours, and quite close to him. It came, indeed, to within six
+feet of him, and, becoming alarmed, he commended his soul to God, and
+lay down in the boat, only holding his head high enough to enable him to
+observe the monster. It passed him, disappeared, and returned; but, a
+breeze springing up, it sank, and he saw it no more. He described it as
+being about six fathoms long, the body (which was as round as a
+serpent's) two feet across, the head as long as a ten-gallon cask, the
+eyes large, round, red, sparkling, and about five inches in diameter:
+close behind the head a mane like a fin commenced along the neck, and
+spread itself out on both sides, right and left, when swimming. The
+mane, as well as the head, was of the colour of mahogany. The body was
+quite smooth, its movements occasionally fast and slow. It was
+serpent-like, and moved up and down. The few undulations which those
+parts of the body and tail that were out of water made, were scarcely a
+fathom in length. These undulations were not so high that he could see
+between them and the water.
+
+In confirmation of this account Mr. Soren Knudtzon, Dr. Hoffmann,
+surgeon in Molde, Rector Hammer, Mr. Kraft, curate, and several other
+persons, testified that they had seen in the neighbourhood of
+Christiansand a sea-serpent of considerable size.
+
+Mr. William Knudtzon, and Mr. Bochlum, a candidate for holy orders, also
+gave their account of it, much to the same purport; but some of these
+remarks are worthy of note for future comment. They say, "its motions
+were in undulations, and so strong that white foam appeared before it,
+and at the side, which stretched out several fathoms. It did not appear
+very high out of the water; the head was long and small in proportion to
+the throat: as the latter appeared much greater than the former,
+probably it was furnished with a mane."
+
+Sheriffe Göttsche testified to a similar effect. "He could not judge of
+the animal's entire length; he could not observe its extremity. At the
+back of the head there was a mane, which was the same colour as the rest
+of the body."
+
+We must take one more Norwegian account, for it is a very important
+one. The venerable P. W. Deinbolt,[30] Archdeacon of Molde, gives the
+following account of an incident that occurred there on the 28th of
+July, 1845:
+
+  [30] Hitherto erroneously printed "Deinboll."
+
+     "J. C. Lund, bookseller and printer; G. S. Krogh, merchant;
+     Christian Flang, Lund's apprentice, and John Elgenses, labourer,
+     were out on Romsdal-fjord, fishing. The sea was, after a warm,
+     sunshiny day, quite calm. About seven o'clock in the afternoon, at
+     a little distance from the shore, near the ballast place and Molde
+     Hooe, they saw a long marine animal, which slowly moved itself
+     forward, as it appeared to them, with the help of two fins, on the
+     fore-part of the body nearest the head, which they judged by the
+     boiling of the water on both sides of it. The visible part of the
+     body appeared to be between forty and fifty feet in length, and
+     moved in undulations, like a snake. The body was round and of a
+     dark colour, and seemed to be several ells in thickness. As they
+     discerned a waving motion in the water behind the animal, they
+     concluded that part of the body was concealed under water. That it
+     was one continuous animal they saw plainly from its movement. When
+     the animal was about one hundred yards from the boat, they noticed
+     tolerably correctly its fore parts, which ended in a sharp snout;
+     its colossal head raised itself above the water in the form of a
+     semi-circle; the lower part was not visible. The colour of the head
+     was dark-brown and the skin smooth; they did not notice the eyes,
+     or any mane or bristles on the throat. When the serpent came about
+     a musket-shot near, Lund fired at it, and was certain the shots hit
+     it in the head. After the shot it dived, but came up immediately.
+     It raised its neck in the air, like a snake preparing to dart on
+     his prey. After he had turned and got his body in a straight line,
+     which he appeared to do with great difficulty, he darted like an
+     arrow against the boat. They reached the shore, and the animal,
+     perceiving it had come into shallow water, dived immediately and
+     disappeared in the deep. Such is the declaration of these four men,
+     and no one has cause to question their veracity, or imagine that
+     they were so seized with fear that they could not observe what took
+     place so near them. There are not many here, or on other parts of
+     the Norwegian coast, who longer doubt the existence of the
+     sea-serpent. The writer of this narrative was a long time
+     sceptical, as he had not been so fortunate as to see this monster
+     of the deep; but after the many accounts he has read, and the
+     relations he has received from credible witnesses, he does not dare
+     longer to doubt the existence of the sea-serpent.
+
+     "P. W. DEINBOLT.
+
+     "Molde, 29th Nov., 1845."
+
+We may at once accept most fully and frankly the statements of all the
+worthy people mentioned in this series of incidents. There is no room
+for the shadow of a doubt that they all recounted conscientiously that
+which they saw. The last quoted occurrence, especially, is most
+accurately and intelligently described--so clearly, indeed, that it
+furnishes us with a clue to the identity of the strange visitant.
+
+Here let me say--and I wish it to be distinctly understood--that I do
+not deny the possibility of the existence of a great sea serpent, or
+other great creatures at present unknown to science, and that I have no
+inclination to explain away that which others have seen, because I
+myself have not witnessed it. "Seeing is believing," it is said, and it
+is not agreeable to have to tell a person that, in common parlance, he
+"must not trust his own eyes." It seems presumptuous even to hint that
+one may know better what was seen than the person who saw it. And yet I
+am obliged to say, reluctantly and courteously, but most firmly and
+assuredly, that these perfectly credible eye-witnesses did not correctly
+interpret that which they witnessed. In these cases, it is not the eye
+which deceives, nor the tongue which is untruthful, but the imagination
+which is led astray by the association of the thing seen with an
+erroneous idea. I venture to say this, not with any insolent assumption
+of superior acumen, but because we now possess a key to the mystery
+which Archdeacon Deinbolt and his neighbours had not access to, and
+which has only within the last few years been placed in our hands. The
+movements and aspect of their sea monster are those of an animal with
+which we are now well acquainted, but of the existence of which the
+narrators of these occasional visitations were unaware; namely, the
+great calamary, the same which gave rise to the stories of the Kraken,
+and which has probably been a denizen of the Scandinavian seas and
+fjords from time immemorial. It must be remembered, as I have elsewhere
+said, that until the year 1873, notwithstanding the adventure of the
+_Alecton_ in 1861, a cuttle measuring in total length fifty or sixty
+feet was generally looked upon as equally mythical with the great
+sea-serpent. Both were popularly scoffed at, and to express belief in
+either was to incur ridicule. But in the year above mentioned, specimens
+of even greater dimensions than those quoted were met with on the coasts
+of Newfoundland, and portions of them were deposited in museums, to
+silence the incredulous and interest zoologists. When Archdeacon
+Deinbolt published in 1846 the declaration of Mr. Lund and his
+companions of the fishing excursion, he and they knew nothing of there
+being such an animal. They had formed no conception of it, nor had they
+the instructive privilege, possessed of late years by the public in
+England, of being able to watch attentively, and at leisure, the habits
+and movements of these strangely modified mollusks living in great tanks
+of sea-water in aquaria. If they had been thus acquainted with them, I
+believe they would have recognised in their supposed snake the elongated
+body of a giant squid.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 18.--A CALAMARY SWIMMING AT THE SURFACE OF THE SEA.]
+
+When swimming, these squids propel themselves backwards by the
+out-rush of a stream of water from a tube pointed in a direction
+contrary to that in which the animal is proceeding. The tail part,
+therefore, goes in advance, and the body tapers towards this, almost to
+a blunt point. At a short distance from the actual extremity two flat
+fins project from the body, one on each side, as shown in Figs. 16 and
+18, so that this end of the squid's body somewhat resembles in shape the
+government "broad arrow." It is a habit of these squids, the small
+species of which are met with in some localities in teeming abundance,
+to swim on the smooth surface of the water in hot and calm weather. The
+arrow-headed tail is then raised out of water, to a height which in a
+large individual might be three feet or more; and, as it precedes the
+rest of the body, moving at the rate of several miles an hour, it of
+course looks, to a person who has never heard of an animal going tail
+first at such a speed, like the creature's head. The appearance of this
+"head" varies in accordance with the lateral fins being seen in profile
+or in broad expanse. The elongated, tubular-looking body gives the idea
+of the neck to which the "head" is attached; the eight arms trailing
+behind (the tentacles are always coiled away and concealed) supply the
+supposed mane floating on each side; the undulating motion in swimming,
+as the water is alternately drawn in and expelled, accords with the
+description, and the excurrent stream pouring aft from the locomotor
+tube, causes a long swirl and swell to be left in the animal's wake,
+which, as I have often seen, may easily be mistaken for an indefinite
+prolongation of its body. The eyes are very large and prominent, and the
+general tone of colour varies through every tint of brown, purple, pink,
+and grey, as the creature is more or less excited, and the pigmentary
+matter circulates with more or less vigour through the curiously moving
+cells.
+
+Here we have the "long marine animal" with "two fins on the forepart of
+the body near the head," the "boiling of the water," the "moving in
+undulations," the "body round, and of a dark colour," the "waving motion
+in the water behind the animal, from which the witnesses concluded that
+part of the body was concealed under water," the "head raised, but the
+lower part not visible," "the sharp snout," the "smooth skin," and the
+appearance described by Mr. William Knudtzon, and Candidatus Theologiæ
+Bochlum, of "the head being long and small in proportion to the throat,
+the latter appearing much greater than the former," which caused them to
+think "it was _probably_ furnished with a mane." Not that they _saw_ any
+mane, but as they had been told of it, they thought they _ought to have
+seen it_. Less careful and conscientious persons would have persuaded
+themselves, and declared on oath, that they _did see it_.
+
+I need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is the
+proverbially smooth, gliding motion of a serpent, with the supposition
+of its passage through the water causing such frictional disturbance
+that "white foam appeared before it, and at the side, which stretched
+out several fathoms," and of "the water boiling around it on both sides
+of it." The cuttle is the only animal that I know of that would cause
+this by the effluent current from its "syphon tube." I have seen a
+deeply laden ship push in front of her a vast hillock of water, which
+fell off on each side in foam as it was parted by her bow; but that was
+of man's construction. Nature builds on better lines. No swimming
+creature has such unnecessary friction to overcome. Even the seemingly
+unwieldy body of a porpoise enters and passes through the water without
+a splash, and nothing can be more easy and graceful than the feathering
+action of the flippers of the awkward-looking turtle.
+
+We now come to an incident which, from the character of those who
+witnessed it, immediately commanded attention, and excited popular
+curiosity. In the _Times_ of the 9th of October, 1848, appeared a
+paragraph stating that a sea-serpent had been met with by the _Dædalus_
+frigate, on her homeward voyage from the East Indies. The Admiralty
+immediately inquired of her commander, Captain M'Quhæ, as to the truth
+of the report; and his official reply, as follows, addressed to Admiral
+Sir W. H. Gage, G.C.H., Devonport, was printed in the _Times_ of the
+13th of October, 1848.
+
+     "H.M.S. _Dædalus_, Hamoaze,
+     October 11th, 1848.
+
+     "Sir,--In reply to your letter of this date, requiring information
+     as to the truth of the statement published in the _Times_
+     newspaper, of a sea-serpent of extraordinary dimensions having been
+     seen from H.M.S. _Dædalus_, under my command, on her passage from
+     the East Indies, I have the honour to acquaint you, for the
+     information of my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, that at 5
+     o'clock P.M. on the 6th of Aug. last, in lat. 24° 44' S. and long.
+     9° 22' E., the weather dark and cloudy, wind fresh from the N.W.
+     with a long ocean swell from the W., the ship on the port tack,
+     head being N.E. by N., something very unusual was seen by Mr.
+     Sartoris, midshipman, rapidly approaching the ship from before the
+     beam. The circumstance was immediately reported by him to the
+     officer of the watch, Lieut. Edgar Drummond, with whom and Mr. Wm.
+     Barrett, the Master, I was at the time walking the quarter-deck.
+     The ship's company were at supper. On our attention being called to
+     the object it was discovered to be an enormous serpent, with head
+     and shoulders kept about four feet constantly above the surface of
+     the sea, and, as nearly as we could approximate by comparing it
+     with the length of what our main-topsail yard would show in the
+     water, there was at the very least sixty feet of the animal _à
+     fleur d'eau_, no portion of which was, to our perception, used in
+     propelling it through the water, either by vertical or horizontal
+     undulation. It passed rapidly, but so close under our lee quarter
+     that had it been a man of my acquaintance I should easily have
+     recognised his features with the naked eye; and it did not, either
+     in approaching the ship or after it had passed our wake, deviate in
+     the slightest degree from its course to the S.W., which it held on
+     at the pace of from twelve to fifteen miles per hour, apparently on
+     some determined purpose.
+
+     "The diameter of the serpent was about fifteen or sixteen inches
+     behind the head, which was without any doubt that of a snake; and
+     it was never, during the twenty minutes it continued in sight of
+     our glasses, once below the surface of the water; its colour dark
+     brown, and yellowish white about the throat. It had no fins, but
+     something like the mane of a horse, or rather a bunch of seaweed,
+     washed about its back. It was seen by the quartermaster, the
+     boatswain's mate, and the man at the wheel, in addition to myself
+     and the officers above mentioned.
+
+     "I am having a drawing of the serpent made from a sketch taken
+     immediately after it was seen, which I hope to have ready for
+     transmission to my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty by
+     to-morrow's post.--PETER M'QUHÆ, Captain."
+
+The sketches referred to in the captain's letter were made under his
+supervision, and copies of them, of which he certified his approbation,
+were published in the _Illustrated London News_ on the 28th of October,
+1848. I am kindly permitted by the proprietors of that journal to
+reproduce two of them, reduced in size to suit these pages--one showing
+the relative positions of the "serpent" and the ship when the former was
+first seen (_Frontispiece_), and the other (Fig. 19) representing the
+animal afterwards passing under the frigate's quarter. An enlarged
+drawing of its head was also given, which I have not thought it
+necessary to copy.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 19.--THE "SEA SERPENT" PASSING UNDER THE QUARTER OF
+H.M.S. 'DÆDALUS.']
+
+Lieutenant Drummond, the officer of the watch mentioned in Captain
+M'Quhæ's report, published his memorandum of the impression made on his
+mind by the animal at the time of its appearance. It differs somewhat
+from the captain's description, and is the more cautious of the two.
+
+     "I beg to send you the following extract from my journal. H.M.S.
+     'Dædalus,' August 6, 1848, lat. 25° S., long. 9° 37' E., St. Helena
+     1,015 miles. In the 4 to 6 watch, at about 5 o'clock, we observed a
+     most remarkable fish on our lee-quarter, crossing the stern in a
+     S.W. direction. The appearance of its head, which with the back fin
+     was the only portion of the animal visible, was long, pointed and
+     flattened at the top, perhaps ten feet in length, the upper jaw
+     projecting considerably; the fin was perhaps 20 feet in the rear of
+     the head, and visible occasionally; the captain also asserted that
+     he saw the tail, or another fin, about the same distance behind it;
+     the upper part of the head and shoulders appeared of a dark brown
+     colour, and beneath the under-jaw a brownish-white. It pursued a
+     steady undeviating course, keeping its head horizontal with the
+     surface of the water, and in rather a raised position, disappearing
+     occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief interval, and not
+     apparently for purposes of respiration. It was going at the rate of
+     perhaps from twelve to fourteen miles an hour, and when nearest was
+     perhaps one hundred yards distant; in fact it gave one quite the
+     idea of a large snake or eel. No one in the ship has ever seen
+     anything similar; so it is at least extraordinary. It was visible
+     to the naked eye for five minutes, and with a glass for perhaps
+     fifteen more. The weather was dark and squally at the time, with
+     some sea running.--EDGAR DRUMMOND, Lieut. H.M.S. 'Dædalus;'
+     Southampton, Oct. 28, 1848."
+
+Statements so interesting and important, of course, elicited much
+correspondence and controversy. Mr. J. D. Morries Stirling, a director
+of the Bergen Museum, wrote to the Secretary of the British Admiralty,
+Captain Hamilton, R.N., saying that while becalmed in a yacht between
+Bergen and Sogne, in Norway, he had seen, three years previously, a
+large fish or reptile of cylindrical form (he would not say "sea
+serpent") ruffling the otherwise smooth surface of the fjord. No head
+was visible. This appears to have been, like the others from the same
+locality, a large calamary. Mr. Stirling unaware, doubtless, that Mr.
+Edward Newman, editor of the _Zoologist_, had previously propounded the
+same idea, suggested that the supposed serpent might be one of the old
+marine reptiles, hitherto supposed only to exist in the fossil state.
+This letter was published in the _Illustrated News_ of October 28th, and
+four days afterwards, November 2nd, a letter signed F.G.S. appeared in
+the _Times_, in which the same idea was mooted, and the opinion
+expressed that it might be the _Plesiosaurus_. This brought out that
+great master in physiology, Professor Owen, who in a long, and, it is
+needless to say, most able letter to the _Times_, dated the 9th of
+November, 1848, set forth a series of weighty arguments against belief
+in the supposed serpent, which I regret that I am unable, from want of
+space, to quote _in extenso_. The reasoning of the most eminent of
+living physiologists of course had its influence on those who could best
+appreciate it; but, as it went against the current of popular opinion,
+it met with little favour from the public, and has been slurred over
+much too superciliously by some subsequent writers. He suggested also
+that the creature seen might have been a great seal, such as the leonine
+seal, or the sea-elephant (the head, as shown in the enlarged drawing,
+was wonderfully seal-like), but it was generally felt that this
+explanation was unsatisfactory. The nature of his criticism of the
+official statement will be seen from Captain M'Quhæ's reply, which was
+promptly given in the _Times_ of the 21st of November, 1848, as
+follows:--
+
+     "Professor Owen correctly states that I evidently saw a large
+     creature moving rapidly through the water very different from
+     anything I had before witnessed, neither a whale, a grampus, a
+     great shark, an alligator, nor any of the larger surface-swimming
+     creatures fallen in with in ordinary voyages. I now assert--neither
+     was it a common seal nor a sea-elephant, its great length and its
+     totally differing physiognomy precluding the possibility of its
+     being a '_Phoca_' of any species. The head was flat, and not a
+     'capacious vaulted cranium;' nor had it a stiff, inflexible
+     trunk--a conclusion at which Professor Owen has jumped, most
+     certainly not justified by the simple statement, that no portion of
+     the sixty feet seen by us was used in propelling it through the
+     water either by vertical or horizontal undulation.
+
+     "It is also assumed that the 'calculation of its length was made
+     under a strong preconception of the nature of the beast;' another
+     conclusion quite contrary to the fact. It was not until after the
+     great length was developed by its nearest approach to the ship, and
+     until after that most important point had been duly considered and
+     debated, as well as such could be in the brief space of time
+     allowed for so doing, that it was pronounced to be a serpent by all
+     who saw it, and who are too well accustomed to judge of lengths and
+     breadths of objects in the sea to mistake a real substance and an
+     actual living body, coolly and dispassionately contemplated, at so
+     short a distance, too, for the 'eddy caused by the action of the
+     deeper immersed fins and tail of a rapidly moving gigantic seal
+     raising its head above the surface of the water,' as Professor Owen
+     imagines, in quest of its lost iceberg.
+
+     "The creative powers of the human mind may be very limited. On
+     this occasion they were not called into requisition; my purpose and
+     desire throughout being to furnish eminent naturalists, such as the
+     learned Professor, with accurate facts, and not with exaggerated
+     representations, nor with what could by any possibility proceed
+     from optical illusion; and I beg to assure him that old Pontoppidan
+     having clothed his sea-serpent with a mane could not have suggested
+     the idea of ornamenting the creature seen from the 'Dædalus' with a
+     similar appendage, for the simple reason that I had never seen his
+     account, or even heard of his sea-serpent, until my arrival in
+     London. Some other solution must therefore be found for the very
+     remarkable coincidence between us in that particular, in order to
+     unravel the mystery.
+
+     "Finally, I deny the existence of excitement or the possibility of
+     optical illusion. I adhere to the statements, as to form, colour,
+     and dimensions, contained in my official report to the Admiralty,
+     and I leave them as data whereupon the learned and scientific may
+     exercise the 'pleasures of imagination' until some more fortunate
+     opportunity shall occur of making a closer acquaintance with the
+     'great unknown'--in the present instance most assuredly no ghost.
+
+     "P. M'QUHÆ, late Captain of H.M.S. 'Dædalus.'"
+
+Of course neither Professor Owen, nor any one else, doubted the
+veracity or _bona fides_ of the captain and officers of one of Her
+Majesty's ships; and their testimony was the more important because it
+was that of men accustomed to the sights of the sea. Their practised
+eyes would, probably, be able to detect the true character of anything
+met with afloat, even if only partially seen, as intuitively as the Red
+Indian reads the signs of the forest or the trail; and therefore they
+were not likely to be deceived by any of the objects with which sailors
+are familiar. They would not be deluded by seals, porpoises, trunks of
+trees, or Brobdingnagian stems of algæ; but there was one animal with
+which they were not familiar, of the existence of which they were
+unaware, and which, as I have said, at that date was generally believed
+to be as unreal as the sea-serpent itself--namely, the great calamary,
+the elongated form of which has certainly in some other instances been
+mistaken for that of a sea-snake. One of these seen swimming in the
+manner I have described, and endeavoured to portray (p. 77), would
+fulfil the description given by Lieutenant Drummond, and would in a
+great measure account for the appearances reported by Captain M'Quhæ.
+"_The head long, pointed and flat on the top_," accords with the pointed
+extremity and caudal fin of the squid. "_Head kept horizontal with the
+surface of the water, and in rather a raised position, disappearing
+occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief interval, and not
+apparently for purposes of respiration._" A perfect description of the
+position and action of a squid swimming. "_No portion of it perceptibly
+used in propelling it through the water, either by vertical or
+horizontal undulations._" The mode of propulsion of a squid--the
+outpouring stream of water from its locomotor tube--would be unseen and
+unsuspected, because submerged. Its effect, the swirl in its wake, would
+suggest a prolongation of the creature's body. The numerous arms
+trailing astern at the surface of the water would give the appearance of
+a mane. I think it not impossible that if the officers of the _Dædalus_
+had been acquainted with this great sea creature the impression on their
+mind's eye would not have taken the form of a serpent. I offer this,
+with much diffidence, as a suggestion arising from recent discoveries;
+and by no means insist on its acceptance; for Captain M'Quhæ, who had a
+very close view of the animal, distinctly says that "the head was,
+without any doubt, that of a serpent," and one of his officers
+subsequently declared that the eye, the mouth, the nostril, the colour,
+and the form were all most distinctly visible.
+
+In a letter addressed to the Editor of the _Bombay Times_, and dated
+"Kamptee, January 3rd, 1849," Mr. R. Davidson, Superintending Surgeon,
+Nagpore Subsidiary Force, describes a great sea animal seen by him
+whilst on board the ship _Royal Saxon_, on a voyage to India, in 1829.
+The features of this incident are consistent with his having seen one of
+the, then unknown, great calamaries.
+
+Dr. Scott, of Exeter, sent to the Editor of the _Zoologist_ (p. 2459),
+an extract from the memorandum-book of Lieutenant Sandford, R.N.,
+written about the year 1820, when he was in command of the merchant ship
+_Lady Combermere_. In it he mentions his having met with, in lat. 46,
+long. 3 (Bay of Biscay), an animal unknown to him, an immense body on
+the surface of the water, spouting, not unlike the blowing of a whale,
+and the raising up of a triangular extremity, and subsequently of a head
+and neck erected six feet above the surface of the water. This was
+evidently a great squid seen under circumstances similar to those
+described by Hans Egede (p. 67).
+
+In the _Sun_ Newspaper of July 9th, 1849, was published the following
+statement of Captain Herriman, of the ship _Brazilian_:
+
+     "On the morning of the 24th February, the ship being becalmed in
+     lat. 26° S., long. 8° E. (about forty miles from the place where
+     Captain M'Quhæ is said to have seen the serpent), the captain
+     perceived something right astern, stretched along the water to a
+     length of twenty five or thirty feet, and perceptibly moving from
+     the ship, with a steady sinuous motion. The head, which seemed to
+     be lifted several feet above the water, had something resembling a
+     mane running down to the floating portion, and within about six
+     feet of the tail. Of course Captain Herriman, Mr. Long, his chief
+     officer, and the passengers who saw this came to the conclusion
+     that it must be the sea-serpent. As the 'Brazilian' was making no
+     headway, to bring all doubts to an issue, the captain had a boat
+     lowered, and himself standing in the bow, armed with a harpoon,
+     approached the monster. It was found to be an immense piece of
+     sea-weed, drifting with the current, which sets constantly to the
+     westward in this latitude, and which, with the swell left by the
+     subsidence of a previous gale, gave it the sinuous snake-like
+     motion."
+
+Captain Harrington, of the ship _Castilian_, reported in the _Times_ of
+February 5th, 1858, that:
+
+     "On the 12th of December, 1857, N.E. end of St. Helena distant ten
+     miles, he and his officers were startled by the sight of a huge
+     marine animal which reared its head out of the water within twenty
+     yards of the ship. The head was shaped like a long nun-buoy,[31]
+     and they supposed it to have been seven or eight feet in diameter
+     in the largest part, with a kind of scroll or tuft of loose skin,
+     encircling it about two feet from the top. The water was
+     discoloured for several hundred feet from its head, so much so that
+     on its first appearance my impression was that the ship was in
+     broken water."
+
+  [31] See illustration, p. 67.
+
+Evidently, again, a large calamary raising its caudal extremity and fin
+above the surface, and discolouring the water by discharging its ink.
+
+This was immediately followed by a letter from Captain Frederick Smith,
+of the ship _Pekin_, who stated that:
+
+     "On December 28th, 1848, being then in lat. 26° S., long. 6° E.
+     (about half-way between the Cape and St. Helena), he saw a very
+     extraordinary-looking thing in the water, of considerable length.
+     With the telescope, he could plainly discern a huge head and neck,
+     covered with a shaggy-looking kind of mane, which it kept lifting
+     at intervals out of water. This was seen by all hands, and was
+     declared to be the great sea-serpent. A boat was lowered; a line
+     was made fast to the 'snake,' and it was towed alongside and
+     hoisted on board. It was a piece of gigantic sea-weed, twenty feet
+     long, and completely covered with snaky-looking barnacles. So like
+     a huge living monster did this appear, that had circumstances
+     prevented my sending a boat to it, I should certainly have believed
+     I had seen the great sea-serpent."
+
+In September, 1872, Mr. Frank Buckland published, in _Land and Water_,
+an account by the late Duke of Marlborough, of a "sea-serpent" having
+been seen several times within a few days, in Loch Hourn, Scotland. A
+sketch of it was given which almost exactly accorded with that of
+Pontoppidan's sea-serpent, namely, seven hunches or protuberances like
+so many porpoises swimming in line, preceded by a head and neck raised
+slightly out of water. Many other accounts have been published of the
+appearance of serpent-like sea monsters, but I have only space for two
+or three more of the most remarkable of them.
+
+On the 10th of January, 1877, the following affidavit was made before
+Mr. Raffles, magistrate, at Liverpool:
+
+     "We, the undersigned officers and crew of the barque 'Pauline' (of
+     London), of Liverpool, in the county of Lancaster, in the United
+     Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, do solemnly and sincerely
+     declare that, on July 8, 1875, in lat. 5° 13' S., long. 35° W., we
+     observed three large sperm whales, and one of them was gripped
+     round the body with two turns of what appeared to be a huge
+     serpent. The head and tail appeared to have a length beyond the
+     coils of about thirty feet, and its girth eight feet or nine feet.
+     The serpent whirled its victim round and round for about fifteen
+     minutes, and then suddenly dragged the whale to the bottom, head
+     first.
+
+"GEO. DREVAR, Master; HORATIO THOMPSON, JOHN HENDERSON
+LANDELLS, OWEN BAKER, and WILLIAM LEWARN.
+
+     "Again, on July 13, a similar serpent was seen, about two hundred
+     yards off, shooting itself along the surface, head and neck being
+     out of the water several feet. This was seen only by the captain
+     and one ordinary seaman.
+
+"GEORGE DREVAR, Master.
+
+     "A few moments after it was seen some 60 feet elevated
+     perpendicularly in the air by the chief officer and the following
+     seamen:--Horatio Thompson, Owen Baker, Wm. Lewarn. And we make this
+     solemn declaration, conscientiously believing the same to be true."
+
+In the _Illustrated London News_, of November 20th, 1875, there had
+previously appeared a letter from the Rev. E. L. Penny, Chaplain to
+H.M.S. _London_, at Zanzibar, describing this occurrence and also the
+representation of a sketch (which I am kindly permitted to reproduce
+here), drawn by him from the descriptions given by the captain and crew
+of the _Pauline_. "The whale," he said, "should have been placed deeper
+in the water, but he would then have been unable to depict so clearly
+the manner in which the animal was attacked." He adds that, "Captain
+Drevar is a singularly able and observant man, and those of the crew and
+officers with whom he conversed were singularly intelligent; nor did any
+of their descriptions vary from one another in the least: there were no
+discrepancies." The event took place whilst their vessel was on her way
+from Shields to Zanzibar, with a cargo of coals, for the use of H.M.S.
+_London_, then the guard ship on that station.
+
+It is impossible to doubt for a moment the genuineness of the
+statement made by Captain Drevar and his crew, or their honest desire to
+describe faithfully that which they believed they had seen; but the
+height to which the snake is said to have upreared itself is evidently
+greatly exaggerated; for it is impossible that any serpent could
+"elevate its body some sixty feet perpendicularly in the air"--nearly
+one-third of the height of the Monument of the Great Fire of London. I
+have no desire to force this narrative of the master and crew of the
+_Pauline_ into conformity with any preconceived idea. They may have seen
+a veritable sea-serpent; or they may have witnessed the amours of two
+whales, and have seen the great creatures rolling over and over that
+they might breathe alternately by the blow-hole of each coming to the
+surface of the water; or the supposed coils of the snake may have been
+the arms of a great calamary, cast over and around the huge cetacean.
+The other two appearances--1st, the animal "seen shooting itself along
+the surface with head and neck raised" (p. 77), and 2nd, the elevation
+of the body to a considerable height, as in Egede's sea monster, (p.
+67), would certainly accord with this last hypothesis; but, taking the
+statement as it stands, it must be left for further elucidation.
+
+[Illustration: FIG 20.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AND SPERM WHALE AS SEEN FROM
+THE 'PAULINE.']
+
+On the 28th of January, 1879, a "sea-serpent" was seen from the s.s.
+_City of Baltimore_, in the Gulf of Aden, by Major H. W. J. Senior, of
+the Bengal Staff Corps. The narrator "observed a long, black object
+darting rapidly in and out of the water, and advancing nearer to the
+vessel. The shape of the head was not unlike pictures of the dragon he
+had often seen, with a bull-dog expression of the forehead and eyebrows.
+When the monster had drawn its head sufficiently out of the water, it
+let its body drop, as it were a log of wood, prior to darting forward
+under the water. This motion caused a splash of about fifteen feet in
+length on either side of the neck much in the 'shape of a pair of
+wings.'" This last particular of its appearance, as well as its
+movements, suggest a great calamary; but, as one with "a bull-dog
+expression of eyebrow, visible at 500 yards distance," does not come
+within my ken, I will not claim it as such.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 21.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM THE 'CITY OF
+BALTIMORE.']
+
+In June 1877 Commander Pearson reported to the Admiralty, that on the
+2nd of that month, he and other officers of the Royal Yacht _Osborne_,
+had seen, off Cape Vito, Sicily, a large marine animal, of which the
+following account and sketches were furnished by Lieutenant Haynes, and
+were confirmed by Commander Pearson, Mr. Douglas Haynes, Mr. Forsyth,
+and Mr. Moore, engineer.
+
+     "Lieutenant Haynes writes, under date, 'Royal Yacht _Osborne_,
+     Gibraltar, June 6': On the evening of that day, the sea being
+     perfectly smooth, my attention was first called by seeing a ridge
+     of fins above the surface of the water, extending about thirty
+     feet, and varying from five to six feet in height. On inspecting it
+     by means of a telescope, at about one and a-half cables' distance,
+     I distinctly saw a head, two flappers, and about thirty feet of an
+     animal's shoulder. The head, as nearly as I could judge, was about
+     six feet thick, the neck narrower, about four to five feet, the
+     shoulder about fifteen feet across, and the flappers each about
+     fifteen feet in length. The movements of the flappers were those of
+     a turtle, and the animal resembled a huge seal, the resemblance
+     being strongest about the back of the head. I could not see the
+     length of the head, but from its crown or top to just below the
+     shoulder (where it became immersed), I should reckon about fifty
+     feet. The tail end I did not see, being under water, unless the
+     ridge of fins to which my attention was first attracted, and which
+     had disappeared by the time I got a telescope, were really the
+     continuation of the shoulder to the end of the object's body. The
+     animal's head was not always above water, but was thrown upwards,
+     remaining above for a few seconds at a time, and then disappearing.
+     There was an entire absence of 'blowing,' or 'spouting.' I herewith
+     beg to enclose a rough sketch, showing the view of the 'ridge of
+     fins,' and also of the animal in the act of propelling itself by
+     its two fins."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 22.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT
+'OSBORNE.'
+
+PHASE I.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 23.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT
+'OSBORNE.'
+
+PHASE 2.]
+
+It seems to me that this description cannot be explained as applicable
+to any one animal yet known. The ridge of dorsal fins might, possibly,
+as was suggested by Mr. Frank Buckland, belong to four basking sharks,
+swimming in line, in close order; but the combination of them with long
+flippers, and the turtle-like mode of swimming, forms a zoological
+enigma which I am unable to solve.
+
+This brings us face to face with the question: "Is it then so
+impossible that there may exist some great sea creature, or creatures,
+with which zoologists are hitherto unacquainted, that it is necessary in
+every case to regard the authors of such narratives as wilfully
+untruthful, or mistaken in their observations, if their descriptions are
+irreconcileable with something already known?" I, for one, am of the
+opinion that there is no such impossibility. Calamaries or squids of the
+ordinary size have, from time immemorial, been amongst the commonest and
+best known of marine animals in many seas; but only a few years ago any
+one who expressed his belief in one formidable enough to capsize a boat,
+or pull a man out of one, was derided for his credulity, although
+voyagers had constantly reported that in the Indian seas they were so
+dreaded that the natives always carried hatchets with them in their
+canoes, with which to cut off the arms or tentacles of these creatures,
+if attacked by them. We now know that their existence is no fiction; for
+individuals have been captured measuring more than fifty feet, and some
+are reported to have measured eighty feet, in total length. As marine
+snakes some feet in length, and having fin-like tails adapted for
+swimming, abound over an extensive geographical range, and are
+frequently met with far at sea, I cannot regard it as impossible that
+some of these also may attain to an abnormal and colossal development.
+Dr. Andrew Wilson, who has given much attention to this subject, is of
+the opinion that "in this huge development of ordinary forms we discover
+the true and natural law of the production of the giant serpent of the
+sea." It goes far, at any rate, towards accounting for its supposed
+appearance. I am convinced that, whilst naturalists have been searching
+amongst the vertebrata for a solution of the problem, the great unknown,
+and therefore unrecognized, calamaries by their elongated, cylindrical
+bodies and peculiar mode of swimming, have played the part of the
+sea-serpent in many a well-authenticated incident. In other cases, such
+as some of those mentioned by Pontoppidan, the supposed "vertical
+undulations" of the snake seen out of water have been the burly bodies
+of so many porpoises swimming in line--the connecting undulations
+beneath the surface have been supplied by the imagination. The dorsal
+fins of basking sharks, as figured by Mr. Buckland, or of ribbon-fishes,
+as suggested by Dr. Andrew Wilson, may have furnished the "ridge of
+fins;" an enormous conger is not an impossibility; a giant turtle may
+have done duty, with its propelling flippers and broad back; or a marine
+snake of enormous size may, really, have been seen. But if we accept as
+accurate the observations recorded (which I certainly do not in all
+cases, for they are full of errors and mistakes), the difficulty is not
+entirely met, even by this last admission, for the instances are very
+few in which an ophidian proper--a true serpent--is indicated. There has
+seemed to be wanting an animal having a long snake-like neck, a small
+head and a slender body, and propelling itself by paddles.[32]
+
+  [32] It must be noted, however, that in almost every case, except
+  that of the _Osborne_, the paddles were _supposed_, not _seen_, and
+  were invented to account for an animal of great length progressing
+  at the surface of the water at the rate of twelve to fifteen miles
+  an hour without its being possible to perceive, upon the closest
+  and most attentive inspection, any undulatory movement to which its
+  rapid advance could be ascribed. As the great calamaries were
+  unknown, their mode of swift retrograde motion, by means of an
+  outflowing current of water, was of course unsuspected.
+
+The similarity of such an animal to the _Plesiosaurus_ of old was
+remarkable. That curious compound reptile, which has been compared with
+"a snake threaded through the body of a turtle," is described by Dean
+Buckland, in his _Bridgewater Treatise_, as having "the head of a
+lizard, the teeth of a crocodile, a neck of enormous length resembling
+the body of a serpent, the ribs of a chameleon, and the paddles of a
+whale." In the number of its cervical vertebræ (about thirty-three) it
+surpasses that of the longest-necked bird, the swan.
+
+The form and probable movements of this ancient saurian agree so
+markedly with some of the accounts given of the "great sea-serpent,"
+that Mr. Edward Newman advanced the opinion that the closest affinities
+of the latter would be found to be with the _Enaliosauria_, or marine
+lizards, whose fossil remains are so abundant in the oolite and the
+lias. This view has also been taken by other writers, and emphatically
+by Mr. Gosse. Neither he nor Mr. Newman insist that the "great unknown"
+must be the _Plesiosaurus_ itself. Mr. Gosse says, "I should not look
+for any species, scarcely even any genus, to be perpetuated from the
+oolitic period to the present. Admitting the actual continuation of the
+order _Enaliosauria_, it would be, I think, quite in conformity with
+general analogy to find some salient features of several extinct forms."
+
+[Illustration: FIG 24.
+
+_Plesiosaurus Dolichodeirus restored by The Rev. W. D. Canybeare._]
+
+The form and habits of the recently-recognized gigantic cuttles account
+for so many appearances which, without knowledge of them, were
+inexplicable when Mr. Gosse and Mr. Newman wrote, that I think this
+theory is not now forced upon us. Mr. Gosse well and clearly sums up the
+evidence as follows: "Carefully comparing the independent narratives of
+English witnesses of known character and position, most of them being
+officers under the crown, we have a creature possessing the following
+characteristics: 1st. The general form of a serpent. 2nd. Great length,
+say above sixty feet. 3rd. Head considered to resemble that of a
+serpent. 4th. Neck from twelve to sixteen inches in diameter. 5th.
+Appendages on the head, neck, or back, resembling a crest or mane.
+(Considerable discrepancy in details.) 6th. Colour dark brown, or green,
+streaked or spotted with white. 7th. Swims at surface of the water with
+a rapid or slow movement, the head and neck projected and elevated above
+the surface. 8th. Progression, steady and uniform; the body straight,
+but capable of being thrown into convolutions. 9th. Spouts in the manner
+of a whale. 10th. Like a long nun-buoy." He concludes with the
+question--"To which of the recognized classes of created beings can this
+huge rover of the ocean be referred?"
+
+I reply: "To the Cephalopoda. There is not one of the above judiciously
+summarized characteristics that is not supplied by the great calamary,
+and its ascertained habits and peculiar mode of locomotion.
+
+"Only a geologist can fully appreciate how enormously the balance of
+probability is contrary to the supposition that any of the gigantic
+marine saurians of the secondary deposits should have continued to live
+up to the present time. And yet I am bound to say, that this does not
+amount to an impossibility, for the evidence against it is entirely
+negative. Nor is the conjecture that there may be in existence some
+congeners of these great reptiles inconsistent with zoological science.
+Dr. J. E. Gray, late of the British Museum, a strict zoologist, is cited
+by Mr. Gosse as having long ago expressed his opinion that some
+undescribed form exists which is intermediate between the tortoises and
+the serpents."[33]
+
+  [33] Dr. Gray wrote in his 'Synopsis of Genera of Reptiles,' in the
+  Annals of Philosophy, 1825: "There is every reason to believe from
+  general structure that there exists an affinity between the
+  tortoises and the snakes; but the genus that exactly unites them is
+  at present unknown to European naturalists; which is not
+  astonishing when we consider the immense number of undescribed
+  animals which are daily occurring. If I may be allowed to speculate
+  from the peculiarities of structure which I have observed, I am
+  inclined to think that the union will most probably take place by
+  some newly discovered genera allied to the marine or fluviatile
+  soft-skinned turtles and the marine serpent."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 25.--THE "SEA SERPENT," ON THE ENALIOSAURIAN
+HYPOTHESIS.
+
+_After_ Mr. P. H. GOSSE, F.R.S.]
+
+Professor Agassiz, too, is adduced by a correspondent of the _Zoologist_
+(p. 2395), as having said concerning the present existence of the
+_Enaliosaurian_ type that "it would be in precise conformity with
+analogy that such an animal should exist in the American Seas, as he had
+found numerous instances in which the fossil forms of the Old World were
+represented by living types in the New."
+
+On this point, Mr. Newman records, in the _Zoologist_ (p. 2356), an
+actual testimony which he considers, "in all respects, the most
+interesting natural-history fact of the present century." He writes:
+
+     "Captain the Hon. George Hope states that when in H.M.S. 'Fly,' in
+     the Gulf of California, the sea being perfectly calm and
+     transparent, he saw at the bottom a large marine animal with the
+     head and general figure of the alligator, except that the neck was
+     much longer, and that instead of legs the creature had four large
+     flappers, somewhat like those of turtles, the anterior pair being
+     larger than the posterior; the creature was distinctly visible, and
+     all its movements could be observed with ease; it appeared to be
+     pursuing its prey at the bottom of the sea; its movements were
+     somewhat serpentine, and an appearance of annulations, or ring-like
+     divisions of the body, was distinctly perceptible. Captain Hope
+     made this relation in company, and as a matter of conversation.
+     When I heard it from the gentleman to whom it was narrated, I
+     enquired whether Captain Hope was acquainted with those remarkable
+     fossil animals _Ichthyosauri_ and _Plesiosauri_, the supposed forms
+     of which so nearly correspond with what he describes as having seen
+     alive, and I cannot find that he had heard of them; the alligator
+     being the only animal he mentioned as bearing a partial similarity
+     to the creature in question."
+
+Unfortunately, the estimated dimensions of this creature are not given.
+
+That negative evidence alone is an unsafe basis for argument against the
+existence of unknown animals, the following illustrations will show:
+
+During the deep-sea dredgings of H.M.S. _Lightning_, _Porcupine_, and
+_Challenger_, many new species of mollusca, and others which had been
+supposed to have been extinct ever since the chalk epoch, were brought
+to light; and by the deep-sea trawlings of the last-mentioned ship,
+there have been brought up from great depths fishes of unknown species,
+and which could not exist near the surface, owing to the distension and
+rupture of their air-bladder when removed from the pressure of deep
+water.
+
+Mr. Gosse mentions that the ship in which he made the voyage to Jamaica
+was surrounded in the North Atlantic, for seventeen continuous hours by
+a troop of whales of large size of an undescribed species, which on no
+other occasion has fallen under scientific observation. Unique specimens
+of other cetaceans are also recorded.
+
+We have evidence, to which attention has been directed by Mr. A. D.
+Bartlett, that, "even on land there exists at least one of the largest
+mammals, probably in thousands, of which only one individual has been
+brought to notice, namely, the hairy-eared, two horned rhinoceros (_R.
+lasiotis_), now in the Zoological Gardens, London. It was captured in
+1868, at Chittagong, in India, where for years collectors and
+naturalists have worked and published lists of the animals met with, and
+yet no knowledge of this great beast was ever before obtained, nor is
+there any portion of one in any museum. It remains unique."
+
+I arrive, then, at the following conclusions: 1st. That, without
+straining resemblances, or casting a doubt upon narratives not proved to
+be erroneous, the various appearances of the supposed "Great
+Sea-serpent" may now be nearly all accounted for by the forms and habits
+of known animals; especially if we admit, as proposed by Dr. Andrew
+Wilson, that some of them, including the marine snakes, may, like the
+cuttles, attain to an extraordinary size.
+
+2nd. That to assume that naturalists have perfect cognizance of every
+existing marine animal of large size, would be quite unwarrantable. It
+appears to me more than probable that many marine animals, unknown to
+science, and some of them of gigantic size, may have their ordinary
+habitat in the great depths of the sea, and only occasionally come to
+the surface; and I think it not impossible that amongst them may be
+marine snakes of greater dimensions than we are aware of, and even a
+creature having close affinities with the old sea-reptiles whose fossil
+skeletons tell of their magnitude and abundance in past ages.
+
+It is most desirable that every supposed appearance of the "Great
+Sea-serpent" shall be faithfully noted and described; and I hope that no
+truthful observer will be deterred from reporting such an occurrence by
+fear of the disbelief of naturalists, or the ridicule of witlings.
+
+
+FINIS.
+
+
+
+
+  LONDON:
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+  STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+[Illustration: A MERMAID.
+
+_From a Picture by Otto Sinding._]
+
+
+
+
+  _International Fisheries Exhibition_ LONDON, 1883
+
+  SEA FABLES EXPLAINED
+
+  BY
+
+  HENRY LEE, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.
+
+  SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM
+  AND
+  AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT;'
+  'SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED,' ETC.
+
+  ILLUSTRATED
+
+  LONDON
+
+  WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED
+  INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION
+  AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.
+  1883
+
+
+
+
+  LONDON:
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+  STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The little book 'Sea Monsters Unmasked,' recently issued as one of the
+Handbooks in connection with the Great International Fisheries
+Exhibition has met with so favourable a reception, that I have been
+honoured by the request to continue the subject, and to treat also of
+some of the Fables of the Sea, which once were universally believed, and
+even now are not utterly extinct.
+
+The topic is not here exhausted. Other sea fables and fallacies might be
+mentioned and explained; but the amount of letter-press, and the number
+of illustrations that can be printed without loss for the small sum of
+one shilling--the price at which these Handbooks are uniformly
+published--is necessarily limited. I have, therefore, thought it better
+to endeavour to make each chapter as complete as possible than to crowd
+into the space allotted to me a greater variety of subjects less fully
+and carefully discussed.
+
+I have the pleasure of acknowledging the kind assistance I have again
+received in the matter of illustrations. I gratefully appreciate Mr.
+Murray's permission to use the woodcut of Hercules slaying the Hydra,
+taken from Smith's 'Classical Dictionary,' and those of the golden
+ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycenæ, and figured in the very
+interesting book in which his excavations there are described. I have
+also to thank the proprietors of the _Illustrated London News_, the
+_Leisure Hour_, and _Land and Water_, for the use of illustrations
+especially mentioned in the text.
+
+                                        HENRY LEE.
+
+SAVAGE CLUB;
+  _Sept. 4th, 1883_.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                    PAGE
+
+  THE MERMAID                          1
+
+  THE LERNEAN HYDRA                   48
+
+  SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS                59
+
+  THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES            62
+
+  THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS       76
+
+  BARNACLE GEESE--GOOSE BARNACLES     98
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+  FIG.                                                          PAGE
+
+   A MERMAID. _From a picture by Otto Sinding_        _Frontispiece_
+
+   1. NOAH, HIS WIFE AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED DEITIES.       2
+      _From a gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet_
+
+   2. HEA, OR NOAH, THE GOD OF THE FLOOD. _Khorsabad_              3
+
+   3. DAGON. _From a bas-relief. Nimroud_                          4
+
+   4. DAGON: HALF MAN, HALF FISH. _From Lamy's 'Apparatus          5
+      Biblicus'_
+
+   5. DAGON. _From an agate signet. Nineveh_                       "
+
+   6. FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU. _After Calmet and Maurice_            6
+
+   7. ATERGATIS, THE GODDESS OF THE SYRIANS. _From a               8
+      Phoenician Coin_
+
+   8. VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS. _After      9
+      Calmet_
+
+   9. VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. _From two            10
+      Corinthian Coins_
+
+  10. DITTO.                                                      11
+
+  11. SEAL, DRAWN AS A FISH. _From the Catacombs at Rome_          "
+
+  12. MERMAID AND FISHES OF AMBOYNA. _After Valentyn_             17
+
+  13. A JAPANESE ARTIFICIAL MERMAID                               27
+
+  14. AN ARTIFICIAL MERMAID. _Probably Japanese_                  28
+
+  15. PORTRAIT OF A MERMAID SAID TO HAVE BEEN CAPTURED IN JAPAN   29
+
+  16. THE DUGONG. _From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's 'Ceylon'_        43
+
+  17. THE MANATEE                                                 45
+
+  18. FIGURE OF A CALAMARY, FROM THE TEMPLE OF BAYR-EL-BAHREE     50
+
+  19. FIGURE OF AN OCTOPUS ON A GOLD ORNAMENT FOUND BY DR.        51
+      SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENÆ
+
+  20. DITTO.                                                      52
+
+  21. DITTO.                                                      53
+
+  22. DITTO.                                                       "
+
+  23. HERCULES SLAYING THE LERNEAN HYDRA                          57
+
+  24. THE PHYSETER INUNDATING A SHIP. _After Olaus Magnus_        64
+
+  25. A WHALE POURING WATER INTO A SHIP FROM ITS BLOW-HOLE.       64
+      _After Olaus Magnus_
+
+  26. SPERM WHALES "SPOUTING"                                     65
+
+  27. THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) SAILING               76
+
+  28. DITTO. RETRACTED WITHIN ITS SHELL                           81
+
+  29. DITTO. CRAWLING                                             86
+
+  30. DITTO. SWIMMING                                             87
+
+  31. SHELL OF THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)              88
+
+  32. SHELL OF THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus pompilius_)         89
+
+  33. THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus Pompilius_) AND SECTION OF   90
+      ITS SHELL
+
+  34. THE GOOSE-TREE. _From Gerard's 'Herball'_                  104
+
+  35. DITTO. _Fac-simile from Aldrovandus_                       110
+
+  36. DEVELOPMENT OF BARNACLES INTO GEESE. _Fac-simile from      111
+      Aldrovandus_
+
+  37. SECTION OF A SESSILE BARNACLE. _Balanus tintinnabulum_     113
+
+  38. PEDUNCULATED BARNACLE. _Lepas anatifera_                   115
+
+  39. A SHIP'S FIGURE-HEAD PARTLY COVERED WITH BARNACLES         116
+
+  40. WHALE BARNACLE. _Coronula diadema_                         117
+
+  41. A YOUNG BARNACLE. _Larva of Chthamalus stellatus_          118
+
+
+
+
+SEA FABLES EXPLAINED.
+
+
+
+
+THE MERMAID.
+
+
+Next to the pleasure which the earnest zoologist derives from study of
+the habits and structure of living animals, and his intelligent
+appreciation of their perfect adaptation to their modes of life, and the
+circumstances in which they are placed, is the interest he feels in
+eliminating fiction from truth, whilst comparing the fancies of the past
+with the facts of the present. As his knowledge increases, he learns
+that the descriptions by ancient writers of so-called "fabulous
+creatures" are rather distorted portraits than invented falsehoods, and
+that there is hardly one of the monsters of old which has not its
+prototype in Nature at the present day. The idea of the Lernean Hydra,
+whose heads grew again when cut off by Hercules, originated, as I have
+shown in another chapter, in a knowledge of the octopus; and in the form
+and movements of other animals with which we are now familiar we may, in
+like manner, recognise the similitude and archetype of the mermaid.
+
+But we must search deeply into the history of mankind to discover the
+real source of a belief that has prevailed in almost all ages, and in
+all parts of the world, in the existence of a race of beings uniting the
+form of man with that of the fish. A rude resemblance between these
+creatures of imagination and tradition and certain aquatic animals is
+not sufficient to account for that belief. It probably had its origin in
+ancient mythologies, and in the sculptures and pictures connected with
+them, which were designed to represent certain attributes of the deities
+of various nations. In the course of time the meaning of these was lost;
+and subsequent generations regarded as the portraits of existing beings
+effigies which were at first intended to be merely emblematic and
+symbolical.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 1.--NOAH, HIS WIFE, AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED
+DEITIES.
+
+_From a Gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet._]
+
+Early idolatry consisted, first, in separating the idea of the One
+Divinity into that of his various attributes, and of inventing symbols
+and making images of each separately; secondly, in the worship of the
+sun, moon, stars, and planets, as living existences; thirdly, in the
+deification of ancestors and early kings; and these three forms were
+often mingled together in strange and tangled confusion.
+
+Amongst the famous personages with whose history men were made
+acquainted by oral tradition was Noah. He was known as the second father
+of the human race, and the preserver and teacher of the arts and
+sciences as they existed before the Great Deluge, of which so many
+separate traditions exist among the various races of mankind.
+Consequently, he was an object of worship in many countries and under
+many names; and his wife and sons, as his assistants in the diffusion of
+knowledge, were sometimes associated with him.
+
+According to Berosus, of Babylon,--the Chaldean priest and astronomer,
+who extracted from the sacred books of "that great city" much
+interesting ancient lore, which he introduced into his 'History of
+Syria,' written, about B.C. 260, for the use of the Greeks,--at a time
+when men were sunk in barbarism, there came up from the Erythrean Sea
+(the Persian Gulf), and landed on the Babylonian shore, a creature named
+Oannes, which had the body and head of a fish. But above the fish's head
+was the head of a man, and below the tail of the fish were human feet.
+It had also human arms, a human voice, and human language. This strange
+monster sojourned among the rude people during the day, taking no food,
+but retiring to the sea at night; and it continued for some time thus to
+visit them, teaching them the arts of civilized life, and instructing
+them in science and religion.[34]
+
+  [34] Berosus, lib. i. p. 48.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 2.--HEA, OR NOAH, THE GOD OF THE FLOOD.
+_Khorsabad._]
+
+In this tale we have a distorted account of the life and occupation of
+Noah after his escape from the deluge which destroyed his home and
+drowned his neighbours. Oannes was one of the names under which he was
+worshipped in Chaldea, at Erech ("the place of the ark"), as the sacred
+and intelligent fish-god, the teacher of mankind, the god of science and
+knowledge. There he was also called Oes, Hoa, Ea, Ana, Anu, Aun, and
+Oan. Noah was worshipped, also, in Syria and Mesopotamia, and in Egypt,
+at "populous No,"[35] or Thebes--so named from "Theba," "the ark."
+
+  [35] Nahum iii. 8.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 3.--DAGON. _From a bas relief. Nimroud._]
+
+The history of the coffin of Osiris is another version of Noah's ark,
+and the period during which that Egyptian divinity is said to have been
+shut up in it, after it was set afloat upon the waters, was precisely
+the same as that during which Noah remained in the ark.
+
+Dagon, also--sometimes called Odacon--the great fish-god of the
+Philistines and Babylonians, was another phase of Oannes. "Dag," in
+Hebrew, signifies "a male fish," and "Aun" and "Oan" were two of the
+names of Noah. "Dag-aun" or "Dag-oan" therefore means "the fish Noah."
+He was portrayed in two ways. The more ancient image of him was that of
+a man issuing from a fish, as described of Oannes by Berosus; but in
+later times it was varied to that of a man whose upper half was human,
+and the lower parts those of a fish. The image of Dagon which fell upon
+its face to the ground before "the ark of the God of Israel," was
+probably of this latter form, for we read[36] that in its fall, "the
+head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the
+threshold: only the _stump_ (in the margin, "_the fishy part_") of Dagon
+was left to him." This was evidently Milton's conception of him:
+
+     "Dagon his name; sea-monster, upward man
+     And downward fish."[37]
+
+  [36] 1 Samuel v. 4.
+
+  [37] 'Paradise Lost,' Book i. l. 462.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 4.--DAGON. _After Calmet._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 5.--DAGON. _From an Agate Signet. Nineveh._]
+
+In some of the Nineveh sculptures of the fish-god, the head of the fish
+forms a kind of mitre on the head of the man, whilst the body of the
+fish appears as a cloak or cape over his shoulders and back. The fish
+varies in length; in some cases the tail almost touches the ground; in
+others it reaches but little below the man's waist.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 6.--FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU.
+
+_After Calmet and Maurice._]
+
+In one of his "avatars," or incarnations, the god Vishnu "the
+Preserver," is represented as issuing from the mouth of a fish. He is
+celebrated as having miraculously preserved one righteous family, and,
+also, the Vedas, the sacred records, when the world was drowned. Not
+only is this legend of the Indian god wrought up with the history of
+Noah, but Vishnu and Noah bear the same name--Vishnu being the Sanscrit
+form of "Ish-nuh," "the man Noah." The word "avatar" also means "out of
+the boat." In fact the whole mythology of Greece and Rome, as well as of
+Asia, is full of the history and deeds of Noah, which it is impossible
+to misunderstand. In all the representations of a deity having a
+combined human and piscine form, the original idea was that of a person
+coming out of a fish--not being part of one, but issuing from
+it, as Noah issued from the ark. In all of them the fish denoted
+"preservation," "fecundity," "plenty," and "diffusion of knowledge."[38]
+As the image was not the effigy of a divine personage, but symbolized
+certain attributes of Divinity, its sex was comparatively unimportant,
+although it is possible that, combined with the fecundity of the fish,
+the idea of Noah's wife, as the second mother of all subsequent
+generations, according to the widely-spread and accepted traditions of
+the deluge, may have influenced the impersonation.
+
+  [38] Some writers are of the opinion that the legend of Oannes
+  contains an allusion to the rising and setting of the sun, and that
+  his semi-piscine form was the expression of the idea that half his
+  time was spent above ground, and half below the waves. The same
+  commentators also regard all the "civilizing" gods and goddesses
+  as, respectively, solar and lunar deities. The attributes
+  symbolized in the worship of Noah and the sun are so nearly alike
+  that the two interpretations are not incompatible.
+
+Atergatis, the far-famed goddess of the Syrians, was also a
+fish-divinity. Her image, like that of Dagon, had at first a fish's body
+with human extremities protruding from it; but in the course of
+centuries it was gradually altered to that of a being the upper portion
+of whose body was that of a woman and the lower half that of a fish.
+Gatis was a powerful queen of Sidon, and mother of Semiramis. She
+received the title of "Ater," or "Ader," "the Great," for the benefits
+she conferred on her people; one of these benefits being a strict
+conservation of their fisheries, both from their own imprudent use, and
+from foreign interference. She issued an edict that no fish should be
+eaten without her consent, and that no one should take fish in the
+neighbouring sea without a licence from herself. It is not improbable
+that she and her celebrated daughter, who is said by Ovid and others to
+have been the builder of the walls of Babylon, were worshipped together;
+for that Atergatis was the same as the fish-goddess Ashteroth, or
+Ashtoreth, "the builder of the encompassing wall," we have, amongst
+other proofs, a remarkable one in Biblical history. In the first book of
+Maccabees v. 43, 44, we read that "all the heathen being discomfited
+before him (Judas Maccabeus) cast away their weapons, and fled unto the
+temple that was at _Carnaim_. But they took the city, and burned the
+temple with all that were therein. Thus was _Carnaim_ subdued, neither
+could they stand any longer before Judas." In the second book of
+Maccabees xii. 26, we are told that "Maccabeus marched forth to
+_Carnion_, and to the temple of _Atargatis_, and there he slew five and
+twenty thousand persons." In Genesis xiv. 5, this city and temple are
+referred to as "_Ashteroth Karnaim_."
+
+Fig. 7 is a representation of Atergatis on a medal coined at Marseilles.
+It shows that when the Phoenician colony from Syria, by whom that city
+was founded, settled there, they brought with them the worship of the
+gods of their country.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 7.--ATERGATIS.
+
+_From a Phoenician coin._]
+
+Atergatis was worshipped by the Greeks as Derceto and Astarte. Lucian
+writes[39]:--"In Phoenicia I saw the image of Derceto, a strange sight,
+truly! For she had the half of a woman, and from the thighs downwards a
+fish's tail." Diodorus Siculus describes (lib. ii.) the same deity, as
+represented at Ascalon, as "having the face of a woman, but all the rest
+of the body a fish's." And this very same image at Ascalon, which
+Diodorus calls Derceto, or Atergatis, is denominated by Herodotus[40]
+"the celestial Aphrodite," who was identical with the Cyprian and Roman
+Venus. Of all the sacred buildings erected to the goddess, this temple
+was by far the most ancient; and the Cyprians themselves acknowledged
+that their temple was built after the model of it by certain Phoenicians
+who came from that part of Syria.
+
+  [39] 'Opera Omnia,' tom. ii. p. 884, edit. Bened. de Dea. Syr.
+
+  [40] Lib. i. cap. cv.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 8.--VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS.
+
+_After Calmet._]
+
+Thus the worship of Noah, as the second father of mankind, the
+repopulator of the earth, passed through various phases and
+transformations till it merged in that of Venus, who rose from the sea,
+and was regarded as the representative of the reproductive power of
+Nature--the goddess whom Lucretius thus addressed:
+
+    "Blest Venus! Thou the sea and fruitful earth
+    Peoplest amain; to thee whatever lives
+    Its being owes, and that it sees the sun:"
+
+and to whom refers the passage in the Orphic hymn:
+
+    "From thee are all things--all things thou producest
+    Which are in heaven, or in the fertile earth,
+    Or in the sea, or in the great abyss."
+
+Under this latter phase--the impersonation of Venus--the fish portion of
+the body was discarded, and the cast-off form was allotted in popular
+credence to the Tritons--minor deities, who acknowledged the supremacy
+of the goddess, and were ready to render her homage and service by
+bearing her in their arms, drawing her chariot, etc., but who still
+possessed considerable power as sea-gods, and could calm the waves and
+rule the storm, at pleasure.
+
+[Illustration:
+
+FIG. 9. FIG. 10.
+
+VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. _From two Corinthian coins._]
+
+Figs. 9 and 10 are from two Corinthian medals, each shewing Venus in a
+car or chariot drawn by Tritons, one male, the other female. On the
+obverse of Fig. 9, is the head of Nero, and on that of Fig. 10, the head
+of his grandmother Agrippina.[41]
+
+  [41] It is worthy of note that the fish was also adopted as an
+  emblem by the early Christians, and was frequently sculptured on
+  their tombs as a private mark or sign of the faith in which the
+  person there interred had died. It alluded to the letters which
+  composed the Greek word [Greek: Ichthys] ("a fish") forming an
+  anagram, the initials of words which conveyed the following
+  sentiment: [Greek: Iêsous], Jesus; [Greek: Christos], Christ;
+  [Greek: Theou], of God; [Greek: gios], Son; [Greek: Sôtêr],
+  Saviour. But it doubtless bore, also, the older meaning of
+  "preservation" and "reproduction," of which the fish was the
+  symbol, and betokened a belief in a future resurrection, as Noah
+  was preserved to dwell in, and populate, a new world. In 'Sea
+  Monsters Unmasked,' page 55, I gave a figure, copied by permission
+  from the _Illustrated London News_, of a rough sculpture in the
+  Roman catacombs, of Jonah being disgorged by a sea-monster. Near to
+  it was found, on another Christian tomb, one of these designs of
+  the "fish;" and it is not a little curious that, whereas the animal
+  depicted as casting forth Jonah is not a whale, but a sea-serpent,
+  or dragon, the _ichtheus_ in this instance is apparently not a
+  fish, but a seal.
+
+  [Illustration: FIG. 11.--CHRISTIAN SYMBOL. _From the Catacombs at
+  Rome._]
+
+  The article referred to appeared in the _Illustrated London News_ of
+  February 3rd, 1872, and the woodcut (fig. 11), an electrotype of
+  which was most kindly presented to me by the proprietors of that
+  paper, was one of the sketches that accompanied it.
+
+From the very earliest period of history, then, the conjoined human and
+fish form was known to every generation of men. It was presented to
+their sight in childhood by sculptures and pictures, and was a
+conspicuous object in their religious worship. By the lapse of time its
+original import was lost and debased; and, from being an emblem and
+symbol, it came to be accepted as the corporeal shape and structure of
+actually-existent sea-deities, who might present themselves to the view
+of the mariner, in visible and tangible form, at any moment. Thus were
+men trained and prepared to believe in mermen and mermaids, to expect to
+meet with them at sea, and to recognise as one of them any animal the
+appearance and movements of which could possibly be brought into
+conformity with their pre-conceived ideas.
+
+Accordingly, and very naturally, we find that from north to south this
+belief has been entertained. Megasthenes, who was a contemporary of
+Aristotle, but his junior, and whose geographical work was probably
+written at about the period of the great philosopher's death, reported
+that the sea which surrounded Taprobana, the ancient Ceylon, was
+inhabited by creatures having the appearance of women. Ælian stated that
+there were "whales," or "great fishes," having the form of satyrs. The
+early Portuguese settlers in India asserted that true mermen were found
+in the Eastern seas, and old Norse legends tell of submarine beings of
+conjoined human and piscine form, who dwell in a wide territory far
+below the region of the fishes, over which the sea, like the cloudy
+canopy of our sky, loftily rolls, and some of whom have, from time to
+time, landed on Scandinavian shores, exchanged their fishy extremities
+for human limbs, and acquired amphibious habits. Not only have poets
+sung of the wondrous and seductive beauty of the maidens of these
+aquatic tribes, but many a Jack tar has come home from sea prepared to
+affirm on oath that he has seen a mermaid. To the best of his belief he
+has told the truth. He has seen some living being which looked
+wonderfully human, and his imagination, aided by an inherited
+superstition, has supplied the rest.
+
+Before endeavouring to identify the object of his delusion, it may be
+well to mention a few instances of the supposed appearance of mermen and
+mermaidens in various localities.
+
+Pliny writes[42]: "When Tiberius was emperor, an embassy was sent to him
+from Olysippo (Lisbon) expressly to inform him that a Triton, which was
+recognised as such by its form, had shown itself in a certain cave, and
+had been heard to produce loud sounds on a conch-shell. The Nereid,
+also, is not imaginary: its body is rough and covered with scales, but
+it has the appearance of a human being. For one was seen upon the same
+coast; and when it was dying those dwelling near at hand heard it
+moaning sadly for a long time. And the Governor of Gaul wrote to the
+divine Augustus that several Nereids had been found dead upon the shore.
+I have many informants--illustrious persons in high positions--who have
+assured me that they saw in the Sea of Cadiz a merman whose whole body
+was exactly like that of a man, that these mermen mount on board ships
+by night, and weigh down that end of the vessel on which they rest, and
+that if they are allowed to remain there long they will sink the ship."
+
+  [42] _Naturalis Historia_, Lib. ix. cap. v.
+
+Ælian in one of his short, jerky, disconnected chapters,[43] which
+rarely exceed a page in length, and some of which only contain two
+lines, writes: "It is reported that the great sea which surrounds the
+island of Taprobana (Ceylon) contains an immense multitude of fishes and
+whales, and some of them have the heads of lions, panthers, rams, and
+other animals; and (which is more wonderful still) some of the cetaceans
+have the form of satyrs. There are others which have the face of a
+woman, but prickles instead of hair. In addition to these, it is said
+there are other creatures of so strange and monstrous a kind that it
+would be impossible exactly to explain their appearance without the aid
+of a skilfully drawn picture: these have elongated and coiled tails,
+and, for feet, have claws[44] or fins. And I hear that in the same sea
+there are great amphibious beasts which are gregarious, and live on
+grain, and by night feed on the corn crops and grass, and are also very
+fond of the ripe fruit of the palms. To obtain these they encircle in
+their embrace the trees which are young and flexible, and, shaking them
+violently, enjoy the fruit which they thus cause to fall. When morning
+dawns they return to the sea, and plunge beneath the waves."
+
+  [43] _De Naturâ Animalium_, Lib. xvi. cap. xviii.
+
+  [44] "_Forfices_," literally "shears," or "nippers," like the claws
+  of a lobster.
+
+Ælian seems to have derived this information from Megasthenes, already
+referred to; but in another chapter,[45] he writes with greater
+certainty concerning these semi-human whales, and claims divine
+authority for his belief in the existence of tritons. "Although," he
+says, "we have no rational explanation nor absolute proof of that which
+fishermen are said to be able to affirm concerning the form of the
+tritons, we have the sworn testimony of many persons that there are in
+the sea cetaceans which from the head down to the middle of the body
+resemble the human species. Demostratus, in his works on fishing, says
+that an aged triton was seen near the town of Tanagra, in Boeotia, which
+was like the drawings and pictures of tritons, but its features were so
+obscured by age, and it disappeared so quickly, that its true character
+was not easily perceptible. But on the spot where it had rested on the
+shore were found some rough and very hard scales which had become
+detached from it. A certain senator--one of those selected by lot to
+carry on the administration of Achaia and the duties of the annual
+magistracy" (the mayor, in fact,) "being anxious to investigate the
+nature of this triton, put a portion of its skin on the fire. It gave
+out a most horrible odour; and those standing by were unable to decide
+whether it belonged to a terrestrial or marine animal. But the
+magistrate's curiosity had an evil ending, for very soon afterwards,
+whilst crossing a narrow creek in a boat, he fell overboard and was
+drowned; and the Tanagreans all regarded this as a judgment upon him for
+his crime of impiety towards the triton--an interpretation which was
+confirmed when his decomposing body was cast ashore, for it emitted
+exactly the same odour as had the burned skin of the triton. The
+Tanagreans and Demostratus explain whence the triton had strayed, and
+how it was stranded in this place. I believe," continues Ælian, "that
+tritons exist, and I reverentially produce as my witness a most
+veracious god--namely, Apollo Didymæus, whom no man in his senses would
+presume to regard as unworthy of credit. He sings thus of the triton,
+which he calls the sheep of the sea:
+
+  [45] Lib. xiii. cap. xxi.
+
+    '_Dum vocale maris monstrum natat æquore triton,
+    Neptuni pecus, in funes forte incidit extra
+    Demissos navim_';"
+
+which I venture to translate as follows:
+
+    A triton, vocal monster of the deep,
+    One of a flock of Neptune's scaly sheep,
+    Was caught, whilst swimming o'er the watery plain,
+    By lines which fishers from their boat had lain.
+
+"Therefore," Ælian concludes, "if he, the omniscient god, pronounces
+that there are tritons, it does not behove us to doubt their existence."
+
+Sir J. Emerson Tennent, in his 'Natural History of Ceylon,' quoting
+from the _Histoire de la Compagnie de Jésus_, mentions that the annalist
+of the exploits of the Jesuits in India gravely records that seven of
+these monsters, male and female, were captured at Manaar, in 1560, and
+carried to Goa, where they were dissected by Demas Bosquez, physician to
+the Viceroy, "and their internal structure found to be in all respects
+conformable to the human." He also quotes Valentyn, one of the Dutch
+colonial chaplains, who, in his account of the Natural History of
+Amboyna,[46] embodied in his great work on the Netherlands' possessions
+in India, published in 1727,[47] devoted the first section of his
+chapter on the fishes of that island to a minute description of the
+"Zee-Menschen," "Zee-Wyven," and mermaids, the existence of which he
+warmly insists on as being beyond cavil. He relates that in 1663, when a
+lieutenant in the Dutch service was leading a party of soldiers along
+the sea-shore in Amboyna, he and all his company saw the mermen swimming
+at a short distance from the beach. They had long and flowing hair of a
+colour between grey and green. Six weeks afterwards the creatures were
+again seen by him and more than fifty witnesses, at the same place, by
+clear daylight. "If any narrative in the world," adds Valentyn,
+"deserves credit it is this; since not only one, but two mermen together
+were seen by so many eye-witnesses. Should the stubborn world, however,
+hesitate to believe it, it matters nothing, as there are people who
+would even deny that such cities as Rome, Constantinople, or Cairo,
+exist, merely because they themselves have not happened to see them. But
+what are such incredulous persons," he continues, "to make of the
+circumstance recorded by Albrecht Herport[48] in his account of India,
+that a merman was seen in the water near the church of Taquan on the
+morning of the 29th of April, 1661, and a mermaid at the same spot the
+same afternoon? Or what do they say to the fact that in 1714 a mermaid
+was not only seen but captured near the island of Booro, five feet,
+Rhineland measure, in height; which lived four days and seven hours,
+but, refusing all food, died without leaving any intelligible account of
+herself?" Valentyn, in support of his own faith in the mermaid, cites
+many other instances in which both "sea-men and sea-women" were seen and
+taken at Amboyna; especially one by a district visitor of the
+church, who presented it to the Governor Vanderstel. Of this
+"well-authenticated" specimen he gives an elaborate portrait amongst the
+fishes of the island,[49] with a minute description of each for the
+satisfaction of men of science.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 12.--MERMAID AND FISHES OF AMBOYNA. _After
+Valentyn._]
+
+  [46] One of the Dutch spice-islands in the Banda Sea, between
+  Celebes and Papua.
+
+  [47] _Beschrijving van Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien_, etc., 5 vols.
+  folio, Dordrecht and Amsterdam, 1727, vol. iii. p. 330.
+
+  [48] _Itinerarium Indicum_, Berne, 1669.
+
+  [49] With the permission and assistance of Messrs. Longman, the
+  accompanying wood-cut of this picture, and that of the Dugong, on
+  page 43, are copied from Sir J. Emerson Tennent's book published in
+  1861.
+
+The fame of this creature having reached Europe, the British minister in
+Holland wrote to Valentyn on the 28th of December, 1716, whilst the
+Emperor Peter the Great, of Russia, was his guest at Amsterdam, to
+communicate the desire of the Czar that the mermaid should be brought
+home from Amboyna for his inspection. To complete his proofs of the
+existence of mermen and merwomen, Valentyn points triumphantly to the
+historical fact that in Holland, in the year 1404, a mermaid was driven,
+during a tempest, through a breach in the dyke of Edam, and was taken
+alive in the lake of Purmer. Thence she was carried to Haarlem, where
+the Dutch women taught her to spin, and where several years after, she
+died in the Roman Catholic faith;--"but this," says the pious
+Calvinistic chaplain, "in no way militates against the truth of her
+story." The worthy minister citing the authority of various writers as
+proof that mermaids had in all ages been known in Gaul, Naples, Epirus,
+and the Morea, comes to the conclusion that as there are "sea-cows,"
+"sea-horses," "sea-dogs," as well as "sea-trees," and "sea-flowers,"
+which he himself had seen, there are no reasonable grounds for doubt
+that there may also be "sea-maidens" and "sea-men."
+
+In an early account of Newfoundland,[50] Whitbourne describes a
+"maremaid or mareman," which he had seen "within the length of a pike,"
+and which "came swimming swiftly towards him, looking cheerfully on his
+face, as it had been a woman. By the face, eyes, nose, mouth, chin,
+ears, neck and forehead, it appeared to be so beautiful, and in those
+parts so well proportioned, having round about the head many blue
+streaks resembling hair, but certainly it was no hair. The shoulders and
+back down to the middle were square, white, and smooth as the back of a
+man, and from the middle to the end it tapered like a broad-hooked
+arrow." The animal put both its paws on the side of the boat wherein its
+observer sat, and strove much to get in, but was repelled by a blow.
+
+  [50] Whitbourne's 'Discourse of Newfoundland.'
+
+In 1676, a description was given by an English surgeon named Glover, of
+an animal of this kind. The author did not designate it by any name, but
+the incident has the honour of being recorded in the _Philosophical
+Transactions_.[51] About three leagues from the mouth of the river
+Rappahannock, in America, while alone in a vessel, he observed, at the
+distance of about half a stone-throw, he says, "a most prodigious
+creature, much resembling a man, only somewhat larger, standing right up
+in the water, with his head, neck, shoulders, breast and waist, to the
+cubits of his arms, above water, and his skin was tawny, much like that
+of an Indian; the figure of his head was pyramidal and sleek, without
+hair; his eyes large and black, and so were his eyebrows; his mouth very
+wide, with a broad black streak on the upper lip, which turned upwards
+at each end like mustachios. His countenance was grim and terrible. His
+neck, shoulders, arms, breast and waist, were like unto the neck, arms,
+shoulders, breast and waist of a man. His hands, if he had any, were
+under water. He seemed to stand with his eyes fixed on me for some time,
+and afterwards dived down, and, a little after, rose at somewhat a
+greater distance, and turned his head towards me again, and then
+immediately fell a little under water, that I could discern him throw
+out his arms and gather them in as a man does when he swims. At last, he
+shot with his head downwards, by which means he cast his tail above the
+water, which exactly resembled the tail of a fish, with a broad fane at
+the end of it."
+
+  [51] Glover's 'Account of Virginia,' ap. Phil. Trans. vol. xi. p.
+  625.
+
+Thormodus Torfæus[52] maintains that mermaids are found on the south
+coast of Iceland, and, according to Olafsen,[53] two have been taken in
+the surrounding seas, the first in the earlier part of the history of
+that island, and the second in 1733. The latter was found in the stomach
+of a shark. Its lower parts were consumed, but the upper were entire.
+They were as large as those of a boy eight or nine years old. Both the
+cutting teeth and grinders were long and shaped like pins, and the
+fingers were connected by a large web. Olafsen was inclined to believe
+that these were human remains, but the islanders all firmly maintained
+that they were part of "a marmennill," by which name the mermaid is
+known among them.
+
+  [52] _Historia rerum Norvegicarum._
+
+  [53] _Voyage en Islande_, tom. iii. p. 223.
+
+Of course the worthy bishop of Bergen, Pontoppidan, has something to
+tell us about mermaids in his part of the world. "Amongst the sea
+monsters," he says,[54] "which are in the North Sea, and are often seen,
+I shall give the first place to the Hav-manden, or merman, whose mate is
+called Hav-fruen, or mermaid. The existence of this creature is
+questioned by many, nor is it at all to be wondered at, because most of
+the accounts we have had of it are mixed with mere fables, and may be
+looked upon as idle tales." As such he regards the story told by Jonas
+Ramus in his 'History of Norway,' of a mermaid taken by fishermen at
+Hordeland, near Bergen, and which is said to have sung an unmusical song
+to King Hiorlief. In the same category he places an account given by
+Besenius in his life of Frederic II. (1577), of a mermaid that called
+herself Isbrandt, and held several conversations with a peasant at
+Samsoe, in which she foretold the birth of King Christian IV., "and made
+the peasant preach repentance to the courtiers, who were very much given
+to drunkenness." Equally "idle" with the above stories is, in his
+opinion, another, extracted from an old manuscript still to be seen in
+the University Library at Copenhagen, and quoted by Andrew Bussæus
+(1619), of a merman caught by the two senators, Ulf Rosensparre and
+Christian Holch, whilst on their voyage home to Denmark from Norway.
+This sea-man frightened the two worshipful gentlemen so terribly that
+they were glad to let him go again; for as he lay upon the deck he spoke
+Danish to them, and threatened that if they did not give him his liberty
+"the ship should be cast away, and every soul of the crew should
+perish."
+
+  [54] 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii. p. 190.
+
+"When such fictions as these," says Pontoppidan, "are mixed with the
+history of the merman, and when that creature is represented as a
+prophet and an orator; when they give the mermaid a melodious voice, and
+tell us that she is a fine singer, we need not wonder that so few people
+of sense will give credit to such absurdities, or that they even doubt
+the existence of such a creature." The good prelate, however, goes on to
+say that "whilst we have no ground to believe all these fables, yet, as
+to the existence of the creature we may safely give our assent to it,"
+and, "if this be called in question, it must proceed entirely from the
+fabulous stories usually mixed with the truth." Like Valentyn, he argues
+that as there are "sea-horses," "sea-cows," "sea-wolves," "sea-dogs,"
+"sea-hogs," etc., it is probable from analogy, that "we should find in
+the ocean a fish or creature which resembles the human species more than
+any other." As for the objection "founded on self-love and respect to
+our own species which is honoured with the image of God, who made man
+lord of all creatures, and that, consequently, we may suppose he is
+entitled to a noble and heavenly form which other creatures must not
+partake of," he thinks "its force vanishes when we consider the form of
+apes, and especially of another African creature called 'Quoyas Morrov'
+described by Odoard Dapper" in his work on Africa, and which appears to
+have been a chimpanzee. Pontoppidan regarded it as being the Satyr of
+the ancients. He therefore claims that "if we will not allow our
+Norwegian Hastromber the honourable name of merman, we may very well
+call it the 'Sea-ape,' or the 'Sea-Quoyas-Morrov;'" especially as the
+author already quoted says that, "in the Sea of Angola mermaids are
+frequently caught which resemble the human species. They are taken in
+nets, and killed by the negroes, and are heard to shriek and cry like
+women."
+
+The Bishop adds that in the diocese of Bergen, as well as in the manor
+of Nordland, there were hundreds of persons who affirmed with the
+strongest assurances that they had seen this kind of creature; sometimes
+at a distance and at other times quite close to their boats, standing
+upright, and formed like a human creature down to the middle--the rest
+they could not see--but of those who had seen them out of water and
+handled them he had not been able to find more than one person of credit
+who could vouch it for truth. This informant, "the Reverend Mr. Peter
+Angel, minister of Vand-Elvens Gield, on Suderoe," assured his bishop,
+when he was on a visitation journey, that "in the year 1719, he (being
+then about twenty years old) saw what is called a merman lying dead on a
+point of land near the sea, which had been cast ashore by the waves
+along with several sea-calves (seals), and other dead fish. The length
+of this creature was much greater than what has been mentioned of any
+before, namely, above three fathoms. It was of a dark grey colour all
+over: in the lower part it was like a fish, and had a tail like that of
+a porpoise. The face resembled that of a man, with a mouth, forehead,
+eyes, etc. The nose was flat, and, as it were, pressed down to the face,
+in which the nostrils were very visible. The breast was not far from the
+head; the arms seemed to hang to the side, to which they were joined by
+a thin skin, or membrane. The hands were, to all appearance, like the
+paws of a sea-calf. The back of this creature was very fat, and a great
+part of it was cut off, which, with the liver, yielded a large quantity
+of train-oil." The author then quotes a description by Luke Debes[55] of
+a mermaid seen in 1670 at Faroe, westward of Qualboe Eide, by many of
+the inhabitants, as also by others from different parts of Suderoe. She
+was close to the shore, and stood there for two hours and a half, and
+was up to her waist in water. She had long hairs on her head, which hung
+down to the surface of the water all round about her, and she held a
+fish in her right hand.
+
+  [55] _Feroa Reserata_, or Description of the Faroe Islands. 8vo.
+  Copenhagen, 1673.
+
+Pontoppidan mentions other instances of similar appearances, and says
+that the latest he had heard of was of a merman seen in Denmark on the
+20th of September, 1723, by three ferrymen who, at some distance from
+the land, were towing a ship just arrived from the Baltic. Having caught
+sight of something which looked like a dead body floating on the water,
+they rowed towards it, and there, resting on their oars, allowed it to
+drift close to them. It sank, but immediately came to the surface again,
+and then they saw that it had the appearance of an old man,
+strong-limbed, and with broad shoulders, but his arms they could not
+see. His head was small in proportion to his body, and had short,
+curled, black hair, which did not reach below his ears; his eyes lay
+deep in his head, and he had a meagre and pinched face, with a black,
+coarse beard, that looked as if it had been cut. His skin was coarse,
+and very full of hair. He stood in the same place for half a quarter of
+an hour, and was seen above the water down to his breast: at last the
+men grew apprehensive of some danger, and began to retire; upon which
+the monster blew up his cheeks, and made a kind of roaring noise, and
+then dived under water, so that they did not see him any more. One of
+them, Peter Gunnersen, related (what the others did not observe) that
+this merman was, about the body and downwards, quite pointed, like a
+fish. This same Peter Gunnersen likewise deposed that "about twenty
+years before, as he was in a boat near Kulleor, the place where he was
+born, he saw a mermaid with long hair and large breasts." He and his two
+companions were, by command of the king, examined by the burgomaster of
+Elsineur, Andrew Bussæus, before the privy-councillor, Fridrich von
+Gram, and their testimony to the above effect was given on their
+respective oaths.
+
+Brave old Henry Hudson, the sturdy and renowned navigator, who thrice,
+in three successive years, gave battle to the northern ice, and was each
+time defeated in his endeavour to discover a north-west or north-east
+passage to China, though he stamped his name on the title-page of a
+mighty nation's history, records the following incident: "This evening
+(June 15th) one of our company, looking overboard, saw a mermaid, and,
+calling up some of the company to see her, one more of the crew came up,
+and by that time she was come close to the ship's side, looking
+earnestly on the men. A little after a sea came and overturned her. From
+the navel upward, her back and breasts were like a woman's, as they say
+that saw her; her body as big as one of us, her skin very white, and
+long hair hanging down behind, of colour black. In her going down they
+saw her tail, which was like the tail of a porpoise and speckled like a
+mackarel's. Their names that saw her were Thomas Hilles and Robert
+Rayner."
+
+Steller, who was a zoologist of some repute, reports having seen in
+Behrings Straits a strange animal, which he calls a "sea-ape," and in
+which one might almost recognise Pontoppidan's "Sea-Quoyas-Morrov." It
+was about five feet long, had sharp and erect ears and large eyes, and
+on its lips a kind of beard. Its body was thick and round, and it
+tapered to the tail, which was bifurcated, with the upper lobe longest.
+It was covered with thick hair, grey on the back, and red on the belly.
+No feet nor paws were visible. It was full of frolic, and sported in the
+manner of a monkey, swimming sometimes on one side of the ship and
+sometimes on the other. It often raised one-third of its body out of the
+water, and stood upright for a considerable time. It would frequently
+bring up a sea-plant, not unlike a bottle-gourd, which it would toss
+about and catch in its mouth, playing numberless fantastic tricks with
+it.
+
+Somewhat similar accounts have been brought from the Southern
+Hemisphere, two, at least, of which are worth transcribing.
+
+Captain Colnett, in his 'Voyage to the South Atlantic,' says:--"A very
+singular circumstance happened off the coast of Chili, in lat. 24° S.,
+which spread some alarm amongst my people, and awakened their
+superstitious apprehensions. About 8 o'clock in the evening an animal
+rose alongside the ship, and uttered such shrieks and tones of
+lamentation, so much like those produced by the female human voice when
+expressing the deepest distress as to occasion no small degree of alarm
+among those who first heard it. These cries continued for upwards of
+three hours, and seemed to increase as the ship sailed from it. I never
+heard any noise whatever that approached so near those sounds which
+proceed from the organs of utterance in the human species."
+
+Captain Weddell, in his 'Voyage towards the South Pole' (p. 143), writes
+that one of his men, having been left ashore on Hall's Island to take
+care of some produce, heard one night about ten o'clock, after he had
+lain down to rest, a noise resembling human cries. As daylight does not
+disappear in those latitudes at the season in which the incident
+occurred, the sailor rose and searched along the beach, thinking that,
+possibly, a boat might have been upset, and that some of the crew might
+be clinging to the detached rocks.
+
+    "Roused by that voice of silver sound,
+    From the paved floor he lightly sprung,
+    And, glaring with his eyes around,
+    Where the fair nymph her tresses wrung,"[56]
+
+guided by occasional sounds, he at length saw an object lying on a rock
+a dozen yards from the shore, at which he was somewhat frightened. "The
+face and shoulders appeared of human form and of a reddish colour; over
+the shoulders hung long green hair; the tail resembled that of a seal,
+but the extremities of the arms he could not see distinctly."
+
+    "As on the wond'ring youth she smiled,
+    Again she raised the melting lay,"[56]
+
+  [56] John Leyden.
+
+for the creature continued to make a musical noise during the two
+minutes he gazed at it, and, on perceiving him, disappeared in an
+instant.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 13.--A JAPANESE ARTIFICIAL MERMAID.]
+
+The universality of the belief in an animal of combined human and
+fish-like form is very remarkable. That it exists amongst the Japanese
+we have evidence in their curious and ingeniously-constructed models
+which are occasionally brought to this country. I have one of these
+which is so exactly the counterpart of that which my friend Mr. Frank
+Buckland described, originally in _Land and Water_, and which forms the
+subject of a chapter in his 'Curiosities of Natural History,'[57] that
+the portrait of the one (Fig. 13) will equally well represent the other.
+The lower half of the body is made of the skin and scales of a fish of
+the carp family, and fastened on to this, so neatly that it is hardly
+possible to detect where the joint is made, is a wooden body, the ribs
+of which are so prominent that the poor mermaid has a miserable and
+half-starved appearance. The upper part of the body is in the attitude
+of a Sphinx, leaning upon its elbows and fore-arms. The arms are thin
+and scraggy, and the fingers attenuated and skeleton-like. The nails are
+formed of small pieces of ivory or bone. The head is like that of a
+small monkey, and a little wool covers the crown, so thinly and untidily
+that if the mermaid possessed a crystal mirror she would see the
+necessity for the vigorous use of her comb of pearl. The teeth are those
+of some fish--apparently of the cat-fish, (_Anarchicas lupus_). These
+Japanese artificial mermaids have brought many a dollar into the pockets
+of Mr. Barnum and other showmen.
+
+  [57] Third Series, vol. ii. p. 134, 2nd ed.
+
+Somewhat different in appearance from this, but of the same kind, was an
+artificial mermaid described in the _Saturday Magazine_ of June 4th,
+1836. Fig. 14 is a facsimile of the woodcut which accompanied it. This
+grotesque composition was exhibited in a glass case, some years
+previously, "in a leading street at the west end" of London. It was
+constructed "of the skin of the head and shoulders of a monkey, which
+was attached to the dried skin of a fish of the salmon kind with the
+head cut off, and the whole was stuffed and highly varnished, the better
+to deceive the eye." It was said to have been "taken by the crew of a
+Dutch vessel from on board a native Malacca boat, and from the reverence
+shown to it, it was supposed to be a representative of one of their idol
+gods." I am inclined to think that it was of Japanese origin.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 14.--AN ARTIFICIAL MERMAID, PROBABLY JAPANESE.]
+
+Fig. 15 is described in the article above referred to as having been
+copied from a Japanese drawing, and as being a portrait of one of their
+deities. Its similarity to one of those of the Assyrians (Fig. 2, page
+3) is remarkable. The inscription, however, does not indicate this. The
+Chinese characters in the centre--"_Nin giyo_"--signify "human fish;"
+those on the right in Japanese _Hira Kana_, or running-hand, have the
+same purport, and those on the left, in _Kata Kana_, the characters of
+the Japanese alphabet, mean "_Ichi hiru ike_"--"one day kept alive." The
+whole legend seems to pretend that this human fish was actually caught,
+and kept alive in water for twenty-four hours, but, as the box on which
+it is inscribed is one of those in which the Japanese showmen keep their
+toys, it was probably the subject of a "penny peep-show."
+
+We need not travel from our own country to find the belief in mermaids
+yet existing. It is still credited in the north of Scotland that they
+inhabit the neighbouring seas: and Dr. Robert Hamilton, F.R.S.E.,
+writing in 1839, expressed emphatically his opinion that there was then
+as much ignorance on this subject as had prevailed at any former
+period.[58]
+
+  [58] Naturalist's Library, Marine Amphibiæ, p. 291.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 15.--A MERMAID. _From a Japanese picture._]
+
+In the year 1797, Mr. Munro, schoolmaster of Thurso, affirmed that he
+had seen "a figure like a naked female, sitting on a rock projecting
+into the sea, at Sandside Head, in the parish of Reay. Its head was
+covered with long, thick, light-brown hair, flowing down on the
+shoulders. The forehead was round, the face plump, and the cheeks ruddy.
+The mouth and lips resembled those of a human being, and the eyes were
+blue. The arms, fingers, breast, and abdomen were as large as those of a
+full-grown female," and, altogether,
+
+    "That sea-nymph's form of pearly light
+    Was whiter than the downy spray,
+    And round her bosom, heaving bright,
+    Her glossy yellow ringlets play."[59]
+
+  [59] John Leyden.
+
+"This creature," continued Mr. Munro, "was apparently in the act of
+combing its hair with its fingers, which seemed to afford it pleasure,
+and it remained thus occupied during some minutes, when it dropped into
+the sea." The Dominie
+
+                "saw the maiden there,
+    Just as the daylight faded,
+    Braiding her locks of gowden hair
+    An' singing as she braided,"[60]
+
+  [60] The Ettrick Shepherd.
+
+but he did not remark whether the fingers were webbed. On the whole, he
+infers that this was a marine animal of which he had a distinct and
+satisfactory view, and that the portion seen by him bore a narrow
+resemblance to the human form. But for the dangerous situation it had
+chosen, and its appearance among the waves, he would have supposed it to
+be a woman. Twelve years later, several persons observed near the same
+spot an animal which they also supposed to be a mermaid.
+
+A very remarkable story of this kind is one related by Dr. Robert
+Hamilton in the volume already referred to, and for the general truth of
+which he vouches, from his personal knowledge of some of the persons
+connected with the occurrence. In 1823 it was reported that some
+fishermen of Yell, one of the Shetland group, had captured a mermaid by
+its being entangled in their lines. The statement was that "the animal
+was about three feet long, the upper part of the body resembling the
+human, with protuberant mammæ, like a woman; the face, forehead, and
+neck were short, and resembled those of a monkey; the arms, which were
+small, were kept folded across the breast; the fingers were distinct,
+not webbed; a few stiff, long bristles were on the top of the head,
+extending down to the shoulders, and these it could erect and depress at
+pleasure, something like a crest. The inferior part of the body was like
+a fish. The skin was smooth, and of a grey colour. It offered no
+resistance, nor attempted to bite, but uttered a low, plaintive sound.
+The crew, six in number, took it within their boat, but, superstition
+getting the better of curiosity, they carefully disentangled it from the
+lines and a hook which had accidentally become fastened in its body, and
+returned it to its native element. It instantly dived, descending in a
+perpendicular direction." Mr. Edmonston, the original narrator of this
+incident, was "a well-known and intelligent observer," says Dr.
+Hamilton, and in a communication made by him to the Professor of Natural
+History in the Edinburgh University gave the following additional
+particulars, which he had learned from the skipper and one of the crew
+of the boat. "They had the animal for three hours within the boat: the
+body was without scales or hair; it was of a silvery grey colour above,
+and white below; it was like the human skin; no gills were observed, nor
+fins on the back or belly. The tail was like that of a dog-fish; the
+mammæ were about as large as those of a woman; the mouth and lips were
+very distinct, and resembled the human. Not one of the six men dreamed
+of a doubt of its being a mermaid, and it could not be suggested that
+they were influenced by their fears, for the mermaid is not an object of
+terror to fishermen: it is rather a welcome guest, and danger is
+apprehended from its experiencing bad treatment." Mr. Edmonston
+concludes by saying that "the usual resources of scepticism that the
+seals and other sea-animals appearing under certain circumstances,
+operating upon an excited imagination, and so producing ocular illusion,
+cannot avail here. It is quite impossible that six Shetland fishermen
+could commit such a mistake." It would seem that the narrator demands
+that his readers shall be silenced, if unconvinced; but
+
+    "He that complies against his will
+    Is of his own opinion still."
+
+This incident is well-attested, and merits respectful and careful
+consideration; but I decline to admit any such impossibility of error in
+observation or description on the part of the fishermen, or the further
+impossibility of recognising in the animal captured by them one known to
+naturalists. The particulars given in this instance, and also of the
+supposed merman seen cast ashore dead in 1719 by the Rev. Peter Angel
+(p. 22), are sufficiently accurate descriptions of a warm-blooded marine
+animal, with which the Shetlanders, and probably Mr. Edmonston also,
+were unacquainted, namely, the rytina, of which I shall have more to say
+presently; and these occurrences afford some slight hope that this
+remarkable beast may not have become extinct in 1768, as has been
+supposed, but that it may still exist somewhat further south than it was
+met with by its original describer, Steller.
+
+Turning to Ireland, we find the same credence in the semi-human fish,
+or fish-tailed human being. In the autumn of 1819 it was affirmed that
+"a creature appeared on the Irish coast, about the size of a girl ten
+years of age, with a bosom as prominent as one of sixteen, having a
+profusion of long dark-brown hair, and full, dark eyes. The hands and
+arms were formed like those of a man, with a slight web connecting the
+upper part of the fingers, which were frequently employed in throwing
+back and dividing the hair. The tail appeared like that of a dolphin."
+This creature remained basking on the rocks during an hour, in the sight
+of numbers of people, until frightened by the flash of a musket, when
+
+    "Away she went with a sea-gull's scream,
+    And a splash of her saucy tail,"[61]
+
+  [61] Tom Hood. 'The Mermaid at Margate.'
+
+for it instantly plunged with a scream into the sea.
+
+From Irish legends we learn that those sea-nereids, the "Merrows," or
+"Moruachs" came occasionally from the sea, gained the affections of men,
+and interested themselves in their affairs; and similar traditions of
+the "Morgan" (sea-women) and the "Morverch" (sea-daughters) are current
+in Brittany.
+
+In English poetry the mermaid has been the subject of many charming
+verses, and Shakspeare alludes to it in his plays no less than six
+times. The head-quarters of these "daughters of the sea" in England, or
+of the belief in their existence, are in Cornwall. There the fisherman,
+many a time and
+
+            "Oft, beneath the silver moon,[62]
+    Has heard, afar, the mermaid sing,"
+
+and has listened, so they say, to
+
+    "The mermaid's sweet sea-soothing lay
+    That charmed the dancing waves to sleep."[62]
+
+  [62] John Leyden.
+
+Mr. Robert Hunt, F.R.S., in his collection of the traditions and
+superstitions of old Cornwall,[63] records several curious legends of
+the "merrymaids" and "merrymen" (the local name of mermaids), which he
+had gathered from the fisher-folk and peasants in different parts of
+that county.
+
+  [63] 'Romances and Drolls of the West of England.' London: Hotten,
+  1871.
+
+And, in a pleasant article in 'All the Year Round,'[64] 1865, "A Cornish
+Vicar"[65] mentions some of the superstitions of the people in his
+neighbourhood, and the perplexing questions they occasionally put to
+him. One of his parishioners, an old man named Anthony Cleverdon, but
+who was popularly known as "Uncle Tony," having been the seventh son of
+his parents, in direct succession, was looked upon, in consequence, as a
+soothsayer. This "ancient augur" confided to his pastor many highly
+efficacious charms and formularies, and, in return, sought for
+information from him on other subjects. One day he puzzled the parson by
+a question which so well illustrates the local ideas concerning
+mermaids, and the sequel of which is, moreover, so humorously related by
+the vicar, that I venture to quote his own words, as follows:--
+
+  [64] Vol. xiii. p. 336.
+
+  [65] The "Cornish Vicar" was, evidently, the Rev. Robert Stephen
+  Hawker, M.A., Vicar of Morwenstow, and author of 'Echoes from Old
+  Cornwall,' 'Footprints of Former Men in Cornwall,' etc.
+
+"Uncle Tony said to me, 'Sir, there is one thing I want to ask you, if
+I may be so free, and it is this: why should a merrymaid, that will ride
+about upon the waters in such terrible storms, and toss from sea to sea
+in such ruckles as there be upon the coast, why should she never lose
+her looking-glass and comb?' 'Well, I suppose,' said I, 'that if there
+are such creatures, Tony, they must wear their looking-glasses and combs
+fastened on somehow, like fins to a fish.' 'See!' said Tony, chuckling
+with delight, 'what a thing it is to know the Scriptures, like your
+reverence; I should never have found it out. But there's another point,
+sir, I should like to know, if you please; I've been bothered about it
+in my mind hundreds of times. Here be I, that have gone up and down
+Holacombe cliffs and streams fifty years come next Candlemas, and I've
+gone and watched the water by moonlight and sunlight, days and nights,
+on purpose, in rough weather and smooth (even Sundays, too, saving your
+presence), and my sight as good as most men's, and yet I never could
+come to see a merrymaid in all my life: how's that, sir?' 'Are you sure,
+Tony,' I rejoined, 'that there are such things in existence at all?'
+'Oh, sir, my old father seen her twice! He was out one night for wreck
+(my father watched the coast, like most of the old people formerly), and
+it came to pass that he was down at the duck-pool on the sand at
+low-water tide, and all to once he heard music in the sea. Well, he
+croped on behind a rock, like a coastguardsman watching a boat, and got
+very near the music ... and there was the merrymaid, very plain to be
+seen, swimming about upon the waves like a woman bathing--and singing
+away. But my father said it was very sad and solemn to hear--more like
+the tune of a funeral hymn than a Christmas carol, by far--but it was so
+sweet that it was as much as he could do to hold back from plunging into
+the tide after her. And he an old man of sixty-seven, with a wife and a
+houseful of children at home. The second time was down here by Holacombe
+Pits. He had been looking out for spars--there was a ship breaking up in
+the Channel--and he saw some one move just at half-tide mark, so he went
+on very softly, step by step, till he got nigh the place, and there was
+the merrymaid sitting on a rock, the bootyfullest merrymaid that eye
+could behold, and she was twisting about her long hair, and dressing it,
+just like one of our girls getting ready for her sweetheart on the
+Sabbath-day. The old man made sure he should greep hold of her before
+ever she found him out, and he had got so near that a couple of paces
+more and he would have caught her by the hair, as sure as tithe or tax,
+when, lo and behold, she looked back and glimpsed him! So, in one moment
+she dived head-foremost off the rock, and then tumbled herself
+topsy-turvy about in the water, and cast a look at my poor father, and
+grinned like a seal.'" And a seal it probably was that Tony's "poor
+father" saw.
+
+What, then, are these mermaids and mermen, a belief in whose existence
+has prevailed in all ages, and amongst all the nations of the earth?
+Have they, really, some of the parts and proportions of man, or do they
+belong to another order of mammals on which credulity and inaccurate
+observation have bestowed a false character?
+
+Mr. Swainson, a naturalist of deserved eminence, has maintained on
+purely scientific grounds, that there must exist a marine animal uniting
+the general form of a fish with that of a man; that by the laws of
+Nature the natatorial type of the _Quadrumana_ is most assuredly
+wanting, and that, apart from man, a being connecting the seals with the
+monkeys is required to complete the circle of quadrumanous animals.[66]
+
+  [66] 'Geography and Distribution of Animals.'
+
+Mr. Gosse[67] argues that all the characters which Mr. Swainson selects
+as marking the natatorial type of animals belong to man, and that he
+being, in his savage state, a great swimmer, is the true aquatic
+primate, which Mr. Swainson regards as absent. Mr. Gosse admits,
+however, that "nature has an odd way of mocking at our impossibilities,
+and" that "it _may be_ that green-haired maidens with oary tails, lurk
+in the ocean caves, and keep mirrors and combs upon their rocky
+shelves;" and the conclusion he arrives at is that the combined evidence
+"induces a strong suspicion that the northern seas may hold forms of
+life as yet uncatalogued by science."
+
+  [67] 'Romance of Natural History,' 2nd Series.
+
+That there are animals in the northern and other seas with which we are
+unacquainted, is more than probable: discoveries of animals of new
+species are constantly being made, especially in the life of the deep
+sea. But I venture to think that the production of an animal at present
+unknown is quite unnecessary to account for the supposed appearances of
+mermaids.
+
+We have in the form and habits of the _Phocidæ_, or earless seals, a
+sufficient interpretation of almost every incident of the kind that has
+occurred north of the Equator--of those in which protuberant _mammæ_ are
+described, we must presently seek another explanation. The round, plump,
+expressive face of a seal, the beautiful, limpid eyes, the hand-like
+fore-paws, the sleek body, tapering towards the flattened hinder fins,
+which are directed backwards, and spread out in the form of a broad fin,
+like the tail of a fish, might well give the idea of an animal having
+the anterior part of its body human and the posterior half piscine.
+
+In the habits of the seals, also, we may trace those of the supposed
+mermaid, and the more easily the better we are acquainted with them. All
+seals are fond of leaving the water frequently. They always select the
+flattest and most shelving rocks which have been covered at high tide,
+and prefer those that are separated from the mainland. They generally go
+ashore at half-tide, and invariably lie with their heads towards the
+water, and seldom more than a yard or two from it. There they will often
+remain, if undisturbed, for six hours; that is, until the returning tide
+floats them off the rock. As for the sweet melody, "so melting soft,"
+that must depend much on the ear and musical taste of the listener. I
+have never heard a seal utter any vocal sounds but a porcine grunt, a
+plaintive moan, and a pitiful whine. But another habit of the seals has,
+probably more than anything else, caused them to be mistaken for
+semi-human beings--namely, that of poising themselves upright in the
+water with the head and the upper third part of the body above the
+surface.
+
+One calm sunny morning in August, 1881, a fine schooner-yacht, on board
+of which I was a guest, was slowly gliding out of the mouth of the river
+Maas, past the Hook of Holland, into the North Sea, when a seal rose
+just ahead of us, and assumed the attitude above described. It waited
+whilst we passed it, inspecting us apparently with the greatest
+interest; then dived, swam in the direction in which we were sailing, so
+as to intercept our course, and came up again, sitting upright as
+before. This it repeated three times, and so easily might it have been
+taken for a mermaid, that one of the party, who was called on deck to
+see it, thought, at first, that it was a boy who had swam off from the
+shore to the vessel on a begging expedition.
+
+Laing, in his account of a voyage to the North, mentions having seen a
+seal under similar circumstances.
+
+A young seal which was brought from Yarmouth to the Brighton Aquarium
+in 1873, habitually sat thus, showing his head and a considerable
+portion of his body out of water. His bath was so shallow in some parts
+that he was able to touch the bottom, and, with his after-flippers
+tucked under him, like a lobster's tail, and spread out in front, he
+would balance himself on his hind quarters, and look inquisitively at
+everybody, and listen attentively to everything within sight and
+hearing. When he was satisfied that no one was likely to interfere with
+him, and that it was unnecessary to be on the alert, he would half-close
+his beautiful, soft eyes, and either contentedly pat, stroke, and
+scratch his little fat stomach with his right paw, or flap both of them
+across his breast in a most ludicrous manner, exactly as a cabman warms
+the tips of his fingers on a wintry day, by swinging his arms vigorously
+across his chest, and striking his hands against his body on either
+side. He was very sensitive to musical sounds, as many dogs are, and
+when a concert took place in the building a high note from one of the
+vocalists would cause him to utter a mournful wail, and to dive with a
+splash that made the water fly, the audience smile, and the singer
+frown.
+
+Captain Scoresby tells us that he had seen the walrus with its head
+above water, and in such a position that it required little stretch of
+imagination to mistake it for a human being, and that on one occasion of
+this kind the surgeon of his ship actually reported to him that he had
+seen a man with his head above water.
+
+Peter Gunnersen's merman (p. 24), who "blew up his cheeks and made a
+kind of roaring noise" before diving, was probably a "bladder-nose"
+seal. The males of that species have on the head a peculiar pad, which
+they can dilate at pleasure, and their voice is loud and discordant.
+
+The appearance and behaviour of Steller's "sea-ape," described on p.
+25, may, I think, be attributed to one of the eared seals, the so-called
+sea-lions, or sea-bears. Every one who has seen these animals fed must
+have noticed the rapidity with which they will dive and swim to any part
+of their pond where they expect to receive food, and how, like a dog
+after a pebble, they will keenly watch their keeper's movements, and
+start in the direction to which he is apparently about to throw a fish,
+even before the latter has left his hand. This may be seen at the
+Zoological Gardens, Regent's Park, and, better than anywhere else in
+Europe, at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, Paris. It would be quite in
+accordance with their habits that one of these _Otaria_ should dive
+under a ship, and rise above the surface on either side, eagerly
+surveying those on board, in hope of obtaining food, or from mere
+curiosity.
+
+The seals and their movements account for so many mermaid stories, that
+all accounts of sea-women with prominent bosoms were ridiculed and
+discredited until competent observers recognised in the form and habits
+of certain aquatic animals met with in the bays and estuaries of the
+Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, the west coast of Africa, and sub-tropical
+America, the originals of these "travellers' tales." These were--first,
+the _manatee_, which is found in the West Indian Islands, Florida, the
+Gulf of Mexico, and Brazil, and in Africa in the River Congo,
+Senegambia, and the Mozambique Channel; second, the _dugong_, or
+_halicore_, which ranges along the east coast of Africa, Southern Asia,
+the Bornean Archipelago, and Australia; and, third, the _rytina_, seen
+on Behring's Island in the Kamschatkan Sea by Steller, the Russian
+zoologist and voyager, in 1741, and which is supposed to have become
+extinct within twenty-seven years after its discovery, by its having
+been recklessly and indiscriminately slaughtered.[68] Then science, in
+the person of Illeger, made the _amende honorable_, and frankly
+accepting Jack's introduction to his fish-tailed _innamorata_, classed
+these three animals together as a sub-order of the animal kingdom, and
+bestowed on them the name of the _Sirenia_. This was, of course, in
+allusion to the Sirens of classical mythology, who, in later art, were
+represented as having the body of a woman above the waist, and that of a
+fish below, although the lower portion of their body was originally
+described as being in the form of a bird.
+
+  [68] Almost all that is known of the living rytina is from an
+  account published in 1751, in St. Petersburg, by Steller, who was
+  one of an exploring party wrecked on Behring's Island in 1741.
+  During the ten months the crew remained on the island they pursued
+  this easily-captured animal so persistently, for food, that it was
+  all but annihilated at the time. The last one there was killed in
+  1768.
+
+It has been found difficult to determine to which order these _Manatidæ_
+are most nearly allied. In shape they most closely resemble the whales
+and seals. But the cetacea are all carnivorous, whereas the manatee and
+its relatives live entirely on vegetable food. Although, therefore, Dr.
+J. E. Gray, following Cuvier, classed them with the cetacea in his
+British Museum catalogue, other anatomists, as Professor Agassiz,
+Professor Owen, and Dr. Murie, regard their resemblance to the whales as
+rather superficial than real, and conclude from their organisation and
+dentition that they ought either to form a group apart or be classed
+with the pachyderms--the hippopotamus, tapir, etc.--with which they have
+the nearest affinities, and to which they seem to have been more
+immediately linked by the now lost genera, _Dinotherium_ and
+_Halitherium_. With the opinion of those last-named authorities I
+entirely agree. I regard the manatee as exhibiting a wonderful
+modification and adaptation of the structure of a warm-blooded land
+animal which enables it to pass its whole life in water, and as a
+connecting link between the hippopotamus, elephant, etc., on the one
+side, and the whales and seals on the other.
+
+The _Halitherium_ was a Sirenian with which we are only acquainted by
+its fossil remains found in the Miocene formation of Central and
+Southern Europe. These indicate that it had short hind limbs, and,
+consequently, approached more nearly the terrestrial type than either
+the manatee, the rytina, or the dugong, in which the hind limbs are
+absent. The two last named tend more than does the manatee to the marine
+mammals; but there is a strong likeness between these three recent
+forms. They all have a cylindrical body, like that of a seal, but
+instead of hind limbs there is in all a broad tail flattened
+horizontally; and the chief difference in their outward appearance is in
+the shape of this organ. In the manatee it is rounded, in the dugong
+forked like that of a whale, in the rytina crescent-shaped. The tail of
+the _Halitherium_ appears to have been shaped somewhat like that of the
+beaver. The body of the manatee is broader in proportion to its length
+and depth than that of the dugong. In a paper read before the Royal
+Society, July 12th, 1821, on a manatee sent to London in spirits by the
+Duke of Manchester, then Governor of Jamaica, Sir Everard Home remarked
+of this greater lateral expansion that, as the manatee feeds on plants
+that grow at the mouths of great rivers, and the dugong upon those met
+with in the shallows amongst small islands in the Eastern seas, the
+difference of form would make the manatee more buoyant and better fitted
+to float in fresh water.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 16.--THE DUGONG. _From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's
+'Ceylon.'_]
+
+In all the _Manatidæ_ the mammæ of the female, which are greatly
+distended during the period of lactation, are situated very differently
+from those of the whales, being just beneath the pectoral fins. These
+fins or paws are much more flexible and free in their movements than
+those of the cetæ, and are sufficiently prehensile to enable the animal
+to gather food between the palms or inner surfaces of both, and the
+female to hold her young one to her breast with one of them. Like the
+whales, they are warm-blooded mammals, breathing by lungs, and are
+therefore obliged to come to the surface at frequent intervals for
+respiration. As they breathe through nostrils at the end of the muzzle,
+instead of, like most of the whales, through a blow-hole on the top of
+the head, their habit is to rise, sometimes vertically, in the water,
+with the head and fore part of the body exposed above the surface, and
+often to remain in this position for some minutes. When seen thus, with
+head and breast bare, and clasping its young one to its body, the female
+presents a certain resemblance to a woman from the waist upward. When
+approached or disturbed it dives; the tail and hinder portion of the
+body come into view, and we see that if there was little of the "_mulier
+formosa superne_," at any rate "_desinit in piscem_." The manatee has
+thence been called by the Spaniards and Portuguese the "woman-fish," and
+by the Dutch the "manetje," or mannikin. The dugong, having the muzzle
+bristly, is named by the latter the "baardmanetje," or "little bearded
+man." There are no bristles or whiskers on the muzzle of the manatee;
+all the portraits of it in which these are shown are in that respect
+erroneous. The origin of the word "manatee" has by some been traced to
+the Spanish, as indicating "an animal with hands." On the west coast of
+Africa it is called by the natives "Ne-hoo-le." By old writers it was
+described as the "sea-cow." Gesner depicts it in the act of bellowing;
+and Mr. Bates, in his work, "The Naturalist on the Amazon," says that
+its voice is something like the bellowing of an ox. The Florida
+"crackers" or "mean whites," make the same statement. Although I have
+had opportunities of prolonged observation of it in captivity, I have
+not heard it give utterance to any sound--not even a grunt--and Mr.
+Bartlett, of the Zoological Gardens, tells me that his experience of it
+is the same. His son, Mr. Clarence Bartlett, says that a young one he
+had in Surinam used to make a feeble cry, or bleat, very much like the
+voice of a young seal. This is the only sound he ever heard from a
+manatee.[69]
+
+  [69] For a full description of the habits of this animal in
+  captivity, see an article by the present writer in the 'Leisure
+  Hour' of September 28, 1878; from which the illustration, Fig. 17,
+  is borrowed by the kind consent of the Editor of that publication.
+
+I believe the dugong to be more especially the animal referred to by
+Ælian as the semi-human whale, and that which has led to this group
+having been supposed by southern voyagers to be aquatic human beings. In
+the first place, the dugong is a denizen of the sea, whereas the manatee
+is chiefly found in rivers and fresh-water lagoons; and secondly, the
+dugong accords with Ælian's description of the creature with a woman's
+face in that it has "prickles instead of hairs," whilst the manatee has
+no such stiff bristles.
+
+In the case of either of these two animals being mistaken for a
+mermaid, however, "distance" must "lend enchantment to the view," and a
+sailor must be very impressible and imaginative who, even after having
+been deprived for many months of the pleasure of females' society, could
+be allured by the charms of a bristly-muzzled dugong, or mistake the
+snorting of a wallowing manatee for the love-song of a beauteous
+sea-maiden.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 17.--THE MANATEE. ITS USUAL POSITION.]
+
+Unfortunately both the dugong and the manatee are being hunted to
+extinction.
+
+The flesh of the manatee is considered a great delicacy. Humboldt
+compares it with ham. Unlike that of the whales, which is of a deep and
+dark red hue, it is as white as veal, and, it is said, tastes very like
+it. It is remarkable for retaining its freshness much longer than other
+meat, which in a tropical climate generally putrefies in twenty-eight
+hours. It is therefore well adapted for pickling, as the salt has time
+to penetrate the flesh before it is tainted. The Catholic clergy of
+South America do not object to its being eaten on fast days, on the
+supposition that, with whales, seals, and other aquatic mammals, it may
+be liberally regarded as "fish." The "Indians" of the Amazon and Orinoco
+are so fond of it that they will spend many days, if necessary, in
+hunting for a manatee, and having killed one will cut it into slabs and
+slices on the spot, and cook these on stakes thrust into the ground
+aslant over a great fire, and heavily gorge themselves as long as the
+provision lasts. The milk of this animal is said to be rich and good,
+and the skin is valuable for its toughness, and is much in request for
+making leathern articles in which great strength and durability are
+required. The tail contains a great deal of oil, which is believed to be
+extremely nutritious, and has also the property of not becoming rancid.
+Unhappily for the dugong, its oil is in similarly high repute, and is
+greatly preferred as a nutrient medicine to cod-liver oil. As its flesh
+also is much esteemed, it is so persistently hunted on the Australian
+coasts that it will probably soon become extinct, like the rytina of
+Steller. The same fate apparently awaits the manatee, which is becoming
+perceptibly more and more scarce.
+
+I fear that before many years have elapsed the Sirens of the
+Naturalist will have disappeared from our earth, before the advance of
+civilization, as completely as the fables and superstitions with which
+they have been connected, before the increase of knowledge; and that the
+mermaid of fact will have become as much a creature of the past as the
+mermaid of fiction. With regard to the latter--the Siren of the
+poets,--the water-maiden of the pearly comb, the crystal mirror, and the
+sea-green tresses,--there are few persons I suppose, at the present day
+who would not be content to be classed with Banks, the fine old
+naturalist and formerly ship-mate of Captain Cook. Sir Humphry Davy in
+his _Salmonia_ relates an anecdote of a baronet, a profound believer in
+these fish-tailed ladies, who on hearing some one praise very highly Sir
+Joseph Banks, said that "Sir Joseph was an excellent man, but he had his
+prejudices--he did not believe in the mermaid." I confess to having a
+similar "prejudice;" and am willing to adopt the further remark of Sir
+Humphry Davy:--"I am too much of the school of Izaac Walton to talk of
+impossibility. It doubtless might please God to make a mermaid, but I
+don't believe God ever did make one."
+
+
+
+
+THE LERNEAN HYDRA.
+
+
+The mystery of the Kraken, of which I treated in a companion volume to
+the present, recently published, is not difficult to unravel. The clue
+to it is plain, and when properly taken up is as easily unwound, to
+arrive at the truth, as a cocoon of silk, to get at the chrysalis within
+it. It was a boorish exaggeration, a legend of ignorance, superstition,
+and wonder. But when such a skein of facts has passed through the hands
+of the poets, it is sure to be found in a much more intricate tangle;
+and many a knot of pure invention may have to be cut before it is made
+clear.
+
+Nevertheless, we shall be able to discern that more than one of the most
+famous and hideous monsters of old classical lore originated, like the
+Kraken, in a knowledge by their authors of the form and habits of those
+strange sea-creatures, the head-footed mollusks. There can be little
+doubt that the octopus was the model from which the old poets and
+artists formed their ideas, and drew their pictures of the Lernean
+Hydra, whose heads grew again when cut off by Hercules; and also of the
+monster Scylla, who, with six heads and six long writhing necks,
+snatched men off the decks of passing ships and devoured them in the
+recesses of her gloomy cavern.
+
+Of the Hydra Diodorus relates that it had a hundred heads; Simonides
+says fifty; but the generally received opinion was that of Apollodorus,
+Hyginus, and others, that it had only nine.
+
+Apollodorus of Athens, son of Asclepiades, who wrote in stiff, quaint
+Greek about 120 B.C., gives in his 'Bibliotheca' (book ii. chapter 5,
+section 2) the following account of the many-headed monster. "This
+Hydra," he says, "nourished in the marshes of Lerne, went forth into the
+open country and destroyed the herds of the land. It had a huge body and
+nine heads, eight mortal, but the ninth immortal. Having mounted his
+chariot, which was driven by Iolaus, Hercules got to Lerne and stopped
+his horses. Finding the Hydra on a certain raised ground near the source
+of the Amymon, where its lair was, he made it come out by pelting it
+with burning missiles. He seized and stopped it, but having twisted
+itself round one of his feet, it struggled with him. He broke its head
+with his club: but that was useless; for when one head was broken two
+sprang up, and a huge crab helped the Hydra by biting the foot of
+Hercules. This he killed, and called Iolaus, who, setting on fire part
+of the adjoining forest, burned with torches the germs of the growing
+heads, and stopped their development. Having thus out-manoeuvred the
+growing heads, he cut off the immortal head, buried it, and put a heavy
+stone upon it, beside the road going from Lerne to Eleonta, and having
+opened the Hydra, dipped his arrows in its gall."
+
+If we wish to find in nature the counterpart of this Hydra, we must
+seek, firstly, for an animal with eight out-growths from its trunk,
+which it can develop afresh, or replace by new ones, in case of any or
+all of them being amputated or injured. We must also show that this
+animal, so strange in form and possessing such remarkable attributes,
+was well known in the locality where the legend was believed. We have it
+in the octopus, which abounded in the Mediterranean and Ægean seas, and
+whose eight prehensile arms, or tentacles, spring from its central body,
+the immortal head, and which, if lost or mutilated by misadventure, are
+capable of reproduction.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 18.--FIGURE OF A CALAMARY. _From the temple of
+Bayr-el-Bahree_.]
+
+That a knowledge of the octopus existed at a very early period of man's
+history we have abundant evidence. The ancient Egyptians figured it
+amongst their hieroglyphics, and an interesting proof that they were
+also acquainted with other cephalopods was given to me by the late Mr.
+E. W. Cooke, R.A. Whilst on a trip up the Nile, in January, 1875, he
+visited the temple of Bayr-el-Bahree, Thebes (date 1700 B.C.), the
+entrance to which had been deeply buried beneath the light, wind-drifted
+sand, accumulated during many centuries. By order of the Khedive, access
+had just at that time been obtained to its interior, by the excavation
+and removal of this deep deposit, and, amongst the hieroglyphics on the
+walls, were found, between the zig-zag lines which represent water,
+figures of various fishes, copies of which Mr. Cooke kindly gave me, and
+which are so accurately portrayed as to be easily identified. With them
+was the outline of a squid fourteen inches long, a figure of which, from
+Mr. Cooke's drawing, is here shown. As this temple is five hundred miles
+from the delta of the Nile, it is remarkable that nearly all the fishes
+there represented are of marine species.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 19.--FIGURE OF AN OCTOPUS ON A GOLD ORNAMENT, FOUND
+BY DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENÆ.]
+
+That the octopus was a familiar object with the ancient Greeks, we know
+by the frequency with which its portrait is found on their coins, gems,
+and ornaments. Aldrovandus describes "very ancient coins" found at
+Syracuse and Tarentum bearing the figure of an octopus. He says the
+Syracusans had two coins, one of bronze, the other of gold, both of
+which had an octopus alone on one side. On the reverse of the bronze one
+was a veiled female face in profile, with the inscription [Greek: SURA].
+I have one of these bronze Syracusan coins; it was kindly given to me,
+some years ago, by my friend, Dr. John Millar, F.L.S. The octopus is
+really well depicted. On the gold coin the female head was differently
+veiled, and at the back of the neck was a fish. The inscription on this
+coin was [Greek: SURAKOSIÔN]. Goltzius was of the opinion that the head
+was that of Arethusa. The coins found at Tarentum had on one side a
+figure of Neptune seated on a dolphin, and holding an octopus in one
+hand and a trident in the other.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 20.--GOLDEN ORNAMENT IN FORM OF AN OCTOPUS, FOUND BY
+DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENÆ.]
+
+Lerne, or Lerna, the reputed home of the Hydra, was a port of Southern
+Greece, situated at the head of the Gulf of Nauplia, and between the
+existing towns of Argos and Tripolitza. Within a few miles of it was
+Mycenæ; and it is remarkable that Dr. Schliemann, during his excavations
+there in 1876, found in a tomb a gold plate, or button, two and a half
+inches in diameter (Fig. 19), on which is figured an octopus, the eight
+arms of which are converted into spirals, the head and the two eyes
+being distinctly visible. In another sepulchre he discovered fifty-three
+golden models of the octopus (Fig. 20), all exactly alike, and
+apparently cast in the same mould. The arms are very naturally carved.
+By the kindness of Mr. Murray, his publisher, I am enabled to give
+illustrations of these and two other handsome ornaments.
+
+Having ascertained that the octopus was a familiar object in the very
+locality where the combat between Hercules and the Hydra is supposed to
+have taken place, let us compare the animal as it exists with the
+monstrous offspring of Typhon and Echidna.
+
+[Illustration:
+
+FIG. 21. FIG. 22.
+
+FIGURES OF THE OCTOPUS ON GOLD ORNAMENTS FOUND BY DR. SCHLIEMANN AT
+MYCENÆ.]
+
+It is a not uncommon occurrence that when an octopus is caught it is
+found to have one or more of its arms shorter than the rest, and showing
+marks of having been amputated, and of the formation of a new growth
+from the old cicatrix. Several such specimens were brought to the
+Brighton Aquarium whilst I had charge of its Natural History Department.
+One of them was particularly interesting. Two of its arms had evidently
+been bitten off about four inches from the base: and out from the end of
+each healed stump (which in proportion to the length of the limb was as
+if a man's arm had been amputated halfway between the shoulder and the
+elbow), grew a slender little piece of newly-formed arm, about as large
+as a lady's stiletto, or a small button-hook--in fact just the
+equivalent of worthy Captain Cuttle's iron hook, which did duty for his
+lost hand. It was an illustrative example of the commencement of the
+repair and restoration of mutilated limbs.
+
+This mutilation is so common in some localities, that Professor
+Steenstrup says[70] that almost every octopus he has examined has had
+one or two arms reproduced; and that he has seen females in which all
+the eight arms had been lost, but were more or less restored. He also
+mentions a male in which this was the case as to seven of its arms. He
+adds that whilst the _Octopoda_ possess the power of reproducing with
+great facility and rapidity their arms, which are exposed to so many
+enemies, the _Decapoda_--the _Sepiidæ_ and Squids--appear to be
+incapable of thus repairing and replacing accidental injuries. This is
+entirely in accord with my own observations.
+
+  [70] Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. August, 1857.
+
+This reparative power is possessed by some other animals, of which the
+starfishes and crustacea are the most familiar instances. In the case of
+the lobster or crab, however, the only joint from which new growth can
+start is that connected with the body, so that if a limb be injured in
+any part, the whole of it must be got rid of, and the animal has,
+therefore, the power of casting it off at will. The octopus, on the
+contrary, is incapable of voluntary dismemberment, but reproduces the
+lost portion of an injured arm, as an out-growth from the old stump.
+
+The ancients were well acquainted with this reparative faculty of the
+octopus: but of course the simple fact was insufficient for an
+imaginative people: and they therefore embellished it with some fancies
+of their own. There lingers still amongst the fishermen of the
+Mediterranean a very old belief that the octopus when pushed by hunger
+will gnaw and devour portions of its arms. Aristotle knew of this
+belief, and positively contradicted it; but a fallacy once planted is
+hard to eradicate. You may cut it down, and apparently destroy it, root
+and branch, but its seeds are scattered abroad, and spring up elsewhere,
+and in unexpected places. Accordingly, we find Oppian, more than five
+centuries later, disseminating the same old notion, and comparing this
+habit of the animal with that of the bear obtaining nutriment from his
+paws by sucking them during his hybernation.
+
+    "When wintry skies o'er the black ocean frown,
+    And clouds hang low with ripen'd storms o'ergrown,
+    Close in the shelter of some vaulted cave
+    The soft-skinn'd prekes[71] their porous bodies save.
+    But forc'd by want, while rougher seas they dread,
+    On their own feet, necessitous, are fed.
+    But when returning spring serenes the skies,
+    Nature the growing parts anew supplies.
+    Again on breezy sands the roamers creep,
+    Twine to the rocks, or paddle in the deep.
+    Doubtless the God whose will commands the seas,
+    Whom liquid worlds and wat'ry natives please,
+    Has taught the fish by tedious wants opprest
+    Life to preserve and be himself the feast."
+
+  [71] The octopus is still called the "preke" in some parts of
+  England, notably in Sussex. The translation of Oppian's
+  'Halieutics,' from which this passage and others are quoted is that
+  by Messrs. Jones and Diaper, of Baliol College, Oxford, and was
+  published in 1722.
+
+The fact is, that the larger predatory fishes regard an octopus as very
+acceptable food, and there is no better bait for many of them than a
+portion of one of its arms. Some of the cetacea also are very fond of
+them, and whalers have often reported that when a "fish" (as they call
+it) is struck it disgorges the contents of its stomach, amongst which
+they have noticed parts of the arms of cuttles which, judging from the
+size of their limbs, must have been very large specimens. The food of
+the sperm whale consists largely of the gregarious squids, and the
+presence in spermaceti of their undigested beaks is accepted as a test
+of its being genuine. That old fish-reptile, the Ichthyosaurus, also,
+preyed upon them; and portions of the horny rings of their suckers were
+discovered in its coprolites by Dean Buckland. Amongst the worst enemies
+of the octopus is the conger. They are both rock-dwellers, and if the
+voracious fish come upon his cephalopod neighbour unseen, he makes a
+meal of him, or, failing to drag him from his hold, bites off as much of
+one or two of his arms as he can conveniently obtain. The conger,
+therefore, is generally the author of the injury which the octopus has
+been unfairly accused of inflicting on itself.
+
+Continuing our comparison with the hydra, we have in the octopus an
+animal capable of quitting its rocky lurking-place in the sea, and going
+on a buccaneering expedition on dry land. Many incidents have been
+related in connection with this; but I can attest it from my own
+observation. I have seen an octopus travel over the floor of a room at a
+very fair rate of speed, toppling and sprawling along in its own
+ungainly fashion; and in May, 1873, we had one at the Brighton Aquarium
+which used regularly every night to quit its tank, and make its way
+along the wall to another tank at some distance from it, in which were
+some young lump-fishes. Day after day, one of these was missing, until,
+at last, the marauder was discovered. Many days elapsed, however, before
+he was detected, for after helping himself to, and devouring a young
+"lump-sucker," he demurely returned before daylight to his own quarters.
+
+Of this habit of the octopus the ancients were, also, fully aware.
+Aristotle wrote that it left the water and walked in stony places, and
+Pliny and Ælian related tales of this animal stealing barrels of salt
+fish from the wharves, and crushing their staves to get at the contents.
+An octopus that could do this would be as formidable a predatory monster
+as the Lernean Hydra, which had the evil reputation of devouring the
+Peloponnesian cattle.
+
+Whoever first described the counter-attack of the Hydra on Hercules must
+have had the octopus in his thoughts. "It twisted itself round one of
+his feet"--exactly that which an octopus would do.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 23.--HERCULES SLAYING THE LERNEAN HYDRA.
+
+_From Smith's 'Classical Dictionary.'_]
+
+Finally, according to the legend, Hercules dipped his arrow-heads in the
+gall of the Hydra, and, from its poisonous nature, all the wounds he
+inflicted with them upon his enemies proved fatal. It is worthy of
+notice that the ancients attributed to the octopus the possession of a
+similarly venomous secretion. Thus Oppian writes:
+
+    "The crawling preke a deadly juice contains
+    Injected poison fires the wounded veins."
+
+The accompanying illustration (Fig. 23) of Hercules slaying the Hydra
+is taken from a marble tablet in the Vatican. It will be immediately
+seen how closely the Hydra, as there depicted, resembles an octopus. The
+body is elongated, but the eight necks with small heads on them bear
+about the same proportion to the body as the arms to the body of an
+octopus.
+
+The Reverend James Spence, in his 'Polymetis,' published in 1755, gives
+a figure, almost the counterpart of this, copied from an antique gem, a
+carnelian, in the collection of the Grand Duke of Tuscany at Florence.
+Only seven necks of the hydra are, however, there visible, and there are
+two coils in the elongated body. On the upper part are two spots which
+have been supposed to represent breasts. This was probably intended by
+the artificer; but that the idea originated from a duplication of the
+syphon tube is evident from the figures (Figs. 21, 22) of the octopus on
+the smaller gold ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycenæ. In the
+same work is also an engraving from a picture in the Vatican Virgil,
+entitled 'The River, or Hateful Passage into the Kingdom of Ades,'
+wherein an octopus-hydra, of which only six heads and necks are shown,
+is one of the monsters called by the author "Terrors of the
+Imagination."
+
+
+
+
+SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS.
+
+
+In the description given by Homer, in the twelfth book of the 'Odyssey,'
+of the unfortunate nymph Scylla, transformed by the arts of Circe into a
+frightful monster, the same typical idea as in the case of the Hydra is
+perceptible. The lurking octopus, having its lair in the cranny of a
+rock, watching in ambush for passing prey, seizing anything coming
+within its reach with one or more of its prehensile arms, even
+brandishing these fear-inspiring weapons out of water in a threatening
+manner, and known in some localities to be dangerous to boats and their
+occupants, is transformed into a many-headed sea monster, seizing in its
+mouths, instead of by the adhesive suckers of its numerous arms, the
+helpless sailors from passing vessels, and devouring them in the abysses
+of its cavernous den.
+
+Circe, prophesying to Ulysses the dangers he had still to encounter,
+warned him especially of Scylla and Charybdis, within the power of one
+of whom he must fall in passing through the narrow strait (between Italy
+and Sicily) where they had their horrid abode. Describing the lofty rock
+of Scylla, she tells him:
+
+    "Full in the centre of this rock displayed
+    A yawning cavern casts a dreadful shade,
+    Nor the fleet arrow from the twanging bow
+    Sent with full force, could reach the depth below.
+    Wide to the west the horrid gulf extends,
+    And the dire passage down to hell descends.
+    O fly the dreadful sight! expand thy sails,
+    Ply the strong oar, and catch the nimble gales;
+    Here Scylla bellows from her dire abodes;
+    Tremendous pest! abhorred by man and gods!
+    Hideous her voice, and with less terrors roar
+    The whelps of lions in the midnight hour.
+    Twelve feet deformed and foul the fiend dispreads;
+    Six horrid necks she rears, and six terrific heads;
+
+           *       *       *       *       *
+
+    When stung with hunger she embroils the flood,
+    The sea-dog and the dolphin are her food;
+    She makes the huge leviathan her prey,
+    And all the monsters of the wat'ry way;
+    The swiftest racer of the azure plain
+    Here fills her sails and spreads her oars in vain;
+    Fell Scylla rises, in her fury roars,
+    At once six mouths expands, at once six men devours."[72]
+
+  [72] Homer's 'Odyssey,' Pope's Translation, Book XII.
+
+Circe then describes the perils of the whirling waters of Charybdis as
+still more dreadful; and, admonishing Ulysses that once in her power all
+must perish, she advises him to choose the lesser of the two evils, and
+to
+
+        "shun the horrid gulf, by Scylla fly;
+    'Tis better six to lose than all to die."
+
+Ulysses continues his voyage; and as his ship enters the ominous strait,
+
+    "Struck with despair, with trembling hearts we viewed
+    The yawning dungeon, and the tumbling flood;
+    When, lo! fierce Scylla stooped to seize her prey,
+    Stretched her dire jaws, and swept six men away.
+    Chiefs of renown! loud echoing shrieks arise;
+    I turn, and view them quivering in the skies;
+    They call, and aid, with outstretched arms, implore,
+    In vain they call! those arms are stretched no more.
+    As from some rock that overhangs the flood,
+    The silent fisher casts th' insidious food;
+    With fraudful care he waits the finny prize,
+    And sudden lifts it quivering to the skies;
+    So the foul monster lifts her prey on high,
+    So pant the wretches, struggling in the sky;
+    In the wide dungeon she devours her food,
+    And the flesh trembles while she churns the blood."
+
+
+
+
+THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES.
+
+
+One of the sea-fallacies still generally believed, and accepted as true,
+is that whales take in water by the mouth, and eject it from the
+spiracle, or blow-hole.
+
+The popular ideas on this subject are still those which existed hundreds
+of years ago, and which are expressed by Oppian in two passages in his
+'Halieutics':
+
+    "Uncouth the sight when they in dreadful play
+    Discharge their nostrils and refund a sea,"
+
+and
+
+    "While noisy fin-fish let their fountains fly
+    And spout the curling torrent to the sky."
+
+Eminent zoologists and intelligent observers, who have had full
+opportunities of obtaining practical knowledge of the habits of these
+great marine mammals, have forcibly combated and repeatedly contradicted
+this erroneous idea; but their sensible remarks have been read by few,
+in comparison with the numbers of those to whom a wrong impression has
+been conveyed by sensational pictures in which whales are represented
+_with their heads above the surface_, and throwing up from their
+nostrils columns of water, like the fountains in Trafalgar Square. One
+can hardly be surprised that the old writers on Natural History were
+unacquainted with the real composition of the whale's "spout." Those of
+them who sought for any original information on marine zoology, obtained
+it chiefly from uninstructed and superstitious fishermen; but they
+generally contented themselves with diligent compilation, and thus
+copied and transmitted the errors of their predecessors, with the
+addition of some slight embellishments of their own. Accordingly, we
+find Olaus Magnus[73] describing, as follows, the _Physeter_, or, as his
+translator, Streater, calls it, the _Whirlpool_. "The _Physeter_ or
+_Pristis_," he says, "is a kind of whale, two hundred cubits long, and
+is very cruel. For, to the danger of seamen, he will sometimes raise
+himself above the sail-yards, and casts such floods of waters above his
+head, which he had sucked in, that with a cloud of them he will often
+sink the strongest ships, or expose the mariners to extreme danger. This
+beast hath also a large round mouth, like a lamprey, whereby he sucks in
+his meat or water, and by his weight cast upon the fore or hinder deck,
+he sinks and drowns a ship."
+
+  [73] 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' lib. xxi. cap. vi.
+  A.D. 1555.
+
+Figures 24 and 25 (p. 64) are facsimiles of the illustrations which
+accompany the above description. It will be seen that, in the first, the
+_Physeter_ is depicted as uprearing a maned neck and head, like that of
+a fabled dragon; whilst in Fig. 25 it is shown as a whale flinging
+itself on board a ship, which is sinking under its ponderous weight. In
+both, torrents of water are issuing from its head, and it is evident
+that they are merely exaggerated misrepresentations of the "spouting" of
+whales.
+
+Gesner copies many of Olaus Magnus's illustrations, and improves upon
+Fig. 25 by putting a numerous crew on board the ship. The unfortunate
+sailors are depicted in every attitude of terror and despair, and seem
+to be incapacitated from any attempt to save themselves by the flood of
+water which the whale is deliberately pouring upon them from its
+blow-holes.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 24.--THE PHYSETER INUNDATING A SHIP. _After Olaus
+Magnus._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 25.--A WHALE POURING WATER INTO A SHIP FROM ITS
+BLOW-HOLE. _After Olaus Magnus._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 26--SPERM WHALES SPOUTING.]
+
+These old pictures appear, no doubt, ridiculous, but they are, really,
+very little more absurd and untrue to nature than many of those which
+disfigure some otherwise useful books on Natural History of the present
+day. I could refer to several, in which whales are represented as
+spouting from their blow-holes one or more columns of water, which,
+after ascending skyward to a considerable distance, fall over gracefully
+as if issuing from the nozzle of an ornamental fountain. I select one
+from amongst them (Fig. 26), not with any disrespect for the artist,
+author, or publisher of the work from which it is taken, but because,
+whilst it shows correctly the position of the blow-hole of the sperm
+whale, it also exhibits exactly that which I wish to confute. The
+publishers of the valuable work in which this picture appeared have
+generously consented to my reproducing it here.
+
+When, in describing, in 1877, the White Whale then exhibited at the
+Westminster Aquarium, I said that whales do not spout water out of their
+blow-holes, and that the idea that they do so is a popular error, the
+statement was so contrary to generally-accepted notions that I was not
+surprised by receiving more than one letter on the subject. One very
+reasonable suggestion made to me was that, although the lesser whales,
+such as the porpoises, which I had had opportunities of watching in
+confinement at Brighton for two years, and the _Beluga_, which had been
+observed for a similar period at the New York Aquarium, and also at
+Westminster, did not "spout," the respiratory apparatus of the larger
+whales might be so modified as to permit them to do so. Let us consider
+the construction of the breathing apparatus which would have to be thus
+modified, as shown in the porpoise.
+
+In the first place, there is a pair of lungs as perfect as those of any
+land mammal, fitted to receive air, and to bring the hot blood into
+contact with the air, that it may absorb the oxygen of the air, and so
+be purified. But this air cannot well be breathed through the mouth of
+an animal which has to take its food from and in water; so it has to be
+inhaled only by the nostrils. If these were situated as they are in land
+mammals, near the extremity of the nose, the porpoise would be obliged
+to stop when pursuing its prey, or, escaping from its enemies, to put
+the tip of its nose above the surface of the water every time it
+required to breathe. A much more convenient arrangement has, therefore,
+been provided for it, and for almost all whales, by which that
+difficulty is removed. Instead of running along the bones of the nose,
+the nostrils are placed on the top of the head, and the windpipe is
+turned up to them without having any connection with the palate. The
+upper jaw is quite solid. Thus the mouth is solely devoted to the
+reception of food, and the animal is enabled to continue its course when
+swimming, however rapidly, by rising obliquely to the surface, and
+exposing the top of its head above it. On the blow-hole being opened,
+the air, from which the oxygen has been absorbed, is expelled in a
+sudden puff, another supply is instantaneously inhaled, and rushes into
+the lungs with extreme velocity, and then the porpoise can either
+descend into the depths, or remain with its spiracle exposed to the air,
+as it may prefer. In this act of breathing the spiracle is normally
+brought above the water, the breath escapes, and the immediate
+inhalation is effected almost in silence. But frequently, and in some
+whales habitually, the blow-hole is opened just below the surface, and
+then the outrush of air causes a splash upwards of the water overlying
+it.
+
+I may here mention that I have frequently seen the porpoises at the
+Brighton Aquarium lying asleep at the surface, with the blow-hole
+exposed above it, breathing automatically, and without conscious effort.
+Aristotle was acquainted with this habit of the cetacea 2,200 years ago,
+for he wrote: "They sleep with the blow-hole, their organ of
+respiration, elevated above the water."
+
+The apparatus for closing the blow-hole, so that not a drop of water
+shall enter the windpipe, even under great pressure, is a beautiful
+contrivance, complex in its structure, yet most simple in its working.
+The external aperture is covered by a continuation of the skin, locally
+thickened, and connected with a conical stopper, of a texture as tough
+as india-rubber, which fits perfectly into a cone or funnel formed by
+the extremity of the windpipe, and closes more and more firmly as the
+pressure upon it is increased. Whilst the orifice is thus guarded, the
+lower end of the tube is surrounded by a strong compressing muscle,
+which clasps also the glottis, and thus the passage from the blow-hole
+to the lungs is completely stopped.
+
+There is nothing in this which indicates the possibility of the spouting
+of water from the nostrils; but as assertions that water had been seen
+to issue from them were positive and persistent, anatomists seem to have
+felt themselves obliged to try to account for it somehow. Accordingly
+the theory was propounded by F. Cuvier that the water taken into the
+mouth is reserved in two pouches (one on each side), until the whale
+rises to blow, when, the gullet being closed, it is forced by the action
+of the tongue and jaws through the nasal passages, somewhat as a smoker
+occasionally expels the smoke of his cigar through his nostrils.
+Although these pouches, or sacs analogous to them, are found at the base
+of the nostrils of the horse, tapir, etc.,--animals which do not "spout"
+from the nostrils water taken in by the mouth--the explanation was
+accepted for a time.
+
+Mr. Bell held this opinion when the first edition of his 'British
+Quadrupeds' was published in 1837, but before the issue of the second
+edition, in 1874, he had found reasons for taking a different view of
+the matter; and, under the advice of his judicious editors, Mr. Alston,
+and Professor Flower (the latter of whom supervised the proofs of the
+chapters on the Cetacea) his sanction of the illusion was withdrawn as
+follows:--"The results of more recent and careful observations, amongst
+which we may notice those of Bennett, Von Baer, Sars and Burmeister, are
+directly opposed to the statement that water is thus ejected; and there
+can now be no doubt that the appearance which has given rise to the idea
+is caused by the moisture with which the expelled breath is
+supercharged, which condenses at once in the cold outer air, and forms a
+cloud or column of white vapour. It is possible indeed that if the
+animal begins to 'blow' before its head is actually at the surface, the
+force of the rushing air may drive up some little spray along with it,
+but this is quite different from the notion that water is really
+expelled from the nasal passages. We may add that on the only occasion
+when we ourselves witnessed the 'spouting' of a large whale we were much
+struck with its resemblance to the column of white spray which is dashed
+up by the ricochetting ball fired from one of the great guns of a
+man-of-war."
+
+The simile is admirable, and nothing could better describe the
+appearance of a whale's "spout"; but, in the previous portion of the
+passage (except with reference to the sperm whale, the nostrils of which
+are not on the top of the head), I think sufficient importance is not
+conceded to the volume of water propelled into the air by the outrush of
+breath from the submerged blow-hole. I do not know how many cubic feet
+of air the lungs of a great whale are capable of containing, but the
+quantity is sufficient to force up to a height of several feet the water
+above the valve when the latter is opened, not only in "some little
+spray," but, for some distance in a good solid jet--enough, in fact, to
+give the appearance of its actually issuing from the blow-hole, and to
+account for the erroneous belief of sailors that it does so. It must be
+remembered that the escape of air is not by a prolonged wheeze, but by a
+sudden blast, and thus when the spiracle is opened just beneath the
+surface, an instant before it is uncovered to take in a fresh supply of
+air, the water above its orifice is thrown up as by a slight subaqueous
+explosion, or as by the momentary opening under water of the
+safety-valve of a steam boiler. Some idea of the force and volume of the
+blast of air from the lungs of even the common porpoise may be formed
+when I mention that one of the porpoises at the Brighton Aquarium,
+happening to open its spiracle just beneath an illuminating gas jet
+fixed over its tank, blew out the light.
+
+In the sperm whale the nostrils are placed near the extremity of the
+nose, and therefore this whale has to raise its snout above the surface
+when it requires to breathe; but instead of this being necessary, as in
+the case of the porpoise twice or thrice in a minute, the sperm whale
+only rises to "blow" at intervals of from an hour to an hour and twenty
+minutes. Mr. Beale says[74] that in a large bull sperm whale the time
+consumed in making one expiration and one inspiration is ten seconds,
+during six of which the nostril is beneath the surface of the water--the
+expiration occupying three seconds, and the inspiration one second. At
+each breathing time this whale makes from sixty to seventy expirations,
+and remains, therefore, at the surface ten or eleven minutes, and then,
+raising its tail, it descends perpendicularly, head first. In different
+individuals the time required for performing these several acts varies;
+but in each they are minutely regular, and this well-known regularity is
+of considerable use to the fishers, for when a whaler has once noticed
+the periods of any particular whale which is not alarmed, he knows to a
+minute when to expect it to come to the surface, and how long it will
+remain there. The "spout" of the sperm whale differs much from that of
+other whales. Unlike, for instance, the straight perpendicular twin jets
+of the "right whale," the single, forward-slanting "spout" of the sperm
+whale presents a thick curled bush of white mist. Each whale has a
+different mode and time of breathing, and the form of the "spout"
+differs accordingly.
+
+  [74] 'Natural History of the Sperm Whale.' Van Voorst, 1839.
+
+It is said that the blowing of the _Beluga_, or "White Whale," is not
+unmusical at sea, and that when it takes place under water it often
+makes a peculiar sound which might be mistaken for the whistling of a
+bird. Hence is derived one of the names given to this whale by
+sailors--the "Sea-canary." Though I have had opportunities of
+attentively watching the breathing and other actions in captivity of two
+specimens of this whale I have never been able to detect the sound
+alluded to.
+
+Besides the opinions cited by Mr. Bell concerning whales spouting water
+from their blow-holes, we have other evidence which is most clear and
+definite, and which ought to be convincing.
+
+We will take first that of Mr. Beale, who as surgeon on board the
+"Kent" and "Sarah and Elizabeth," South Sea whalers, passed several
+seasons amongst sperm whales. He says:--"I can truly say when I find
+myself in opposition to these old and received notions, that out of the
+thousands of sperm whales which I have seen during my wanderings in the
+South and North Pacific Oceans, I have never observed one of them to
+eject a column of water from the nostril. I have seen them at a
+distance, and I have been within a few yards of several hundreds of
+them, and I never saw water pass from the spout-hole. But the column of
+thick and dense vapour which is certainly ejected is exceedingly likely
+to mislead the judgment of the casual observer in these matters; and
+this column does indeed appear very much like a jet of water when seen
+at the distance of one or two miles on a clear day, because of the
+condensation of the vapour which takes place the moment it escapes from
+the nostril, and its consequent opacity, which makes it appear of a
+white colour, and which is not observed when the whale is close to the
+spectator. It then appears only like a jet of white steam. The only
+water in addition is the small quantity that may be lodged in the
+external fissure of the spout hole, when the animal raises it above the
+surface to breathe, and which is blown up into the air with the 'spout,'
+and may probably assist in condensing the vapour of which it is
+formed.... I have been also very close to the _Balæna mysticetus_ (the
+Greenland, or Right whale) when it has been feeding and breathing, and
+yet I never saw even that animal differ in the latter respect from the
+sperm whale in the nature of the spout.... If the weather is fine and
+clear, and there is a gentle breeze at the time, the spout may be seen
+from the masthead of a moderate-sized vessel at the distance of four or
+five miles."
+
+Captain Scoresby, who was a veteran and successful whaler, a good
+zoologist, and a highly intelligent observer, says:--"A moist vapour
+mixed with mucus is discharged from the nostrils when the animal
+breathes; but no water accompanies it unless an expiration of the breath
+be made under the surface."
+
+Dr. Robert Brown, who communicated to the Zoological Society, in May,
+1868, a valuable series of observations on the mammals of Greenland,
+made during his voyages to the Spitzbergen, Iceland, and Jan Mayen Seas,
+and along the eastern and western shores of Davis's Strait and Baffin's
+Bay to near the mouth of Smith's Sound, remarks, in a chapter on the
+Right whale (_Balæna mysticetus_):--"The 'blowing,' so familiar a
+feature of the _Cetacea_, but especially of the _Mysticetus_ is, quite
+analogous to the breathing of the higher mammals, and the blow-holes are
+the homologues of the nostrils. It is most erroneously stated that the
+whale ejects water from the blow-holes. I have been many times only a
+few feet from a whale when 'blowing,' and, though purposely observing
+it, could never see that it ejected from its nostrils anything but the
+ordinary breath--a fact which might almost have been deduced from
+analogy. In the cold arctic air this breath is generally condensed, and
+falls upon those close at hand in the form of a dense spray which may
+have led seamen to suppose that this vapour was originally ejected in
+the form of water. Occasionally, when the whale blows just as it is
+rising out of or sinking in the sea, a little of the superincumbent
+water may be forced upwards by the column of breath. When the whale is
+wounded in the lungs, or in any of the blood-vessels immediately
+supplying them, blood, as might be expected, is ejected in the
+death-throes along with the breath. When the whaleman sees his prey
+'spouting red,' he concludes that its end is not far distant; it is then
+mortally wounded."
+
+Captain F. C. Hall, the commander of the unfortunate "Polaris"
+Expedition, thus describes, in his 'Life with the Esquimaux,' the spout
+of a whale:--"What this blowing is like," he says, "may be described by
+asking if the reader has ever seen the smoke produced by the firing of
+an old-fashioned flint-lock. If so, then he may understand the 'blow' of
+a whale--a flash in the pan and all is over."
+
+Captain Scammon, an experienced American whaling captain, who, like
+Scoresby, could wield well both harpoon and pen, in his fine work on
+'The Marine Mammals of the North-Western Coast of America,' writes to
+the same effect.
+
+Mr. Herman Melville, who is not a naturalist, but has served before the
+mast in a sperm-whaler and borne his part in all the hardships and
+dangers of the chase, writes, in his remarkable book, 'The Whale':--"As
+for this 'whale-spout' you might almost stand in it, and yet be
+undecided as to what it is precisely. Nor is it at all prudent for the
+hunter to be over curious respecting it. For, even when coming into
+slight contact with the outer vapoury shreds of the jet, which will
+often happen, your skin will feverishly smart from the acrimony of the
+thing so touching you. And I know one who, coming into still closer
+contact with the spout--whether with some scientific object in view or
+otherwise I cannot say--the skin peeled off from his cheek and arm.
+Wherefore, among whalemen, the spout is deemed poisonous; they try to
+evade it. I have heard it said, and I do not much doubt it, that if the
+jet were fairly spouted into your eyes it would blind you."
+
+The only other eye-witness I will cite is Mr. Bartlett, of the
+Zoological Gardens, whose experience and accuracy as an observer of the
+habits of animals is unsurpassed. He spent an autumn holiday in
+accompanying the late Mr. Frank Buckland and his colleagues, Messrs.
+Walpole and Young, in a tour of inquiry into the condition of the
+herring fishery in Scotland. When the commissioners left Peterhead, he
+remained there for a few days as the guest of Captain David Gray, of the
+steam whaler, "Eclipse," and as it was reported that large whales had
+been seen in the offing, his host invited him to go in search of them,
+and pay them a visit in his steam-launch. When about twelve miles out,
+they saw the whales, which were "finners," at a distance of four or five
+miles. Fourteen were counted--all large ones--some of which were seventy
+feet in length. On approaching them the captain shut off steam, and the
+launch was allowed to float in amongst them. So close were they to the
+boat that it would not have been difficult to jump upon the back of one
+of them had that been desirable. Mr. Bartlett tells me that he was
+greatly astonished by the immense force of the sudden outrush of air
+from their blow-holes, and the noise by which it was accompanied. He
+believes that the blast was strong enough to blow a man off the spiracle
+if he were seated on it. He authorizes me to say that having seen and
+watched these whales under such favourable circumstances, he entirely
+agrees with all that I have here written concerning the so-called
+"spout." The volume of hot, vaporous breath expelled is enormous, and
+this is accompanied by no small quantity of water, forced up by it when
+the blow-hole is opened below the surface.
+
+An effect similar in appearance to the whale's spout is produced by the
+breathing of the hippopotamus. When this great beast opens its nostrils
+beneath the surface, water and spray are driven and scattered upward by
+the force of the air, but, of course, do not issue from the nasal
+passages. I have, also, seen this effect produced, though in a less
+degree, by the breathing of sea-lions.
+
+I repeat, therefore, that not a drop of sea-water enters or passes out
+of the blow-hole of a whale. If the spiracle valve were in a condition
+to allow it to do so the animal would soon be drowned. Everyone knows
+the extreme irritation and the horrible feeling of suffocation caused to
+a human being, whilst eating or drinking, by a crumb or a little liquid
+"going the wrong way"--that is, being accidentally drawn to the
+air-passages instead of passing to the oesophagus. If water were to
+enter the bronchi of a whale it would instantly produce similar
+discomfort.
+
+The neck of a popular error is hard to break; but it is time that one
+so palpable as that concerning the "spouting" of whales should cease to
+be promulgated and disseminated by fanciful illustrations of instructive
+books.
+
+
+
+
+THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS.
+
+
+One of the prettiest fables of the sea is that relating to the Paper
+Nautilus, the constructor and inhabitant of the delicate and beautiful
+shell which looks as if it were made of ivory no thicker than a sheet of
+writing paper.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 27.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) SAILING.]
+
+It is an old belief that in calm weather it rises from the bottom of
+the sea, and, elevating its two broadly-expanded arms, spreads to the
+gentle air, as a sail, the membrane, light as a spider's web, by which
+they are united; and that, seated in its boat-like shell, it thus floats
+over the smooth surface of the ocean, steering and paddling with its
+other arms. Should storm arise or danger threaten, its masts and sail
+are lowered, its oars laid in, and the frail craft, filling with water,
+sinks gently beneath the waves.
+
+When and where this picturesque idea originated I am unable to discover.
+It dates far back beyond the range of history; for Aristotle mentions
+it, and, unfortunately, sanctioned it. With the weight of his honoured
+name in its favour, this fallacy has maintained its place in popular
+belief, even to our own times; for the mantle of the great father of
+natural history, who was generally so marvellously correct, fell on none
+of his successors; Pliny, and Ælian, and the tribe of compilers who
+succeeded them, having been more concerned to make their histories
+sensational than to verify their statements.
+
+Naturally, the Paper Nautilus has been the subject of many a poet's
+verses. Oppian wrote of it in his 'Halieutics':--
+
+    "Sail-fish in secret, silent deeps reside,
+    In shape and nature to the preke[75] allied;
+    Close in their concave shells their bodies wrap,
+    Avoid the waves and every storm escape.
+    But not to mirksome depths alone confined;
+    When pleasing calms have stilled the sighing wind,
+    Curious to know what seas above contain,
+    They leave the dark recesses of the main;
+    Now, wanton, to the changing surface haste,
+    View clearer skies, and the pure welkin taste.
+    But slow they, cautious, rise, and, prudent, fear
+    The upper region of the watery sphere;
+    Backward they mount, and as the stream o'erflows,
+    Their convex shells to pressing floods oppose.
+    Conscious, they know that, should they forward move,
+    O'erwhelming waves would sink them from above,
+    Fill the void space, and with the rushing weight,
+    Force down th' inconstants to their former seat.
+    When, first arrived, they feel the stronger blast,
+    They lie supine and skim the liquid waste.
+    The natural barks out-do all human art
+    When skilful floaters play the sailor's part.
+    Two feet they upward raise, and steady keep;
+    These are the masts and rigging of the ship:
+    A membrane stretch'd between supplies the sail,
+    Bends from the masts, and swells before the gale.
+    Two other feet hang paddling on each side,
+    And serve for oars to row and helm to guide.
+    'Tis thus they sail, pleased with the wanton game,
+    The fish, the sailor, and the ship, the same.
+    But when the swimmers dread some dangers near
+    The sportive pleasure yields to stronger fear.
+    No more they, wanton, drive before the blasts,
+    But strike the sails, and bring down all the masts;
+    The rolling waves their sinking shells o'erflow,
+    And dash them down again to sands below."
+
+  [75] The octopus.
+
+Montgomery also thus exquisitely paraphrases the same idea in his
+'Pelican Island':--
+
+    "Light as a flake of foam upon the wind,
+    Keel upwards, from the deep emerged a shell,
+    Shaped like the moon ere half her orb is filled.
+    Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose,
+    And moved at will along the yielding water.
+    The native pilot of this little bark
+    Put out a tier of oars on either side,
+    Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail,
+    And mounted up, and glided down, the billows
+    In happy freedom, pleased to feel the air,
+    And wander in the luxury of light."
+
+Byron mentions the Nautilus in his 'Mutiny of the Bounty' as follows:--
+
+    "The tender Nautilus, who steers his prow,
+    The sea-born sailor of his shell canoe,
+    The ocean Mab--the fairy of the sea,
+    Seems far less fragile, and alas! more free.
+    He, when the lightning-winged tornadoes sweep
+    The surge, is safe: his port is in the deep;
+    And triumphs o'er the armadas of mankind
+    Which shake the world, yet crumble in the wind."
+
+The very names by which this animal is known to the science which some
+persons erroneously think must be so hard and dry are poetic. In
+Aristotle's day it was called the _Nautilus_ or _Nauticus_, "the
+mariner," and though two thousand two hundred years have passed since
+the great master wrote, the name still clings to it. As the Pearly
+Nautilus, a very different animal, also bears that name, Gualtieri
+perceived the necessity of distinguishing the Paper Nautilus from it,
+and was followed by Linnæus, who therefore entitled the genus to which
+the latter belongs, _Argonauta_, after the ship _Argo_, in which Jason
+and his companions sailed to Colchis to carry off the "Golden Fleece"
+suspended there in the temple of Mars, and guarded by brazen-hoofed
+bulls, whose nostrils breathed out fire and death, and by a watchful
+dragon that never slept. According to the Greek legend, the _Argo_ was
+named after its builder Argus, the son of Danaus, and was the first ship
+that ever was built. Oppian ('Halieutics,' book I.) expresses his
+opinion that the Nautilus served as a model for the man who first
+conceived the idea of constructing a ship, and embarking on the
+waters:--
+
+    "Ye Powers! when man first felled the stately trees,
+    And passed to distant shores on wafting seas,
+    Whether some god inspired the wondrous thought,
+    Or chance found out, or careful study sought;
+    If humble guess may probably divine,
+    And trace th' improvement to the first design,
+    Some wight of prying search, who wond'ring stood
+    When softer gales had smoothed the dimpled flood,
+    Observed these careless swimmers floating move,
+    And how each blast the easy sailor drove;
+    Hence took the hint, hence formed th' imperfect draught,
+    And ship-like fish the future seaman taught.
+    Then mortals tried the shelving hull to slope,
+    To raise the mast, and twist the stronger rope,
+    To fix the yards, let fly the crowded sails,
+    Sweep through the curling waves, and court auspicious gales."
+
+Pope, too, in his 'Essay on Man' (Ep. 3), adopted the idea in his
+exhortation--
+
+    "Learn of the little Nautilus to sail,
+    Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale."
+
+Poetry, like the wizard's spell, can make
+
+    "A nutshell seem a gilded barge,
+    A sheeling seem a palace large,"
+
+but the equally enchanting wand of science is able by a touch to dispel
+the illusion, and cause the object to appear in its true proportions. So
+with the fiction of the "Paper Sailor."
+
+I have elsewhere described the affinities of the Nautili and their place
+in nature, therefore it will only be necessary for me here to allude to
+these very briefly, to explain the great and essential difference that
+exists between the two kinds of Nautilus which are popularly regarded as
+being one and the same animal.
+
+The _Pearly_ Nautilus (_Nautilus pompilius_) and the Argonaut, which
+from having a fragile shell of somewhat similar external form is called
+the _Paper_ Nautilus, both belong to that great primary group of animals
+known as the _Mollusca_, and to the class of it called the
+_Cephalopoda_, from their having their head in the middle of that which
+is the foot in other mollusks. In the Cephalopoda the foot is split or
+divided into eight segments in some families, and in others into ten
+segments, which radiate from the central head, like so many rays. These
+rays are not only used as feet, but, being highly flexible, are adapted
+for employment also as prehensile arms, with which their owner captures
+its prey, and they are rendered more perfect for this purpose by being
+furnished with suckers which hold firmly to any surface to which they
+are applied. The Cephalopods which have the foot divided into ten of
+these segments or arms are called the _Decapoda_, those which have only
+eight of them are called the _Octopoda_. All of these have _two_
+plume-like gills--one on each side--and so are called _Dibranchiata_;
+and in the eight-armed section of these is the argonaut or Paper
+Nautilus. Of the Pearly Nautilus and the four-gilled order I shall have
+more to say by-and-by: at present we will follow the history of the
+argonaut.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 28--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) RETRACTED
+WITHIN ITS SHELL.]
+
+Notwithstanding all that has been written of it, it is only within the
+last fifty years that this has been correctly understood. An eight-armed
+cuttle was recognised and named _Ocythoe_, which, instead of having,
+like the common octopus, all of its eight arms thong-like and tapering
+to a point, had the two dorsal limbs flattened into a broad thin
+membrane. Although this animal was sometimes seen dead without any
+covering, it was generally found contained in a thin and slightly
+elastic univalve shell of graceful form, and bearing some resemblance to
+an elegantly shaped boat. It did not penetrate to the bottom of this
+shell; it was not attached to it by any muscular ligament, nor was the
+shell moulded on its body, nor apparently made to fit it. Hence it was
+long regarded as doubtful, and even by naturalists so recent and eminent
+as Dumeril and De Blainville, whether the octopod really secreted the
+shell, or whether, like the hermit-crab, it borrowed for its protection
+the shell of some other mollusk. Aristotle left the subject with the
+faithful acknowledgment: "As to the origin and growth of this shell
+nothing is yet exactly determined. It appears to be produced like other
+shells; but even this is not evident, any more than it is whether the
+animal can live without it." Pliny, as usual, instead of throwing light
+on the matter, obscured it. He regarded the shell as the property of a
+gasteropod like the snail, and the octopod as an amateur yachtsman who
+occasionally went on board and took a trip in the frail craft, and
+assisted its owner to navigate it for the fun of the thing. This is what
+he says about it[76]: "Mutianus reports that he saw in the Propontis a
+shell formed like a little ship, having the poop turned up and the prow
+pointed. An animal called the _Nauplius_, resembling an octopus, was
+enclosed in the shell with its owner, for its amusement in the following
+manner. When the sea is calm the guest lowers his arms, and uses them as
+oars and a helm, whilst the owner of the shell expands himself to catch
+the wind; so that one has the pleasure of carrying and sailing, and the
+other of steering. Thus, these two otherwise senseless animals take
+their pleasure together; but the meeting them sailing in their shell is
+a bad omen for mariners, and foretells some great calamity."
+
+  [76] Naturalis Historia, lib. ix. cap. 30.
+
+Although the animal was never found in any other shell, and the shell
+was never known to contain any other animal, and though, when the shell
+and the animal were found together they were always of proportionate
+size, this octopod, as I have said, was looked upon by some
+conchologists as a pirate who had taken possession of a ship which did
+not belong to him, until Madame Jeannette Power, a French lady then
+residing in Messina, having succeeded in keeping alive for a time an
+argonaut the shell of which had been broken in its capture, discovered
+that the animal quickly repaired the fracture, and reproduced the
+portions that had been broken off. Induced by this to make further
+experiments, she kept a number of living argonauts in cages sunk in the
+sea near the citadel of Messina, and in 1836 laid before the "Academy"
+at Catania the following results of her observations of them:--
+
+1st. That the argonaut constructs the shell which it inhabits.
+
+2nd. That it quits the egg entirely naked, and forms the shell after its
+birth.
+
+3rd. That it can repair its shell, if necessary, by a fresh deposit of
+material having the same chemical composition as its original shell.
+
+4th. That this material is secreted by the palmate, or sail, arms, and
+is laid on the outside of the shell, to the exterior of which these
+membranous arms are closely applied.
+
+Madame Power was mistaken on two points. Firstly, the construction of
+the shell does not commence after the birth of the animal, but, as has
+been shown by M. Duvernoy, its rudimentary form is distinctly visible by
+the aid of the microscope in the embryo, whilst still in the egg; and
+secondly, she continued to believe in the use of the membranous arms as
+sails, and of the others as oars. This fallacy was exploded by Captain
+Sander Rang, an officer of the French navy, and "port-captain" at
+Algiers, who carefully followed up Madame Power's experiments, and
+confirmed the more important of them. Thus were set at rest questions
+which for centuries had divided the opinions of zoologists.
+
+The "Paper Nautilus" is, in fact, a female octopod provided with a
+portable nest, in which to carry about and protect her eggs, instead of
+brooding over them in some cranny of a rock, or within the recesses of a
+pile of shells, as does her cousin the octopus. From the membranes of
+the two flattened and expanded arms she secretes and, if necessary,
+repairs her shell, and by applying them closely to its outer surface on
+each side, holds herself within it, for it is not fastened to her body
+by any attaching muscles. When disturbed or in danger she can loosen her
+hold, and, leaving her cradle, swim away independently of it. It has
+been said that, having once left it, she has not the ability nor perhaps
+the sagacity to re-enter her nest, and resume the guardianship of her
+eggs.[77] From my own observations of the breeding habits of other
+octopods I think this most improbable. The use and purpose of the shell
+of the argonaut will be better understood if I briefly describe what I
+have witnessed of the treatment of its eggs by its near relative, the
+octopus.
+
+  [77] Appendix to Sir Edward Belcher's 'Voyage of the "Samarang,"'
+  by Mr. Arthur Adams, assistant surgeon to the expedition.
+
+"The eggs of the octopus," as I have elsewhere said, "when first laid,
+are small, oval, translucent granules, resembling little grains of rice,
+not quite an eighth of an inch long. They grow along and around a common
+stalk, to which every egg is separately attached, as grapes form part of
+a bunch. Each of the elongated bunches is affixed by a glutinous
+secretion to the surface of a rock or stone (never to seaweed, as has
+been erroneously stated), and hangs pendent by its stalk in a long white
+cluster, like a magnified catkin of the filbert, or, to use Aristotle's
+simile, like the fruit of the white alder. The length and number of
+these bunches varies according to the size and condition of the parent.
+Those produced by a small octopus are seldom more than about three
+inches long, and from twelve to twenty in number; but a full-grown
+female will deposit from forty to fifty of such clusters, each about
+five inches in length. I have counted the eggs of which these clusters
+are composed, and find that there are about a thousand in each: so that
+a large octopus produces in one laying, usually extended over three
+days, a progeny of from 40,000 to 50,000. I have seen an octopus, when
+undisturbed, pass one of her arms beneath the hanging bunches of her
+eggs, and, dilating the membrane on each side of it into a boat-shaped
+hollow, gather and receive them in it as in a trough or cradle which
+exhibited in its general shape and outline a remarkable similarity to
+the shell of the argonaut, with the eggs of which octopod its own are
+almost identical in form and appearance. Then she would caress and
+gently rub them, occasionally turning towards them the mouth of her
+flexible exhalent and locomotor tube, like the nozzle of a fireman's
+hose-pipe, so as to direct upon them a jet of the excurrent water. I
+believe that the object of this syringing process is to free the eggs
+from parasitic animalcules, and possibly to prevent the growth of
+conferva, which, I have found, rapidly overspreads those removed from
+her attention."[78]
+
+  [78] 'The Octopus,' 1873, p. 57.
+
+It has been suggested that the syringing may be for the purpose of
+keeping the water surrounding the eggs well aerated; but this is
+evidently erroneous, for the water ejected from the tube has been
+previously deprived of its oxygen, and consequently of its health-giving
+properties, whilst passing over the gills of the parent. Week after
+week, for fifty days, a brooding octopus will continue to attend to her
+eggs with the most watchful and assiduous care, seldom leaving them for
+an instant except to take food, which, without a brief abandonment of
+her position, would be beyond her reach. Aristotle asserted that while
+the female is incubating she takes no food. This is incorrect; but in
+every case of the kind that has come under my observation the mother
+octopod, whenever she has been obliged to leave her nest, has returned
+to it as quickly as possible; and so I believe can, and does, the female
+argonaut to her shell, and that, too, without any difficulty. In her
+case the numerous clusters of eggs are all united at their origin to one
+slender and tapering stalk which is fixed by a spot of glutinous matter
+to the body-whorl of the spiral shell.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 29.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)
+CRAWLING.]
+
+This "paper-sailor," then, whom the poets have regarded as endowed with
+so much grace and beauty, and living in luxurious ease, is but a fine
+lady octopus after all. Turn her out of her handsome residence, and,
+instead of the fairy skimmer of the seas, you have before you an object
+apparently as free from loveliness and romance as her sprawling,
+uncanny-looking, relative. Instead of floating in her pleasure boat over
+the surface of the sea, the argonaut ordinarily crawls along the bottom,
+carrying her shell above her, keel uppermost; and the broad extremities
+of the two arms are not hoisted as sails, nor allowed when at rest to
+dangle over the side of the "boat;" but are used as a kind of hood by
+which the animal retains the shell in its proper position, as a man
+bearing a load on his shoulders holds it with his hands. When she comes
+to the surface, or progresses by swimming instead of walking, she does
+so in the same manner as the octopus: namely, by the forcible expulsion
+of water from her funnel-like tube.
+
+But if truth compels us to deprive her of the counterfeit halo conferred
+on her by poets, we can award her, on behalf of science, a far nobler
+crown; namely, that of the Queen of the whole great Invertebrate Animal
+Kingdom. For, the _Cephalopoda_, of which the argonaut is a highly
+organised member, are not only the highest in their own division, the
+_Mollusca_, but they are as far superior to all other animals which have
+no backbones, as man stands lord and king over all created beings that
+possess them.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 30.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)
+SWIMMING.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 31.--SHELL OF THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta
+argo_).]
+
+Although in outward shape the spiral shell of the Pearly Nautilus
+(_Nautilus pompilius_) somewhat resembles that of the argonaut, its
+internal structure is very different. A section of it shows that it is
+divided into several chambers, each of which is partitioned off from the
+adjoining ones, the last formed or external one, in which the animal
+lives, being much larger than the rest. The object and mode of
+construction of these chambers is as follows. As the animal grows, a
+constant secretion of new material takes place on the edge of the shell.
+By this unceasing process of the addition of new shell in the form of a
+circular curve or coil around the older portion, the whole rapidly
+increases in size, both in diameter, and in the length of the chamber.
+The Nautilus, requiring to keep the secreting portion of its mantle
+applied to the lip of the shell, finds the chamber in which it dwells
+gradually becoming inconveniently long for it, and therefore builds up a
+wall behind itself, and continues its work of enlarging its premises in
+front. Each of these walls, concave in front, towards the mouth of the
+shell, and concave behind, acts as a strong girder and support of the
+arch of the shell against the inward pressure of deep water: and it was
+formerly supposed that each successive chamber so constructed and
+vacated remained filled with air, and _thus_ became an additional float
+by which the constantly increasing weight of the growing shell was
+counter-balanced. By this beautiful adjustment of augmented floating
+power to increased weight, the buoyancy of the shell would be secured
+and its specific gravity maintained as nearly as possible equal to that
+of the surrounding water. This adjustment does probably take place, but
+in a somewhat different manner. As the Nautilus inhabits a depth of from
+twenty to forty fathoms, it is evident that the air within its shell
+would be displaced by the pressure of such a column of water.[79]
+Accordingly, in every instance of the capture of a Nautilus the chambers
+of its shell have been found filled with water. It is not improbable
+that the fluid they contain may be less compressed, and exert less
+pressure from within outwards than that of the external superincumbent
+column of water, and that by this unbalanced pressure--under the same
+hydro-dynamic law which governs its mode of self-propulsion when
+swimming, and possibly in some degree within the control of the
+animal--the latter is relieved of much of the weight of its shell. When
+the Nautilus is at the bottom of the sea its movement is like that of a
+snail crawling along upon the ground with its shell above it. The shell,
+in proportion to the size of the animal that inhabits it, is a heavy
+one, and unless it were rendered semi-buoyant, its owner's strength
+would be severely taxed by the effort to drag it along. By the means
+indicated this portable domicile is borne lightly above the body of the
+Nautilus, without in any way impeding its progress.
+
+  [79] "At 100 fathoms the pressure exceeds 265 lbs. to the square
+  inch. Empty bottles, securely corked, and sunk with weights beyond
+  100 fathoms, are always crushed. If filled with liquid the cork is
+  driven in, and the liquid replaced by salt water; and in drawing
+  the bottle up again the cork is returned to the neck of the bottle,
+  generally in a reversed position."--Sir F. Beaufort, quoted by Dr.
+  S. P. Woodward in his 'Manual of the Mollusca.'
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 32.--SHELL OF THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus
+pompilius_).]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 33.--THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus pompilius_), AND
+SECTION OF ITS SHELL. _After Professor Owen._
+
+_a a_, Partitions; _b b_, chambers; _b'_, the last-formed chamber, in
+which the animal lives; _c c_, the siphuncle; _d_, attaching muscle; _e
+e_, the hollow arms; _f f_, retractile tentacles; _g_, muscular disk, or
+foot; _h_, the eye; _i_, position of funnel.]
+
+The chambers are all connected by a membranous tube slightly coated with
+nacre, which is connected with a large sac in the body of the animal,
+near the heart, and passes through a circular orifice and a short
+projecting tube in the centre of each partition wall, till it ends in
+the smallest chamber at the inner extremity of the shell. Dean Buckland
+believed this "syphon" to be an hydraulic apparatus acting as a "fine
+adjustment" of the specific gravity of the shell, by admitting water
+within it when expanded, and excluding it when contracted. As it
+contains an artery and vein near its origin at the mantle, Professor
+Owen has regarded it as subservient to the maintenance of a low vitality
+in the vacated portion of the shell. Dr. Henry Woodward is of the
+opinion that, whilst in the early life of the Nautilus this siphuncle
+forms the main point of attachment between the animal and its shell, it
+is in the adult "simply an aborted embryonal organ whose function is now
+filled by the shell-muscles, but which in the more ancient and
+straight-shelled representatives of the group (the Orthoceratites) was
+not merely an embryonal but an important organ in the adult."
+
+Every one knows the shell of the Pearly Nautilus. It may be purchased
+at any shell-shop in a seaside watering-place, and is imported by
+hundreds every year from Singapore.[80] It is abundant in the waters of
+the Indian Archipelago, especially about the Molucca and Philippine
+Islands, and on the shores of New Caledonia and the Fiji and Solomon
+Islands. It has also been found alive on Pemba Island, near Zanzibar. It
+seems strange, therefore, that until about half a century ago hardly
+anything was known of the animal that secretes and inhabits it.
+Rumphius, a Dutch naturalist, in his 'Rarities of Amboyna,' published,
+in 1705, a description of one with an engraving, incorrect in drawing,
+and deficient in detail; and until 1832 this was the only information
+which existed concerning it. The great Cuvier never saw one, and being
+acquainted only with the two-gilled cephalopods, he regarded the
+head-footed mollusks as absolutely isolated from all other animals in
+the kingdom of nature, even from the other classes of the mollusca. It
+seemed, however, to Professor Owen, then only nineteen years of age,
+that in the only living representative of the four-gilled order,
+_Nautilus pompilius_, might be found the "missing link." When,
+therefore, in the year 1824, his fellow-student, Mr. George Bennett, was
+about to sail from England to the Polynesian Islands, young Richard Owen
+earnestly charged his friend to do his utmost to obtain, and bring home
+in alcohol, a specimen of the much-coveted Pearly Nautilus. The
+opportunity did not occur till one warm and calm Monday evening, the
+24th of August, 1829, when a living Nautilus was seen at the surface of
+the water not far distant from the ship, in Marekini Bay, on the
+south-west coast of the Island of Erromango, New Hebrides, in the South
+Pacific Ocean. It looked like a dead tortoise-shell cat, as the sailors
+said. As it began to sink as soon as it was observed, it was struck at
+with a boat-hook, and was thus so much injured that it died shortly
+after being taken on board the ship. The shell was destroyed, but the
+soft body of the animal was preserved in spirits, and great was the joy
+of Mr. Owen when, in July, 1831, Mr. Bennett arrived with it in England,
+and presented it to the Royal College of Surgeons. Mr. Owen was then
+Assistant-Conservator of the Museum of the College under Mr. Clift, who
+was afterwards his father-in-law. He immediately commenced to anatomise,
+describe, and figure his rare acquisition, and in the early part of 1832
+published the result of his work in the form of a masterly treatise,
+which proved to be the foundation of his future fame.[81]
+
+  [80] I need hardly say that before the nacreous layer of the shell
+  from which this animal takes its name is made visible, an outer
+  deposit of dense calcareous matter has to be removed by
+  hydrochloric acid: the pearly surface thus exposed is then easily
+  polished.
+
+  [81] It is so interesting to most of us to know something of the
+  early work of our greatest men, and of the tide in their affairs,
+  which, taken at the flood, led on to fortune, that I hope I may be
+  excused for referring to the period when the distinguished chief of
+  the Natural History Department of the British Museum, the great
+  comparative anatomist, the unrivalled palæontologist, the
+  illustrious physiologist, the venerable and venerated friend of all
+  earnest students, was beginning to attract the attention, and to
+  receive the approbation of his seniors as a promising young worker.
+  In Messrs. Griffith and Pidgeon's Supplement to Cuvier's 'Mollusca
+  and Radiata,' published in 1834, the treatise in question is thus
+  mentioned: "We have much pleasure in referring to a most excellent
+  memoir on _Nautilus pompilius_, by Mr. Owen, with elaborate figures
+  of the animal, its shell, and various parts, published by direction
+  of the Council of the College of Surgeons. The reader will find the
+  most satisfactory information on the subject, and the scientific
+  public will earnestly hope that the present volume will be the
+  first of a similar series." This hope has been more than fulfilled.
+  Dean Buckland, in his 'Bridgewater Treatise,' wrote of this work:
+  "I rejoice in the present opportunity of bearing testimony to the
+  value of Professor Owen's highly philosophical and most admirable
+  memoir--a work not less creditable to the author than honourable to
+  the Royal College of Surgeons, under whose auspices the publication
+  has been so handsomely conducted."
+
+Mr. Owen's investigations confirmed his previous supposition that the
+Pearly Nautilus is inferior in its organisation to octopus, sepia, or
+any other known cephalopod; that it is not isolated, but that it recedes
+towards the gasteropods, to which belong the snail, the periwinkle, &c.,
+and that in some of its characters its structure is analogously related
+to the still lower _annulosa_, or worms. Mr. Owen was just about to
+start for Paris with the intention of presenting a copy of his book to
+his celebrated contemporary and friend, and of showing him his
+dissections of the Nautilus which had been the subject of his research,
+when he heard of Baron Cuvier's death. It must have been to him a great
+sorrow and a grievous disappointment.
+
+The Pearly Nautilus, then, is a true cephalopod, in that it has its foot
+divided and arranged in segments around its head, but the form and
+number of these segments are very different from those of any other of
+its class. Instead of there being eight, as in the argonaut and octopus,
+or ten, as in sepia and the calamaries, the Nautilus has about ninety
+projecting in every direction from around the mouth. They are short,
+round, and tapering, of about the length and thickness of the fingers of
+a child. Some of them are retractile into sheaths, and they are attached
+to fleshy processes (which might represent the child's hand), overlying
+each other, and covering the mouth on each side. They have none of the
+suckers with which the arms and tentacles of all the other cuttles are
+furnished, but their annulose structure, like the rings of an
+earthworm's body, gives them some little prehensile power. None of these
+numerous finger-like segments of the foot are flattened out like the
+broad membranous expansions of the argonaut, and, in fact, the Nautilus
+is without any members which can possibly be regarded as sails to hoist,
+or as oars with which to row. It has a strong beak, like the rest of the
+cuttles; but it has no ink-sac, for its shell is strong enough to afford
+it the protection which its two-gilled relatives have to seek in
+concealment.
+
+The Pearly Nautilus usually creeps, like a snail, along the bed of the
+sea. It lives at the bottom, and feeds at the bottom, principally on
+crabs; and, as Dr. S. P. Woodward says, in his 'Manual of the Mollusca,'
+"perhaps often lies in wait for them, like some gigantic sea-anemone,
+with outspread tentacles." The shape of its shell is not well adapted
+for swimming, but it can ascend to the surface, if it so please, in the
+same manner as can all the cuttles--namely, by the outflow of water from
+its locomotor tube. The statement that it visits the surface of the sea
+of its own accord is at present, however, unconfirmed by observation.
+
+But, if the Pearly Nautilus is the inferior and poor relation of the
+argonaut, it lives in a handsome house, and comes of an ancient lineage.
+The Ammonites, whose beautiful whorled and chambered shells, and the
+casts of them, are so abundant in every stratum, especially in the lias,
+the chalk, and the oolite, had four gills also. These Ammonites and the
+Nautili were amongst the earliest occupants of the ancient deep; and,
+with the Hamites, Turrilites, and others, lived upon our earth during a
+great portion of the incalculable period which has elapsed since it
+became fitted for animal existence, and in their time witnessed the rise
+and fall of many an animal dynasty. But they are gone now; and only the
+fossil relics of more than two thousand species (of which 188 were
+Nautili) remain to tell how important a race they were amongst the
+inhabitants of the old world seas. They and their congeners of the
+chambered shells, however, left one representative which has lived on
+through all the changes that have taken place on the surface of this
+globe since they became extinct--namely, _Nautilus pompilius_, the
+Nautilus of the pearly shell--the last of the Tetrabranchs.
+
+I need offer no apology for endeavouring to explain the difference
+between the Nautilus of the chambered shell and the argonaut with the
+membranous arms which it was supposed to use as sails, when Webster, in
+his great standard dictionary, describes the one and figures the other
+as one and the same animal; and when a writer of the celebrity of Dr.
+Oliver Wendell Holmes also blends the two in the following poem,
+containing a sentiment as exquisite as its science is erroneous. I hope
+the latter distinguished and accomplished author, whose delightful
+writings I enjoy and highly appreciate, will pardon my criticism. I
+admit that the beauty of the thought might well atone for its
+inaccuracy, (of which the author is conscious,) were it not that the
+latter is made so attractive that truth appears harsh in disturbing it.
+
+        "THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS."
+
+    "This is the ship of pearl, which poets feign
+                Sails the unshadowed main,
+                The venturous bark that flings
+    On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings,
+    In gulfs enchanted, where the siren sings,
+                And coral reefs lie bare,
+    Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair.
+
+    Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl,
+                Wrecked is the ship of pearl!
+                And every chambered cell,
+    Where its dim, dreaming life was wont to dwell,
+    As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,
+                Before thee lies revealed,
+    Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!
+
+    Year after year beheld the silent toil
+                That spread his lustrous coil;
+                Still, as the spiral grew,
+    He left the past year's dwelling for the new,
+    Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
+                Built up its idle door,
+    Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.
+
+    Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,
+                Child of the wandering sea,
+                Cast from her lap forlorn!
+    From the dead lips a clearer note is born
+    Than ever Triton blew from wreathèd horn!
+                While on mine ear it rings,
+    Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:--
+
+    'Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
+                As the swift seasons roll!
+                Leave thy low vaulted past;
+    Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
+    Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,
+                Till thou at length art free,
+    Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea.'"
+
+
+
+
+BARNACLE GEESE--GOOSE BARNACLES.
+
+
+The belief that some wild geese, instead of being hatched from eggs,
+like other birds, grew on trees and rotten wood has never been surpassed
+as a specimen of ignorant credulity and persistent error.
+
+There are two principal versions of this absurd notion. One is that
+certain trees, resembling willows, and growing always close to the sea,
+produced at the ends of their branches fruit in form like apples, and
+each containing the embryo of a goose, which, when the fruit was ripe,
+fell into the water and flew away. The other is that the geese were bred
+from a fungus growing on rotten timber floating at sea, and were first
+developed in the form of worms in the substance of the wood.
+
+When and whence this improbable theory had its origin is uncertain.
+Aristotle does not mention it, and consequently Pliny and Ælian were
+deprived of the pleasure they would have felt in handing down to
+posterity, without investigation or correction, a statement so
+surprising. It is, comparatively, a modern myth; although we find that
+it was firmly established in the middle of the twelfth century, for
+Gerald de Barri, known in literature as Giraldus Cambrensis, mentions it
+in his 'Topographia Hiberniæ,' published in 1187. Giraldus, who was
+Archdeacon of Brecknock in the reign of Henry II., and tried hard, more
+than once, for the bishopric of St. David's, the functions of which he
+had temporarily administered without obtaining the title, was a vigorous
+and zealous reformer of Church abuses. Amongst the laxities of
+discipline against which he found it necessary to protest was the custom
+then prevailing of eating these Barnacle geese during Lent, under the
+plea that their flesh was not that of birds, but of fishes. He writes:--
+
+     "There are here many birds which are called Bernacæ, which nature
+     produces in a manner contrary to nature, and very wonderful. They
+     are like marsh-geese but smaller. They are produced from fir-timber
+     tossed about at sea, and are at first like geese upon it.
+     Afterwards they hang down by their beaks, as if from a sea-weed
+     attached to the wood, and are enclosed in shells that they may grow
+     the more freely. Having thus, in course of time, been clothed with
+     a strong covering of feathers, they either fall into the water, or
+     seek their liberty in the air by flight. The embryo geese derive
+     their growth and nutriment from the moisture of the wood or of the
+     sea, in a secret and most marvellous manner. I have seen with my
+     own eyes more than a thousand minute bodies of these birds hanging
+     from one piece of timber on the shore, enclosed in shells and
+     already formed. Their eggs are not impregnated _in coitu_, like
+     those of other birds, nor does the bird sit upon its eggs to hatch
+     them, and in no corner of the world have they been known to build a
+     nest. Hence the bishops and clergy in some parts of Ireland are in
+     the habit of partaking of these birds on fast days, without
+     scruple. But in doing so they are led into sin. For, if any one
+     were to eat of the leg of our first parent, although he (Adam) was
+     not born of flesh, that person could not be adjudged innocent of
+     eating flesh."
+
+This fable of the geese appears, however, to have been current at least
+a hundred years before Giraldus wrote, for Professor Max Müller, who
+treats of it in one of his "Lectures on the Science of Language,"
+amongst many interesting references there given, quotes a Cardinal of
+the eleventh century, Petrus Damianus, who clearly describes, that
+version of it which represents the birds as bursting, when fully
+fledged, from fruit resembling apples.
+
+It is a curious fact that these Barnacle geese have troubled the
+priesthood of more than one creed as to the instructions they should
+give to the laity concerning the use of them as food. The Jews--all
+those, at least, who maintain a strict observance of the Hebrew Law--eat
+no meat but that of animals which have been slaughtered in a certain
+prescribed manner; and a doubt arose amongst them at the period we refer
+to, whether these geese should be killed as flesh or as fish. Professor
+Max Müller cites Mordechai,[82] as asking whether these birds are
+fruits, fish, or flesh; that is, whether they must be killed in the
+Jewish way, as if they were flesh. Mordechai describes them as birds
+which grow on trees, and says, "the Rabbi Jehuda, of Worms (who died
+1216) used to say that he had heard from his father, Rabbi Samuel, of
+Speyer (about 1150), that Rabbi Jacob Tham, of Ramerü (who died 1171),
+the grandson of the great Rabbi Rashi (about 1140), had decided that
+they must be killed as flesh."
+
+  [82] Riva, 1559, leaf 142.
+
+Pope Innocent III. took the same view; for at the Lateran Council, in
+1215, he prohibited the eating of Barnacle geese during Lent. In 1277,
+Rabbi Izaak, of Corbeil, determined to be on the safe side, forbade
+altogether the eating of these birds by the Jews, "because they were
+neither flesh nor fish."
+
+Michael Bernhard Valentine,[83] quoting Wormius, says that this
+question caused much perplexity and disputation amongst the doctors of
+the Sorbonne; but that they passed an ordinance that these geese should
+be classed as fishes, and not as birds; and he adds, that in consequence
+of this decision large numbers of these birds were annually sent to
+Paris from England and Scotland, for consumption in Lent. Sir Robert
+Sibbald[84] refers to this, and says that Normandy was the locality from
+which the French capital was reported to be principally supplied; but
+that in fact the greater number of these geese came from Holland. The
+date of this edict is not given.
+
+  [83] 'Historia Simplicium,' lib. iii. p. 327.
+
+  [84] Prodrom. Hist. Nat. Scot. parts 2, lib. iii. p. 21, 1684.
+
+Professor Max Müller says that in Brittany, Barnacle geese are still
+allowed to be eaten on Fridays, and that the Roman Catholic Bishop of
+Ferns may give permission to people out of his diocese to eat these
+birds at his table.
+
+In Bombay, also, where fish is prohibited as food to some classes of the
+population, the priests call this goose a "sea-vegetable," under which
+name it is allowed to be eaten.
+
+Various localities were mentioned as the breeding-places of these
+arboreal geese. Gervasius of Tilbury,[85] writing about 1211, describes
+the process of their generation in full detail, and says that great
+numbers of them grew in his time upon the young willow trees which
+abounded in the neighbourhood of the Abbey of Faversham, in the county
+of Kent, and within the Archiepiscopate of Canterbury. The bird was
+there commonly called the _Barneta_.
+
+  [85] Otia Imperialia, iii. 123.
+
+Hector Boethius, or Boece, the old Scottish historian, combats this
+version of the story. His work, written in Latin, in 1527, was
+translated into quaint Scottish in 1540, by John Bellenden, Archdeacon
+of Murray. In his fourteenth chapter, "Of the nature of claik geis, and
+of the syndry maner of thair procreatioun, and of the ile of Thule," he
+says:--
+
+     "Restis now to speik of the geis generit of the see namit clakis.
+     Sum men belevis that thir clakis growis on treis be the nebbis. Bot
+     thair opinioun is vane. And becaus the nature and procreatioun of
+     thir clakis is strange we have maid na lytyll laubore and deligence
+     to serche ye treuth and verite yairof, we have salit throw ye seis
+     quhare thir clakis ar bred, and I fynd be gret experience, that the
+     nature of the seis is mair relevant caus of thir procreatioun than
+     ony uther thyng."
+
+From the circumstances attending the finding of "ane gret tree that was
+brocht be alluvion and flux of the see to land, in secht of money pepyll
+besyde the castell of Petslego, in the yeir of God ane thousand iiii.
+hundred lxxxx, and of a see tangle hyngand full of mussill schellis,"
+brought to him by "Maister Alexander Galloway, person of Kynkell," who
+knowing him to be "richt desirus of sic uncouth thingis came haistely
+with the said tangle," he arrives at the conclusion, by a process of
+reasoning highly satisfactory and convincing to himself, that,
+
+     "Be thir and mony othir resorcis and examplis we can not beleif
+     that thir clakis ar producit be ony nature of treis or rutis
+     thairof, but allanerly be the nature of the Oceane see, quhilk is
+     the caus and production of mony wonderful thingis. And becaus the
+     rude and ignorant pepyl saw oftymes the fruitis that fel of the
+     treis (quhilkis stude neir the see) convertit within schort tyme in
+     geis, thai belevit that thir geis grew apon the treis hingand be
+     thair nebbis sic lik as appillis and uthir frutis hingis be thair
+     stalkis, bot thair opinioun is nocht to be sustenit. For als sone
+     as thir appillis or frutis fallis of the tre in the see flude thay
+     grow first wormeetin. And be schort process of tyme are alterat in
+     geis."
+
+In describing the bird thus produced, Boethius declares that the male
+has a sharp, pointed beak, like the gallinaceous birds, but that in the
+female the beak is obtuse as in other geese and ducks.
+
+According to other authors, this wonderful production of birds from
+living or dead timber was not confined to England and Scotland.
+Vincentius Bellovacensis[86] (1190-1264) in his 'Speculum Naturæ,' xvii.
+40, states that it took place in Germany, and Jacob de Vitriaco (who
+died 1244) mentions its occurrence in certain parts of Flanders.
+
+  [86] For this quotation and the following one I am indebted to
+  Professor Max Müller's Lecture before referred to.
+
+Jonas Ramus gives a somewhat different version of the process as it
+occurs in Norway. He writes:[87] "It is said that a particular sort of
+geese is found in Nordland, which leave their seed on old trees, and
+stumps and blocks lying in the sea; and that from that seed there grows
+a shell fast to the trees, from which shell, as from an egg, by the heat
+of the sun, young geese are hatched, and afterwards grow up; which gave
+rise to the fable that geese grow upon trees."
+
+  [87] 'Chorographical Description of Norway,' p. 244.
+
+But, strange to say, if any painstaking enquirer, wishing to investigate
+the matter for himself, went to a locality where it was said the
+phenomenon regularly occurred, he was sure to find that he had
+literally, "started on a wild-goose chase," and had come to the wrong
+place. This was the experience of Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini, afterwards
+Pope Pius II., who complained that miracles will always flee farther and
+farther away; for when he was on a visit (about 1430) to King James I.,
+of Scotland,[88] and enquired after the tree which he most eagerly
+desired to see, he was told that it grew much farther north, in the
+Orkney Islands.
+
+  [88] Æneas Sylvius gives us information concerning the personal
+  appearance of his royal host, whom he describes as, "_hominem
+  quadratum et multa pinguedine gravem_,"--literally, "a square-built
+  man, heavy with much fat."
+
+Notwithstanding the suspicious fact that the prodigy receded like Will
+o' the Wisp, whenever it was persistently followed up, Sebastian
+Munster, who relates[89] the foregoing anecdote of Æneas Sylvius,
+appears to have entertained no doubt of the truth of the report, for he
+writes:--
+
+  [89] 'Cosmographia Universalis,' p. 49, 1572.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 34.--THE GOOSE TREE. _Copied from Gerard's
+'Herball,' 1st edition._[90]]
+
+  [90] The original of this picture is a small wood-cut in Matthias
+  de Lobel's 'Stirpium Historia,' published in 1870. The birds within
+  the shells were added by Gerard. Aldrovandus, in copying it, gave
+  leaves to the tree, as shown on page 110.
+
+     "In Scotland there are trees which produce fruit, conglomerated of
+     their leaves; and this fruit, when in due time it falls into the
+     water beneath it, is endowed with new life, and is converted into a
+     living bird, which they call the 'tree-goose.' This tree grows in
+     the Island of Pomonia, which is not far from Scotland, towards the
+     north. Several old cosmographers, especially Saxo Grammaticus,
+     mention the tree, and it must not be regarded as fictitious, as
+     some new writers suppose."
+
+Julius Cæsar Scaliger[91] (1540) gives another reading of the legend, in
+which it is asserted that the leaves which fall from the tree into the
+water are converted into fishes, and those which fall upon the land
+become birds.
+
+  [91] Exercit. 59, sect. 2.
+
+Thus this extraordinary belief held sway, and remained strong and
+invincible, although from time to time some man of sense and independent
+thought attempted to turn the tide of popular error. Albertus Magnus
+(who died 1280) showed its absurdity, and declared that he had seen the
+bird referred to lay its eggs and hatch them in the ordinary way. Roger
+Bacon (who died in 1294) also contradicted it, and Belon, in 1551,
+treated it with ridicule and contempt. Olaus Wormius[92] seems to have
+believed in it, though he wrote cautiously about it. Olaus Magnus (1553)
+mentions it, and apparently accepts it as a fact, occurring in the
+Orkneys, on the authority of "a Scotch historian who diligently sets
+down the secrets of things," and then dismisses it in three lines.
+
+  [92] 'Museum,' p. 257.
+
+Passing over many other writers on the subject, we come to the time of
+the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when (in 1597) "John Gerarde, Master in
+Chirurgerie, London," published his "Herball, or Generall Historie of
+Plants gathered by him," and in the last chapter thereof solemnly
+declared, that he had actually witnessed the transformation of "certaine
+shell fish" into Barnacle Geese, as follows.
+
+
+     _Of the Goose tree, Barnacle tree, or the tree bearing Geese._
+
+     _Britanicæ Conchæ anatiferæ._
+
+     THE BREED OF BARNACLES.
+
+     ¶ _The Description._
+
+     Hauing trauelled from the Grasses growing in the bottome of the
+     fenny waters, the Woods, and mountaines, euen vnto Libanus itselfe;
+     and also the sea, and bowels of the same, wee are arriued at the
+     end of our History; thinking it not impertinent to the conclusion
+     of the same, to end with one of the maruels of this land (we may
+     say of the World). The history whereof to set forth according to
+     the worthinesse and raritie thereof, would not only require a large
+     and peculiar volume, but also a deeper search into the bowels of
+     Nature, then my intended purpose will suffer me to wade into, my
+     sufficiencie also considered; leauing the History thereof rough
+     hewen, vnto some excellent man, learned in the secrets of nature,
+     to be both fined and refined; in the meane space take it as it
+     falleth out, the naked and bare truth, though vnpolished. There are
+     found in the North parts of Scotland and the Islands adjacent,
+     called Orchades, certaine trees whereon do grow certaine shells of
+     a white colour tending to russet, wherein are contained little
+     liuing creatures: which shells in time of maturity doe open, and
+     out of them grow those little liuing things, which falling into the
+     water do become fowles, which we call Barnacles; in the North of
+     England, brant Geese; and in Lancashire, tree Geese: but the other
+     that do fall vpon the land perish and come to nothing. Thus much by
+     the writings of others, and also from the mouthes of people of
+     those parts, which may very well accord with truth.
+
+     But what our eies haue seene, and hands haue touched we shall
+     declare. There is a small Island in Lancashire, called the Pile of
+     Foulders, wherein are found the broken pieces of old and bruised
+     ships some whereof haue beene cast thither by shipwracke, and also
+     the trunks and bodies with the branches of old and rotten trees,
+     cast vp there likewise; whereon is found a certaine spume or froth
+     that in time breedeth vnto certaine shells, in shape like those of
+     the Muskle, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish colour; wherein
+     is contained a thing in forme like a lace of silke finely wouen as
+     it were together, of a whitish colour, one end whereof is fastened
+     vnto the inside of the shell, euen as the fish of Oisters and
+     Muskles are: the other end is made fast vnto the belly of a rude
+     masse or lumpe, which in time commeth to the shape and forme of a
+     Bird: when it is perfectly formed the shell gapeth open, and the
+     first thing that appeareth is the foresaid lace or string; next
+     come the legs of the bird hanging out, and as it groweth greater it
+     openeth the shell by degrees, til at length it is all come forth,
+     and hangeth onely by the bill: in short space after it commeth to
+     full maturitie, and falleth into the sea, where it gathereth
+     feathers, and groweth to a fowle bigger than a Mallard, and lesser
+     than a Goose, hauing blacke legs and bill or beake, and feathers
+     blacke and white, spotted in such manner as is our Magpie, called
+     in some places a Pie-Annet, which the people of Lancashire call by
+     no other name than a tree Goose: which place aforesaid, and all
+     those parts adjoyning do so much abound therewith, that one of the
+     best is bought for three pence. For the truth hereof, if any doubt,
+     may it please them to repaire vnto me, and I shall satisfie them by
+     the testimonie of good witnesses.
+
+     Moreover, it should seeme that there is another sort hereof; the
+     History of which is true, and of mine owne knowledge; for
+     trauelling vpon the shore of our English coast betweene Douer and
+     Rumney, I found the trunke of an old rotten tree, which (with some
+     helpe that I procured by Fishermen's wiues that were there
+     attending their husbands' returne from the sea) we drew out of the
+     water vpon dry land; vpon this rotten tree I found growing many
+     thousands of long crimson bladders, in shape like vnto puddings
+     newly filled, before they be sodden, which were very cleere and
+     shining; at the nether end whereof did grow a shell fish, fashioned
+     somewhat like a small Muskle, but much whiter, resembling a shell
+     fish that groweth vpon the rockes about Garnsey and Garsey, called
+     a Lympit: many of these shells I brought with me to London, which
+     after I had opened I found in them liuing things without forme or
+     shape; in others which were neerer come to ripenesse I found liuing
+     things that were very naked, in shape like a Bird: in others, the
+     Birds couered with soft downe, the shell halfe open, and the Bird
+     ready to fall out, which no doubt were the Fowles called Barnacles.
+     I dare not absolutely auouch euery circumstance of the first part
+     of this history, concerning the tree that beareth those buds
+     aforesaid, but will leaue it to a further consideration; howbeit,
+     that which I haue seene with mine eies, and handled with mine
+     hands, I dare confidently auouch, and boldly put downe for verity.
+     Now if any will object that this tree which I saw might be one of
+     those before mentioned, which either by the waues of the sea or
+     some violent wind had beene ouerturned as many other trees are; or
+     that any trees falling into those seas about the Orchades, will of
+     themselves bear the like Fowles, by reason of those seas and
+     waters, these being so probable conjectures, and likely to be true,
+     I may not without prejudice gainsay, or endeauour to confute.
+
+     ¶ _The Place._
+
+     The bordes and rotten plankes whereon are found these shels
+     breeding the Barnakle, are taken vp in a small Island adioyning to
+     Lancashire, halfe a mile from the main land, called the Pile of
+     Foulders.
+
+     ¶ _The Time._
+
+     They spawn as it were in March and Aprill; the Geese are formed in
+     May and June, and come to fulnesse of feathers in the moneth after.
+
+     And thus hauing through God's assistance discoursed somewhat at
+     large of Grasses, Herbes, Shrubs, Trees, and Mosses, and certaine
+     Excrescenses of the Earth, with other things moe, incident to the
+     historie thereof, we conclude and end our present Volume, with this
+     wonder of England. For the which God's name be euer honored and
+     praised.
+
+Gerard was probably a good botanist and herbalist; but Thomas Johnson,
+the editor of a subsequent issue of his book, tells us that
+
+     "He, out of a propense good will to the publique advancement of
+     this knowledge, endeavoured to performe therein more than he could
+     well accomplish, which was partly through want of sufficient
+     learning; but," he adds, "let none blame him for these defects,
+     seeing he was neither wanting in pains nor good will to performe
+     what hee intended: and there are none so simple but know that
+     heavie burthens are with most paines vndergone by the weakest men;
+     and although there are many faults in the worke, yet iudge well of
+     the Author; for, as a late writer well saith:--'To err and to be
+     deceived is human, and he must seek solitude who wishes to live
+     only with the perfect.'"
+
+It is difficult to comply with the request to think well of one who,
+writing as an authority, deliberately promulgated, with an affectation
+of piety, that which he must have known to be untrue, and who was,
+moreover, a shameless plagiarist; for Gerard's ponderous book is little
+more than a translation of Dodonæus, whole chapters having been taken
+verbatim from that comparatively unread author without acknowledgment.
+
+After this series of erroneous observations, self-delusion, and
+ignorant credulity, it is refreshing to turn to the pages of the two
+little thick quarto volumes of Gaspar Schott.[93] This learned Jesuit
+made himself acquainted with everything that had been written on the
+subject, and besides the authors I have referred to, quotes and compares
+the statements of Majolus, Abrahamus Ortelius, Hieronymus Cardanus,
+Eusebius, Nierembergius, Deusingius, Odoricus, Gerhardus de Vera,
+Ferdinand of Cordova, and many others. He then gives, firmly and
+clearly, his own opinion that the assertion that birds in Britain spring
+from the fruit or leaves of trees, or from wood, or from fungus, or from
+shells, is without foundation, and that neither reason, experience, nor
+authority tend to confirm it. He concedes that worms may be bred in
+rotting timber, and even that they may be of a kind that fly away on
+arriving at maturity (referring probably to caterpillars being developed
+into moths), but that birds should be thus generated, he says, is simply
+the repetition of a vulgar error, for not one of the authors whom he has
+examined has seen what they all affirm; nor are they able to bring
+forward a single eye-witness of it. He asks how it can be possible that
+animals so large and so highly-organised as these birds can grow from
+puny animalcules generated in putrid wood. He further declares that
+these British geese are hatched from eggs like other geese, which he
+considers proved by the testimony of Albertus Magnus, Gerhardus de Vera,
+and of Dutch seamen, who, in 1569, gave their written declaration that
+they had personally seen these birds sitting on their eggs, and hatching
+them, on the coasts of Nova Zembla.
+
+  [93] 'Physica Curiosa, sive Mirabilia Naturæ et Artis,' 1662, lib.
+  ix. cap. xxii. p. 960.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 35.--THE BARNACLE GOOSE TREE. _After Aldrovandus._]
+
+In marked and disgraceful contrast with this careful and philosophical
+investigation and its author's just deductions from it, is 'A Relation
+concerning Barnacles by Sir Robert Moray, lately one of His Majesty's
+Council for the Kingdom of Scotland,' read before the Royal Society, and
+published in the 'Philosophical Transactions,' No. 137, January and
+February, 1677-8.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 36.--DEVELOPMENT OF BARNACLES INTO GEESE. _After
+Aldrovandus._]
+
+Describing "a cut of a large Firr-tree of about two and a half feet
+diameter, and nine or ten feet long," which he saw on the shore in the
+Western Islands of Scotland, and which had become so dry that many of
+the Barnacle shells with which it had been covered had been rubbed off,
+he says:--
+
+     "Only on the parts that lay next the ground there still hung
+     multitudes of little Shells, having within them little Birds,
+     perfectly shap'd, supposed to be Barnacles. The Shells hung very
+     thick and close one by another, and were of different sizes. Of the
+     colour and consistence of Muscle-Shells, and the sides and joynts
+     of them joyned with such a kind of film as Muscle-Shells are, which
+     serves them for a Hing to move upon, when they open and shut....
+     The Shells hang at the Tree by a Neck longer than the Shell, of a
+     kind of Filmy substance, round, and hollow, and creased, not unlike
+     the Wind-pipe of a chicken, spreading out broadest where it is
+     fastened to the Tree, from which it seems to draw and convey the
+     matter which serves for the growth and vegetation of the Shell and
+     the little Bird within it. This Bird in every Shell that I opened,
+     as well the least as the biggest, I found so curiously and
+     compleatly formed, that there appeared nothing wanting as to
+     internal parts, for making up a perfect Seafowl: every little part
+     appearing so distinctly that the whole looked like a large Bird
+     seen through a concave or diminishing glass, colour and feature
+     being everywhere so clear and neat. The little Bill, like that of a
+     Goose; the eyes marked; the Head, Neck, Breast, Wings, Tail, and
+     Feet formed, the Feathers everywhere perfectly shap'd, and blackish
+     coloured; and the Feet like those of other Water-fowl, to my best
+     remembrance. All being dead and dry, I did not look after the
+     internal parts of them. Nor did I ever see any of the little Birds
+     alive, nor met with anybody that did. Only some credible persons
+     have assured me they have seen some as big as their fist."
+
+It seems almost incredible that little more than two hundred years ago
+this twaddle should not only have been laid before the highest
+representatives of science in the land, but that it should have been
+printed in their "Transactions" for the further delusion of posterity.
+
+Ray, in his edition of Willughby's Ornithology, published in the same
+year as the above, contradicted the fallacy as strongly as Gaspar
+Schott; and (except that he incidentally admits the possibility of
+spontaneous generation in some of the lower animals, as insects and
+frogs) in language so similar that I think he must have had Schott's
+work before him when he wrote.
+
+Aldrovandus[94] tells us that an Irish priest, named Octavianus, assured
+him with an oath on the Gospels that he had seen and handled the geese
+in their embryo condition; and he adds that he "would rather err with
+the majority than seem to pass censure on so many eminent writers who
+have believed the story."
+
+  [94] 'Ornithologia,' lib. xix. p. 173, ed. 1603.
+
+In 1629 Count Maier (Michaelus Meyerus--these old authors when writing
+in Latin, latinized their names also) published a monograph 'On the
+Tree-bird'[95] in which he explains the process of its birth, and states
+that he opened a hundred of the goose-bearing shells and found the
+rudiments of the bird fully formed.
+
+    So slow Bootes underneath him sees,
+    In th' icy isles, those goslings hatched on trees,
+    Whose fruitful leaves, falling into the water,
+    Are turned, they say, to living fowls soon after;
+    So rotten sides of broken ships do change,
+    To barnacles, O, transformation strange!
+    'Twas first a green tree; then a gallant hull;
+    Lately a mushroom; then a flying gull.[96]
+
+  [95] 'De Volucri Arborea,' 1629.
+
+  [96] Du Bartas' "Divine Week" p. 228. Joshua Sylvester's
+  translation.
+
+Now, let us turn from fiction to facts.
+
+[Illustration: FIG 37.--SECTION OF A SESSILE BARNACLE. _Balanus
+tintinnabulum._]
+
+Almost every one is acquainted with at least one kind of the Barnacle
+shells which were supposed to enclose the embryo of a goose, namely the
+small white conical hillocks which are found, in tens of thousands,
+adhering to stones, rocks, and old timber such as the piles of piers,
+and may be seen affixed to the shells of oysters and mussels in any
+fishmonger's shop. The little animals which secrete and inhabit these
+shells belong to a sub-class and order of the Crustacea, called the
+_Cirrhopoda_, because their feet (_poda_), which in the crab and lobster
+terminate in claws, are modified into tufts of curled hairs (_cirri_),
+or feathers. When the animal is alive and active under water, a crater
+may be seen to open on the summit of the little shelly mountain, and, as
+if from the mouth of a miniature volcano, there issue from this
+aperture, from between two inner shells, the _cirri_ in the form of a
+feathery hand, which clutches at the water within its reach, and is then
+quickly retracted within the shell. During this movement the
+hair-fringed fingers have filtered from the water and conveyed towards
+the mouth within the shell, for their owner's nutriment, some minute
+solid particles or animalcules, and this action of the casting-net
+alternately shot forth and retracted continues for hours incessantly, as
+the water flows over its resting-place. The animal can live for a long
+time out of water, and in some situations thus passes half its life.
+Under such circumstances, the shells, containing a reserve of moisture,
+remain firmly closed until the return of the tide brings a fresh supply
+of water and food. These are the "acorn-barnacles," the _balani_,
+commonly known in some localities as "chitters."
+
+Barnacles of another kind are those furnished with a long stem, or
+peduncle, which Sir Robert Moray described as "round, hollow, and
+creased, and not unlike the wind-pipe of a chicken." The stem has, in
+fact, the ringed formation of the annelids, or worms. The shelly valves
+are thin, flat, and in shape somewhat like a mitre. They are composed of
+five pieces, two on each side, and one, a kind of rounded keel along the
+back of the valves, by which these are united. The shells are delicately
+tinted with lavender or pale blue varied with white, and the edges are
+frequently of a bright chrome yellow or orange colour.
+
+It is not an uncommon occurrence for a large plank entirely covered with
+these "necked barnacles" to be found floating at sea and brought ashore
+for exhibition at some watering-place; and I have more than once sent
+portions of such planks to the Aquaria at Brighton, and the Crystal
+Palace.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 38.--PEDUNCULATED BARNACLES. (_Lepas anatifera._)]
+
+It is most interesting to watch a dense mass of living cirripedes so
+closely packed together that not a speck of the surface of the wood is
+left uncovered by them; their fleshy stalks overhanging each other, and
+often attached in clusters to those of some larger individuals; their
+plumose casting-nets ever gathering in the food that comes within their
+reach, and carrying towards the mouth any solid particles suitable for
+their sustenance. How much of insoluble matter barnacles will eliminate
+from the water is shown by the rapidity with which they will render
+turbid sea water clear and transparent. The most common species of these
+"necked barnacles" bears the name of "_Lepas anatifera_," "the
+duck-bearing _Lepas_." It was so entitled by Linnæus, in recognition of
+its having been connected with the fable, which, of course, met with no
+credit from him.
+
+Fig. 39 represents the figure-head of a ship, partly covered with
+barnacles, which was picked up about thirty miles off Lowestoft on the
+22nd of October, 1857. It was described in the _Illustrated London
+News_, and the proprietors of that paper have kindly given me a copy of
+the block from which its portrait was printed.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 39.--A SHIP'S FIGURE-HEAD WITH BARNACLES ATTACHED TO
+IT.]
+
+Others of the barnacles affix themselves to the bottoms of ships, or
+parasitically upon whales and sharks, and those of the latter kind often
+burrow deeply into the skin of their host. Fig. 40 is a portrait of a
+_Coronula diadema_ taken from the nose of a whale stranded at
+Kintradwell, in the north of Scotland, in 1866, and sent to the late Mr.
+Frank Buckland. Growing on this _Coronula_ are three of the curious
+eared barnacles, _Conchoderma aurita_; the _Lepas aurita_ of Linnæus.
+The species of the whale from which these Barnacles were taken was not
+mentioned, but it was probably the "hunch-backed" whale, _Megaptera
+longimana_, which is generally infested with this _Coronula_. This very
+illustrative specimen was, and I hope still is, in Mr. Buckland's Museum
+at South Kensington. It was described by him in _Land and Water_, of May
+19th, 1866, and I am indebted to the proprietors of that paper for the
+accompanying portrait of it.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 40.--WHALE BARNACLE (_Coronula diadema_), WITH THREE
+_Conchoderma aurita_ ATTACHED TO IT.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 41.--A YOUNG BARNACLE. (_Larva of Chthamalus
+stellatus._)]
+
+The young Barnacle when just extruded from the shell of its parent is a
+very different being from that which it will be in its mature condition.
+It begins its life in a form exactly like that of an entomostracous
+crustacean, and, like a Cyclops, has one large eye in the middle of its
+forehead. In this state it swims freely, and with great activity. It
+undergoes three moults, each time altering its figure, until at the
+third exuviation it has become enclosed in a bivalve shell, and has
+acquired a second eye. It is now ready to attach itself to its
+abiding-place; so, selecting its future residence, it presses itself
+against the wood, or whatever the substance may be, pours out from its
+two antennæ a glutinous cement, which hardens in water, and thus fastens
+itself by the front of its head, is henceforth a fixture for life, and
+assumes the adult form in which most persons know it best.[97]
+
+  [97] If any of my readers wish to observe the development of young
+  barnacles they may easily do so. The method I have generally
+  adopted has been as follows: Procure a shallow glass or earthenware
+  milk-pan that will hold at least a gallon. Fill this to within an
+  inch of the top with sea-water, and place it in any shaded part of
+  a room--not in front of a window. Put in the pan six or eight
+  pebbles or clean shells of equal height, say 1œ or 2 inches, and
+  on them lay a clean sheet of glass, which, by resting on the
+  pebbles, is brought to within about 2œ inches of the surface of
+  the water. Select some limpets or mussels having acorn-barnacles on
+  them; carefully cut out the limpet or mussel, and clean nicely the
+  interior of the shell; then place a dozen or more of these shells
+  on the sheet of glass, and the barnacles upon them will be within
+  convenient reach of any observation with a magnifying glass. If
+  this be done in the month of March, the experimenter will not have
+  to wait long before he sees young _Balani_ ejected from the summits
+  of some of the shells. Up to the moment of their birth each of them
+  is enclosed in a little cocoon or case, in shape like a
+  canary-seed, and most of them are tossed into the world whilst
+  still enclosed in this. In a few seconds this casing is ruptured
+  longitudinally, apparently by the struggles of its inmate, which
+  escapes at one end, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis,
+  and swims freely to the surface of the water, leaving the split
+  cocoon or case at the bottom of the pan. Some few of the young
+  barnacles seem to be freed from the cocoon before, or at the moment
+  of, extrusion. From three to a dozen or more of these escape with
+  each protrusion of the cirri of the parent, and as the parturient
+  barnacle will put forth its feathery casting net at least twenty
+  times in a minute for an hour or more, it follows that as many as
+  ten thousand young ones may be produced in an hour. These, as they
+  are cast forth at each pulsation of the parent's cirri, fall upon
+  the clean sheet of glass, and may be taken up in a pipette, and
+  placed under a microscope, or removed to a smaller vessel of
+  sea-water, for minute and separate investigation. It seems strange
+  that animals which, like the oyster and the barnacles, are
+  condemned in their mature condition to lead so sedentary a life,
+  should in the earlier stages of their existence swim freely and
+  merrily through the water--young fellows seeking a home, and when
+  they have found it, although their connubial life must be a very
+  tame one, settling down, and not caring to rove about any more for
+  the remainder of their days. These young _Balani_ dart about like
+  so many water-fleas, and yet, after a few days of freedom, they
+  become fixed and immovable, the inhabitants of the pyramidal shells
+  which grow in such abundance on other shells, stones, and old wood.
+
+It is unnecessary for me to describe more minutely the anatomy of the
+Cirripedes; I have said enough to show the nature of the plumose
+appurtenances which, hanging from the dead shells, were supposed to be
+the feathers of a little bird within; but it is difficult to understand
+how any one could have seen in the natural occupant of the shell, "the
+little bill, like that of a goose, the eyes, head, neck, breast, wings,
+tail, and feet, like those of other water-fowl," so precisely and
+categorically detailed by Sir Robert Moray. As Pontoppidan, who
+denounced the whole story, as being "without the least foundation," very
+truly says, "One must take the force of imagination to help to make it
+look so!"
+
+As to the origin of the myth, I venture to differ entirely from
+philologists who attribute it to "language," and "a similarity of
+names," for, although, as Professor Max Müller observes in one of his
+lectures, "words without definite meanings are at the bottom of nearly
+all our philosophical and religious controversies," it certainly is not
+applicable in this instance. Every quotation here given shows that the
+mistake arose from the supposed resemblance of the plumes of the
+cirrhopod, and the feathers of a bird, and the fallacious deductions
+derived therefrom. The statements of Maier (p. 112), Gerard (p. 106),
+Sir Robert Moray (p. 110), &c., prove that this fanciful misconception
+sprang from erroneous observation. The love of the marvellous inherent
+in mankind, and especially prevalent in times of ignorance and
+superstition, favoured its reception and adoption, and I believe that it
+would have been as widely circulated, and have met with equal credence,
+if the names of the cirripede and of the goose that was supposed to be
+its offspring had been far more dissimilar than, at first, they really
+were.
+
+Setting aside several ingenious and far-fetched derivations that have
+been proposed, I think we may safely regard the word "barnacle," as
+applied to the cirrhopod, as a corruption of _pernacula_, the diminutive
+of _perna_, a bivalve mollusk, so-called from the similarity in shape of
+its shell to that of a ham--_pernacula_ being changed to _bernacula_. In
+some old Glossaries _perna_ is actually spelt _berna_.
+
+To arrive at the origin of the word "barnacle," or "bernicle," as
+applied to the goose, we must understand that this bird, _Anser
+leucopsis_, was formerly called the "brent," "brant," or "bran" goose,
+and was supposed to be identical with the species, _Anser torquatus_,
+which is now known by that name. The Scottish word for "goose" is
+"clake," or "clakis,"[98] and I think that the suggestion made long ago
+to Gesner[99] (1558), by his correspondent, Joannes Caius, is correct,
+that the word "barnacle" comes from "branclakis," or "barnclake," "the
+dark-coloured goose."
+
+  [98] See the quotation from Hector Boethius, p. 101.
+
+  [99] 'Historia Animalium,' lib. iii. p. 110.
+
+Professor Max Müller is of the opinion that its Latin name may have been
+derived from _Hibernicæ_, _Hiberniculæ_, _Berniculæ_, as it was against
+the Irish bishops that Geraldus wrote, but I must say that this does not
+commend itself to me; for the name _Bernicula_ was not used in the early
+times to denote these birds. Giraldus himself described them as
+_Bernacæ_, but they were variously known, also, as _Barliates_,
+_Bernestas_, _Barnetas_, _Barbates_, etc.
+
+I agree with Dr. John Hill,[100] that "the whole matter that gave
+origin to the story is that the 'shell-fish' (cirripedes), supposed to
+have this wonderful production usually adhere to old wood, and that they
+have a kind of fibres hanging out of them, which, in some degree,
+resemble feathers of some bird. From this slight origin arose the story
+that they contained real birds: what grew on trees people soon asserted
+to be the fruit of trees, and, from step to step, the story gained
+credit with the hearers," till, at length, Gerard had the audacity to
+say that he had witnessed the transformation.
+
+  [100] 'History of Animals,' p. 422. 1752.
+
+The Barnacle Goose is only a winter visitor of Great Britain. It breeds
+in the far north, in Greenland, Iceland, Spitzbergen, and Nova Zembla,
+and probably, also, along the shores of the White Sea. There are
+generally some specimens of this prettily-marked goose in the gardens of
+the Zoological Society in the Regent's Park, London; and they thrive
+there, and become very tame. In the months of December and January these
+geese may often be seen hanging for sale in poulterers' shops; and he
+who has tasted one well cooked may be pardoned if the suspicion cross
+his mind that the "monks of old," and "the bare-footed friars," as well
+as the laity, may not have been unwilling to sustain the fiction in
+order that they might conserve the privilege of having on their tables
+during the long fast of Lent so agreeable and succulent a "vegetable" or
+"fish" as a Barnacle Goose.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+
+  Transcriber's note:
+
+  _Underscores_ have been used to indicate _italic_ fonts.
+  Inconsistent hyphenation has been left as written.
+  Missing end quote marks have been inserted.
+  The word irreconcileable has been left as written: "I
+  need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is the"
+  The word gowden has been left as written: "Braiding her
+  locks of gowden hair"
+  The word fane has been left as written: "exactly resembled
+  the tail of a fish, with a broad fane"
+  The word engulphed has been left as written: "were all
+  suddenly engulphed in the waves on the night of the battle"
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED and SEA FABLES EXPLAINED, by Henry Lee, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S..
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables Explained
+
+Author: Henry Lee
+
+Release Date: July 9, 2011 [EBook #36677]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Jeannie Howse, Anna Hall, Bryan Ness and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="frontispiece" id="frontispiece">
+<img src="images/frontispiece.jpg" width="600" height="412" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">THE SEA SERPENT, AS FIRST SEEN FROM H.M.S. &#39;D&AElig;DALUS.&#39; Frontispiece.</span>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="big center">(<i>International Fisheries Exhibition</i>
+LONDON, 1883)</p>
+
+<h1>SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED</h1>
+
+<p class="center">BY<br />
+<span class="big">HENRY LEE</span>, <small>F.L.S.</small>, <small>F.G.S.</small>, <small>F.Z.S.</small></p>
+
+<p class="center">SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM<br />
+AND<br />
+AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT'</p>
+
+<p class="center">ILLUSTRATED</p>
+
+<p class="center">LONDON<br />
+WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED<br />
+INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION<br />
+AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.<br />
+1883<br /></p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
+
+
+<p>As I commence this little history of two sea monsters
+there comes to my mind a remark made to me by my
+friend, Mr. Samuel L. Clemens&mdash;"Mark Twain"&mdash;which
+illustrates a feeling that many a writer must have
+experienced when dealing with a subject that has been
+previously well handled. Expressing to me one day the
+gratification he felt in having made many pleasant
+acquaintances in England, he added, with dry humour,
+and a grave countenance, "Yes! I owe your countrymen
+no grudge or ill-will. I freely forgive them, though one
+of them did me a grievous wrong, an irreparable injury!
+It was Shakspeare: if he had not written those plays of
+his, I should have done so! They contain <i>my</i> thoughts,
+<i>my</i> sentiments! He forestalled me!"</p>
+
+<p>In treating of the so-called "sea-serpent," I have been
+anticipated by many able writers. Mr. Gosse, in his
+delightful book, 'The Romance of Natural History,'
+published in 1862, devoted a chapter to it; and numerous
+articles concerning it have appeared in various papers and
+periodicals.</p>
+
+<p>But, for the information from which those authors have
+drawn their inferences, and on which they have founded
+their opinions, they have been greatly indebted, as must
+be all who have seriously to consider this subject, to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span>
+late experienced editor of the <i>Zoologist</i>, Mr. Edward
+Newman, a man of wonderful power of mind, of great
+judgment, a profound thinker, and an able writer. At a
+time when, as he said, "the shafts of ridicule were launched
+against believers and unbelievers in the sea-serpent in a
+very pleasing and impartial manner," he, in the true spirit
+of philosophical inquiry, in 1847, opened the columns of
+his magazine to correspondence on this topic, and all the
+more recent reports of marine monsters having been seen
+are therein recorded. To him, therefore, the fullest
+acknowledgments are due.</p>
+
+<p>The great cuttles, also, have been the subject of articles
+in various magazines, notably one by Mr. W. Saville
+Kent, F.L.S., in the 'Popular Science Review' of April,
+1874, and a chapter in my little book on the Octopus,
+published in 1873, is also devoted to them. In writing
+of them as the living representatives of the kraken, and as
+having been frequently mistaken for the "sea-serpent,"
+my deductions have been drawn from personal knowledge,
+and an intimate acquaintance with the habits, form, and
+structure of the animals described. It was only by
+watching the movements of specimens of the "common
+squid" (<i>Loligo vulgaris</i>), and the "little squid" (<i>L. media</i>),
+which lived in the tanks of the Brighton Aquarium, that
+I recognised in their peculiar habit of occasionally
+swimming half-submerged, with uplifted caudal extremity,
+and trailing arms, the fact that I had before me the "sea-serpent"
+of many a well-authenticated anecdote. A mere
+knowledge of their form and anatomy after death had
+never suggested to me that which became at once apparent
+when I saw them in life.</p>
+
+<p>It is a pleasure to me to acknowledge gratefully the
+kindness I have met with in connection with the illustrations<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span>
+of this book. The proprietors of the <i>Illustrated
+London News</i> not only gave me permission to copy, in
+reduced size, their two pictures of the <i>D&aelig;dalus</i> incident,
+but presented to me electrotype copies of all others small
+enough for these pages&mdash;namely, "Jonah and the Monster,"
+Egede's "Sea-Serpent," and the Whale as seen from the
+<i>Pauline</i>. Equally kind have been the proprietors of the
+<i>Field</i>. To them I am greatly indebted for their permission
+to copy the beautiful woodcuts of the "Octopus at Rest,"
+"The Sepia seizing its Prey," and the arms of the Newfoundland
+squids, and also for "electros" of the two curious
+Japanese engravings, all of which originally appeared
+in their paper. From the <i>Graphic</i> I have had similar
+permission to copy any cuts that might be thought
+suitable, and the illustrations of the sea-serpent, as seen
+from Her Majesty's yacht <i>Osborne</i> and the <i>City of Baltimore</i>,
+are from that journal. Messrs. Nisbet most courteously
+allowed me to have a copy of the block of the <i>Enaliosaurus</i>
+swimming, which was one of the numerous pictures in
+Mr. Gosse's book, published by them, already referred to.
+And last, not least, I have to thank Miss Ellen Woodward,
+daughter of my friend, Dr. Henry Woodward, F.R.S., for
+enabling me to better explain the movements and appearances
+of the squids when swimming, and when raising their
+bodies out of water in an erect position, by carefully
+drawing them from my rough sketches.</p>
+
+<p class="right">HENRY LEE.<br /></p>
+<p>
+<span class="smcap">Savage Club</span>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;"><i>July 21st, 1883</i>.</span><br />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
+
+<ul class="toc">
+<li><a href="#frontispiece"><i>Frontispiece.</i>&mdash;The Sea Serpent as first seen from H.M.S.
+<i>D&aelig;dalus</i>.</a></li>
+<li><span class="smcap">FIG. &nbsp;</span><span class="label"><small>PAGE</small></span></li>
+<li><ol><li><a href="#fig_001">Beak and Arms of a Decapod Cuttle</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">16</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_002">The Octopus (<i>Octopus vulgaris</i>)</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">18</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_003">The Cuttle (<i>Sepia officinalis</i>)</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">21</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_004">Hooked Tentacles of <i>Onychoteuthis</i></a> &nbsp;<span class="label">23</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_005">Japanese fisherman attacked by a Cuttle</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">29</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_006">Arms of a great Cuttle exhibited in a Japanese fish</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">29</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_007">Facsimile of De Montfort's "<i>Poulpe colossal</i>"</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">32</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_008">Gigantic Calamary caught by the French despatch vessel <i>Alecton</i>, near Teneriffe</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">39</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_009">Tentacle of a great Calamary (<i>Architeuthis princeps</i>) taken in Conception Bay, Newfoundland</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">43</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_010">Head and Tentacles of a great Calamary (<i>Architeuthis princeps</i>) taken in Logie Bay, Newfoundland</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">44</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_011">Jonah and the Sea Monster</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">55</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_012">Sea Serpent seizing a man on board ship</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">58</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_013">Gigantic Lobster dragging a man from a ship</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">58</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_014">Pontoppidan's "Sea Serpent"</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">63</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_015">The Animal drawn by Mr. Bing as having been seen by Egede</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">66</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_016">The Animal which Egede probably saw</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">67</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_017">The Sea Serpent of the Wernerian Society (<i>facsimile</i>)</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">69</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_018">A Calamary swimming at the surface of the sea</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">77</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_019">The Sea Serpent passing under the quarter of H.M.S. <i>D&aelig;dalus</i></a> &nbsp;<span class="label">81</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_020">The Sea Serpent and Sperm Whale as seen from the <i>Pauline</i></a> &nbsp;<span class="label">91</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_021">The Sea Serpent as seen from the <i>City of Baltimore</i></a> &nbsp;<span class="label">93</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_022">The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht <i>Osborne</i>. Phase 1</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">94</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_023">The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht <i>Osborne</i>. Phase 2</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">94</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_024">Skeleton of the <i>Plesiosaurus</i>, restored by Mr. Conybeare</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">98</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig_025">The Sea Serpent on the Enaliosaurian hypothesis</a> &nbsp;<span class="label">100</span></li>
+</ol></li>
+</ul>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p class="big center">SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE KRAKEN.</h2>
+
+
+<p>In the legends and traditions of northern nations, stories of
+the existence of a marine animal of such enormous size
+that it more resembled an island than an organised being
+frequently found a place. It is thus described in an
+ancient manuscript (about <small>A.D.</small> 1180), attributed to the
+Norwegian King Sverre; and the belief in it has been
+alluded to by other Scandinavian writers from an early
+period to the present day. It was an obscure and
+mysterious sea-monster, known as the Kraken, whose form
+and nature were imperfectly understood, and it was peculiarly
+the object of popular wonder and superstitious
+dread.</p>
+
+<p>Eric Pontoppidan, the younger, Bishop of Bergen, and
+member of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Copenhagen,
+is generally, but unjustly, regarded as the inventor of the
+semi-fabulous Kraken, and is constantly misquoted by
+authors who have never read his work,<a name="Anchor_1_1" id="Anchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 1.">&nbsp;[1]&nbsp;</a> and who, one after
+another, have copied from their predecessors erroneous statements
+concerning him. More than half a century before him,
+Christian Francis Paullinus,<a name="Anchor_2_2" id="Anchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 2.">&nbsp;[2]&nbsp;</a> a physician and naturalist of
+Eisenach, who evinced in his writings an admiration of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>the marvellous rather than of the useful, had described
+as resembling Gesner's 'Heracleoticon,' a monstrous animal
+which occasionally rose from the sea on the coasts of
+Lapland and Finmark, and which was of such enormous
+dimensions, that a regiment of soldiers could conveniently
+man&oelig;uvre on its back. About the same date, but a little
+earlier, Bartholinus, a learned Dane, told how, on a certain
+occasion, the Bishop of Midaros found the Kraken quietly
+reposing on the shore, and mistaking the enormous creature
+for a huge rock, erected an altar upon it and performed
+mass. The Kraken respectfully waited till the ceremony
+was concluded, and the reverend prelate safe on shore, and
+then sank beneath the waves.</p>
+
+<p>And a hundred and fifty years before Bartholinus and
+Paullinus wrote, Olaus Magnus,<a name="Anchor_3_3" id="Anchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 3.">&nbsp;[3]&nbsp;</a> Archbishop of Upsala, in
+Sweden, had related many wondrous narratives of sea-monsters,&mdash;tales
+which had gathered and accumulated
+marvels as they had been passed on from generation to
+generation in oral history, and which he took care to bequeath
+to his successors undeprived of any of their fascination.
+According to him, the Kraken was not so polite to
+the laity as to the Bishop, for when some fishermen lighted
+a fire on its back, it sank beneath their feet, and overwhelmed
+them in the waters.</p>
+
+<p>Pontoppidan was not a fabricator of falsehoods; but, in
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>collecting evidence relating to the "great beasts" living in
+"the great and wide sea," was influenced, as he tells us, by
+"a desire to extend the popular knowledge of the glorious
+works of a beneficent Creator." He gave too much
+credence to contemporary narratives and old traditions of
+floating islands and sea monsters, and to the superstitious
+beliefs and exaggerated statements of ignorant fishermen:
+but if those who ridicule him had lived in his day and amongst
+his people, they would probably have done the same; for
+even Linn&aelig;us was led to believe in the Kraken, and catalogued
+it in the first edition of his 'Systema Natur&aelig;,' as
+'<i>Sepia Microcosmos</i>.' He seems to have afterwards had
+cause to discredit his information respecting it, for he
+omitted it in the next edition. The Norwegian bishop was
+a conscientious and painstaking investigator, and the tone of
+his writings is neither that of an intentional deceiver nor of
+an incautious dupe. He diligently endeavoured to separate
+the truth from the cloud of error and fiction by which it
+was obscured; and in this he was to a great extent successful,
+for he correctly identifies, from the vague and perplexing
+descriptions submitted to him, the animal whose habits
+and structure had given rise to so many terror-laden
+narratives and extravagant traditions.</p>
+
+<p>The following are some of his remarks on the subject of
+this gigantic and ill-defined animal. Although I have
+greatly abbreviated them, I have thought it right to quote
+them at considerable length, that the modest and candid
+spirit in which they were written may be understood:<a name="Anchor_4_4" id="Anchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 4.">&nbsp;[4]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Amongst the many things," he says, "which are in the ocean,
+and concealed from our eyes, or only presented to our view for a
+few minutes, is the Kraken. This creature is the largest and most
+surprising of all the animal creation, and consequently well deserves<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>
+such an account as the nature of the thing, according to
+the Creator's wise ordinances, will admit of. Such I shall give at
+present, and perhaps much greater light on this subject may be
+reserved for posterity.</p>
+
+<p>"Our fishermen unanimously affirm, and without the least
+variation in their accounts, that when they row out several miles to
+sea, particularly in the hot summer days, and by their situation
+(which they know by taking a view of different points of land)
+expect to find eighty or a hundred fathoms of water, it often
+happens that they do not find above twenty or thirty, and sometimes
+less. At these places they generally find the greatest plenty
+of fish, especially cod and ling. Their lines, they say, are no
+sooner out than they may draw them up with the hooks all full of
+fish. By this they know that the Kraken is at the bottom. They
+say this creature causes those unnatural shallows mentioned above,
+and prevents their sounding. These the fishermen are always glad
+to find, looking upon them as a means of their taking abundance
+of fish. There are sometimes twenty boats or more got together
+and throwing out their lines at a moderate distance from each
+other; and the only thing they then have to observe is whether
+the depth continues the same, which they know by their lines, or
+whether it grows shallower, by their seeming to have less water.
+If this last be the case they know that the Kraken is raising himself
+nearer the surface, and then it is not time for them to stay any longer;
+they immediately leave off fishing, take to their oars, and get away
+as fast as they can. When they have reached the usual depth of
+the place, and find themselves out of danger, they lie upon their
+oars, and in a few minutes after they see this enormous monster
+come up to the surface of the water; he there shows himself sufficiently,
+though his whole body does not appear, which, in all
+likelihood, no human eye ever beheld. Its back or upper part,
+which seems to be in appearance about an English mile and a
+half in circumference (some say more, but I chuse the least for
+greater certainty), looks at first like a number of small islands surrounded
+with something that floats and fluctuates like sea-weeds.
+Here and there a larger rising is observed like sand-banks, on
+which various kinds of small fishes are seen continually leaping<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>
+about till they roll off into the water from the sides of it; at last
+several bright points or horns appear, which grow thicker and
+thicker the higher they rise above the surface of the water, and
+sometimes they stand up as high and as large as the masts of
+middle-sized vessels. It seems these are the creature's arms, and
+it is said if they were to lay hold of the largest man of war they
+would pull it down to the bottom. After this monster has been
+on the surface of the water a short time it begins slowly to sink
+again, and then the danger is as great as before; because the
+motion of his sinking causes such a swell in the sea, and such an
+eddy or whirlpool, that it draws everything down with it, like the
+current of the river Male.</p>
+
+<p>"As this enormous sea-animal in all probability may be reckoned
+of the Polype, or of the Starfish kind, as shall hereafter be
+more fully proved, it seems that the parts which are seen rising at
+its pleasure, and are called arms, are properly the tentacula, or
+feeling instruments, called horns, as well as arms. With these they
+move themselves, and likewise gather in their food.</p>
+
+<p>"Besides these, for this last purpose the great Creator has also
+given this creature a strong and peculiar scent, which it can emit
+at certain times, and by means of which it beguiles and draws
+other fish to come in heaps about it. This animal has another
+strange property, known by the experience of many old fishermen.
+They observe that for some months the Kraken or Krabben is
+continually eating, and in other months he always voids his excrements.
+During this evacuation the surface of the water is coloured
+with the excrement, and appears quite thick and turbid. This
+muddiness is said to be so very agreeable to the smell or taste of
+other fishes, or to both, that they gather together from all parts to
+it, and keep for that purpose directly over the Kraken; he then
+opens his arms or horns, seizes and swallows his welcome guests,
+and converts them after due time, by digestion, into a bait for
+other fish of the same kind. I relate what is affirmed by many;
+but I cannot give so certain assurances of this particular, as I can
+of the existence of this surprising creature; though I do not find
+anything in it absolutely contrary to Nature. As we can hardly
+expect to examine this enormous sea-animal alive, I am the more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>
+concerned that nobody embraced that opportunity which, according
+to the following account once did, and perhaps never more may
+offer, of seeing it entire when dead."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The lost opportunity which the worthy prelate thus
+lamented, with the true feeling of a naturalist, was made
+known to him by the Rev. Mr. Friis, Consistorial Assessor,
+Minister of Bodoen in Nordland, and Vicar of the
+college for promoting Christian knowledge, and was to the
+following effect:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"In the year 1680, a Krake (perhaps a young and foolish one)
+came into the water that runs between the rocks and cliffs in the
+parish of Alstaboug, though the general custom of that creature is
+to keep always several leagues from land, and therefore of course
+they must die there. It happened that its extended long arms or
+antenn&aelig;, which this creature seems to use like the snail in turning
+about, caught hold of some trees standing near the water,
+which might easily have been torn up by the roots; but beside
+this, as it was found afterwards, he entangled himself in some
+openings or clefts in the rock, and therein stuck so fast, and hung
+so unfortunately, that he could not work himself out, but perished
+and putrefied on the spot. The carcass, which was a long while
+decaying, and filled great part of that narrow channel, made it
+almost impassable by its intolerable stench.</p>
+
+<p>"The Kraken has never been known to do any great harm,
+except," the Author quaintly says, "they have taken away the lives
+of those who consequently could not bring the tidings. I have
+heard but one instance mentioned, which happened a few years
+ago, near Fridrichstad, in the diocess of Aggerhuus. They say that
+two fishermen accidentally, and to their great surprise, fell into
+such a spot on the water as has been before described, full of a thick
+slime almost like a morass. They immediately strove to get out of
+this place, but they had not time to turn quick enough to save
+themselves from one of the Kraken's horns, which crushed the
+head of the boat, so that it was with great difficulty they saved
+their lives on the wreck, though the weather was as calm as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>
+possible; for these monsters, like the sea-snake, never appear at
+other times."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Pontoppidan then reviews the stories of floating islands
+which suddenly appear, and as suddenly vanish, commonly
+credited, and especially mentioned by Luke Debes in his
+'Description of Faroe.'</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"These islands in the boisterous ocean could not be imagined,"
+he says, "to be of the nature of real floating islands, because they
+could not possibly stand against the violence of the waves in the
+ocean, which break the largest vessels, and therefore our sailors
+have concluded this delusion could come from no other than the
+great deceiver, the devil."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>This accusation, the good bishop, in his desire to be
+strictly impartial, will not admit on such hear-say evidence,
+but is determined to, literally, "give the devil his due;"
+for he warns his readers that "we ought not to charge
+that apostate spirit without a cause; for," he adds, "I
+rather think that this devil who so suddenly makes and
+unmakes these floating islands, is nothing else but the
+Kraken."</p>
+
+<p>Referring to a monster described by Pliny, he repeats
+his belief that "This sea-animal belongs to the Polype, or
+Star-fish species;" but he becomes very much "mixed"
+between the <i>Cephalopoda</i> and the <i>Asterid&aelig;</i>, between the
+pedal segments, or arms, of the cuttle radiating from its
+head, and the rays of a Star-fish radiating from a central
+portion of the body. He evidently inclines strongly
+towards a particular Star-fish, the rays of which continually
+divide and subdivide themselves, or, as he describes it,
+"which shoots its rays into branches like those of trees,"
+and to which he gave the name of "Medusa's Head," a title
+by which, in its Greek form, <i>Gorgonocephalus</i>, it is still
+known to zoologists. "These Medusa's Heads," he says,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>
+"are supposed by some seafaring people here, to be the
+young of the Sea-Krake; perhaps they are its smallest
+ovula." After considering other reports concerning the
+Kraken, he arrives at the following definite opinion:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"We learn from all this that the Polype or Starfish have amongst
+their various species some that are much larger than others; and,
+according to all appearance, amongst the very largest inhabitants
+of the ocean. If the axiom be true that greatness or littleness
+makes no change in the species, then this Krake must be of the
+Polypus kind, notwithstanding its enormous size."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>His diagnosis is correct; but it is stated with a modesty
+which his detractors would do well to imitate; and his
+concluding words on this subject place him in a light
+very different from that in which he is popularly regarded:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"I do not in the least insist on this conjecture being true," he
+writes, "but willingly submit my suppositions in this and every
+other dubious matter to the judgment of those who are better
+experienced. If I was an admirer of uncertain reports and fabulous
+stories, I might here add much more concerning this and other
+Norwegian sea-monsters, whose existence I will not take upon me
+to deny, but do not chuse, by a mixture of uncertain relations to
+make such account appear doubtful as I myself believe to be true
+and well attested. I shall therefore quit the subject here, and
+leave it to future writers on this plan to complete what I have
+imperfectly sketched out, by further experience, which is always
+the best instructor."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>It is easy to recognise in Pontoppidan's description of
+the Kraken, the form and habits of one of the "Cuttle-fishes,"
+so-called. The appearance of its numerous arms,
+with which it gathers in its food, and which grow thicker
+and thicker as they rise above the surface, is just what
+would take place in the case of one of the pelagic species
+of these mollusks raising its head out of the sea. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>
+rendering of the water turbid and thick by the emission of
+a substance which the narrator supposed to be f&aelig;cal
+matter, is exactly that which occurs when a cuttle discharges
+the contents of the remarkable organ known as
+its ink-bag; and the strong and peculiar scent mentioned
+as appertaining to it, is actually characteristic of its inky
+secretion. The musky odour referred to, is more perceptible
+in some species than in others. In one of the Octopods
+(<i>Eledone moschatus</i>), it is so strong, that the specific
+name of the animal is derived from it.</p>
+
+<p>The ancient Greeks and Romans, who were well acquainted
+with the various kinds of cuttles and regarded
+them all as excellent food, and even as delicacies of the
+table, applied the word "polypus" especially to the
+octopus. But Pontoppidan evidently uses it as descriptive
+of all the cephalopods. It must not be forgotten, however,
+that when he wrote, science was only slowly recovering
+from neglect of many centuries' duration. In the enlightened
+times of Greece and Rome, natural history
+flourished, and as in our day, attracted and occupied the
+attention of the man of science, and afforded recreation to
+the man of business and the politician. Aristotle wrote
+322 years before the birth of Christ, and his works are
+monuments of practical wisdom. When we consider the
+period during which he lived, and the isolated nature of his
+labours, and compare them with the information which he
+possessed, we are astonished at his sagacity and the great
+scope and general accuracy of his knowledge. Pliny, 240
+years later, lived in times more favourable for the cultivation
+of science; but with all his advantages made little
+improvement on the work of the great master. And then,
+later still, the sun of learning set; and there came over
+Europe the long night of the dark ages which succeeded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>
+Roman greatness, during which science was degraded and
+ignorance prevailed; and it is not till the middle of the
+sixteenth century, that the zoologist finds much to interest
+and instruct him. When we further reflect, that until
+within the past five and twenty years&mdash;till our large
+aquaria were constructed&mdash;Aristotle's knowledge of the
+habits and life-history of marine animals, and amongst them
+the cephalopods, was incomparably greater and more perfect
+than that possessed by any man who had lived since he
+recorded his observations, we cannot help feeling that in
+some departments of knowledge there is still lost ground to
+be recovered.</p>
+
+<p>In the old days of the C&aelig;sars, a Greek or Roman house-wife
+who was accustomed to see the cuttle, the squid, and
+the octopus daily exposed for sale in the markets, would
+of course have laughed at the idea of mistaking the one for
+the other; but there are comparatively few persons in our
+own country, at the present day, except those who have
+made marine zoology their study, whose ideas on the subject
+are not exceedingly hazy. This want of technical
+knowledge is not confined to the masses; but is common,
+if not general, amongst those who have been well educated,
+and is frequently apparent even in leaders in the daily
+papers&mdash;the productions, for the most part, of men of
+receptive minds, trained discrimination, and great general
+knowledge. As the subject is one in which I have long
+felt especial interest, I venture to hope that I may succeed
+in making clear the difference between the eight-footed
+octopus and its ten-footed relatives, and thus enable the
+reader to identify the member of the family from which we
+are to strip the dress and "make up" in which it masqueraded
+as the Kraken, and cause it to appear in its true
+and natural form.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>One of the great primary groups or divisions of the
+animal kingdom is that of the soft-bodied mollusca; which
+includes the cuttle, the oyster, the snail, &amp;c. It has been
+separated into five "classes," of which the one we have
+especially to notice is the <i>Cephalopoda</i>,<a name="Anchor_5_5" id="Anchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 5.">&nbsp;[5]&nbsp;</a> or "head-footed,"&mdash;the
+animals belonging to it having their feet, or the
+organs which correspond with the foot of other molluscs, so
+attached to the head as to form a circle or coronet round
+the mouth. Some of these have the foot divided into eight
+segments, and are therefore called the <i>Octopoda</i>:<a name="Anchor_6_6" id="Anchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 6.">&nbsp;[6]&nbsp;</a> others
+have, in addition to the eight feet, lobes, or arms, two
+longer tentacular appendages, making ten in all, and are
+consequently called the <i>Decapoda</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Of the ten-footed section of the cephalopods, there are
+four "families;" two only of which exist in Britain&mdash;the
+<i>Teuthid&aelig;</i>, and the <i>Sepiid&aelig;</i>. The <i>Teuthid&aelig;</i> are the Calamaries,
+popularly known as "Squids," and are represented
+by the long-bodied <i>Loligo vulgaris</i>, that has internally
+along its back a gristly, translucent stiffener, shaped like a
+quill-pen; from which and its ink it derives its names of
+"calamary" (from "<i>calamus</i>," a "pen"), "pen-and-ink
+fish," and "sea-clerk." The <i>Sepiid&aelig;</i> are generally known
+as the Cuttles proper. As a type of them we may take the
+common "cuttle-fish," <i>Sepia officinalis</i>, the owner of the
+hard, calcareous shell often thrown up on the shore, and
+known as "cuttle-bone," or "sea-biscuit."</p>
+
+<p>It must here be remarked, that as these head-footed mollusks
+are not "fish," any more than lobsters, crabs, oysters,
+mussels, &amp;c., which fishmongers call "shell-fish," are "fish,"
+the word "fish" is misleading, and should be abandoned;
+and secondly, that the names "cuttle" and "squid," as distinctive
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>appellations, are unsatisfactory. The word "cuttle"
+is derived from "cuddle," to hug, or embrace&mdash;in allusion
+to the manner in which the animal seizes its prey, and enfolds
+it in its arms; and "squid" is derived from "squirt,"
+in reference to its habit of squirting water or ink. But as
+all the known members of the class, except the pearly
+nautilus, <i>Nautilus pompilius</i>, have these habits in common,
+the distinguishing terms are hardly apposite. As, however,
+they are conventionally accepted and understood, I prefer
+to use them. As with other mollusks, so with the cephalopods,
+some have shells, and some are naked or have only
+rudimentary shells. The Argonaut, or paper nautilus, has
+been regarded as the analogue of the snail, which, like it,
+secretes an <i>external</i> shell for the protection of its soft body;
+and the octopus as that of the garden slug, which, having
+organs like those of the snail, as the octopus has organs
+like those of the shell-bearing argonaut, has no shell. The
+cuttles and squids may be compared to some of the sea-slugs,
+as <i>Aplysia</i> and <i>Bull&aelig;a</i>, and to some land-slugs, as
+<i>Parmacella</i> and <i>Limax</i>, which have an <i>internal</i> shell.</p>
+
+<p>The argonaut and the other families of the cephalopods
+do not come within the scope of this treatise; we will therefore
+confine our attention to the three above mentioned. Of
+the anatomy and homology of the <i>Octopus</i>, <i>Sepia</i>, and <i>Calamary</i>
+we need say no more than will suffice to show in what
+manner they resemble each other, and wherein they differ,
+in order that we may the more clearly perceive to which of
+them the story of the Kraken probably owes its origin.</p>
+
+<p>The octopus, the sepia, and the calamary are all constructed
+on one fundamental plan. A bag of fleshy
+muscular skin, called the mantle-sac, contains the organs
+of the body, heart, stomach, liver, intestines, a pair of gills
+by which oxygen is absorbed from the water for the purification<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>
+of the blood, and an excurrent tube by which the
+water thus deprived of its life-sustaining gas is expelled.
+The outrush of water with more or less force, from this
+"syphon-tube," is also the principal source of locomotion
+when the animal is swimming, as it propels it backward&mdash;not
+by the striking of the expelled fluid against the surrounding
+water, as is generally supposed; but by the unbalanced
+pressure of the fluid acting inside the body in the direction
+in which the creature goes. Into this syphon-tube, or
+funnel, opens, by a special duct, the ink-bag; and from it
+is squirted at will the intensely black fluid therein secreted.
+I doubt very much the correctness of the statement
+mentioned by Pontoppidan and others, that the cuttle
+ejects its ink with a desire to lie hidden and in ambush
+for its intended prey, or with the intention to attract fish
+within its reach by their partiality for the musky odour of
+this secretion. It may be so, but during the long period
+that I had these animals under close observation at the
+Brighton Aquarium, I never witnessed such an incident.
+I believe that the emission of the ink is a symptom
+of fear, and is only employed as a means of concealment
+from a suspected enemy. I have found, that
+when first taken, the <i>Sepia</i>, of all its kind, is the most
+sensitively timid. Its keen, unwinking eye watches for
+and perceives the slightest movement of its captor; and if
+even most cautiously looked at from above, its ink is
+belched forth in eddying volumes, rolling over and over
+like the smoke which follows the discharge of a great gun
+from a ship's port, and mixes with marvellous rapidity with
+the surrounding water. But, like all of its class, the <i>Sepia</i>
+is very intelligent. It soon learns to discriminate between
+friend and foe, and ultimately becomes very tame, and
+ceases to shoot its ink, unless it be teased and excited. By<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>
+means of the communication between the ink-bag and the
+locomotor tube, it happens that when the ink is ejected,
+a stream of water is forcibly emitted with it, and thus the
+very effort for escape serves the double purpose of propelling
+the creature away from danger, and discolouring
+the water in which it moves. Oppian has well described
+this&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The endangered cuttle thus evades his fears,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And native hoards of fluids safely wears.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;A pitchy ink peculiar glands supply<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Whose shades the sharpest beam of light defy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Pursued, he bids the sable fountains flow,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And, wrapt in clouds, eludes the impending foe.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The fish retreats unseen, while self-born night<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;With pious shade befriends her parent's flight."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Professor Owen has remarked that the ejection of the
+ink of the cephalopods serves by its colour as a means of
+defence, as corresponding secretions in some of the mammalia
+by their odour.</p>
+
+<p>It is worthy of notice that the pearly nautilus and the
+allied fossil forms are without this means of concealment,
+which their strong external shells render unnecessary for
+their protection.</p>
+
+<p>From the sac-like body containing the various organs,
+protrudes a head, globose in shape, and containing a brain,
+and furnished with a pair of strong, horny mandibles, which
+bite vertically, like the beak of a parrot. By these the
+flesh of prey is torn and partly masticated, and within
+them lies the tongue, covered with recurved and retractile
+teeth, like that of its distant relatives, the whelk,
+limpet, &amp;c., by which the food is conducted to the gullet.
+Around this head is, as I have said, the organ which is
+equivalent to the foot in other molluscs&mdash;that by which
+the slug and the snail crawl&mdash;only that the head is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>
+placed in the centre, instead of in the front of it, and it
+is divided into segments, which radiate from this central
+head. These segments are very flexible, and capable of
+movement in every direction, and are thus developed
+into arms, prehensile limbs, by which their owner can
+seize and hold its living prey. That this may be more
+perfectly accomplished, these arms are studded along
+their inner surface with rows of sucking discs, in each of
+which, by means of a retractile piston, a vacuum can
+be produced. The consequent pressure of the outer atmosphere
+or water, causes them to adhere firmly to any
+substance to which they are applied, whether stone, fish,
+crustacean, or flesh of man.</p>
+
+<p>But, although in all these highly-organised head-footed
+mollusks the same general build prevails, it is admirably
+modified in each of them to suit certain habits and necessities.
+Thus the octopus, being a shore dweller, its soft
+and pliant, but very tough body, having merely a very
+small and rudimentary indication of an internal shell (just
+a little "style") is exactly adapted for wedging itself
+amongst crevices of rocks. A large, rigid, cellular float, or
+"sepiostaire," such as <i>Sepia</i> possesses, or a long, horny pen
+such as <i>Loligo</i> has, would be in the way, and worse than
+useless in such places as the octopus inhabits. Its eight
+long powerful arms or feet are precisely fitted for clambering
+over rocks and stones, and as its food of course consists
+principally of the living things most abundant in such
+localities, namely, the shore-crabs, its great flexible suckers,
+devoid of hooks or horny armature, are exactly adapted to
+firm and air-tight attachment to the smooth shells of the
+crustacea.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_001" id="fig_001">
+<img src="images/fig_001.jpg" width="470" height="258" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 1.--BEAK AND ARMS OF A DECAPOD CUTTLE.<br /> a, the eight shorter arms; t, the tentacles; f, the funnel, or locomotor tube.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Unlike the octopus, which is capable only of short flights
+through the water, the "cuttles" and "squids," such as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>
+<i>Sepia</i> and <i>Loligo</i>, are all free swimmers. For them it is
+necessary for accuracy of natation that their soft, and in
+the squids long bodies, should be supported by such a
+framework as they possess. In <i>Sepia</i>, the mantle-sac is
+flattened horizontally all along its lateral edges so as to
+form a pair of fins, which nearly surround the trunk. These
+fins could never be used, as they are, to enable the animal
+to poise itself delicately in the water by means of their
+beautiful undulations, which I have often watched with
+delight, if their attached edges were not kept in a straight
+line on either side. Then, these ten-footed or ten-armed
+genera have not, because they need them not, eight long,
+strong and highly mobile arms like those of the octopus, nor
+have they large suckers upon them. Whereas a great length
+of reach is an advantage to the octopus, animals which are
+purely swimmers, and which hunt and overtake their prey
+by speed, would be impeded by having to drag after them
+a bundle of stout, lengthy appendages trailing heavily
+astern. Their eight pedal arms are short and comparatively
+weak, though strong enough, in individuals such as are
+regarded on our own coasts as fullgrown, to seize and hold<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>
+a fish or crustacean as strong as a good sized shore-crab.
+But, as compensation for the shortness of the eight arms, they
+are provided with two others more than three times the
+length of the short ones. These are so slender that they
+generally lie coiled up in a spiral cone in two pockets, one
+on each side, just below the eye, when the animal is
+quiescent, and are only seen when it takes its food. These
+long, slender tentacular arms are expanded at their extremity,
+and the inner surface of their enlarged part is studded
+with suckers&mdash;some of them larger in size than those on
+the eight shorter arms. As the food of these swimmers
+consists, of course, chiefly of fish, their sucking disks are
+curiously modified for the better retention of a slippery
+captive. A horny ring with a sharply serrated edge is imbedded
+in the outer circumference of each of them, and
+when a vacuum is formed, the keen, saw-like teeth are
+pressed into the skin or scales of the unfortunate prisoner,
+and deprive it of the slightest chance of escape.</p>
+
+<p>The manner in which the eight-armed and ten-armed
+cephalopods capture their prey is similar in principle and
+plan, but differs in action in accordance with their mode of
+life. The ordinary habit of the octopus is either to rest
+suspended to the side of a rock to which it clings with the
+suckers of several of its arms, or to remain lurking in some
+favourite cranny; its body thrust for protection and concealment
+well back in the interior of the recess; its bright eyes
+keenly on the watch; three or four of its limbs firmly
+attached to the walls of its hiding place&mdash;the others gently
+waving, gliding, and feeling about in the water, as if to
+maintain its vigilance, and keep itself always on the alert,
+and in readiness to pounce on any unfortunate wayfarer
+that may pass near its den. To a shore-crab that comes
+within its reach the slightest contact with one of those lithe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>
+arms is fatal. Instantaneously as pull of trigger brings
+down a bird, or touch of electric wire explodes a torpedo or
+a mining fuse, the pistons of the series of suckers are
+simultaneously drawn inward, the air is removed from the
+pneumatic holders, and a vacuum created in each: the crab
+tries to escape, but in a second is completely pinioned:
+not a movement, not a struggle is possible; each leg, each
+claw is grasped all over by suckers, enfolded in them,
+stretched out to its fullest extent by them; the back of
+the carapace is completely covered by the tenacious disks,
+brought together by the adaptable contractions of the limb,
+and ranged in close order, shoulder to shoulder, touching
+each other; and the pressure of the air is so great that
+nothing can effect the relaxation of their retentive power but
+the destruction of the air-pump that works them, or the
+closing of the throttle-valve by which they are connected
+with it. Meanwhile the abdominal plates of the captive
+crab are dragged towards the mouth; the black tip of the
+hard horny beak is seen for a single instant protruding
+from the circular orifice in the centre of the radiation of
+the arms; and, the next, has crushed through the shell, and
+is buried deep in the flesh of the victim.</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="fig_002" id="fig_002">
+<img src="images/fig_002.jpg" width="600" height="428" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 2.&mdash;THE OCTOPUS (Octopus vulgaris).</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Unlike the skulking, hiding octopus, its ten-armed relative,
+the <i>Sepia</i> loves the daylight and the freedom of the
+upper water. Its predatory acts are not those of a concealed
+and ambushed brigand lying in wait behind a
+rock, or peeping furtively from within the gloomy shadow
+of a cave; but it may better be compared to the war-like
+Comanche vidette seated gracefully on his horse, and scanning
+from some elevated knoll a wide expanse of prairie, in
+readiness to swoop upon a weak or unarmed foe. Poised
+near the surface of the water, like a hawk in the air, the
+<i>Sepia</i> moves gently to and fro by graceful undulations of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>
+its lateral fins,&mdash;an exquisite play of colour occasionally
+taking place over its beautifully barred and mottled back.
+When thus tranquil, its eight pedal arms are usually
+brought close together, and droop in front of its head, like
+the trunk of an elephant, shortened; its two longer tentacular
+arms being coiled up within their pouches and unseen.
+Only when some small fish approaches it does it arouse
+itself. Then, its eyes dilate, and its colours become more
+bright and vivid. It carefully takes aim, advancing or
+retreating to such a distance as will just allow the two
+hidden tentacles to reach the quarry when they shall be shot
+out. Next, the two highest or central feet are lifted up,
+and the three others on each side are spread aside, so that
+they may be all out of the way of the two concealed tentacles,
+presently to be launched forth; and then, in a
+moment&mdash;so instantaneously that the eye of an observer,
+be he ever so watchful, can hardly see the act&mdash;this pair
+of tentacles, side by side, are projected and withdrawn, as
+if in a flash. The fish or shrimp has vanished, the suckers
+of the dilated ends of the tentacles having adhered to it,
+and left it, as they re-entered their pouches, within the fatal
+"cuddle," or embrace, where it is torn to pieces by the
+devouring beak.<a name="Anchor_7_7" id="Anchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 7.">&nbsp;[7]&nbsp;</a> This action of the tentacles of the
+decapods is the most rapid motion that I know of in the
+whole animal kingdom&mdash;not excepting even that of the
+tongue of the toad and the lizard. These long tentacles
+are not used when the food is within reach of the shorter
+arms.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 596px;">
+<a name="fig_003" id="fig_003">
+<img src="images/fig_003.jpg" width="596" height="425" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 3.&mdash;THE CUTTLE (Sepia officinalis).</span>
+</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The calamaries or squids of our British Seas seize their
+prey in the same manner as <i>Sepia</i>, and the description of one
+will suffice for both. But there exist two groups of them,
+which are armed with curved and sharp-pointed hooks or
+claws, either in addition to, or instead of suckers. In the
+one group (<i>Onychoteuthis</i>), the hooks are restricted to the
+extremities of the pair of tentacles, in the other (<i>Enoploteuthis</i>),
+both the tentacles and the shorter arms have hooks.
+Professor Owen, in his description of these hook-armed
+calamaries in the <i>Cyclop&aelig;dia of Anatomy</i>, notices also
+another structure which adds greatly to their prehensile
+power (<a href="#fig_004">Fig. 4.</a>). "At the extremity of the long tentacles a cluster
+of small, simple, unarmed suckers may be observed at the
+base of the expanded part. When these latter suckers are
+applied to one another the tentacles are securely locked
+together at that part, and the united strength of both the
+elongated peduncles can be applied to drag towards the
+mouth any resisting object which has been grappled by the
+terminal hooks. There is no mechanical contrivance which
+surpasses this structure; art has remotely imitated it in
+the fabrication of the obstetrical forceps, in which either
+blade can be used separately, or, by the inter-locking of a
+temporary blade, be made to act in combination."</p>
+
+<p>The cephalopods obtain and eat their food very much
+like the rapacious birds. They are the falcons of the sea.
+Some of them, like <i>Onychoteuthis</i>, strike their prey with
+talons and suckers also, others lay hold of it with
+suckers alone; but they all tear the flesh with their beaks,
+and swallow and digest their food in the same manner as
+the hawk or vulture.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 154px;">
+<a name="fig_004" id="fig_004">
+<img src="images/fig_004.jpg" width="154" height="600" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 4.&mdash;HOOKED TENTACLES
+OF Onychoteuthis.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The <i>Sepia</i>, the owner of the broad, flattened bone, has a
+decided predilection for the vicinity of the shore, and for
+comparatively shallow water. It
+there attaches its grape-like eggs
+to some convenient stone or growing
+alga, and delights occasionally
+to sink to the bottom, and there
+to rest half covered by the sand,
+a habit for which the form of its
+body is well adapted. But the
+calamaries&mdash;they of the horny pen&mdash;prefer
+the wide waters of the
+open ocean; and although they,
+too, especially the smaller species,
+are common upon the coasts, they
+are frequently met with far out at
+sea, and away from any land. The
+elongated and almost arrow-like
+shape of their bodies enables them
+to glide through the water with
+great rapidity, and the momentum
+exerted by a vigorous out-rush from
+their syphon-tube is sometimes so
+great that when the opposite pressure
+thus produced is so exerted as
+to cause them to take an upward
+direction they leap out of the water
+to so great a height as to fall on the
+decks of ships; and are, therefore,
+called by sailors, "flying squids."
+Their spawn is very different from
+that of either octopus, or sepia. It
+consists of dozens of semi-transparent,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
+gelatinous, slender, cylindrical sheaths, about four
+or five inches long, each containing many ova imbedded
+in it (making a total number of about 40,000 embryos), all
+springing from a common centre and resembling a mop
+without a handle. I have never seen any of these "sea-mops"
+attached to anything, and the pelagic habits of the
+calamaries render it probable that they are left floating on
+the surface of the sea.</p>
+
+<p>Having made ourselves acquainted with the structure
+and habits of these three divisions of the eight-footed and
+ten-footed mollusks, let us take evidence as to the size to
+which they are respectively known to attain, and the degree
+in which they may be regarded as dangerous to man.</p>
+
+<p>An octopus from our own coasts having arms two feet in
+length may be considered a rather large specimen; and
+Dr. J. E. Gray, who was always most kindly ready to place
+at the disposal of any sincere inquirer the vast store of
+knowledge laid up in his wonderful memory, told me that
+"there is not one in the British Museum which exceeds
+this size, or which would not go into a quart pot&mdash;body,
+arms and all." The largest British specimen I have hitherto
+seen had arms 2 ft. 6 in. long. We have sufficient evidence,
+however, that it exceeds this in the South of France, and
+along the Spanish and Italian coasts of the Mediterranean;
+and my deceased friend John Keast Lord tells us in his
+book, 'The Naturalist in British Columbia,' that he saw
+and measured, in Vancouver's Island, an octopus which
+had arms five feet long.</p>
+
+<p>I have often been asked whether an octopus of
+the ordinary size can really be dangerous to bathers.
+Decidedly, "Yes," in certain situations. The holding
+power of its numerous suckers is enormous. It is
+almost impossible forcibly to detach it from its adhesion<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>
+to a rock or the flat bottom of a tank; and if a large one
+happened to fix one or more of its strong, tough arms on
+the leg of a swimmer whilst the others held firmly to a rock,
+I doubt if the man could disengage himself under water
+by mere strength, before being exhausted. Fortunately
+the octopus can be made to relax its hold by grasping it
+tightly round the "throat" (if I may so call it), and it may
+be well that this should be known.</p>
+
+<p>That men are occasionally drowned by these creatures
+is, unhappily, a fact too well attested. I have elsewhere<a name="Anchor_8_8" id="Anchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 8.">&nbsp;[8]&nbsp;</a>
+related several instances of this having occurred.
+Omitting those, I will give two or three others which have
+since come under my notice. Sir Grenville Temple, in his
+'Excursions in the Mediterranean Sea,' tells how a Sardinian
+captain, whilst bathing at Jerbeh, was seized and drowned
+by an octopus. When his body was found, his limbs were
+bound together by the arms of the animal; and this took
+place in water only four feet deep.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. J. K. Lord's account of the formidable strength of
+these creatures in Oregon is confirmed by an incident
+recorded in the <i>Weekly Oregonian</i> (the principal paper of
+Oregon) of October 6th, 1877. A few days before that
+date an Indian woman, whilst bathing, was held beneath
+the surface by an octopus, and drowned. The body was
+discovered on the following day in the horrid embrace of
+the creature. Indians dived down and with their knives
+severed the arms of the octopus and recovered the corpse.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Clemens Laming, in his book, 'The French in Algiers,'
+writes:&mdash;"The soldiers were in the habit of bathing
+in the sea every evening, and from time to time several of
+them disappeared&mdash;no one knew how. Bathing was, in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>
+consequence, strictly forbidden; in spite of which several
+men went into the water one evening. Suddenly one of
+them screamed for help, and when several others rushed to
+his assistance they found that an octopus had seized him
+by the leg by four of its arms whilst it clung to the rock
+with the rest. The soldiers brought the 'monster' home
+with them, and out of revenge they boiled it alive and ate
+it. This adventure accounted for the disappearance of the
+other soldiers."</p>
+
+<p>The Rev. W. Wyatt Gill, who for more than a quarter
+of a century has resided as a missionary amongst the inhabitants
+of the Hervey Islands, and with whom I had the
+pleasure of conversing on this subject when he was in
+England in 1875, described in the <i>Leisure Hour</i> of April
+20th, 1872, another mode of attack by which an octopus might
+deprive a man of life. A servant of his went diving for
+"poulpes" (octopods), leaving his son in charge of the
+canoe. After a short time he rose to the surface, his arms
+free, but his nostrils and mouth completely covered by a
+large octopus. If his son had not promptly torn the
+living plaister from off his face he must have been suffocated&mdash;a
+fate which actually befell some years previously a
+man who foolishly went diving alone.</p>
+
+<p>In <i>Appleton's American Journal of Science and Art</i>,
+January 31st, 1874, a correspondent describes an attack
+by an octopus on a diver who was at work on the wreck of
+a sunken steamer off the coast of Florida. The man, a powerful
+Irishman, was helpless in its grasp, and would have been
+drowned if he had not been quickly brought to the surface;
+for when dragged on to the raft from which he had
+descended, he fainted, and his companions were unable to
+pull the creature from its hold upon him until they had
+dealt it a sharp blow across its baggy body.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>A similar incident occurred to the government diver of
+the colony of Victoria, Australia. Whilst pursuing his
+avocation in the estuary of the river Moyne he was seized
+by an octopus. He killed it by striking it with an iron
+bar, and brought to shore with him a portion of it with the
+arms more than three feet long.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Laurence Oliphant, in his 'China and Japan,' describes
+a Japanese show, which consisted of "a series of groups
+of figures carved in wood, the size of life, and as cleverly
+coloured as Madame Tussaud's wax-works. One of these
+was a group of women bathing in the sea. One of them
+had been caught in the folds of a cuttle-fish; the others,
+in alarm, were escaping, leaving their companion to her
+fate. The cuttle-fish was represented on a huge scale, its
+eyes, eyelids, and mouth being made to move simultaneously
+by a man inside the head."</p>
+
+<p>An attack of this kind is most artistically represented
+in a small Japanese ivory-carving in the possession of
+Mr. Bartlett, of the Zoological Gardens.<a name="Anchor_9_9" id="Anchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 9.">&nbsp;[9]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>The Japanese are well acquainted with the octopus; for
+it is commonly depicted on their ornaments, and forms no
+unimportant item in their fisheries.</p>
+
+<p>I have recently had an opportunity of inspecting a most
+curious Japanese book, in the possession of my friend Mr.
+W. B. Tegetmeier, which is chiefly devoted to the representations
+of the fisheries and fish-curing processes of the
+country. It is in three volumes, and is entitled, 'Land and
+Sea Products,' by Ki Kone. It is evidently ancient, for it
+is slightly worm-eaten, but the plates, each 12 inches by
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>8 inches, are full of vigour. Two of these illustrate in a
+very interesting manner the subject before us, and by the
+kindness of Mr. Tegetmeier I am able to give facsimiles of
+them, which appeared with an article by him on this book,
+in the <i>Field</i> of March 14th, 1874. <a href="#fig_005">Fig. 5</a> represents a fisherman
+in a boat out at sea: a gigantic octopus has thrown
+one of its arms over the side of the boat; the man, who is
+alone, has started forward from the stern of the boat, and
+has succeeded, by means of a large knife attached to a long
+handle, in lopping off the dangerous limb of his enemy.
+As Mr. Tegetmeier says, "From the extreme matter of fact
+manner in which all these engravings are made, and the total
+absence of exaggeration in any other representation, I cannot
+but regard the relative sizes of the man, the boat, and
+the octopus, as correctly given, in which case we have
+evidence of the existence of gigantic cephalopods in
+Japanese waters." The only doubt I have is whether the
+fisherman correctly described his assailant as an octopus,
+and whether it was not a calamary. <a href="#fig_006">Fig. </a>6 is a vivid
+picture of a fishmonger's shop in a market, under the awning
+of which may be seen two arms of a gigantic cuttle hung
+up for sale as food. These are evidently of most unusual
+size, judging from the action of the lookers on; the one
+to the left, with a tall stand or case on his back, like a
+Parisian cocoa-vendor, is holding out his hand in mute
+astonishment; whilst the attention of the smaller personage
+in the right-hand corner is directed to the suspended arms
+of the cuttle by the man nearest to him, who is pointing to
+them with upraised hand. In another plate in this most
+interesting work a Japanese mode of fishing for cuttles is
+delineated. A man in a boat is tossing crabs, one at a
+time, into the sea, and when a cuttle rises at the bait he
+spears it with a trident and tosses it into the boat.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_005" id="fig_005">
+<img src="images/fig_005.jpg" width="470" height="335" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 5.&mdash;JAPANESE FISHERMAN ATTACKED BY A CUTTLE.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_006" id="fig_006">
+<img src="images/fig_006.jpg" width="470" height="461" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 6.&mdash;ARMS OF A GREAT CUTTLE EXHIBITED IN A JAPANESE
+FISHMONGER&#39;S SHOP.</span>
+</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The octopus, therefore, though not abundant on our own
+coasts, is found in every sea in the temperate zone; and in
+so far as that it secretes an ink with which it can render
+the water turbid, and has many radiating arms with which
+it can seize and drown a man, it possesses certain attributes
+of the Kraken; but we have no authentic knowledge
+of its ever attaining to greater dimensions than I have
+stated, nor does it bask on the surface of the sea. It is not
+amongst the <i>Octopid&aelig;</i> therefore that we must look for a
+solution of the mystery.</p>
+
+<p>The basking condition is fulfilled by the <i>Sepia</i>; and its
+flattened back, supported and rendered hard and firm to
+the touch by the calcareous <i>sepiostaire</i> beneath the skin, is
+broader in proportion than that of the octopus or the squid.
+Thus <i>Sepia</i> might pass as a microscopic miniature of the
+great Scandinavian monster. But it lacks the character of
+size. We have no reason to believe that any true <i>Sepia</i>
+exists, as the family is now understood, that has a body
+more than eighteen inches long. If it were otherwise it would
+be more likely to be known of this family than of its relatives,
+for its lightly constructed and well known "cuttle-bone"
+would float on the surface for many weeks after the death
+of its owner, and large specimens of it would be seen and
+recognised from passing ships.</p>
+
+<p>As we can find no species of the <i>Octopid&aelig;</i> or <i>Sepiid&aelig;</i>
+which can furnish a pretext for the stories told of the
+Kraken, we must try to ascertain how far a similitude to it
+may be traced in the third family we have discussed, the
+<i>Teuthid&aelig;</i>.</p>
+
+<p>The belief in the existence of gigantic cuttles is an
+ancient one. Aristotle mentions it, and Pliny tells of an
+enormous polypus which at Carteia, in Grenada&mdash;an old
+and important Roman colony near Gibraltar&mdash;used to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>
+come out of the sea at night, and carry off and devour
+salted tunnies from the curing depots on the shore; and
+adds that when it was at last killed, the head of it (they
+used to call the body the head, because in swimming it
+goes in advance) was found to weigh 700 lbs. &AElig;lian records
+a similar incident, and describes his monster as
+crushing in its arms the barrels of salt fish to get at the
+contents. These two must have been octopods if they
+were anything; the word "polypus" thus especially
+designates it, and moreover, the free-swimming cuttles and
+squids would be helpless if stranded on the shore. Some
+of the old writers seem to have aimed rather at making their
+histories sensational than at carefully investigating the
+credibility or the contrary of the highly coloured reports
+brought to them. These were, of course, gross exaggerations,
+but there was generally a substratum of truth in
+them. They were based on the rare occurrence of specimens,
+smaller certainly, but still enormous, of some known
+species, and in most cases the worst that can be said of
+their authors is that they were culpably careless and foolishly
+credulous.</p>
+
+<p>Unhappily so lenient a judgment cannot be passed on
+some comparatively recent writers. Denys de Montfort,
+half a century later than Pontoppidan, not only professed
+to believe in the Kraken, but also in the existence of
+another gigantic animal distinct from it; a colossal <i>poulpe</i>,
+or octopus, compared with which Pliny's was a mere
+pigmy. In a drawing fitter to decorate the outside of a
+showman's caravan at a fair than seriously to illustrate a
+work on natural history,<a name="Anchor_10_10" id="Anchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 10.">&nbsp;[10]&nbsp;</a> he depicted this tremendous
+cuttle as throwing its arms over a three masted vessel,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>snapping off its masts, tearing down the yards, and on the
+point of dragging it to the bottom, if the crew had not succeeded
+in cutting off its immense limbs with cutlasses and
+hatchets. De Montfort had good opportunities of obtaining
+information, for he was at one time an assistant in the
+geological department of the Museum of Natural History,
+in Paris; and wrote a work on conchology,<a name="Anchor_11_11" id="Anchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 11.">&nbsp;[11]&nbsp;</a> besides that
+already referred to. But it appears to have been his deliberate
+purpose to cajole the public; for it is reported
+that he exclaimed to M. Defrance: "If my entangled
+ship is accepted, I will make my 'colossal poulpe' overthrow
+a whole fleet." Accordingly we find him gravely
+declaring<a name="Anchor_12_12" id="Anchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 12.">&nbsp;[12]&nbsp;</a> that one of the great victories of the British
+navy was converted into a disaster by the monsters
+which are the subject of his history. He boldly asserted
+that the six men-of-war captured from the French by
+Admiral Rodney in the West Indies on the 12th of April,
+1782, together with four British ships detached from his
+fleet to convoy the prizes, were all suddenly engulphed in
+the waves on the night of the battle under such circumstances
+as showed that the catastrophe was caused by
+colossal cuttles, and not by a gale or any ordinary casualty.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 468px;">
+<a name="fig_007" id="fig_007">
+<img src="images/fig_007.jpg" width="468" height="732" alt="Giant octopus attacking a ship" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 7.&mdash;FACSIMILE OF DE MONTFORT&#39;S &quot;Poulpe colossal.&quot;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Unfortunately for De Montfort, the inexorable logic of
+facts not only annihilates his startling theory, but demonstrates
+the reckless falsity of his plausible statements. The
+captured vessels did not sink on the night of the action,
+but were all sent to Jamaica to refit, and arrived there
+safely. Five months afterwards, however, a convoy of nine
+line-of-battle ships (amongst which were Rodney's prizes),
+one frigate, and about a hundred merchantmen, were dispersed,
+whilst on their voyage to England, by a violent
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>storm, during which some of them unfortunately foundered.
+The various accidents which preceded the loss of these
+vessels was related in evidence to the Admiralty by the
+survivors, and official documents prove that De Montfort's
+fleet-destroying <i>poulpe</i> was an invention of his own, and
+had no part whatever in the disaster that he attributed
+to it.</p>
+
+<p>I have been told, but cannot vouch for the truth of
+the report, that De Montfort's propensity to write that
+which was not true culminated in his committing forgery,
+and that he died in the galleys. But he records a statement
+of Captain Jean Magnus Dens, said to have been
+a respectable and veracious man, who, after having made
+several voyages to China as a master trader, retired from a
+seafaring life and lived at Dunkirk. He told De Montfort
+that in one of his voyages, whilst crossing from St. Helena
+to Cape Negro, he was becalmed, and took advantage of
+the enforced idleness of the crew to have the vessel scraped
+and painted. Whilst three of his men were standing on
+planks slung over the side, an enormous cuttle rose from
+the water, and threw one of its arms around two of the
+sailors, whom it tore away, with the scaffolding on which
+they stood. With another arm it seized the third man, who
+held on tightly to the rigging, and shouted for help. His
+shipmates ran to his assistance, and succeeded in rescuing
+him by cutting away the creature's arm with axes and
+knives, but he died delirious on the following night. The
+captain tried to save the other two sailors by killing the
+animal, and drove several harpoons into it; but they broke
+away, and the men were carried down by the monster.</p>
+
+<p>The arm cut off was said to have been twenty-five feet
+long, and as thick as the mizen-yard, and to have had on it
+suckers as big as saucepan-lids. I believe the old sea-captain's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>
+narrative of the incident to be true; the dimensions
+given by De Montfort are wilfully and deliberately false.
+The belief in the power of the cuttle to sink a ship and
+devour her crew is as widely spread over the surface of the
+globe, as it is ancient in point of time. I have been told
+by a friend that he saw in a shop in China a picture of a
+cuttle embracing a junk, apparently of about 300 tons
+burthen, and helping itself to the sailors, as one picks
+gooseberries off a bush.</p>
+
+<p>Traditions of a monstrous cuttle attacking and destroying
+ships are current also at the present day in the Polynesian
+Islands. Mr. Gill, the missionary previously quoted, tells
+us<a name="Anchor_13_13" id="Anchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 13.">&nbsp;[13]&nbsp;</a> that the natives of Aitutaki, in the Hervey group, have
+a legend of a famous explorer, named Rata, who built a
+double canoe, decked and rigged it, and then started off in
+quest of adventures. At the prow was stationed the dauntless
+Nganaoa, armed with a long spear and ready to slay
+all monsters. One day when speeding pleasantly over the
+ocean, the voice of the ever vigilant Nganaoa was heard:
+"O Rata! yonder is a terrible enemy starting up from
+ocean depths." It proved to be an octopus (query, squid?)
+of extraordinary dimensions. Its huge tentacles encircled
+the vessel in their embrace, threatening its instant destruction.
+At this critical moment Nganaoa seized his spear, and
+fearlessly drove it through the head of the creature. The
+tentacles slowly relaxed, and the dead monster floated off
+on the surface of the ocean.</p>
+
+<p>Passing from the early records of the appearance of
+cuttles of unusual size, and the current as well as
+the traditional belief in their existence by the inhabitants
+of many countries, let us take the testimony of travellers
+and naturalists who have a right to be regarded as competent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>
+observers. In so doing we must bear in mind that
+until Professor Owen propounded the very clear and convenient
+classification now universally adopted, the squids,
+as well as the eight-footed <i>Octopid&aelig;</i>, were all grouped
+under the title of <i>Sepia</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Pernetty, describing a voyage made by him in the years
+1763-4,<a name="Anchor_14_14" id="Anchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 14.">&nbsp;[14]&nbsp;</a> mentions gigantic cuttles met with in the Southern
+Seas.</p>
+
+<p>Shortly afterwards, during the first week in March 1769,
+Banks and Solander, the scientific fellow-voyagers with
+Lieutenant Cook (afterwards the celebrated Captain Cook),
+in H.M.S. <i>Endeavour</i>, found in the North Pacific, in latitude
+38&deg; 44&acute; S. and longitude 110&deg; 33&acute; W., a large calamary
+which had just been killed by the birds, and was floating in
+a mangled condition on the water. Its arms were furnished,
+instead of suckers, with a double row of very sharp talons,
+which resembled those of a cat, and, like them, were retractable
+into a sheath of skin from which they might be thrust
+at pleasure. Of this cuttle they say, with evident pleasurable
+remembrance of a savoury meal, they made one of the
+best soups they ever tasted. Professor Owen tells us, in the
+paper already referred to, that when he was curator of the
+Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and
+preparing, in 1829, his first catalogue thereof, he was struck
+with the number of oceanic invertebrates which Hunter had
+obtained. He learned from Mr. Clift that Hunter had supplied
+Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks with stoppered
+bottles containing alcohol, in which to preserve the new
+marine animals that he might meet with during the circumnavigatory
+voyage about to be undertaken by Cook.
+Thinking it probable that Banks might have stowed some
+parts of this great hook-armed squid in one of these bottles for
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>his anatomical friend, he searched for, and found in a bottle
+marked "J. B.," portions of its arms, the beak with tongue, a
+heart ventricle, &amp;c., and, amongst the dry preparations, the
+terminal part of the body, with an attached pair of rhomboidal
+fins. The remainder had furnished Cook and his
+companions Banks and Solander with a welcome change of
+diet in the commander's cabin of the <i>Endeavour</i>. As the
+inner surface of the arms of the squid, as well as the
+terminals of its tentacles, were studded with hooks, Professor
+Owen named it <i>Enoploteuthis Cookii</i>. He estimates the
+diameter of the tail fin at 15 inches, the length of its body
+3 feet, of its head 10 inches, of the shorter arms 16 inches,
+and of the longer tentacles about the same as its body&mdash;thus
+giving a total length of about 6 ft. 9 in. Although
+individuals of other species, of larger dimensions, are known
+to have existed, this is the largest specimen of the hook-armed
+calamaries that has been scientifically examined.
+It would have been a formidable antagonist to a man under
+circumstances favourable to the exertion of its strength, and
+the use of its prehensile and lacerating talons.</p>
+
+<p>Peron,<a name="Anchor_15_15" id="Anchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 15.">&nbsp;[15]&nbsp;</a> the well-known French zoologist, mentions having
+seen at sea, in 1801, not far from Van Diemen's Land, at a
+very little distance from his ship, <i>Le G&eacute;ographe</i>, a "Sepia,"
+of the size of a barrel, rolling with noise on the waves; its
+arms, between 6 and 7 feet long, and 6 or 7 inches in
+diameter at the base, extended on the surface, and writhing
+about like great snakes. He recognised in this, and no
+doubt correctly, one of the calamaries. The arms that he
+saw were evidently the animal's shorter ones, as under such
+circumstances, with neither enemy to combat nor prey to
+seize at the moment, the longer tentacles would remain
+concealed.</p>
+
+<p>Quoy and Gaimard<a name="Anchor_16_16" id="Anchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 16.">&nbsp;[16]&nbsp;</a> report that in the Atlantic Ocean,
+near the Equator, they found the remains of an enormous
+calamary, half eaten by the sharks and birds, which could
+not have weighed less, when entire, than 200 lbs. A portion
+of this was secured, and is preserved in the Museum of
+Natural History, Paris.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Sander Rang<a name="Anchor_17_17" id="Anchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 17.">&nbsp;[17]&nbsp;</a> records having fallen in with, in
+mid-ocean, a species distinct from the others, of a dark red
+colour, having short arms, and a body the size of a hogshead.</p>
+
+<p>In a manuscript by Paulsen (referred to by Professor
+Steenstrup, at a meeting of Scandinavian naturalists at
+Copenhagen in 1847) is a description of a large calamary,
+cast ashore on the coast of Zeeland, which the latter named
+<i>Architeuthis monachus</i>. Its body measured 21 feet, and its
+tentacles 18 feet, making a total of 39 feet.</p>
+
+<p>In 1854 another was stranded at the Skag in Jutland,
+which Professor Steenstrup believed to belong to the same
+genus as the preceding, but to be of a different species, and
+called it <i>Architeuthis dux</i>. The body was cut in pieces by
+the fishermen for bait, and furnished many wheelbarrow
+loads. Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys<a name="Anchor_18_18" id="Anchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 18.">&nbsp;[18]&nbsp;</a> says Dr. M&ouml;rch informed him
+that the beak of this animal was nine inches long. He adds
+that another huge cephalopod was stranded in 1860 or
+1861, between Hillswick and Scalloway, on the west of
+Shetland. From a communication received by Professor
+Allman, it appears that its tentacles were 16 feet long, the
+pedal arms about half that length, and the mantle sac 7
+feet. The largest suckers examined by Professor Allman
+were three-quarters of an inch in diameter.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 464px;">
+<a name="fig_008" id="fig_008">
+<img src="images/fig_008.jpg" width="464" height="714" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 8.&mdash;GIGANTIC CALAMARY CAUGHT BY THE FRENCH DESPATCH
+VESSEL &#39;ALECTON,&#39; NEAR TENERIFFE.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>We have also the statement of the officers and crew of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>
+the French despatch steamer, <i>Alecton</i>, commanded by Lieutenant
+Bouyer, describing their having met with a great
+calamary on the 30th of November, 1861, between Madeira
+and Teneriffe. It was seen about noon on that day floating
+on the surface of the water, and the vessel was stopped with
+a view to its capture. Many bullets were aimed at it, but
+they passed through its soft flesh without doing it much
+injury, until at length "the waves were observed to be
+covered with foam and blood." It had probably discharged
+the contents of its ink-bag; for a strong odour of
+musk immediately became perceptible&mdash;a perfume which I
+have already mentioned as appertaining to the ink of many
+of the cephalopoda, and also as being one of the reputed
+attributes of the Kraken. Harpoons were thrust into it,
+but would not hold in the yielding flesh; and the animal
+broke adrift from them, and, diving beneath the vessel,
+came up on the other side. The crew wished to launch
+a boat that they might attack it at closer quarters, but the
+commander forbade this, not feeling justified in risking the
+lives of his men. A rope with a running knot was, however,
+slipped over it, and held fast at the junction of the broad
+caudal fin; but when an attempt was made to hoist it on
+deck the enormous weight caused the rope to cut through
+the flesh, and all but the hinder part of the body fell back into
+the sea and disappeared. M. Berthelot, the French consul at
+Teneriffe, saw the fin and posterior portion of the animal on
+board the <i>Alecton</i> ten days afterwards, and sent a report
+of the occurrence to the Paris Academy of Sciences. The
+body of this great squid, which, like Rang's specimen, was
+of a deep-red colour, was estimated to have been from
+16 feet to 18 feet long, without reckoning the length of its
+formidable arms.<a name="Anchor_19_19" id="Anchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 19.">&nbsp;[19]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>These are statements made by men who, by their intelligence,
+character, and position, are entitled to respect and
+credence; and whose evidence would be accepted without
+question or hesitation in any court of law. There is, moreover,
+a remarkable coincidence of particulars in their several
+accounts, which gives great importance to their combined
+testimony.</p>
+
+<p>But, fortunately, we are not left dependent on documentary
+evidence alone, nor with the option of accepting
+or rejecting, as caprice or prejudice may prompt us, the
+narratives of those who have told us they have seen what
+we have not. Portions of cuttles of extraordinary size are
+preserved in several European museums. In the collection
+of the Faculty of Sciences at Montpellier is one six feet
+long, taken by fishermen at Cette, which Professor Steenstrup
+has identified as <i>Ommastrephes pteropus</i>. One of the
+same species, which was formerly in the possession of M.
+Eschricht, who received it from Marseilles, may be seen in
+the museum at Copenhagen. The body of another,
+analogous to these, is exhibited in the Museum of Trieste:
+it was taken on the coast of Dalmatia. At the meeting of
+the British Association at Plymouth in 1841, Colonel Smith
+exhibited drawings of the beak and other parts of a very
+large calamary preserved at Haarlem; and M. P. Harting,
+in 1860, described in the Memoirs of the Royal Scientific
+Academy of Amsterdam portions of two extant in other
+collections in Holland, one of which he believes to be Steenstrup's
+<i>Architeuthis dux</i>, a species which he regards as
+identical with <i>Ommastrephes todarus</i> of D'Orbigny.</p>
+
+<p>Still there remained a residuum of doubt in the minds of
+naturalists and the public concerning the existence of
+gigantic cuttles until, towards the close of the year 1873,
+two specimens were encountered on the coast of Newfoundland,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>
+and a portion of one and the whole of the other,
+were brought ashore, and preserved for examination by
+competent zoologists.</p>
+
+<p>The circumstances under which the first was seen, as
+sensationally described by the Rev. M. Harvey, Presbyterian
+minister of St. John's, Newfoundland, in a letter to
+Principal Dawson, of McGill College, were, briefly and
+soberly, as follows:&mdash;Two fishermen were out in a small
+punt on the 26th of October, 1873, near the eastern end of
+Belle Isle, Conception Bay, about nine miles from St. John's.
+Observing some object floating on the water at a short
+distance, they rowed towards it, supposing it to be the <i>d&eacute;bris</i>
+of a wreck. On reaching it one of them struck it with his
+"gaff," when immediately it showed signs of life, and shot
+out its two tentacular arms, as if to seize its antagonists.
+The other man, named Theophilus Picot, though naturally
+alarmed, severed both arms with an axe as they lay on the
+gunwale of the boat, whereupon the animal moved off, and
+ejected a quantity of inky fluid which darkened the surrounding
+water for a considerable distance. The men went
+home, and, as fishermen will, magnified their lost "fish."
+They "estimated" the body to have been 60 feet in length,
+and 10 feet across the tail fin; and declared that when
+the "fish" attacked them "it reared a parrot-like beak
+which was as big as a six-gallon keg."</p>
+
+<p>All this, in the excitement of the moment, Mr. Harvey
+appears to have been willing to believe, and related without
+the expression of a doubt. Fortunately, he was able to
+obtain from the fishermen a portion of one of the tentacular
+arms which they had chopped off with the axe, and by so
+doing rendered good service to science. This fragment
+(<a href="#fig_009">Fig. 9</a>), as measured by Mr. Alexander Murray, provincial
+geologist of Newfoundland, and Professor Verrill, of Yale<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>
+College, Connecticut, is 17 feet long and 3&frac12; feet in circumference.
+It is now in St. John's Museum. By careful calculation
+of its girth, the breadth and circumference of the
+expanded sucker-bearing portion at its extremity, and the
+diameter of the suckers, Professor Verrill has computed its
+dimensions to have been as follows:&mdash;Length of body 10 feet;
+diameter of body 2 feet 5 inches. Long tentacular arms
+32 feet; head 2 feet; total length about 44 feet. The upper
+mandible of the beak, instead of being "as large as a six-gallon
+keg" would be about 3 inches long, and the lower
+mandible 1&frac12; inch long. From the size of the large suckers
+relatively to those of another specimen to be presently
+described, he regards it as probable that this individual was
+a female.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 465px;">
+<a name="fig_009" id="fig_009">
+<img src="images/fig_009.jpg" width="465" height="203" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 9.&mdash;TENTACLE OF A GREAT CALAMARY (Architeuthis princeps) TAKEN
+IN CONCEPTION BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, OCT. 26, 1873.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In November, 1873&mdash;about three weeks after the occurrence
+in Conception Bay&mdash;another calamary somewhat
+smaller than the preceding, but of the same species, also
+came into Mr. Harvey's possession. Three fishermen, when
+hauling their herring-net in Logie Bay, about three miles
+from St. John's, found the huge animal entangled in its folds.
+With great difficulty they succeeded in despatching it and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>
+bringing it ashore, having been compelled to cut off its head
+before they could get it into their boat.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_010" id="fig_010">
+<img src="images/fig_010.jpg" width="470" height="608" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 10.&mdash;HEAD AND TENTACLES OF A GREAT CALAMARY (Architeuthis
+princeps) TAKEN IN LOGIE BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, NOV. 1873.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The body of this specimen was over 7 feet long; the
+caudal fin 22 inches broad; the two long tentacular arms
+24 feet in length; the eight shorter arms each 6 feet long,
+the largest of the latter being 10 inches in circumference at
+the base; total length of this calamary 32 feet. Professor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>
+Verrill considers that this and the Conception Bay squid
+are both referable to one species&mdash;Steenstrup's <i>Architeuthis
+dux</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Excellent woodcuts from photographs of these two specimens
+were given in the <i>Field</i> of December 13th, 1873, and
+January 31st, 1874, respectively, and I am indebted to the
+proprietors of that journal for their kind and courteous permission
+to copy them in reduced size for the illustration of
+this little work.</p>
+
+<p>For the preservation of both of the above described
+specimens we have to thank Mr. Harvey, and he produces
+additional evidence of other gigantic cuttles having been
+previously seen on the coast of Newfoundland. He mentions
+two especially, which, as stated by the Rev. Mr.
+Gabriel, were cast ashore in the winter of 1870-71, near
+Lamaline on the south coast of the island, which measured
+respectively 40 feet and 47 feet in length; and he also tells
+of another stranded two years later, the total length of
+which was 80 feet.</p>
+
+<p>In the <i>American Journal of Science and Arts</i>, of March
+1875, Professor Verrill gives particulars and authenticated
+testimony of several other examples of great calamaries,
+varying in total length from 30 feet to 52 feet, which have
+been taken in the neighbourhood of Newfoundland since
+the year 1870. One of these was found floating, apparently
+dead, near the Grand Banks in October 1871, by Captain
+Campbell, of the schooner <i>B. D. Hoskins</i>, of Gloucester,
+Mass. It was taken on board, and part of it used for bait.
+The body is stated to have been 15 feet long, and the pedal
+or shorter arms between 9 feet and 10 feet. The beak was
+forwarded to the Smithsonian Institution.</p>
+
+<p>Another instance given by Professor Verrill is of a great
+squid found alive in shallow water in Coomb's Cove,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>
+Fortune Bay, in the year 1872. Its measurements, taken by
+the Hon. T. R. Bennett, of English Harbour, Newfoundland,
+were, length of body 10 feet; length of tentacle 42 feet;
+length of one of the ordinary arms 6 feet: the cups on the
+tentacles were serrated. Professor Verrill also mentions a
+pair of jaws and two suckers in the Smithsonian Institution,
+as having been received from the Rev. A. Munn, with a
+statement that they were taken from a calamary which
+went ashore in Bonavista Bay, and which measured 32 feet
+in total length.</p>
+
+<p>On the 22nd of September, 1877, another gigantic squid
+was stranded at Catalina, on the north shore of Trinity
+Bay, Newfoundland, during a heavy equinoctial gale. It
+was alive when first seen, but died soon after the ebbing of
+the tide, and was left high and dry upon the beach. Two
+fishermen took possession of it, and the whole settlement
+gathered to gaze in astonishment at the monster. Formerly
+it would have been converted into manure, or cut up as
+food for dogs, but, thanks to the diffusion of intelligence,
+there were some persons in Catalina who knew the importance
+of preserving such a rarity, and who advised the
+fishermen to take it to St. John's. After being exhibited
+there for two days, it was packed in half-a-ton of ice in
+readiness for transmission to Professor Verrill, in the hope
+that it would be placed in the Peabody or Smithsonian
+Museum; but at the last moment its owners violated their
+agreement, and sold it to a higher bidder. The final
+purchase was made for the New York Aquarium, where it
+arrived on the 7th of October, immersed in methylated
+spirit in a large glass tank. Its measurements were as follows:&mdash;length
+of body 10 feet; length of tentacles 30 feet;
+length of shorter arm 11 feet; circumference of body 7 feet;
+breadth of caudal fin 2 feet 9 inches; diameter of largest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>
+tentacular sucker 1 inch; number of suckers on each of
+the shorter arms 250.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance of so many of these great squids on
+the shores of Newfoundland during the term of seven years,
+and after so long a period of popular uncertainty as to
+their very existence had previously elapsed, might lead one
+to suppose that the waters of the North Atlantic Ocean
+which wash the north-eastern coasts of the American Continent
+were, at any rate, temporarily, their principal habitat,
+especially as a smaller member of their family, <i>Ommastrephes
+sagittatus</i>, is there found in such extraordinary
+numbers that it furnishes the greater part of the bait used
+in the Newfoundland cod fisheries. But that they are by
+no means confined to this locality is proved by recent
+instances, as well as by those already cited.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. F. Hilgendorf records<a name="Anchor_20_20" id="Anchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 20.">&nbsp;[20]&nbsp;</a> observations of a huge squid
+exhibited for money at Yedo, Japan, in 1873, and of another
+of similar size, which he saw exposed for sale in the Yedo
+fish market.</p>
+
+<p>When the French expedition was sent to the Island of
+St. Paul, in 1874, for the purpose of observing the transit
+of Venus, which occurred on the 9th of December in that
+year, it was fortunately accompanied by an able zoologist,
+M. Ch. Velain. He reports<a name="Anchor_21_21" id="Anchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 21.">&nbsp;[21]&nbsp;</a> that on the 2nd of November
+a tidal wave cast upon the north shore of the island a great
+calamary which measured in total length nearly 23 feet,
+namely: length of body 7 feet; length of tentacles 16 feet.
+There are several points of interest connected with its
+generic characters, and M. Velain's grounds for regarding
+it as being of a previously unknown species, but they
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>are too technical for discussion here. This specimen was
+photographed as it lay upon the beach by M. Cazin, the
+photographer to the expedition.</p>
+
+<p>The following account of the still more recent capture of
+a large squid off the west coast of Ireland was given in the
+<i>Zoologist</i> of June 1875, by Sergeant Thomas O'Connor, of
+the Royal Irish Constabulary:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"On the 26th of April, 1875, a very large calamary was met
+with on the north-west of Boffin Island, Connemara. The crew of
+a 'curragh' (a boat made like the 'coracle,' with wooden ribs
+covered with tarred canvas) observed to seaward a large floating
+mass, surrounded by gulls. They pulled out to it, believing it to
+be wreck, but to their astonishment found it was an enormous
+cuttle-fish, lying perfectly still, as if basking on the surface of the
+water. Paddling up with caution, they lopped off one of its arms.
+The animal immediately set out to sea, rushing through the water
+at a tremendous pace. The men gave chase, and, after a hard
+pull in their frail canvas craft, came up with it, five miles out in
+the open Atlantic, and severed another of its arms and the head.
+These portions are now in the Dublin Museum. The shorter
+arms measure, each, eight feet in length, and fifteen inches round
+the base: the tentacular arms are said to have been thirty feet
+long. The body sank."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Finally, there is in our own national collection, preserved
+in spirit in a tall glass jar, a single arm of a huge cephalopod,
+which, by the kindness and courtesy of the officers of the
+department, I was permitted to examine and measure when
+I first described it, in May, 1873. It is 9 feet long, and 12
+inches in circumference at the base, tapering gradually to a
+fine point. It has about 300 suckers, pedunculated, or set
+on tubular footstalks, placed alternately in two rows, and
+having serrated, horny rings, but no hooks; the diameter
+of the largest of these rings is half an inch; the smallest is
+not larger than a pin's head. This is one of the eight<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>
+shorter, or pedal, and not one of the long, or tentacular,
+arms of the calamary to which it belonged. The relative
+length of the arms to that of the body and tentacles
+varies in different genera of the <i>Teuthid&aelig;</i>, and it is not
+impossible that this may be the case even in individuals
+of the same species. But, judging from the proportions
+of known examples, I estimate the length of the tentacles
+at 36 feet, and that of the body at from 10 to
+11 feet: total length 47 feet. The beak would probably
+have been about 5 inches long from hinge socket to point,
+and the diameter of the largest suckers of the tentacles
+about 1 inch. So much for De Montfort's "suckers as big
+as saucepan-lids." From a well defined fold of skin which
+spreads out from each margin of that surface of the arm
+over which the suckers are situated, Professor Owen has
+given to this calamary the generic name of <i>Plectoteuthis</i>,
+with the specific title of <i>grandis</i> to indicate its enormous
+size. No history relating to this interesting specimen has
+been preserved. No one knows its origin, nor when it was
+received, but Dr. Gray told me that he believed it came
+from the east coast of South America. It has, however,
+long formed part of the stores of the British Museum, and,
+although previously open to public view, was more recently
+for many years kept in the basement chambers of the old
+building in Bloomsbury, which were irreverently called by
+the initiated "the spirit vaults and bottle department,"
+because fishes, mollusca, &amp;c., preserved in spirits were
+there deposited. I hope the public will have greater
+facility of access to it in the new Museum.</p>
+
+<p>Here, then, in our midst, and to be seen by all who ask
+permission to inspect it, is, and has long been, a limb of a
+great cephalopod capable of upsetting a boat, or of hauling
+a man out of her, or of clutching one engaged in scraping<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>
+a ship's side, and dragging him under water, as described
+by the old master-mariner Magnus Dens. The tough,
+supple tentacles, shot forth with lightning rapidity, would
+be long enough to reach him at a distance of a dozen yards,
+and strong enough to drag him within the grasp of the
+eight shorter arms, a helpless victim to the mandibles of a
+beak sufficiently powerful to tear him in pieces and crush
+some of his smaller bones. For, once within that dreadful
+embrace, his escape, unaided, would be impossible. The
+clinging power of this <i>Plectoteuthis</i> is so enormously augmented
+by the additional surface given by the expanded
+folds to the under side of the arms, that I doubt if even
+one of the smaller whales, such as the "White Whale," or
+the "Pilot Whale," could extricate itself from their combined
+hold, if those eight supple, clammy, adhesive arms,
+each 9 feet long, and 5 inches in diameter at the base
+on the flat under surface, and armed with a battery of
+2400 suckers, were once fairly lapped around it.</p>
+
+<p>Ought it to surprise us, then, that an uneducated seafaring
+population, such as the fishermen of Fridrichstad,
+mentioned by Pontoppidan, absolutely ignorant of the
+habits and affinities, and even unacquainted with the real
+external form of such a creature, should exaggerate its
+dimensions and invest it with mystery? All that they
+knew of it was that whilst their friends and neighbours,
+whom we will call Eric Paulsen, Hans Ohlsen, and Olaf
+Bruhn were out fishing one calm day, a shapeless "something"
+rose just above the surface of the tranquil sea not
+far from their boat. They could see that there was much
+more of its bulk under water, but how far it extended they
+could not ascertain. Mistrusting its appearance, and with
+foreboding of danger, they were about to get up their
+anchor, when, suddenly, from thirty feet away, a rope was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>
+shot on board which fastened itself on Hans; he was
+dragged from amongst them towards the strange floating
+mass; there was a commotion; from the foaming sea
+upreared themselves, as it seemed to Eric and Olaf, several
+writhing serpents, which twined themselves around Hans;
+and as they gazed, helpless, in horror and bewilderment,
+the monster sank, and with a mighty swirl the waters
+closed for ever over their unfortunate companion. The
+men would naturally hasten home, and describe the dreadful
+incident&mdash;their imagination excited by its mysterious
+nature; the tale would spread through the district, losing
+nothing by repetition, and within a week the fabled Kraken
+would be the result.</p>
+
+<p>The existence, in almost every sea, of calamaries capable
+of playing their part in such a scene has been fully proved,
+and this vexed question of marine zoology set at rest for
+ever. The "much greater light on this subject," which, as
+Pontoppidan sagaciously foresaw, was "reserved for posterity,"
+has been thrown upon it by the discoveries of the
+last few years; and the "further experience which is
+always the best instructor," and which he correctly anticipated
+would be possessed by the "future writers," to whom
+he bequeathed the completion of his "sketch," has been
+obtained. Viewed by their aid, and seen in the clearer
+atmosphere of our present knowledge, the great sea-monster
+which loomed so indefinitely vast in the mist of ignorance and
+superstition, stands revealed in its true form and proportions&mdash;its
+magnitude reduced, its outline distinct, and its mystery
+gone&mdash;and we recognise in the supposed Kraken, as the
+Norwegian bishop rightly conjectured that we should, an
+animal "of the Polypus (or cuttle) kind, and amongst the
+largest inhabitants of the ocean."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE GREAT SEA SERPENT.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The belief in the existence of sea-serpents of formidable
+dimensions is of great antiquity. Aristotle, writing about
+<small>B.C.</small> 340, says<a name="Anchor_22_22" id="Anchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 22.">&nbsp;[22]&nbsp;</a>:&mdash;"The serpents of Libya are of an enormous
+size. Navigators along that coast report having seen
+a great quantity of bones of oxen, which they believe,
+without doubt, to have been devoured by the serpents.
+These serpents pursued them when they left the shore, and
+upset one of their triremes"&mdash;a vessel of a large class,
+having three banks of oars.</p>
+
+<p>Pliny tells us<a name="Anchor_23_23" id="Anchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 23.">&nbsp;[23]&nbsp;</a> that a squadron sent by Alexander the
+Great on a voyage of discovery, under the command of
+Onesicritus and Nearchus, encountered, in the neighbourhood
+of some islands in the Persian Gulf, sea-serpents
+thirty feet long, which filled the fleet with terror.</p>
+
+<p>Valerius Maximus,<a name="Anchor_24_24" id="Anchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 24.">&nbsp;[24]&nbsp;</a> quoting Livy, describes the alarm
+into which, during the Punic wars, the Romans, under
+Attilius Regulus (who was afterwards so cruelly put to
+death by the Carthaginians), were thrown by an aquatic,
+though not marine, serpent which had its lair on the
+banks of the Bagrados, near Ithaca. It is said to have
+swallowed many of the soldiers, after crushing them in
+its folds, and to have kept the army from crossing the
+river, till at length, being invulnerable by ordinary weapons,
+it was destroyed by heavy stones hurled by balistas,
+catapults, and other military engines used in those days
+for casting heavy missiles, and battering the walls of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>fortified towns. According to the historian, the annoyance
+caused by it to the army did not cease with its death, for
+the water was polluted with its gore, and the air with the
+noxious fumes from its corrupted carcase, to such a degree
+that the Romans were obliged to remove their camp. They,
+however secured the animal's skin and skull, which were preserved
+in a temple at Rome till the time of the Numantine
+war. This combat has been described, to the same effect,
+by Florus (lib. ii.), Seneca (litt. 82), Silvius Italicus (l. vi.),
+Aulus Gellius (lib. vi., cap. 3), Orosius, Zonaras, &amp;c., and is
+referred to by Pliny (lib. viii., cap. 14) as an incident known
+to every one. Diodorus Siculus also tells of a great serpent,
+sixty feet long, which lived chiefly in the water, but landed
+at frequent intervals to devour the cattle in its neighbourhood.
+A party was collected to capture it; but their first
+attempt failed, and the monster killed twenty of them. It
+was afterwards taken in a strong net, carried alive to
+Alexandria, and presented to King Ptolemy II., the founder
+of the Alexandrian Library and Museum, who was a great
+collector of zoological and other curiosities. This snake
+was probably one of the great boas.</p>
+
+<p>The "<i>Serpens marinus</i>" is figured and referred to by
+many other writers, but as they evidently allude to the
+Conger and the Murena, we will pass over their descriptions.</p>
+
+<p>The sea-serpents mentioned by Aristotle, Pliny, and
+Diodorus were, doubtless, real sea-snakes, true marine
+ophidians, which are more common in tropical seas than is
+generally supposed. They are found most abundantly in
+the Indian Ocean; but they have an extensive geographical
+range, and between forty and fifty species of them are
+known. They are all highly poisonous, and some are so
+ferocious that they more frequently attack than avoid man.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+The greatest length to which they are authentically known
+to attain is about twelve feet. The form and structure of
+these <i>hydrophides</i> are modified from those of land serpents,
+to suit their aquatic habits. The tail is compressed vertically,
+flattened from the sides, so as to form a fin like the
+tail of an eel, by which they propel themselves; but instead
+of tapering to a point, it is rounded off at the end, like the
+blade of a paper-knife, or the scabbard of a cavalry sabre.
+Like other lung-breathing animals which live in water, they
+are also provided with a respiratory apparatus adapted to
+their circumstances and requirements&mdash;their nostrils, which
+are very small, being furnished, like those of the seal,
+manatee, &amp;c., with a valve opening at will to admit air, and
+closing perfectly to exclude water.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving these water-snakes of the tropics, we come,
+next in order of date, upon some very remarkable evidence
+that there was current amongst a community where we
+should little expect to find it, the idea of a marine monster
+corresponding in many respects with some of the descriptions
+given several centuries later of the sea-serpent. In
+an interesting article on the Catacombs of Rome in the
+<i>Illustrated London News</i> of February 3rd, 1872, allusion
+is made by the author to the collection of sarcophagi or
+coffins of the early Christians, removed from the Catacombs,
+and preserved in the museum of the Lateran Palace, where
+they were arranged by the late Padre Marchi for Pope
+Pius IX. There are more than twenty of these, sculptured
+with various designs&mdash;the Father and the Son, Adam and
+Eve and the Serpent, the Sacrifice of Abraham, Moses
+striking the Rock, Daniel and the Lions, and other Scripture
+themes. Amongst them also is Jonah and the "whale."
+A facsimile of this sculpture (<a href="#fig_011">Fig. 11</a>) is one of the illustrations
+of the article referred to. It will be seen that Jonah<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>
+is being swallowed feet foremost, or possibly being ejected
+head first, by an enormous sea monster, having the chest
+and fore-legs of a horse, a long arching neck, with a mane
+at its base, near the shoulders, a head like nothing in
+nature, but having hair upon and beneath the cheeks, the
+hinder portion of the body being that of a serpent of
+prodigious length, undulating in several vertical curves.
+This sculpture appears to have been cut between the
+beginning and the middle of the third century, about
+<small>A.D.</small> 230, but it probably represents a tradition of far
+greater antiquity.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 463px;">
+<a name="fig_011" id="fig_011">
+<img src="images/fig_011.jpg" width="463" height="155" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 11.&mdash;JONAH AND THE SEA MONSTER.
+
+From the Catacombs of Rome.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>We will now consider the accounts given by Scandinavian
+historians, of the sea-serpent having been seen in northern
+waters. Here, I suppose, I ought to indulge in the usual
+flippant sneer at Bishop Pontoppidan. I know that in abstaining
+from doing so I am sadly out of the fashion; but I
+venture to think that the dead lion has been kicked at too
+often already, and undeservedly. Whether there be, or be not,
+a huge marine animal, not necessarily an ophidian, answering
+to some of the descriptions of the sea-serpent&mdash;so called&mdash;Pontoppidan
+did not invent the stories told of its appearance.
+Long before he was born the monster had been
+described and figured; and for centuries previously the
+Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, and Fins had believed in its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>
+existence as implicitly as in the tenets of their religious
+creed. Olaus Magnus, Archbishop of Upsala, in Sweden,
+wrote of it in <small>A.D.</small> 1555 as follows:&mdash;<a name="Anchor_25_25" id="Anchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 25.">&nbsp;[25]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"They who in works of navigation on the coasts of Norway
+employ themselves in fishing or merchandize do all agree in this
+strange story, that there is a serpent there which is of a vast
+magnitude, namely 200 foot long, and moreover, 20 foot thick;
+and is wont to live in rocks and caves toward the sea-coast about
+Berge: which will go alone from his holes on a clear night in
+summer, and devour calves, lambs, and hogs, or else he goes into
+the sea to feed on polypus (octopus), locusts (lobsters), and all
+sorts of sea-crabs. He hath commonly hair hanging from his
+neck a cubit long, and sharp scales, and is black, and he hath
+flaming, shining eyes. This snake disquiets the shippers; and
+he puts up his head on high like a pillar, and catcheth away men,
+and he devours them; and this happeneth not but it signifies
+some wonderful change of the kingdom near at hand; namely,
+that the princes shall die, or be banished; or some tumultuous
+wars shall presently follow. There is also another serpent of an
+incredible magnitude in an island called Moos in the diocess of
+Hammer; which, as a comet portends a change in all the world,
+so that portends a change in the kingdom of Norway, as it was
+seen anno 1522; that lifts himself high above the waters, and rolls
+himself round like a sphere.<a name="Anchor_26_26" id="Anchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 26.">&nbsp;[26]&nbsp;</a> This serpent was thought to be
+fifty cubits long by conjecture, by sight afar off: there followed
+this the banishment of King Christiernus, and a great persecution
+of the Bishops; and it shewed also the destruction of the
+country."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The Gothic Archbishop, amongst other signs and omens,
+also attributes this power of divination to the small red
+ants which are sometimes so troublesome in houses, and
+declares that they also portended the downfall, <small>A.D.</small> 1523,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>
+of the abominably cruel Danish king, Christian II., above
+mentioned. His curious work is full of wild improbabilities
+and odd superstitions, most of which he states with a
+calm air of unquestioning assent; but as he wrote in the
+time of our Henry VIII., long before the belief in witches
+and warlocks, fairies and banshees, had died out in our own
+country, we can hardly throw stones at him on that score.
+It is a most amusing and interesting history, and gives a
+wonderful insight of the habits and customs of the northern
+nations in his day.</p>
+
+<p>Amongst his illustrations of the sea monsters he describes
+are the two of which I give facsimiles on the next page. In
+<a href="#fig_012">Fig. 12</a> a sea-serpent is seen writhing in many coils upon
+the surface of the water, and having in its mouth a sailor,
+whom it has seized from the deck of a ship. The poor fellow
+is trying to grasp the ratlins of the shrouds, but is being
+dragged from his hold and lifted over the bulwarks by the
+monster. His companions, in terror, are endeavouring to
+escape in various directions. One is climbing aloft by the
+stay, in the hope of getting out of reach in that way,
+whilst two others are hurrying aft to obtain the shelter of
+a little castle or cabin projecting over the stern. I am
+strongly of the opinion that this is but the fallacious representation
+of an actual occurrence. Read by the light of
+recent knowledge, these old pictures convey to a practised
+eye a meaning as clear as that of hieroglyphics to an
+Egyptologist, and my translation of this is the following:
+The crew of a ship have witnessed the dreadful sight of a
+serpent-like form issuing from the sea, rising over the
+bulwarks of their vessel, seizing one of their messmates<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>
+from amongst them, and dragging him overboard and
+under water. Awe-stricken by the mysterious disappearance
+of their comrade, and too frightened and anxious for
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>their own safety to be able, during the short space of time
+occupied by an affair, which all happened in a few seconds,
+to observe accurately their terrible assailant, they naturally
+conjecture that it must have been a snake. It was probably
+a gigantic calamary, such as we now know exist,
+and the dead carcases of which have been found in the
+locality where the event depicted is supposed to have taken
+place. The presumed body of the serpent was one of the arms
+of the squid, and the two rows of suckers thereto belonging
+are indicated in the illustration by the medial line traversing
+its whole length (intended to represent a dorsal fin) and
+the double row of transverse septa, one on each side of it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_012" id="fig_012">
+<img src="images/fig_012.jpg" width="470" height="293" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 12.&mdash;A SEA SERPENT SEIZING A MAN ON BOARD SHIP.
+
+After Olaus Magnus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_013" id="fig_013">
+<img src="images/fig_013.jpg" width="470" height="302" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 13.&mdash;A GIGANTIC LOBSTER DRAGGING A MAN FROM A SHIP.
+
+After Olaus Magnus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In Fig. 13 an enormous lobster is in the act of similarly
+dragging overboard from a vessel a man whom it has seized
+by the arm with one of its great claws. From the crude
+image of a lobster having eight minor claws and two larger
+ones, to that of a cuttle having eight minor arms and two
+longer ones, the transition is not great; and I believe that
+this also is a pictorial misrepresentation of a casualty
+by the attack of a calamary similar to that above described,
+possibly another view of the same incident. The
+idea is that of a sea animal capable of suddenly seizing and
+grasping a man, and we must remember that we have
+evidence, in the writings of Pontoppidan and others, that,
+even two centuries later than Olaus Magnus, the Norsemen's
+knowledge of the cuttles was exceedingly vague and
+indistinct. Any one who has seen, as I frequently have at
+the Brighton Aquarium, and as they doubtless had whilst
+lobster-catching, the threatening and ferocious manner in
+which a lobster will brandish, and, if I may use the term,
+"gnash" its claws at an intruding hand, even if held above
+the surface of the water, can well imagine a party of fishermen
+discussing such a tragic occurrence as the foregoing,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>
+and differing in opinion as to the identity of the creature
+which had caused the catastrophe, some maintaining that it
+must have been a sea-serpent, and others shaking their
+heads and asserting that nothing but a colossal lobster
+could have done it.</p>
+
+<p>Pontoppidan, in writing his history of Norway, of course
+had before him the statements of Olaus Magnus; but, though
+their author was an archbishop, he did not accept them
+with the childlike simplicity generally ascribed to him.
+Quoting, and, singularly enough, misquoting, the Swedish
+prelate as referring to a sea-serpent, when he is describing,
+incorrectly, one of the <i>Acaleph&aelig;</i>, or sea-nettles, Pontoppidan
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"I have never heard of this sort, and should hardly believe
+the good Olaus if he did not say that he affirmed this from his
+own experience. The disproportion makes me think there must
+be some error of the press.... He mixes truth and fable together
+according to the relations of others; but this was excusable in
+that dark age when that author wrote. Notwithstanding all this,
+we, in the present more enlightened age, are much obliged to him
+for his industry and judicious observations."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Of the sea-serpent Pontoppidan writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"I have questioned its existence myself, till that suspicion was
+removed by full and sufficient evidence from creditable and experienced
+fishermen and sailors in Norway, of which there are hundreds
+who can testify that they have annually seen them. All
+these persons agree very well in the general description; and
+others who acknowledge that they only know it by report or by
+what their neighbours have told them, still relate the same particulars.
+In all my inquiry about these affairs I have hardly spoke
+with any intelligent person born in the manor of Nordland who
+was not able to give a pertinent answer, and strong assurances of
+the existence of this fish; and some of our north traders that
+come here every year with their merchandize think it a very strange<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>
+question when they are seriously asked whether there be any such
+creature: they think it as ridiculous as if the question was put to
+them whether there be such fish as eel or cod."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The worthy Bishop of Bergen did his best to sift truth
+from fable, but he could not always succeed in separating
+them. Many stupendous falsehoods were brought to him,
+and some of them passed through his sieve in spite of his
+care. Of these are the accounts of the "spawning times"
+of the sea-serpent, its dislike of certain scents, &amp;c. We
+must pass over all this, and confine ourselves to the
+evidence offered by him of its having been seen.</p>
+
+<p>The first witness he adduces is Captain Lawrence de
+Ferry, of the Norwegian navy, and first pilot in Bergen,
+who, premising that he had doubted a great while whether
+there were any such creature till he had ocular demonstration
+of it, made the following statement, addressed formally
+and officially to the procurator of Bergen:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>"Mr. <span class="smcap">John Reutz</span>&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The latter end of August, in the year 1746, as I was on a
+voyage, on my return from Trundhiem, on a very calm and hot
+day, having a mind to put in at Molde, it happened that when
+we were arrived with my vessel within six English miles of
+the aforesaid Molde, being at a place called Jule-N&aelig;ss, as
+I was reading in a book, I heard a kind of a murmuring
+voice from amongst the men at the oars, who were eight in
+number, and observed that the man at the helm kept off from
+the land. Upon this I inquired what was the matter, and was
+informed that there was a sea-snake before us. I then ordered
+the man at the helm to keep to the land again, and to come up
+with this creature of which I had heard so many stories. Though
+the fellows were under some apprehension, they were obliged to
+obey my orders. In the meantime the sea-snake passed by us,
+and we were obliged to tack the vessel about in order to get nearer
+to it. As the snake swam faster than we could row, I took my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>
+gun, that was ready charged, and fired at it; on this he immediately
+plunged under the water. We rowed to the place where
+it sunk down (which in the calm might be easily observed) and
+lay upon our oars, thinking it would come up again to the surface;
+however it did not. Where the snake plunged down, the water
+appeared thick and red; perhaps some of the shot might wound it,
+the distance being very little. The head of this snake, which it held
+more than two feet above the surface of the water, resembled that
+of a horse. It was of a greyish colour, and the mouth was quite
+black, and very large. It had black eyes, and a long white mane,
+that hung down from the neck to the surface of the water.
+Besides the head and neck, we saw seven or eight folds, or coils,
+of this snake, which were very thick, and as far as we could guess
+there was about a fathom distance between each fold. I related
+this affair in a certain company, where there was a person of distinction
+present who desired that I would communicate to him an
+authentic detail of all that happened; and for this reason two of
+my sailors, who were present at the same time and place where I
+saw this monster, namely, Nicholas Pedersen Kopper, and Nicholas
+Nicholsen Anglewigen, shall appear in court, to declare on oath
+the truth of every particular herein set forth; and I desire the
+favour of an attested copy of the said descriptions.</p>
+
+<p>
+"I remain, Sir, your obliged servant,<br />
+<br />
+"<span class="smcap">L. de Ferry</span>.<br />
+<br />
+"Bergen, 21st February, 1751.<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"After this the before-named witnesses gave their corporal
+oaths, and, with their finger held up according to law, witnessed
+and confirmed the aforesaid letter or declaration, and every particular
+set forth therein to be strictly true. A copy of the said
+attestation was made out for the said Procurator Reutz, and
+granted by the Recorder. That this was transacted in our court
+of justice we confirm with our hand and seals. <i>Actum Bergis die
+et loco, ut supra.</i></p>
+
+<p>
+"<span class="smcap">A. C. Dass</span> (<i>Chief Advocate</i>).<br />
+<br />
+"<span class="smcap">H. C. Gartner</span> (<i>Recorder</i>)."<br />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 151px;">
+<a name="fig_014" id="fig_014">
+<img src="images/fig_014.jpg" width="151" height="600" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 14.&mdash;PONTOPPIDAN&#39;S
+&quot;SEA SERPENT.&quot;</span>
+</div></blockquote>
+
+<p>The figure of the sea-serpent (Fig. 14) given by Pontoppidan
+was drawn, he tells us, under the inspection of a
+clergyman, Mr. Hans Strom, from
+descriptions given of it by two of
+his neighbours, Messrs. Reutz and
+Teuchsen, of Herroe; and was declared
+to agree in every particular
+with that seen by Captain de Ferry,
+and another subsequently observed
+by Governor Benstrup. The supposed
+coils of the serpent's body
+present exactly the appearance of
+eight porpoises following each other
+in line. This is a well-known habit
+of some of the smaller cetacea.
+They are often met with at sea
+thus proceeding in close single file,
+part only of their rotund forms
+being visible as they raise their
+backs above the surface of the
+water to inhale air through their
+"blow-holes." Under these circumstances
+they have been described
+by naturalists and seamen as resembling
+a long string of casks or
+buoys, often extending for sixty,
+eighty, or a hundred yards. This
+is just such a spectacle as that
+described by Olaus Magnus&mdash;his
+"long line of spherical convolutions,"
+and also as one reported
+to Pontoppidan as being descriptive of the sea-serpent:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p><blockquote><p>"'I have been informed,' he says, 'by some of our sea-faring
+men that a cable<a name="Anchor_27_27" id="Anchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 27.">&nbsp;[27]&nbsp;</a> would not be long enough to measure the
+length of some of them when they are observed on the surface of
+the water in an even line. They say those round lumps or folds
+sometimes lie one after another as far as a man can see. I
+confess, if this be true, that we must suppose most probably that
+it is not one snake, but two or more of these creatures lying in
+a line that exhibit this phenomenon.' In a foot-note he adds:
+'If any one enquires how many folds may be counted on a sea-snake,
+the answer is that the number is not always the same, but
+depends upon the various sizes of them: five and twenty is the
+greatest number that I find well attested.' Adam Olearius, in his
+Gottorf Museum, writes of it thus: 'A person of distinction from
+Sweden related here at Gottorf that he had heard the burgomaster
+of Malmoe, a very worthy man, say that as he was once standing
+on the top of a very high hill, towards the North Sea, he saw in
+the water, which was very calm, a snake, which appeared at that
+distance to be as thick as a pipe of wine, and had twenty-five
+folds. Those kind of snakes only appear at certain times, and
+in calm weather.'"</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>I believe that in every case so far cited from Pontoppidan,
+as well as that given by Olaus Magnus, the supposed coils
+or protuberances of the serpent's body, were only so many
+porpoises swimming in line in accordance with their habit
+before mentioned. If an upraised head, like that of a horse,
+was seen preceding them, it was either unconnected with
+them, or it certainly was not that of a snake; for no serpent
+could throw its body into those vertical undulations.
+The form of the vertebr&aelig; in the ophidians renders such a
+movement impossible. All their flexions are horizontal;
+the curving of their body is from side to side, not up and
+down.</p>
+
+<p>The sea-monster seen by Egede was of an entirely different
+kind; and his account of it&mdash;let sceptics deride it
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>as they may&mdash;is worthy of attention and careful consideration.
+The Rev. Hans Egede, known as "The Apostle of
+Greenland," was superintendent of the Christian missions to
+that country. He was a truthful, pious, and single-minded
+man, possessing considerable powers of observation, and a
+genuine love of natural history. He wrote two books on
+the products, people, and natural history of Greenland,<a name="Anchor_28_28" id="Anchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 28.">&nbsp;[28]&nbsp;</a>
+and his statements therein are modest, accurate, and free
+from exaggeration. His illustrations are little, if at all,
+superior in style of art to the two Japanese wood-cuts
+shown on <a href="#Page_29">page 29</a>, but they bear the same unmistakable
+signs of fidelity which characterise those of the Japanese.</p>
+
+<p>In his 'Journal of the Missions to Greenland' this author
+tell us that&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"On the 6th of July, 1734, there appeared a very large and
+frightful sea monster, which raised itself so high out of the water
+that its head reached above our main-top. It had a long, sharp
+snout, and spouted water like a whale; and very broad flappers.
+The body seemed to be covered with scales, and the skin was
+uneven and wrinkled, and the lower part was formed like a snake.
+After some time the creature plunged backwards into the water,
+and then turned its tail up above the surface, a whole ship-length
+from the head. The following evening we had very bad weather."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The high character of the narrator would lead us to
+accept his statement that he had seen something previously
+unknown to him (he does not say it was a sea-serpent)
+even if we could not explain or understand what it was
+that he saw. Fortunately, however, the sketch made by
+Mr. Bing, one of his brother missionaries, has enabled us to
+do this. We must remember that in his endeavour to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>
+portray the incident he was dealing with an animal with
+the nature of which he was unacquainted, and which was
+only partially, and for a very short time, within his view.
+He therefore delineated rather the impression left on his
+mind than the thing itself. But although he invested it
+with a character that did not belong to it, his drawing is so
+far correct that we are able to recognise at a glance the
+distorted portrait of an old acquaintance, and to say unhesitatingly
+that Egede's sea-monster was one of the great
+calamaries which have since been occasionally met with,
+but which have only been believed in and recognised within
+the last few years. That which Mr. Egede believed to be
+the creature's head was the tail part of the cuttle, which
+goes in advance as the animal swims, and the two side
+appendages represent very efficiently the two lobes of the
+caudal fin. In propelling itself to the surface the squid<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>
+raised this portion of its body out of the water to a considerable
+height, an occurrence which I have often witnessed, and
+which I have elsewhere described (see pp. 23 and 27). The
+supposed tail, which was turned up at some distance from
+the other visible portion of the body, after the latter had sunk
+back into the sea, was one of the shorter arms of the cuttle, and
+the suckers on its under side are clearly and conspicuously
+marked. Egede was, of course, in error in making the
+"spout" of water to issue from the mouth of his monster.
+The out-pouring jet, which he, no doubt, saw, came from
+the locomotor tube, and the puff of spray which would
+accompany it as the orifice of the tube rose to the surface
+of the water is sketched with remarkable truthfulness. In
+quoting Egede, Pontoppidan gives a copy (so-called) of this
+engraving, but his artist embellished it so much as to
+deprive it of its original force and character, and of the
+honestly drawn points which furnish proofs of its identity.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="fig_015" id="fig_015">
+<img src="images/fig_015.jpg" width="600" height="382" alt="Smoke breathing sea dragon" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 15&mdash;THE ANIMAL DRAWN BY MR. BING AS HAVING BEEN SEEN BY HANS EGEDE.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_016" id="fig_016">
+<img src="images/fig_016.jpg" width="470" height="387" alt="Cuttle" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 16.&mdash;THE ANIMAL WHICH EGEDE PROBABLY SAW.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Pontoppidan records other supposed appearances of the
+sea-serpent, but from the date of his history I know of no
+other account of such an occurrence until that of an animal
+"apparently belonging to this class," which was stranded
+on the Island of Stronsa, one of the Orkneys, in the year
+1808:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"According to the narrative, it was first seen entire, and
+measured by respectable individuals. It measured fifty-six feet
+in length, and twelve in circumference. The head was small, not
+being a foot long from the snout to the first vertebra; the neck
+was slender, extending to the length of fifteen feet. All the witnesses
+agree in assigning it blow-holes, though they differ as to the
+precise situation. On the shoulders something like a bristly mane
+commenced which extended to near the extremity of the tail. It
+had three pairs of fins or paws connected with the body; the
+anterior were the largest, measuring more than four feet in length,
+and their extremities were something like toes partially webbed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>
+The skin was smooth and of a greyish colour; the eye was of
+the size of a seal's. When the decaying carcass was broken up
+by the waves, portions of it were secured (such as the skull, the
+upper bones of the swimming paws, &amp;c.) by Mr. Laing, a neighbouring
+proprietor, and some of the vertebr&aelig; were preserved and
+deposited in the Royal University Museum, Edinburgh, and in
+the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, London. An
+able paper," says Dr. Robert Hamilton, in his account of it,<a name="Anchor_29_29" id="Anchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 29.">&nbsp;[29]&nbsp;</a> "on
+these latter fragments and on the wreck of the animal was read
+by the late Dr. Barclay to the Wernerian Society, and will be
+found in Vol. I. of its Transactions, to which we refer. We have
+supplied a wood-cut of the sketch" (of which I give a <i>facsimile</i>
+here) "which was taken at the time, and which, from the many
+affidavits proffered by respectable individuals, as well as from
+other circumstances narrated, leaves no manner of doubt as to the
+existence of some such animal."</p></blockquote>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_017" id="fig_017">
+<img src="images/fig_017.jpg" width="470" height="69" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 17.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; OF THE WERNERIAN SOCIETY. (Facsimile.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Well! one would think so. It looks convincing, and
+there is a savour of philosophy about it that might lull
+the suspicions of a doubting zoologist. What more could
+be required? We have accurate measurements and a
+sketch taken of the animal as it lay upon the shore, minute
+particulars of its outward form, characteristic portions of
+its skeleton preserved in well-known museums, and any
+amount of affidavits forthcoming from most respectable
+individuals if confirmation be required. And yet,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"'Tis true, 'tis pity;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And pity 'tis 'tis true,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>the whole fabric of circumstances crumbled at the touch<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>
+of science. When the two vertebr&aelig; in the Museum of the
+Royal College of Surgeons were examined by Sir Everard
+Home he pronounced them to be those of a great shark of
+the genus <i>Selache</i>, and as being undistinguishable from
+those of the species called the "basking shark," of which
+individuals from thirty to thirty-five feet in length have been
+from time to time captured or stranded on our coasts. Professor
+Owen has confirmed this. Any one who feels inclined
+to dispute the identification by this distinguished
+comparative anatomist of a bone which he has seen and
+handled can examine these vertebr&aelig; for himself. If they
+had not been preserved, this incident would have been cited
+for all time as among the most satisfactorily authenticated
+instances on record of the appearance of the sea-serpent.
+As it is, it furnishes a valuable warning of the necessity for
+the most careful scrutiny of the evidence of well-meaning
+persons to whom no intentional deception or exaggeration
+can be imputed.</p>
+
+<p>In 1809, Mr. Maclean, the minister of Eigg, in the Western
+Isles of Scotland, informed Dr. Neill, the secretary of the
+Wernerian Society, that he had seen, off the Isle of Canna,
+a great animal which chased his boat as he hurried ashore
+to escape from it; and that it was also seen by the crews
+of thirteen fishing-boats, who were so terrified by it that
+they fled from it to the nearest creek for safety. His description
+of it is exceedingly vague, but is strongly indicative
+of a great calamary.</p>
+
+<p>In 1817 a large marine animal, supposed to be a serpent,
+was seen at Gloucester Harbour, near Cape Ann, Massachusetts,
+about thirty miles from Boston. The Linn&aelig;an
+Society of New England investigated the matter, and took
+much trouble to obtain evidence thereon. The depositions
+of eleven credible witnesses were certified on oath before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>
+magistrates, one of whom had himself seen the creature,
+and who confirmed the statements. All agreed that the
+animal had the appearance of a serpent, but estimated its
+length, variously, at from fifty to a hundred feet. Its head
+was in shape like that of a turtle, or snake, but as large
+as the head of a horse. There was no appearance of a
+mane. Its mode of progressing was by vertical undulations;
+and five of the witnesses described it as having the hunched
+protuberances mentioned by Captain de Ferry and others.
+Of this, I can offer no zoological explanation. The testimony
+given was apparently sincere, but it was received
+with mistrust; for, as Mr. Gosse says, "owing to a habit
+prevalent in the United States of supposing that there is
+somewhat of wit in gross exaggeration or hoaxing invention,
+we do naturally look with a lurking suspicion
+on American statements when they describe unusual or
+disputed phenomena."</p>
+
+<p>On the 15th of May, 1833, a party of British officers,
+consisting of Captain Sullivan, Lieutenants Maclachlan and
+Malcolm of the Rifle Brigade, Lieutenant Lister of the
+Artillery, and Mr. Ince of the Ordnance, whilst crossing
+Margaret's Bay in a small yacht, on their way from Halifax
+to Mahone Bay, "saw, at a distance of a hundred and fifty
+to two hundred yards, the head and neck of some denizen
+of the deep, precisely like those of a common snake in the
+act of swimming, the head so far elevated and thrown
+forward by the curve of the neck, as to enable them to see
+the water under and beyond it. The creature rapidly
+passed, leaving a regular wake, from the commencement of
+which to the fore part, which was out of water, they judged
+its length to be about eighty feet." They "set down the
+head at about six feet in length (considerably larger than
+that of a horse), and that portion of the neck which they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>
+saw at the same." "There could be no mistake&mdash;no delusion,"
+they say; "and we were all perfectly satisfied that we
+had been favoured with a view of the true and veritable
+sea-serpent." This account was published in the <i>Zoologist</i>,
+in 1847 (p. 1715), and at that date all the officers above
+named were still living.</p>
+
+<p>The next incident of the kind in point of date that we
+find recorded carries us back to the locality of which
+Pontoppidan wrote, and in which was seen the animal
+vouched for by Captain de Ferry. In 1847 there appeared
+in a London daily paper a long account translated from
+the Norse journals of fresh appearances of the sea-serpent.
+The statement made was, that it had recently been
+frequently seen in the neighbourhood of Christiansand
+and Molde. In the large bight of the sea at Christiansand
+it had been seen every year, only in the warmest weather,
+and when the sea was perfectly calm, and the surface of
+the water unruffled. The evidence of three respectable
+persons was taken, namely, Nils Roe, a workman at Mr.
+William Knudtzon's, who saw it twice there, John Johnson,
+merchant, and Lars John&ouml;en, fisherman at Smolen. The
+latter said he had frequently seen it, and that one afternoon
+in the dog-days, as he was sitting in his boat, he saw it
+twice in the course of two hours, and quite close to him.
+It came, indeed, to within six feet of him, and, becoming
+alarmed, he commended his soul to God, and lay down in
+the boat, only holding his head high enough to enable him
+to observe the monster. It passed him, disappeared, and
+returned; but, a breeze springing up, it sank, and he saw
+it no more. He described it as being about six fathoms
+long, the body (which was as round as a serpent's) two feet
+across, the head as long as a ten-gallon cask, the eyes
+large, round, red, sparkling, and about five inches in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>
+diameter: close behind the head a mane like a fin commenced
+along the neck, and spread itself out on both sides,
+right and left, when swimming. The mane, as well as the
+head, was of the colour of mahogany. The body was
+quite smooth, its movements occasionally fast and slow.
+It was serpent-like, and moved up and down. The few
+undulations which those parts of the body and tail that
+were out of water made, were scarcely a fathom in length.
+These undulations were not so high that he could see
+between them and the water.</p>
+
+<p>In confirmation of this account Mr. Soren Knudtzon,
+Dr. Hoffmann, surgeon in Molde, Rector Hammer, Mr.
+Kraft, curate, and several other persons, testified that they
+had seen in the neighbourhood of Christiansand a sea-serpent
+of considerable size.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. William Knudtzon, and Mr. Bochlum, a candidate
+for holy orders, also gave their account of it, much to the
+same purport; but some of these remarks are worthy of
+note for future comment. They say, "its motions were in
+undulations, and so strong that white foam appeared before
+it, and at the side, which stretched out several fathoms.
+It did not appear very high out of the water; the head
+was long and small in proportion to the throat: as the
+latter appeared much greater than the former, probably it
+was furnished with a mane."</p>
+
+<p>Sheriffe G&ouml;ttsche testified to a similar effect. "He
+could not judge of the animal's entire length; he could
+not observe its extremity. At the back of the head there
+was a mane, which was the same colour as the rest of the
+body."</p>
+
+<p>We must take one more Norwegian account, for it is
+a very important one. The venerable P. W. Deinbolt,<a name="Anchor_30_30" id="Anchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 30.">&nbsp;[30]&nbsp;</a>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>Archdeacon of Molde, gives the following account of an
+incident that occurred there on the 28th of July, 1845:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"J. C. Lund, bookseller and printer; G. S. Krogh, merchant;
+Christian Flang, Lund's apprentice, and John Elgenses, labourer,
+were out on Romsdal-fjord, fishing. The sea was, after a warm,
+sunshiny day, quite calm. About seven o'clock in the afternoon,
+at a little distance from the shore, near the ballast place and
+Molde Hooe, they saw a long marine animal, which slowly moved
+itself forward, as it appeared to them, with the help of two fins,
+on the fore-part of the body nearest the head, which they judged
+by the boiling of the water on both sides of it. The visible part
+of the body appeared to be between forty and fifty feet in length,
+and moved in undulations, like a snake. The body was round
+and of a dark colour, and seemed to be several ells in thickness.
+As they discerned a waving motion in the water behind the animal,
+they concluded that part of the body was concealed under water.
+That it was one continuous animal they saw plainly from its movement.
+When the animal was about one hundred yards from the
+boat, they noticed tolerably correctly its fore parts, which ended
+in a sharp snout; its colossal head raised itself above the water
+in the form of a semi-circle; the lower part was not visible. The
+colour of the head was dark-brown and the skin smooth; they
+did not notice the eyes, or any mane or bristles on the throat.
+When the serpent came about a musket-shot near, Lund fired
+at it, and was certain the shots hit it in the head. After the
+shot it dived, but came up immediately. It raised its neck in the
+air, like a snake preparing to dart on his prey. After he had
+turned and got his body in a straight line, which he appeared to
+do with great difficulty, he darted like an arrow against the boat.
+They reached the shore, and the animal, perceiving it had come
+into shallow water, dived immediately and disappeared in the
+deep. Such is the declaration of these four men, and no one has
+cause to question their veracity, or imagine that they were so
+seized with fear that they could not observe what took place so
+near them. There are not many here, or on other parts of the
+Norwegian coast, who longer doubt the existence of the sea-serpent.
+The writer of this narrative was a long time sceptical,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>
+as he had not been so fortunate as to see this monster of the
+deep; but after the many accounts he has read, and the relations
+he has received from credible witnesses, he does not dare longer
+to doubt the existence of the sea-serpent.</p>
+
+<p>
+"<span class="smcap">P. W. Deinbolt.</span><br />
+<br />
+"Molde, 29th Nov., 1845."<br />
+</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>We may at once accept most fully and frankly the
+statements of all the worthy people mentioned in this
+series of incidents. There is no room for the shadow of a
+doubt that they all recounted conscientiously that which
+they saw. The last quoted occurrence, especially, is most
+accurately and intelligently described&mdash;so clearly, indeed,
+that it furnishes us with a clue to the identity of the
+strange visitant.</p>
+
+<p>Here let me say&mdash;and I wish it to be distinctly understood&mdash;that
+I do not deny the possibility of the existence
+of a great sea serpent, or other great creatures at present
+unknown to science, and that I have no inclination to
+explain away that which others have seen, because I
+myself have not witnessed it. "Seeing is believing," it is
+said, and it is not agreeable to have to tell a person that, in
+common parlance, he "must not trust his own eyes." It
+seems presumptuous even to hint that one may know
+better what was seen than the person who saw it. And
+yet I am obliged to say, reluctantly and courteously, but
+most firmly and assuredly, that these perfectly credible
+eye-witnesses did not correctly interpret that which they
+witnessed. In these cases, it is not the eye which deceives,
+nor the tongue which is untruthful, but the imagination
+which is led astray by the association of the thing seen with
+an erroneous idea. I venture to say this, not with any
+insolent assumption of superior acumen, but because we
+now possess a key to the mystery which Archdeacon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>
+Deinbolt and his neighbours had not access to, and which
+has only within the last few years been placed in our
+hands. The movements and aspect of their sea monster
+are those of an animal with which we are now well
+acquainted, but of the existence of which the narrators
+of these occasional visitations were unaware; namely, the
+great calamary, the same which gave rise to the stories of
+the Kraken, and which has probably been a denizen of the
+Scandinavian seas and fjords from time immemorial. It
+must be remembered, as I have elsewhere said, that until
+the year 1873, notwithstanding the adventure of the
+<i>Alecton</i> in 1861, a cuttle measuring in total length fifty
+or sixty feet was generally looked upon as equally
+mythical with the great sea-serpent. Both were popularly
+scoffed at, and to express belief in either was to incur
+ridicule. But in the year above mentioned, specimens of
+even greater dimensions than those quoted were met with
+on the coasts of Newfoundland, and portions of them were
+deposited in museums, to silence the incredulous and
+interest zoologists. When Archdeacon Deinbolt published
+in 1846 the declaration of Mr. Lund and his companions
+of the fishing excursion, he and they knew nothing of there
+being such an animal. They had formed no conception of
+it, nor had they the instructive privilege, possessed of late
+years by the public in England, of being able to watch
+attentively, and at leisure, the habits and movements of
+these strangely modified mollusks living in great tanks of
+sea-water in aquaria. If they had been thus acquainted
+with them, I believe they would have recognised in their
+supposed snake the elongated body of a giant squid.</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 88px;">
+<a name="fig_018" id="fig_018">
+<img src="images/fig_018.jpg" width="88" height="600" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 18.&mdash;A CALAMARY SWIMMING AT THE SURFACE OF THE SEA.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>When swimming, these squids propel themselves backwards
+by the out-rush of a stream of water from a tube
+pointed in a direction contrary to that in which the animal<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>
+is proceeding. The tail part, therefore, goes in advance,
+and the body tapers towards this, almost
+to a blunt point. At a short
+distance from the actual extremity two
+flat fins project from the body, one
+on each side, as shown in Figs. 16
+and 18, so that this end of the squid's
+body somewhat resembles in shape
+the government "broad arrow." It
+is a habit of these squids, the small
+species of which are met with in some
+localities in teeming abundance, to swim
+on the smooth surface of the water in
+hot and calm weather. The arrow-headed
+tail is then raised out of water,
+to a height which in a large individual
+might be three feet or more; and, as it
+precedes the rest of the body, moving
+at the rate of several miles an hour, it
+of course looks, to a person who has
+never heard of an animal going tail first
+at such a speed, like the creature's head.
+The appearance of this "head" varies
+in accordance with the lateral fins being
+seen in profile or in broad expanse. The
+elongated, tubular-looking body gives the
+idea of the neck to which the "head"
+is attached; the eight arms trailing behind
+(the tentacles are always coiled
+away and concealed) supply the supposed
+mane floating on each side; the
+undulating motion in swimming, as the
+water is alternately drawn in and expelled, accords with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span>
+the description, and the excurrent stream pouring aft
+from the locomotor tube, causes a long swirl and swell to
+be left in the animal's wake, which, as I have often seen,
+may easily be mistaken for an indefinite prolongation of
+its body. The eyes are very large and prominent, and
+the general tone of colour varies through every tint of
+brown, purple, pink, and grey, as the creature is more or
+less excited, and the pigmentary matter circulates with
+more or less vigour through the curiously moving cells.</p>
+
+<p>Here we have the "long marine animal" with "two fins
+on the forepart of the body near the head," the "boiling of
+the water," the "moving in undulations," the "body round,
+and of a dark colour," the "waving motion in the water
+behind the animal, from which the witnesses concluded
+that part of the body was concealed under water," the
+"head raised, but the lower part not visible," "the sharp
+snout," the "smooth skin," and the appearance described
+by Mr. William Knudtzon, and Candidatus Theologi&aelig;
+Bochlum, of "the head being long and small in proportion
+to the throat, the latter appearing much greater than the
+former," which caused them to think "it was <i>probably</i> furnished
+with a mane." Not that they <i>saw</i> any mane, but
+as they had been told of it, they thought they <i>ought to have
+seen it</i>. Less careful and conscientious persons would have
+persuaded themselves, and declared on oath, that they
+<i>did see it</i>.</p>
+
+<p>I need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is
+the proverbially smooth, gliding motion of a serpent, with
+the supposition of its passage through the water causing
+such frictional disturbance that "white foam appeared
+before it, and at the side, which stretched out several
+fathoms," and of "the water boiling around it on both sides
+of it." The cuttle is the only animal that I know of that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>
+would cause this by the effluent current from its "syphon
+tube." I have seen a deeply laden ship push in front of
+her a vast hillock of water, which fell off on each side in
+foam as it was parted by her bow; but that was of man's
+construction. Nature builds on better lines. No swimming
+creature has such unnecessary friction to overcome. Even
+the seemingly unwieldy body of a porpoise enters and
+passes through the water without a splash, and nothing can
+be more easy and graceful than the feathering action of the
+flippers of the awkward-looking turtle.</p>
+
+<p>We now come to an incident which, from the character
+of those who witnessed it, immediately commanded attention,
+and excited popular curiosity. In the <i>Times</i> of
+the 9th of October, 1848, appeared a paragraph stating
+that a sea-serpent had been met with by the <i>D&aelig;dalus</i>
+frigate, on her homeward voyage from the East Indies.
+The Admiralty immediately inquired of her commander,
+Captain M'Quh&aelig;, as to the truth of the report; and
+his official reply, as follows, addressed to Admiral Sir
+W. H. Gage, G.C.H., Devonport, was printed in the <i>Times</i>
+of the 13th of October, 1848.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>
+"H.M.S. <i>D&aelig;dalus</i>, Hamoaze,<br />
+"October 11th, 1848.<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"<span class="smcap">Sir</span>,&mdash;In reply to your letter of this date, requiring information
+as to the truth of the statement published in the <i>Times</i> newspaper,
+of a sea-serpent of extraordinary dimensions having been seen
+from H.M.S. <i>D&aelig;dalus</i>, under my command, on her passage from
+the East Indies, I have the honour to acquaint you, for the information
+of my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, that at 5
+o'clock <small>P.M.</small> on the 6th of Aug. last, in lat. 24&deg; 44' S. and long.
+9&deg; 22' E., the weather dark and cloudy, wind fresh from the N.W.
+with a long ocean swell from the W., the ship on the port tack,
+head being N.E. by N., something very unusual was seen by Mr.
+Sartoris, midshipman, rapidly approaching the ship from before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>
+the beam. The circumstance was immediately reported by him
+to the officer of the watch, Lieut. Edgar Drummond, with whom
+and Mr. Wm. Barrett, the Master, I was at the time walking the
+quarter-deck. The ship's company were at supper. On our
+attention being called to the object it was discovered to be an
+enormous serpent, with head and shoulders kept about four feet
+constantly above the surface of the sea, and, as nearly as we could
+approximate by comparing it with the length of what our main-topsail
+yard would show in the water, there was at the very least
+sixty feet of the animal <i>&agrave; fleur d'eau</i>, no portion of which was, to
+our perception, used in propelling it through the water, either by
+vertical or horizontal undulation. It passed rapidly, but so close
+under our lee quarter that had it been a man of my acquaintance
+I should easily have recognised his features with the naked eye;
+and it did not, either in approaching the ship or after it had
+passed our wake, deviate in the slightest degree from its course
+to the S.W., which it held on at the pace of from twelve to
+fifteen miles per hour, apparently on some determined purpose.</p>
+
+<p>"The diameter of the serpent was about fifteen or sixteen
+inches behind the head, which was without any doubt that of a
+snake; and it was never, during the twenty minutes it continued
+in sight of our glasses, once below the surface of the water; its
+colour dark brown, and yellowish white about the throat. It had
+no fins, but something like the mane of a horse, or rather a bunch
+of seaweed, washed about its back. It was seen by the quartermaster,
+the boatswain's mate, and the man at the wheel, in
+addition to myself and the officers above mentioned.</p>
+
+<p>"I am having a drawing of the serpent made from a sketch
+taken immediately after it was seen, which I hope to have ready
+for transmission to my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty by
+to-morrow's post.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Peter M'Quh&aelig;</span>, Captain."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The sketches referred to in the captain's letter were
+made under his supervision, and copies of them, of which
+he certified his approbation, were published in the <i>Illustrated
+London News</i> on the 28th of October, 1848. I am kindly
+permitted by the proprietors of that journal to reproduce<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span>two of them, reduced in size to suit these pages&mdash;one
+showing the relative positions of the "serpent" and the
+ship when the former was first seen (<i>Frontispiece</i>), and the
+other (Fig. 19) representing the animal afterwards passing
+under the frigate's quarter. An enlarged drawing of its
+head was also given, which I have not thought it necessary
+to copy.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="fig_019" id="fig_019">
+<img src="images/fig_019.jpg" width="600" height="390" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 19.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; PASSING UNDER THE QUARTER OF H.M.S. &#39;D&AElig;DALUS.&#39;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Lieutenant Drummond, the officer of the watch mentioned
+in Captain M'Quh&aelig;'s report, published his memorandum
+of the impression made on his mind by the
+animal at the time of its appearance. It differs somewhat
+from the captain's description, and is the more cautious of
+the two.</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"I beg to send you the following extract from my journal.
+H.M.S. 'D&aelig;dalus,' August 6, 1848, lat. 25&deg; S., long. 9&deg; 37' E., St.
+Helena 1,015 miles. In the 4 to 6 watch, at about 5 o'clock,
+we observed a most remarkable fish on our lee-quarter, crossing
+the stern in a S.W. direction. The appearance of its head, which
+with the back fin was the only portion of the animal visible, was
+long, pointed and flattened at the top, perhaps ten feet in length,
+the upper jaw projecting considerably; the fin was perhaps 20 feet
+in the rear of the head, and visible occasionally; the captain also
+asserted that he saw the tail, or another fin, about the same distance
+behind it; the upper part of the head and shoulders appeared
+of a dark brown colour, and beneath the under-jaw a brownish-white.
+It pursued a steady undeviating course, keeping its head
+horizontal with the surface of the water, and in rather a raised
+position, disappearing occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief
+interval, and not apparently for purposes of respiration. It was
+going at the rate of perhaps from twelve to fourteen miles an hour,
+and when nearest was perhaps one hundred yards distant; in fact
+it gave one quite the idea of a large snake or eel. No one in the
+ship has ever seen anything similar; so it is at least extraordinary.
+It was visible to the naked eye for five minutes, and with a glass
+for perhaps fifteen more. The weather was dark and squally at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>
+the time, with some sea running.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Edgar Drummond</span>, Lieut.
+H.M.S. 'D&aelig;dalus;' Southampton, Oct. 28, 1848."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Statements so interesting and important, of course,
+elicited much correspondence and controversy. Mr. J. D.
+Morries Stirling, a director of the Bergen Museum, wrote
+to the Secretary of the British Admiralty, Captain
+Hamilton, R.N., saying that while becalmed in a yacht
+between Bergen and Sogne, in Norway, he had seen, three
+years previously, a large fish or reptile of cylindrical form
+(he would not say "sea serpent") ruffling the otherwise
+smooth surface of the fjord. No head was visible. This
+appears to have been, like the others from the same
+locality, a large calamary. Mr. Stirling unaware, doubtless,
+that Mr. Edward Newman, editor of the <i>Zoologist</i>,
+had previously propounded the same idea, suggested that
+the supposed serpent might be one of the old marine
+reptiles, hitherto supposed only to exist in the fossil state.
+This letter was published in the <i>Illustrated News</i> of October
+28th, and four days afterwards, November 2nd, a
+letter signed F.G.S. appeared in the <i>Times</i>, in which the
+same idea was mooted, and the opinion expressed that it
+might be the <i>Plesiosaurus</i>. This brought out that great
+master in physiology, Professor Owen, who in a long, and,
+it is needless to say, most able letter to the <i>Times</i>, dated
+the 9th of November, 1848, set forth a series of weighty
+arguments against belief in the supposed serpent, which
+I regret that I am unable, from want of space, to quote
+<i>in extenso</i>. The reasoning of the most eminent of living
+physiologists of course had its influence on those who
+could best appreciate it; but, as it went against the
+current of popular opinion, it met with little favour from
+the public, and has been slurred over much too superciliously
+by some subsequent writers. He suggested also<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>
+that the creature seen might have been a great seal, such
+as the leonine seal, or the sea-elephant (the head, as
+shown in the enlarged drawing, was wonderfully seal-like),
+but it was generally felt that this explanation was unsatisfactory.
+The nature of his criticism of the official
+statement will be seen from Captain M'Quh&aelig;'s reply,
+which was promptly given in the <i>Times</i> of the 21st of
+November, 1848, as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Professor Owen correctly states that I evidently saw a large
+creature moving rapidly through the water very different from
+anything I had before witnessed, neither a whale, a grampus, a
+great shark, an alligator, nor any of the larger surface-swimming
+creatures fallen in with in ordinary voyages. I now assert&mdash;neither
+was it a common seal nor a sea-elephant, its great length and its
+totally differing physiognomy precluding the possibility of its being
+a '<i>Phoca</i>' of any species. The head was flat, and not a 'capacious
+vaulted cranium;' nor had it a stiff, inflexible trunk&mdash;a
+conclusion at which Professor Owen has jumped, most certainly
+not justified by the simple statement, that no portion of the sixty
+feet seen by us was used in propelling it through the water either
+by vertical or horizontal undulation.</p>
+
+<p>"It is also assumed that the 'calculation of its length was made
+under a strong preconception of the nature of the beast;' another
+conclusion quite contrary to the fact. It was not until after the
+great length was developed by its nearest approach to the ship,
+and until after that most important point had been duly considered
+and debated, as well as such could be in the brief space of time
+allowed for so doing, that it was pronounced to be a serpent by all
+who saw it, and who are too well accustomed to judge of lengths
+and breadths of objects in the sea to mistake a real substance and
+an actual living body, coolly and dispassionately contemplated, at
+so short a distance, too, for the 'eddy caused by the action of the
+deeper immersed fins and tail of a rapidly moving gigantic seal
+raising its head above the surface of the water,' as Professor Owen
+imagines, in quest of its lost iceberg.</p>
+
+<p>"The creative powers of the human mind may be very limited.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>
+On this occasion they were not called into requisition; my purpose
+and desire throughout being to furnish eminent naturalists, such
+as the learned Professor, with accurate facts, and not with exaggerated
+representations, nor with what could by any possibility proceed
+from optical illusion; and I beg to assure him that old
+Pontoppidan having clothed his sea-serpent with a mane could
+not have suggested the idea of ornamenting the creature seen
+from the 'D&aelig;dalus' with a similar appendage, for the simple
+reason that I had never seen his account, or even heard of his
+sea-serpent, until my arrival in London. Some other solution
+must therefore be found for the very remarkable coincidence
+between us in that particular, in order to unravel the mystery.</p>
+
+<p>"Finally, I deny the existence of excitement or the possibility
+of optical illusion. I adhere to the statements, as to form, colour,
+and dimensions, contained in my official report to the Admiralty,
+and I leave them as data whereupon the learned and scientific
+may exercise the 'pleasures of imagination' until some more fortunate
+opportunity shall occur of making a closer acquaintance
+with the 'great unknown'&mdash;in the present instance most assuredly
+no ghost.</p>
+
+<p>
+"<span class="smcap">P. M'Quh&aelig;</span>, late Captain of H.M.S. 'D&aelig;dalus.'"<br />
+</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Of course neither Professor Owen, nor any one else,
+doubted the veracity or <i>bona fides</i> of the captain and
+officers of one of Her Majesty's ships; and their testimony
+was the more important because it was that of men accustomed
+to the sights of the sea. Their practised eyes would,
+probably, be able to detect the true character of anything
+met with afloat, even if only partially seen, as intuitively as
+the Red Indian reads the signs of the forest or the trail; and
+therefore they were not likely to be deceived by any of the
+objects with which sailors are familiar. They would not be
+deluded by seals, porpoises, trunks of trees, or Brobdingnagian
+stems of alg&aelig;; but there was one animal with which
+they were not familiar, of the existence of which they were
+unaware, and which, as I have said, at that date was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>
+generally believed to be as unreal as the sea-serpent itself&mdash;namely,
+the great calamary, the elongated form of which
+has certainly in some other instances been mistaken for
+that of a sea-snake. One of these seen swimming in the
+manner I have described, and endeavoured to portray
+(p. 77), would fulfil the description given by Lieutenant
+Drummond, and would in a great measure account for the
+appearances reported by Captain M'Quh&aelig;. "<i>The head long,
+pointed and flat on the top</i>," accords with the pointed extremity
+and caudal fin of the squid. "<i>Head kept horizontal
+with the surface of the water, and in rather a raised position,
+disappearing occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief
+interval, and not apparently for purposes of respiration.</i>"
+A perfect description of the position and action of a squid
+swimming. "<i>No portion of it perceptibly used in propelling
+it through the water, either by vertical or horizontal undulations.</i>"
+The mode of propulsion of a squid&mdash;the outpouring
+stream of water from its locomotor tube&mdash;would be unseen
+and unsuspected, because submerged. Its effect, the swirl
+in its wake, would suggest a prolongation of the creature's
+body. The numerous arms trailing astern at the surface
+of the water would give the appearance of a mane. I
+think it not impossible that if the officers of the <i>D&aelig;dalus</i>
+had been acquainted with this great sea creature the impression
+on their mind's eye would not have taken the
+form of a serpent. I offer this, with much diffidence, as a
+suggestion arising from recent discoveries; and by no means
+insist on its acceptance; for Captain M'Quh&aelig;, who had a
+very close view of the animal, distinctly says that "the
+head was, without any doubt, that of a serpent," and one of
+his officers subsequently declared that the eye, the mouth,
+the nostril, the colour, and the form were all most distinctly
+visible.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In a letter addressed to the Editor of the <i>Bombay Times</i>,
+and dated "Kamptee, January 3rd, 1849," Mr. R. Davidson,
+Superintending Surgeon, Nagpore Subsidiary Force, describes
+a great sea animal seen by him whilst on board
+the ship <i>Royal Saxon</i>, on a voyage to India, in 1829. The
+features of this incident are consistent with his having seen
+one of the, then unknown, great calamaries.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Scott, of Exeter, sent to the Editor of the <i>Zoologist</i>
+(p. 2459), an extract from the memorandum-book of Lieutenant
+Sandford, R.N., written about the year 1820, when
+he was in command of the merchant ship <i>Lady Combermere</i>.
+In it he mentions his having met with, in lat. 46, long. 3
+(Bay of Biscay), an animal unknown to him, an immense
+body on the surface of the water, spouting, not unlike the
+blowing of a whale, and the raising up of a triangular extremity,
+and subsequently of a head and neck erected six
+feet above the surface of the water. This was evidently a
+great squid seen under circumstances similar to those
+described by Hans Egede (p. 67).</p>
+
+<p>In the <i>Sun</i> Newspaper of July 9th, 1849, was published
+the following statement of Captain Herriman, of the ship
+<i>Brazilian</i>:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"On the morning of the 24th February, the ship being becalmed
+in lat. 26&deg; S., long. 8&deg; E. (about forty miles from the place
+where Captain M'Quh&aelig; is said to have seen the serpent), the
+captain perceived something right astern, stretched along the
+water to a length of twenty five or thirty feet, and perceptibly
+moving from the ship, with a steady sinuous motion. The head,
+which seemed to be lifted several feet above the water, had something
+resembling a mane running down to the floating portion,
+and within about six feet of the tail. Of course Captain Herriman,
+Mr. Long, his chief officer, and the passengers who saw this came
+to the conclusion that it must be the sea-serpent. As the 'Brazilian'
+was making no headway, to bring all doubts to an issue,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span>
+the captain had a boat lowered, and himself standing in the
+bow, armed with a harpoon, approached the monster. It was
+found to be an immense piece of sea-weed, drifting with the
+current, which sets constantly to the westward in this latitude,
+and which, with the swell left by the subsidence of a previous
+gale, gave it the sinuous snake-like motion."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Captain Harrington, of the ship <i>Castilian</i>, reported in the
+<i>Times</i> of February 5th, 1858, that:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"On the 12th of December, 1857, N.E. end of St. Helena
+distant ten miles, he and his officers were startled by the sight of
+a huge marine animal which reared its head out of the water
+within twenty yards of the ship. The head was shaped like a long
+nun-buoy,<a name="Anchor_31_31" id="Anchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 31.">&nbsp;[31]&nbsp;</a> and they supposed it to have been seven or eight feet
+in diameter in the largest part, with a kind of scroll or tuft of loose
+skin, encircling it about two feet from the top. The water was
+discoloured for several hundred feet from its head, so much so
+that on its first appearance my impression was that the ship was
+in broken water."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Evidently, again, a large calamary raising its caudal
+extremity and fin above the surface, and discolouring the
+water by discharging its ink.</p>
+
+<p>This was immediately followed by a letter from Captain
+Frederick Smith, of the ship <i>Pekin</i>, who stated that:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"On December 28th, 1848, being then in lat. 26&deg; S., long. 6&deg; E.
+(about half-way between the Cape and St. Helena), he saw a very
+extraordinary-looking thing in the water, of considerable length.
+With the telescope, he could plainly discern a huge head and neck,
+covered with a shaggy-looking kind of mane, which it kept lifting
+at intervals out of water. This was seen by all hands, and was
+declared to be the great sea-serpent. A boat was lowered; a line
+was made fast to the 'snake,' and it was towed alongside and
+hoisted on board. It was a piece of gigantic sea-weed, twenty<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>
+feet long, and completely covered with snaky-looking barnacles.
+So like a huge living monster did this appear, that had circumstances
+prevented my sending a boat to it, I should certainly have
+believed I had seen the great sea-serpent."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>In September, 1872, Mr. Frank Buckland published, in
+<i>Land and Water</i>, an account by the late Duke of Marlborough,
+of a "sea-serpent" having been seen several times
+within a few days, in Loch Hourn, Scotland. A sketch of
+it was given which almost exactly accorded with that of
+Pontoppidan's sea-serpent, namely, seven hunches or protuberances
+like so many porpoises swimming in line, preceded
+by a head and neck raised slightly out of water. Many other
+accounts have been published of the appearance of serpent-like
+sea monsters, but I have only space for two or three
+more of the most remarkable of them.</p>
+
+<p>On the 10th of January, 1877, the following affidavit was
+made before Mr. Raffles, magistrate, at Liverpool:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"We, the undersigned officers and crew of the barque 'Pauline'
+(of London), of Liverpool, in the county of Lancaster, in the
+United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, do solemnly and
+sincerely declare that, on July 8, 1875, in lat. 5&deg; 13' S., long. 35&deg; W.,
+we observed three large sperm whales, and one of them was gripped
+round the body with two turns of what appeared to be a huge
+serpent. The head and tail appeared to have a length beyond the
+coils of about thirty feet, and its girth eight feet or nine feet. The
+serpent whirled its victim round and round for about fifteen
+minutes, and then suddenly dragged the whale to the bottom, head
+first.</p>
+
+<p>
+"<span class="smcap">Geo. Drevar</span>, Master; <span class="smcap">Horatio Thompson</span>, <span class="smcap">John Henderson<br />
+Landells</span>, <span class="smcap">Owen Baker</span>, and <span class="smcap">William<br />
+Lewarn</span>.<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"Again, on July 13, a similar serpent was seen, about two
+hundred yards off, shooting itself along the surface, head and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>
+neck being out of the water several feet. This was seen only
+by the captain and one ordinary seaman.</p>
+
+<p>
+"<span class="smcap">George Drevar</span>, Master.<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"A few moments after it was seen some 60 feet elevated perpendicularly
+in the air by the chief officer and the following
+seamen:&mdash;Horatio Thompson, Owen Baker, Wm. Lewarn. And
+we make this solemn declaration, conscientiously believing the
+same to be true."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>In the <i>Illustrated London News</i>, of November 20th, 1875,
+there had previously appeared a letter from the Rev. E. L.
+Penny, Chaplain to H.M.S. <i>London</i>, at Zanzibar, describing
+this occurrence and also the representation of a sketch
+(which I am kindly permitted to reproduce here), drawn by
+him from the descriptions given by the captain and crew
+of the <i>Pauline</i>. "The whale," he said, "should have been
+placed deeper in the water, but he would then have been
+unable to depict so clearly the manner in which the animal
+was attacked." He adds that, "Captain Drevar is a singularly
+able and observant man, and those of the crew and officers
+with whom he conversed were singularly intelligent; nor did
+any of their descriptions vary from one another in the least:
+there were no discrepancies." The event took place whilst
+their vessel was on her way from Shields to Zanzibar, with
+a cargo of coals, for the use of H.M.S. <i>London</i>, then the
+guard ship on that station.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to doubt for a moment the genuineness
+of the statement made by Captain Drevar and his crew, or
+their honest desire to describe faithfully that which they
+believed they had seen; but the height to which the snake is
+said to have upreared itself is evidently greatly exaggerated;
+for it is impossible that any serpent could "elevate its body
+some sixty feet perpendicularly in the air"&mdash;nearly one-third
+of the height of the Monument of the Great Fire of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>London. I have no desire to force this narrative of the
+master and crew of the <i>Pauline</i> into conformity with any
+preconceived idea. They may have seen a veritable sea-serpent;
+or they may have witnessed the amours of two
+whales, and have seen the great creatures rolling over and
+over that they might breathe alternately by the blow-hole
+of each coming to the surface of the water; or the supposed
+coils of the snake may have been the arms of a great
+calamary, cast over and around the huge cetacean. The
+other two appearances&mdash;1st, the animal "seen shooting
+itself along the surface with head and neck raised" (p. 77),
+and 2nd, the elevation of the body to a considerable height,
+as in Egede's sea monster, (p. 67), would certainly accord
+with this last hypothesis; but, taking the statement as it
+stands, it must be left for further elucidation.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="fig_020" id="fig_020">
+<img src="images/fig_020.jpg" width="600" height="335" alt="serpent wrapped around a whale" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG 20.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; AND SPERM WHALE AS SEEN FROM THE &#39;PAULINE.&#39;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>On the 28th of January, 1879, a "sea-serpent" was seen
+from the s.s. <i>City of Baltimore</i>, in the Gulf of Aden, by
+Major H. W. J. Senior, of the Bengal Staff Corps. The
+narrator "observed a long, black object darting rapidly in
+and out of the water, and advancing nearer to the vessel.
+The shape of the head was not unlike pictures of the
+dragon he had often seen, with a bull-dog expression of the
+forehead and eyebrows. When the monster had drawn its
+head sufficiently out of the water, it let its body drop, as it
+were a log of wood, prior to darting forward under the
+water. This motion caused a splash of about fifteen feet
+in length on either side of the neck much in the 'shape
+of a pair of wings.'" This last particular of its appearance,
+as well as its movements, suggest a great calamary; but,
+as one with "a bull-dog expression of eyebrow, visible at
+500 yards distance," does not come within my ken, I will
+not claim it as such.</p>
+
+<p>In June 1877 Commander Pearson reported to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>
+Admiralty, that on the 2nd of that month, he and other
+officers of the Royal Yacht <i>Osborne</i>, had seen, off Cape
+Vito, Sicily, a large marine animal, of which the following
+account and sketches were furnished by Lieutenant Haynes,
+and were confirmed by Commander Pearson, Mr. Douglas
+Haynes, Mr. Forsyth, and Mr. Moore, engineer.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 471px;">
+<a name="fig_021" id="fig_021">
+<img src="images/fig_021.jpg" width="471" height="600" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 21.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; AS SEEN FROM THE &#39;CITY OF
+BALTIMORE.&#39;</span>
+</div>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Lieutenant Haynes writes, under date, 'Royal Yacht <i>Osborne</i>,
+Gibraltar, June 6': On the evening of that day, the sea being perfectly
+smooth, my attention was first called by seeing a ridge of fins above<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>
+the surface of the water, extending about thirty feet, and varying
+from five to six feet in height. On inspecting it by means of a
+telescope, at about one and a-half cables' distance, I distinctly saw
+a head, two flappers, and about thirty feet of an animal's shoulder.
+The head, as nearly as I could judge, was about six feet thick, the
+neck narrower, about four to five feet, the shoulder about fifteen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>
+feet across, and the flappers each about fifteen feet in length. The
+movements of the flappers were those of a turtle, and the animal
+resembled a huge seal, the resemblance being strongest about the
+back of the head. I could not see the length of the head, but
+from its crown or top to just below the shoulder (where it became
+immersed), I should reckon about fifty feet. The tail end I did
+not see, being under water, unless the ridge of fins to which my
+attention was first attracted, and which had disappeared by the
+time I got a telescope, were really the continuation of the shoulder
+to the end of the object's body. The animal's head was not always
+above water, but was thrown upwards, remaining above for a few
+seconds at a time, and then disappearing. There was an entire
+absence of 'blowing,' or 'spouting.' I herewith beg to enclose
+a rough sketch, showing the view of the 'ridge of fins,' and also
+of the animal in the act of propelling itself by its two fins."</p></blockquote>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_022" id="fig_022">
+<img src="images/fig_022.jpg" width="470" height="373" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 22.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT &#39;OSBORNE.&#39;
+
+PHASE I.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig_023" id="fig_023">
+<img src="images/fig_023.jpg" width="470" height="372" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 23.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT&quot; AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT &#39;OSBORNE.&#39;
+
+PHASE 2.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It seems to me that this description cannot be explained
+as applicable to any one animal yet known. The ridge of
+dorsal fins might, possibly, as was suggested by Mr. Frank
+Buckland, belong to four basking sharks, swimming in
+line, in close order; but the combination of them with long
+flippers, and the turtle-like mode of swimming, forms a
+zoological enigma which I am unable to solve.</p>
+
+<p>This brings us face to face with the question: "Is it then
+so impossible that there may exist some great sea creature,
+or creatures, with which zoologists are hitherto unacquainted,
+that it is necessary in every case to regard the authors of
+such narratives as wilfully untruthful, or mistaken in their
+observations, if their descriptions are irreconcileable with
+something already known?" I, for one, am of the opinion
+that there is no such impossibility. Calamaries or squids
+of the ordinary size have, from time immemorial, been
+amongst the commonest and best known of marine
+animals in many seas; but only a few years ago any one
+who expressed his belief in one formidable enough to capsize<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>
+a boat, or pull a man out of one, was derided for his
+credulity, although voyagers had constantly reported that
+in the Indian seas they were so dreaded that the natives
+always carried hatchets with them in their canoes, with
+which to cut off the arms or tentacles of these creatures, if
+attacked by them. We now know that their existence is
+no fiction; for individuals have been captured measuring
+more than fifty feet, and some are reported to have
+measured eighty feet, in total length. As marine snakes
+some feet in length, and having fin-like tails adapted for
+swimming, abound over an extensive geographical range,
+and are frequently met with far at sea, I cannot regard it
+as impossible that some of these also may attain to an
+abnormal and colossal development. Dr. Andrew Wilson,
+who has given much attention to this subject, is of the
+opinion that "in this huge development of ordinary forms
+we discover the true and natural law of the production of
+the giant serpent of the sea." It goes far, at any rate,
+towards accounting for its supposed appearance. I am
+convinced that, whilst naturalists have been searching amongst
+the vertebrata for a solution of the problem, the great unknown,
+and therefore unrecognized, calamaries by their elongated,
+cylindrical bodies and peculiar mode of swimming, have
+played the part of the sea-serpent in many a well-authenticated
+incident. In other cases, such as some of those mentioned
+by Pontoppidan, the supposed "vertical undulations"
+of the snake seen out of water have been the burly bodies
+of so many porpoises swimming in line&mdash;the connecting
+undulations beneath the surface have been supplied by the
+imagination. The dorsal fins of basking sharks, as figured
+by Mr. Buckland, or of ribbon-fishes, as suggested by Dr.
+Andrew Wilson, may have furnished the "ridge of fins;"
+an enormous conger is not an impossibility; a giant turtle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>
+may have done duty, with its propelling flippers and broad
+back; or a marine snake of enormous size may, really, have
+been seen. But if we accept as accurate the observations
+recorded (which I certainly do not in all cases, for they are
+full of errors and mistakes), the difficulty is not entirely met,
+even by this last admission, for the instances are very few
+in which an ophidian proper&mdash;a true serpent&mdash;is indicated.
+There has seemed to be wanting an animal having a long
+snake-like neck, a small head and a slender body, and propelling
+itself by paddles.<a name="Anchor_32_32" id="Anchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 32.">&nbsp;[32]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>The similarity of such an animal to the <i>Plesiosaurus</i> of
+old was remarkable. That curious compound reptile, which
+has been compared with "a snake threaded through the
+body of a turtle," is described by Dean Buckland, in his
+<i>Bridgewater Treatise</i>, as having "the head of a lizard, the
+teeth of a crocodile, a neck of enormous length resembling
+the body of a serpent, the ribs of a chameleon, and the
+paddles of a whale." In the number of its cervical vertebr&aelig;
+(about thirty-three) it surpasses that of the longest-necked
+bird, the swan.</p>
+
+<p>The form and probable movements of this ancient saurian
+agree so markedly with some of the accounts given of the
+"great sea-serpent," that Mr. Edward Newman advanced
+the opinion that the closest affinities of the latter would be
+found to be with the <i>Enaliosauria</i>, or marine lizards, whose
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>fossil remains are so abundant in the oolite and the lias.
+This view has also been taken by other writers, and emphatically
+by Mr. Gosse. Neither he nor
+Mr. Newman insist that the "great
+unknown" must be the <i>Plesiosaurus</i>
+itself. Mr. Gosse says, "I should not
+look for any species, scarcely even
+any genus, to be perpetuated from
+the oolitic period to the present. Admitting
+the actual continuation of
+the order <i>Enaliosauria</i>, it would be, I
+think, quite in conformity with general
+analogy to find some salient features
+of several extinct forms."</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 140px;">
+<a name="fig_024" id="fig_024">
+<img src="images/fig_024.jpg" width="140" height="600" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG 24.
+
+Plesiosaurus Dolichodeirus
+restored by The Rev. W. D. Canybeare.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The form and habits of the recently-recognized
+gigantic cuttles account for
+so many appearances which, without
+knowledge of them, were inexplicable
+when Mr. Gosse and Mr. Newman
+wrote, that I think this theory is not
+now forced upon us. Mr. Gosse well
+and clearly sums up the evidence as
+follows: "Carefully comparing the
+independent narratives of English
+witnesses of known character and
+position, most of them being officers
+under the crown, we have a creature
+possessing the following characteristics:
+1st. The general form of a
+serpent. 2nd. Great length, say above
+sixty feet. 3rd. Head considered to
+resemble that of a serpent. 4th. Neck from twelve to
+sixteen inches in diameter. 5th. Appendages on the head,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>
+neck, or back, resembling a crest or mane. (Considerable
+discrepancy in details.) 6th. Colour dark brown, or green,
+streaked or spotted with white. 7th. Swims at surface of
+the water with a rapid or slow movement, the head and
+neck projected and elevated above the surface. 8th.
+Progression, steady and uniform; the body straight, but
+capable of being thrown into convolutions. 9th. Spouts
+in the manner of a whale. 10th. Like a long nun-buoy."
+He concludes with the question&mdash;"To which of the recognized
+classes of created beings can this huge rover of
+the ocean be referred?"</p>
+
+<p>I reply: "To the Cephalopoda. There is not one of
+the above judiciously summarized characteristics that is
+not supplied by the great calamary, and its ascertained
+habits and peculiar mode of locomotion.</p>
+
+<p>"Only a geologist can fully appreciate how enormously the
+balance of probability is contrary to the supposition that
+any of the gigantic marine saurians of the secondary
+deposits should have continued to live up to the present time.
+And yet I am bound to say, that this does not amount
+to an impossibility, for the evidence against it is entirely
+negative. Nor is the conjecture that there may be in
+existence some congeners of these great reptiles inconsistent
+with zoological science. Dr. J. E. Gray, late of the British
+Museum, a strict zoologist, is cited by Mr. Gosse as having
+long ago expressed his opinion that some undescribed form
+exists which is intermediate between the tortoises and the
+serpents."<a name="Anchor_33_33" id="Anchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 33.">&nbsp;[33]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="fig_025" id="fig_025">
+<img src="images/fig_025.jpg" width="600" height="372" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 25.&mdash;THE &quot;SEA SERPENT,&quot; ON THE ENALIOSAURIAN HYPOTHESIS.
+
+After Mr. P. H. Gosse, F.R.S.</span>
+</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Professor Agassiz, too, is adduced by a correspondent of
+the <i>Zoologist</i> (p. 2395), as having said concerning the present
+existence of the <i>Enaliosaurian</i> type that "it would be in
+precise conformity with analogy that such an animal should
+exist in the American Seas, as he had found numerous
+instances in which the fossil forms of the Old World were
+represented by living types in the New."</p>
+
+<p>On this point, Mr. Newman records, in the <i>Zoologist</i>
+(p. 2356), an actual testimony which he considers, "in all
+respects, the most interesting natural-history fact of the
+present century." He writes:</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Captain the Hon. George Hope states that when in H.M.S.
+'Fly,' in the Gulf of California, the sea being perfectly calm and
+transparent, he saw at the bottom a large marine animal with the
+head and general figure of the alligator, except that the neck was
+much longer, and that instead of legs the creature had four large
+flappers, somewhat like those of turtles, the anterior pair being
+larger than the posterior; the creature was distinctly visible, and
+all its movements could be observed with ease; it appeared to
+be pursuing its prey at the bottom of the sea; its movements
+were somewhat serpentine, and an appearance of annulations, or
+ring-like divisions of the body, was distinctly perceptible. Captain
+Hope made this relation in company, and as a matter of conversation.
+When I heard it from the gentleman to whom it was narrated,
+I enquired whether Captain Hope was acquainted with
+those remarkable fossil animals <i>Ichthyosauri</i> and <i>Plesiosauri</i>, the
+supposed forms of which so nearly correspond with what he describes
+as having seen alive, and I cannot find that he had heard
+of them; the alligator being the only animal he mentioned as
+bearing a partial similarity to the creature in question."</p></blockquote><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately, the estimated dimensions of this creature
+are not given.</p>
+
+<p>That negative evidence alone is an unsafe basis for argument
+against the existence of unknown animals, the following
+illustrations will show:</p>
+
+<p>During the deep-sea dredgings of H.M.S. <i>Lightning</i>,
+<i>Porcupine</i>, and <i>Challenger</i>, many new species of mollusca,
+and others which had been supposed to have been extinct
+ever since the chalk epoch, were brought to light; and by
+the deep-sea trawlings of the last-mentioned ship, there have
+been brought up from great depths fishes of unknown
+species, and which could not exist near the surface, owing
+to the distension and rupture of their air-bladder when
+removed from the pressure of deep water.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Gosse mentions that the ship in which he made the
+voyage to Jamaica was surrounded in the North Atlantic,
+for seventeen continuous hours by a troop of whales of
+large size of an undescribed species, which on no other
+occasion has fallen under scientific observation. Unique
+specimens of other cetaceans are also recorded.</p>
+
+<p>We have evidence, to which attention has been directed
+by Mr. A. D. Bartlett, that, "even on land there exists at
+least one of the largest mammals, probably in thousands,
+of which only one individual has been brought to notice,
+namely, the hairy-eared, two horned rhinoceros (<i>R. lasiotis</i>),
+now in the Zoological Gardens, London. It was captured
+in 1868, at Chittagong, in India, where for years collectors
+and naturalists have worked and published lists of the
+animals met with, and yet no knowledge of this great beast
+was ever before obtained, nor is there any portion of one in
+any museum. It remains unique."</p>
+
+<p>I arrive, then, at the following conclusions: 1st. That,
+without straining resemblances, or casting a doubt upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>
+narratives not proved to be erroneous, the various appearances
+of the supposed "Great Sea-serpent" may now be
+nearly all accounted for by the forms and habits of known
+animals; especially if we admit, as proposed by Dr. Andrew
+Wilson, that some of them, including the marine snakes,
+may, like the cuttles, attain to an extraordinary size.</p>
+
+<p>2nd. That to assume that naturalists have perfect cognizance
+of every existing marine animal of large size, would
+be quite unwarrantable. It appears to me more than probable
+that many marine animals, unknown to science, and
+some of them of gigantic size, may have their ordinary
+habitat in the great depths of the sea, and only occasionally
+come to the surface; and I think it not impossible that
+amongst them may be marine snakes of greater dimensions
+than we are aware of, and even a creature having close
+affinities with the old sea-reptiles whose fossil skeletons tell
+of their magnitude and abundance in past ages.</p>
+
+<p>It is most desirable that every supposed appearance of
+the "Great Sea-serpent" shall be faithfully noted and
+described; and I hope that no truthful observer will be
+deterred from reporting such an occurrence by fear of the
+disbelief of naturalists, or the ridicule of witlings.</p>
+
+
+<p>FINIS.</p>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="center">LONDON:
+PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 95%;" />
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 456px;">
+<a name="frontispiece02" id="frontispiece02">
+<img src="images/frontispiece02.jpg" width="456" height="769" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">A MERMAID.
+
+From a Picture by Otto Sinding.</span>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+<p class="center"><i>International Fisheries Exhibition</i></p>
+
+<p class="center">LONDON, 1883</p>
+
+<p class="center">SEA FABLES EXPLAINED</p>
+
+<p class="center">BY</p>
+
+<p class="center">HENRY LEE, <small>F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.</small></p>
+
+<p class="center">SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM
+AND
+AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT;'
+'SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED,' ETC.</p>
+
+<p class="center">ILLUSTRATED</p>
+
+<p class="center">LONDON</p>
+
+<p class="center">WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, <span class="smcap">Limited</span>
+INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION
+AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.
+1883
+</p>
+
+
+
+<p class="center">LONDON:
+PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, <span class="smcap">Limited</span>,
+STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>PREFACE.</p>
+
+
+<p>The little book 'Sea Monsters Unmasked,' recently
+issued as one of the Handbooks in connection with the
+Great International Fisheries Exhibition has met with so
+favourable a reception, that I have been honoured by the
+request to continue the subject, and to treat also of some
+of the Fables of the Sea, which once were universally
+believed, and even now are not utterly extinct.</p>
+
+<p>The topic is not here exhausted. Other sea fables and
+fallacies might be mentioned and explained; but the
+amount of letter-press, and the number of illustrations that
+can be printed without loss for the small sum of one
+shilling&mdash;the price at which these Handbooks are uniformly
+published&mdash;is necessarily limited. I have, therefore, thought
+it better to endeavour to make each chapter as complete
+as possible than to crowd into the space allotted to me a
+greater variety of subjects less fully and carefully discussed.</p>
+
+<p>I have the pleasure of acknowledging the kind assistance
+I have again received in the matter of illustrations.
+I gratefully appreciate Mr. Murray's permission to use
+the woodcut of Hercules slaying the Hydra, taken from
+Smith's 'Classical Dictionary,' and those of the golden
+ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycen&aelig;, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi_b" id="Page_vi_b">[Pg vi]</a></span>
+figured in the very interesting book in which his excavations
+there are described. I have also to thank the
+proprietors of the <i>Illustrated London News</i>, the <i>Leisure
+Hour</i>, and <i>Land and Water</i>, for the use of illustrations
+especially mentioned in the text.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 20em;">HENRY LEE.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span class="smcap">Savage Club</span>;<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>Sept. 4th, 1883</i>.</span><br />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii_b" id="Page_vii_b">[Pg vii]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>CONTENTS.</h2>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii_b" id="Page_viii_b">[Pg viii]</a></span></p>
+
+<ul class="toc">
+<li> &nbsp;<span class="label"><small>PAGE</small></span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#THE_MERMAID">The Mermaid</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">1</span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#THE_LERNEAN_HYDRA">The Lernean Hydra</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">48</span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#SCYLLA_AND_CHARYBDIS">Scylla and Charybdis</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">59</span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#THE_SPOUTING_OF_WHALES">The "Spouting" of Whales</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">62</span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#THE_SAILING_OF_THE_NAUTILUS">The "Sailing" of the Nautilus</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">76</span></li>
+<li><span class="smcap"><a href="#BARNACLE_GEESE_GOOSE_BARNACLES">Barnacle Geese&mdash;Goose Barnacles</a></span> &nbsp;<span class="label">98</span></li>
+</ul>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix_b" id="Page_ix_b">[Pg ix]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
+
+
+<ul class="toc">
+<li><small>FIG.</small>&nbsp; <span class="label"><small>PAGE</small></span></li>
+<li><a href="#frontispiece02"><span class="smcap">A Mermaid.</span> <i>From a picture by Otto Sinding</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label"><i>Frontispiece</i></span></li>
+<li><ol>
+<li><a href="#fig02_001"><span class="smcap">Noah, His Wife and Three Sons, as Fish-tailed Deities.</span> <i>From a gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">2</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_002"><span class="smcap">Hea, or Noah, the God of the Flood.</span> <i>Khorsabad</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">3</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_003"><span class="smcap">Dagon.</span> <i>From a bas-relief. Nimroud</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">4</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_004"><span class="smcap">Dagon: Half Man, Half Fish.</span> <i>From Lamy's 'Apparatus Biblicus'</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">5</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_005"><span class="smcap">Dagon.</span> <i>From an agate signet. Nineveh</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">"</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_006"><span class="smcap">Fish Avatar of Vishnu.</span> <i>After Calmet and Maurice</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">6</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_007"><span class="smcap">Atergatis, The Goddess of the Syrians.</span> <i>From a Ph&oelig;nician Coin</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">8</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_008"><span class="smcap">Venus Rising from the Sea, Supported by Tritons.</span> <i>After Calmet</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">9</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_009"><span class="smcap">Venus Drawn in Her Chariot by Tritons.</span> <i>From two Corinthian Coins</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">10</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_010"><span class="smcap">Ditto.</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">11</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_011"><span class="smcap">Seal, Drawn as a Fish.</span> <i>From the Catacombs at Rome</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">"</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_012"><span class="smcap">Mermaid and Fishes of Amboyna.</span> <i>After Valentyn</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">17</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_013"><span class="smcap">A Japanese Artificial Mermaid</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">27</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_014"><span class="smcap">An Artificial Mermaid.</span> <i>Probably Japanese</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">28</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_015"><span class="smcap">Portrait of a Mermaid said to have been Captured in Japan</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">29</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_016"><span class="smcap">The Dugong.</span> <i>From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's 'Ceylon'</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">43</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_017"><span class="smcap">The Manatee</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">45</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_018"><span class="smcap">Figure of a Calamary, From the Temple of Bayr-el-Bahree</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">50</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_019"><span class="smcap">Figure of an Octopus on a Gold Ornament found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycen&aelig;</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">51</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_020"><span class="smcap">Ditto.</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">52</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_021"><span class="smcap">Ditto.</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">53</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_022"><span class="smcap">Ditto.</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">"</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_023"><span class="smcap">Hercules Slaying the Lernean Hydra</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">57</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_024"><span class="smcap">The Physeter Inundating a Ship.</span> <i>After Olaus Magnus</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">64</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_025"><span class="smcap">A Whale Pouring Water into a Ship from its Blow-hole.</span> <i>After Olaus Magnus</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">64</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_026"><span class="smcap">Sperm Whales "Spouting"</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">65</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_027"><span class="smcap">The Paper Nautilus</span> (<i>Argonauta argo</i>) <span class="smcap">Sailing</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">76</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_028"><span class="smcap">Ditto. Retracted Within its Shell</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">81</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_029"><span class="smcap">Ditto. Crawling</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">86</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_030"><span class="smcap">Ditto. Swimming</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">87</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_031"><span class="smcap">Shell of the Paper Nautilus</span> (<i>Argonauta argo</i>)</a>&nbsp; <span class="label">88</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_032"><span class="smcap">Shell of the Pearly Nautilus</span> (<i>Nautilus pompilius</i>)</a>&nbsp; <span class="label">89</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_033"><span class="smcap">The Pearly Nautilus</span> (<i>Nautilus Pompilius</i>) <span class="smcap">and Section of its Shell</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">90</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_034"><span class="smcap">The Goose-Tree.</span> <i>From Gerard's 'Herball'</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">104</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_035"><span class="smcap">Ditto.</span> <i>Fac-simile from Aldrovandus</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">110</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_036"><span class="smcap">Development of Barnacles into Geese.</span> <i>Fac-simile from Aldrovandus</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">111</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_037"><span class="smcap">Section of a Sessile Barnacle.</span> <i>Balanus tintinnabulum</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">113</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_038"><span class="smcap">Pedunculated Barnacle.</span> <i>Lepas anatifera</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">115</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_039"><span class="smcap">A Ship's Figure-head Partly Covered with Barnacles</span></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">116</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_040"><span class="smcap">Whale Barnacle.</span> <i>Coronula diadema</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">117</span></li>
+<li><a href="#fig02_041"><span class="smcap">A Young Barnacle.</span> <i>Larva of Chthamalus stellatus</i></a>&nbsp; <span class="label">118</span></li>
+</ol></li>
+</ul>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1_b" id="Page_1_b">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p class="big center">SEA FABLES EXPLAINED.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_MERMAID" id="THE_MERMAID"></a>THE MERMAID.</h2>
+
+
+<p>Next to the pleasure which the earnest zoologist derives
+from study of the habits and structure of living animals,
+and his intelligent appreciation of their perfect adaptation
+to their modes of life, and the circumstances in which they
+are placed, is the interest he feels in eliminating fiction
+from truth, whilst comparing the fancies of the past with the
+facts of the present. As his knowledge increases, he learns
+that the descriptions by ancient writers of so-called "fabulous
+creatures" are rather distorted portraits than invented
+falsehoods, and that there is hardly one of the monsters of old
+which has not its prototype in Nature at the present day.
+The idea of the Lernean Hydra, whose heads grew again
+when cut off by Hercules, originated, as I have shown in
+another chapter, in a knowledge of the octopus; and in
+the form and movements of other animals with which we
+are now familiar we may, in like manner, recognise the
+similitude and archetype of the mermaid.</p>
+
+<p>But we must search deeply into the history of mankind
+to discover the real source of a belief that has prevailed in
+almost all ages, and in all parts of the world, in the
+existence of a race of beings uniting the form of man with
+that of the fish. A rude resemblance between these<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2_b" id="Page_2_b">[Pg 2]</a></span>
+creatures of imagination and tradition and certain aquatic
+animals is not sufficient to account for that belief. It
+probably had its origin in ancient mythologies, and in the
+sculptures and pictures connected with them, which were
+designed to represent certain attributes of the deities of
+various nations. In the course of time the meaning of
+these was lost; and subsequent generations regarded as
+the portraits of existing beings effigies which were at first
+intended to be merely emblematic and symbolical.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_001" id="fig02_001">
+<img src="images/fig02_001.jpg" width="470" height="358" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 1.&mdash;NOAH, HIS WIFE, AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED DEITIES.
+
+From a Gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Early idolatry consisted, first, in separating the idea of
+the One Divinity into that of his various attributes, and of
+inventing symbols and making images of each separately;
+secondly, in the worship of the sun, moon, stars, and
+planets, as living existences; thirdly, in the deification of
+ancestors and early kings; and these three forms were
+often mingled together in strange and tangled confusion.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3_b" id="Page_3_b">[Pg 3]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Amongst the famous personages with whose history men
+were made acquainted by oral tradition was Noah. He
+was known as the second father of the human race, and
+the preserver and teacher of the arts and sciences as they
+existed before the Great Deluge, of which so many separate
+traditions exist among the various races of mankind. Consequently,
+he was an object of worship in many countries
+and under many names; and his wife and sons, as his
+assistants in the diffusion of knowledge, were sometimes
+associated with him.</p>
+
+<p>According to Berosus, of Babylon,&mdash;the Chaldean priest
+and astronomer, who extracted from the sacred books of
+"that great city" much interesting ancient lore, which he introduced
+into his 'History of Syria,' written, about <small>B.C.</small> 260,
+for the use of the Greeks,&mdash;at a time when men were sunk
+in barbarism, there came up from the Erythrean Sea (the
+Persian Gulf), and landed on the Babylonian shore, a creature
+named Oannes, which had the body and head of a fish. But
+above the fish's head was the head of a man, and below the
+tail of the fish were human feet. It had also human arms, a
+human voice, and human language. This strange monster
+sojourned among the rude people during
+the day, taking no food, but retiring to
+the sea at night; and it continued for
+some time thus to visit them, teaching
+them the arts of civilized life, and instructing
+them in science and religion.<a name="Anchor_34_34" id="Anchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 34.">&nbsp;[34]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 150px;">
+<a name="fig02_002" id="fig02_002">
+<img src="images/fig02_002.jpg" width="150" height="171" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 2.&mdash;HEA, OR
+NOAH, THE GOD
+OF THE FLOOD.
+Khorsabad.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In this tale we have a distorted account
+of the life and occupation of Noah
+after his escape from the deluge which
+destroyed his home and drowned his
+neighbours. Oannes was one of the names under which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4_b" id="Page_4_b">[Pg 4]</a></span>he was worshipped in Chaldea, at Erech ("the place of the
+ark"), as the sacred and intelligent fish-god, the teacher
+of mankind, the god of science and knowledge. There he
+was also called Oes, Hoa, Ea, Ana, Anu, Aun, and Oan.
+Noah was worshipped, also, in Syria and Mesopotamia,
+and in Egypt, at "populous
+No,"<a name="Anchor_35_35" id="Anchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 35.">&nbsp;[35]&nbsp;</a> or Thebes&mdash;so named
+from "Theba," "the ark."</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_003" id="fig02_003">
+<img src="images/fig02_003.jpg" width="200" height="456" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 3.&mdash;DAGON. From a bas
+relief. Nimroud.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The history of the coffin of
+Osiris is another version of
+Noah's ark, and the period
+during which that Egyptian
+divinity is said to have been
+shut up in it, after it was set
+afloat upon the waters, was
+precisely the same as that
+during which Noah remained
+in the ark.</p>
+
+<p>Dagon, also&mdash;sometimes
+called Odacon&mdash;the great fish-god
+of the Philistines and
+Babylonians, was another
+phase of Oannes. "Dag," in
+Hebrew, signifies "a male
+fish," and "Aun" and "Oan"
+were two of the names of
+Noah. "Dag-aun" or "Dag-oan"
+therefore means "the fish Noah." He was portrayed
+in two ways. The more ancient image of him was that
+of a man issuing from a fish, as described of Oannes by
+Berosus; but in later times it was varied to that of a man
+whose upper half was human, and the lower parts those of
+a fish. The image of Dagon which fell upon its face to
+the ground before "the ark of the God of Israel," was
+probably of this latter form, for we read<a name="Anchor_36_36" id="Anchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 36.">&nbsp;[36]&nbsp;</a> that in its fall,
+"the head of Dagon and
+both the palms of his hands
+were cut off upon the threshold:
+only the <i>stump</i> (in the
+margin, "<i>the fishy part</i>") of
+Dagon was left to him. This
+was evidently Milton's conception
+of him:</p>
+
+<p>
+"Dagon his name; sea-monster, upward man<br />
+And downward fish."<a name="Anchor_37_37" id="Anchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 37.">&nbsp;[37]&nbsp;</a><br />
+</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_004" id="fig02_004">
+<img src="images/fig02_004.jpg" width="200" height="506" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 4.&mdash;DAGON. After Calmet.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 100px;">
+<a name="fig02_005" id="fig02_005">
+<img src="images/fig02_005.jpg" width="100" height="176" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 5.&mdash;DAGON.
+From an Agate
+Signet. Nineveh.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In some of the Nineveh
+sculptures of the fish-god,
+the head of
+the fish forms
+a kind of
+mitre on the
+head of the
+man, whilst
+the body of
+the fish appears
+as a
+cloak or cape
+over his
+shoulders and
+back. The fish varies in length; in some cases the tail
+almost touches the ground; in others it reaches but little
+below the man's waist.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 250px;">
+<a name="fig02_006" id="fig02_006">
+<img src="images/fig02_006.jpg" width="250" height="621" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 6.&mdash;FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU.
+
+After Calmet and Maurice.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In one of his "avatars,"
+or incarnations,
+the god Vishnu "the
+Preserver," is represented
+as issuing from
+the mouth of a fish.
+He is celebrated as
+having miraculously
+preserved one righteous
+family, and, also, the
+Vedas, the sacred records,
+when the world
+was drowned. Not only
+is this legend of the
+Indian god wrought up
+with the history of
+Noah, but Vishnu and
+Noah bear the same
+name&mdash;Vishnu being
+the Sanscrit form of
+"Ish-nuh," "the man
+Noah." The word
+"avatar" also means
+"out of the boat." In
+fact the whole mythology
+of Greece and
+Rome, as well as of
+Asia, is full of the history
+and deeds of Noah,
+which it is impossible
+to misunderstand. In all the representations of a deity
+having a combined human and piscine form, the original idea
+was that of a person coming out of a fish&mdash;not being part of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7_b" id="Page_7_b">[Pg 7]</a></span>
+one, but issuing from it, as Noah issued from the ark. In
+all of them the fish denoted "preservation," "fecundity,"
+"plenty," and "diffusion of knowledge."<a name="Anchor_38_38" id="Anchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 38.">&nbsp;[38]&nbsp;</a> As the image
+was not the effigy of a divine personage, but symbolized
+certain attributes of Divinity, its sex was comparatively
+unimportant, although it is possible that, combined with
+the fecundity of the fish, the idea of Noah's wife, as the
+second mother of all subsequent generations, according to
+the widely-spread and accepted traditions of the deluge,
+may have influenced the impersonation.</p>
+
+<p>Atergatis, the far-famed goddess of the Syrians, was also
+a fish-divinity. Her image, like that of Dagon, had at
+first a fish's body with human extremities protruding
+from it; but in the course of centuries it was gradually
+altered to that of a being the upper portion of whose
+body was that of a woman and the lower half that of
+a fish. Gatis was a powerful queen of Sidon, and mother
+of Semiramis. She received the title of "Ater," or "Ader,"
+"the Great," for the benefits she conferred on her people;
+one of these benefits being a strict conservation of their
+fisheries, both from their own imprudent use, and from foreign
+interference. She issued an edict that no fish should be
+eaten without her consent, and that no one should take fish
+in the neighbouring sea without a licence from herself. It
+is not improbable that she and her celebrated daughter, who
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8_b" id="Page_8_b">[Pg 8]</a></span>is said by Ovid and others to have been the builder of the
+walls of Babylon, were worshipped together; for that
+Atergatis was the same as the fish-goddess Ashteroth, or
+Ashtoreth, "the builder of the encompassing wall," we have,
+amongst other proofs, a remarkable one in Biblical history.
+In the first book of Maccabees v. 43, 44, we read that "all
+the heathen being discomfited before him (Judas Maccabeus)
+cast away their weapons, and fled unto the temple that was
+at <i>Carnaim</i>. But they took the city, and burned the temple
+with all that were therein. Thus was <i>Carnaim</i> subdued,
+neither could they stand any longer before Judas." In the
+second book of Maccabees xii. 26, we are told that "Maccabeus
+marched forth to <i>Carnion</i>, and to the temple of <i>Atargatis</i>,
+and there he slew five and twenty thousand persons."
+In Genesis xiv. 5, this city and temple are referred to as
+"<i>Ashteroth Karnaim</i>."</p>
+
+<p>Fig. 7 is a representation of Atergatis
+on a medal coined at Marseilles.
+It shows that when the Ph&oelig;nician
+colony from Syria, by whom that city
+was founded, settled there, they
+brought with them the worship of
+the gods of their country.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 150px;">
+<a name="fig02_007" id="fig02_007">
+<img src="images/fig02_007.jpg" width="150" height="157" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 7.&mdash;ATERGATIS.
+
+<i>From a Ph&oelig;nician coin.</i></span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Atergatis was worshipped by the
+Greeks as Derceto and Astarte.
+Lucian writes<a name="Anchor_39_39" id="Anchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 39.">&nbsp;[39]&nbsp;</a>:&mdash;"In Ph&oelig;nicia I saw the image of Derceto,
+a strange sight, truly! For she had the half of
+a woman, and from the thighs downwards a fish's tail."
+Diodorus Siculus describes (lib. ii.) the same deity, as
+represented at Ascalon, as "having the face of a woman,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9_b" id="Page_9_b">[Pg 9]</a></span>but all the rest of the body a fish's." And this very same
+image at Ascalon, which Diodorus calls Derceto, or
+Atergatis, is denominated by Herodotus<a name="Anchor_40_40" id="Anchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 40.">&nbsp;[40]&nbsp;</a> "the celestial
+Aphrodite," who was identical with the Cyprian and Roman
+Venus. Of all the sacred buildings erected to the goddess,
+this temple was by far the most ancient; and the Cyprians
+themselves acknowledged that their temple was built after
+the model of it by certain Ph&oelig;nicians who came from
+that part of Syria.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_008" id="fig02_008">
+<img src="images/fig02_008.jpg" width="470" height="454" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 8.&mdash;VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS.
+
+After Calmet.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Thus the worship of Noah, as the second father of mankind,
+the repopulator of the earth, passed through various
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10_b" id="Page_10_b">[Pg 10]</a></span>phases and transformations till it merged in that of Venus,
+who rose from the sea, and was regarded as the representative
+of the reproductive power of Nature&mdash;the goddess whom
+Lucretius thus addressed:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Blest Venus! Thou the sea and fruitful earth<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Peoplest amain; to thee whatever lives<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Its being owes, and that it sees the sun:"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>and to whom refers the passage in the Orphic hymn:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"From thee are all things&mdash;all things thou producest<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Which are in heaven, or in the fertile earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Or in the sea, or in the great abyss."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Under this latter phase&mdash;the impersonation of Venus&mdash;the
+fish portion of the body was discarded, and the cast-off
+form was allotted in popular credence to the Tritons&mdash;minor
+deities, who acknowledged the supremacy of the goddess,
+and were ready to render her homage and service by bearing
+her in their arms, drawing her chariot, etc., but who still
+possessed considerable power as sea-gods, and could calm
+the waves and rule the storm, at pleasure.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_009" id="fig02_009">
+<img src="images/fig02_009.jpg" width="200" height="191" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 9.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_010" id="fig02_010">
+<img src="images/fig02_010.jpg" width="200" height="191" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 10.</span>
+</div>
+<hr class="hidden" />
+<div class="figcenter">
+<span class="caption">VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. From two Corinthian coins.</span>
+</div>
+
+
+<p>Figs. 9 and 10 are from two Corinthian medals, each
+shewing Venus in a car or chariot drawn by Tritons, one
+male, the other female. On the obverse of Fig. 9, is the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11_b" id="Page_11_b">[Pg 11]</a></span>
+head of Nero, and on that of Fig. 10, the head of his
+grandmother Agrippina.<a name="Anchor_41_41" id="Anchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 41.">&nbsp;[41]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>From the very earliest period of history, then, the
+conjoined human and fish form was known to every
+generation of men. It was presented to their sight in
+childhood by sculptures and pictures, and was a conspicuous
+object in their religious worship. By the lapse of time its
+original import was lost and debased; and, from being
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12_b" id="Page_12_b">[Pg 12]</a></span>an emblem and symbol, it came to be accepted as the
+corporeal shape and structure of actually-existent sea-deities,
+who might present themselves to the view of the
+mariner, in visible and tangible form, at any moment.
+Thus were men trained and prepared to believe in mermen
+and mermaids, to expect to meet with them at sea, and to
+recognise as one of them any animal the appearance and
+movements of which could possibly be brought into conformity
+with their pre-conceived ideas.</p>
+
+<p>Accordingly, and very naturally, we find that from north
+to south this belief has been entertained. Megasthenes,
+who was a contemporary of Aristotle, but his junior, and
+whose geographical work was probably written at about the
+period of the great philosopher's death, reported that the sea
+which surrounded Taprobana, the ancient Ceylon, was inhabited
+by creatures having the appearance of women.
+&AElig;lian stated that there were "whales," or "great fishes,"
+having the form of satyrs. The early Portuguese settlers in
+India asserted that true mermen were found in the Eastern
+seas, and old Norse legends tell of submarine beings of conjoined
+human and piscine form, who dwell in a wide territory
+far below the region of the fishes, over which the sea, like
+the cloudy canopy of our sky, loftily rolls, and some of whom
+have, from time to time, landed on Scandinavian shores,
+exchanged their fishy extremities for human limbs, and
+acquired amphibious habits. Not only have poets sung of
+the wondrous and seductive beauty of the maidens of these
+aquatic tribes, but many a Jack tar has come home from
+sea prepared to affirm on oath that he has seen a mermaid.
+To the best of his belief he has told the truth. He has
+seen some living being which looked wonderfully human,
+and his imagination, aided by an inherited superstition, has
+supplied the rest.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13_b" id="Page_13_b">[Pg 13]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Before endeavouring to identify the object of his delusion,
+it may be well to mention a few instances of the supposed
+appearance of mermen and mermaidens in various localities.</p>
+
+<p>Pliny writes<a name="Anchor_42_42" id="Anchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 42.">&nbsp;[42]&nbsp;</a>: "When Tiberius was emperor, an embassy
+was sent to him from Olysippo (Lisbon) expressly to
+inform him that a Triton, which was recognised as such by
+its form, had shown itself in a certain cave, and had been
+heard to produce loud sounds on a conch-shell. The
+Nereid, also, is not imaginary: its body is rough and
+covered with scales, but it has the appearance of a human
+being. For one was seen upon the same coast; and when
+it was dying those dwelling near at hand heard it moaning
+sadly for a long time. And the Governor of Gaul wrote to
+the divine Augustus that several Nereids had been found
+dead upon the shore. I have many informants&mdash;illustrious
+persons in high positions&mdash;who have assured me that they
+saw in the Sea of Cadiz a merman whose whole body was
+exactly like that of a man, that these mermen mount on
+board ships by night, and weigh down that end of the
+vessel on which they rest, and that if they are allowed to
+remain there long they will sink the ship."</p>
+
+<p>&AElig;lian in one of his short, jerky, disconnected chapters,<a name="Anchor_43_43" id="Anchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 43.">&nbsp;[43]&nbsp;</a>
+which rarely exceed a page in length, and some of which
+only contain two lines, writes: "It is reported that the
+great sea which surrounds the island of Taprobana (Ceylon)
+contains an immense multitude of fishes and whales, and
+some of them have the heads of lions, panthers, rams, and
+other animals; and (which is more wonderful still) some of
+the cetaceans have the form of satyrs. There are others
+which have the face of a woman, but prickles instead of
+hair. In addition to these, it is said there are other
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14_b" id="Page_14_b">[Pg 14]</a></span>creatures of so strange and monstrous a kind that it would
+be impossible exactly to explain their appearance without
+the aid of a skilfully drawn picture: these have elongated
+and coiled tails, and, for feet, have claws<a name="Anchor_44_44" id="Anchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 44.">&nbsp;[44]&nbsp;</a> or fins. And I
+hear that in the same sea there are great amphibious
+beasts which are gregarious, and live on grain, and by night
+feed on the corn crops and grass, and are also very fond of
+the ripe fruit of the palms. To obtain these they encircle
+in their embrace the trees which are young and flexible,
+and, shaking them violently, enjoy the fruit which they thus
+cause to fall. When morning dawns they return to the
+sea, and plunge beneath the waves."</p>
+
+<p>&AElig;lian seems to have derived this information from
+Megasthenes, already referred to; but in another chapter,<a name="Anchor_45_45" id="Anchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 45.">&nbsp;[45]&nbsp;</a>
+he writes with greater certainty concerning these semi-human
+whales, and claims divine authority for his belief in the existence
+of tritons. "Although," he says, "we have no rational
+explanation nor absolute proof of that which fishermen are
+said to be able to affirm concerning the form of the tritons,
+we have the sworn testimony of many persons that there are
+in the sea cetaceans which from the head down to the middle
+of the body resemble the human species. Demostratus,
+in his works on fishing, says that an aged triton was seen
+near the town of Tanagra, in B&oelig;otia, which was like the
+drawings and pictures of tritons, but its features were so
+obscured by age, and it disappeared so quickly, that its true
+character was not easily perceptible. But on the spot
+where it had rested on the shore were found some rough
+and very hard scales which had become detached from it.
+A certain senator&mdash;one of those selected by lot to carry on
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15_b" id="Page_15_b">[Pg 15]</a></span>the administration of Achaia and the duties of the annual
+magistracy" (the mayor, in fact,) "being anxious to investigate
+the nature of this triton, put a portion of its skin
+on the fire. It gave out a most horrible odour; and those
+standing by were unable to decide whether it belonged
+to a terrestrial or marine animal. But the magistrate's
+curiosity had an evil ending, for very soon afterwards,
+whilst crossing a narrow creek in a boat, he fell overboard
+and was drowned; and the Tanagreans all regarded this as
+a judgment upon him for his crime of impiety towards the
+triton&mdash;an interpretation which was confirmed when his
+decomposing body was cast ashore, for it emitted exactly
+the same odour as had the burned skin of the triton. The
+Tanagreans and Demostratus explain whence the triton
+had strayed, and how it was stranded in this place. I
+believe," continues &AElig;lian, "that tritons exist, and I reverentially
+produce as my witness a most veracious god&mdash;namely,
+Apollo Didym&aelig;us, whom no man in his senses would
+presume to regard as unworthy of credit. He sings thus
+of the triton, which he calls the sheep of the sea:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">'<i>Dum vocale maris monstrum natat &aelig;quore triton,</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Neptuni pecus, in funes forte incidit extra</i><br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><i>Demissos navim</i>';"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>which I venture to translate as follows:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">A triton, vocal monster of the deep,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">One of a flock of Neptune's scaly sheep,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Was caught, whilst swimming o'er the watery plain,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">By lines which fishers from their boat had lain.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Therefore," &AElig;lian concludes, "if he, the omniscient god,
+pronounces that there are tritons, it does not behove us to
+doubt their existence."</p>
+
+<p>Sir J. Emerson Tennent, in his 'Natural History of
+Ceylon,' quoting from the <i>Histoire de la Compagnie de<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16_b" id="Page_16_b">[Pg 16]</a></span>
+J&eacute;sus</i>, mentions that the annalist of the exploits of the
+Jesuits in India gravely records that seven of these
+monsters, male and female, were captured at Manaar, in
+1560, and carried to Goa, where they were dissected by
+Demas Bosquez, physician to the Viceroy, "and their
+internal structure found to be in all respects conformable to
+the human." He also quotes Valentyn, one of the Dutch
+colonial chaplains, who, in his account of the Natural History
+of Amboyna,<a name="Anchor_46_46" id="Anchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 46.">&nbsp;[46]&nbsp;</a> embodied in his great work on the Netherlands'
+possessions in India, published in 1727,<a name="Anchor_47_47" id="Anchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 47.">&nbsp;[47]&nbsp;</a> devoted
+the first section of his chapter on the fishes of that island
+to a minute description of the "Zee-Menschen," "Zee-Wyven,"
+and mermaids, the existence of which he warmly
+insists on as being beyond cavil. He relates that in 1663,
+when a lieutenant in the Dutch service was leading a party
+of soldiers along the sea-shore in Amboyna, he and all his
+company saw the mermen swimming at a short distance
+from the beach. They had long and flowing hair of a
+colour between grey and green. Six weeks afterwards the
+creatures were again seen by him and more than fifty
+witnesses, at the same place, by clear daylight. "If any
+narrative in the world," adds Valentyn, "deserves credit it
+is this; since not only one, but two mermen together were
+seen by so many eye-witnesses. Should the stubborn
+world, however, hesitate to believe it, it matters nothing,
+as there are people who would even deny that such cities
+as Rome, Constantinople, or Cairo, exist, merely because
+they themselves have not happened to see them. But
+what are such incredulous persons," he continues, "to make
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17_b" id="Page_17_b">[Pg 17]</a></span>of the circumstance recorded by Albrecht Herport<a name="Anchor_48_48" id="Anchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 48.">&nbsp;[48]&nbsp;</a> in his
+account of India, that a merman was seen in the water
+near the church of Taquan on the morning of the 29th of
+April, 1661, and a mermaid at the same spot the same
+afternoon? Or what do they say to the fact that in 1714
+a mermaid was not only seen but captured near the island
+of Booro, five feet, Rhineland measure, in height; which
+lived four days and seven hours, but, refusing all food,
+died without leaving any intelligible account of herself?"
+Valentyn, in support of his own faith in the mermaid, cites
+many other instances in which both "sea-men and sea-women"
+were seen and taken at Amboyna; especially one
+by a district visitor of the church, who presented it to the
+Governor Vanderstel. Of this "well-authenticated" specimen
+he gives an elaborate portrait amongst the fishes of the island,<a name="Anchor_49_49" id="Anchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 49.">&nbsp;[49]&nbsp;</a>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18_b" id="Page_18_b">[Pg 18]</a></span>with a minute description of each for the satisfaction of
+men of science.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_012" id="fig02_012">
+<img src="images/fig02_012.jpg" width="470" height="336" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 12.&mdash;MERMAID AND FISHES OF AMBOYNA. After Valentyn.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The fame of this creature having reached Europe, the
+British minister in Holland wrote to Valentyn on the 28th
+of December, 1716, whilst the Emperor Peter the Great, of
+Russia, was his guest at Amsterdam, to communicate the
+desire of the Czar that the mermaid should be brought
+home from Amboyna for his inspection. To complete his
+proofs of the existence of mermen and merwomen, Valentyn
+points triumphantly to the historical fact that in Holland,
+in the year 1404, a mermaid was driven, during a tempest,
+through a breach in the dyke of Edam, and was taken alive
+in the lake of Purmer. Thence she was carried to Haarlem,
+where the Dutch women taught her to spin, and where
+several years after, she died in the Roman Catholic faith;&mdash;"but
+this," says the pious Calvinistic chaplain, "in no way
+militates against the truth of her story." The worthy
+minister citing the authority of various writers as proof that
+mermaids had in all ages been known in Gaul, Naples,
+Epirus, and the Morea, comes to the conclusion that as
+there are "sea-cows," "sea-horses," "sea-dogs," as well as
+"sea-trees," and "sea-flowers," which he himself had seen,
+there are no reasonable grounds for doubt that there may
+also be "sea-maidens" and "sea-men."</p>
+
+<p>In an early account of Newfoundland,<a name="Anchor_50_50" id="Anchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 50.">&nbsp;[50]&nbsp;</a> Whitbourne
+describes a "maremaid or mareman," which he had seen
+"within the length of a pike," and which "came swimming
+swiftly towards him, looking cheerfully on his face, as it had
+been a woman. By the face, eyes, nose, mouth, chin, ears,
+neck and forehead, it appeared to be so beautiful, and in
+those parts so well proportioned, having round about the
+head many blue streaks resembling hair, but certainly it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19_b" id="Page_19_b">[Pg 19]</a></span>
+was no hair. The shoulders and back down to the middle
+were square, white, and smooth as the back of a man, and
+from the middle to the end it tapered like a broad-hooked
+arrow." The animal put both its paws on the side of the
+boat wherein its observer sat, and strove much to get in,
+but was repelled by a blow.</p>
+
+<p>In 1676, a description was given by an English surgeon
+named Glover, of an animal of this kind. The author did
+not designate it by any name, but the incident has the
+honour of being recorded in the <i>Philosophical Transactions</i>.<a name="Anchor_51_51" id="Anchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 51.">&nbsp;[51]&nbsp;</a>
+About three leagues from the mouth of the river Rappahannock,
+in America, while alone in a vessel, he observed, at
+the distance of about half a stone-throw, he says, "a most
+prodigious creature, much resembling a man, only somewhat
+larger, standing right up in the water, with his head, neck,
+shoulders, breast and waist, to the cubits of his arms, above
+water, and his skin was tawny, much like that of an Indian;
+the figure of his head was pyramidal and sleek, without
+hair; his eyes large and black, and so were his eyebrows;
+his mouth very wide, with a broad black streak on the
+upper lip, which turned upwards at each end like
+mustachios. His countenance was grim and terrible. His
+neck, shoulders, arms, breast and waist, were like unto the
+neck, arms, shoulders, breast and waist of a man. His
+hands, if he had any, were under water. He seemed to
+stand with his eyes fixed on me for some time, and afterwards
+dived down, and, a little after, rose at somewhat
+a greater distance, and turned his head towards me again,
+and then immediately fell a little under water, that I could
+discern him throw out his arms and gather them in as a
+man does when he swims. At last, he shot with his head
+downwards, by which means he cast his tail above the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20_b" id="Page_20_b">[Pg 20]</a></span>water, which exactly resembled the tail of a fish, with a
+broad fane at the end of it."</p>
+
+<p>Thormodus Torf&aelig;us<a name="Anchor_52_52" id="Anchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 52.">&nbsp;[52]&nbsp;</a> maintains that mermaids are found
+on the south coast of Iceland, and, according to Olafsen,<a name="Anchor_53_53" id="Anchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 53.">&nbsp;[53]&nbsp;</a>
+two have been taken in the surrounding seas, the first in the
+earlier part of the history of that island, and the second in
+1733. The latter was found in the stomach of a shark. Its
+lower parts were consumed, but the upper were entire.
+They were as large as those of a boy eight or nine years
+old. Both the cutting teeth and grinders were long and
+shaped like pins, and the fingers were connected by a large
+web. Olafsen was inclined to believe that these were
+human remains, but the islanders all firmly maintained
+that they were part of "a marmennill," by which name the
+mermaid is known among them.</p>
+
+<p>Of course the worthy bishop of Bergen, Pontoppidan,
+has something to tell us about mermaids in his part of
+the world. "Amongst the sea monsters," he says,<a name="Anchor_54_54" id="Anchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 54.">&nbsp;[54]&nbsp;</a> "which
+are in the North Sea, and are often seen, I shall give the
+first place to the Hav-manden, or merman, whose mate
+is called Hav-fruen, or mermaid. The existence of this
+creature is questioned by many, nor is it at all to be
+wondered at, because most of the accounts we have had of
+it are mixed with mere fables, and may be looked upon as
+idle tales." As such he regards the story told by Jonas
+Ramus in his 'History of Norway,' of a mermaid taken by
+fishermen at Hordeland, near Bergen, and which is said to
+have sung an unmusical song to King Hiorlief. In the
+same category he places an account given by Besenius in
+his life of Frederic II. (1577), of a mermaid that called
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21_b" id="Page_21_b">[Pg 21]</a></span>herself Isbrandt, and held several conversations with a
+peasant at Samsoe, in which she foretold the birth of
+King Christian IV., "and made the peasant preach repentance
+to the courtiers, who were very much given to
+drunkenness." Equally "idle" with the above stories is,
+in his opinion, another, extracted from an old manuscript
+still to be seen in the University Library at Copenhagen,
+and quoted by Andrew Buss&aelig;us (1619), of a merman caught
+by the two senators, Ulf Rosensparre and Christian Holch,
+whilst on their voyage home to Denmark from Norway.
+This sea-man frightened the two worshipful gentlemen so
+terribly that they were glad to let him go again; for
+as he lay upon the deck he spoke Danish to them, and
+threatened that if they did not give him his liberty "the ship
+should be cast away, and every soul of the crew should
+perish."</p>
+
+<p>"When such fictions as these," says Pontoppidan, "are
+mixed with the history of the merman, and when that creature
+is represented as a prophet and an orator; when they
+give the mermaid a melodious voice, and tell us that she is
+a fine singer, we need not wonder that so few people of sense
+will give credit to such absurdities, or that they even doubt
+the existence of such a creature." The good prelate, however,
+goes on to say that "whilst we have no ground to believe
+all these fables, yet, as to the existence of the creature we
+may safely give our assent to it," and, "if this be called in
+question, it must proceed entirely from the fabulous stories
+usually mixed with the truth." Like Valentyn, he argues
+that as there are "sea-horses," "sea-cows," "sea-wolves,"
+"sea-dogs," "sea-hogs," etc., it is probable from analogy,
+that "we should find in the ocean a fish or creature which
+resembles the human species more than any other." As
+for the objection "founded on self-love and respect to our<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22_b" id="Page_22_b">[Pg 22]</a></span>
+own species which is honoured with the image of God, who
+made man lord of all creatures, and that, consequently, we
+may suppose he is entitled to a noble and heavenly form
+which other creatures must not partake of," he thinks "its
+force vanishes when we consider the form of apes, and
+especially of another African creature called 'Quoyas
+Morrov' described by Odoard Dapper" in his work on
+Africa, and which appears to have been a chimpanzee.
+Pontoppidan regarded it as being the Satyr of the ancients.
+He therefore claims that "if we will not allow our
+Norwegian Hastromber the honourable name of merman,
+we may very well call it the 'Sea-ape,' or the 'Sea-Quoyas-Morrov;'"
+especially as the author already quoted
+says that, "in the Sea of Angola mermaids are frequently
+caught which resemble the human species. They are taken
+in nets, and killed by the negroes, and are heard to shriek
+and cry like women."</p>
+
+<p>The Bishop adds that in the diocese of Bergen, as well
+as in the manor of Nordland, there were hundreds of
+persons who affirmed with the strongest assurances that
+they had seen this kind of creature; sometimes at a distance
+and at other times quite close to their boats, standing
+upright, and formed like a human creature down to the
+middle&mdash;the rest they could not see&mdash;but of those who had
+seen them out of water and handled them he had not been
+able to find more than one person of credit who could vouch
+it for truth. This informant, "the Reverend Mr. Peter
+Angel, minister of Vand-Elvens Gield, on Suderoe,"
+assured his bishop, when he was on a visitation journey,
+that "in the year 1719, he (being then about twenty years
+old) saw what is called a merman lying dead on a point of
+land near the sea, which had been cast ashore by the waves
+along with several sea-calves (seals), and other dead fish.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23_b" id="Page_23_b">[Pg 23]</a></span>
+The length of this creature was much greater than what
+has been mentioned of any before, namely, above three
+fathoms. It was of a dark grey colour all over: in the
+lower part it was like a fish, and had a tail like that of a
+porpoise. The face resembled that of a man, with a mouth,
+forehead, eyes, etc. The nose was flat, and, as it were,
+pressed down to the face, in which the nostrils were
+very visible. The breast was not far from the head; the
+arms seemed to hang to the side, to which they were
+joined by a thin skin, or membrane. The hands were, to
+all appearance, like the paws of a sea-calf. The back of this
+creature was very fat, and a great part of it was cut off,
+which, with the liver, yielded a large quantity of train-oil."
+The author then quotes a description by Luke Debes<a name="Anchor_55_55" id="Anchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 55.">&nbsp;[55]&nbsp;</a> of
+a mermaid seen in 1670 at Faroe, westward of Qualboe
+Eide, by many of the inhabitants, as also by others from
+different parts of Suderoe. She was close to the shore, and
+stood there for two hours and a half, and was up to her
+waist in water. She had long hairs on her head, which
+hung down to the surface of the water all round about her,
+and she held a fish in her right hand.</p>
+
+<p>Pontoppidan mentions other instances of similar appearances,
+and says that the latest he had heard of was of a
+merman seen in Denmark on the 20th of September, 1723,
+by three ferrymen who, at some distance from the land,
+were towing a ship just arrived from the Baltic. Having
+caught sight of something which looked like a dead body
+floating on the water, they rowed towards it, and there,
+resting on their oars, allowed it to drift close to them. It
+sank, but immediately came to the surface again, and then
+they saw that it had the appearance of an old man, strong-limbed,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24_b" id="Page_24_b">[Pg 24]</a></span>and with broad shoulders, but his arms they could
+not see. His head was small in proportion to his body,
+and had short, curled, black hair, which did not reach below
+his ears; his eyes lay deep in his head, and he had a
+meagre and pinched face, with a black, coarse beard, that
+looked as if it had been cut. His skin was coarse, and
+very full of hair. He stood in the same place for half a
+quarter of an hour, and was seen above the water down to
+his breast: at last the men grew apprehensive of some
+danger, and began to retire; upon which the monster
+blew up his cheeks, and made a kind of roaring noise, and
+then dived under water, so that they did not see him any
+more. One of them, Peter Gunnersen, related (what the
+others did not observe) that this merman was, about the
+body and downwards, quite pointed, like a fish. This same
+Peter Gunnersen likewise deposed that "about twenty years
+before, as he was in a boat near Kulleor, the place where
+he was born, he saw a mermaid with long hair and large
+breasts." He and his two companions were, by command
+of the king, examined by the burgomaster of Elsineur,
+Andrew Buss&aelig;us, before the privy-councillor, Fridrich von
+Gram, and their testimony to the above effect was given
+on their respective oaths.</p>
+
+<p>Brave old Henry Hudson, the sturdy and renowned
+navigator, who thrice, in three successive years, gave battle
+to the northern ice, and was each time defeated in his
+endeavour to discover a north-west or north-east passage
+to China, though he stamped his name on the title-page
+of a mighty nation's history, records the following incident:
+"This evening (June 15th) one of our company,
+looking overboard, saw a mermaid, and, calling up some of
+the company to see her, one more of the crew came up, and
+by that time she was come close to the ship's side, looking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25_b" id="Page_25_b">[Pg 25]</a></span>
+earnestly on the men. A little after a sea came and overturned
+her. From the navel upward, her back and breasts
+were like a woman's, as they say that saw her; her body as
+big as one of us, her skin very white, and long hair hanging
+down behind, of colour black. In her going down they saw
+her tail, which was like the tail of a porpoise and speckled
+like a mackarel's. Their names that saw her were Thomas
+Hilles and Robert Rayner."</p>
+
+<p>Steller, who was a zoologist of some repute, reports
+having seen in Behrings Straits a strange animal, which he
+calls a "sea-ape," and in which one might almost recognise
+Pontoppidan's "Sea-Quoyas-Morrov." It was about
+five feet long, had sharp and erect ears and large eyes,
+and on its lips a kind of beard. Its body was thick and
+round, and it tapered to the tail, which was bifurcated, with
+the upper lobe longest. It was covered with thick hair,
+grey on the back, and red on the belly. No feet nor paws
+were visible. It was full of frolic, and sported in the
+manner of a monkey, swimming sometimes on one side of
+the ship and sometimes on the other. It often raised one-third
+of its body out of the water, and stood upright for a
+considerable time. It would frequently bring up a sea-plant,
+not unlike a bottle-gourd, which it would toss about
+and catch in its mouth, playing numberless fantastic tricks
+with it.</p>
+
+<p>Somewhat similar accounts have been brought from the
+Southern Hemisphere, two, at least, of which are worth
+transcribing.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Colnett, in his 'Voyage to the South Atlantic,'
+says:&mdash;"A very singular circumstance happened off the
+coast of Chili, in lat. 24&deg; S., which spread some alarm
+amongst my people, and awakened their superstitious apprehensions.
+About 8 o'clock in the evening an animal<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26_b" id="Page_26_b">[Pg 26]</a></span>
+rose alongside the ship, and uttered such shrieks and tones
+of lamentation, so much like those produced by the female
+human voice when expressing the deepest distress as to
+occasion no small degree of alarm among those who first
+heard it. These cries continued for upwards of three hours,
+and seemed to increase as the ship sailed from it. I never
+heard any noise whatever that approached so near those
+sounds which proceed from the organs of utterance in the
+human species."</p>
+
+<p>Captain Weddell, in his 'Voyage towards the South
+Pole' (p. 143), writes that one of his men, having been left
+ashore on Hall's Island to take care of some produce, heard
+one night about ten o'clock, after he had lain down to rest,
+a noise resembling human cries. As daylight does not
+disappear in those latitudes at the season in which the
+incident occurred, the sailor rose and searched along the
+beach, thinking that, possibly, a boat might have been upset,
+and that some of the crew might be clinging to the detached
+rocks.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Roused by that voice of silver sound,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;From the paved floor he lightly sprung,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And, glaring with his eyes around,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Where the fair nymph her tresses wrung,"<a name="Anchor_56_56" id="Anchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 56.">&nbsp;[56]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>guided by occasional sounds, he at length saw an object
+lying on a rock a dozen yards from the shore, at which he
+was somewhat frightened. "The face and shoulders appeared
+of human form and of a reddish colour; over the
+shoulders hung long green hair; the tail resembled that of
+a seal, but the extremities of the arms he could not see
+distinctly."</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"As on the wond'ring youth she smiled,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Again she raised the melting lay,"<a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 56.">&nbsp;[56]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27_b" id="Page_27_b">[Pg 27]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>for the creature continued to make a musical noise during
+the two minutes he gazed at it, and, on perceiving him,
+disappeared in an instant.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_013" id="fig02_013">
+<img src="images/fig02_013.jpg" width="470" height="171" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 13.&mdash;A JAPANESE ARTIFICIAL MERMAID.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The universality of the belief in an animal of combined
+human and fish-like form is very remarkable. That it
+exists amongst the Japanese we have evidence in their
+curious and ingeniously-constructed models which are
+occasionally brought to this country. I have one of
+these which is so exactly the counterpart of that which
+my friend Mr. Frank Buckland described, originally in
+<i>Land and Water</i>, and which forms the subject of a
+chapter in his 'Curiosities of Natural History,'<a name="Anchor_57_57" id="Anchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 57.">&nbsp;[57]&nbsp;</a> that the
+portrait of the one (Fig. 13) will equally well represent
+the other. The lower half of the body is made of the skin
+and scales of a fish of the carp family, and fastened on
+to this, so neatly that it is hardly possible to detect where
+the joint is made, is a wooden body, the ribs of which are so
+prominent that the poor mermaid has a miserable and half-starved
+appearance. The upper part of the body is in the
+attitude of a Sphinx, leaning upon its elbows and fore-arms.
+The arms are thin and scraggy, and the fingers attenuated
+and skeleton-like. The nails are formed of small pieces of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28_b" id="Page_28_b">[Pg 28]</a></span>
+ivory or bone. The head is like that of a small monkey, and
+a little wool covers the crown, so thinly and untidily that if
+the mermaid possessed a crystal mirror she would see the
+necessity for the vigorous use of her comb of pearl. The
+teeth are those of some fish&mdash;apparently of the cat-fish,
+(<i>Anarchicas lupus</i>). These Japanese artificial mermaids have
+brought many a dollar into the pockets of Mr. Barnum and
+other showmen.</p>
+
+<p>Somewhat different in appearance from this, but of the
+same kind, was an artificial mermaid described in the
+<i>Saturday Magazine</i> of June 4th, 1836.
+Fig. 14 is a facsimile of the woodcut
+which accompanied it. This grotesque
+composition was exhibited in a glass
+case, some years previously, "in a
+leading street at the west end" of
+London. It was constructed "of the
+skin of the head and shoulders of a
+monkey, which was attached to the
+dried skin of a fish of the salmon kind
+with the head cut off, and the whole
+was stuffed and highly varnished, the
+better to deceive the eye." It was
+said to have been "taken by the crew
+of a Dutch vessel from on board a
+native Malacca boat, and from the
+reverence shown to it, it was supposed
+to be a representative of one of their idol gods." I am
+inclined to think that it was of Japanese origin.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 152px;">
+<a name="fig02_014" id="fig02_014">
+<img src="images/fig02_014.jpg" width="152" height="300" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 14.&mdash;AN ARTIFICIAL
+MERMAID, PROBABLY
+JAPANESE.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p><a href="#fig02_015">Fig. 15</a> is described in the article above referred to as
+having been copied from a Japanese drawing, and as being
+a portrait of one of their deities. Its similarity to one of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29_b" id="Page_29_b">[Pg 29]</a></span>
+those of the Assyrians (<a href="#fig02_002">Fig. 2</a>, page 3) is remarkable. The
+inscription, however, does not indicate this. The Chinese
+characters in the centre&mdash;"<i>Nin giyo</i>"&mdash;signify "human
+fish;" those on the right in Japanese <i>Hira Kana</i>, or running-hand,
+have the same purport, and those on the left, in <i>Kata
+Kana</i>, the characters of the Japanese alphabet, mean "<i>Ichi
+hiru ike</i>"&mdash;"one day kept alive." The whole legend seems
+to pretend that this human fish was actually caught, and
+kept alive in water for twenty-four hours, but, as the box on
+which it is inscribed is one of those in which the Japanese
+showmen keep their toys, it was
+probably the subject of a
+"penny peep-show."</p>
+
+<p>We need not travel from our
+own country to find the belief
+in mermaids yet existing. It is
+still credited in the north of
+Scotland that they inhabit the
+neighbouring seas: and Dr.
+Robert Hamilton, F.R.S.E.,
+writing in 1839, expressed emphatically
+his opinion that there
+was then as much ignorance on this subject as had prevailed
+at any former period.<a name="Anchor_58_58" id="Anchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 58.">&nbsp;[58]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_015" id="fig02_015">
+<img src="images/fig02_015.jpg" width="200" height="222" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 15.&mdash;A MERMAID. From a
+Japanese picture.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the year 1797, Mr. Munro, schoolmaster of Thurso,
+affirmed that he had seen "a figure like a naked female,
+sitting on a rock projecting into the sea, at Sandside Head,
+in the parish of Reay. Its head was covered with long,
+thick, light-brown hair, flowing down on the shoulders.
+The forehead was round, the face plump, and the cheeks
+ruddy. The mouth and lips resembled those of a human
+being, and the eyes were blue. The arms, fingers, breast,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30_b" id="Page_30_b">[Pg 30]</a></span>
+and abdomen were as large as those of a full-grown
+female," and, altogether,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"That sea-nymph's form of pearly light<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Was whiter than the downy spray,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And round her bosom, heaving bright,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Her glossy yellow ringlets play."<a name="Anchor_59_59" id="Anchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 59.">&nbsp;[59]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"This creature," continued Mr. Munro, "was apparently
+in the act of combing its hair with its fingers, which seemed
+to afford it pleasure, and it remained thus occupied during
+some minutes, when it dropped into the sea." The Dominie</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i6">"saw the maiden there,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Just as the daylight faded,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Braiding her locks of gowden hair<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;An' singing as she braided,"<a name="Anchor_60_60" id="Anchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 60.">&nbsp;[60]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>but he did not remark whether the fingers were webbed.
+On the whole, he infers that this was a marine animal of
+which he had a distinct and satisfactory view, and that
+the portion seen by him bore a narrow resemblance to the
+human form. But for the dangerous situation it had chosen,
+and its appearance among the waves, he would have supposed
+it to be a woman. Twelve years later, several persons
+observed near the same spot an animal which they also
+supposed to be a mermaid.</p>
+
+<p>A very remarkable story of this kind is one related by
+Dr. Robert Hamilton in the volume already referred to,
+and for the general truth of which he vouches, from his
+personal knowledge of some of the persons connected with
+the occurrence. In 1823 it was reported that some fishermen
+of Yell, one of the Shetland group, had captured a mermaid
+by its being entangled in their lines. The statement was that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31_b" id="Page_31_b">[Pg 31]</a></span>"the animal was about three feet long, the upper part of the
+body resembling the human, with protuberant mamm&aelig;,
+like a woman; the face, forehead, and neck were short,
+and resembled those of a monkey; the arms, which were
+small, were kept folded across the breast; the fingers were
+distinct, not webbed; a few stiff, long bristles were on the
+top of the head, extending down to the shoulders, and
+these it could erect and depress at pleasure, something like
+a crest. The inferior part of the body was like a fish.
+The skin was smooth, and of a grey colour. It offered no
+resistance, nor attempted to bite, but uttered a low, plaintive
+sound. The crew, six in number, took it within their boat,
+but, superstition getting the better of curiosity, they carefully
+disentangled it from the lines and a hook which had
+accidentally become fastened in its body, and returned it
+to its native element. It instantly dived, descending in a perpendicular
+direction." Mr. Edmonston, the original narrator
+of this incident, was "a well-known and intelligent observer,"
+says Dr. Hamilton, and in a communication made by him
+to the Professor of Natural History in the Edinburgh
+University gave the following additional particulars, which
+he had learned from the skipper and one of the crew of
+the boat. "They had the animal for three hours within
+the boat: the body was without scales or hair; it was of a
+silvery grey colour above, and white below; it was like the
+human skin; no gills were observed, nor fins on the back
+or belly. The tail was like that of a dog-fish; the mamm&aelig;
+were about as large as those of a woman; the mouth and lips
+were very distinct, and resembled the human. Not one of
+the six men dreamed of a doubt of its being a mermaid,
+and it could not be suggested that they were influenced by
+their fears, for the mermaid is not an object of terror to
+fishermen: it is rather a welcome guest, and danger is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32_b" id="Page_32_b">[Pg 32]</a></span>
+apprehended from its experiencing bad treatment." Mr.
+Edmonston concludes by saying that "the usual resources
+of scepticism that the seals and other sea-animals appearing
+under certain circumstances, operating upon an
+excited imagination, and so producing ocular illusion,
+cannot avail here. It is quite impossible that six Shetland
+fishermen could commit such a mistake." It would seem
+that the narrator demands that his readers shall be silenced,
+if unconvinced; but</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"He that complies against his will<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Is of his own opinion still."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>This incident is well-attested, and merits respectful and
+careful consideration; but I decline to admit any such impossibility
+of error in observation or description on the part
+of the fishermen, or the further impossibility of recognising
+in the animal captured by them one known to naturalists.
+The particulars given in this instance, and also of the
+supposed merman seen cast ashore dead in 1719 by the
+Rev. Peter Angel (p. 22), are sufficiently accurate descriptions
+of a warm-blooded marine animal, with which the
+Shetlanders, and probably Mr. Edmonston also, were unacquainted,
+namely, the rytina, of which I shall have more
+to say presently; and these occurrences afford some slight
+hope that this remarkable beast may not have become
+extinct in 1768, as has been supposed, but that it may still
+exist somewhat further south than it was met with by its
+original describer, Steller.</p>
+
+<p>Turning to Ireland, we find the same credence in the
+semi-human fish, or fish-tailed human being. In the
+autumn of 1819 it was affirmed that "a creature appeared
+on the Irish coast, about the size of a girl ten years of age,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33_b" id="Page_33_b">[Pg 33]</a></span>
+with a bosom as prominent as one of sixteen, having a
+profusion of long dark-brown hair, and full, dark eyes. The
+hands and arms were formed like those of a man, with a
+slight web connecting the upper part of the fingers, which
+were frequently employed in throwing back and dividing
+the hair. The tail appeared like that of a dolphin." This
+creature remained basking on the rocks during an hour, in
+the sight of numbers of people, until frightened by the flash
+of a musket, when</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Away she went with a sea-gull's scream,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And a splash of her saucy tail,"<a name="Anchor_61_61" id="Anchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 61.">&nbsp;[61]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>for it instantly plunged with a scream into the sea.</p>
+
+<p>From Irish legends we learn that those sea-nereids, the
+"Merrows," or "Moruachs" came occasionally from the sea,
+gained the affections of men, and interested themselves in
+their affairs; and similar traditions of the "Morgan" (sea-women)
+and the "Morverch" (sea-daughters) are current in
+Brittany.</p>
+
+<p>In English poetry the mermaid has been the subject of
+many charming verses, and Shakspeare alludes to it in his
+plays no less than six times. The head-quarters of these
+"daughters of the sea" in England, or of the belief in their
+existence, are in Cornwall. There the fisherman, many a
+time and</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i6">"Oft, beneath the silver moon,<a name="Anchor_62_62" id="Anchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 62.">&nbsp;[62]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Has heard, afar, the mermaid sing,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>and has listened, so they say, to</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The mermaid's sweet sea-soothing lay<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;That charmed the dancing waves to sleep."<a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 62.">&nbsp;[62]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34_b" id="Page_34_b">[Pg 34]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mr. Robert Hunt, F.R.S., in his collection of the traditions
+and superstitions of old Cornwall,<a name="Anchor_63_63" id="Anchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 63.">&nbsp;[63]&nbsp;</a> records several
+curious legends of the "merrymaids" and "merrymen" (the
+local name of mermaids), which he had gathered from the
+fisher-folk and peasants in different parts of that county.</p>
+
+<p>And, in a pleasant article in 'All the Year Round,'<a name="Anchor_64_64" id="Anchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 64.">&nbsp;[64]&nbsp;</a> 1865,
+"A Cornish Vicar"<a name="Anchor_65_65" id="Anchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 65.">&nbsp;[65]&nbsp;</a> mentions some of the superstitions of the
+people in his neighbourhood, and the perplexing questions
+they occasionally put to him. One of his parishioners, an
+old man named Anthony Cleverdon, but who was popularly
+known as "Uncle Tony," having been the seventh son of
+his parents, in direct succession, was looked upon, in consequence,
+as a soothsayer. This "ancient augur" confided to
+his pastor many highly efficacious charms and formularies,
+and, in return, sought for information from him on other
+subjects. One day he puzzled the parson by a question
+which so well illustrates the local ideas concerning mermaids,
+and the sequel of which is, moreover, so humorously
+related by the vicar, that I venture to quote his own words,
+as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Uncle Tony said to me, 'Sir, there is one thing I want
+to ask you, if I may be so free, and it is this: why should
+a merrymaid, that will ride about upon the waters in such
+terrible storms, and toss from sea to sea in such ruckles as
+there be upon the coast, why should she never lose her
+looking-glass and comb?' 'Well, I suppose,' said I, 'that
+if there are such creatures, Tony, they must wear their
+looking-glasses and combs fastened on somehow, like fins
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35_b" id="Page_35_b">[Pg 35]</a></span>to a fish.' 'See!' said Tony, chuckling with delight, 'what
+a thing it is to know the Scriptures, like your reverence; I
+should never have found it out. But there's another point,
+sir, I should like to know, if you please; I've been bothered
+about it in my mind hundreds of times. Here be I, that
+have gone up and down Holacombe cliffs and streams fifty
+years come next Candlemas, and I've gone and watched
+the water by moonlight and sunlight, days and nights, on
+purpose, in rough weather and smooth (even Sundays, too,
+saving your presence), and my sight as good as most men's,
+and yet I never could come to see a merrymaid in all my
+life: how's that, sir?' 'Are you sure, Tony,' I rejoined,
+'that there are such things in existence at all?' 'Oh, sir,
+my old father seen her twice! He was out one night for
+wreck (my father watched the coast, like most of the old
+people formerly), and it came to pass that he was down at
+the duck-pool on the sand at low-water tide, and all to
+once he heard music in the sea. Well, he croped on
+behind a rock, like a coastguardsman watching a boat, and
+got very near the music ... and there was the merrymaid,
+very plain to be seen, swimming about upon the
+waves like a woman bathing&mdash;and singing away. But
+my father said it was very sad and solemn to hear&mdash;more
+like the tune of a funeral hymn than a Christmas carol, by
+far&mdash;but it was so sweet that it was as much as he could do
+to hold back from plunging into the tide after her. And
+he an old man of sixty-seven, with a wife and a houseful of
+children at home. The second time was down here by
+Holacombe Pits. He had been looking out for spars&mdash;there
+was a ship breaking up in the Channel&mdash;and he saw
+some one move just at half-tide mark, so he went on very
+softly, step by step, till he got nigh the place, and there
+was the merrymaid sitting on a rock, the bootyfullest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36_b" id="Page_36_b">[Pg 36]</a></span>
+merrymaid that eye could behold, and she was twisting
+about her long hair, and dressing it, just like one of our
+girls getting ready for her sweetheart on the Sabbath-day.
+The old man made sure he should greep hold of her before
+ever she found him out, and he had got so near that a
+couple of paces more and he would have caught her by the
+hair, as sure as tithe or tax, when, lo and behold, she looked
+back and glimpsed him! So, in one moment she dived
+head-foremost off the rock, and then tumbled herself topsy-turvy
+about in the water, and cast a look at my poor father,
+and grinned like a seal.'" And a seal it probably was that
+Tony's "poor father" saw.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, are these mermaids and mermen, a belief in
+whose existence has prevailed in all ages, and amongst all
+the nations of the earth? Have they, really, some of the
+parts and proportions of man, or do they belong to another
+order of mammals on which credulity and inaccurate
+observation have bestowed a false character?</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Swainson, a naturalist of deserved eminence, has
+maintained on purely scientific grounds, that there must exist
+a marine animal uniting the general form of a fish with that
+of a man; that by the laws of Nature the natatorial type
+of the <i>Quadrumana</i> is most assuredly wanting, and that,
+apart from man, a being connecting the seals with the
+monkeys is required to complete the circle of quadrumanous
+animals.<a name="Anchor_66_66" id="Anchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 66.">&nbsp;[66]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>Mr. Gosse<a name="Anchor_67_67" id="Anchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 67.">&nbsp;[67]&nbsp;</a> argues that all the characters which Mr.
+Swainson selects as marking the natatorial type of animals
+belong to man, and that he being, in his savage state, a great
+swimmer, is the true aquatic primate, which Mr. Swainson
+regards as absent. Mr. Gosse admits, however, that "nature
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37_b" id="Page_37_b">[Pg 37]</a></span>has an odd way of mocking at our impossibilities, and" that
+"it <i>may be</i> that green-haired maidens with oary tails, lurk
+in the ocean caves, and keep mirrors and combs upon their
+rocky shelves;" and the conclusion he arrives at is that the
+combined evidence "induces a strong suspicion that the
+northern seas may hold forms of life as yet uncatalogued
+by science."</p>
+
+<p>That there are animals in the northern and other seas
+with which we are unacquainted, is more than probable:
+discoveries of animals of new species are constantly being
+made, especially in the life of the deep sea. But I venture
+to think that the production of an animal at present
+unknown is quite unnecessary to account for the supposed
+appearances of mermaids.</p>
+
+<p>We have in the form and habits of the <i>Phocid&aelig;</i>, or earless
+seals, a sufficient interpretation of almost every incident of
+the kind that has occurred north of the Equator&mdash;of those
+in which protuberant <i>mamm&aelig;</i> are described, we must
+presently seek another explanation. The round, plump,
+expressive face of a seal, the beautiful, limpid eyes, the
+hand-like fore-paws, the sleek body, tapering towards the
+flattened hinder fins, which are directed backwards, and
+spread out in the form of a broad fin, like the tail of a fish,
+might well give the idea of an animal having the anterior
+part of its body human and the posterior half piscine.</p>
+
+<p>In the habits of the seals, also, we may trace those of the
+supposed mermaid, and the more easily the better we are
+acquainted with them. All seals are fond of leaving the
+water frequently. They always select the flattest and most
+shelving rocks which have been covered at high tide, and
+prefer those that are separated from the mainland. They
+generally go ashore at half-tide, and invariably lie with
+their heads towards the water, and seldom more than a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38_b" id="Page_38_b">[Pg 38]</a></span>
+yard or two from it. There they will often remain, if
+undisturbed, for six hours; that is, until the returning tide
+floats them off the rock. As for the sweet melody,
+"so melting soft," that must depend much on the ear and
+musical taste of the listener. I have never heard a seal
+utter any vocal sounds but a porcine grunt, a plaintive
+moan, and a pitiful whine. But another habit of the seals
+has, probably more than anything else, caused them to be
+mistaken for semi-human beings&mdash;namely, that of poising
+themselves upright in the water with the head and the
+upper third part of the body above the surface.</p>
+
+<p>One calm sunny morning in August, 1881, a fine schooner-yacht,
+on board of which I was a guest, was slowly gliding
+out of the mouth of the river Maas, past the Hook of
+Holland, into the North Sea, when a seal rose just ahead
+of us, and assumed the attitude above described. It waited
+whilst we passed it, inspecting us apparently with the
+greatest interest; then dived, swam in the direction in
+which we were sailing, so as to intercept our course, and
+came up again, sitting upright as before. This it repeated
+three times, and so easily might it have been taken for a
+mermaid, that one of the party, who was called on deck to
+see it, thought, at first, that it was a boy who had swam off
+from the shore to the vessel on a begging expedition.</p>
+
+<p>Laing, in his account of a voyage to the North, mentions
+having seen a seal under similar circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>A young seal which was brought from Yarmouth to the
+Brighton Aquarium in 1873, habitually sat thus, showing
+his head and a considerable portion of his body out of
+water. His bath was so shallow in some parts that he was
+able to touch the bottom, and, with his after-flippers tucked
+under him, like a lobster's tail, and spread out in front, he
+would balance himself on his hind quarters, and look inquisitively<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39_b" id="Page_39_b">[Pg 39]</a></span>
+at everybody, and listen attentively to everything
+within sight and hearing. When he was satisfied
+that no one was likely to interfere with him, and that it
+was unnecessary to be on the alert, he would half-close his
+beautiful, soft eyes, and either contentedly pat, stroke, and
+scratch his little fat stomach with his right paw, or flap
+both of them across his breast in a most ludicrous manner,
+exactly as a cabman warms the tips of his fingers on a
+wintry day, by swinging his arms vigorously across his
+chest, and striking his hands against his body on either
+side. He was very sensitive to musical sounds, as many
+dogs are, and when a concert took place in the building a
+high note from one of the vocalists would cause him to
+utter a mournful wail, and to dive with a splash that made
+the water fly, the audience smile, and the singer frown.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Scoresby tells us that he had seen the walrus
+with its head above water, and in such a position that it
+required little stretch of imagination to mistake it for a
+human being, and that on one occasion of this kind the
+surgeon of his ship actually reported to him that he had
+seen a man with his head above water.</p>
+
+<p>Peter Gunnersen's merman (p. 24), who "blew up his
+cheeks and made a kind of roaring noise" before diving,
+was probably a "bladder-nose" seal. The males of that
+species have on the head a peculiar pad, which they can
+dilate at pleasure, and their voice is loud and discordant.</p>
+
+<p>The appearance and behaviour of Steller's "sea-ape,"
+described on p. 25, may, I think, be attributed to one of
+the eared seals, the so-called sea-lions, or sea-bears. Every
+one who has seen these animals fed must have noticed the
+rapidity with which they will dive and swim to any part of
+their pond where they expect to receive food, and how,
+like a dog after a pebble, they will keenly watch their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40_b" id="Page_40_b">[Pg 40]</a></span>
+keeper's movements, and start in the direction to which he
+is apparently about to throw a fish, even before the latter
+has left his hand. This may be seen at the Zoological
+Gardens, Regent's Park, and, better than anywhere else in
+Europe, at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, Paris. It would be
+quite in accordance with their habits that one of these
+<i>Otaria</i> should dive under a ship, and rise above the surface
+on either side, eagerly surveying those on board, in hope of
+obtaining food, or from mere curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>The seals and their movements account for so many
+mermaid stories, that all accounts of sea-women with
+prominent bosoms were ridiculed and discredited until
+competent observers recognised in the form and habits of
+certain aquatic animals met with in the bays and estuaries
+of the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, the west coast of Africa,
+and sub-tropical America, the originals of these "travellers'
+tales." These were&mdash;first, the <i>manatee</i>, which is found in
+the West Indian Islands, Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, and
+Brazil, and in Africa in the River Congo, Senegambia, and
+the Mozambique Channel; second, the <i>dugong</i>, or <i>halicore</i>,
+which ranges along the east coast of Africa, Southern Asia,
+the Bornean Archipelago, and Australia; and, third, the
+<i>rytina</i>, seen on Behring's Island in the Kamschatkan Sea
+by Steller, the Russian zoologist and voyager, in 1741, and
+which is supposed to have become extinct within twenty-seven
+years after its discovery, by its having been recklessly
+and indiscriminately slaughtered.<a name="Anchor_68_68" id="Anchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 68.">&nbsp;[68]&nbsp;</a> Then science, in the
+person of Illeger, made the <i>amende honorable</i>, and frankly
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41_b" id="Page_41_b">[Pg 41]</a></span>accepting Jack's introduction to his fish-tailed <i>innamorata</i>,
+classed these three animals together as a sub-order of the
+animal kingdom, and bestowed on them the name of the
+<i>Sirenia</i>. This was, of course, in allusion to the Sirens of
+classical mythology, who, in later art, were represented as
+having the body of a woman above the waist, and that
+of a fish below, although the lower portion of their body
+was originally described as being in the form of a bird.</p>
+
+<p>It has been found difficult to determine to which order
+these <i>Manatid&aelig;</i> are most nearly allied. In shape they most
+closely resemble the whales and seals. But the cetacea
+are all carnivorous, whereas the manatee and its relatives
+live entirely on vegetable food. Although, therefore, Dr.
+J. E. Gray, following Cuvier, classed them with the cetacea
+in his British Museum catalogue, other anatomists, as
+Professor Agassiz, Professor Owen, and Dr. Murie, regard
+their resemblance to the whales as rather superficial than
+real, and conclude from their organisation and dentition
+that they ought either to form a group apart or be classed
+with the pachyderms&mdash;the hippopotamus, tapir, etc.&mdash;with
+which they have the nearest affinities, and to which they
+seem to have been more immediately linked by the now
+lost genera, <i>Dinotherium</i> and <i>Halitherium</i>. With the
+opinion of those last-named authorities I entirely agree. I
+regard the manatee as exhibiting a wonderful modification
+and adaptation of the structure of a warm-blooded land
+animal which enables it to pass its whole life in water, and
+as a connecting link between the hippopotamus, elephant,
+etc., on the one side, and the whales and seals on the other.</p>
+
+<p>The <i>Halitherium</i> was a Sirenian with which we are only
+acquainted by its fossil remains found in the Miocene
+formation of Central and Southern Europe. These indicate
+that it had short hind limbs, and, consequently, approached<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42_b" id="Page_42_b">[Pg 42]</a></span>
+more nearly the terrestrial type than either the manatee,
+the rytina, or the dugong, in which the hind limbs are
+absent. The two last named tend more than does the
+manatee to the marine mammals; but there is a strong
+likeness between these three recent forms. They all have
+a cylindrical body, like that of a seal, but instead of hind
+limbs there is in all a broad tail flattened horizontally; and
+the chief difference in their outward appearance is in the
+shape of this organ. In the manatee it is rounded, in the
+dugong forked like that of a whale, in the rytina crescent-shaped.
+The tail of the <i>Halitherium</i> appears to have been
+shaped somewhat like that of the beaver. The body of
+the manatee is broader in proportion to its length and
+depth than that of the dugong. In a paper read before the
+Royal Society, July 12th, 1821, on a manatee sent to
+London in spirits by the Duke of Manchester, then
+Governor of Jamaica, Sir Everard Home remarked of this
+greater lateral expansion that, as the manatee feeds on
+plants that grow at the mouths of great rivers, and the dugong
+upon those met with in the shallows amongst small islands
+in the Eastern seas, the difference of form would make the
+manatee more buoyant and better fitted to float in fresh
+water.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_016" id="fig02_016">
+<img src="images/fig02_016.jpg" width="470" height="258" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 16.&mdash;THE DUGONG. From Sir J. Emerson Tennent&#39;s &#39;Ceylon.&#39;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In all the <i>Manatid&aelig;</i> the mamm&aelig; of the female, which
+are greatly distended during the period of lactation, are
+situated very differently from those of the whales, being
+just beneath the pectoral fins. These fins or paws are
+much more flexible and free in their movements than
+those of the cet&aelig;, and are sufficiently prehensile to enable
+the animal to gather food between the palms or inner
+surfaces of both, and the female to hold her young one
+to her breast with one of them. Like the whales, they are
+warm-blooded mammals, breathing by lungs, and are therefore<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43_b" id="Page_43_b">[Pg 43]</a></span>
+obliged to come to the surface at frequent intervals
+for respiration. As they breathe through nostrils at the
+end of the muzzle, instead of, like most of the whales,
+through a blow-hole on the top of the head, their habit is
+to rise, sometimes vertically, in the water, with the head
+and fore part of the body exposed above the surface, and
+often to remain in this position for some minutes. When
+seen thus, with head and breast bare, and clasping its
+young one to its body, the female presents a certain resemblance
+to a woman from the waist upward. When
+approached or disturbed it dives; the tail and hinder portion
+of the body come into view, and we see that if there was
+little of the "<i>mulier formosa superne</i>," at any rate "<i>desinit
+in piscem</i>." The manatee has thence been called by the
+Spaniards and Portuguese the "woman-fish," and by the
+Dutch the "manetje," or mannikin. The dugong, having
+the muzzle bristly, is named by the latter the "baardmanetje,"
+or "little bearded man." There are no bristles
+or whiskers on the muzzle of the manatee; all the portraits<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44_b" id="Page_44_b">[Pg 44]</a></span>
+of it in which these are shown are in that respect erroneous.
+The origin of the word "manatee" has by some been
+traced to the Spanish, as indicating "an animal with
+hands." On the west coast of Africa it is called by the
+natives "Ne-hoo-le." By old writers it was described as
+the "sea-cow." Gesner depicts it in the act of bellowing;
+and Mr. Bates, in his work, "The Naturalist on the
+Amazon," says that its voice is something like the bellowing
+of an ox. The Florida "crackers" or "mean whites,"
+make the same statement. Although I have had opportunities
+of prolonged observation of it in captivity, I have
+not heard it give utterance to any sound&mdash;not even a grunt&mdash;and
+Mr. Bartlett, of the Zoological Gardens, tells me that
+his experience of it is the same. His son, Mr. Clarence
+Bartlett, says that a young one he had in Surinam used to
+make a feeble cry, or bleat, very much like the voice of
+a young seal. This is the only sound he ever heard from
+a manatee.<a name="Anchor_69_69" id="Anchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 69.">&nbsp;[69]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>I believe the dugong to be more especially the animal
+referred to by &AElig;lian as the semi-human whale, and that
+which has led to this group having been supposed by southern
+voyagers to be aquatic human beings. In the first place,
+the dugong is a denizen of the sea, whereas the manatee
+is chiefly found in rivers and fresh-water lagoons; and
+secondly, the dugong accords with &AElig;lian's description of
+the creature with a woman's face in that it has "prickles
+instead of hairs," whilst the manatee has no such stiff
+bristles.</p>
+
+<p>In the case of either of these two animals being mistaken
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45_b" id="Page_45_b">[Pg 45]</a></span>for a mermaid, however, "distance" must "lend enchantment
+to the view," and a sailor must be very impressible
+and imaginative who, even after having been deprived for
+many months of the pleasure of females' society, could be
+allured by the charms of a bristly-muzzled dugong, or
+mistake the snorting of a wallowing manatee for the love-song
+of a beauteous sea-maiden.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_017" id="fig02_017">
+<img src="images/fig02_017.jpg" width="470" height="640" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 17.&mdash;THE MANATEE. ITS USUAL POSITION.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Unfortunately both the dugong and the manatee are
+being hunted to extinction.</p>
+
+<p>The flesh of the manatee is considered a great delicacy.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46_b" id="Page_46_b">[Pg 46]</a></span>
+Humboldt compares it with ham. Unlike that of the
+whales, which is of a deep and dark red hue, it is as white
+as veal, and, it is said, tastes very like it. It is remarkable
+for retaining its freshness much longer than other meat,
+which in a tropical climate generally putrefies in twenty-eight
+hours. It is therefore well adapted for pickling, as
+the salt has time to penetrate the flesh before it is tainted.
+The Catholic clergy of South America do not object to its
+being eaten on fast days, on the supposition that, with
+whales, seals, and other aquatic mammals, it may be liberally
+regarded as "fish." The "Indians" of the Amazon and
+Orinoco are so fond of it that they will spend many days,
+if necessary, in hunting for a manatee, and having killed one
+will cut it into slabs and slices on the spot, and cook these
+on stakes thrust into the ground aslant over a great fire,
+and heavily gorge themselves as long as the provision lasts.
+The milk of this animal is said to be rich and good, and
+the skin is valuable for its toughness, and is much in
+request for making leathern articles in which great strength
+and durability are required. The tail contains a great
+deal of oil, which is believed to be extremely nutritious,
+and has also the property of not becoming rancid. Unhappily
+for the dugong, its oil is in similarly high repute,
+and is greatly preferred as a nutrient medicine to cod-liver
+oil. As its flesh also is much esteemed, it is so
+persistently hunted on the Australian coasts that it will
+probably soon become extinct, like the rytina of Steller.
+The same fate apparently awaits the manatee, which is
+becoming perceptibly more and more scarce.</p>
+
+<p>I fear that before many years have elapsed the Sirens of
+the Naturalist will have disappeared from our earth, before
+the advance of civilization, as completely as the fables and
+superstitions with which they have been connected, before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47_b" id="Page_47_b">[Pg 47]</a></span>
+the increase of knowledge; and that the mermaid of fact
+will have become as much a creature of the past as the
+mermaid of fiction. With regard to the latter&mdash;the Siren of
+the poets,&mdash;the water-maiden of the pearly comb, the crystal
+mirror, and the sea-green tresses,&mdash;there are few persons I
+suppose, at the present day who would not be content to
+be classed with Banks, the fine old naturalist and formerly
+ship-mate of Captain Cook. Sir Humphry Davy in his
+<i>Salmonia</i> relates an anecdote of a baronet, a profound
+believer in these fish-tailed ladies, who on hearing some one
+praise very highly Sir Joseph Banks, said that "Sir Joseph
+was an excellent man, but he had his prejudices&mdash;he did
+not believe in the mermaid." I confess to having a similar
+"prejudice;" and am willing to adopt the further remark
+of Sir Humphry Davy:&mdash;"I am too much of the school of
+Izaac Walton to talk of impossibility. It doubtless might
+please God to make a mermaid, but I don't believe God
+ever did make one."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48_b" id="Page_48_b">[Pg 48]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_LERNEAN_HYDRA" id="THE_LERNEAN_HYDRA"></a>THE LERNEAN HYDRA.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The mystery of the Kraken, of which I treated in a companion
+volume to the present, recently published, is not
+difficult to unravel. The clue to it is plain, and when
+properly taken up is as easily unwound, to arrive at the
+truth, as a cocoon of silk, to get at the chrysalis within
+it. It was a boorish exaggeration, a legend of ignorance,
+superstition, and wonder. But when such a skein of facts
+has passed through the hands of the poets, it is sure to be
+found in a much more intricate tangle; and many a knot of
+pure invention may have to be cut before it is made clear.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, we shall be able to discern that more than
+one of the most famous and hideous monsters of old
+classical lore originated, like the Kraken, in a knowledge by
+their authors of the form and habits of those strange sea-creatures,
+the head-footed mollusks. There can be little
+doubt that the octopus was the model from which the old
+poets and artists formed their ideas, and drew their
+pictures of the Lernean Hydra, whose heads grew again
+when cut off by Hercules; and also of the monster Scylla,
+who, with six heads and six long writhing necks, snatched
+men off the decks of passing ships and devoured them in
+the recesses of her gloomy cavern.</p>
+
+<p>Of the Hydra Diodorus relates that it had a hundred
+heads; Simonides says fifty; but the generally received
+opinion was that of Apollodorus, Hyginus, and others, that
+it had only nine.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49_b" id="Page_49_b">[Pg 49]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Apollodorus of Athens, son of Asclepiades, who wrote in
+stiff, quaint Greek about 120 <small>B.C.</small>, gives in his 'Bibliotheca'
+(book ii. chapter 5, section 2) the following account of the
+many-headed monster. "This Hydra," he says, "nourished
+in the marshes of Lerne, went forth into the open country
+and destroyed the herds of the land. It had a huge body
+and nine heads, eight mortal, but the ninth immortal.
+Having mounted his chariot, which was driven by Iolaus,
+Hercules got to Lerne and stopped his horses. Finding
+the Hydra on a certain raised ground near the source of the
+Amymon, where its lair was, he made it come out by pelting
+it with burning missiles. He seized and stopped it, but
+having twisted itself round one of his feet, it struggled with
+him. He broke its head with his club: but that was useless;
+for when one head was broken two sprang up, and a
+huge crab helped the Hydra by biting the foot of Hercules.
+This he killed, and called Iolaus, who, setting on fire part
+of the adjoining forest, burned with torches the germs of
+the growing heads, and stopped their development. Having
+thus out-man&oelig;uvred the growing heads, he cut off the
+immortal head, buried it, and put a heavy stone upon it,
+beside the road going from Lerne to Eleonta, and having
+opened the Hydra, dipped his arrows in its gall."</p>
+
+<p>If we wish to find in nature the counterpart of this
+Hydra, we must seek, firstly, for an animal with eight out-growths
+from its trunk, which it can develop afresh, or
+replace by new ones, in case of any or all of them being
+amputated or injured. We must also show that this
+animal, so strange in form and possessing such remarkable
+attributes, was well known in the locality where the legend
+was believed. We have it in the octopus, which abounded
+in the Mediterranean and &AElig;gean seas, and whose eight
+prehensile arms, or tentacles, spring from its central body,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50_b" id="Page_50_b">[Pg 50]</a></span>
+the immortal head, and which, if lost or mutilated by
+misadventure, are capable of reproduction.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_018" id="fig02_018">
+<img src="images/fig02_018.jpg" width="470" height="218" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 18.&mdash;FIGURE OF A CALAMARY. From the temple of Bayr-el-Bahree.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>That a knowledge of the octopus existed at a very early
+period of man's history we have abundant evidence. The
+ancient Egyptians figured it amongst their hieroglyphics,
+and an interesting proof that they were also acquainted
+with other cephalopods was given to me by the late
+Mr. E. W. Cooke, R.A. Whilst on a trip up the Nile, in
+January, 1875, he visited the temple of Bayr-el-Bahree,
+Thebes (date 1700 <small>B.C.</small>), the entrance to which had been
+deeply buried beneath the light, wind-drifted sand, accumulated
+during many centuries. By order of the Khedive,
+access had just at that time been obtained to its interior,
+by the excavation and removal of this deep deposit, and,
+amongst the hieroglyphics on the walls, were found, between
+the zig-zag lines which represent water, figures of various
+fishes, copies of which Mr. Cooke kindly gave me, and
+which are so accurately portrayed as to be easily identified.
+With them was the outline of a squid fourteen inches long,
+a figure of which, from Mr. Cooke's drawing, is here shown.
+As this temple is five hundred miles from the delta of the
+Nile, it is remarkable that nearly all the fishes there represented
+are of marine species.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51_b" id="Page_51_b">[Pg 51]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_019" id="fig02_019">
+<img src="images/fig02_019.jpg" width="470" height="455" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 19.&mdash;FIGURE OF AN OCTOPUS ON A GOLD ORNAMENT, FOUND BY
+DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCEN&AElig;.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>That the octopus was a familiar object with the
+ancient Greeks, we know by the frequency with which its
+portrait is found on their coins, gems, and ornaments.
+Aldrovandus describes "very ancient coins" found at
+Syracuse and Tarentum bearing the figure of an octopus.
+He says the Syracusans had two coins, one of bronze, the
+other of gold, both of which had an octopus alone on one
+side. On the reverse of the bronze one was a veiled
+female face in profile, with the inscription [Greek: SURA]. I have one
+of these bronze Syracusan coins; it was kindly given to
+me, some years ago, by my friend, Dr. John Millar, F.L.S.
+The octopus is really well depicted. On the gold coin the
+female head was differently veiled, and at the back of the
+neck was a fish. The inscription on this coin was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52_b" id="Page_52_b">[Pg 52]</a></span>
+[Greek: SURAKOSI&Ocirc;N]. Goltzius was of the opinion that the head
+was that of Arethusa. The coins found at Tarentum had
+on one side a figure of Neptune seated on a dolphin, and
+holding an octopus in one hand and a trident in the
+other.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_020" id="fig02_020">
+<img src="images/fig02_020.jpg" width="470" height="362" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 20.&mdash;GOLDEN ORNAMENT IN FORM OF AN OCTOPUS, FOUND BY
+DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCEN&AElig;.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Lerne, or Lerna, the reputed home of the Hydra, was a
+port of Southern Greece, situated at the head of the Gulf
+of Nauplia, and between the existing towns of Argos and
+Tripolitza. Within a few miles of it was Mycen&aelig;; and it
+is remarkable that Dr. Schliemann, during his excavations
+there in 1876, found in a tomb a gold plate, or button, two
+and a half inches in diameter (Fig. 19), on which is figured an
+octopus, the eight arms of which are converted into spirals,
+the head and the two eyes being distinctly visible. In
+another sepulchre he discovered fifty-three golden models
+of the octopus (Fig. 20), all exactly alike, and apparently
+cast in the same mould. The arms are very naturally
+carved. By the kindness of Mr. Murray, his publisher, I am
+enabled to give illustrations of these and two other
+handsome ornaments.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53_b" id="Page_53_b">[Pg 53]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Having ascertained that the octopus was a familiar
+object in the very locality where the combat between
+Hercules and the Hydra is supposed to have taken place,
+let us compare the animal as it exists with the monstrous
+offspring of Typhon and Echidna.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_021" id="fig02_021">
+<img src="images/fig02_021.jpg" width="200" height="193" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 21.</span>
+</div>
+<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;">
+<a name="fig02_022" id="fig02_022">
+<img src="images/fig02_022.jpg" width="200" height="193" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 22.</span>
+</div>
+<hr class="hidden" />
+<div class="figcenter">
+<span class="caption">FIGURES OF THE OCTOPUS ON GOLD ORNAMENTS FOUND BY
+DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCEN&AElig;.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is a not uncommon occurrence that when an octopus
+is caught it is found to have one or more of its arms shorter
+than the rest, and showing marks of having been amputated,
+and of the formation of a new growth from the old cicatrix.
+Several such specimens were brought to the Brighton
+Aquarium whilst I had charge of its Natural History
+Department. One of them was particularly interesting. Two
+of its arms had evidently been bitten off about four inches
+from the base: and out from the end of each healed stump
+(which in proportion to the length of the limb was as if
+a man's arm had been amputated halfway between the
+shoulder and the elbow), grew a slender little piece of newly-formed
+arm, about as large as a lady's stiletto, or a small
+button-hook&mdash;in fact just the equivalent of worthy Captain
+Cuttle's iron hook, which did duty for his lost hand. It
+was an illustrative example of the commencement of the
+repair and restoration of mutilated limbs.</p>
+
+<p>This mutilation is so common in some localities, that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54_b" id="Page_54_b">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+Professor Steenstrup says<a name="Anchor_70_70" id="Anchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 70.">&nbsp;[70]&nbsp;</a> that almost every octopus he
+has examined has had one or two arms reproduced; and
+that he has seen females in which all the eight arms had
+been lost, but were more or less restored. He also
+mentions a male in which this was the case as to seven of its
+arms. He adds that whilst the <i>Octopoda</i> possess the power
+of reproducing with great facility and rapidity their arms,
+which are exposed to so many enemies, the <i>Decapoda</i>&mdash;the
+<i>Sepiid&aelig;</i> and Squids&mdash;appear to be incapable of thus
+repairing and replacing accidental injuries. This is
+entirely in accord with my own observations.</p>
+
+<p>This reparative power is possessed by some other animals,
+of which the starfishes and crustacea are the most familiar
+instances. In the case of the lobster or crab, however, the
+only joint from which new growth can start is that connected
+with the body, so that if a limb be injured in any
+part, the whole of it must be got rid of, and the animal has,
+therefore, the power of casting it off at will. The octopus,
+on the contrary, is incapable of voluntary dismemberment,
+but reproduces the lost portion of an injured arm, as an
+out-growth from the old stump.</p>
+
+<p>The ancients were well acquainted with this reparative
+faculty of the octopus: but of course the simple fact was
+insufficient for an imaginative people: and they therefore
+embellished it with some fancies of their own. There
+lingers still amongst the fishermen of the Mediterranean a
+very old belief that the octopus when pushed by hunger
+will gnaw and devour portions of its arms. Aristotle knew
+of this belief, and positively contradicted it; but a fallacy
+once planted is hard to eradicate. You may cut it down,
+and apparently destroy it, root and branch, but its seeds
+are scattered abroad, and spring up elsewhere, and in unexpected
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55_b" id="Page_55_b">[Pg 55]</a></span>places. Accordingly, we find Oppian, more than
+five centuries later, disseminating the same old notion, and
+comparing this habit of the animal with that of the bear
+obtaining nutriment from his paws by sucking them during
+his hybernation.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"When wintry skies o'er the black ocean frown,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And clouds hang low with ripen'd storms o'ergrown,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Close in the shelter of some vaulted cave<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The soft-skinn'd prekes<a name="Anchor_71_71" id="Anchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 71.">&nbsp;[71]&nbsp;</a> their porous bodies save.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But forc'd by want, while rougher seas they dread,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;On their own feet, necessitous, are fed.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But when returning spring serenes the skies,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Nature the growing parts anew supplies.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Again on breezy sands the roamers creep,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Twine to the rocks, or paddle in the deep.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Doubtless the God whose will commands the seas,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Whom liquid worlds and wat'ry natives please,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Has taught the fish by tedious wants opprest<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Life to preserve and be himself the feast."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The fact is, that the larger predatory fishes regard an
+octopus as very acceptable food, and there is no better
+bait for many of them than a portion of one of its arms.
+Some of the cetacea also are very fond of them, and
+whalers have often reported that when a "fish" (as they
+call it) is struck it disgorges the contents of its stomach,
+amongst which they have noticed parts of the arms of
+cuttles which, judging from the size of their limbs, must
+have been very large specimens. The food of the sperm
+whale consists largely of the gregarious squids, and
+the presence in spermaceti of their undigested beaks is
+accepted as a test of its being genuine. That old fish-reptile,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56_b" id="Page_56_b">[Pg 56]</a></span>the Ichthyosaurus, also, preyed upon them; and
+portions of the horny rings of their suckers were discovered
+in its coprolites by Dean Buckland. Amongst the worst
+enemies of the octopus is the conger. They are both rock-dwellers,
+and if the voracious fish come upon his cephalopod
+neighbour unseen, he makes a meal of him, or, failing to
+drag him from his hold, bites off as much of one or two
+of his arms as he can conveniently obtain. The conger,
+therefore, is generally the author of the injury which the
+octopus has been unfairly accused of inflicting on itself.</p>
+
+<p>Continuing our comparison with the hydra, we have in
+the octopus an animal capable of quitting its rocky lurking-place
+in the sea, and going on a buccaneering expedition
+on dry land. Many incidents have been related in connection
+with this; but I can attest it from my own observation.
+I have seen an octopus travel over the floor of a
+room at a very fair rate of speed, toppling and sprawling
+along in its own ungainly fashion; and in May, 1873, we
+had one at the Brighton Aquarium which used regularly
+every night to quit its tank, and make its way along the
+wall to another tank at some distance from it, in which
+were some young lump-fishes. Day after day, one of these
+was missing, until, at last, the marauder was discovered.
+Many days elapsed, however, before he was detected, for
+after helping himself to, and devouring a young "lump-sucker,"
+he demurely returned before daylight to his own
+quarters.</p>
+
+<p>Of this habit of the octopus the ancients were, also, fully
+aware. Aristotle wrote that it left the water and walked
+in stony places, and Pliny and &AElig;lian related tales of
+this animal stealing barrels of salt fish from the wharves,
+and crushing their staves to get at the contents. An
+octopus that could do this would be as formidable a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57_b" id="Page_57_b">[Pg 57]</a></span>
+predatory monster as the Lernean Hydra, which had the
+evil reputation of devouring the Peloponnesian cattle.</p>
+
+<p>Whoever first described the counter-attack of the Hydra
+on Hercules must have had the octopus in his thoughts. "It
+twisted itself round one of his feet"&mdash;exactly that which an
+octopus would do.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_023" id="fig02_023">
+<img src="images/fig02_023.jpg" width="470" height="475" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 23.&mdash;HERCULES SLAYING THE LERNEAN HYDRA.
+
+From Smith&#39;s &#39;Classical Dictionary.&#39;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Finally, according to the legend, Hercules dipped his
+arrow-heads in the gall of the Hydra, and, from its poisonous
+nature, all the wounds he inflicted with them upon his
+enemies proved fatal. It is worthy of notice that the
+ancients attributed to the octopus the possession of a
+similarly venomous secretion. Thus Oppian writes:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The crawling preke a deadly juice contains<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Injected poison fires the wounded veins."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The accompanying illustration (Fig. 23) of Hercules
+slaying the Hydra is taken from a marble tablet in the
+Vatican. It will be immediately seen how closely the
+Hydra, as there depicted, resembles an octopus. The body<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58_b" id="Page_58_b">[Pg 58]</a></span>
+is elongated, but the eight necks with small heads on them
+bear about the same proportion to the body as the arms to
+the body of an octopus.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend James Spence, in his 'Polymetis,' published
+in 1755, gives a figure, almost the counterpart of this,
+copied from an antique gem, a carnelian, in the collection of
+the Grand Duke of Tuscany at Florence. Only seven
+necks of the hydra are, however, there visible, and there
+are two coils in the elongated body. On the upper part
+are two spots which have been supposed to represent
+breasts. This was probably intended by the artificer; but
+that the idea originated from a duplication of the syphon
+tube is evident from the figures (Figs. 21, 22) of the octopus
+on the smaller gold ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at
+Mycen&aelig;. In the same work is also an engraving from a
+picture in the Vatican Virgil, entitled 'The River, or
+Hateful Passage into the Kingdom of Ades,' wherein an
+octopus-hydra, of which only six heads and necks are
+shown, is one of the monsters called by the author "Terrors
+of the Imagination."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59_b" id="Page_59_b">[Pg 59]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="SCYLLA_AND_CHARYBDIS" id="SCYLLA_AND_CHARYBDIS"></a>SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS.</h2>
+
+
+<p>In the description given by Homer, in the twelfth book of
+the 'Odyssey,' of the unfortunate nymph Scylla, transformed
+by the arts of Circe into a frightful monster, the same
+typical idea as in the case of the Hydra is perceptible. The
+lurking octopus, having its lair in the cranny of a rock,
+watching in ambush for passing prey, seizing anything
+coming within its reach with one or more of its prehensile
+arms, even brandishing these fear-inspiring weapons out of
+water in a threatening manner, and known in some localities
+to be dangerous to boats and their occupants, is transformed
+into a many-headed sea monster, seizing in its
+mouths, instead of by the adhesive suckers of its numerous
+arms, the helpless sailors from passing vessels, and devouring
+them in the abysses of its cavernous den.</p>
+
+<p>Circe, prophesying to Ulysses the dangers he had still to
+encounter, warned him especially of Scylla and Charybdis,
+within the power of one of whom he must fall in passing
+through the narrow strait (between Italy and Sicily) where
+they had their horrid abode. Describing the lofty rock of
+Scylla, she tells him:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Full in the centre of this rock displayed<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;A yawning cavern casts a dreadful shade,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Nor the fleet arrow from the twanging bow<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Sent with full force, could reach the depth below.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Wide to the west the horrid gulf extends,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And the dire passage down to hell descends.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60_b" id="Page_60_b">[Pg 60]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;O fly the dreadful sight! expand thy sails,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Ply the strong oar, and catch the nimble gales;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Here Scylla bellows from her dire abodes;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Tremendous pest! abhorred by man and gods!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Hideous her voice, and with less terrors roar<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The whelps of lions in the midnight hour.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Twelve feet deformed and foul the fiend dispreads;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Six horrid necks she rears, and six terrific heads;<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br />
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When stung with hunger she embroils the flood,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The sea-dog and the dolphin are her food;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;She makes the huge leviathan her prey,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And all the monsters of the wat'ry way;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The swiftest racer of the azure plain<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Here fills her sails and spreads her oars in vain;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Fell Scylla rises, in her fury roars,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;At once six mouths expands, at once six men devours."<a name="Anchor_72_72" id="Anchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 72.">&nbsp;[72]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Circe then describes the perils of the whirling waters of
+Charybdis as still more dreadful; and, admonishing Ulysses
+that once in her power all must perish, she advises him to
+choose the lesser of the two evils, and to</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">"shun the horrid gulf, by Scylla fly;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Tis better six to lose than all to die."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Ulysses continues his voyage; and as his ship enters the
+ominous strait,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Struck with despair, with trembling hearts we viewed<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The yawning dungeon, and the tumbling flood;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When, lo! fierce Scylla stooped to seize her prey,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Stretched her dire jaws, and swept six men away.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Chiefs of renown! loud echoing shrieks arise;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;I turn, and view them quivering in the skies;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;They call, and aid, with outstretched arms, implore,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;In vain they call! those arms are stretched no more.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;As from some rock that overhangs the flood,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The silent fisher casts th' insidious food;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61_b" id="Page_61_b">[Pg 61]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;With fraudful care he waits the finny prize,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And sudden lifts it quivering to the skies;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;So the foul monster lifts her prey on high,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;So pant the wretches, struggling in the sky;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;In the wide dungeon she devours her food,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And the flesh trembles while she churns the blood."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62_b" id="Page_62_b">[Pg 62]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_SPOUTING_OF_WHALES" id="THE_SPOUTING_OF_WHALES"></a>THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES.</h2>
+
+
+<p>One of the sea-fallacies still generally believed, and accepted
+as true, is that whales take in water by the mouth, and
+eject it from the spiracle, or blow-hole.</p>
+
+<p>The popular ideas on this subject are still those which
+existed hundreds of years ago, and which are expressed by
+Oppian in two passages in his 'Halieutics':</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Uncouth the sight when they in dreadful play<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Discharge their nostrils and refund a sea,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>and</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"While noisy fin-fish let their fountains fly<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And spout the curling torrent to the sky."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Eminent zoologists and intelligent observers, who have
+had full opportunities of obtaining practical knowledge of
+the habits of these great marine mammals, have forcibly
+combated and repeatedly contradicted this erroneous idea;
+but their sensible remarks have been read by few, in comparison
+with the numbers of those to whom a wrong impression
+has been conveyed by sensational pictures in which
+whales are represented <i>with their heads above the surface</i>,
+and throwing up from their nostrils columns of water, like
+the fountains in Trafalgar Square. One can hardly be
+surprised that the old writers on Natural History were unacquainted
+with the real composition of the whale's "spout."
+Those of them who sought for any original information on
+marine zoology, obtained it chiefly from uninstructed and
+superstitious fishermen; but they generally contented<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63_b" id="Page_63_b">[Pg 63]</a></span>
+themselves with diligent compilation, and thus copied and
+transmitted the errors of their predecessors, with the
+addition of some slight embellishments of their own. Accordingly,
+we find Olaus Magnus<a name="Anchor_73_73" id="Anchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 73.">&nbsp;[73]&nbsp;</a> describing, as follows,
+the <i>Physeter</i>, or, as his translator, Streater, calls it, the
+<i>Whirlpool</i>. "The <i>Physeter</i> or <i>Pristis</i>," he says, "is a kind
+of whale, two hundred cubits long, and is very cruel. For,
+to the danger of seamen, he will sometimes raise himself
+above the sail-yards, and casts such floods of waters above
+his head, which he had sucked in, that with a cloud of them
+he will often sink the strongest ships, or expose the mariners
+to extreme danger. This beast hath also a large round
+mouth, like a lamprey, whereby he sucks in his meat or
+water, and by his weight cast upon the fore or hinder deck,
+he sinks and drowns a ship."</p>
+
+<p>Figures 24 and 25 (p. 64) are facsimiles of the illustrations
+which accompany the above description. It will be seen
+that, in the first, the <i>Physeter</i> is depicted as uprearing a
+maned neck and head, like that of a fabled dragon; whilst
+in <a href="#fig02_025">Fig. 25</a> it is shown as a whale flinging itself on board a
+ship, which is sinking under its ponderous weight. In
+both, torrents of water are issuing from its head, and it is
+evident that they are merely exaggerated misrepresentations
+of the "spouting" of whales.</p>
+
+<p>Gesner copies many of Olaus Magnus's illustrations, and
+improves upon Fig. 25 by putting a numerous crew on
+board the ship. The unfortunate sailors are depicted in
+every attitude of terror and despair, and seem to be incapacitated
+from any attempt to save themselves by the
+flood of water which the whale is deliberately pouring upon
+them from its blow-holes.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64_b" id="Page_64_b">[Pg 64]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_024" id="fig02_024">
+<img src="images/fig02_024.jpg" width="470" height="295" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 24.&mdash;THE PHYSETER INUNDATING A SHIP. After Olaus Magnus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_025" id="fig02_025">
+<img src="images/fig02_025.jpg" width="470" height="295" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 25.&mdash;A WHALE POURING WATER INTO A SHIP FROM ITS BLOW-HOLE.
+After Olaus Magnus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 520px;">
+<a name="fig02_026" id="fig02_026">
+<img src="images/fig02_026.jpg" width="520" height="368" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 26&mdash;SPERM WHALES SPOUTING.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>These old pictures appear, no doubt, ridiculous, but they
+are, really, very little more absurd and untrue to nature
+than many of those which disfigure some otherwise useful
+books on Natural History of the present day. I could<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65_b" id="Page_65_b">[Pg 65]</a></span>
+refer to several, in which whales are represented as spouting
+from their blow-holes one or more columns of water, which,
+after ascending skyward to a considerable distance, fall
+over gracefully as if issuing from the nozzle of an ornamental
+fountain. I select one from amongst them (Fig. 26), not with
+any disrespect for the artist, author, or publisher of the work<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66_b" id="Page_66_b">[Pg 66]</a></span>
+from which it is taken, but because, whilst it shows correctly
+the position of the blow-hole of the sperm whale, it also exhibits
+exactly that which I wish to confute. The publishers
+of the valuable work in which this picture appeared have
+generously consented to my reproducing it here.</p>
+
+<p>When, in describing, in 1877, the White Whale then exhibited
+at the Westminster Aquarium, I said that whales
+do not spout water out of their blow-holes, and that the
+idea that they do so is a popular error, the statement was
+so contrary to generally-accepted notions that I was not
+surprised by receiving more than one letter on the subject.
+One very reasonable suggestion made to me was that,
+although the lesser whales, such as the porpoises, which I
+had had opportunities of watching in confinement at
+Brighton for two years, and the <i>Beluga</i>, which had been
+observed for a similar period at the New York Aquarium,
+and also at Westminster, did not "spout," the respiratory
+apparatus of the larger whales might be so modified as to
+permit them to do so. Let us consider the construction of
+the breathing apparatus which would have to be thus
+modified, as shown in the porpoise.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, there is a pair of lungs as perfect as
+those of any land mammal, fitted to receive air, and to
+bring the hot blood into contact with the air, that it may
+absorb the oxygen of the air, and so be purified. But this
+air cannot well be breathed through the mouth of an
+animal which has to take its food from and in water; so it
+has to be inhaled only by the nostrils. If these were
+situated as they are in land mammals, near the extremity
+of the nose, the porpoise would be obliged to stop when
+pursuing its prey, or, escaping from its enemies, to put the
+tip of its nose above the surface of the water every time it
+required to breathe. A much more convenient arrangement<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67_b" id="Page_67_b">[Pg 67]</a></span>
+has, therefore, been provided for it, and for almost all
+whales, by which that difficulty is removed. Instead of
+running along the bones of the nose, the nostrils are placed
+on the top of the head, and the windpipe is turned up to
+them without having any connection with the palate. The
+upper jaw is quite solid. Thus the mouth is solely devoted
+to the reception of food, and the animal is enabled to continue
+its course when swimming, however rapidly, by rising
+obliquely to the surface, and exposing the top of its head
+above it. On the blow-hole being opened, the air, from
+which the oxygen has been absorbed, is expelled in a
+sudden puff, another supply is instantaneously inhaled, and
+rushes into the lungs with extreme velocity, and then the
+porpoise can either descend into the depths, or remain with
+its spiracle exposed to the air, as it may prefer. In this
+act of breathing the spiracle is normally brought above the
+water, the breath escapes, and the immediate inhalation is
+effected almost in silence. But frequently, and in some
+whales habitually, the blow-hole is opened just below the
+surface, and then the outrush of air causes a splash upwards
+of the water overlying it.</p>
+
+<p>I may here mention that I have frequently seen the
+porpoises at the Brighton Aquarium lying asleep at the
+surface, with the blow-hole exposed above it, breathing
+automatically, and without conscious effort. Aristotle was
+acquainted with this habit of the cetacea 2,200 years ago,
+for he wrote: "They sleep with the blow-hole, their organ
+of respiration, elevated above the water."</p>
+
+<p>The apparatus for closing the blow-hole, so that not a
+drop of water shall enter the windpipe, even under great
+pressure, is a beautiful contrivance, complex in its structure,
+yet most simple in its working. The external aperture is
+covered by a continuation of the skin, locally thickened, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68_b" id="Page_68_b">[Pg 68]</a></span>
+connected with a conical stopper, of a texture as tough as
+india-rubber, which fits perfectly into a cone or funnel
+formed by the extremity of the windpipe, and closes more
+and more firmly as the pressure upon it is increased.
+Whilst the orifice is thus guarded, the lower end of the
+tube is surrounded by a strong compressing muscle, which
+clasps also the glottis, and thus the passage from the blow-hole
+to the lungs is completely stopped.</p>
+
+<p>There is nothing in this which indicates the possibility of
+the spouting of water from the nostrils; but as assertions
+that water had been seen to issue from them were positive
+and persistent, anatomists seem to have felt themselves
+obliged to try to account for it somehow. Accordingly
+the theory was propounded by F. Cuvier that the water
+taken into the mouth is reserved in two pouches (one on
+each side), until the whale rises to blow, when, the gullet
+being closed, it is forced by the action of the tongue and
+jaws through the nasal passages, somewhat as a smoker
+occasionally expels the smoke of his cigar through his
+nostrils. Although these pouches, or sacs analogous to
+them, are found at the base of the nostrils of the horse,
+tapir, etc.,&mdash;animals which do not "spout" from the nostrils
+water taken in by the mouth&mdash;the explanation was accepted
+for a time.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Bell held this opinion when the first edition of his
+'British Quadrupeds' was published in 1837, but before
+the issue of the second edition, in 1874, he had found
+reasons for taking a different view of the matter; and,
+under the advice of his judicious editors, Mr. Alston, and
+Professor Flower (the latter of whom supervised the proofs
+of the chapters on the Cetacea) his sanction of the illusion
+was withdrawn as follows:&mdash;"The results of more recent
+and careful observations, amongst which we may notice<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69_b" id="Page_69_b">[Pg 69]</a></span>
+those of Bennett, Von Baer, Sars and Burmeister, are directly
+opposed to the statement that water is thus ejected; and
+there can now be no doubt that the appearance which has
+given rise to the idea is caused by the moisture with which
+the expelled breath is supercharged, which condenses at
+once in the cold outer air, and forms a cloud or column of
+white vapour. It is possible indeed that if the animal
+begins to 'blow' before its head is actually at the surface,
+the force of the rushing air may drive up some little spray
+along with it, but this is quite different from the notion that
+water is really expelled from the nasal passages. We may
+add that on the only occasion when we ourselves witnessed
+the 'spouting' of a large whale we were much struck with
+its resemblance to the column of white spray which is
+dashed up by the ricochetting ball fired from one of the
+great guns of a man-of-war."</p>
+
+<p>The simile is admirable, and nothing could better describe
+the appearance of a whale's "spout"; but, in the previous
+portion of the passage (except with reference to the sperm
+whale, the nostrils of which are not on the top of the head),
+I think sufficient importance is not conceded to the volume
+of water propelled into the air by the outrush of breath
+from the submerged blow-hole. I do not know how many
+cubic feet of air the lungs of a great whale are capable of
+containing, but the quantity is sufficient to force up to a
+height of several feet the water above the valve when the
+latter is opened, not only in "some little spray," but, for some
+distance in a good solid jet&mdash;enough, in fact, to give the
+appearance of its actually issuing from the blow-hole, and
+to account for the erroneous belief of sailors that it does so.
+It must be remembered that the escape of air is not by a
+prolonged wheeze, but by a sudden blast, and thus when
+the spiracle is opened just beneath the surface, an instant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70_b" id="Page_70_b">[Pg 70]</a></span>
+before it is uncovered to take in a fresh supply of air, the
+water above its orifice is thrown up as by a slight subaqueous
+explosion, or as by the momentary opening under
+water of the safety-valve of a steam boiler. Some idea of
+the force and volume of the blast of air from the lungs of
+even the common porpoise may be formed when I mention
+that one of the porpoises at the Brighton Aquarium,
+happening to open its spiracle just beneath an illuminating
+gas jet fixed over its tank, blew out the light.</p>
+
+<p>In the sperm whale the nostrils are placed near the
+extremity of the nose, and therefore this whale has to raise
+its snout above the surface when it requires to breathe;
+but instead of this being necessary, as in the case of the
+porpoise twice or thrice in a minute, the sperm whale only
+rises to "blow" at intervals of from an hour to an hour and
+twenty minutes. Mr. Beale says<a name="Anchor_74_74" id="Anchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 74.">&nbsp;[74]&nbsp;</a> that in a large bull sperm
+whale the time consumed in making one expiration and one
+inspiration is ten seconds, during six of which the nostril is
+beneath the surface of the water&mdash;the expiration occupying
+three seconds, and the inspiration one second. At each
+breathing time this whale makes from sixty to seventy
+expirations, and remains, therefore, at the surface ten or
+eleven minutes, and then, raising its tail, it descends
+perpendicularly, head first. In different individuals the
+time required for performing these several acts varies; but
+in each they are minutely regular, and this well-known
+regularity is of considerable use to the fishers, for when a
+whaler has once noticed the periods of any particular whale
+which is not alarmed, he knows to a minute when to expect
+it to come to the surface, and how long it will remain there.
+The "spout" of the sperm whale differs much from that of
+other whales. Unlike, for instance, the straight perpendicular<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71_b" id="Page_71_b">[Pg 71]</a></span>
+twin jets of the "right whale," the single, forward-slanting
+"spout" of the sperm whale presents a thick curled
+bush of white mist. Each whale has a different mode and
+time of breathing, and the form of the "spout" differs
+accordingly.</p>
+
+<p>It is said that the blowing of the <i>Beluga</i>, or "White
+Whale," is not unmusical at sea, and that when it takes
+place under water it often makes a peculiar sound which
+might be mistaken for the whistling of a bird. Hence is
+derived one of the names given to this whale by sailors&mdash;the
+"Sea-canary." Though I have had opportunities of
+attentively watching the breathing and other actions in
+captivity of two specimens of this whale I have never been
+able to detect the sound alluded to.</p>
+
+<p>Besides the opinions cited by Mr. Bell concerning whales
+spouting water from their blow-holes, we have other
+evidence which is most clear and definite, and which ought
+to be convincing.</p>
+
+<p>We will take first that of Mr. Beale, who as surgeon on
+board the "Kent" and "Sarah and Elizabeth," South Sea
+whalers, passed several seasons amongst sperm whales.
+He says:&mdash;"I can truly say when I find myself in opposition
+to these old and received notions, that out of the
+thousands of sperm whales which I have seen during my
+wanderings in the South and North Pacific Oceans, I have
+never observed one of them to eject a column of water from
+the nostril. I have seen them at a distance, and I have
+been within a few yards of several hundreds of them, and
+I never saw water pass from the spout-hole. But the
+column of thick and dense vapour which is certainly
+ejected is exceedingly likely to mislead the judgment of
+the casual observer in these matters; and this column does
+indeed appear very much like a jet of water when seen at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72_b" id="Page_72_b">[Pg 72]</a></span>
+the distance of one or two miles on a clear day, because of
+the condensation of the vapour which takes place the
+moment it escapes from the nostril, and its consequent
+opacity, which makes it appear of a white colour, and
+which is not observed when the whale is close to the spectator.
+It then appears only like a jet of white steam.
+The only water in addition is the small quantity that may
+be lodged in the external fissure of the spout hole, when
+the animal raises it above the surface to breathe, and which
+is blown up into the air with the 'spout,' and may probably
+assist in condensing the vapour of which it is
+formed.... I have been also very close to the <i>Bal&aelig;na
+mysticetus</i> (the Greenland, or Right whale) when it has been
+feeding and breathing, and yet I never saw even that
+animal differ in the latter respect from the sperm whale in
+the nature of the spout.... If the weather is fine and
+clear, and there is a gentle breeze at the time, the spout
+may be seen from the masthead of a moderate-sized vessel
+at the distance of four or five miles."</p>
+
+<p>Captain Scoresby, who was a veteran and successful
+whaler, a good zoologist, and a highly intelligent observer,
+says:&mdash;"A moist vapour mixed with mucus is discharged
+from the nostrils when the animal breathes; but no water
+accompanies it unless an expiration of the breath be made
+under the surface."</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Robert Brown, who communicated to the Zoological
+Society, in May, 1868, a valuable series of observations on
+the mammals of Greenland, made during his voyages to the
+Spitzbergen, Iceland, and Jan Mayen Seas, and along the
+eastern and western shores of Davis's Strait and Baffin's
+Bay to near the mouth of Smith's Sound, remarks, in a
+chapter on the Right whale (<i>Bal&aelig;na mysticetus</i>):&mdash;"The
+'blowing,' so familiar a feature of the <i>Cetacea</i>, but especially<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73_b" id="Page_73_b">[Pg 73]</a></span>
+of the <i>Mysticetus</i> is, quite analogous to the breathing
+of the higher mammals, and the blow-holes are the homologues
+of the nostrils. It is most erroneously stated that
+the whale ejects water from the blow-holes. I have been
+many times only a few feet from a whale when 'blowing,'
+and, though purposely observing it, could never see that it
+ejected from its nostrils anything but the ordinary breath&mdash;a
+fact which might almost have been deduced from analogy.
+In the cold arctic air this breath is generally condensed, and
+falls upon those close at hand in the form of a dense spray
+which may have led seamen to suppose that this vapour
+was originally ejected in the form of water. Occasionally,
+when the whale blows just as it is rising out of or sinking in
+the sea, a little of the superincumbent water may be forced
+upwards by the column of breath. When the whale is
+wounded in the lungs, or in any of the blood-vessels immediately
+supplying them, blood, as might be expected, is
+ejected in the death-throes along with the breath. When
+the whaleman sees his prey 'spouting red,' he concludes
+that its end is not far distant; it is then mortally wounded."</p>
+
+<p>Captain F. C. Hall, the commander of the unfortunate
+"Polaris" Expedition, thus describes, in his 'Life with the
+Esquimaux,' the spout of a whale:&mdash;"What this blowing is
+like," he says, "may be described by asking if the reader
+has ever seen the smoke produced by the firing of an old-fashioned
+flint-lock. If so, then he may understand the
+'blow' of a whale&mdash;a flash in the pan and all is over."</p>
+
+<p>Captain Scammon, an experienced American whaling
+captain, who, like Scoresby, could wield well both harpoon
+and pen, in his fine work on 'The Marine Mammals of the
+North-Western Coast of America,' writes to the same
+effect.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Herman Melville, who is not a naturalist, but
+has served before the mast in a sperm-whaler and borne<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74_b" id="Page_74_b">[Pg 74]</a></span>
+his part in all the hardships and dangers of the chase,
+writes, in his remarkable book, 'The Whale':&mdash;"As for
+this 'whale-spout' you might almost stand in it, and yet be
+undecided as to what it is precisely. Nor is it at all prudent
+for the hunter to be over curious respecting it. For, even
+when coming into slight contact with the outer vapoury
+shreds of the jet, which will often happen, your skin will
+feverishly smart from the acrimony of the thing so touching
+you. And I know one who, coming into still closer
+contact with the spout&mdash;whether with some scientific
+object in view or otherwise I cannot say&mdash;the skin peeled
+off from his cheek and arm. Wherefore, among whalemen,
+the spout is deemed poisonous; they try to evade it. I
+have heard it said, and I do not much doubt it, that if the
+jet were fairly spouted into your eyes it would blind you."</p>
+
+<p>The only other eye-witness I will cite is Mr. Bartlett, of
+the Zoological Gardens, whose experience and accuracy as
+an observer of the habits of animals is unsurpassed. He
+spent an autumn holiday in accompanying the late Mr.
+Frank Buckland and his colleagues, Messrs. Walpole and
+Young, in a tour of inquiry into the condition of the
+herring fishery in Scotland. When the commissioners
+left Peterhead, he remained there for a few days as the
+guest of Captain David Gray, of the steam whaler,
+"Eclipse," and as it was reported that large whales had
+been seen in the offing, his host invited him to go in search
+of them, and pay them a visit in his steam-launch. When
+about twelve miles out, they saw the whales, which were
+"finners," at a distance of four or five miles. Fourteen
+were counted&mdash;all large ones&mdash;some of which were seventy
+feet in length. On approaching them the captain shut off
+steam, and the launch was allowed to float in amongst
+them. So close were they to the boat that it would not
+have been difficult to jump upon the back of one of them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75_b" id="Page_75_b">[Pg 75]</a></span>
+had that been desirable. Mr. Bartlett tells me that he was
+greatly astonished by the immense force of the sudden outrush
+of air from their blow-holes, and the noise by which it
+was accompanied. He believes that the blast was strong
+enough to blow a man off the spiracle if he were seated on
+it. He authorizes me to say that having seen and watched
+these whales under such favourable circumstances, he
+entirely agrees with all that I have here written concerning
+the so-called "spout." The volume of hot, vaporous breath
+expelled is enormous, and this is accompanied by no small
+quantity of water, forced up by it when the blow-hole is
+opened below the surface.</p>
+
+<p>An effect similar in appearance to the whale's spout is
+produced by the breathing of the hippopotamus. When
+this great beast opens its nostrils beneath the surface,
+water and spray are driven and scattered upward by the
+force of the air, but, of course, do not issue from the nasal
+passages. I have, also, seen this effect produced, though
+in a less degree, by the breathing of sea-lions.</p>
+
+<p>I repeat, therefore, that not a drop of sea-water enters or
+passes out of the blow-hole of a whale. If the spiracle
+valve were in a condition to allow it to do so the animal
+would soon be drowned. Everyone knows the extreme
+irritation and the horrible feeling of suffocation caused to
+a human being, whilst eating or drinking, by a crumb or a
+little liquid "going the wrong way"&mdash;that is, being accidentally
+drawn to the air-passages instead of passing to the
+&oelig;sophagus. If water were to enter the bronchi of a whale
+it would instantly produce similar discomfort.</p>
+
+<p>The neck of a popular error is hard to break; but it is
+time that one so palpable as that concerning the "spouting"
+of whales should cease to be promulgated and disseminated
+by fanciful illustrations of instructive books.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76_b" id="Page_76_b">[Pg 76]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_SAILING_OF_THE_NAUTILUS" id="THE_SAILING_OF_THE_NAUTILUS"></a>THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS.</h2>
+
+
+<p>One of the prettiest fables of the sea is that relating to the
+Paper Nautilus, the constructor and inhabitant of the
+delicate and beautiful shell which looks as if it were made
+of ivory no thicker than a sheet of writing paper.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_027" id="fig02_027">
+<img src="images/fig02_027.jpg" width="470" height="482" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 27.&mdash;THE PAPER NAUTILUS (Argonauta argo) SAILING.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is an old belief that in calm weather it rises from the
+bottom of the sea, and, elevating its two broadly-expanded
+arms, spreads to the gentle air, as a sail, the membrane,
+light as a spider's web, by which they are united; and that,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77_b" id="Page_77_b">[Pg 77]</a></span>
+seated in its boat-like shell, it thus floats over the smooth
+surface of the ocean, steering and paddling with its other
+arms. Should storm arise or danger threaten, its masts
+and sail are lowered, its oars laid in, and the frail craft,
+filling with water, sinks gently beneath the waves.</p>
+
+<p>When and where this picturesque idea originated I am
+unable to discover. It dates far back beyond the range
+of history; for Aristotle mentions it, and, unfortunately,
+sanctioned it. With the weight of his honoured name in
+its favour, this fallacy has maintained its place in popular
+belief, even to our own times; for the mantle of the great
+father of natural history, who was generally so marvellously
+correct, fell on none of his successors; Pliny, and &AElig;lian,
+and the tribe of compilers who succeeded them, having been
+more concerned to make their histories sensational than to
+verify their statements.</p>
+
+<p>Naturally, the Paper Nautilus has been the subject of many
+a poet's verses. Oppian wrote of it in his 'Halieutics':&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Sail-fish in secret, silent deeps reside,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;In shape and nature to the preke<a name="Anchor_75_75" id="Anchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 75.">&nbsp;[75]&nbsp;</a> allied;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Close in their concave shells their bodies wrap,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Avoid the waves and every storm escape.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But not to mirksome depths alone confined;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When pleasing calms have stilled the sighing wind,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Curious to know what seas above contain,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;They leave the dark recesses of the main;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Now, wanton, to the changing surface haste,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;View clearer skies, and the pure welkin taste.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But slow they, cautious, rise, and, prudent, fear<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The upper region of the watery sphere;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Backward they mount, and as the stream o'erflows,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Their convex shells to pressing floods oppose.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Conscious, they know that, should they forward move,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;O'erwhelming waves would sink them from above,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78_b" id="Page_78_b">[Pg 78]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Fill the void space, and with the rushing weight,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Force down th' inconstants to their former seat.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When, first arrived, they feel the stronger blast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;They lie supine and skim the liquid waste.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The natural barks out-do all human art<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When skilful floaters play the sailor's part.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Two feet they upward raise, and steady keep;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;These are the masts and rigging of the ship:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;A membrane stretch'd between supplies the sail,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Bends from the masts, and swells before the gale.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Two other feet hang paddling on each side,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And serve for oars to row and helm to guide.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;'Tis thus they sail, pleased with the wanton game,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The fish, the sailor, and the ship, the same.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But when the swimmers dread some dangers near<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The sportive pleasure yields to stronger fear.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;No more they, wanton, drive before the blasts,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;But strike the sails, and bring down all the masts;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The rolling waves their sinking shells o'erflow,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And dash them down again to sands below."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Montgomery also thus exquisitely paraphrases the same
+idea in his 'Pelican Island':&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Light as a flake of foam upon the wind,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Keel upwards, from the deep emerged a shell,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Shaped like the moon ere half her orb is filled.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And moved at will along the yielding water.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The native pilot of this little bark<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Put out a tier of oars on either side,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And mounted up, and glided down, the billows<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;In happy freedom, pleased to feel the air,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And wander in the luxury of light."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Byron mentions the Nautilus in his 'Mutiny of the
+Bounty' as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The tender Nautilus, who steers his prow,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The sea-born sailor of his shell canoe,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The ocean Mab&mdash;the fairy of the sea,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Seems far less fragile, and alas! more free.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79_b" id="Page_79_b">[Pg 79]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;He, when the lightning-winged tornadoes sweep<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;The surge, is safe: his port is in the deep;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And triumphs o'er the armadas of mankind<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Which shake the world, yet crumble in the wind."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The very names by which this animal is known to the
+science which some persons erroneously think must be so
+hard and dry are poetic. In Aristotle's day it was called
+the <i>Nautilus</i> or <i>Nauticus</i>, "the mariner," and though two
+thousand two hundred years have passed since the great
+master wrote, the name still clings to it. As the Pearly
+Nautilus, a very different animal, also bears that name,
+Gualtieri perceived the necessity of distinguishing the Paper
+Nautilus from it, and was followed by Linn&aelig;us, who therefore
+entitled the genus to which the latter belongs,
+<i>Argonauta</i>, after the ship <i>Argo</i>, in which Jason and his
+companions sailed to Colchis to carry off the "Golden
+Fleece" suspended there in the temple of Mars, and
+guarded by brazen-hoofed bulls, whose nostrils breathed
+out fire and death, and by a watchful dragon that never
+slept. According to the Greek legend, the <i>Argo</i> was
+named after its builder Argus, the son of Danaus, and was
+the first ship that ever was built. Oppian ('Halieutics,'
+book I.) expresses his opinion that the Nautilus served as
+a model for the man who first conceived the idea of constructing
+a ship, and embarking on the waters:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Ye Powers! when man first felled the stately trees,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And passed to distant shores on wafting seas,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Whether some god inspired the wondrous thought,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Or chance found out, or careful study sought;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;If humble guess may probably divine,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And trace th' improvement to the first design,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Some wight of prying search, who wond'ring stood<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;When softer gales had smoothed the dimpled flood,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Observed these careless swimmers floating move,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And how each blast the easy sailor drove;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80_b" id="Page_80_b">[Pg 80]</a></span><br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Hence took the hint, hence formed th' imperfect draught,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;And ship-like fish the future seaman taught.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Then mortals tried the shelving hull to slope,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;To raise the mast, and twist the stronger rope,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;To fix the yards, let fly the crowded sails,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Sweep through the curling waves, and court auspicious gales."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Pope, too, in his 'Essay on Man' (Ep. 3), adopted the
+idea in his exhortation&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Learn of the little Nautilus to sail,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Poetry, like the wizard's spell, can make</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"A nutshell seem a gilded barge,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;A sheeling seem a palace large,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>but the equally enchanting wand of science is able by a
+touch to dispel the illusion, and cause the object to appear
+in its true proportions. So with the fiction of the "Paper
+Sailor."</p>
+
+<p>I have elsewhere described the affinities of the Nautili
+and their place in nature, therefore it will only be necessary
+for me here to allude to these very briefly, to explain the
+great and essential difference that exists between the two
+kinds of Nautilus which are popularly regarded as being
+one and the same animal.</p>
+
+<p>The <i>Pearly</i> Nautilus (<i>Nautilus pompilius</i>) and the
+Argonaut, which from having a fragile shell of somewhat
+similar external form is called the <i>Paper</i> Nautilus, both
+belong to that great primary group of animals known as
+the <i>Mollusca</i>, and to the class of it called the <i>Cephalopoda</i>,
+from their having their head in the middle of that which is
+the foot in other mollusks. In the Cephalopoda the foot is
+split or divided into eight segments in some families, and
+in others into ten segments, which radiate from the central
+head, like so many rays. These rays are not only used as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81_b" id="Page_81_b">[Pg 81]</a></span>
+feet, but, being highly flexible, are adapted for employment
+also as prehensile arms, with which their owner captures
+its prey, and they are rendered more perfect for this purpose
+by being furnished with suckers which hold firmly to any
+surface to which they are applied. The Cephalopods
+which have the foot divided into ten of these segments or
+arms are called the <i>Decapoda</i>, those which have only eight
+of them are called the <i>Octopoda</i>. All of these have <i>two</i>
+plume-like gills&mdash;one on each side&mdash;and so are called
+<i>Dibranchiata</i>; and in the eight-armed section of these is the
+argonaut or Paper Nautilus. Of the Pearly Nautilus and
+the four-gilled order I shall have more to say by-and-by:
+at present we will follow the history of the argonaut.</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 220px;">
+<a name="fig02_028" id="fig02_028">
+<img src="images/fig02_028.jpg" width="220" height="162" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 28&mdash;THE PAPER NAUTILUS
+(Argonauta argo) RETRACTED
+WITHIN ITS SHELL.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Notwithstanding all that has
+been written of it, it is only
+within the last fifty years
+that this has been correctly
+understood. An eight-armed
+cuttle was recognised and named
+<i>Ocythoe</i>, which, instead of having,
+like the common octopus,
+all of its eight arms thong-like
+and tapering to a point, had
+the two dorsal limbs flattened into a broad thin membrane.
+Although this animal was sometimes seen dead
+without any covering, it was generally found contained in
+a thin and slightly elastic univalve shell of graceful form,
+and bearing some resemblance to an elegantly shaped boat.
+It did not penetrate to the bottom of this shell; it was not
+attached to it by any muscular ligament, nor was the shell
+moulded on its body, nor apparently made to fit it. Hence
+it was long regarded as doubtful, and even by naturalists so
+recent and eminent as Dumeril and De Blainville, whether<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82_b" id="Page_82_b">[Pg 82]</a></span>
+the octopod really secreted the shell, or whether, like the
+hermit-crab, it borrowed for its protection the shell of some
+other mollusk. Aristotle left the subject with the faithful
+acknowledgment: "As to the origin and growth of this
+shell nothing is yet exactly determined. It appears to be
+produced like other shells; but even this is not evident,
+any more than it is whether the animal can live without it."
+Pliny, as usual, instead of throwing light on the matter,
+obscured it. He regarded the shell as the property of a
+gasteropod like the snail, and the octopod as an amateur
+yachtsman who occasionally went on board and took a trip
+in the frail craft, and assisted its owner to navigate it for the
+fun of the thing. This is what he says about it<a name="Anchor_76_76" id="Anchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 76.">&nbsp;[76]&nbsp;</a>:
+"Mutianus reports that he saw in the Propontis a shell
+formed like a little ship, having the poop turned up and
+the prow pointed. An animal called the <i>Nauplius</i>, resembling
+an octopus, was enclosed in the shell with its
+owner, for its amusement in the following manner. When
+the sea is calm the guest lowers his arms, and uses them as
+oars and a helm, whilst the owner of the shell expands
+himself to catch the wind; so that one has the pleasure of
+carrying and sailing, and the other of steering. Thus, these
+two otherwise senseless animals take their pleasure together;
+but the meeting them sailing in their shell is a bad omen
+for mariners, and foretells some great calamity."</p>
+
+<p>Although the animal was never found in any other shell, and
+the shell was never known to contain any other animal, and
+though, when the shell and the animal were found together
+they were always of proportionate size, this octopod, as I have
+said, was looked upon by some conchologists as a pirate who
+had taken possession of a ship which did not belong to him,
+until Madame Jeannette Power, a French lady then
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83_b" id="Page_83_b">[Pg 83]</a></span>residing in Messina, having succeeded in keeping alive for a
+time an argonaut the shell of which had been broken in its
+capture, discovered that the animal quickly repaired the
+fracture, and reproduced the portions that had been broken
+off. Induced by this to make further experiments, she
+kept a number of living argonauts in cages sunk in the
+sea near the citadel of Messina, and in 1836 laid before
+the "Academy" at Catania the following results of her
+observations of them:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>1st. That the argonaut constructs the shell which it
+inhabits.</p>
+
+<p>2nd. That it quits the egg entirely naked, and forms the
+shell after its birth.</p>
+
+<p>3rd. That it can repair its shell, if necessary, by a fresh
+deposit of material having the same chemical composition
+as its original shell.</p>
+
+<p>4th. That this material is secreted by the palmate, or
+sail, arms, and is laid on the outside of the shell, to the
+exterior of which these membranous arms are closely
+applied.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Power was mistaken on two points. Firstly,
+the construction of the shell does not commence after the
+birth of the animal, but, as has been shown by M.
+Duvernoy, its rudimentary form is distinctly visible by the
+aid of the microscope in the embryo, whilst still in the
+egg; and secondly, she continued to believe in the use of
+the membranous arms as sails, and of the others as oars.
+This fallacy was exploded by Captain Sander Rang, an
+officer of the French navy, and "port-captain" at Algiers,
+who carefully followed up Madame Power's experiments,
+and confirmed the more important of them. Thus were
+set at rest questions which for centuries had divided the
+opinions of zoologists.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84_b" id="Page_84_b">[Pg 84]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The "Paper Nautilus" is, in fact, a female octopod
+provided with a portable nest, in which to carry about and
+protect her eggs, instead of brooding over them in some
+cranny of a rock, or within the recesses of a pile of shells,
+as does her cousin the octopus. From the membranes of
+the two flattened and expanded arms she secretes and, if
+necessary, repairs her shell, and by applying them closely
+to its outer surface on each side, holds herself within it, for
+it is not fastened to her body by any attaching muscles.
+When disturbed or in danger she can loosen her hold, and,
+leaving her cradle, swim away independently of it. It
+has been said that, having once left it, she has not the
+ability nor perhaps the sagacity to re-enter her nest, and
+resume the guardianship of her eggs.<a name="Anchor_77_77" id="Anchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 77.">&nbsp;[77]&nbsp;</a> From my own
+observations of the breeding habits of other octopods I
+think this most improbable. The use and purpose of the
+shell of the argonaut will be better understood if I briefly
+describe what I have witnessed of the treatment of its eggs
+by its near relative, the octopus.</p>
+
+<p>"The eggs of the octopus," as I have elsewhere said, "when
+first laid, are small, oval, translucent granules, resembling
+little grains of rice, not quite an eighth of an inch long.
+They grow along and around a common stalk, to which
+every egg is separately attached, as grapes form part of a
+bunch. Each of the elongated bunches is affixed by a
+glutinous secretion to the surface of a rock or stone (never
+to seaweed, as has been erroneously stated), and hangs
+pendent by its stalk in a long white cluster, like a magnified
+catkin of the filbert, or, to use Aristotle's simile, like
+the fruit of the white alder. The length and number of
+these bunches varies according to the size and condition of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85_b" id="Page_85_b">[Pg 85]</a></span>the parent. Those produced by a small octopus are
+seldom more than about three inches long, and from
+twelve to twenty in number; but a full-grown female will
+deposit from forty to fifty of such clusters, each about five
+inches in length. I have counted the eggs of which these
+clusters are composed, and find that there are about a
+thousand in each: so that a large octopus produces in one
+laying, usually extended over three days, a progeny of from
+40,000 to 50,000. I have seen an octopus, when undisturbed,
+pass one of her arms beneath the hanging bunches of her
+eggs, and, dilating the membrane on each side of it into a
+boat-shaped hollow, gather and receive them in it as in a
+trough or cradle which exhibited in its general shape and
+outline a remarkable similarity to the shell of the argonaut,
+with the eggs of which octopod its own are almost identical
+in form and appearance. Then she would caress and
+gently rub them, occasionally turning towards them the
+mouth of her flexible exhalent and locomotor tube, like
+the nozzle of a fireman's hose-pipe, so as to direct upon
+them a jet of the excurrent water. I believe that the
+object of this syringing process is to free the eggs from
+parasitic animalcules, and possibly to prevent the growth
+of conferva, which, I have found, rapidly overspreads those
+removed from her attention."<a name="Anchor_78_78" id="Anchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 78.">&nbsp;[78]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>It has been suggested that the syringing may be for the
+purpose of keeping the water surrounding the eggs well
+aerated; but this is evidently erroneous, for the water
+ejected from the tube has been previously deprived of its
+oxygen, and consequently of its health-giving properties,
+whilst passing over the gills of the parent. Week after
+week, for fifty days, a brooding octopus will continue to
+attend to her eggs with the most watchful and assiduous
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86_b" id="Page_86_b">[Pg 86]</a></span>care, seldom leaving them for an instant except to take
+food, which, without a brief abandonment of her position,
+would be beyond her reach. Aristotle asserted that while
+the female is incubating she takes no food. This is
+incorrect; but in every case of the kind that has come
+under my observation the mother octopod, whenever she
+has been obliged to leave her nest, has returned to it as
+quickly as possible; and so I believe can, and does, the
+female argonaut to her shell, and that, too, without any
+difficulty. In her case the numerous clusters of eggs are all
+united at their origin to one slender and tapering stalk
+which is fixed by a spot of glutinous matter to the body-whorl
+of the spiral shell.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_029" id="fig02_029">
+<img src="images/fig02_029.jpg" width="470" height="197" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 29.&mdash;THE PAPER NAUTILUS (Argonauta argo) CRAWLING.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>This "paper-sailor," then, whom the poets have regarded
+as endowed with so much grace and beauty, and living
+in luxurious ease, is but a fine lady octopus after all.
+Turn her out of her handsome residence, and, instead
+of the fairy skimmer of the seas, you have before you an
+object apparently as free from loveliness and romance as
+her sprawling, uncanny-looking, relative. Instead of floating
+in her pleasure boat over the surface of the sea, the
+argonaut ordinarily crawls along the bottom, carrying her
+shell above her, keel uppermost; and the broad extremities
+of the two arms are not hoisted as sails, nor allowed when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87_b" id="Page_87_b">[Pg 87]</a></span>
+at rest to dangle over the side of the "boat;" but are used
+as a kind of hood by which the animal retains the shell in
+its proper position, as a man bearing a load on his shoulders
+holds it with his hands. When she comes to the surface,
+or progresses by swimming instead of walking, she does so
+in the same manner as the octopus: namely, by the forcible
+expulsion of water from her funnel-like tube.</p>
+
+<p>But if truth compels us to deprive her of the counterfeit
+halo conferred on her by poets, we can award her, on behalf
+of science, a far nobler crown; namely, that of the Queen
+of the whole great Invertebrate Animal Kingdom. For,
+the <i>Cephalopoda</i>, of which the argonaut is a highly
+organised member, are not only the highest in their own
+division, the <i>Mollusca</i>, but they are as far superior to all
+other animals which have no backbones, as man stands
+lord and king over all created beings that possess them.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_030" id="fig02_030">
+<img src="images/fig02_030.jpg" width="470" height="155" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 30.&mdash;THE PAPER NAUTILUS (Argonauta argo) SWIMMING.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_031" id="fig02_031">
+<img src="images/fig02_031.jpg" width="470" height="312" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 31.&mdash;SHELL OF THE PAPER NAUTILUS (Argonauta argo).</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Although in outward shape the spiral shell of the Pearly
+Nautilus (<i>Nautilus pompilius</i>) somewhat resembles that of
+the argonaut, its internal structure is very different. A
+section of it shows that it is divided into several chambers,
+each of which is partitioned off from the adjoining ones, the
+last formed or external one, in which the animal lives, being
+much larger than the rest. The object and mode of
+construction of these chambers is as follows. As the
+animal grows, a constant secretion of new material takes
+place on the edge of the shell. By this unceasing process<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88_b" id="Page_88_b">[Pg 88]</a></span>
+of the addition of new shell in the form of a circular curve
+or coil around the older portion, the whole rapidly increases
+in size, both in diameter, and in the length of the chamber.
+The Nautilus, requiring to keep the secreting portion of its
+mantle applied to the lip of the shell, finds the chamber in
+which it dwells gradually becoming inconveniently long for
+it, and therefore builds up a wall behind itself, and continues
+its work of enlarging its premises in front. Each of these
+walls, concave in front, towards the mouth of the shell, and
+concave behind, acts as a strong girder and support of the
+arch of the shell against the inward pressure of deep water:
+and it was formerly supposed that each successive chamber
+so constructed and vacated remained filled with air, and
+<i>thus</i> became an additional float by which the constantly
+increasing weight of the growing shell was counter-balanced.
+By this beautiful adjustment of augmented floating power to
+increased weight, the buoyancy of the shell would be secured
+and its specific gravity maintained as nearly as possible equal
+to that of the surrounding water. This adjustment does<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89_b" id="Page_89_b">[Pg 89]</a></span>
+probably take place, but in a somewhat different manner.
+As the Nautilus inhabits a depth of from twenty to forty
+fathoms, it is evident that the air within its shell would
+be displaced by the pressure of such a column of water.<a name="Anchor_79_79" id="Anchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 79.">&nbsp;[79]&nbsp;</a>
+Accordingly, in every instance of the capture of a Nautilus
+the chambers of its shell have been found filled with water.
+It is not improbable that the fluid they contain may be less
+compressed, and exert less pressure from within outwards
+than that of the external superincumbent column of water,
+and that by this unbalanced pressure&mdash;under the same
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90_b" id="Page_90_b">[Pg 90]</a></span>hydro-dynamic law which governs its mode of self-propulsion
+when swimming, and possibly in some degree within the
+control of the animal&mdash;the latter is relieved of much of the
+weight of its shell. When the Nautilus is at the bottom of
+the sea its movement is like that of a snail crawling along
+upon the ground with its shell above it. The shell, in
+proportion to the size of the animal that inhabits it, is a
+heavy one, and unless it were rendered semi-buoyant, its
+owner's strength would be severely taxed by the effort to
+drag it along. By the means indicated this portable<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91_b" id="Page_91_b">[Pg 91]</a></span>
+domicile is borne lightly above the body of the Nautilus,
+without in any way impeding its progress.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_032" id="fig02_032">
+<img src="images/fig02_032.jpg" width="470" height="419" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 32.&mdash;SHELL OF THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (Nautilus pompilius).</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_033" id="fig02_033">
+<img src="images/fig02_033.jpg" width="470" height="439" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 33.&mdash;THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (Nautilus pompilius), AND SECTION OF
+ITS SHELL. After Professor Owen.
+
+a a, Partitions; b b, chambers; b&#39;, the last-formed chamber, in which the
+animal lives; c c, the siphuncle; d, attaching muscle; e e, the hollow
+arms; f f, retractile tentacles; g, muscular disk, or foot; h, the eye; i,
+position of funnel.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The chambers are all connected by a membranous tube
+slightly coated with nacre, which is connected with a large
+sac in the body of the animal, near the heart, and passes
+through a circular orifice and a short projecting tube in the
+centre of each partition wall, till it ends in the smallest
+chamber at the inner extremity of the shell. Dean
+Buckland believed this "syphon" to be an hydraulic apparatus
+acting as a "fine adjustment" of the specific gravity
+of the shell, by admitting water within it when expanded,
+and excluding it when contracted. As it contains an
+artery and vein near its origin at the mantle, Professor
+Owen has regarded it as subservient to the maintenance of
+a low vitality in the vacated portion of the shell. Dr.
+Henry Woodward is of the opinion that, whilst in the
+early life of the Nautilus this siphuncle forms the main
+point of attachment between the animal and its shell, it
+is in the adult "simply an aborted embryonal organ whose
+function is now filled by the shell-muscles, but which in the
+more ancient and straight-shelled representatives of the
+group (the Orthoceratites) was not merely an embryonal
+but an important organ in the adult."</p>
+
+<p>Every one knows the shell of the Pearly Nautilus. It
+may be purchased at any shell-shop in a seaside watering-place,
+and is imported by hundreds every year from
+Singapore.<a name="Anchor_80_80" id="Anchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 80.">&nbsp;[80]&nbsp;</a> It is abundant in the waters of the Indian
+Archipelago, especially about the Molucca and Philippine
+Islands, and on the shores of New Caledonia and the Fiji
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92_b" id="Page_92_b">[Pg 92]</a></span>and Solomon Islands. It has also been found alive on
+Pemba Island, near Zanzibar. It seems strange, therefore,
+that until about half a century ago hardly anything was
+known of the animal that secretes and inhabits it. Rumphius,
+a Dutch naturalist, in his 'Rarities of Amboyna,'
+published, in 1705, a description of one with an engraving,
+incorrect in drawing, and deficient in detail; and until 1832
+this was the only information which existed concerning it.
+The great Cuvier never saw one, and being acquainted only
+with the two-gilled cephalopods, he regarded the head-footed
+mollusks as absolutely isolated from all other
+animals in the kingdom of nature, even from the other
+classes of the mollusca. It seemed, however, to Professor
+Owen, then only nineteen years of age, that in the only
+living representative of the four-gilled order, <i>Nautilus
+pompilius</i>, might be found the "missing link." When,
+therefore, in the year 1824, his fellow-student, Mr. George
+Bennett, was about to sail from England to the Polynesian
+Islands, young Richard Owen earnestly charged his friend
+to do his utmost to obtain, and bring home in alcohol, a
+specimen of the much-coveted Pearly Nautilus. The
+opportunity did not occur till one warm and calm Monday
+evening, the 24th of August, 1829, when a living Nautilus
+was seen at the surface of the water not far distant from
+the ship, in Marekini Bay, on the south-west coast of the
+Island of Erromango, New Hebrides, in the South Pacific
+Ocean. It looked like a dead tortoise-shell cat, as the
+sailors said. As it began to sink as soon as it was
+observed, it was struck at with a boat-hook, and was thus
+so much injured that it died shortly after being taken on
+board the ship. The shell was destroyed, but the soft
+body of the animal was preserved in spirits, and great was
+the joy of Mr. Owen when, in July, 1831, Mr. Bennett<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93_b" id="Page_93_b">[Pg 93]</a></span>
+arrived with it in England, and presented it to the Royal
+College of Surgeons. Mr. Owen was then Assistant-Conservator
+of the Museum of the College under Mr. Clift,
+who was afterwards his father-in-law. He immediately
+commenced to anatomise, describe, and figure his rare
+acquisition, and in the early part of 1832 published the
+result of his work in the form of a masterly treatise, which
+proved to be the foundation of his future fame.<a name="Anchor_81_81" id="Anchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 81.">&nbsp;[81]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>Mr. Owen's investigations confirmed his previous supposition
+that the Pearly Nautilus is inferior in its organisation
+to octopus, sepia, or any other known cephalopod;
+that it is not isolated, but that it recedes towards the
+gasteropods, to which belong the snail, the periwinkle, &amp;c.,
+and that in some of its characters its structure is analogously
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94_b" id="Page_94_b">[Pg 94]</a></span>related to the still lower <i>annulosa</i>, or worms. Mr.
+Owen was just about to start for Paris with the intention
+of presenting a copy of his book to his celebrated contemporary
+and friend, and of showing him his dissections of the
+Nautilus which had been the subject of his research, when
+he heard of Baron Cuvier's death. It must have been to
+him a great sorrow and a grievous disappointment.</p>
+
+<p>The Pearly Nautilus, then, is a true cephalopod, in
+that it has its foot divided and arranged in segments around
+its head, but the form and number of these segments are
+very different from those of any other of its class. Instead of
+there being eight, as in the argonaut and octopus, or ten, as in
+sepia and the calamaries, the Nautilus has about ninety
+projecting in every direction from around the mouth. They
+are short, round, and tapering, of about the length and thickness
+of the fingers of a child. Some of them are retractile
+into sheaths, and they are attached to fleshy processes
+(which might represent the child's hand), overlying each other,
+and covering the mouth on each side. They have none
+of the suckers with which the arms and tentacles of all the
+other cuttles are furnished, but their annulose structure,
+like the rings of an earthworm's body, gives them some
+little prehensile power. None of these numerous finger-like
+segments of the foot are flattened out like the broad
+membranous expansions of the argonaut, and, in fact, the
+Nautilus is without any members which can possibly be
+regarded as sails to hoist, or as oars with which to row.
+It has a strong beak, like the rest of the cuttles; but it has
+no ink-sac, for its shell is strong enough to afford it the
+protection which its two-gilled relatives have to seek in
+concealment.</p>
+
+<p>The Pearly Nautilus usually creeps, like a snail, along
+the bed of the sea. It lives at the bottom, and feeds<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95_b" id="Page_95_b">[Pg 95]</a></span>
+at the bottom, principally on crabs; and, as Dr. S. P.
+Woodward says, in his 'Manual of the Mollusca,' "perhaps
+often lies in wait for them, like some gigantic sea-anemone,
+with outspread tentacles." The shape of its shell is not
+well adapted for swimming, but it can ascend to the surface,
+if it so please, in the same manner as can all the cuttles&mdash;namely,
+by the outflow of water from its locomotor tube.
+The statement that it visits the surface of the sea of its own
+accord is at present, however, unconfirmed by observation.</p>
+
+<p>But, if the Pearly Nautilus is the inferior and poor relation
+of the argonaut, it lives in a handsome house, and
+comes of an ancient lineage. The Ammonites, whose
+beautiful whorled and chambered shells, and the casts of
+them, are so abundant in every stratum, especially in the
+lias, the chalk, and the oolite, had four gills also. These
+Ammonites and the Nautili were amongst the earliest
+occupants of the ancient deep; and, with the Hamites,
+Turrilites, and others, lived upon our earth during a great
+portion of the incalculable period which has elapsed since
+it became fitted for animal existence, and in their time
+witnessed the rise and fall of many an animal dynasty.
+But they are gone now; and only the fossil relics of more
+than two thousand species (of which 188 were Nautili)
+remain to tell how important a race they were amongst the
+inhabitants of the old world seas. They and their congeners
+of the chambered shells, however, left one representative
+which has lived on through all the changes that have
+taken place on the surface of this globe since they became
+extinct&mdash;namely, <i>Nautilus pompilius</i>, the Nautilus of the
+pearly shell&mdash;the last of the Tetrabranchs.</p>
+
+<p>I need offer no apology for endeavouring to explain the
+difference between the Nautilus of the chambered shell and
+the argonaut with the membranous arms which it was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96_b" id="Page_96_b">[Pg 96]</a></span>
+supposed to use as sails, when Webster, in his great standard
+dictionary, describes the one and figures the other as
+one and the same animal; and when a writer of the celebrity
+of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes also blends the two in
+the following poem, containing a sentiment as exquisite as
+its science is erroneous. I hope the latter distinguished
+and accomplished author, whose delightful writings I enjoy
+and highly appreciate, will pardon my criticism. I admit
+that the beauty of the thought might well atone for its inaccuracy,
+(of which the author is conscious,) were it not that
+the latter is made so attractive that truth appears harsh
+in disturbing it.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4">"THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"This is the ship of pearl, which poets feign<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Sails the unshadowed main,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">The venturous bark that flings<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;In gulfs enchanted, where the siren sings,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">And coral reefs lie bare,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Wrecked is the ship of pearl!<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">And every chambered cell,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Where its dim, dreaming life was wont to dwell,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Before thee lies revealed,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Year after year beheld the silent toil<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">That spread his lustrous coil;<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Still, as the spiral grew,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;He left the past year's dwelling for the new,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Stole with soft step its shining archway through,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Built up its idle door,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97_b" id="Page_97_b">[Pg 97]</a></span><br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Child of the wandering sea,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Cast from her lap forlorn!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;From the dead lips a clearer note is born<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Than ever Triton blew from wreath&egrave;d horn!<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">While on mine ear it rings,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:&mdash;<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;'Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">As the swift seasons roll!<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Leave thy low vaulted past;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Let each new temple, nobler than the last,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i6">Till thou at length art free,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&nbsp;Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea.'"<br /></span>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98_b" id="Page_98_b">[Pg 98]</a></span></div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="BARNACLE_GEESE_GOOSE_BARNACLES" id="BARNACLE_GEESE_GOOSE_BARNACLES"></a>BARNACLE GEESE&mdash;GOOSE BARNACLES.</h2>
+
+
+<p>The belief that some wild geese, instead of being hatched
+from eggs, like other birds, grew on trees and rotten
+wood has never been surpassed as a specimen of ignorant
+credulity and persistent error.</p>
+
+<p>There are two principal versions of this absurd notion.
+One is that certain trees, resembling willows, and growing
+always close to the sea, produced at the ends of their
+branches fruit in form like apples, and each containing
+the embryo of a goose, which, when the fruit was ripe, fell
+into the water and flew away. The other is that the geese
+were bred from a fungus growing on rotten timber floating
+at sea, and were first developed in the form of worms in
+the substance of the wood.</p>
+
+<p>When and whence this improbable theory had its origin
+is uncertain. Aristotle does not mention it, and consequently
+Pliny and &AElig;lian were deprived of the pleasure
+they would have felt in handing down to posterity, without
+investigation or correction, a statement so surprising. It is,
+comparatively, a modern myth; although we find that
+it was firmly established in the middle of the twelfth
+century, for Gerald de Barri, known in literature as
+Giraldus Cambrensis, mentions it in his 'Topographia
+Hiberni&aelig;,' published in 1187. Giraldus, who was Archdeacon
+of Brecknock in the reign of Henry II., and tried hard, more
+than once, for the bishopric of St. David's, the functions of
+which he had temporarily administered without obtaining<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99_b" id="Page_99_b">[Pg 99]</a></span>
+the title, was a vigorous and zealous reformer of Church
+abuses. Amongst the laxities of discipline against which
+he found it necessary to protest was the custom then
+prevailing of eating these Barnacle geese during Lent,
+under the plea that their flesh was not that of birds, but of
+fishes. He writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"There are here many birds which are called Bernac&aelig;, which
+nature produces in a manner contrary to nature, and very wonderful.
+They are like marsh-geese but smaller. They are produced from fir-timber
+tossed about at sea, and are at first like geese upon it. Afterwards
+they hang down by their beaks, as if from a sea-weed attached
+to the wood, and are enclosed in shells that they may grow the more
+freely. Having thus, in course of time, been clothed with a strong
+covering of feathers, they either fall into the water, or seek their liberty
+in the air by flight. The embryo geese derive their growth and nutriment
+from the moisture of the wood or of the sea, in a secret and most
+marvellous manner. I have seen with my own eyes more than a
+thousand minute bodies of these birds hanging from one piece of
+timber on the shore, enclosed in shells and already formed. Their
+eggs are not impregnated <i>in coitu</i>, like those of other birds, nor does
+the bird sit upon its eggs to hatch them, and in no corner of the world
+have they been known to build a nest. Hence the bishops and clergy
+in some parts of Ireland are in the habit of partaking of these birds on
+fast days, without scruple. But in doing so they are led into sin.
+For, if any one were to eat of the leg of our first parent, although he
+(Adam) was not born of flesh, that person could not be adjudged
+innocent of eating flesh."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>This fable of the geese appears, however, to have been
+current at least a hundred years before Giraldus wrote, for
+Professor Max M&uuml;ller, who treats of it in one of his
+"Lectures on the Science of Language," amongst many
+interesting references there given, quotes a Cardinal of the
+eleventh century, Petrus Damianus, who clearly describes,
+that version of it which represents the birds as bursting,
+when fully fledged, from fruit resembling apples.</p>
+
+<p>It is a curious fact that these Barnacle geese have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100_b" id="Page_100_b">[Pg 100]</a></span>
+troubled the priesthood of more than one creed as to the
+instructions they should give to the laity concerning the use
+of them as food. The Jews&mdash;all those, at least, who
+maintain a strict observance of the Hebrew Law&mdash;eat no
+meat but that of animals which have been slaughtered in a
+certain prescribed manner; and a doubt arose amongst
+them at the period we refer to, whether these geese should
+be killed as flesh or as fish. Professor Max M&uuml;ller cites
+Mordechai,<a name="Anchor_82_82" id="Anchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 82.">&nbsp;[82]&nbsp;</a> as asking whether these birds are fruits, fish,
+or flesh; that is, whether they must be killed in the Jewish
+way, as if they were flesh. Mordechai describes them as
+birds which grow on trees, and says, "the Rabbi Jehuda, of
+Worms (who died 1216) used to say that he had heard from
+his father, Rabbi Samuel, of Speyer (about 1150), that
+Rabbi Jacob Tham, of Ramer&uuml; (who died 1171), the grandson
+of the great Rabbi Rashi (about 1140), had decided that
+they must be killed as flesh."</p>
+
+<p>Pope Innocent III. took the same view; for at the
+Lateran Council, in 1215, he prohibited the eating of
+Barnacle geese during Lent. In 1277, Rabbi Izaak, of
+Corbeil, determined to be on the safe side, forbade altogether
+the eating of these birds by the Jews, "because they were
+neither flesh nor fish."</p>
+
+<p>Michael Bernhard Valentine,<a name="Anchor_83_83" id="Anchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 83.">&nbsp;[83]&nbsp;</a> quoting Wormius, says
+that this question caused much perplexity and disputation
+amongst the doctors of the Sorbonne; but that they passed
+an ordinance that these geese should be classed as fishes,
+and not as birds; and he adds, that in consequence of this
+decision large numbers of these birds were annually sent to
+Paris from England and Scotland, for consumption in
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101_b" id="Page_101_b">[Pg 101]</a></span>Lent. Sir Robert Sibbald<a name="Anchor_84_84" id="Anchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 84.">&nbsp;[84]&nbsp;</a> refers to this, and says that
+Normandy was the locality from which the French capital
+was reported to be principally supplied; but that in fact
+the greater number of these geese came from Holland.
+The date of this edict is not given.</p>
+
+<p>Professor Max M&uuml;ller says that in Brittany, Barnacle
+geese are still allowed to be eaten on Fridays, and that the
+Roman Catholic Bishop of Ferns may give permission to
+people out of his diocese to eat these birds at his table.</p>
+
+<p>In Bombay, also, where fish is prohibited as food to some
+classes of the population, the priests call this goose a "sea-vegetable,"
+under which name it is allowed to be eaten.</p>
+
+<p>Various localities were mentioned as the breeding-places of
+these arboreal geese. Gervasius of Tilbury,<a name="Anchor_85_85" id="Anchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 85.">&nbsp;[85]&nbsp;</a> writing about
+1211, describes the process of their generation in full detail,
+and says that great numbers of them grew in his time
+upon the young willow trees which abounded in the
+neighbourhood of the Abbey of Faversham, in the county
+of Kent, and within the Archiepiscopate of Canterbury.
+The bird was there commonly called the <i>Barneta</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Hector Boethius, or Boece, the old Scottish historian,
+combats this version of the story. His work, written in
+Latin, in 1527, was translated into quaint Scottish in 1540,
+by John Bellenden, Archdeacon of Murray. In his fourteenth
+chapter, "Of the nature of claik geis, and of the
+syndry maner of thair procreatioun, and of the ile of
+Thule," he says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Restis now to speik of the geis generit of the see namit clakis.
+Sum men belevis that thir clakis growis on treis be the nebbis. Bot
+thair opinioun is vane. And becaus the nature and procreatioun of
+thir clakis is strange we have maid na lytyll laubore and deligence to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102_b" id="Page_102_b">[Pg 102]</a></span>
+serche ye treuth and verite yairof, we have salit throw ye seis quhare
+thir clakis ar bred, and I fynd be gret experience, that the nature of
+the seis is mair relevant caus of thir procreatioun than ony uther
+thyng."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>From the circumstances attending the finding of "ane
+gret tree that was brocht be alluvion and flux of the see to
+land, in secht of money pepyll besyde the castell of Petslego,
+in the yeir of God ane thousand iiii. hundred lxxxx, and of
+a see tangle hyngand full of mussill schellis," brought to
+him by "Maister Alexander Galloway, person of Kynkell,"
+who knowing him to be "richt desirus of sic uncouth
+thingis came haistely with the said tangle," he arrives at
+the conclusion, by a process of reasoning highly satisfactory
+and convincing to himself, that,</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Be thir and mony othir resorcis and examplis we can not beleif
+that thir clakis ar producit be ony nature of treis or rutis thairof, but
+allanerly be the nature of the Oceane see, quhilk is the caus and production
+of mony wonderful thingis. And becaus the rude and ignorant
+pepyl saw oftymes the fruitis that fel of the treis (quhilkis stude neir
+the see) convertit within schort tyme in geis, thai belevit that thir geis
+grew apon the treis hingand be thair nebbis sic lik as appillis and
+uthir frutis hingis be thair stalkis, bot thair opinioun is nocht to be
+sustenit. For als sone as thir appillis or frutis fallis of the tre in the
+see flude thay grow first wormeetin. And be schort process of tyme
+are alterat in geis."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>In describing the bird thus produced, Boethius declares
+that the male has a sharp, pointed beak, like the gallinaceous
+birds, but that in the female the beak is obtuse as
+in other geese and ducks.</p>
+
+<p>According to other authors, this wonderful production of
+birds from living or dead timber was not confined to
+England and Scotland. Vincentius Bellovacensis<a name="Anchor_86_86" id="Anchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 86.">&nbsp;[86]&nbsp;</a> (1190-1264)
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103_b" id="Page_103_b">[Pg 103]</a></span>in his 'Speculum Natur&aelig;,' xvii. 40, states that it
+took place in Germany, and Jacob de Vitriaco (who
+died 1244) mentions its occurrence in certain parts of
+Flanders.</p>
+
+<p>Jonas Ramus gives a somewhat different version of the
+process as it occurs in Norway. He writes:<a name="Anchor_87_87" id="Anchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 87.">&nbsp;[87]&nbsp;</a> "It is said
+that a particular sort of geese is found in Nordland, which
+leave their seed on old trees, and stumps and blocks lying
+in the sea; and that from that seed there grows a shell fast
+to the trees, from which shell, as from an egg, by the heat
+of the sun, young geese are hatched, and afterwards grow
+up; which gave rise to the fable that geese grow upon
+trees."</p>
+
+<p>But, strange to say, if any painstaking enquirer, wishing
+to investigate the matter for himself, went to a locality
+where it was said the phenomenon regularly occurred, he
+was sure to find that he had literally, "started on a wild-goose
+chase," and had come to the wrong place. This was
+the experience of &AElig;neas Sylvius Piccolomini, afterwards
+Pope Pius II., who complained that miracles will always
+flee farther and farther away; for when he was on a visit
+(about 1430) to King James I., of Scotland,<a name="Anchor_88_88" id="Anchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 88.">&nbsp;[88]&nbsp;</a> and enquired
+after the tree which he most eagerly desired to see, he
+was told that it grew much farther north, in the Orkney
+Islands.</p>
+
+<p>Notwithstanding the suspicious fact that the prodigy
+receded like Will o' the Wisp, whenever it was persistently
+followed up, Sebastian Munster, who relates<a name="Anchor_89_89" id="Anchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 89.">&nbsp;[89]&nbsp;</a> the foregoing
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104_b" id="Page_104_b">[Pg 104]</a></span>anecdote of &AElig;neas Sylvius, appears to have entertained no
+doubt of the truth of the report, for he writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_034" id="fig02_034">
+<img src="images/fig02_034.jpg" width="470" height="769" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 34.&mdash;THE GOOSE TREE. Copied from Gerard&#39;s &#39;Herball,&#39; 1st edition.</span>
+<a name="Anchor_90_90" id="Anchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 90.">&nbsp;[90]&nbsp;</a></div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105_b" id="Page_105_b">[Pg 105]</a></span></p><blockquote><p>"In Scotland there are trees which produce fruit, conglomerated of
+their leaves; and this fruit, when in due time it falls into the water
+beneath it, is endowed with new life, and is converted into a living
+bird, which they call the 'tree-goose.' This tree grows in the Island
+of Pomonia, which is not far from Scotland, towards the north.
+Several old cosmographers, especially Saxo Grammaticus, mention
+the tree, and it must not be regarded as fictitious, as some new writers
+suppose."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Julius C&aelig;sar Scaliger<a name="Anchor_91_91" id="Anchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 91.">&nbsp;[91]&nbsp;</a> (1540) gives another reading of
+the legend, in which it is asserted that the leaves which
+fall from the tree into the water are converted into fishes,
+and those which fall upon the land become birds.</p>
+
+<p>Thus this extraordinary belief held sway, and remained
+strong and invincible, although from time to time some
+man of sense and independent thought attempted to turn
+the tide of popular error. Albertus Magnus (who died 1280)
+showed its absurdity, and declared that he had seen the
+bird referred to lay its eggs and hatch them in the ordinary
+way. Roger Bacon (who died in 1294) also contradicted it,
+and Belon, in 1551, treated it with ridicule and contempt.
+Olaus Wormius<a name="Anchor_92_92" id="Anchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 92.">&nbsp;[92]&nbsp;</a> seems to have believed in it, though he
+wrote cautiously about it. Olaus Magnus (1553) mentions
+it, and apparently accepts it as a fact, occurring in the
+Orkneys, on the authority of "a Scotch historian who
+diligently sets down the secrets of things," and then dismisses
+it in three lines.</p>
+
+<p>Passing over many other writers on the subject, we come
+to the time of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when (in 1597)
+"John Gerarde, Master in Chirurgerie, London," published
+his "Herball, or Generall Historie of Plants gathered by
+him," and in the last chapter thereof solemnly declared,
+that he had actually witnessed the transformation of
+"certaine shell fish" into Barnacle Geese, as follows.</p>
+
+<p><i>Of the Goose tree, Barnacle tree, or the tree
+bearing Geese.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Britanic&aelig; Conch&aelig; anatifer&aelig;.</i></p>
+
+<p>THE BREED OF BARNACLES.</p>
+
+
+<p>&para; <i>The Description.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p>Hauing trauelled from the Grasses growing in the bottome of the
+fenny waters, the Woods, and mountaines, euen vnto Libanus itselfe;
+and also the sea, and bowels of the same, wee are arriued at the end
+of our History; thinking it not impertinent to the conclusion of the
+same, to end with one of the maruels of this land (we may say of the
+World). The history whereof to set forth according to the worthinesse
+and raritie thereof, would not only require a large and peculiar volume,
+but also a deeper search into the bowels of Nature, then my intended
+purpose will suffer me to wade into, my sufficiencie also considered;
+leauing the History thereof rough hewen, vnto some excellent man,
+learned in the secrets of nature, to be both fined and refined; in the
+meane space take it as it falleth out, the naked and bare truth, though
+vnpolished. There are found in the North parts of Scotland and the
+Islands adjacent, called Orchades, certaine trees whereon do grow
+certaine shells of a white colour tending to russet, wherein are contained
+little liuing creatures: which shells in time of maturity doe open, and
+out of them grow those little liuing things, which falling into the water
+do become fowles, which we call Barnacles; in the North of England,
+brant Geese; and in Lancashire, tree Geese: but the other that do
+fall vpon the land perish and come to nothing. Thus much by the
+writings of others, and also from the mouthes of people of those parts,
+which may very well accord with truth.</p>
+
+<p>But what our eies haue seene, and hands haue touched we shall
+declare. There is a small Island in Lancashire, called the Pile of
+Foulders, wherein are found the broken pieces of old and bruised ships
+some whereof haue beene cast thither by shipwracke, and also the
+trunks and bodies with the branches of old and rotten trees, cast vp
+there likewise; whereon is found a certaine spume or froth that in
+time breedeth vnto certaine shells, in shape like those of the Muskle,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107_b" id="Page_107_b">[Pg 107]</a></span>
+but sharper pointed, and of a whitish colour; wherein is contained a
+thing in forme like a lace of silke finely wouen as it were together, of a
+whitish colour, one end whereof is fastened vnto the inside of the shell,
+euen as the fish of Oisters and Muskles are: the other end is made
+fast vnto the belly of a rude masse or lumpe, which in time commeth to
+the shape and forme of a Bird: when it is perfectly formed the shell
+gapeth open, and the first thing that appeareth is the foresaid lace or
+string; next come the legs of the bird hanging out, and as it groweth
+greater it openeth the shell by degrees, til at length it is all come
+forth, and hangeth onely by the bill: in short space after it commeth
+to full maturitie, and falleth into the sea, where it gathereth feathers,
+and groweth to a fowle bigger than a Mallard, and lesser than a
+Goose, hauing blacke legs and bill or beake, and feathers blacke and
+white, spotted in such manner as is our Magpie, called in some places
+a Pie-Annet, which the people of Lancashire call by no other name
+than a tree Goose: which place aforesaid, and all those parts adjoyning
+do so much abound therewith, that one of the best is bought for
+three pence. For the truth hereof, if any doubt, may it please them to
+repaire vnto me, and I shall satisfie them by the testimonie of good
+witnesses.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, it should seeme that there is another sort hereof; the
+History of which is true, and of mine owne knowledge; for trauelling
+vpon the shore of our English coast betweene Douer and Rumney, I
+found the trunke of an old rotten tree, which (with some helpe that I
+procured by Fishermen's wiues that were there attending their
+husbands' returne from the sea) we drew out of the water vpon dry
+land; vpon this rotten tree I found growing many thousands of long
+crimson bladders, in shape like vnto puddings newly filled, before they
+be sodden, which were very cleere and shining; at the nether end
+whereof did grow a shell fish, fashioned somewhat like a small Muskle,
+but much whiter, resembling a shell fish that groweth vpon the rockes
+about Garnsey and Garsey, called a Lympit: many of these shells I
+brought with me to London, which after I had opened I found in them
+liuing things without forme or shape; in others which were neerer
+come to ripenesse I found liuing things that were very naked, in shape
+like a Bird: in others, the Birds couered with soft downe, the shell
+halfe open, and the Bird ready to fall out, which no doubt were the
+Fowles called Barnacles. I dare not absolutely auouch euery circumstance
+of the first part of this history, concerning the tree that beareth
+those buds aforesaid, but will leaue it to a further consideration; howbeit,
+that which I haue seene with mine eies, and handled with mine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108_b" id="Page_108_b">[Pg 108]</a></span>
+hands, I dare confidently auouch, and boldly put downe for verity.
+Now if any will object that this tree which I saw might be one of those
+before mentioned, which either by the waues of the sea or some violent
+wind had beene ouerturned as many other trees are; or that any trees
+falling into those seas about the Orchades, will of themselves bear
+the like Fowles, by reason of those seas and waters, these being so
+probable conjectures, and likely to be true, I may not without prejudice
+gainsay, or endeauour to confute.</p></blockquote>
+
+
+<p>&para; <i>The Place.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p>The bordes and rotten plankes whereon are found these shels breeding
+the Barnakle, are taken vp in a small Island adioyning to Lancashire,
+halfe a mile from the main land, called the Pile of Foulders.</p></blockquote>
+
+
+<p>&para; <i>The Time.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p>They spawn as it were in March and Aprill; the Geese are formed
+in May and June, and come to fulnesse of feathers in the moneth
+after.</p>
+
+<p>And thus hauing through God's assistance discoursed somewhat at
+large of Grasses, Herbes, Shrubs, Trees, and Mosses, and certaine
+Excrescenses of the Earth, with other things moe, incident to the
+historie thereof, we conclude and end our present Volume, with this
+wonder of England. For the which God's name be euer honored and
+praised.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>Gerard was probably a good botanist and herbalist; but
+Thomas Johnson, the editor of a subsequent issue of his
+book, tells us that</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"He, out of a propense good will to the publique advancement of
+this knowledge, endeavoured to performe therein more than he could
+well accomplish, which was partly through want of sufficient learning;
+but," he adds, "let none blame him for these defects, seeing he was
+neither wanting in pains nor good will to performe what hee intended:
+and there are none so simple but know that heavie burthens are with
+most paines vndergone by the weakest men; and although there are
+many faults in the worke, yet iudge well of the Author; for, as a late
+writer well saith:&mdash;'To err and to be deceived is human, and he must
+seek solitude who wishes to live only with the perfect.'"</p></blockquote><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109_b" id="Page_109_b">[Pg 109]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It is difficult to comply with the request to think well of
+one who, writing as an authority, deliberately promulgated,
+with an affectation of piety, that which he must have known
+to be untrue, and who was, moreover, a shameless plagiarist;
+for Gerard's ponderous book is little more than a translation
+of Dodon&aelig;us, whole chapters having been taken
+verbatim from that comparatively unread author without
+acknowledgment.</p>
+
+<p>After this series of erroneous observations, self-delusion,
+and ignorant credulity, it is refreshing to turn to the pages
+of the two little thick quarto volumes of Gaspar Schott.<a name="Anchor_93_93" id="Anchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 93.">&nbsp;[93]&nbsp;</a>
+This learned Jesuit made himself acquainted with everything
+that had been written on the subject, and besides the
+authors I have referred to, quotes and compares the statements
+of Majolus, Abrahamus Ortelius, Hieronymus Cardanus,
+Eusebius, Nierembergius, Deusingius, Odoricus,
+Gerhardus de Vera, Ferdinand of Cordova, and many
+others. He then gives, firmly and clearly, his own opinion
+that the assertion that birds in Britain spring from the
+fruit or leaves of trees, or from wood, or from fungus, or
+from shells, is without foundation, and that neither reason,
+experience, nor authority tend to confirm it. He concedes
+that worms may be bred in rotting timber, and even
+that they may be of a kind that fly away on arriving at
+maturity (referring probably to caterpillars being developed
+into moths), but that birds should be thus generated, he
+says, is simply the repetition of a vulgar error, for not one
+of the authors whom he has examined has seen what they
+all affirm; nor are they able to bring forward a single
+eye-witness of it. He asks how it can be possible that
+animals so large and so highly-organised as these birds
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110_b" id="Page_110_b">[Pg 110]</a></span>can grow from puny animalcules generated in putrid
+wood. He further declares that these British geese are
+hatched from eggs like other geese, which he considers
+proved by the testimony of Albertus Magnus, Gerhardus
+de Vera, and of Dutch seamen, who, in 1569, gave their
+written declaration that they had personally seen these
+birds sitting on their eggs, and hatching them, on the
+coasts of Nova Zembla.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_035" id="fig02_035">
+<img src="images/fig02_035.jpg" width="470" height="468" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 35.&mdash;THE BARNACLE GOOSE TREE. After Aldrovandus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In marked and disgraceful contrast with this careful
+and philosophical investigation and its author's just deductions
+from it, is 'A Relation concerning Barnacles by
+Sir Robert Moray, lately one of His Majesty's Council for
+the Kingdom of Scotland,' read before the Royal Society,
+and published in the 'Philosophical Transactions,' No. 137,
+January and February, 1677-8.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111_b" id="Page_111_b">[Pg 111]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_036" id="fig02_036">
+<img src="images/fig02_036.jpg" width="470" height="502" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 36.&mdash;DEVELOPMENT OF BARNACLES INTO GEESE. After Aldrovandus.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Describing "a cut of a large Firr-tree of about two and
+a half feet diameter, and nine or ten feet long," which he
+saw on the shore in the Western Islands of Scotland, and
+which had become so dry that many of the Barnacle shells
+with which it had been covered had been rubbed off, he
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<blockquote><p>"Only on the parts that lay next the ground there still hung
+multitudes of little Shells, having within them little Birds, perfectly
+shap'd, supposed to be Barnacles. The Shells hung very thick and
+close one by another, and were of different sizes. Of the colour and
+consistence of Muscle-Shells, and the sides and joynts of them joyned
+with such a kind of film as Muscle-Shells are, which serves them for a
+Hing to move upon, when they open and shut.... The Shells hang at
+the Tree by a Neck longer than the Shell, of a kind of Filmy
+substance, round, and hollow, and creased, not unlike the Wind-pipe
+of a chicken, spreading out broadest where it is fastened to the Tree,
+from which it seems to draw and convey the matter which serves for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112_b" id="Page_112_b">[Pg 112]</a></span>
+the growth and vegetation of the Shell and the little Bird within it.
+This Bird in every Shell that I opened, as well the least as the biggest,
+I found so curiously and compleatly formed, that there appeared
+nothing wanting as to internal parts, for making up a perfect Seafowl:
+every little part appearing so distinctly that the whole looked
+like a large Bird seen through a concave or diminishing glass, colour
+and feature being everywhere so clear and neat. The little Bill, like
+that of a Goose; the eyes marked; the Head, Neck, Breast, Wings,
+Tail, and Feet formed, the Feathers everywhere perfectly shap'd, and
+blackish coloured; and the Feet like those of other Water-fowl, to my
+best remembrance. All being dead and dry, I did not look after the
+internal parts of them. Nor did I ever see any of the little Birds alive,
+nor met with anybody that did. Only some credible persons have
+assured me they have seen some as big as their fist."</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>It seems almost incredible that little more than two
+hundred years ago this twaddle should not only have been
+laid before the highest representatives of science in the
+land, but that it should have been printed in their "Transactions"
+for the further delusion of posterity.</p>
+
+<p>Ray, in his edition of Willughby's Ornithology, published
+in the same year as the above, contradicted the fallacy as
+strongly as Gaspar Schott; and (except that he incidentally
+admits the possibility of spontaneous generation in
+some of the lower animals, as insects and frogs) in language
+so similar that I think he must have had Schott's work
+before him when he wrote.</p>
+
+<p>Aldrovandus<a name="Anchor_94_94" id="Anchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 94.">&nbsp;[94]&nbsp;</a> tells us that an Irish priest, named
+Octavianus, assured him with an oath on the Gospels that
+he had seen and handled the geese in their embryo condition;
+and he adds that he "would rather err with the
+majority than seem to pass censure on so many eminent
+writers who have believed the story."</p>
+
+<p>In 1629 Count Maier (Michaelus Meyerus&mdash;these old
+authors when writing in Latin, latinized their names also)
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113_b" id="Page_113_b">[Pg 113]</a></span>published a monograph 'On the Tree-bird'<a name="Anchor_95_95" id="Anchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 95.">&nbsp;[95]&nbsp;</a> in which he
+explains the process of its birth, and states that he opened
+a hundred of the goose-bearing shells and found the rudiments
+of the bird fully formed.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">So slow Bootes underneath him sees,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In th' icy isles, those goslings hatched on trees,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Whose fruitful leaves, falling into the water,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Are turned, they say, to living fowls soon after;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So rotten sides of broken ships do change,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To barnacles, O, transformation strange!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Twas first a green tree; then a gallant hull;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lately a mushroom; then a flying gull.<a name="Anchor_96_96" id="Anchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 96.">&nbsp;[96]&nbsp;</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Now, let us turn from fiction to facts.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_037" id="fig02_037">
+<img src="images/fig02_037.jpg" width="470" height="373" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG 37.&mdash;SECTION OF A SESSILE BARNACLE. Balanus tintinnabulum.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Almost every one is acquainted with at least one kind of
+the Barnacle shells which were supposed to enclose the
+embryo of a goose, namely the small white conical hillocks
+which are found, in tens of thousands, adhering to stones,
+rocks, and old timber such as the piles of piers, and may
+be seen affixed to the shells of oysters and mussels in any
+fishmonger's shop. The little animals which secrete and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114_b" id="Page_114_b">[Pg 114]</a></span>inhabit these shells belong to a sub-class and order of the
+Crustacea, called the <i>Cirrhopoda</i>, because their feet (<i>poda</i>),
+which in the crab and lobster terminate in claws, are
+modified into tufts of curled hairs (<i>cirri</i>), or feathers. When
+the animal is alive and active under water, a crater may be
+seen to open on the summit of the little shelly mountain,
+and, as if from the mouth of a miniature volcano, there issue
+from this aperture, from between two inner shells, the
+<i>cirri</i> in the form of a feathery hand, which clutches at the
+water within its reach, and is then quickly retracted within
+the shell. During this movement the hair-fringed fingers
+have filtered from the water and conveyed towards the
+mouth within the shell, for their owner's nutriment, some
+minute solid particles or animalcules, and this action of the
+casting-net alternately shot forth and retracted continues
+for hours incessantly, as the water flows over its resting-place.
+The animal can live for a long time out of water,
+and in some situations thus passes half its life. Under such
+circumstances, the shells, containing a reserve of moisture,
+remain firmly closed until the return of the tide brings a fresh
+supply of water and food. These are the "acorn-barnacles,"
+the <i>balani</i>, commonly known in some localities as "chitters."</p>
+
+<p>Barnacles of another kind are those furnished with a long
+stem, or peduncle, which Sir Robert Moray described as
+"round, hollow, and creased, and not unlike the wind-pipe
+of a chicken." The stem has, in fact, the ringed formation
+of the annelids, or worms. The shelly valves are thin, flat,
+and in shape somewhat like a mitre. They are composed
+of five pieces, two on each side, and one, a kind of rounded
+keel along the back of the valves, by which these are united.
+The shells are delicately tinted with lavender or pale blue
+varied with white, and the edges are frequently of a bright
+chrome yellow or orange colour.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115_b" id="Page_115_b">[Pg 115]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It is not an uncommon occurrence for a large plank
+entirely covered with these "necked barnacles" to be found
+floating at sea and brought ashore for exhibition at some
+watering-place; and I have more than once sent portions
+of such planks to the Aquaria at Brighton, and the Crystal
+Palace.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_038" id="fig02_038">
+<img src="images/fig02_038.jpg" width="470" height="495" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 38.&mdash;PEDUNCULATED BARNACLES. (Lepas anatifera.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is most interesting to watch a dense mass of living
+cirripedes so closely packed together that not a speck of
+the surface of the wood is left uncovered by them; their
+fleshy stalks overhanging each other, and often attached
+in clusters to those of some larger individuals; their
+plumose casting-nets ever gathering in the food that
+comes within their reach, and carrying towards the mouth
+any solid particles suitable for their sustenance. How
+much of insoluble matter barnacles will eliminate from
+the water is shown by the rapidity with which they
+will render turbid sea water clear and transparent. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116_b" id="Page_116_b">[Pg 116]</a></span>
+most common species of these "necked barnacles" bears
+the name of "<i>Lepas anatifera</i>," "the duck-bearing <i>Lepas</i>."
+It was so entitled by Linn&aelig;us, in recognition of its having
+been connected with the fable, which, of course, met with
+no credit from him.</p>
+
+<p>Fig. 39 represents the figure-head of a ship, partly
+covered with barnacles, which was picked up about thirty
+miles off Lowestoft on the 22nd of October, 1857. It was
+described in the <i>Illustrated London News</i>, and the proprietors
+of that paper have kindly given me a copy of
+the block from which its portrait was printed.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_039" id="fig02_039">
+<img src="images/fig02_039.jpg" width="470" height="482" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 39.&mdash;A SHIP&#39;S FIGURE-HEAD WITH BARNACLES ATTACHED TO IT.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Others of the barnacles affix themselves to the bottoms
+of ships, or parasitically upon whales and sharks, and
+those of the latter kind often burrow deeply into the skin of
+their host. Fig. 40 is a portrait of a <i>Coronula diadema</i> taken
+from the nose of a whale stranded at Kintradwell, in the
+north of Scotland, in 1866, and sent to the late Mr. Frank
+Buckland. Growing on this <i>Coronula</i> are three of the
+curious eared barnacles, <i>Conchoderma aurita</i>; the <i>Lepas</i><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117_b" id="Page_117_b">[Pg 117]</a></span>
+<i>aurita</i> of Linn&aelig;us. The species of the whale from which
+these Barnacles were taken was not mentioned, but it was
+probably the "hunch-backed" whale, <i>Megaptera longimana</i>,
+which is generally infested with this <i>Coronula</i>. This very
+illustrative specimen was, and I hope still is, in Mr. Buckland's
+Museum at South Kensington. It was described by
+him in <i>Land and Water</i>, of May 19th, 1866, and I am<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118_b" id="Page_118_b">[Pg 118]</a></span>
+indebted to the proprietors of that paper for the accompanying
+portrait of it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<a name="fig02_040" id="fig02_040">
+<img src="images/fig02_040.jpg" width="400" height="839" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 40.&mdash;WHALE BARNACLE (Coronula diadema), WITH THREE
+Conchoderma aurita ATTACHED TO IT.</span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_041" id="fig02_041">
+<img src="images/fig02_041.jpg" width="470" height="504" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 41.&mdash;A YOUNG BARNACLE. (Larva of Chthamalus stellatus.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The young Barnacle when just extruded from the shell of
+its parent is a very different being from that which it will
+be in its mature condition. It begins its life in a form
+exactly like that of an entomostracous crustacean, and,
+like a Cyclops, has one large eye in the middle of its forehead.
+In this state it swims freely, and with great activity.
+It undergoes three moults, each time altering its figure,
+until at the third exuviation it has become enclosed in a
+bivalve shell, and has acquired a second eye. It is now
+ready to attach itself to its abiding-place; so, selecting its
+future residence, it presses itself against the wood, or whatever
+the substance may be, pours out from its two antenn&aelig;
+a glutinous cement, which hardens in water, and thus fastens
+itself by the front of its head, is henceforth a fixture for
+life, and assumes the adult form in which most persons
+know it best.<a name="Anchor_97_97" id="Anchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 97.">&nbsp;[97]&nbsp;</a></p>
+
+<p>It is unnecessary for me to describe more minutely the
+anatomy of the Cirripedes; I have said enough to show<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120_b" id="Page_120_b">[Pg 120]</a></span>
+the nature of the plumose appurtenances which, hanging
+from the dead shells, were supposed to be the feathers of a
+little bird within; but it is difficult to understand how any
+one could have seen in the natural occupant of the shell,
+"the little bill, like that of a goose, the eyes, head, neck,
+breast, wings, tail, and feet, like those of other water-fowl,"
+so precisely and categorically detailed by Sir Robert
+Moray. As Pontoppidan, who denounced the whole story,
+as being "without the least foundation," very truly says,
+"One must take the force of imagination to help to make
+it look so!"</p>
+
+<p>As to the origin of the myth, I venture to differ entirely
+from philologists who attribute it to "language," and "a
+similarity of names," for, although, as Professor Max
+M&uuml;ller observes in one of his lectures, "words without
+definite meanings are at the bottom of nearly all our
+philosophical and religious controversies," it certainly is not
+applicable in this instance. Every quotation here given
+shows that the mistake arose from the supposed resemblance
+of the plumes of the cirrhopod, and the feathers of
+a bird, and the fallacious deductions derived therefrom.
+The statements of Maier (p. 112), Gerard (p. 106), Sir Robert
+Moray (p. 110), &amp;c., prove that this fanciful misconception
+sprang from erroneous observation. The love of the marvellous
+inherent in mankind, and especially prevalent in times
+of ignorance and superstition, favoured its reception and
+adoption, and I believe that it would have been as widely
+circulated, and have met with equal credence, if the names
+of the cirripede and of the goose that was supposed to be
+its offspring had been far more dissimilar than, at first, they
+really were.</p>
+
+<p>Setting aside several ingenious and far-fetched derivations
+that have been proposed, I think we may safely<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121_b" id="Page_121_b">[Pg 121]</a></span>
+regard the word "barnacle," as applied to the cirrhopod,
+as a corruption of <i>pernacula</i>, the diminutive of <i>perna</i>, a
+bivalve mollusk, so-called from the similarity in shape of
+its shell to that of a ham&mdash;<i>pernacula</i> being changed to
+<i>bernacula</i>. In some old Glossaries <i>perna</i> is actually spelt
+<i>berna</i>.</p>
+
+<p>To arrive at the origin of the word "barnacle," or
+"bernicle," as applied to the goose, we must understand
+that this bird, <i>Anser leucopsis</i>, was formerly called the
+"brent," "brant," or "bran" goose, and was supposed to
+be identical with the species, <i>Anser torquatus</i>, which is now
+known by that name. The Scottish word for "goose" is
+"clake," or "clakis,"<a name="Anchor_98_98" id="Anchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 98.">&nbsp;[98]&nbsp;</a> and I think that the suggestion
+made long ago to Gesner<a name="Anchor_99_99" id="Anchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 99.">&nbsp;[99]&nbsp;</a> (1558), by his correspondent,
+Joannes Caius, is correct, that the word "barnacle" comes
+from "branclakis," or "barnclake," "the dark-coloured
+goose."</p>
+
+<p>Professor Max M&uuml;ller is of the opinion that its Latin
+name may have been derived from <i>Hibernic&aelig;</i>, <i>Hibernicul&aelig;</i>,
+<i>Bernicul&aelig;</i>, as it was against the Irish bishops that Geraldus
+wrote, but I must say that this does not commend itself to
+me; for the name <i>Bernicula</i> was not used in the early times
+to denote these birds. Giraldus himself described them as
+<i>Bernac&aelig;</i>, but they were variously known, also, as <i>Barliates</i>,
+<i>Bernestas</i>, <i>Barnetas</i>, <i>Barbates</i>, etc.</p>
+
+<p>I agree with Dr. John Hill,<a name="Anchor_100_100" id="Anchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 100.">&nbsp;[100]&nbsp;</a> that "the whole matter that
+gave origin to the story is that the 'shell-fish' (cirripedes),
+supposed to have this wonderful production usually adhere
+to old wood, and that they have a kind of fibres hanging
+out of them, which, in some degree, resemble feathers of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122_b" id="Page_122_b">[Pg 122]</a></span>some bird. From this slight origin arose the story that
+they contained real birds: what grew on trees people soon
+asserted to be the fruit of trees, and, from step to step, the
+story gained credit with the hearers," till, at length, Gerard
+had the audacity to say that he had witnessed the transformation.</p>
+
+<p>The Barnacle Goose is only a winter visitor of Great
+Britain. It breeds in the far north, in Greenland, Iceland,
+Spitzbergen, and Nova Zembla, and probably, also, along
+the shores of the White Sea. There are generally some
+specimens of this prettily-marked goose in the gardens of
+the Zoological Society in the Regent's Park, London; and
+they thrive there, and become very tame. In the months
+of December and January these geese may often be seen
+hanging for sale in poulterers' shops; and he who has tasted
+one well cooked may be pardoned if the suspicion cross
+his mind that the "monks of old," and "the bare-footed
+friars," as well as the laity, may not have been unwilling to
+sustain the fiction in order that they might conserve the
+privilege of having on their tables during the long fast of
+Lent so agreeable and succulent a "vegetable" or "fish"
+as a Barnacle Goose.</p>
+
+
+<p>THE END.</p>
+
+<p class="center">LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+</p>
+
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_1_1"><span class="label">&nbsp;[1]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Natural History of Norway.' A.D. 1751.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_2_2"><span class="label">&nbsp;[2]&nbsp;</span></a> Born 1643; died 1712.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_3_3"><span class="label">&nbsp;[3]&nbsp;</span></a> Olaus Magnus has sometimes been mistaken for his brother and
+predecessor in the archiepiscopal see, Johan Magnus, author of a
+book entitled 'Gothorum, Suevorumque Historia.' Olaus was the
+last Roman Catholic archbishop of the Swedish church, and when the
+Reformation, supported by Gustavus Vasa, gained the ascendancy in
+Sweden, he remained true to his faith, and retired to Rome, where he
+wrote his work, 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Rom&aelig;,
+1555. An English translation of this book was published by
+J. Streater, in 1658. It does not contain the illustrations.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_4_4"><span class="label">&nbsp;[4]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii., p. 210.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_5_5"><span class="label">&nbsp;[5]&nbsp;</span></a> From the Greek words <i>cephale</i>, the head; and <i>poda</i>, feet.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_6_6"><span class="label">&nbsp;[6]&nbsp;</span></a> From <i>octo</i>, eight; and <i>pous</i> (<i>poda</i>), feet.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_7_7"><span class="label">&nbsp;[7]&nbsp;</span></a> See an excellent article in the <i>Field</i>, Sept. 2, 1876, on the 'Ten
+Footed Cuttle' (<i>Sepia officinalis</i>), by the late Mr. W. A. Lloyd, an
+earnest and accomplished aquatic zoologist; eccentric, but in all that
+relates to the construction and management of an aquarium a master
+of his craft. It was his wish that in any future edition of my little
+book on the Octopus, or other writings on the cephalopods, I should
+use the woodcuts which illustrated his articles on Sepia and Octopus.
+By the kind permission of the proprietors of the <i>Field</i>, I reproduce
+them in suitable size for these pages.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_8_8"><span class="label">&nbsp;[8]&nbsp;</span></a> See 'The Octopus; or, the Devil-fish of Fiction and of Fact.'
+1873. Chapman and Hall.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_9_9"><span class="label">&nbsp;[9]&nbsp;</span></a> This carving was figured in illustration of an interesting paper
+by Professor Owen, C.B., F.R.S., &amp;c., "On some new and rare
+Cephalopoda," in the Transactions of the Zoological Society, April 20,
+1880.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_10_10"><span class="label">&nbsp;[10]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Histoire Naturelle g&eacute;n&eacute;rale et particuli&egrave;re des Mollusques,'
+vol. ii., p. 256.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_11_11"><span class="label">&nbsp;[11]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Conchyliologie Syst&eacute;matique.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_12_12"><span class="label">&nbsp;[12]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Hist. Nat. des Moll.,' vol. ii., pp. 358 to 368.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_13_13"><span class="label">&nbsp;[13]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Leisure Hour</i>, October, 1875, p. 636.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_14_14"><span class="label">&nbsp;[14]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Voyage aux Iles Malouines.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_15_15"><span class="label">&nbsp;[15]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Voyage de D&eacute;couvertes aux Terres Australes.'<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_16_16"><span class="label">&nbsp;[16]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Voyage de l'Uranie: Zoologie,' vol. i., part 2, p. 411. 1824.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_17_17"><span class="label">&nbsp;[17]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Manuel des Mollusques,' p. 86.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_18_18"><span class="label">&nbsp;[18]&nbsp;</span></a> 'British Conchology,' vol. v., p. 124.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_19_19"><span class="label">&nbsp;[19]&nbsp;</span></a> In the accompanying illustration, the size of the squid is exaggerated,
+but not so much as has been supposed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_20_20"><span class="label">&nbsp;[20]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Sitzungsberichte der Gesellschaft naturforschender Freunde zu
+Berlin,' pp. 65-67, quoted by Professor Owen, <i>op. cit.</i></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_21_21"><span class="label">&nbsp;[21]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Comptes Rendus,' t. 80, 1875, p. 998.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_22_22"><span class="label">&nbsp;[22]&nbsp;</span></a> 'History of Animals,' book 8, chap. 28.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_23_23"><span class="label">&nbsp;[23]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Naturalis Histori&aelig;,' Lib. vi., cap. 23.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_24_24"><span class="label">&nbsp;[24]&nbsp;</span></a> 'De Factis, Dictisque Memorabilibus,' Lib. i., cap. 8, 1st century.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_25_25"><span class="label">&nbsp;[25]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Lib. xxi. cap. 43.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_26_26"><span class="label">&nbsp;[26]&nbsp;</span></a> "Coils itself in spherical convolutions" is a better translation of
+the original Latin.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_27_27"><span class="label">&nbsp;[27]&nbsp;</span></a> Six hundred feet.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_28_28"><span class="label">&nbsp;[28]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Des alten Gr&ouml;nlands neue Perlustration,' 8vo., Frankfurt, 1730,
+and 'Det Gamle Gr&ouml;nlands nye perlustratione eller Naturel Historie.'
+4to., Copenhagen, 1741.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_29_29"><span class="label">&nbsp;[29]&nbsp;</span></a> Jardine's Naturalists' Library: 'Marine Amphibia,' p. 314.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_30_30"><span class="label">&nbsp;[30]&nbsp;</span></a> Hitherto erroneously printed "Deinboll."</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_31_31"><span class="label">&nbsp;[31]&nbsp;</span></a> See illustration, p. 67.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_32_32"><span class="label">&nbsp;[32]&nbsp;</span></a> It must be noted, however, that in almost every case, except that
+of the <i>Osborne</i>, the paddles were <i>supposed</i>, not <i>seen</i>, and were invented
+to account for an animal of great length progressing at the surface of
+the water at the rate of twelve to fifteen miles an hour without its being
+possible to perceive, upon the closest and most attentive inspection,
+any undulatory movement to which its rapid advance could be
+ascribed. As the great calamaries were unknown, their mode of swift
+retrograde motion, by means of an outflowing current of water, was
+of course unsuspected.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_33_33"><span class="label">&nbsp;[33]&nbsp;</span></a> Dr. Gray wrote in his 'Synopsis of Genera of Reptiles,' in the
+Annals of Philosophy, 1825: "There is every reason to believe from
+general structure that there exists an affinity between the tortoises and
+the snakes; but the genus that exactly unites them is at present
+unknown to European naturalists; which is not astonishing when we
+consider the immense number of undescribed animals which are daily
+occurring. If I may be allowed to speculate from the peculiarities of
+structure which I have observed, I am inclined to think that the union
+will most probably take place by some newly discovered genera allied
+to the marine or fluviatile soft-skinned turtles and the marine serpent."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_34_34"><span class="label">&nbsp;[34]&nbsp;</span></a> Berosus, lib. i. p. 48.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_35_35"><span class="label">&nbsp;[35]&nbsp;</span></a> Nahum iii. 8.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5_b" id="Page_5_b">[Pg 5]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_36_36"><span class="label">&nbsp;[36]&nbsp;</span></a> 1 Samuel v. 4.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_37_37"><span class="label">&nbsp;[37]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Paradise Lost,' Book i. l. 462.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6_b" id="Page_6_b">[Pg 6]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_38_38"><span class="label">&nbsp;[38]&nbsp;</span></a> Some writers are of the opinion that the legend of Oannes
+contains an allusion to the rising and setting of the sun, and that his
+semi-piscine form was the expression of the idea that half his time was
+spent above ground, and half below the waves. The same commentators
+also regard all the "civilizing" gods and goddesses as, respectively,
+solar and lunar deities. The attributes symbolized in the
+worship of Noah and the sun are so nearly alike that the two interpretations
+are not incompatible.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_39_39"><span class="label">&nbsp;[39]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Opera Omnia,' tom. ii. p. 884, edit. Bened. de Dea. Syr.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_40_40"><span class="label">&nbsp;[40]&nbsp;</span></a> Lib. i. cap. cv.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_41_41"><span class="label">&nbsp;[41]&nbsp;</span></a> It is worthy of note that the fish was also adopted as an emblem
+by the early Christians, and was frequently sculptured on their tombs
+as a private mark or sign of the faith in which the person there
+interred had died. It alluded to the letters which composed the
+Greek word [Greek: Ichthys] ("a fish") forming an anagram, the initials
+of words which conveyed the following sentiment: [Greek: I&ecirc;sous], Jesus;
+[Greek: Christos], Christ; [Greek: Theou], of God; [Greek: gios], Son; [Greek: S&ocirc;t&ecirc;r], Saviour. But it
+doubtless bore, also, the older meaning of "preservation" and "reproduction,"
+of which the fish was the symbol, and betokened a belief
+in a future resurrection, as Noah was preserved to dwell in, and
+populate, a new world. In 'Sea Monsters Unmasked,' <a href="#Page_55">page 55</a>,
+I gave a figure, copied by permission from the <i>Illustrated London
+News</i>, of a rough sculpture in the Roman catacombs, of Jonah being
+disgorged by a sea-monster. Near to it was found, on another Christian
+tomb, one of these designs of the "fish;" and it is not a little
+curious that, whereas the animal depicted as casting forth Jonah is
+not a whale, but a sea-serpent, or dragon, the <i>ichtheus</i> in this instance
+is apparently not a fish, but a seal.
+</p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 470px;">
+<a name="fig02_011" id="fig02_011">
+<img src="images/fig02_011.jpg" width="470" height="166" alt="" title="" />
+</a>
+<span class="caption">FIG. 11.&mdash;CHRISTIAN SYMBOL. From the Catacombs at Rome.</span>
+</div>
+<p>
+The article referred to appeared in the <i>Illustrated London News</i>
+of February 3rd, 1872, and the woodcut (fig. 11), an electrotype of
+which was most kindly presented to me by the proprietors of that
+paper, was one of the sketches that accompanied it.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_42_42"><span class="label">&nbsp;[42]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Naturalis Historia</i>, Lib. ix. cap. v.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_43_43"><span class="label">&nbsp;[43]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>De Natur&acirc; Animalium</i>, Lib. xvi. cap. xviii.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_44_44"><span class="label">&nbsp;[44]&nbsp;</span></a> "<i>Forfices</i>," literally "shears," or "nippers," like the claws of a
+lobster.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_45_45"><span class="label">&nbsp;[45]&nbsp;</span></a> Lib. xiii. cap. xxi.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_46_46"><span class="label">&nbsp;[46]&nbsp;</span></a> One of the Dutch spice-islands in the Banda Sea, between Celebes
+and Papua.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_47_47"><span class="label">&nbsp;[47]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Beschrijving van Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien</i>, etc., 5 vols. folio,
+Dordrecht and Amsterdam, 1727, vol. iii. p. 330.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_48_48"><span class="label">&nbsp;[48]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Itinerarium Indicum</i>, Berne, 1669.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_49_49"><span class="label">&nbsp;[49]&nbsp;</span></a> With the permission and assistance of Messrs. Longman, the
+accompanying wood-cut of this picture, and that of the Dugong, on <a href="#Page_43_b">page
+43</a>, are copied from Sir J. Emerson Tennent's book published in 1861.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_50_50"><span class="label">&nbsp;[50]&nbsp;</span></a> Whitbourne's 'Discourse of Newfoundland.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_51_51"><span class="label">&nbsp;[51]&nbsp;</span></a> Glover's 'Account of Virginia,' ap. Phil. Trans. vol. xi. p. 625.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_52_52"><span class="label">&nbsp;[52]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Historia rerum Norvegicarum.</i></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_53_53"><span class="label">&nbsp;[53]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Voyage en Islande</i>, tom. iii. p. 223.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_54_54"><span class="label">&nbsp;[54]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii. p. 190.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_55_55"><span class="label">&nbsp;[55]&nbsp;</span></a> <i>Feroa Reserata</i>, or Description of the Faroe Islands. 8vo. Copenhagen,
+1673.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_56_56"><span class="label">&nbsp;[56]&nbsp;</span></a> John Leyden.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_57_57"><span class="label">&nbsp;[57]&nbsp;</span></a> Third Series, vol. ii. p. 134, 2nd ed.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_58_58"><span class="label">&nbsp;[58]&nbsp;</span></a> Naturalist's Library, Marine Amphibi&aelig;, p. 291.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_59_59"><span class="label">&nbsp;[59]&nbsp;</span></a> John Leyden.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_60_60"><span class="label">&nbsp;[60]&nbsp;</span></a> The Ettrick Shepherd.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_61_61"><span class="label">&nbsp;[61]&nbsp;</span></a> Tom Hood. 'The Mermaid at Margate.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_62_62"><span class="label">&nbsp;[62]&nbsp;</span></a> John Leyden.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_63_63"><span class="label">&nbsp;[63]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Romances and Drolls of the West of England.' London: Hotten,
+1871.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_64_64"><span class="label">&nbsp;[64]&nbsp;</span></a> Vol. xiii. p. 336.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_65_65"><span class="label">&nbsp;[65]&nbsp;</span></a> The "Cornish Vicar" was, evidently, the Rev. Robert Stephen
+Hawker, M.A., Vicar of Morwenstow, and author of 'Echoes from
+Old Cornwall,' 'Footprints of Former Men in Cornwall,' etc.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_66_66"><span class="label">&nbsp;[66]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Geography and Distribution of Animals.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_67_67"><span class="label">&nbsp;[67]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Romance of Natural History,' 2nd Series.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_68_68"><span class="label">&nbsp;[68]&nbsp;</span></a> Almost all that is known of the living rytina is from an account
+published in 1751, in St. Petersburg, by Steller, who was one of an exploring
+party wrecked on Behring's Island in 1741. During the ten
+months the crew remained on the island they pursued this easily-captured
+animal so persistently, for food, that it was all but annihilated at
+the time. The last one there was killed in 1768.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_69_69"><span class="label">&nbsp;[69]&nbsp;</span></a> For a full description of the habits of this animal in captivity, see
+an article by the present writer in the 'Leisure Hour' of September
+28, 1878; from which the illustration, <a href="#fig02_017">Fig. 17</a>, is borrowed by the kind
+consent of the Editor of that publication.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_70_70"><span class="label">&nbsp;[70]&nbsp;</span></a> Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. August, 1857.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_71_71"><span class="label">&nbsp;[71]&nbsp;</span></a> The octopus is still called the "preke" in some parts of England,
+notably in Sussex. The translation of Oppian's 'Halieutics,' from
+which this passage and others are quoted is that by Messrs. Jones and
+Diaper, of Baliol College, Oxford, and was published in 1722.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_72_72"><span class="label">&nbsp;[72]&nbsp;</span></a> Homer's 'Odyssey,' Pope's Translation, Book XII.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_73_73"><span class="label">&nbsp;[73]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' lib. xxi. cap. vi. <small>A.D.</small>
+1555.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_74_74"><span class="label">&nbsp;[74]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Natural History of the Sperm Whale.' Van Voorst, 1839.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_75_75"><span class="label">&nbsp;[75]&nbsp;</span></a> The octopus.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_76_76"><span class="label">&nbsp;[76]&nbsp;</span></a> Naturalis Historia, lib. ix. cap. 30.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_77_77"><span class="label">&nbsp;[77]&nbsp;</span></a> Appendix to Sir Edward Belcher's 'Voyage of the "Samarang,"'
+by Mr. Arthur Adams, assistant surgeon to the expedition.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_78_78"><span class="label">&nbsp;[78]&nbsp;</span></a> 'The Octopus,' 1873, p. 57.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_79_79"><span class="label">&nbsp;[79]&nbsp;</span></a> "At 100 fathoms the pressure exceeds 265 lbs. to the square inch.
+Empty bottles, securely corked, and sunk with weights beyond 100
+fathoms, are always crushed. If filled with liquid the cork is driven
+in, and the liquid replaced by salt water; and in drawing the bottle up
+again the cork is returned to the neck of the bottle, generally in a
+reversed position."&mdash;Sir F. Beaufort, quoted by Dr. S. P. Woodward
+in his 'Manual of the Mollusca.'</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_80_80"><span class="label">&nbsp;[80]&nbsp;</span></a> I need hardly say that before the nacreous layer of the shell
+from which this animal takes its name is made visible, an outer deposit
+of dense calcareous matter has to be removed by hydrochloric acid:
+the pearly surface thus exposed is then easily polished.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_81_81"><span class="label">&nbsp;[81]&nbsp;</span></a> It is so interesting to most of us to know something of the early
+work of our greatest men, and of the tide in their affairs, which,
+taken at the flood, led on to fortune, that I hope I may be excused for
+referring to the period when the distinguished chief of the Natural
+History Department of the British Museum, the great comparative
+anatomist, the unrivalled pal&aelig;ontologist, the illustrious physiologist,
+the venerable and venerated friend of all earnest students, was beginning
+to attract the attention, and to receive the approbation of his
+seniors as a promising young worker. In Messrs. Griffith and Pidgeon's
+Supplement to Cuvier's 'Mollusca and Radiata,' published in 1834, the
+treatise in question is thus mentioned: "We have much pleasure in referring
+to a most excellent memoir on <i>Nautilus pompilius</i>, by Mr. Owen,
+with elaborate figures of the animal, its shell, and various parts, published
+by direction of the Council of the College of Surgeons. The
+reader will find the most satisfactory information on the subject, and
+the scientific public will earnestly hope that the present volume will be
+the first of a similar series." This hope has been more than fulfilled.
+Dean Buckland, in his 'Bridgewater Treatise,' wrote of this work: "I
+rejoice in the present opportunity of bearing testimony to the value of
+Professor Owen's highly philosophical and most admirable memoir&mdash;a
+work not less creditable to the author than honourable to the Royal
+College of Surgeons, under whose auspices the publication has been so
+handsomely conducted."</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_82_82"><span class="label">&nbsp;[82]&nbsp;</span></a> Riva, 1559, leaf 142.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_83_83"><span class="label">&nbsp;[83]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Historia Simplicium,' lib. iii. p. 327.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_84_84"><span class="label">&nbsp;[84]&nbsp;</span></a> Prodrom. Hist. Nat. Scot. parts 2, lib. iii. p. 21, 1684.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_85_85"><span class="label">&nbsp;[85]&nbsp;</span></a> Otia Imperialia, iii. 123.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_86_86"><span class="label">&nbsp;[86]&nbsp;</span></a> For this quotation and the following one I am indebted to
+Professor Max M&uuml;ller's Lecture before referred to.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_87_87"><span class="label">&nbsp;[87]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Chorographical Description of Norway,' p. 244.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_88_88"><span class="label">&nbsp;[88]&nbsp;</span></a> &AElig;neas Sylvius gives us information concerning the personal
+appearance of his royal host, whom he describes as, "<i>hominem quadratum
+et multa pinguedine gravem</i>,"&mdash;literally, "a square-built man,
+heavy with much fat."</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_89_89"><span class="label">&nbsp;[89]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Cosmographia Universalis,' p. 49, 1572.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_90_90"><span class="label">&nbsp;[90]&nbsp;</span></a> The original of this picture is a small wood-cut in Matthias de
+Lobel's 'Stirpium Historia,' published in 1870. The birds within the
+shells were added by Gerard. Aldrovandus, in copying it, gave leaves
+to the tree, as shown on <a href="#Page_110_b">page 110</a>.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_91_91"><span class="label">&nbsp;[91]&nbsp;</span></a> Exercit. 59, sect. 2.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_92_92"><span class="label">&nbsp;[92]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Museum,' p. 257.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106_b" id="Page_106_b">[Pg 106]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_93_93"><span class="label">&nbsp;[93]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Physica Curiosa, sive Mirabilia Natur&aelig; et Artis,' 1662, lib. ix.
+cap. xxii. p. 960.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_94_94"><span class="label">&nbsp;[94]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Ornithologia,' lib. xix. p. 173, ed. 1603.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_95_95"><span class="label">&nbsp;[95]&nbsp;</span></a> 'De Volucri Arborea,' 1629.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_96_96"><span class="label">&nbsp;[96]&nbsp;</span></a> Du Bartas' "Divine Week" p. 228. Joshua Sylvester's translation.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_97_97"><span class="label">&nbsp;[97]&nbsp;</span></a> If any of my readers wish to observe the development of young
+barnacles they may easily do so. The method I have generally
+adopted has been as follows: Procure a shallow glass or earthenware
+milk-pan that will hold at least a gallon. Fill this to within an inch
+of the top with sea-water, and place it in any shaded part of a room&mdash;not
+in front of a window. Put in the pan six or eight pebbles or clean
+shells of equal height, say 1&frac12; or 2 inches, and on them lay a clean
+sheet of glass, which, by resting on the pebbles, is brought to within
+about 2&frac12; inches of the surface of the water. Select some limpets or
+mussels having acorn-barnacles on them; carefully cut out the limpet
+or mussel, and clean nicely the interior of the shell; then place a
+dozen or more of these shells on the sheet of glass, and the barnacles
+upon them will be within convenient reach of any observation with
+a magnifying glass. If this be done in the month of March, the experimenter
+will not have to wait long before he sees young <i>Balani</i>
+ejected from the summits of some of the shells. Up to the moment of
+their birth each of them is enclosed in a little cocoon or case, in shape
+like a canary-seed, and most of them are tossed into the world whilst
+still enclosed in this. In a few seconds this casing is ruptured longitudinally,
+apparently by the struggles of its inmate, which escapes at
+one end, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, and swims freely
+to the surface of the water, leaving the split cocoon or case at the
+bottom of the pan. Some few of the young barnacles seem to be
+freed from the cocoon before, or at the moment of, extrusion. From
+three to a dozen or more of these escape with each protrusion of the
+cirri of the parent, and as the parturient barnacle will put forth its
+feathery casting net at least twenty times in a minute for an hour or
+more, it follows that as many as ten thousand young ones may be produced
+in an hour. These, as they are cast forth at each pulsation of
+the parent's cirri, fall upon the clean sheet of glass, and may be taken
+up in a pipette, and placed under a microscope, or removed to a
+smaller vessel of sea-water, for minute and separate investigation. It
+seems strange that animals which, like the oyster and the barnacles,
+are condemned in their mature condition to lead so sedentary a life,
+should in the earlier stages of their existence swim freely and merrily
+through the water&mdash;young fellows seeking a home, and when they
+have found it, although their connubial life must be a very tame one,
+settling down, and not caring to rove about any more for the remainder
+of their days. These young <i>Balani</i> dart about like so many water-fleas,
+and yet, after a few days of freedom, they become fixed and immovable,
+the inhabitants of the pyramidal shells which grow in such
+abundance on other shells, stones, and old wood.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119_b" id="Page_119_b">[Pg 119]</a></span></p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_98_98"><span class="label">&nbsp;[98]&nbsp;</span></a> See the quotation from Hector Boethius, p. 101.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_99_99"><span class="label">&nbsp;[99]&nbsp;</span></a> 'Historia Animalium,' lib. iii. p. 110.</p></div>
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a title="Return to text." href="#Anchor_100_100"><span class="label">&nbsp;[100]&nbsp;</span></a> 'History of Animals,' p. 422. 1752.</p></div>
+<div><br /></div>
+<p class="transnote">
+<span class="big">Transcriber's note:</span><br />
+Inconsistent hyphenation has been left as written.<br />
+Missing end quote marks have been inserted.<br />
+On <a href="#Page_95">page 95</a> the word irreconcileable has been left as written: "I need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is the"<br />
+On <a href="#Page_30_b">page 30</a> the word gowden has been left as written: "Braiding her locks of gowden hair"<br />
+On <a href="#Page_20_b">page 20</a> the word fane has been left as written: "exactly resembled the tail of a fish, with a broad fane"<br />
+On <a href="#Page_33">page 33</a> the word engulphed has been left as written: "were all suddenly engulphed in the waves on the night of the battle"<br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
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+</body>
+</html>
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@@ -0,0 +1,7065 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables Explained
+
+Author: Henry Lee
+
+Release Date: July 9, 2011 [EBook #36677]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Jeannie Howse, Anna Hall, Bryan Ness and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+(This file was produced from images generously made
+available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: THE SEA SERPENT, AS FIRST SEEN FROM H.M.S. 'DAEDALUS.'
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+
+
+  (_International Fisheries Exhibition_ LONDON, 1883)
+
+
+  SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED
+
+  BY
+
+  HENRY LEE, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.
+
+  SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM
+  AND
+  AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT'
+
+  ILLUSTRATED
+
+  LONDON
+  WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED
+  INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION
+  AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.
+  1883
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+As I commence this little history of two sea monsters there comes to my
+mind a remark made to me by my friend, Mr. Samuel L. Clemens--"Mark
+Twain"--which illustrates a feeling that many a writer must have
+experienced when dealing with a subject that has been previously well
+handled. Expressing to me one day the gratification he felt in having
+made many pleasant acquaintances in England, he added, with dry humour,
+and a grave countenance, "Yes! I owe your countrymen no grudge or
+ill-will. I freely forgive them, though one of them did me a grievous
+wrong, an irreparable injury! It was Shakspeare: if he had not written
+those plays of his, I should have done so! They contain _my_ thoughts,
+_my_ sentiments! He forestalled me!"
+
+In treating of the so-called "sea-serpent," I have been anticipated by
+many able writers. Mr. Gosse, in his delightful book, 'The Romance of
+Natural History,' published in 1862, devoted a chapter to it; and
+numerous articles concerning it have appeared in various papers and
+periodicals.
+
+But, for the information from which those authors have drawn their
+inferences, and on which they have founded their opinions, they have
+been greatly indebted, as must be all who have seriously to consider
+this subject, to the late experienced editor of the _Zoologist_, Mr.
+Edward Newman, a man of wonderful power of mind, of great judgment, a
+profound thinker, and an able writer. At a time when, as he said, "the
+shafts of ridicule were launched against believers and unbelievers in
+the sea-serpent in a very pleasing and impartial manner," he, in the
+true spirit of philosophical inquiry, in 1847, opened the columns of his
+magazine to correspondence on this topic, and all the more recent
+reports of marine monsters having been seen are therein recorded. To
+him, therefore, the fullest acknowledgments are due.
+
+The great cuttles, also, have been the subject of articles in various
+magazines, notably one by Mr. W. Saville Kent, F.L.S., in the 'Popular
+Science Review' of April, 1874, and a chapter in my little book on the
+Octopus, published in 1873, is also devoted to them. In writing of them
+as the living representatives of the kraken, and as having been
+frequently mistaken for the "sea-serpent," my deductions have been drawn
+from personal knowledge, and an intimate acquaintance with the habits,
+form, and structure of the animals described. It was only by watching
+the movements of specimens of the "common squid" (_Loligo vulgaris_),
+and the "little squid" (_L. media_), which lived in the tanks of the
+Brighton Aquarium, that I recognised in their peculiar habit of
+occasionally swimming half-submerged, with uplifted caudal extremity,
+and trailing arms, the fact that I had before me the "sea-serpent" of
+many a well-authenticated anecdote. A mere knowledge of their form and
+anatomy after death had never suggested to me that which became at once
+apparent when I saw them in life.
+
+It is a pleasure to me to acknowledge gratefully the kindness I have
+met with in connection with the illustrations of this book. The
+proprietors of the _Illustrated London News_ not only gave me permission
+to copy, in reduced size, their two pictures of the _Daedalus_ incident,
+but presented to me electrotype copies of all others small enough for
+these pages--namely, "Jonah and the Monster," Egede's "Sea-Serpent," and
+the Whale as seen from the _Pauline_. Equally kind have been the
+proprietors of the _Field_. To them I am greatly indebted for their
+permission to copy the beautiful woodcuts of the "Octopus at Rest," "The
+Sepia seizing its Prey," and the arms of the Newfoundland squids, and
+also for "electros" of the two curious Japanese engravings, all of which
+originally appeared in their paper. From the _Graphic_ I have had
+similar permission to copy any cuts that might be thought suitable, and
+the illustrations of the sea-serpent, as seen from Her Majesty's yacht
+_Osborne_ and the _City of Baltimore_, are from that journal. Messrs.
+Nisbet most courteously allowed me to have a copy of the block of the
+_Enaliosaurus_ swimming, which was one of the numerous pictures in Mr.
+Gosse's book, published by them, already referred to. And last, not
+least, I have to thank Miss Ellen Woodward, daughter of my friend, Dr.
+Henry Woodward, F.R.S., for enabling me to better explain the movements
+and appearances of the squids when swimming, and when raising their
+bodies out of water in an erect position, by carefully drawing them from
+my rough sketches.
+
+                                        HENRY LEE.
+
+  SAVAGE CLUB;
+    _July 21st, 1883_.
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+_Frontispiece._--The Sea Serpent as first seen from H.M.S. _Daedalus_.
+
+  FIG.                                                              PAGE
+
+   1. Beak and Arms of a Decapod Cuttle                               16
+
+   2. The Octopus (_Octopus vulgaris_)                                18
+
+   3. The Cuttle (_Sepia officinalis_)                                21
+
+   4. Hooked Tentacles of _Onychoteuthis_                             23
+
+   5. Japanese fisherman attacked by a Cuttle                         29
+
+   6. Arms of a great Cuttle exhibited in a Japanese fish-shop        29
+
+   7. Facsimile of De Montfort's "_Poulpe colossal_"                  32
+
+   8. Gigantic Calamary caught by the French despatch vessel
+      _Alecton_, near Teneriffe                                       39
+
+   9. Tentacle of a great Calamary (_Architeuthis princeps_)
+      taken in Conception Bay, Newfoundland                           43
+
+  10. Head and Tentacles of a great Calamary (_Architeuthis
+      princeps_) taken in Logie Bay, Newfoundland                     44
+
+  11. Jonah and the Sea Monster                                       55
+
+  12. Sea Serpent seizing a man on board ship                         58
+
+  13. Gigantic Lobster dragging a man from a ship                     58
+
+  14. Pontoppidan's "Sea Serpent"                                     63
+
+  15. The Animal drawn by Mr. Bing as having been seen by Egede       66
+
+  16. The Animal which Egede probably saw                             67
+
+  17. The Sea Serpent of the Wernerian Society (_facsimile_)          69
+
+  18. A Calamary swimming at the surface of the sea                   77
+
+  19. The Sea Serpent passing under the quarter of H.M.S.
+      _Daedalus_                                                       81
+
+  20. The Sea Serpent and Sperm Whale as seen from the _Pauline_      91
+
+  21. The Sea Serpent as seen from the _City of Baltimore_            93
+
+  22. The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht _Osborne_. Phase 1      94
+
+  23. The Sea Serpent as seen from H.M. yacht _Osborne_. Phase 2      94
+
+  24. Skeleton of the _Plesiosaurus_, restored by Mr. Conybeare       98
+
+  25. The Sea Serpent on the Enaliosaurian hypothesis                100
+
+
+
+
+SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED.
+
+
+
+
+THE KRAKEN.
+
+
+In the legends and traditions of northern nations, stories of the
+existence of a marine animal of such enormous size that it more
+resembled an island than an organised being frequently found a place. It
+is thus described in an ancient manuscript (about A.D. 1180), attributed
+to the Norwegian King Sverre; and the belief in it has been alluded to
+by other Scandinavian writers from an early period to the present day.
+It was an obscure and mysterious sea-monster, known as the Kraken, whose
+form and nature were imperfectly understood, and it was peculiarly the
+object of popular wonder and superstitious dread.
+
+Eric Pontoppidan, the younger, Bishop of Bergen, and member of the
+Royal Academy of Sciences at Copenhagen, is generally, but unjustly,
+regarded as the inventor of the semi-fabulous Kraken, and is constantly
+misquoted by authors who have never read his work,[1] and who, one after
+another, have copied from their predecessors erroneous statements
+concerning him. More than half a century before him, Christian Francis
+Paullinus,[2] a physician and naturalist of Eisenach, who evinced in his
+writings an admiration of the marvellous rather than of the useful, had
+described as resembling Gesner's 'Heracleoticon,' a monstrous animal
+which occasionally rose from the sea on the coasts of Lapland and
+Finmark, and which was of such enormous dimensions, that a regiment of
+soldiers could conveniently manoeuvre on its back. About the same date,
+but a little earlier, Bartholinus, a learned Dane, told how, on a
+certain occasion, the Bishop of Midaros found the Kraken quietly
+reposing on the shore, and mistaking the enormous creature for a huge
+rock, erected an altar upon it and performed mass. The Kraken
+respectfully waited till the ceremony was concluded, and the reverend
+prelate safe on shore, and then sank beneath the waves.
+
+  [1] 'Natural History of Norway.' A.D. 1751.
+
+  [2] Born 1643; died 1712.
+
+And a hundred and fifty years before Bartholinus and Paullinus wrote,
+Olaus Magnus,[3] Archbishop of Upsala, in Sweden, had related many
+wondrous narratives of sea-monsters,--tales which had gathered and
+accumulated marvels as they had been passed on from generation to
+generation in oral history, and which he took care to bequeath to his
+successors undeprived of any of their fascination. According to him, the
+Kraken was not so polite to the laity as to the Bishop, for when some
+fishermen lighted a fire on its back, it sank beneath their feet, and
+overwhelmed them in the waters.
+
+  [3] Olaus Magnus has sometimes been mistaken for his brother and
+  predecessor in the archiepiscopal see, Johan Magnus, author of a
+  book entitled 'Gothorum, Suevorumque Historia.' Olaus was the last
+  Roman Catholic archbishop of the Swedish church, and when the
+  Reformation, supported by Gustavus Vasa, gained the ascendancy in
+  Sweden, he remained true to his faith, and retired to Rome, where
+  he wrote his work, 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Romae,
+  1555. An English translation of this book was published by J.
+  Streater, in 1658. It does not contain the illustrations.
+
+Pontoppidan was not a fabricator of falsehoods; but, in collecting
+evidence relating to the "great beasts" living in "the great and wide
+sea," was influenced, as he tells us, by "a desire to extend the popular
+knowledge of the glorious works of a beneficent Creator." He gave too
+much credence to contemporary narratives and old traditions of floating
+islands and sea monsters, and to the superstitious beliefs and
+exaggerated statements of ignorant fishermen: but if those who ridicule
+him had lived in his day and amongst his people, they would probably
+have done the same; for even Linnaeus was led to believe in the Kraken,
+and catalogued it in the first edition of his 'Systema Naturae,' as
+'_Sepia Microcosmos_.' He seems to have afterwards had cause to
+discredit his information respecting it, for he omitted it in the next
+edition. The Norwegian bishop was a conscientious and painstaking
+investigator, and the tone of his writings is neither that of an
+intentional deceiver nor of an incautious dupe. He diligently
+endeavoured to separate the truth from the cloud of error and fiction by
+which it was obscured; and in this he was to a great extent successful,
+for he correctly identifies, from the vague and perplexing descriptions
+submitted to him, the animal whose habits and structure had given rise
+to so many terror-laden narratives and extravagant traditions.
+
+The following are some of his remarks on the subject of this gigantic
+and ill-defined animal. Although I have greatly abbreviated them, I have
+thought it right to quote them at considerable length, that the modest
+and candid spirit in which they were written may be understood:[4]
+
+     "Amongst the many things," he says, "which are in the ocean, and
+     concealed from our eyes, or only presented to our view for a few
+     minutes, is the Kraken. This creature is the largest and most
+     surprising of all the animal creation, and consequently well
+     deserves such an account as the nature of the thing, according to
+     the Creator's wise ordinances, will admit of. Such I shall give at
+     present, and perhaps much greater light on this subject may be
+     reserved for posterity.
+
+     "Our fishermen unanimously affirm, and without the least variation
+     in their accounts, that when they row out several miles to sea,
+     particularly in the hot summer days, and by their situation (which
+     they know by taking a view of different points of land) expect to
+     find eighty or a hundred fathoms of water, it often happens that
+     they do not find above twenty or thirty, and sometimes less. At
+     these places they generally find the greatest plenty of fish,
+     especially cod and ling. Their lines, they say, are no sooner out
+     than they may draw them up with the hooks all full of fish. By this
+     they know that the Kraken is at the bottom. They say this creature
+     causes those unnatural shallows mentioned above, and prevents their
+     sounding. These the fishermen are always glad to find, looking upon
+     them as a means of their taking abundance of fish. There are
+     sometimes twenty boats or more got together and throwing out their
+     lines at a moderate distance from each other; and the only thing
+     they then have to observe is whether the depth continues the same,
+     which they know by their lines, or whether it grows shallower, by
+     their seeming to have less water. If this last be the case they
+     know that the Kraken is raising himself nearer the surface, and
+     then it is not time for them to stay any longer; they immediately
+     leave off fishing, take to their oars, and get away as fast as they
+     can. When they have reached the usual depth of the place, and find
+     themselves out of danger, they lie upon their oars, and in a few
+     minutes after they see this enormous monster come up to the surface
+     of the water; he there shows himself sufficiently, though his whole
+     body does not appear, which, in all likelihood, no human eye ever
+     beheld. Its back or upper part, which seems to be in appearance
+     about an English mile and a half in circumference (some say more,
+     but I chuse the least for greater certainty), looks at first like a
+     number of small islands surrounded with something that floats and
+     fluctuates like sea-weeds. Here and there a larger rising is
+     observed like sand-banks, on which various kinds of small fishes
+     are seen continually leaping about till they roll off into the
+     water from the sides of it; at last several bright points or horns
+     appear, which grow thicker and thicker the higher they rise above
+     the surface of the water, and sometimes they stand up as high and
+     as large as the masts of middle-sized vessels. It seems these are
+     the creature's arms, and it is said if they were to lay hold of the
+     largest man of war they would pull it down to the bottom. After
+     this monster has been on the surface of the water a short time it
+     begins slowly to sink again, and then the danger is as great as
+     before; because the motion of his sinking causes such a swell in
+     the sea, and such an eddy or whirlpool, that it draws everything
+     down with it, like the current of the river Male.
+
+     "As this enormous sea-animal in all probability may be reckoned of
+     the Polype, or of the Starfish kind, as shall hereafter be more
+     fully proved, it seems that the parts which are seen rising at its
+     pleasure, and are called arms, are properly the tentacula, or
+     feeling instruments, called horns, as well as arms. With these they
+     move themselves, and likewise gather in their food.
+
+     "Besides these, for this last purpose the great Creator has also
+     given this creature a strong and peculiar scent, which it can emit
+     at certain times, and by means of which it beguiles and draws other
+     fish to come in heaps about it. This animal has another strange
+     property, known by the experience of many old fishermen. They
+     observe that for some months the Kraken or Krabben is continually
+     eating, and in other months he always voids his excrements. During
+     this evacuation the surface of the water is coloured with the
+     excrement, and appears quite thick and turbid. This muddiness is
+     said to be so very agreeable to the smell or taste of other fishes,
+     or to both, that they gather together from all parts to it, and
+     keep for that purpose directly over the Kraken; he then opens his
+     arms or horns, seizes and swallows his welcome guests, and converts
+     them after due time, by digestion, into a bait for other fish of
+     the same kind. I relate what is affirmed by many; but I cannot give
+     so certain assurances of this particular, as I can of the existence
+     of this surprising creature; though I do not find anything in it
+     absolutely contrary to Nature. As we can hardly expect to examine
+     this enormous sea-animal alive, I am the more concerned that nobody
+     embraced that opportunity which, according to the following account
+     once did, and perhaps never more may offer, of seeing it entire
+     when dead."
+
+  [4] 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii., p. 210.
+
+The lost opportunity which the worthy prelate thus lamented, with the
+true feeling of a naturalist, was made known to him by the Rev. Mr.
+Friis, Consistorial Assessor, Minister of Bodoen in Nordland, and Vicar
+of the college for promoting Christian knowledge, and was to the
+following effect:
+
+     "In the year 1680, a Krake (perhaps a young and foolish one) came
+     into the water that runs between the rocks and cliffs in the parish
+     of Alstaboug, though the general custom of that creature is to keep
+     always several leagues from land, and therefore of course they must
+     die there. It happened that its extended long arms or antennae,
+     which this creature seems to use like the snail in turning about,
+     caught hold of some trees standing near the water, which might
+     easily have been torn up by the roots; but beside this, as it was
+     found afterwards, he entangled himself in some openings or clefts
+     in the rock, and therein stuck so fast, and hung so unfortunately,
+     that he could not work himself out, but perished and putrefied on
+     the spot. The carcass, which was a long while decaying, and filled
+     great part of that narrow channel, made it almost impassable by its
+     intolerable stench.
+
+     "The Kraken has never been known to do any great harm, except,"
+     the Author quaintly says, "they have taken away the lives of those
+     who consequently could not bring the tidings. I have heard but one
+     instance mentioned, which happened a few years ago, near
+     Fridrichstad, in the diocess of Aggerhuus. They say that two
+     fishermen accidentally, and to their great surprise, fell into such
+     a spot on the water as has been before described, full of a thick
+     slime almost like a morass. They immediately strove to get out of
+     this place, but they had not time to turn quick enough to save
+     themselves from one of the Kraken's horns, which crushed the head
+     of the boat, so that it was with great difficulty they saved their
+     lives on the wreck, though the weather was as calm as possible; for
+     these monsters, like the sea-snake, never appear at other times."
+
+Pontoppidan then reviews the stories of floating islands which suddenly
+appear, and as suddenly vanish, commonly credited, and especially
+mentioned by Luke Debes in his 'Description of Faroe.'
+
+     "These islands in the boisterous ocean could not be imagined," he
+     says, "to be of the nature of real floating islands, because they
+     could not possibly stand against the violence of the waves in the
+     ocean, which break the largest vessels, and therefore our sailors
+     have concluded this delusion could come from no other than the
+     great deceiver, the devil."
+
+This accusation, the good bishop, in his desire to be strictly
+impartial, will not admit on such hear-say evidence, but is determined
+to, literally, "give the devil his due;" for he warns his readers that
+"we ought not to charge that apostate spirit without a cause; for," he
+adds, "I rather think that this devil who so suddenly makes and unmakes
+these floating islands, is nothing else but the Kraken."
+
+Referring to a monster described by Pliny, he repeats his belief that
+"This sea-animal belongs to the Polype, or Star-fish species;" but he
+becomes very much "mixed" between the _Cephalopoda_ and the _Asteridae_,
+between the pedal segments, or arms, of the cuttle radiating from its
+head, and the rays of a Star-fish radiating from a central portion of
+the body. He evidently inclines strongly towards a particular Star-fish,
+the rays of which continually divide and subdivide themselves, or, as he
+describes it, "which shoots its rays into branches like those of trees,"
+and to which he gave the name of "Medusa's Head," a title by which, in
+its Greek form, _Gorgonocephalus_, it is still known to zoologists.
+"These Medusa's Heads," he says, "are supposed by some seafaring people
+here, to be the young of the Sea-Krake; perhaps they are its smallest
+ovula." After considering other reports concerning the Kraken, he
+arrives at the following definite opinion:
+
+     "We learn from all this that the Polype or Starfish have amongst
+     their various species some that are much larger than others; and,
+     according to all appearance, amongst the very largest inhabitants
+     of the ocean. If the axiom be true that greatness or littleness
+     makes no change in the species, then this Krake must be of the
+     Polypus kind, notwithstanding its enormous size."
+
+His diagnosis is correct; but it is stated with a modesty which his
+detractors would do well to imitate; and his concluding words on this
+subject place him in a light very different from that in which he is
+popularly regarded:
+
+     "I do not in the least insist on this conjecture being true," he
+     writes, "but willingly submit my suppositions in this and every
+     other dubious matter to the judgment of those who are better
+     experienced. If I was an admirer of uncertain reports and fabulous
+     stories, I might here add much more concerning this and other
+     Norwegian sea-monsters, whose existence I will not take upon me to
+     deny, but do not chuse, by a mixture of uncertain relations to make
+     such account appear doubtful as I myself believe to be true and
+     well attested. I shall therefore quit the subject here, and leave
+     it to future writers on this plan to complete what I have
+     imperfectly sketched out, by further experience, which is always
+     the best instructor."
+
+It is easy to recognise in Pontoppidan's description of the Kraken, the
+form and habits of one of the "Cuttle-fishes," so-called. The appearance
+of its numerous arms, with which it gathers in its food, and which grow
+thicker and thicker as they rise above the surface, is just what would
+take place in the case of one of the pelagic species of these mollusks
+raising its head out of the sea. The rendering of the water turbid and
+thick by the emission of a substance which the narrator supposed to be
+faecal matter, is exactly that which occurs when a cuttle discharges the
+contents of the remarkable organ known as its ink-bag; and the strong
+and peculiar scent mentioned as appertaining to it, is actually
+characteristic of its inky secretion. The musky odour referred to, is
+more perceptible in some species than in others. In one of the Octopods
+(_Eledone moschatus_), it is so strong, that the specific name of the
+animal is derived from it.
+
+The ancient Greeks and Romans, who were well acquainted with the
+various kinds of cuttles and regarded them all as excellent food, and
+even as delicacies of the table, applied the word "polypus" especially
+to the octopus. But Pontoppidan evidently uses it as descriptive of all
+the cephalopods. It must not be forgotten, however, that when he wrote,
+science was only slowly recovering from neglect of many centuries'
+duration. In the enlightened times of Greece and Rome, natural history
+flourished, and as in our day, attracted and occupied the attention of
+the man of science, and afforded recreation to the man of business and
+the politician. Aristotle wrote 322 years before the birth of Christ,
+and his works are monuments of practical wisdom. When we consider the
+period during which he lived, and the isolated nature of his labours,
+and compare them with the information which he possessed, we are
+astonished at his sagacity and the great scope and general accuracy of
+his knowledge. Pliny, 240 years later, lived in times more favourable
+for the cultivation of science; but with all his advantages made little
+improvement on the work of the great master. And then, later still, the
+sun of learning set; and there came over Europe the long night of the
+dark ages which succeeded Roman greatness, during which science was
+degraded and ignorance prevailed; and it is not till the middle of the
+sixteenth century, that the zoologist finds much to interest and
+instruct him. When we further reflect, that until within the past five
+and twenty years--till our large aquaria were constructed--Aristotle's
+knowledge of the habits and life-history of marine animals, and amongst
+them the cephalopods, was incomparably greater and more perfect than
+that possessed by any man who had lived since he recorded his
+observations, we cannot help feeling that in some departments of
+knowledge there is still lost ground to be recovered.
+
+In the old days of the Caesars, a Greek or Roman house-wife who was
+accustomed to see the cuttle, the squid, and the octopus daily exposed
+for sale in the markets, would of course have laughed at the idea of
+mistaking the one for the other; but there are comparatively few persons
+in our own country, at the present day, except those who have made
+marine zoology their study, whose ideas on the subject are not
+exceedingly hazy. This want of technical knowledge is not confined to
+the masses; but is common, if not general, amongst those who have been
+well educated, and is frequently apparent even in leaders in the daily
+papers--the productions, for the most part, of men of receptive minds,
+trained discrimination, and great general knowledge. As the subject is
+one in which I have long felt especial interest, I venture to hope that
+I may succeed in making clear the difference between the eight-footed
+octopus and its ten-footed relatives, and thus enable the reader to
+identify the member of the family from which we are to strip the dress
+and "make up" in which it masqueraded as the Kraken, and cause it to
+appear in its true and natural form.
+
+One of the great primary groups or divisions of the animal kingdom is
+that of the soft-bodied mollusca; which includes the cuttle, the oyster,
+the snail, &c. It has been separated into five "classes," of which the
+one we have especially to notice is the _Cephalopoda_,[5] or
+"head-footed,"--the animals belonging to it having their feet, or the
+organs which correspond with the foot of other molluscs, so attached to
+the head as to form a circle or coronet round the mouth. Some of these
+have the foot divided into eight segments, and are therefore called the
+_Octopoda_:[6] others have, in addition to the eight feet, lobes, or
+arms, two longer tentacular appendages, making ten in all, and are
+consequently called the _Decapoda_.
+
+  [5] From the Greek words _cephale_, the head; and _poda_, feet.
+
+  [6] From _octo_, eight; and _pous_ (_poda_), feet.
+
+Of the ten-footed section of the cephalopods, there are four "families;"
+two only of which exist in Britain--the _Teuthidae_, and the _Sepiidae_.
+The _Teuthidae_ are the Calamaries, popularly known as "Squids," and are
+represented by the long-bodied _Loligo vulgaris_, that has internally
+along its back a gristly, translucent stiffener, shaped like a
+quill-pen; from which and its ink it derives its names of "calamary"
+(from "_calamus_," a "pen"), "pen-and-ink fish," and "sea-clerk." The
+_Sepiidae_ are generally known as the Cuttles proper. As a type of them
+we may take the common "cuttle-fish," _Sepia officinalis_, the owner of
+the hard, calcareous shell often thrown up on the shore, and known as
+"cuttle-bone," or "sea-biscuit."
+
+It must here be remarked, that as these head-footed mollusks are not
+"fish," any more than lobsters, crabs, oysters, mussels, &c., which
+fishmongers call "shell-fish," are "fish," the word "fish" is
+misleading, and should be abandoned; and secondly, that the names
+"cuttle" and "squid," as distinctive appellations, are unsatisfactory.
+The word "cuttle" is derived from "cuddle," to hug, or embrace--in
+allusion to the manner in which the animal seizes its prey, and enfolds
+it in its arms; and "squid" is derived from "squirt," in reference to
+its habit of squirting water or ink. But as all the known members of the
+class, except the pearly nautilus, _Nautilus pompilius_, have these
+habits in common, the distinguishing terms are hardly apposite. As,
+however, they are conventionally accepted and understood, I prefer to
+use them. As with other mollusks, so with the cephalopods, some have
+shells, and some are naked or have only rudimentary shells. The
+Argonaut, or paper nautilus, has been regarded as the analogue of the
+snail, which, like it, secretes an _external_ shell for the protection
+of its soft body; and the octopus as that of the garden slug, which,
+having organs like those of the snail, as the octopus has organs like
+those of the shell-bearing argonaut, has no shell. The cuttles and
+squids may be compared to some of the sea-slugs, as _Aplysia_ and
+_Bullaea_, and to some land-slugs, as _Parmacella_ and _Limax_, which
+have an _internal_ shell.
+
+The argonaut and the other families of the cephalopods do not come
+within the scope of this treatise; we will therefore confine our
+attention to the three above mentioned. Of the anatomy and homology of
+the _Octopus_, _Sepia_, and _Calamary_ we need say no more than will
+suffice to show in what manner they resemble each other, and wherein
+they differ, in order that we may the more clearly perceive to which of
+them the story of the Kraken probably owes its origin.
+
+The octopus, the sepia, and the calamary are all constructed on one
+fundamental plan. A bag of fleshy muscular skin, called the mantle-sac,
+contains the organs of the body, heart, stomach, liver, intestines, a
+pair of gills by which oxygen is absorbed from the water for the
+purification of the blood, and an excurrent tube by which the water thus
+deprived of its life-sustaining gas is expelled. The outrush of water
+with more or less force, from this "syphon-tube," is also the principal
+source of locomotion when the animal is swimming, as it propels it
+backward--not by the striking of the expelled fluid against the
+surrounding water, as is generally supposed; but by the unbalanced
+pressure of the fluid acting inside the body in the direction in which
+the creature goes. Into this syphon-tube, or funnel, opens, by a special
+duct, the ink-bag; and from it is squirted at will the intensely black
+fluid therein secreted. I doubt very much the correctness of the
+statement mentioned by Pontoppidan and others, that the cuttle ejects
+its ink with a desire to lie hidden and in ambush for its intended prey,
+or with the intention to attract fish within its reach by their
+partiality for the musky odour of this secretion. It may be so, but
+during the long period that I had these animals under close observation
+at the Brighton Aquarium, I never witnessed such an incident. I believe
+that the emission of the ink is a symptom of fear, and is only employed
+as a means of concealment from a suspected enemy. I have found, that
+when first taken, the _Sepia_, of all its kind, is the most sensitively
+timid. Its keen, unwinking eye watches for and perceives the slightest
+movement of its captor; and if even most cautiously looked at from
+above, its ink is belched forth in eddying volumes, rolling over and
+over like the smoke which follows the discharge of a great gun from a
+ship's port, and mixes with marvellous rapidity with the surrounding
+water. But, like all of its class, the _Sepia_ is very intelligent. It
+soon learns to discriminate between friend and foe, and ultimately
+becomes very tame, and ceases to shoot its ink, unless it be teased and
+excited. By means of the communication between the ink-bag and the
+locomotor tube, it happens that when the ink is ejected, a stream of
+water is forcibly emitted with it, and thus the very effort for escape
+serves the double purpose of propelling the creature away from danger,
+and discolouring the water in which it moves. Oppian has well described
+this--
+
+    "The endangered cuttle thus evades his fears,
+    And native hoards of fluids safely wears.
+    A pitchy ink peculiar glands supply
+    Whose shades the sharpest beam of light defy.
+    Pursued, he bids the sable fountains flow,
+    And, wrapt in clouds, eludes the impending foe.
+    The fish retreats unseen, while self-born night
+    With pious shade befriends her parent's flight."
+
+Professor Owen has remarked that the ejection of the ink of the
+cephalopods serves by its colour as a means of defence, as corresponding
+secretions in some of the mammalia by their odour.
+
+It is worthy of notice that the pearly nautilus and the allied fossil
+forms are without this means of concealment, which their strong external
+shells render unnecessary for their protection.
+
+From the sac-like body containing the various organs, protrudes a head,
+globose in shape, and containing a brain, and furnished with a pair of
+strong, horny mandibles, which bite vertically, like the beak of a
+parrot. By these the flesh of prey is torn and partly masticated, and
+within them lies the tongue, covered with recurved and retractile teeth,
+like that of its distant relatives, the whelk, limpet, &c., by which the
+food is conducted to the gullet. Around this head is, as I have said,
+the organ which is equivalent to the foot in other molluscs--that by
+which the slug and the snail crawl--only that the head is placed in the
+centre, instead of in the front of it, and it is divided into segments,
+which radiate from this central head. These segments are very flexible,
+and capable of movement in every direction, and are thus developed into
+arms, prehensile limbs, by which their owner can seize and hold its
+living prey. That this may be more perfectly accomplished, these arms
+are studded along their inner surface with rows of sucking discs, in
+each of which, by means of a retractile piston, a vacuum can be
+produced. The consequent pressure of the outer atmosphere or water,
+causes them to adhere firmly to any substance to which they are applied,
+whether stone, fish, crustacean, or flesh of man.
+
+But, although in all these highly-organised head-footed mollusks the
+same general build prevails, it is admirably modified in each of them to
+suit certain habits and necessities. Thus the octopus, being a shore
+dweller, its soft and pliant, but very tough body, having merely a very
+small and rudimentary indication of an internal shell (just a little
+"style") is exactly adapted for wedging itself amongst crevices of
+rocks. A large, rigid, cellular float, or "sepiostaire," such as _Sepia_
+possesses, or a long, horny pen such as _Loligo_ has, would be in the
+way, and worse than useless in such places as the octopus inhabits. Its
+eight long powerful arms or feet are precisely fitted for clambering
+over rocks and stones, and as its food of course consists principally of
+the living things most abundant in such localities, namely, the
+shore-crabs, its great flexible suckers, devoid of hooks or horny
+armature, are exactly adapted to firm and air-tight attachment to the
+smooth shells of the crustacea.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 1.--BEAK AND ARMS OF A DECAPOD CUTTLE.
+
+_a_, the eight shorter arms; _t_, the tentacles; _f_, the funnel, or
+locomotor tube.]
+
+Unlike the octopus, which is capable only of short flights through the
+water, the "cuttles" and "squids," such as _Sepia_ and _Loligo_, are all
+free swimmers. For them it is necessary for accuracy of natation that
+their soft, and in the squids long bodies, should be supported by such a
+framework as they possess. In _Sepia_, the mantle-sac is flattened
+horizontally all along its lateral edges so as to form a pair of fins,
+which nearly surround the trunk. These fins could never be used, as they
+are, to enable the animal to poise itself delicately in the water by
+means of their beautiful undulations, which I have often watched with
+delight, if their attached edges were not kept in a straight line on
+either side. Then, these ten-footed or ten-armed genera have not,
+because they need them not, eight long, strong and highly mobile arms
+like those of the octopus, nor have they large suckers upon them.
+Whereas a great length of reach is an advantage to the octopus, animals
+which are purely swimmers, and which hunt and overtake their prey by
+speed, would be impeded by having to drag after them a bundle of stout,
+lengthy appendages trailing heavily astern. Their eight pedal arms are
+short and comparatively weak, though strong enough, in individuals such
+as are regarded on our own coasts as fullgrown, to seize and hold a fish
+or crustacean as strong as a good sized shore-crab. But, as compensation
+for the shortness of the eight arms, they are provided with two others
+more than three times the length of the short ones. These are so slender
+that they generally lie coiled up in a spiral cone in two pockets, one
+on each side, just below the eye, when the animal is quiescent, and are
+only seen when it takes its food. These long, slender tentacular arms
+are expanded at their extremity, and the inner surface of their enlarged
+part is studded with suckers--some of them larger in size than those on
+the eight shorter arms. As the food of these swimmers consists, of
+course, chiefly of fish, their sucking disks are curiously modified for
+the better retention of a slippery captive. A horny ring with a sharply
+serrated edge is imbedded in the outer circumference of each of them,
+and when a vacuum is formed, the keen, saw-like teeth are pressed into
+the skin or scales of the unfortunate prisoner, and deprive it of the
+slightest chance of escape.
+
+The manner in which the eight-armed and ten-armed cephalopods capture
+their prey is similar in principle and plan, but differs in action in
+accordance with their mode of life. The ordinary habit of the octopus is
+either to rest suspended to the side of a rock to which it clings with
+the suckers of several of its arms, or to remain lurking in some
+favourite cranny; its body thrust for protection and concealment well
+back in the interior of the recess; its bright eyes keenly on the watch;
+three or four of its limbs firmly attached to the walls of its hiding
+place--the others gently waving, gliding, and feeling about in the
+water, as if to maintain its vigilance, and keep itself always on the
+alert, and in readiness to pounce on any unfortunate wayfarer that may
+pass near its den. To a shore-crab that comes within its reach the
+slightest contact with one of those lithe arms is fatal. Instantaneously
+as pull of trigger brings down a bird, or touch of electric wire
+explodes a torpedo or a mining fuse, the pistons of the series of
+suckers are simultaneously drawn inward, the air is removed from the
+pneumatic holders, and a vacuum created in each: the crab tries to
+escape, but in a second is completely pinioned: not a movement, not a
+struggle is possible; each leg, each claw is grasped all over by
+suckers, enfolded in them, stretched out to its fullest extent by them;
+the back of the carapace is completely covered by the tenacious disks,
+brought together by the adaptable contractions of the limb, and ranged
+in close order, shoulder to shoulder, touching each other; and the
+pressure of the air is so great that nothing can effect the relaxation
+of their retentive power but the destruction of the air-pump that works
+them, or the closing of the throttle-valve by which they are connected
+with it. Meanwhile the abdominal plates of the captive crab are dragged
+towards the mouth; the black tip of the hard horny beak is seen for a
+single instant protruding from the circular orifice in the centre of the
+radiation of the arms; and, the next, has crushed through the shell, and
+is buried deep in the flesh of the victim.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 2.--THE OCTOPUS (_Octopus vulgaris_).]
+
+Unlike the skulking, hiding octopus, its ten-armed relative, the
+_Sepia_ loves the daylight and the freedom of the upper water. Its
+predatory acts are not those of a concealed and ambushed brigand lying
+in wait behind a rock, or peeping furtively from within the gloomy
+shadow of a cave; but it may better be compared to the war-like Comanche
+vidette seated gracefully on his horse, and scanning from some elevated
+knoll a wide expanse of prairie, in readiness to swoop upon a weak or
+unarmed foe. Poised near the surface of the water, like a hawk in the
+air, the _Sepia_ moves gently to and fro by graceful undulations of its
+lateral fins,--an exquisite play of colour occasionally taking place
+over its beautifully barred and mottled back. When thus tranquil, its
+eight pedal arms are usually brought close together, and droop in front
+of its head, like the trunk of an elephant, shortened; its two longer
+tentacular arms being coiled up within their pouches and unseen. Only
+when some small fish approaches it does it arouse itself. Then, its eyes
+dilate, and its colours become more bright and vivid. It carefully takes
+aim, advancing or retreating to such a distance as will just allow the
+two hidden tentacles to reach the quarry when they shall be shot out.
+Next, the two highest or central feet are lifted up, and the three
+others on each side are spread aside, so that they may be all out of the
+way of the two concealed tentacles, presently to be launched forth; and
+then, in a moment--so instantaneously that the eye of an observer, be he
+ever so watchful, can hardly see the act--this pair of tentacles, side
+by side, are projected and withdrawn, as if in a flash. The fish or
+shrimp has vanished, the suckers of the dilated ends of the tentacles
+having adhered to it, and left it, as they re-entered their pouches,
+within the fatal "cuddle," or embrace, where it is torn to pieces by the
+devouring beak.[7] This action of the tentacles of the decapods is the
+most rapid motion that I know of in the whole animal kingdom--not
+excepting even that of the tongue of the toad and the lizard. These long
+tentacles are not used when the food is within reach of the shorter
+arms.
+
+  [7] See an excellent article in the _Field_, Sept. 2, 1876, on the
+  'Ten Footed Cuttle' (_Sepia officinalis_), by the late Mr. W. A.
+  Lloyd, an earnest and accomplished aquatic zoologist; eccentric,
+  but in all that relates to the construction and management of an
+  aquarium a master of his craft. It was his wish that in any future
+  edition of my little book on the Octopus, or other writings on the
+  cephalopods, I should use the woodcuts which illustrated his
+  articles on Sepia and Octopus. By the kind permission of the
+  proprietors of the _Field_, I reproduce them in suitable size for
+  these pages.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 3.--THE CUTTLE (_Sepia officinalis_).]
+
+The calamaries or squids of our British Seas seize their prey in the
+same manner as _Sepia_, and the description of one will suffice for
+both. But there exist two groups of them, which are armed with curved
+and sharp-pointed hooks or claws, either in addition to, or instead
+of suckers. In the one group (_Onychoteuthis_), the hooks are
+restricted to the extremities of the pair of tentacles, in the other
+(_Enoploteuthis_), both the tentacles and the shorter arms have hooks.
+Professor Owen, in his description of these hook-armed calamaries in the
+_Cyclopaedia of Anatomy_, notices also another structure which adds
+greatly to their prehensile power (Fig. 4.). "At the extremity of the
+long tentacles a cluster of small, simple, unarmed suckers may be
+observed at the base of the expanded part. When these latter suckers are
+applied to one another the tentacles are securely locked together at
+that part, and the united strength of both the elongated peduncles can
+be applied to drag towards the mouth any resisting object which has been
+grappled by the terminal hooks. There is no mechanical contrivance which
+surpasses this structure; art has remotely imitated it in the
+fabrication of the obstetrical forceps, in which either blade can be
+used separately, or, by the inter-locking of a temporary blade, be made
+to act in combination."
+
+The cephalopods obtain and eat their food very much like the rapacious
+birds. They are the falcons of the sea. Some of them, like
+_Onychoteuthis_, strike their prey with talons and suckers also, others
+lay hold of it with suckers alone; but they all tear the flesh with
+their beaks, and swallow and digest their food in the same manner as the
+hawk or vulture.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 4.--HOOKED TENTACLES OF _Onychoteuthis_.]
+
+The _Sepia_, the owner of the broad, flattened bone, has a decided
+predilection for the vicinity of the shore, and for comparatively
+shallow water. It there attaches its grape-like eggs to some convenient
+stone or growing alga, and delights occasionally to sink to the bottom,
+and there to rest half covered by the sand, a habit for which the form
+of its body is well adapted. But the calamaries--they of the horny
+pen--prefer the wide waters of the open ocean; and although they, too,
+especially the smaller species, are common upon the coasts, they are
+frequently met with far out at sea, and away from any land. The
+elongated and almost arrow-like shape of their bodies enables them to
+glide through the water with great rapidity, and the momentum exerted by
+a vigorous out-rush from their syphon-tube is sometimes so great that
+when the opposite pressure thus produced is so exerted as to cause them
+to take an upward direction they leap out of the water to so great a
+height as to fall on the decks of ships; and are, therefore, called by
+sailors, "flying squids." Their spawn is very different from that of
+either octopus, or sepia. It consists of dozens of semi-transparent,
+gelatinous, slender, cylindrical sheaths, about four or five inches
+long, each containing many ova imbedded in it (making a total number of
+about 40,000 embryos), all springing from a common centre and resembling
+a mop without a handle. I have never seen any of these "sea-mops"
+attached to anything, and the pelagic habits of the calamaries render it
+probable that they are left floating on the surface of the sea.
+
+Having made ourselves acquainted with the structure and habits of these
+three divisions of the eight-footed and ten-footed mollusks, let us take
+evidence as to the size to which they are respectively known to attain,
+and the degree in which they may be regarded as dangerous to man.
+
+An octopus from our own coasts having arms two feet in length may be
+considered a rather large specimen; and Dr. J. E. Gray, who was always
+most kindly ready to place at the disposal of any sincere inquirer the
+vast store of knowledge laid up in his wonderful memory, told me that
+"there is not one in the British Museum which exceeds this size, or
+which would not go into a quart pot--body, arms and all." The largest
+British specimen I have hitherto seen had arms 2 ft. 6 in. long. We have
+sufficient evidence, however, that it exceeds this in the South of
+France, and along the Spanish and Italian coasts of the Mediterranean;
+and my deceased friend John Keast Lord tells us in his book, 'The
+Naturalist in British Columbia,' that he saw and measured, in
+Vancouver's Island, an octopus which had arms five feet long.
+
+I have often been asked whether an octopus of the ordinary size can
+really be dangerous to bathers. Decidedly, "Yes," in certain situations.
+The holding power of its numerous suckers is enormous. It is almost
+impossible forcibly to detach it from its adhesion to a rock or the flat
+bottom of a tank; and if a large one happened to fix one or more of its
+strong, tough arms on the leg of a swimmer whilst the others held firmly
+to a rock, I doubt if the man could disengage himself under water by
+mere strength, before being exhausted. Fortunately the octopus can be
+made to relax its hold by grasping it tightly round the "throat" (if I
+may so call it), and it may be well that this should be known.
+
+That men are occasionally drowned by these creatures is, unhappily, a
+fact too well attested. I have elsewhere[8] related several instances of
+this having occurred. Omitting those, I will give two or three others
+which have since come under my notice. Sir Grenville Temple, in his
+'Excursions in the Mediterranean Sea,' tells how a Sardinian captain,
+whilst bathing at Jerbeh, was seized and drowned by an octopus. When his
+body was found, his limbs were bound together by the arms of the animal;
+and this took place in water only four feet deep.
+
+  [8] See 'The Octopus; or, the Devil-fish of Fiction and of Fact.'
+  1873. Chapman and Hall.
+
+Mr. J. K. Lord's account of the formidable strength of these creatures
+in Oregon is confirmed by an incident recorded in the _Weekly Oregonian_
+(the principal paper of Oregon) of October 6th, 1877. A few days before
+that date an Indian woman, whilst bathing, was held beneath the surface
+by an octopus, and drowned. The body was discovered on the following day
+in the horrid embrace of the creature. Indians dived down and with their
+knives severed the arms of the octopus and recovered the corpse.
+
+Mr. Clemens Laming, in his book, 'The French in Algiers,' writes:--"The
+soldiers were in the habit of bathing in the sea every evening, and from
+time to time several of them disappeared--no one knew how. Bathing was,
+in consequence, strictly forbidden; in spite of which several men went
+into the water one evening. Suddenly one of them screamed for help, and
+when several others rushed to his assistance they found that an octopus
+had seized him by the leg by four of its arms whilst it clung to the
+rock with the rest. The soldiers brought the 'monster' home with them,
+and out of revenge they boiled it alive and ate it. This adventure
+accounted for the disappearance of the other soldiers."
+
+The Rev. W. Wyatt Gill, who for more than a quarter of a century has
+resided as a missionary amongst the inhabitants of the Hervey Islands,
+and with whom I had the pleasure of conversing on this subject when he
+was in England in 1875, described in the _Leisure Hour_ of April 20th,
+1872, another mode of attack by which an octopus might deprive a man of
+life. A servant of his went diving for "poulpes" (octopods), leaving his
+son in charge of the canoe. After a short time he rose to the surface,
+his arms free, but his nostrils and mouth completely covered by a large
+octopus. If his son had not promptly torn the living plaister from off
+his face he must have been suffocated--a fate which actually befell some
+years previously a man who foolishly went diving alone.
+
+In _Appleton's American Journal of Science and Art_, January 31st,
+1874, a correspondent describes an attack by an octopus on a diver who
+was at work on the wreck of a sunken steamer off the coast of Florida.
+The man, a powerful Irishman, was helpless in its grasp, and would have
+been drowned if he had not been quickly brought to the surface; for when
+dragged on to the raft from which he had descended, he fainted, and his
+companions were unable to pull the creature from its hold upon him until
+they had dealt it a sharp blow across its baggy body.
+
+A similar incident occurred to the government diver of the colony of
+Victoria, Australia. Whilst pursuing his avocation in the estuary of the
+river Moyne he was seized by an octopus. He killed it by striking it
+with an iron bar, and brought to shore with him a portion of it with the
+arms more than three feet long.
+
+Mr. Laurence Oliphant, in his 'China and Japan,' describes a Japanese
+show, which consisted of "a series of groups of figures carved in wood,
+the size of life, and as cleverly coloured as Madame Tussaud's
+wax-works. One of these was a group of women bathing in the sea. One of
+them had been caught in the folds of a cuttle-fish; the others, in
+alarm, were escaping, leaving their companion to her fate. The
+cuttle-fish was represented on a huge scale, its eyes, eyelids, and
+mouth being made to move simultaneously by a man inside the head."
+
+An attack of this kind is most artistically represented in a small
+Japanese ivory-carving in the possession of Mr. Bartlett, of the
+Zoological Gardens.[9]
+
+  [9] This carving was figured in illustration of an interesting
+  paper by Professor Owen, C.B., F.R.S., &c., "On some new and rare
+  Cephalopoda," in the Transactions of the Zoological Society, April
+  20, 1880.
+
+The Japanese are well acquainted with the octopus; for it is commonly
+depicted on their ornaments, and forms no unimportant item in their
+fisheries.
+
+I have recently had an opportunity of inspecting a most curious
+Japanese book, in the possession of my friend Mr. W. B. Tegetmeier,
+which is chiefly devoted to the representations of the fisheries and
+fish-curing processes of the country. It is in three volumes, and is
+entitled, 'Land and Sea Products,' by Ki Kone. It is evidently ancient,
+for it is slightly worm-eaten, but the plates, each 12 inches by 8
+inches, are full of vigour. Two of these illustrate in a very
+interesting manner the subject before us, and by the kindness of Mr.
+Tegetmeier I am able to give facsimiles of them, which appeared with an
+article by him on this book, in the _Field_ of March 14th, 1874. Fig. 5
+represents a fisherman in a boat out at sea: a gigantic octopus has
+thrown one of its arms over the side of the boat; the man, who is alone,
+has started forward from the stern of the boat, and has succeeded, by
+means of a large knife attached to a long handle, in lopping off the
+dangerous limb of his enemy. As Mr. Tegetmeier says, "From the extreme
+matter of fact manner in which all these engravings are made, and the
+total absence of exaggeration in any other representation, I cannot but
+regard the relative sizes of the man, the boat, and the octopus, as
+correctly given, in which case we have evidence of the existence of
+gigantic cephalopods in Japanese waters." The only doubt I have is
+whether the fisherman correctly described his assailant as an octopus,
+and whether it was not a calamary. Fig. 6 is a vivid picture of a
+fishmonger's shop in a market, under the awning of which may be seen two
+arms of a gigantic cuttle hung up for sale as food. These are evidently
+of most unusual size, judging from the action of the lookers on; the one
+to the left, with a tall stand or case on his back, like a Parisian
+cocoa-vendor, is holding out his hand in mute astonishment; whilst the
+attention of the smaller personage in the right-hand corner is directed
+to the suspended arms of the cuttle by the man nearest to him, who is
+pointing to them with upraised hand. In another plate in this most
+interesting work a Japanese mode of fishing for cuttles is delineated. A
+man in a boat is tossing crabs, one at a time, into the sea, and when a
+cuttle rises at the bait he spears it with a trident and tosses it into
+the boat.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 5.--JAPANESE FISHERMAN ATTACKED BY A CUTTLE.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 6.--ARMS OF A GREAT CUTTLE EXHIBITED IN A JAPANESE
+FISHMONGER'S SHOP.]
+
+The octopus, therefore, though not abundant on our own coasts, is found
+in every sea in the temperate zone; and in so far as that it secretes an
+ink with which it can render the water turbid, and has many radiating
+arms with which it can seize and drown a man, it possesses certain
+attributes of the Kraken; but we have no authentic knowledge of its ever
+attaining to greater dimensions than I have stated, nor does it bask on
+the surface of the sea. It is not amongst the _Octopidae_ therefore that
+we must look for a solution of the mystery.
+
+The basking condition is fulfilled by the _Sepia_; and its flattened
+back, supported and rendered hard and firm to the touch by the
+calcareous _sepiostaire_ beneath the skin, is broader in proportion than
+that of the octopus or the squid. Thus _Sepia_ might pass as a
+microscopic miniature of the great Scandinavian monster. But it lacks
+the character of size. We have no reason to believe that any true
+_Sepia_ exists, as the family is now understood, that has a body more
+than eighteen inches long. If it were otherwise it would be more likely
+to be known of this family than of its relatives, for its lightly
+constructed and well known "cuttle-bone" would float on the surface for
+many weeks after the death of its owner, and large specimens of it would
+be seen and recognised from passing ships.
+
+As we can find no species of the _Octopidae_ or _Sepiidae_ which can
+furnish a pretext for the stories told of the Kraken, we must try to
+ascertain how far a similitude to it may be traced in the third family
+we have discussed, the _Teuthidae_.
+
+The belief in the existence of gigantic cuttles is an ancient one.
+Aristotle mentions it, and Pliny tells of an enormous polypus which at
+Carteia, in Grenada--an old and important Roman colony near
+Gibraltar--used to come out of the sea at night, and carry off and
+devour salted tunnies from the curing depots on the shore; and adds that
+when it was at last killed, the head of it (they used to call the body
+the head, because in swimming it goes in advance) was found to weigh 700
+lbs. AElian records a similar incident, and describes his monster as
+crushing in its arms the barrels of salt fish to get at the contents.
+These two must have been octopods if they were anything; the word
+"polypus" thus especially designates it, and moreover, the free-swimming
+cuttles and squids would be helpless if stranded on the shore. Some of
+the old writers seem to have aimed rather at making their histories
+sensational than at carefully investigating the credibility or the
+contrary of the highly coloured reports brought to them. These were, of
+course, gross exaggerations, but there was generally a substratum of
+truth in them. They were based on the rare occurrence of specimens,
+smaller certainly, but still enormous, of some known species, and in
+most cases the worst that can be said of their authors is that they were
+culpably careless and foolishly credulous.
+
+Unhappily so lenient a judgment cannot be passed on some comparatively
+recent writers. Denys de Montfort, half a century later than
+Pontoppidan, not only professed to believe in the Kraken, but also in
+the existence of another gigantic animal distinct from it; a colossal
+_poulpe_, or octopus, compared with which Pliny's was a mere pigmy. In a
+drawing fitter to decorate the outside of a showman's caravan at a fair
+than seriously to illustrate a work on natural history,[10] he depicted
+this tremendous cuttle as throwing its arms over a three masted vessel,
+snapping off its masts, tearing down the yards, and on the point of
+dragging it to the bottom, if the crew had not succeeded in cutting off
+its immense limbs with cutlasses and hatchets. De Montfort had good
+opportunities of obtaining information, for he was at one time an
+assistant in the geological department of the Museum of Natural History,
+in Paris; and wrote a work on conchology,[11] besides that already
+referred to. But it appears to have been his deliberate purpose to
+cajole the public; for it is reported that he exclaimed to M. Defrance:
+"If my entangled ship is accepted, I will make my 'colossal poulpe'
+overthrow a whole fleet." Accordingly we find him gravely declaring[12]
+that one of the great victories of the British navy was converted into a
+disaster by the monsters which are the subject of his history. He boldly
+asserted that the six men-of-war captured from the French by Admiral
+Rodney in the West Indies on the 12th of April, 1782, together with four
+British ships detached from his fleet to convoy the prizes, were all
+suddenly engulphed in the waves on the night of the battle under such
+circumstances as showed that the catastrophe was caused by colossal
+cuttles, and not by a gale or any ordinary casualty.
+
+  [10] 'Histoire Naturelle generale et particuliere des Mollusques,'
+  vol. ii., p. 256.
+
+  [11] 'Conchyliologie Systematique.'
+
+  [12] 'Hist. Nat. des Moll.,' vol. ii., pp. 358 to 368.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 7.--FACSIMILE OF DE MONTFORT'S "_Poulpe colossal_."]
+
+Unfortunately for De Montfort, the inexorable logic of facts not only
+annihilates his startling theory, but demonstrates the reckless falsity
+of his plausible statements. The captured vessels did not sink on the
+night of the action, but were all sent to Jamaica to refit, and arrived
+there safely. Five months afterwards, however, a convoy of nine
+line-of-battle ships (amongst which were Rodney's prizes), one frigate,
+and about a hundred merchantmen, were dispersed, whilst on their voyage
+to England, by a violent storm, during which some of them unfortunately
+foundered. The various accidents which preceded the loss of these
+vessels was related in evidence to the Admiralty by the survivors, and
+official documents prove that De Montfort's fleet-destroying _poulpe_
+was an invention of his own, and had no part whatever in the disaster
+that he attributed to it.
+
+I have been told, but cannot vouch for the truth of the report, that De
+Montfort's propensity to write that which was not true culminated in his
+committing forgery, and that he died in the galleys. But he records a
+statement of Captain Jean Magnus Dens, said to have been a respectable
+and veracious man, who, after having made several voyages to China as a
+master trader, retired from a seafaring life and lived at Dunkirk. He
+told De Montfort that in one of his voyages, whilst crossing from St.
+Helena to Cape Negro, he was becalmed, and took advantage of the
+enforced idleness of the crew to have the vessel scraped and painted.
+Whilst three of his men were standing on planks slung over the side, an
+enormous cuttle rose from the water, and threw one of its arms around
+two of the sailors, whom it tore away, with the scaffolding on which
+they stood. With another arm it seized the third man, who held on
+tightly to the rigging, and shouted for help. His shipmates ran to his
+assistance, and succeeded in rescuing him by cutting away the creature's
+arm with axes and knives, but he died delirious on the following night.
+The captain tried to save the other two sailors by killing the animal,
+and drove several harpoons into it; but they broke away, and the men
+were carried down by the monster.
+
+The arm cut off was said to have been twenty-five feet long, and as
+thick as the mizen-yard, and to have had on it suckers as big as
+saucepan-lids. I believe the old sea-captain's narrative of the incident
+to be true; the dimensions given by De Montfort are wilfully and
+deliberately false. The belief in the power of the cuttle to sink a ship
+and devour her crew is as widely spread over the surface of the globe,
+as it is ancient in point of time. I have been told by a friend that he
+saw in a shop in China a picture of a cuttle embracing a junk,
+apparently of about 300 tons burthen, and helping itself to the sailors,
+as one picks gooseberries off a bush.
+
+Traditions of a monstrous cuttle attacking and destroying ships are
+current also at the present day in the Polynesian Islands. Mr. Gill, the
+missionary previously quoted, tells us[13] that the natives of Aitutaki,
+in the Hervey group, have a legend of a famous explorer, named Rata, who
+built a double canoe, decked and rigged it, and then started off in
+quest of adventures. At the prow was stationed the dauntless Nganaoa,
+armed with a long spear and ready to slay all monsters. One day when
+speeding pleasantly over the ocean, the voice of the ever vigilant
+Nganaoa was heard: "O Rata! yonder is a terrible enemy starting up from
+ocean depths." It proved to be an octopus (query, squid?) of
+extraordinary dimensions. Its huge tentacles encircled the vessel in
+their embrace, threatening its instant destruction. At this critical
+moment Nganaoa seized his spear, and fearlessly drove it through the
+head of the creature. The tentacles slowly relaxed, and the dead monster
+floated off on the surface of the ocean.
+
+  [13] _Leisure Hour_, October, 1875, p. 636.
+
+Passing from the early records of the appearance of cuttles of unusual
+size, and the current as well as the traditional belief in their
+existence by the inhabitants of many countries, let us take the
+testimony of travellers and naturalists who have a right to be regarded
+as competent observers. In so doing we must bear in mind that until
+Professor Owen propounded the very clear and convenient classification
+now universally adopted, the squids, as well as the eight-footed
+_Octopidae_, were all grouped under the title of _Sepia_.
+
+Pernetty, describing a voyage made by him in the years 1763-4,[14]
+mentions gigantic cuttles met with in the Southern Seas.
+
+  [14] 'Voyage aux Iles Malouines.'
+
+Shortly afterwards, during the first week in March 1769, Banks and
+Solander, the scientific fellow-voyagers with Lieutenant Cook
+(afterwards the celebrated Captain Cook), in H.M.S. _Endeavour_, found
+in the North Pacific, in latitude 38 deg. 44' S. and longitude 110 deg. 33' W.,
+a large calamary which had just been killed by the birds, and was
+floating in a mangled condition on the water. Its arms were furnished,
+instead of suckers, with a double row of very sharp talons, which
+resembled those of a cat, and, like them, were retractable into a sheath
+of skin from which they might be thrust at pleasure. Of this cuttle they
+say, with evident pleasurable remembrance of a savoury meal, they made
+one of the best soups they ever tasted. Professor Owen tells us, in the
+paper already referred to, that when he was curator of the Hunterian
+Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and preparing, in 1829, his
+first catalogue thereof, he was struck with the number of oceanic
+invertebrates which Hunter had obtained. He learned from Mr. Clift that
+Hunter had supplied Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks with stoppered
+bottles containing alcohol, in which to preserve the new marine animals
+that he might meet with during the circumnavigatory voyage about to be
+undertaken by Cook. Thinking it probable that Banks might have stowed
+some parts of this great hook-armed squid in one of these bottles for
+his anatomical friend, he searched for, and found in a bottle marked
+"J. B.," portions of its arms, the beak with tongue, a heart ventricle,
+&c., and, amongst the dry preparations, the terminal part of the body,
+with an attached pair of rhomboidal fins. The remainder had furnished
+Cook and his companions Banks and Solander with a welcome change of diet
+in the commander's cabin of the _Endeavour_. As the inner surface of the
+arms of the squid, as well as the terminals of its tentacles, were
+studded with hooks, Professor Owen named it _Enoploteuthis Cookii_. He
+estimates the diameter of the tail fin at 15 inches, the length of its
+body 3 feet, of its head 10 inches, of the shorter arms 16 inches, and
+of the longer tentacles about the same as its body--thus giving a total
+length of about 6 ft. 9 in. Although individuals of other species, of
+larger dimensions, are known to have existed, this is the largest
+specimen of the hook-armed calamaries that has been scientifically
+examined. It would have been a formidable antagonist to a man under
+circumstances favourable to the exertion of its strength, and the use of
+its prehensile and lacerating talons.
+
+Peron,[15] the well-known French zoologist, mentions having seen at sea,
+in 1801, not far from Van Diemen's Land, at a very little distance from
+his ship, _Le Geographe_, a "Sepia," of the size of a barrel, rolling
+with noise on the waves; its arms, between 6 and 7 feet long, and 6 or 7
+inches in diameter at the base, extended on the surface, and writhing
+about like great snakes. He recognised in this, and no doubt correctly,
+one of the calamaries. The arms that he saw were evidently the animal's
+shorter ones, as under such circumstances, with neither enemy to combat
+nor prey to seize at the moment, the longer tentacles would remain
+concealed.
+
+  [15] 'Voyage de Decouvertes aux Terres Australes.'
+
+Quoy and Gaimard[16] report that in the Atlantic Ocean, near the
+Equator, they found the remains of an enormous calamary, half eaten by
+the sharks and birds, which could not have weighed less, when entire,
+than 200 lbs. A portion of this was secured, and is preserved in the
+Museum of Natural History, Paris.
+
+  [16] 'Voyage de l'Uranie: Zoologie,' vol. i., part 2, p. 411. 1824.
+
+Captain Sander Rang[17] records having fallen in with, in mid-ocean, a
+species distinct from the others, of a dark red colour, having short
+arms, and a body the size of a hogshead.
+
+  [17] 'Manuel des Mollusques,' p. 86.
+
+In a manuscript by Paulsen (referred to by Professor Steenstrup, at a
+meeting of Scandinavian naturalists at Copenhagen in 1847) is a
+description of a large calamary, cast ashore on the coast of Zeeland,
+which the latter named _Architeuthis monachus_. Its body measured 21
+feet, and its tentacles 18 feet, making a total of 39 feet.
+
+In 1854 another was stranded at the Skag in Jutland, which Professor
+Steenstrup believed to belong to the same genus as the preceding, but to
+be of a different species, and called it _Architeuthis dux_. The body
+was cut in pieces by the fishermen for bait, and furnished many
+wheelbarrow loads. Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys[18] says Dr. Moerch informed him
+that the beak of this animal was nine inches long. He adds that another
+huge cephalopod was stranded in 1860 or 1861, between Hillswick and
+Scalloway, on the west of Shetland. From a communication received by
+Professor Allman, it appears that its tentacles were 16 feet long, the
+pedal arms about half that length, and the mantle sac 7 feet. The
+largest suckers examined by Professor Allman were three-quarters of an
+inch in diameter.
+
+  [18] 'British Conchology,' vol. v., p. 124.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 8.--GIGANTIC CALAMARY CAUGHT BY THE FRENCH DESPATCH
+VESSEL 'ALECTON,' NEAR TENERIFFE.]
+
+We have also the statement of the officers and crew of the French
+despatch steamer, _Alecton_, commanded by Lieutenant Bouyer, describing
+their having met with a great calamary on the 30th of November, 1861,
+between Madeira and Teneriffe. It was seen about noon on that day
+floating on the surface of the water, and the vessel was stopped with a
+view to its capture. Many bullets were aimed at it, but they passed
+through its soft flesh without doing it much injury, until at length
+"the waves were observed to be covered with foam and blood." It had
+probably discharged the contents of its ink-bag; for a strong odour of
+musk immediately became perceptible--a perfume which I have already
+mentioned as appertaining to the ink of many of the cephalopoda, and
+also as being one of the reputed attributes of the Kraken. Harpoons were
+thrust into it, but would not hold in the yielding flesh; and the animal
+broke adrift from them, and, diving beneath the vessel, came up on the
+other side. The crew wished to launch a boat that they might attack it
+at closer quarters, but the commander forbade this, not feeling
+justified in risking the lives of his men. A rope with a running knot
+was, however, slipped over it, and held fast at the junction of the
+broad caudal fin; but when an attempt was made to hoist it on deck the
+enormous weight caused the rope to cut through the flesh, and all but
+the hinder part of the body fell back into the sea and disappeared. M.
+Berthelot, the French consul at Teneriffe, saw the fin and posterior
+portion of the animal on board the _Alecton_ ten days afterwards, and
+sent a report of the occurrence to the Paris Academy of Sciences. The
+body of this great squid, which, like Rang's specimen, was of a deep-red
+colour, was estimated to have been from 16 feet to 18 feet long, without
+reckoning the length of its formidable arms.[19]
+
+  [19] In the accompanying illustration, the size of the squid is
+  exaggerated, but not so much as has been supposed.
+
+These are statements made by men who, by their intelligence, character,
+and position, are entitled to respect and credence; and whose evidence
+would be accepted without question or hesitation in any court of law.
+There is, moreover, a remarkable coincidence of particulars in their
+several accounts, which gives great importance to their combined
+testimony.
+
+But, fortunately, we are not left dependent on documentary evidence
+alone, nor with the option of accepting or rejecting, as caprice or
+prejudice may prompt us, the narratives of those who have told us they
+have seen what we have not. Portions of cuttles of extraordinary size
+are preserved in several European museums. In the collection of the
+Faculty of Sciences at Montpellier is one six feet long, taken by
+fishermen at Cette, which Professor Steenstrup has identified as
+_Ommastrephes pteropus_. One of the same species, which was formerly in
+the possession of M. Eschricht, who received it from Marseilles, may be
+seen in the museum at Copenhagen. The body of another, analogous to
+these, is exhibited in the Museum of Trieste: it was taken on the coast
+of Dalmatia. At the meeting of the British Association at Plymouth in
+1841, Colonel Smith exhibited drawings of the beak and other parts of a
+very large calamary preserved at Haarlem; and M. P. Harting, in 1860,
+described in the Memoirs of the Royal Scientific Academy of Amsterdam
+portions of two extant in other collections in Holland, one of which he
+believes to be Steenstrup's _Architeuthis dux_, a species which he
+regards as identical with _Ommastrephes todarus_ of D'Orbigny.
+
+Still there remained a residuum of doubt in the minds of naturalists
+and the public concerning the existence of gigantic cuttles until,
+towards the close of the year 1873, two specimens were encountered on
+the coast of Newfoundland, and a portion of one and the whole of the
+other, were brought ashore, and preserved for examination by competent
+zoologists.
+
+The circumstances under which the first was seen, as sensationally
+described by the Rev. M. Harvey, Presbyterian minister of St. John's,
+Newfoundland, in a letter to Principal Dawson, of McGill College, were,
+briefly and soberly, as follows:--Two fishermen were out in a small punt
+on the 26th of October, 1873, near the eastern end of Belle Isle,
+Conception Bay, about nine miles from St. John's. Observing some object
+floating on the water at a short distance, they rowed towards it,
+supposing it to be the _debris_ of a wreck. On reaching it one of them
+struck it with his "gaff," when immediately it showed signs of life, and
+shot out its two tentacular arms, as if to seize its antagonists. The
+other man, named Theophilus Picot, though naturally alarmed, severed
+both arms with an axe as they lay on the gunwale of the boat, whereupon
+the animal moved off, and ejected a quantity of inky fluid which
+darkened the surrounding water for a considerable distance. The men went
+home, and, as fishermen will, magnified their lost "fish." They
+"estimated" the body to have been 60 feet in length, and 10 feet across
+the tail fin; and declared that when the "fish" attacked them "it reared
+a parrot-like beak which was as big as a six-gallon keg."
+
+All this, in the excitement of the moment, Mr. Harvey appears to have
+been willing to believe, and related without the expression of a doubt.
+Fortunately, he was able to obtain from the fishermen a portion of one
+of the tentacular arms which they had chopped off with the axe, and by
+so doing rendered good service to science. This fragment (Fig. 9), as
+measured by Mr. Alexander Murray, provincial geologist of Newfoundland,
+and Professor Verrill, of Yale College, Connecticut, is 17 feet long and
+3-1/2 feet in circumference. It is now in St. John's Museum. By careful
+calculation of its girth, the breadth and circumference of the expanded
+sucker-bearing portion at its extremity, and the diameter of the
+suckers, Professor Verrill has computed its dimensions to have been as
+follows:--Length of body 10 feet; diameter of body 2 feet 5 inches. Long
+tentacular arms 32 feet; head 2 feet; total length about 44 feet. The
+upper mandible of the beak, instead of being "as large as a six-gallon
+keg" would be about 3 inches long, and the lower mandible 1-1/2 inch
+long. From the size of the large suckers relatively to those of another
+specimen to be presently described, he regards it as probable that this
+individual was a female.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 9.--TENTACLE OF A GREAT CALAMARY (_Architeuthis
+princeps_) TAKEN IN CONCEPTION BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, OCT. 26, 1873.]
+
+In November, 1873--about three weeks after the occurrence in Conception
+Bay--another calamary somewhat smaller than the preceding, but of the
+same species, also came into Mr. Harvey's possession. Three fishermen,
+when hauling their herring-net in Logie Bay, about three miles from St.
+John's, found the huge animal entangled in its folds. With great
+difficulty they succeeded in despatching it and bringing it ashore,
+having been compelled to cut off its head before they could get it into
+their boat.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 10.--HEAD AND TENTACLES OF A GREAT CALAMARY
+(_Architeuthis princeps_) TAKEN IN LOGIE BAY, NEWFOUNDLAND, NOV. 1873.]
+
+The body of this specimen was over 7 feet long; the caudal fin 22
+inches broad; the two long tentacular arms 24 feet in length; the eight
+shorter arms each 6 feet long, the largest of the latter being 10 inches
+in circumference at the base; total length of this calamary 32 feet.
+Professor Verrill considers that this and the Conception Bay squid are
+both referable to one species--Steenstrup's _Architeuthis dux_.
+
+Excellent woodcuts from photographs of these two specimens were given in
+the _Field_ of December 13th, 1873, and January 31st, 1874,
+respectively, and I am indebted to the proprietors of that journal for
+their kind and courteous permission to copy them in reduced size for the
+illustration of this little work.
+
+For the preservation of both of the above described specimens we have to
+thank Mr. Harvey, and he produces additional evidence of other gigantic
+cuttles having been previously seen on the coast of Newfoundland. He
+mentions two especially, which, as stated by the Rev. Mr. Gabriel, were
+cast ashore in the winter of 1870-71, near Lamaline on the south coast
+of the island, which measured respectively 40 feet and 47 feet in
+length; and he also tells of another stranded two years later, the total
+length of which was 80 feet.
+
+In the _American Journal of Science and Arts_, of March 1875, Professor
+Verrill gives particulars and authenticated testimony of several other
+examples of great calamaries, varying in total length from 30 feet to 52
+feet, which have been taken in the neighbourhood of Newfoundland since
+the year 1870. One of these was found floating, apparently dead, near
+the Grand Banks in October 1871, by Captain Campbell, of the schooner
+_B. D. Hoskins_, of Gloucester, Mass. It was taken on board, and part of
+it used for bait. The body is stated to have been 15 feet long, and the
+pedal or shorter arms between 9 feet and 10 feet. The beak was forwarded
+to the Smithsonian Institution.
+
+Another instance given by Professor Verrill is of a great squid found
+alive in shallow water in Coomb's Cove, Fortune Bay, in the year 1872.
+Its measurements, taken by the Hon. T. R. Bennett, of English Harbour,
+Newfoundland, were, length of body 10 feet; length of tentacle 42 feet;
+length of one of the ordinary arms 6 feet: the cups on the tentacles
+were serrated. Professor Verrill also mentions a pair of jaws and two
+suckers in the Smithsonian Institution, as having been received from the
+Rev. A. Munn, with a statement that they were taken from a calamary
+which went ashore in Bonavista Bay, and which measured 32 feet in total
+length.
+
+On the 22nd of September, 1877, another gigantic squid was stranded at
+Catalina, on the north shore of Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, during a
+heavy equinoctial gale. It was alive when first seen, but died soon
+after the ebbing of the tide, and was left high and dry upon the beach.
+Two fishermen took possession of it, and the whole settlement gathered
+to gaze in astonishment at the monster. Formerly it would have been
+converted into manure, or cut up as food for dogs, but, thanks to the
+diffusion of intelligence, there were some persons in Catalina who knew
+the importance of preserving such a rarity, and who advised the
+fishermen to take it to St. John's. After being exhibited there for two
+days, it was packed in half-a-ton of ice in readiness for transmission
+to Professor Verrill, in the hope that it would be placed in the Peabody
+or Smithsonian Museum; but at the last moment its owners violated their
+agreement, and sold it to a higher bidder. The final purchase was made
+for the New York Aquarium, where it arrived on the 7th of October,
+immersed in methylated spirit in a large glass tank. Its measurements
+were as follows:--length of body 10 feet; length of tentacles 30 feet;
+length of shorter arm 11 feet; circumference of body 7 feet; breadth of
+caudal fin 2 feet 9 inches; diameter of largest tentacular sucker 1
+inch; number of suckers on each of the shorter arms 250.
+
+The appearance of so many of these great squids on the shores of
+Newfoundland during the term of seven years, and after so long a period
+of popular uncertainty as to their very existence had previously
+elapsed, might lead one to suppose that the waters of the North Atlantic
+Ocean which wash the north-eastern coasts of the American Continent
+were, at any rate, temporarily, their principal habitat, especially as a
+smaller member of their family, _Ommastrephes sagittatus_, is there
+found in such extraordinary numbers that it furnishes the greater part
+of the bait used in the Newfoundland cod fisheries. But that they are by
+no means confined to this locality is proved by recent instances, as
+well as by those already cited.
+
+Dr. F. Hilgendorf records[20] observations of a huge squid exhibited for
+money at Yedo, Japan, in 1873, and of another of similar size, which he
+saw exposed for sale in the Yedo fish market.
+
+  [20] 'Sitzungsberichte der Gesellschaft naturforschender Freunde zu
+  Berlin,' pp. 65-67, quoted by Professor Owen, _op. cit._
+
+When the French expedition was sent to the Island of St. Paul, in 1874,
+for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus, which occurred on the
+9th of December in that year, it was fortunately accompanied by an able
+zoologist, M. Ch. Velain. He reports[21] that on the 2nd of November a
+tidal wave cast upon the north shore of the island a great calamary
+which measured in total length nearly 23 feet, namely: length of body 7
+feet; length of tentacles 16 feet. There are several points of interest
+connected with its generic characters, and M. Velain's grounds for
+regarding it as being of a previously unknown species, but they are too
+technical for discussion here. This specimen was photographed as it lay
+upon the beach by M. Cazin, the photographer to the expedition.
+
+  [21] 'Comptes Rendus,' t. 80, 1875, p. 998.
+
+The following account of the still more recent capture of a large squid
+off the west coast of Ireland was given in the _Zoologist_ of June 1875,
+by Sergeant Thomas O'Connor, of the Royal Irish Constabulary:--
+
+     "On the 26th of April, 1875, a very large calamary was met with on
+     the north-west of Boffin Island, Connemara. The crew of a 'curragh'
+     (a boat made like the 'coracle,' with wooden ribs covered with
+     tarred canvas) observed to seaward a large floating mass,
+     surrounded by gulls. They pulled out to it, believing it to be
+     wreck, but to their astonishment found it was an enormous
+     cuttle-fish, lying perfectly still, as if basking on the surface of
+     the water. Paddling up with caution, they lopped off one of its
+     arms. The animal immediately set out to sea, rushing through the
+     water at a tremendous pace. The men gave chase, and, after a hard
+     pull in their frail canvas craft, came up with it, five miles out
+     in the open Atlantic, and severed another of its arms and the head.
+     These portions are now in the Dublin Museum. The shorter arms
+     measure, each, eight feet in length, and fifteen inches round the
+     base: the tentacular arms are said to have been thirty feet long.
+     The body sank."
+
+Finally, there is in our own national collection, preserved in spirit
+in a tall glass jar, a single arm of a huge cephalopod, which, by the
+kindness and courtesy of the officers of the department, I was permitted
+to examine and measure when I first described it, in May, 1873. It is 9
+feet long, and 12 inches in circumference at the base, tapering
+gradually to a fine point. It has about 300 suckers, pedunculated, or
+set on tubular footstalks, placed alternately in two rows, and having
+serrated, horny rings, but no hooks; the diameter of the largest of
+these rings is half an inch; the smallest is not larger than a pin's
+head. This is one of the eight shorter, or pedal, and not one of the
+long, or tentacular, arms of the calamary to which it belonged. The
+relative length of the arms to that of the body and tentacles varies in
+different genera of the _Teuthidae_, and it is not impossible that this
+may be the case even in individuals of the same species. But, judging
+from the proportions of known examples, I estimate the length of the
+tentacles at 36 feet, and that of the body at from 10 to 11 feet: total
+length 47 feet. The beak would probably have been about 5 inches long
+from hinge socket to point, and the diameter of the largest suckers of
+the tentacles about 1 inch. So much for De Montfort's "suckers as big as
+saucepan-lids." From a well defined fold of skin which spreads out from
+each margin of that surface of the arm over which the suckers are
+situated, Professor Owen has given to this calamary the generic name of
+_Plectoteuthis_, with the specific title of _grandis_ to indicate its
+enormous size. No history relating to this interesting specimen has been
+preserved. No one knows its origin, nor when it was received, but Dr.
+Gray told me that he believed it came from the east coast of South
+America. It has, however, long formed part of the stores of the British
+Museum, and, although previously open to public view, was more recently
+for many years kept in the basement chambers of the old building in
+Bloomsbury, which were irreverently called by the initiated "the spirit
+vaults and bottle department," because fishes, mollusca, &c., preserved
+in spirits were there deposited. I hope the public will have greater
+facility of access to it in the new Museum.
+
+Here, then, in our midst, and to be seen by all who ask permission to
+inspect it, is, and has long been, a limb of a great cephalopod capable
+of upsetting a boat, or of hauling a man out of her, or of clutching one
+engaged in scraping a ship's side, and dragging him under water, as
+described by the old master-mariner Magnus Dens. The tough, supple
+tentacles, shot forth with lightning rapidity, would be long enough to
+reach him at a distance of a dozen yards, and strong enough to drag him
+within the grasp of the eight shorter arms, a helpless victim to the
+mandibles of a beak sufficiently powerful to tear him in pieces and
+crush some of his smaller bones. For, once within that dreadful embrace,
+his escape, unaided, would be impossible. The clinging power of this
+_Plectoteuthis_ is so enormously augmented by the additional surface
+given by the expanded folds to the under side of the arms, that I doubt
+if even one of the smaller whales, such as the "White Whale," or the
+"Pilot Whale," could extricate itself from their combined hold, if those
+eight supple, clammy, adhesive arms, each 9 feet long, and 5 inches in
+diameter at the base on the flat under surface, and armed with a battery
+of 2400 suckers, were once fairly lapped around it.
+
+Ought it to surprise us, then, that an uneducated seafaring population,
+such as the fishermen of Fridrichstad, mentioned by Pontoppidan,
+absolutely ignorant of the habits and affinities, and even unacquainted
+with the real external form of such a creature, should exaggerate its
+dimensions and invest it with mystery? All that they knew of it was that
+whilst their friends and neighbours, whom we will call Eric Paulsen,
+Hans Ohlsen, and Olaf Bruhn were out fishing one calm day, a shapeless
+"something" rose just above the surface of the tranquil sea not far from
+their boat. They could see that there was much more of its bulk under
+water, but how far it extended they could not ascertain. Mistrusting its
+appearance, and with foreboding of danger, they were about to get up
+their anchor, when, suddenly, from thirty feet away, a rope was shot on
+board which fastened itself on Hans; he was dragged from amongst them
+towards the strange floating mass; there was a commotion; from the
+foaming sea upreared themselves, as it seemed to Eric and Olaf, several
+writhing serpents, which twined themselves around Hans; and as they
+gazed, helpless, in horror and bewilderment, the monster sank, and with
+a mighty swirl the waters closed for ever over their unfortunate
+companion. The men would naturally hasten home, and describe the
+dreadful incident--their imagination excited by its mysterious nature;
+the tale would spread through the district, losing nothing by
+repetition, and within a week the fabled Kraken would be the result.
+
+The existence, in almost every sea, of calamaries capable of playing
+their part in such a scene has been fully proved, and this vexed
+question of marine zoology set at rest for ever. The "much greater light
+on this subject," which, as Pontoppidan sagaciously foresaw, was
+"reserved for posterity," has been thrown upon it by the discoveries of
+the last few years; and the "further experience which is always the best
+instructor," and which he correctly anticipated would be possessed by
+the "future writers," to whom he bequeathed the completion of his
+"sketch," has been obtained. Viewed by their aid, and seen in the
+clearer atmosphere of our present knowledge, the great sea-monster which
+loomed so indefinitely vast in the mist of ignorance and superstition,
+stands revealed in its true form and proportions--its magnitude reduced,
+its outline distinct, and its mystery gone--and we recognise in the
+supposed Kraken, as the Norwegian bishop rightly conjectured that we
+should, an animal "of the Polypus (or cuttle) kind, and amongst the
+largest inhabitants of the ocean."
+
+
+
+
+THE GREAT SEA SERPENT.
+
+
+The belief in the existence of sea-serpents of formidable dimensions is
+of great antiquity. Aristotle, writing about B.C. 340, says[22]:--"The
+serpents of Libya are of an enormous size. Navigators along that coast
+report having seen a great quantity of bones of oxen, which they
+believe, without doubt, to have been devoured by the serpents. These
+serpents pursued them when they left the shore, and upset one of their
+triremes"--a vessel of a large class, having three banks of oars.
+
+  [22] 'History of Animals,' book 8, chap. 28.
+
+Pliny tells us[23] that a squadron sent by Alexander the Great on a
+voyage of discovery, under the command of Onesicritus and Nearchus,
+encountered, in the neighbourhood of some islands in the Persian Gulf,
+sea-serpents thirty feet long, which filled the fleet with terror.
+
+  [23] 'Naturalis Historiae,' Lib. vi., cap. 23.
+
+Valerius Maximus,[24] quoting Livy, describes the alarm into which,
+during the Punic wars, the Romans, under Attilius Regulus (who was
+afterwards so cruelly put to death by the Carthaginians), were thrown by
+an aquatic, though not marine, serpent which had its lair on the banks
+of the Bagrados, near Ithaca. It is said to have swallowed many of the
+soldiers, after crushing them in its folds, and to have kept the army
+from crossing the river, till at length, being invulnerable by ordinary
+weapons, it was destroyed by heavy stones hurled by balistas, catapults,
+and other military engines used in those days for casting heavy
+missiles, and battering the walls of fortified towns. According to the
+historian, the annoyance caused by it to the army did not cease with its
+death, for the water was polluted with its gore, and the air with the
+noxious fumes from its corrupted carcase, to such a degree that the
+Romans were obliged to remove their camp. They, however secured the
+animal's skin and skull, which were preserved in a temple at Rome till
+the time of the Numantine war. This combat has been described, to the
+same effect, by Florus (lib. ii.), Seneca (litt. 82), Silvius Italicus
+(l. vi.), Aulus Gellius (lib. vi., cap. 3), Orosius, Zonaras, &c., and
+is referred to by Pliny (lib. viii., cap. 14) as an incident known to
+every one. Diodorus Siculus also tells of a great serpent, sixty feet
+long, which lived chiefly in the water, but landed at frequent intervals
+to devour the cattle in its neighbourhood. A party was collected to
+capture it; but their first attempt failed, and the monster killed
+twenty of them. It was afterwards taken in a strong net, carried alive
+to Alexandria, and presented to King Ptolemy II., the founder of the
+Alexandrian Library and Museum, who was a great collector of zoological
+and other curiosities. This snake was probably one of the great boas.
+
+  [24] 'De Factis, Dictisque Memorabilibus,' Lib. i., cap. 8, 1st
+  century.
+
+The "_Serpens marinus_" is figured and referred to by many other
+writers, but as they evidently allude to the Conger and the Murena, we
+will pass over their descriptions.
+
+The sea-serpents mentioned by Aristotle, Pliny, and Diodorus were,
+doubtless, real sea-snakes, true marine ophidians, which are more common
+in tropical seas than is generally supposed. They are found most
+abundantly in the Indian Ocean; but they have an extensive geographical
+range, and between forty and fifty species of them are known. They are
+all highly poisonous, and some are so ferocious that they more
+frequently attack than avoid man. The greatest length to which they are
+authentically known to attain is about twelve feet. The form and
+structure of these _hydrophides_ are modified from those of land
+serpents, to suit their aquatic habits. The tail is compressed
+vertically, flattened from the sides, so as to form a fin like the tail
+of an eel, by which they propel themselves; but instead of tapering to a
+point, it is rounded off at the end, like the blade of a paper-knife, or
+the scabbard of a cavalry sabre. Like other lung-breathing animals which
+live in water, they are also provided with a respiratory apparatus
+adapted to their circumstances and requirements--their nostrils, which
+are very small, being furnished, like those of the seal, manatee, &c.,
+with a valve opening at will to admit air, and closing perfectly to
+exclude water.
+
+Leaving these water-snakes of the tropics, we come, next in order of
+date, upon some very remarkable evidence that there was current amongst
+a community where we should little expect to find it, the idea of a
+marine monster corresponding in many respects with some of the
+descriptions given several centuries later of the sea-serpent. In an
+interesting article on the Catacombs of Rome in the _Illustrated London
+News_ of February 3rd, 1872, allusion is made by the author to the
+collection of sarcophagi or coffins of the early Christians, removed
+from the Catacombs, and preserved in the museum of the Lateran Palace,
+where they were arranged by the late Padre Marchi for Pope Pius IX.
+There are more than twenty of these, sculptured with various
+designs--the Father and the Son, Adam and Eve and the Serpent, the
+Sacrifice of Abraham, Moses striking the Rock, Daniel and the Lions, and
+other Scripture themes. Amongst them also is Jonah and the "whale." A
+facsimile of this sculpture (Fig. 11) is one of the illustrations of the
+article referred to. It will be seen that Jonah is being swallowed feet
+foremost, or possibly being ejected head first, by an enormous sea
+monster, having the chest and fore-legs of a horse, a long arching neck,
+with a mane at its base, near the shoulders, a head like nothing in
+nature, but having hair upon and beneath the cheeks, the hinder portion
+of the body being that of a serpent of prodigious length, undulating in
+several vertical curves. This sculpture appears to have been cut between
+the beginning and the middle of the third century, about A.D. 230, but
+it probably represents a tradition of far greater antiquity.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 11.--JONAH AND THE SEA MONSTER.
+
+_From the Catacombs of Rome._]
+
+We will now consider the accounts given by Scandinavian historians, of
+the sea-serpent having been seen in northern waters. Here, I suppose, I
+ought to indulge in the usual flippant sneer at Bishop Pontoppidan. I
+know that in abstaining from doing so I am sadly out of the fashion; but
+I venture to think that the dead lion has been kicked at too often
+already, and undeservedly. Whether there be, or be not, a huge marine
+animal, not necessarily an ophidian, answering to some of the
+descriptions of the sea-serpent--so called--Pontoppidan did not invent
+the stories told of its appearance. Long before he was born the monster
+had been described and figured; and for centuries previously the
+Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, and Fins had believed in its existence as
+implicitly as in the tenets of their religious creed. Olaus Magnus,
+Archbishop of Upsala, in Sweden, wrote of it in A.D. 1555 as
+follows:[25]--
+
+     "They who in works of navigation on the coasts of Norway employ
+     themselves in fishing or merchandize do all agree in this strange
+     story, that there is a serpent there which is of a vast magnitude,
+     namely 200 foot long, and moreover, 20 foot thick; and is wont to
+     live in rocks and caves toward the sea-coast about Berge: which
+     will go alone from his holes on a clear night in summer, and devour
+     calves, lambs, and hogs, or else he goes into the sea to feed on
+     polypus (octopus), locusts (lobsters), and all sorts of sea-crabs.
+     He hath commonly hair hanging from his neck a cubit long, and sharp
+     scales, and is black, and he hath flaming, shining eyes. This snake
+     disquiets the shippers; and he puts up his head on high like a
+     pillar, and catcheth away men, and he devours them; and this
+     happeneth not but it signifies some wonderful change of the kingdom
+     near at hand; namely, that the princes shall die, or be banished;
+     or some tumultuous wars shall presently follow. There is also
+     another serpent of an incredible magnitude in an island called Moos
+     in the diocess of Hammer; which, as a comet portends a change in
+     all the world, so that portends a change in the kingdom of Norway,
+     as it was seen anno 1522; that lifts himself high above the waters,
+     and rolls himself round like a sphere.[26] This serpent was thought
+     to be fifty cubits long by conjecture, by sight afar off: there
+     followed this the banishment of King Christiernus, and a great
+     persecution of the Bishops; and it shewed also the destruction of
+     the country."
+
+  [25] 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' Lib. xxi. cap. 43.
+
+  [26] "Coils itself in spherical convolutions" is a better
+  translation of the original Latin.
+
+The Gothic Archbishop, amongst other signs and omens, also attributes
+this power of divination to the small red ants which are sometimes so
+troublesome in houses, and declares that they also portended the
+downfall, A.D. 1523, of the abominably cruel Danish king, Christian II.,
+above mentioned. His curious work is full of wild improbabilities and
+odd superstitions, most of which he states with a calm air of
+unquestioning assent; but as he wrote in the time of our Henry VIII.,
+long before the belief in witches and warlocks, fairies and banshees,
+had died out in our own country, we can hardly throw stones at him on
+that score. It is a most amusing and interesting history, and gives a
+wonderful insight of the habits and customs of the northern nations in
+his day.
+
+Amongst his illustrations of the sea monsters he describes are the two
+of which I give facsimiles on the next page. In Fig. 12 a sea-serpent is
+seen writhing in many coils upon the surface of the water, and having in
+its mouth a sailor, whom it has seized from the deck of a ship. The poor
+fellow is trying to grasp the ratlins of the shrouds, but is being
+dragged from his hold and lifted over the bulwarks by the monster. His
+companions, in terror, are endeavouring to escape in various directions.
+One is climbing aloft by the stay, in the hope of getting out of reach
+in that way, whilst two others are hurrying aft to obtain the shelter of
+a little castle or cabin projecting over the stern. I am strongly of the
+opinion that this is but the fallacious representation of an actual
+occurrence. Read by the light of recent knowledge, these old pictures
+convey to a practised eye a meaning as clear as that of hieroglyphics to
+an Egyptologist, and my translation of this is the following: The crew
+of a ship have witnessed the dreadful sight of a serpent-like form
+issuing from the sea, rising over the bulwarks of their vessel, seizing
+one of their messmates from amongst them, and dragging him overboard and
+under water. Awe-stricken by the mysterious disappearance of their
+comrade, and too frightened and anxious for their own safety to be able,
+during the short space of time occupied by an affair, which all happened
+in a few seconds, to observe accurately their terrible assailant, they
+naturally conjecture that it must have been a snake. It was probably a
+gigantic calamary, such as we now know exist, and the dead carcases of
+which have been found in the locality where the event depicted is
+supposed to have taken place. The presumed body of the serpent was one
+of the arms of the squid, and the two rows of suckers thereto belonging
+are indicated in the illustration by the medial line traversing its
+whole length (intended to represent a dorsal fin) and the double row of
+transverse septa, one on each side of it.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 12.--A SEA SERPENT SEIZING A MAN ON BOARD SHIP.
+
+_After_ OLAUS MAGNUS.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 13.--A GIGANTIC LOBSTER DRAGGING A MAN FROM A SHIP.
+
+_After_ OLAUS MAGNUS.]
+
+In Fig. 13 an enormous lobster is in the act of similarly dragging
+overboard from a vessel a man whom it has seized by the arm with one of
+its great claws. From the crude image of a lobster having eight minor
+claws and two larger ones, to that of a cuttle having eight minor arms
+and two longer ones, the transition is not great; and I believe that
+this also is a pictorial misrepresentation of a casualty by the attack
+of a calamary similar to that above described, possibly another view of
+the same incident. The idea is that of a sea animal capable of suddenly
+seizing and grasping a man, and we must remember that we have evidence,
+in the writings of Pontoppidan and others, that, even two centuries
+later than Olaus Magnus, the Norsemen's knowledge of the cuttles was
+exceedingly vague and indistinct. Any one who has seen, as I frequently
+have at the Brighton Aquarium, and as they doubtless had whilst
+lobster-catching, the threatening and ferocious manner in which a
+lobster will brandish, and, if I may use the term, "gnash" its claws at
+an intruding hand, even if held above the surface of the water, can well
+imagine a party of fishermen discussing such a tragic occurrence as the
+foregoing, and differing in opinion as to the identity of the creature
+which had caused the catastrophe, some maintaining that it must have
+been a sea-serpent, and others shaking their heads and asserting that
+nothing but a colossal lobster could have done it.
+
+Pontoppidan, in writing his history of Norway, of course had before him
+the statements of Olaus Magnus; but, though their author was an
+archbishop, he did not accept them with the childlike simplicity
+generally ascribed to him. Quoting, and, singularly enough, misquoting,
+the Swedish prelate as referring to a sea-serpent, when he is
+describing, incorrectly, one of the _Acalephae_, or sea-nettles,
+Pontoppidan says:--
+
+     "I have never heard of this sort, and should hardly believe the
+     good Olaus if he did not say that he affirmed this from his own
+     experience. The disproportion makes me think there must be some
+     error of the press.... He mixes truth and fable together according
+     to the relations of others; but this was excusable in that dark age
+     when that author wrote. Notwithstanding all this, we, in the
+     present more enlightened age, are much obliged to him for his
+     industry and judicious observations."
+
+Of the sea-serpent Pontoppidan writes:--
+
+     "I have questioned its existence myself, till that suspicion was
+     removed by full and sufficient evidence from creditable and
+     experienced fishermen and sailors in Norway, of which there are
+     hundreds who can testify that they have annually seen them. All
+     these persons agree very well in the general description; and
+     others who acknowledge that they only know it by report or by what
+     their neighbours have told them, still relate the same particulars.
+     In all my inquiry about these affairs I have hardly spoke with any
+     intelligent person born in the manor of Nordland who was not able
+     to give a pertinent answer, and strong assurances of the existence
+     of this fish; and some of our north traders that come here every
+     year with their merchandize think it a very strange question when
+     they are seriously asked whether there be any such creature: they
+     think it as ridiculous as if the question was put to them whether
+     there be such fish as eel or cod."
+
+The worthy Bishop of Bergen did his best to sift truth from fable, but
+he could not always succeed in separating them. Many stupendous
+falsehoods were brought to him, and some of them passed through his
+sieve in spite of his care. Of these are the accounts of the "spawning
+times" of the sea-serpent, its dislike of certain scents, &c. We must
+pass over all this, and confine ourselves to the evidence offered by him
+of its having been seen.
+
+The first witness he adduces is Captain Lawrence de Ferry, of the
+Norwegian navy, and first pilot in Bergen, who, premising that he had
+doubted a great while whether there were any such creature till he had
+ocular demonstration of it, made the following statement, addressed
+formally and officially to the procurator of Bergen:--
+
+     "Mr. JOHN REUTZ--
+
+     "The latter end of August, in the year 1746, as I was on a voyage,
+     on my return from Trundhiem, on a very calm and hot day, having a
+     mind to put in at Molde, it happened that when we were arrived with
+     my vessel within six English miles of the aforesaid Molde, being at
+     a place called Jule-Naess, as I was reading in a book, I heard a
+     kind of a murmuring voice from amongst the men at the oars, who
+     were eight in number, and observed that the man at the helm kept
+     off from the land. Upon this I inquired what was the matter, and
+     was informed that there was a sea-snake before us. I then ordered
+     the man at the helm to keep to the land again, and to come up with
+     this creature of which I had heard so many stories. Though the
+     fellows were under some apprehension, they were obliged to obey my
+     orders. In the meantime the sea-snake passed by us, and we were
+     obliged to tack the vessel about in order to get nearer to it. As
+     the snake swam faster than we could row, I took my gun, that was
+     ready charged, and fired at it; on this he immediately plunged
+     under the water. We rowed to the place where it sunk down (which in
+     the calm might be easily observed) and lay upon our oars, thinking
+     it would come up again to the surface; however it did not. Where
+     the snake plunged down, the water appeared thick and red; perhaps
+     some of the shot might wound it, the distance being very little.
+     The head of this snake, which it held more than two feet above the
+     surface of the water, resembled that of a horse. It was of a
+     greyish colour, and the mouth was quite black, and very large. It
+     had black eyes, and a long white mane, that hung down from the neck
+     to the surface of the water. Besides the head and neck, we saw
+     seven or eight folds, or coils, of this snake, which were very
+     thick, and as far as we could guess there was about a fathom
+     distance between each fold. I related this affair in a certain
+     company, where there was a person of distinction present who
+     desired that I would communicate to him an authentic detail of all
+     that happened; and for this reason two of my sailors, who were
+     present at the same time and place where I saw this monster,
+     namely, Nicholas Pedersen Kopper, and Nicholas Nicholsen
+     Anglewigen, shall appear in court, to declare on oath the truth of
+     every particular herein set forth; and I desire the favour of an
+     attested copy of the said descriptions.
+
+     "I remain, Sir, your obliged servant,
+
+     "L. DE FERRY.
+
+     "Bergen, 21st February, 1751.
+
+     "After this the before-named witnesses gave their corporal oaths,
+     and, with their finger held up according to law, witnessed and
+     confirmed the aforesaid letter or declaration, and every particular
+     set forth therein to be strictly true. A copy of the said
+     attestation was made out for the said Procurator Reutz, and granted
+     by the Recorder. That this was transacted in our court of justice
+     we confirm with our hand and seals. _Actum Bergis die et loco, ut
+     supra._
+
+     "A. C. DASS (_Chief Advocate_).
+
+     "H. C. GARTNER (_Recorder_)."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 14.--PONTOPPIDAN'S "SEA SERPENT."]
+
+The figure of the sea-serpent (Fig. 14) given by Pontoppidan was drawn,
+he tells us, under the inspection of a clergyman, Mr. Hans Strom, from
+descriptions given of it by two of his neighbours, Messrs. Reutz and
+Teuchsen, of Herroe; and was declared to agree in every particular with
+that seen by Captain de Ferry, and another subsequently observed by
+Governor Benstrup. The supposed coils of the serpent's body present
+exactly the appearance of eight porpoises following each other in line.
+This is a well-known habit of some of the smaller cetacea. They are
+often met with at sea thus proceeding in close single file, part only of
+their rotund forms being visible as they raise their backs above the
+surface of the water to inhale air through their "blow-holes." Under
+these circumstances they have been described by naturalists and seamen
+as resembling a long string of casks or buoys, often extending for
+sixty, eighty, or a hundred yards. This is just such a spectacle as that
+described by Olaus Magnus--his "long line of spherical convolutions,"
+and also as one reported to Pontoppidan as being descriptive of the
+sea-serpent:--
+
+     "'I have been informed,' he says, 'by some of our sea-faring men
+     that a cable[27] would not be long enough to measure the length of
+     some of them when they are observed on the surface of the water in
+     an even line. They say those round lumps or folds sometimes lie one
+     after another as far as a man can see. I confess, if this be true,
+     that we must suppose most probably that it is not one snake, but
+     two or more of these creatures lying in a line that exhibit this
+     phenomenon.' In a foot-note he adds: 'If any one enquires how many
+     folds may be counted on a sea-snake, the answer is that the number
+     is not always the same, but depends upon the various sizes of them:
+     five and twenty is the greatest number that I find well attested.'
+     Adam Olearius, in his Gottorf Museum, writes of it thus: 'A person
+     of distinction from Sweden related here at Gottorf that he had
+     heard the burgomaster of Malmoe, a very worthy man, say that as he
+     was once standing on the top of a very high hill, towards the North
+     Sea, he saw in the water, which was very calm, a snake, which
+     appeared at that distance to be as thick as a pipe of wine, and had
+     twenty-five folds. Those kind of snakes only appear at certain
+     times, and in calm weather.'"
+
+  [27] Six hundred feet.
+
+I believe that in every case so far cited from Pontoppidan, as well as
+that given by Olaus Magnus, the supposed coils or protuberances of the
+serpent's body, were only so many porpoises swimming in line in
+accordance with their habit before mentioned. If an upraised head, like
+that of a horse, was seen preceding them, it was either unconnected with
+them, or it certainly was not that of a snake; for no serpent could
+throw its body into those vertical undulations. The form of the vertebrae
+in the ophidians renders such a movement impossible. All their flexions
+are horizontal; the curving of their body is from side to side, not up
+and down.
+
+The sea-monster seen by Egede was of an entirely different kind; and
+his account of it--let sceptics deride it as they may--is worthy of
+attention and careful consideration. The Rev. Hans Egede, known as "The
+Apostle of Greenland," was superintendent of the Christian missions to
+that country. He was a truthful, pious, and single-minded man,
+possessing considerable powers of observation, and a genuine love of
+natural history. He wrote two books on the products, people, and natural
+history of Greenland,[28] and his statements therein are modest,
+accurate, and free from exaggeration. His illustrations are little, if
+at all, superior in style of art to the two Japanese wood-cuts shown on
+page 29, but they bear the same unmistakable signs of fidelity which
+characterise those of the Japanese.
+
+  [28] 'Des alten Groenlands neue Perlustration,' 8vo., Frankfurt,
+  1730, and 'Det Gamle Groenlands nye perlustratione eller Naturel
+  Historie.' 4to., Copenhagen, 1741.
+
+In his 'Journal of the Missions to Greenland' this author tell us that--
+
+     "On the 6th of July, 1734, there appeared a very large and
+     frightful sea monster, which raised itself so high out of the water
+     that its head reached above our main-top. It had a long, sharp
+     snout, and spouted water like a whale; and very broad flappers. The
+     body seemed to be covered with scales, and the skin was uneven and
+     wrinkled, and the lower part was formed like a snake. After some
+     time the creature plunged backwards into the water, and then turned
+     its tail up above the surface, a whole ship-length from the head.
+     The following evening we had very bad weather."
+
+The high character of the narrator would lead us to accept his
+statement that he had seen something previously unknown to him (he does
+not say it was a sea-serpent) even if we could not explain or understand
+what it was that he saw. Fortunately, however, the sketch made by Mr.
+Bing, one of his brother missionaries, has enabled us to do this. We
+must remember that in his endeavour to portray the incident he was
+dealing with an animal with the nature of which he was unacquainted, and
+which was only partially, and for a very short time, within his view. He
+therefore delineated rather the impression left on his mind than the
+thing itself. But although he invested it with a character that did not
+belong to it, his drawing is so far correct that we are able to
+recognise at a glance the distorted portrait of an old acquaintance, and
+to say unhesitatingly that Egede's sea-monster was one of the great
+calamaries which have since been occasionally met with, but which have
+only been believed in and recognised within the last few years. That
+which Mr. Egede believed to be the creature's head was the tail part of
+the cuttle, which goes in advance as the animal swims, and the two side
+appendages represent very efficiently the two lobes of the caudal fin.
+In propelling itself to the surface the squid raised this portion of its
+body out of the water to a considerable height, an occurrence which I
+have often witnessed, and which I have elsewhere described (see pp. 23
+and 27). The supposed tail, which was turned up at some distance from
+the other visible portion of the body, after the latter had sunk back
+into the sea, was one of the shorter arms of the cuttle, and the suckers
+on its under side are clearly and conspicuously marked. Egede was, of
+course, in error in making the "spout" of water to issue from the mouth
+of his monster. The out-pouring jet, which he, no doubt, saw, came from
+the locomotor tube, and the puff of spray which would accompany it as
+the orifice of the tube rose to the surface of the water is sketched
+with remarkable truthfulness. In quoting Egede, Pontoppidan gives a copy
+(so-called) of this engraving, but his artist embellished it so much as
+to deprive it of its original force and character, and of the honestly
+drawn points which furnish proofs of its identity.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 15--THE ANIMAL DRAWN BY MR. BING AS HAVING BEEN SEEN
+BY HANS EGEDE.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 16.--THE ANIMAL WHICH EGEDE PROBABLY SAW.]
+
+Pontoppidan records other supposed appearances of the sea-serpent, but
+from the date of his history I know of no other account of such an
+occurrence until that of an animal "apparently belonging to this class,"
+which was stranded on the Island of Stronsa, one of the Orkneys, in the
+year 1808:--
+
+     "According to the narrative, it was first seen entire, and measured
+     by respectable individuals. It measured fifty-six feet in length,
+     and twelve in circumference. The head was small, not being a foot
+     long from the snout to the first vertebra; the neck was slender,
+     extending to the length of fifteen feet. All the witnesses agree in
+     assigning it blow-holes, though they differ as to the precise
+     situation. On the shoulders something like a bristly mane commenced
+     which extended to near the extremity of the tail. It had three
+     pairs of fins or paws connected with the body; the anterior were
+     the largest, measuring more than four feet in length, and their
+     extremities were something like toes partially webbed. The skin was
+     smooth and of a greyish colour; the eye was of the size of a
+     seal's. When the decaying carcass was broken up by the waves,
+     portions of it were secured (such as the skull, the upper bones of
+     the swimming paws, &c.) by Mr. Laing, a neighbouring proprietor,
+     and some of the vertebrae were preserved and deposited in the Royal
+     University Museum, Edinburgh, and in the Museum of the Royal
+     College of Surgeons, London. An able paper," says Dr. Robert
+     Hamilton, in his account of it,[29] "on these latter fragments and
+     on the wreck of the animal was read by the late Dr. Barclay to the
+     Wernerian Society, and will be found in Vol. I. of its
+     Transactions, to which we refer. We have supplied a wood-cut of the
+     sketch" (of which I give a _facsimile_ here) "which was taken at
+     the time, and which, from the many affidavits proffered by
+     respectable individuals, as well as from other circumstances
+     narrated, leaves no manner of doubt as to the existence of some
+     such animal."
+
+  [29] Jardine's Naturalists' Library: 'Marine Amphibia,' p. 314.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 17.--THE "SEA SERPENT" OF THE WERNERIAN SOCIETY.
+(_Facsimile._)]
+
+Well! one would think so. It looks convincing, and there is a savour of
+philosophy about it that might lull the suspicions of a doubting
+zoologist. What more could be required? We have accurate measurements
+and a sketch taken of the animal as it lay upon the shore, minute
+particulars of its outward form, characteristic portions of its skeleton
+preserved in well-known museums, and any amount of affidavits
+forthcoming from most respectable individuals if confirmation be
+required. And yet,
+
+    "'Tis true, 'tis pity;
+    And pity 'tis 'tis true,"
+
+the whole fabric of circumstances crumbled at the touch of science.
+When the two vertebrae in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons
+were examined by Sir Everard Home he pronounced them to be those of a
+great shark of the genus _Selache_, and as being undistinguishable from
+those of the species called the "basking shark," of which individuals
+from thirty to thirty-five feet in length have been from time to time
+captured or stranded on our coasts. Professor Owen has confirmed this.
+Any one who feels inclined to dispute the identification by this
+distinguished comparative anatomist of a bone which he has seen and
+handled can examine these vertebrae for himself. If they had not been
+preserved, this incident would have been cited for all time as among the
+most satisfactorily authenticated instances on record of the appearance
+of the sea-serpent. As it is, it furnishes a valuable warning of the
+necessity for the most careful scrutiny of the evidence of well-meaning
+persons to whom no intentional deception or exaggeration can be imputed.
+
+In 1809, Mr. Maclean, the minister of Eigg, in the Western Isles of
+Scotland, informed Dr. Neill, the secretary of the Wernerian Society,
+that he had seen, off the Isle of Canna, a great animal which chased his
+boat as he hurried ashore to escape from it; and that it was also seen
+by the crews of thirteen fishing-boats, who were so terrified by it that
+they fled from it to the nearest creek for safety. His description of it
+is exceedingly vague, but is strongly indicative of a great calamary.
+
+In 1817 a large marine animal, supposed to be a serpent, was seen at
+Gloucester Harbour, near Cape Ann, Massachusetts, about thirty miles
+from Boston. The Linnaean Society of New England investigated the matter,
+and took much trouble to obtain evidence thereon. The depositions of
+eleven credible witnesses were certified on oath before magistrates, one
+of whom had himself seen the creature, and who confirmed the statements.
+All agreed that the animal had the appearance of a serpent, but
+estimated its length, variously, at from fifty to a hundred feet. Its
+head was in shape like that of a turtle, or snake, but as large as the
+head of a horse. There was no appearance of a mane. Its mode of
+progressing was by vertical undulations; and five of the witnesses
+described it as having the hunched protuberances mentioned by Captain de
+Ferry and others. Of this, I can offer no zoological explanation. The
+testimony given was apparently sincere, but it was received with
+mistrust; for, as Mr. Gosse says, "owing to a habit prevalent in the
+United States of supposing that there is somewhat of wit in gross
+exaggeration or hoaxing invention, we do naturally look with a lurking
+suspicion on American statements when they describe unusual or disputed
+phenomena."
+
+On the 15th of May, 1833, a party of British officers, consisting of
+Captain Sullivan, Lieutenants Maclachlan and Malcolm of the Rifle
+Brigade, Lieutenant Lister of the Artillery, and Mr. Ince of the
+Ordnance, whilst crossing Margaret's Bay in a small yacht, on their way
+from Halifax to Mahone Bay, "saw, at a distance of a hundred and fifty
+to two hundred yards, the head and neck of some denizen of the deep,
+precisely like those of a common snake in the act of swimming, the head
+so far elevated and thrown forward by the curve of the neck, as to
+enable them to see the water under and beyond it. The creature rapidly
+passed, leaving a regular wake, from the commencement of which to the
+fore part, which was out of water, they judged its length to be about
+eighty feet." They "set down the head at about six feet in length
+(considerably larger than that of a horse), and that portion of the neck
+which they saw at the same." "There could be no mistake--no delusion,"
+they say; "and we were all perfectly satisfied that we had been favoured
+with a view of the true and veritable sea-serpent." This account was
+published in the _Zoologist_, in 1847 (p. 1715), and at that date all
+the officers above named were still living.
+
+The next incident of the kind in point of date that we find recorded
+carries us back to the locality of which Pontoppidan wrote, and in which
+was seen the animal vouched for by Captain de Ferry. In 1847 there
+appeared in a London daily paper a long account translated from the
+Norse journals of fresh appearances of the sea-serpent. The statement
+made was, that it had recently been frequently seen in the neighbourhood
+of Christiansand and Molde. In the large bight of the sea at
+Christiansand it had been seen every year, only in the warmest weather,
+and when the sea was perfectly calm, and the surface of the water
+unruffled. The evidence of three respectable persons was taken, namely,
+Nils Roe, a workman at Mr. William Knudtzon's, who saw it twice there,
+John Johnson, merchant, and Lars Johnoen, fisherman at Smolen. The
+latter said he had frequently seen it, and that one afternoon in the
+dog-days, as he was sitting in his boat, he saw it twice in the course
+of two hours, and quite close to him. It came, indeed, to within six
+feet of him, and, becoming alarmed, he commended his soul to God, and
+lay down in the boat, only holding his head high enough to enable him to
+observe the monster. It passed him, disappeared, and returned; but, a
+breeze springing up, it sank, and he saw it no more. He described it as
+being about six fathoms long, the body (which was as round as a
+serpent's) two feet across, the head as long as a ten-gallon cask, the
+eyes large, round, red, sparkling, and about five inches in diameter:
+close behind the head a mane like a fin commenced along the neck, and
+spread itself out on both sides, right and left, when swimming. The
+mane, as well as the head, was of the colour of mahogany. The body was
+quite smooth, its movements occasionally fast and slow. It was
+serpent-like, and moved up and down. The few undulations which those
+parts of the body and tail that were out of water made, were scarcely a
+fathom in length. These undulations were not so high that he could see
+between them and the water.
+
+In confirmation of this account Mr. Soren Knudtzon, Dr. Hoffmann,
+surgeon in Molde, Rector Hammer, Mr. Kraft, curate, and several other
+persons, testified that they had seen in the neighbourhood of
+Christiansand a sea-serpent of considerable size.
+
+Mr. William Knudtzon, and Mr. Bochlum, a candidate for holy orders, also
+gave their account of it, much to the same purport; but some of these
+remarks are worthy of note for future comment. They say, "its motions
+were in undulations, and so strong that white foam appeared before it,
+and at the side, which stretched out several fathoms. It did not appear
+very high out of the water; the head was long and small in proportion to
+the throat: as the latter appeared much greater than the former,
+probably it was furnished with a mane."
+
+Sheriffe Goettsche testified to a similar effect. "He could not judge of
+the animal's entire length; he could not observe its extremity. At the
+back of the head there was a mane, which was the same colour as the rest
+of the body."
+
+We must take one more Norwegian account, for it is a very important
+one. The venerable P. W. Deinbolt,[30] Archdeacon of Molde, gives the
+following account of an incident that occurred there on the 28th of
+July, 1845:
+
+  [30] Hitherto erroneously printed "Deinboll."
+
+     "J. C. Lund, bookseller and printer; G. S. Krogh, merchant;
+     Christian Flang, Lund's apprentice, and John Elgenses, labourer,
+     were out on Romsdal-fjord, fishing. The sea was, after a warm,
+     sunshiny day, quite calm. About seven o'clock in the afternoon, at
+     a little distance from the shore, near the ballast place and Molde
+     Hooe, they saw a long marine animal, which slowly moved itself
+     forward, as it appeared to them, with the help of two fins, on the
+     fore-part of the body nearest the head, which they judged by the
+     boiling of the water on both sides of it. The visible part of the
+     body appeared to be between forty and fifty feet in length, and
+     moved in undulations, like a snake. The body was round and of a
+     dark colour, and seemed to be several ells in thickness. As they
+     discerned a waving motion in the water behind the animal, they
+     concluded that part of the body was concealed under water. That it
+     was one continuous animal they saw plainly from its movement. When
+     the animal was about one hundred yards from the boat, they noticed
+     tolerably correctly its fore parts, which ended in a sharp snout;
+     its colossal head raised itself above the water in the form of a
+     semi-circle; the lower part was not visible. The colour of the head
+     was dark-brown and the skin smooth; they did not notice the eyes,
+     or any mane or bristles on the throat. When the serpent came about
+     a musket-shot near, Lund fired at it, and was certain the shots hit
+     it in the head. After the shot it dived, but came up immediately.
+     It raised its neck in the air, like a snake preparing to dart on
+     his prey. After he had turned and got his body in a straight line,
+     which he appeared to do with great difficulty, he darted like an
+     arrow against the boat. They reached the shore, and the animal,
+     perceiving it had come into shallow water, dived immediately and
+     disappeared in the deep. Such is the declaration of these four men,
+     and no one has cause to question their veracity, or imagine that
+     they were so seized with fear that they could not observe what took
+     place so near them. There are not many here, or on other parts of
+     the Norwegian coast, who longer doubt the existence of the
+     sea-serpent. The writer of this narrative was a long time
+     sceptical, as he had not been so fortunate as to see this monster
+     of the deep; but after the many accounts he has read, and the
+     relations he has received from credible witnesses, he does not dare
+     longer to doubt the existence of the sea-serpent.
+
+     "P. W. DEINBOLT.
+
+     "Molde, 29th Nov., 1845."
+
+We may at once accept most fully and frankly the statements of all the
+worthy people mentioned in this series of incidents. There is no room
+for the shadow of a doubt that they all recounted conscientiously that
+which they saw. The last quoted occurrence, especially, is most
+accurately and intelligently described--so clearly, indeed, that it
+furnishes us with a clue to the identity of the strange visitant.
+
+Here let me say--and I wish it to be distinctly understood--that I do
+not deny the possibility of the existence of a great sea serpent, or
+other great creatures at present unknown to science, and that I have no
+inclination to explain away that which others have seen, because I
+myself have not witnessed it. "Seeing is believing," it is said, and it
+is not agreeable to have to tell a person that, in common parlance, he
+"must not trust his own eyes." It seems presumptuous even to hint that
+one may know better what was seen than the person who saw it. And yet I
+am obliged to say, reluctantly and courteously, but most firmly and
+assuredly, that these perfectly credible eye-witnesses did not correctly
+interpret that which they witnessed. In these cases, it is not the eye
+which deceives, nor the tongue which is untruthful, but the imagination
+which is led astray by the association of the thing seen with an
+erroneous idea. I venture to say this, not with any insolent assumption
+of superior acumen, but because we now possess a key to the mystery
+which Archdeacon Deinbolt and his neighbours had not access to, and
+which has only within the last few years been placed in our hands. The
+movements and aspect of their sea monster are those of an animal with
+which we are now well acquainted, but of the existence of which the
+narrators of these occasional visitations were unaware; namely, the
+great calamary, the same which gave rise to the stories of the Kraken,
+and which has probably been a denizen of the Scandinavian seas and
+fjords from time immemorial. It must be remembered, as I have elsewhere
+said, that until the year 1873, notwithstanding the adventure of the
+_Alecton_ in 1861, a cuttle measuring in total length fifty or sixty
+feet was generally looked upon as equally mythical with the great
+sea-serpent. Both were popularly scoffed at, and to express belief in
+either was to incur ridicule. But in the year above mentioned, specimens
+of even greater dimensions than those quoted were met with on the coasts
+of Newfoundland, and portions of them were deposited in museums, to
+silence the incredulous and interest zoologists. When Archdeacon
+Deinbolt published in 1846 the declaration of Mr. Lund and his
+companions of the fishing excursion, he and they knew nothing of there
+being such an animal. They had formed no conception of it, nor had they
+the instructive privilege, possessed of late years by the public in
+England, of being able to watch attentively, and at leisure, the habits
+and movements of these strangely modified mollusks living in great tanks
+of sea-water in aquaria. If they had been thus acquainted with them, I
+believe they would have recognised in their supposed snake the elongated
+body of a giant squid.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 18.--A CALAMARY SWIMMING AT THE SURFACE OF THE SEA.]
+
+When swimming, these squids propel themselves backwards by the
+out-rush of a stream of water from a tube pointed in a direction
+contrary to that in which the animal is proceeding. The tail part,
+therefore, goes in advance, and the body tapers towards this, almost to
+a blunt point. At a short distance from the actual extremity two flat
+fins project from the body, one on each side, as shown in Figs. 16 and
+18, so that this end of the squid's body somewhat resembles in shape the
+government "broad arrow." It is a habit of these squids, the small
+species of which are met with in some localities in teeming abundance,
+to swim on the smooth surface of the water in hot and calm weather. The
+arrow-headed tail is then raised out of water, to a height which in a
+large individual might be three feet or more; and, as it precedes the
+rest of the body, moving at the rate of several miles an hour, it of
+course looks, to a person who has never heard of an animal going tail
+first at such a speed, like the creature's head. The appearance of this
+"head" varies in accordance with the lateral fins being seen in profile
+or in broad expanse. The elongated, tubular-looking body gives the idea
+of the neck to which the "head" is attached; the eight arms trailing
+behind (the tentacles are always coiled away and concealed) supply the
+supposed mane floating on each side; the undulating motion in swimming,
+as the water is alternately drawn in and expelled, accords with the
+description, and the excurrent stream pouring aft from the locomotor
+tube, causes a long swirl and swell to be left in the animal's wake,
+which, as I have often seen, may easily be mistaken for an indefinite
+prolongation of its body. The eyes are very large and prominent, and the
+general tone of colour varies through every tint of brown, purple, pink,
+and grey, as the creature is more or less excited, and the pigmentary
+matter circulates with more or less vigour through the curiously moving
+cells.
+
+Here we have the "long marine animal" with "two fins on the forepart of
+the body near the head," the "boiling of the water," the "moving in
+undulations," the "body round, and of a dark colour," the "waving motion
+in the water behind the animal, from which the witnesses concluded that
+part of the body was concealed under water," the "head raised, but the
+lower part not visible," "the sharp snout," the "smooth skin," and the
+appearance described by Mr. William Knudtzon, and Candidatus Theologiae
+Bochlum, of "the head being long and small in proportion to the throat,
+the latter appearing much greater than the former," which caused them to
+think "it was _probably_ furnished with a mane." Not that they _saw_ any
+mane, but as they had been told of it, they thought they _ought to have
+seen it_. Less careful and conscientious persons would have persuaded
+themselves, and declared on oath, that they _did see it_.
+
+I need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is the
+proverbially smooth, gliding motion of a serpent, with the supposition
+of its passage through the water causing such frictional disturbance
+that "white foam appeared before it, and at the side, which stretched
+out several fathoms," and of "the water boiling around it on both sides
+of it." The cuttle is the only animal that I know of that would cause
+this by the effluent current from its "syphon tube." I have seen a
+deeply laden ship push in front of her a vast hillock of water, which
+fell off on each side in foam as it was parted by her bow; but that was
+of man's construction. Nature builds on better lines. No swimming
+creature has such unnecessary friction to overcome. Even the seemingly
+unwieldy body of a porpoise enters and passes through the water without
+a splash, and nothing can be more easy and graceful than the feathering
+action of the flippers of the awkward-looking turtle.
+
+We now come to an incident which, from the character of those who
+witnessed it, immediately commanded attention, and excited popular
+curiosity. In the _Times_ of the 9th of October, 1848, appeared a
+paragraph stating that a sea-serpent had been met with by the _Daedalus_
+frigate, on her homeward voyage from the East Indies. The Admiralty
+immediately inquired of her commander, Captain M'Quhae, as to the truth
+of the report; and his official reply, as follows, addressed to Admiral
+Sir W. H. Gage, G.C.H., Devonport, was printed in the _Times_ of the
+13th of October, 1848.
+
+     "H.M.S. _Daedalus_, Hamoaze,
+     October 11th, 1848.
+
+     "Sir,--In reply to your letter of this date, requiring information
+     as to the truth of the statement published in the _Times_
+     newspaper, of a sea-serpent of extraordinary dimensions having been
+     seen from H.M.S. _Daedalus_, under my command, on her passage from
+     the East Indies, I have the honour to acquaint you, for the
+     information of my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, that at 5
+     o'clock P.M. on the 6th of Aug. last, in lat. 24 deg. 44' S. and long.
+     9 deg. 22' E., the weather dark and cloudy, wind fresh from the N.W.
+     with a long ocean swell from the W., the ship on the port tack,
+     head being N.E. by N., something very unusual was seen by Mr.
+     Sartoris, midshipman, rapidly approaching the ship from before the
+     beam. The circumstance was immediately reported by him to the
+     officer of the watch, Lieut. Edgar Drummond, with whom and Mr. Wm.
+     Barrett, the Master, I was at the time walking the quarter-deck.
+     The ship's company were at supper. On our attention being called to
+     the object it was discovered to be an enormous serpent, with head
+     and shoulders kept about four feet constantly above the surface of
+     the sea, and, as nearly as we could approximate by comparing it
+     with the length of what our main-topsail yard would show in the
+     water, there was at the very least sixty feet of the animal _a
+     fleur d'eau_, no portion of which was, to our perception, used in
+     propelling it through the water, either by vertical or horizontal
+     undulation. It passed rapidly, but so close under our lee quarter
+     that had it been a man of my acquaintance I should easily have
+     recognised his features with the naked eye; and it did not, either
+     in approaching the ship or after it had passed our wake, deviate in
+     the slightest degree from its course to the S.W., which it held on
+     at the pace of from twelve to fifteen miles per hour, apparently on
+     some determined purpose.
+
+     "The diameter of the serpent was about fifteen or sixteen inches
+     behind the head, which was without any doubt that of a snake; and
+     it was never, during the twenty minutes it continued in sight of
+     our glasses, once below the surface of the water; its colour dark
+     brown, and yellowish white about the throat. It had no fins, but
+     something like the mane of a horse, or rather a bunch of seaweed,
+     washed about its back. It was seen by the quartermaster, the
+     boatswain's mate, and the man at the wheel, in addition to myself
+     and the officers above mentioned.
+
+     "I am having a drawing of the serpent made from a sketch taken
+     immediately after it was seen, which I hope to have ready for
+     transmission to my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty by
+     to-morrow's post.--PETER M'QUHAE, Captain."
+
+The sketches referred to in the captain's letter were made under his
+supervision, and copies of them, of which he certified his approbation,
+were published in the _Illustrated London News_ on the 28th of October,
+1848. I am kindly permitted by the proprietors of that journal to
+reproduce two of them, reduced in size to suit these pages--one showing
+the relative positions of the "serpent" and the ship when the former was
+first seen (_Frontispiece_), and the other (Fig. 19) representing the
+animal afterwards passing under the frigate's quarter. An enlarged
+drawing of its head was also given, which I have not thought it
+necessary to copy.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 19.--THE "SEA SERPENT" PASSING UNDER THE QUARTER OF
+H.M.S. 'DAEDALUS.']
+
+Lieutenant Drummond, the officer of the watch mentioned in Captain
+M'Quhae's report, published his memorandum of the impression made on his
+mind by the animal at the time of its appearance. It differs somewhat
+from the captain's description, and is the more cautious of the two.
+
+     "I beg to send you the following extract from my journal. H.M.S.
+     'Daedalus,' August 6, 1848, lat. 25 deg. S., long. 9 deg. 37' E., St. Helena
+     1,015 miles. In the 4 to 6 watch, at about 5 o'clock, we observed a
+     most remarkable fish on our lee-quarter, crossing the stern in a
+     S.W. direction. The appearance of its head, which with the back fin
+     was the only portion of the animal visible, was long, pointed and
+     flattened at the top, perhaps ten feet in length, the upper jaw
+     projecting considerably; the fin was perhaps 20 feet in the rear of
+     the head, and visible occasionally; the captain also asserted that
+     he saw the tail, or another fin, about the same distance behind it;
+     the upper part of the head and shoulders appeared of a dark brown
+     colour, and beneath the under-jaw a brownish-white. It pursued a
+     steady undeviating course, keeping its head horizontal with the
+     surface of the water, and in rather a raised position, disappearing
+     occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief interval, and not
+     apparently for purposes of respiration. It was going at the rate of
+     perhaps from twelve to fourteen miles an hour, and when nearest was
+     perhaps one hundred yards distant; in fact it gave one quite the
+     idea of a large snake or eel. No one in the ship has ever seen
+     anything similar; so it is at least extraordinary. It was visible
+     to the naked eye for five minutes, and with a glass for perhaps
+     fifteen more. The weather was dark and squally at the time, with
+     some sea running.--EDGAR DRUMMOND, Lieut. H.M.S. 'Daedalus;'
+     Southampton, Oct. 28, 1848."
+
+Statements so interesting and important, of course, elicited much
+correspondence and controversy. Mr. J. D. Morries Stirling, a director
+of the Bergen Museum, wrote to the Secretary of the British Admiralty,
+Captain Hamilton, R.N., saying that while becalmed in a yacht between
+Bergen and Sogne, in Norway, he had seen, three years previously, a
+large fish or reptile of cylindrical form (he would not say "sea
+serpent") ruffling the otherwise smooth surface of the fjord. No head
+was visible. This appears to have been, like the others from the same
+locality, a large calamary. Mr. Stirling unaware, doubtless, that Mr.
+Edward Newman, editor of the _Zoologist_, had previously propounded the
+same idea, suggested that the supposed serpent might be one of the old
+marine reptiles, hitherto supposed only to exist in the fossil state.
+This letter was published in the _Illustrated News_ of October 28th, and
+four days afterwards, November 2nd, a letter signed F.G.S. appeared in
+the _Times_, in which the same idea was mooted, and the opinion
+expressed that it might be the _Plesiosaurus_. This brought out that
+great master in physiology, Professor Owen, who in a long, and, it is
+needless to say, most able letter to the _Times_, dated the 9th of
+November, 1848, set forth a series of weighty arguments against belief
+in the supposed serpent, which I regret that I am unable, from want of
+space, to quote _in extenso_. The reasoning of the most eminent of
+living physiologists of course had its influence on those who could best
+appreciate it; but, as it went against the current of popular opinion,
+it met with little favour from the public, and has been slurred over
+much too superciliously by some subsequent writers. He suggested also
+that the creature seen might have been a great seal, such as the leonine
+seal, or the sea-elephant (the head, as shown in the enlarged drawing,
+was wonderfully seal-like), but it was generally felt that this
+explanation was unsatisfactory. The nature of his criticism of the
+official statement will be seen from Captain M'Quhae's reply, which was
+promptly given in the _Times_ of the 21st of November, 1848, as
+follows:--
+
+     "Professor Owen correctly states that I evidently saw a large
+     creature moving rapidly through the water very different from
+     anything I had before witnessed, neither a whale, a grampus, a
+     great shark, an alligator, nor any of the larger surface-swimming
+     creatures fallen in with in ordinary voyages. I now assert--neither
+     was it a common seal nor a sea-elephant, its great length and its
+     totally differing physiognomy precluding the possibility of its
+     being a '_Phoca_' of any species. The head was flat, and not a
+     'capacious vaulted cranium;' nor had it a stiff, inflexible
+     trunk--a conclusion at which Professor Owen has jumped, most
+     certainly not justified by the simple statement, that no portion of
+     the sixty feet seen by us was used in propelling it through the
+     water either by vertical or horizontal undulation.
+
+     "It is also assumed that the 'calculation of its length was made
+     under a strong preconception of the nature of the beast;' another
+     conclusion quite contrary to the fact. It was not until after the
+     great length was developed by its nearest approach to the ship, and
+     until after that most important point had been duly considered and
+     debated, as well as such could be in the brief space of time
+     allowed for so doing, that it was pronounced to be a serpent by all
+     who saw it, and who are too well accustomed to judge of lengths and
+     breadths of objects in the sea to mistake a real substance and an
+     actual living body, coolly and dispassionately contemplated, at so
+     short a distance, too, for the 'eddy caused by the action of the
+     deeper immersed fins and tail of a rapidly moving gigantic seal
+     raising its head above the surface of the water,' as Professor Owen
+     imagines, in quest of its lost iceberg.
+
+     "The creative powers of the human mind may be very limited. On
+     this occasion they were not called into requisition; my purpose and
+     desire throughout being to furnish eminent naturalists, such as the
+     learned Professor, with accurate facts, and not with exaggerated
+     representations, nor with what could by any possibility proceed
+     from optical illusion; and I beg to assure him that old Pontoppidan
+     having clothed his sea-serpent with a mane could not have suggested
+     the idea of ornamenting the creature seen from the 'Daedalus' with a
+     similar appendage, for the simple reason that I had never seen his
+     account, or even heard of his sea-serpent, until my arrival in
+     London. Some other solution must therefore be found for the very
+     remarkable coincidence between us in that particular, in order to
+     unravel the mystery.
+
+     "Finally, I deny the existence of excitement or the possibility of
+     optical illusion. I adhere to the statements, as to form, colour,
+     and dimensions, contained in my official report to the Admiralty,
+     and I leave them as data whereupon the learned and scientific may
+     exercise the 'pleasures of imagination' until some more fortunate
+     opportunity shall occur of making a closer acquaintance with the
+     'great unknown'--in the present instance most assuredly no ghost.
+
+     "P. M'QUHAE, late Captain of H.M.S. 'Daedalus.'"
+
+Of course neither Professor Owen, nor any one else, doubted the
+veracity or _bona fides_ of the captain and officers of one of Her
+Majesty's ships; and their testimony was the more important because it
+was that of men accustomed to the sights of the sea. Their practised
+eyes would, probably, be able to detect the true character of anything
+met with afloat, even if only partially seen, as intuitively as the Red
+Indian reads the signs of the forest or the trail; and therefore they
+were not likely to be deceived by any of the objects with which sailors
+are familiar. They would not be deluded by seals, porpoises, trunks of
+trees, or Brobdingnagian stems of algae; but there was one animal with
+which they were not familiar, of the existence of which they were
+unaware, and which, as I have said, at that date was generally believed
+to be as unreal as the sea-serpent itself--namely, the great calamary,
+the elongated form of which has certainly in some other instances been
+mistaken for that of a sea-snake. One of these seen swimming in the
+manner I have described, and endeavoured to portray (p. 77), would
+fulfil the description given by Lieutenant Drummond, and would in a
+great measure account for the appearances reported by Captain M'Quhae.
+"_The head long, pointed and flat on the top_," accords with the pointed
+extremity and caudal fin of the squid. "_Head kept horizontal with the
+surface of the water, and in rather a raised position, disappearing
+occasionally beneath a wave for a very brief interval, and not
+apparently for purposes of respiration._" A perfect description of the
+position and action of a squid swimming. "_No portion of it perceptibly
+used in propelling it through the water, either by vertical or
+horizontal undulations._" The mode of propulsion of a squid--the
+outpouring stream of water from its locomotor tube--would be unseen and
+unsuspected, because submerged. Its effect, the swirl in its wake, would
+suggest a prolongation of the creature's body. The numerous arms
+trailing astern at the surface of the water would give the appearance of
+a mane. I think it not impossible that if the officers of the _Daedalus_
+had been acquainted with this great sea creature the impression on their
+mind's eye would not have taken the form of a serpent. I offer this,
+with much diffidence, as a suggestion arising from recent discoveries;
+and by no means insist on its acceptance; for Captain M'Quhae, who had a
+very close view of the animal, distinctly says that "the head was,
+without any doubt, that of a serpent," and one of his officers
+subsequently declared that the eye, the mouth, the nostril, the colour,
+and the form were all most distinctly visible.
+
+In a letter addressed to the Editor of the _Bombay Times_, and dated
+"Kamptee, January 3rd, 1849," Mr. R. Davidson, Superintending Surgeon,
+Nagpore Subsidiary Force, describes a great sea animal seen by him
+whilst on board the ship _Royal Saxon_, on a voyage to India, in 1829.
+The features of this incident are consistent with his having seen one of
+the, then unknown, great calamaries.
+
+Dr. Scott, of Exeter, sent to the Editor of the _Zoologist_ (p. 2459),
+an extract from the memorandum-book of Lieutenant Sandford, R.N.,
+written about the year 1820, when he was in command of the merchant ship
+_Lady Combermere_. In it he mentions his having met with, in lat. 46,
+long. 3 (Bay of Biscay), an animal unknown to him, an immense body on
+the surface of the water, spouting, not unlike the blowing of a whale,
+and the raising up of a triangular extremity, and subsequently of a head
+and neck erected six feet above the surface of the water. This was
+evidently a great squid seen under circumstances similar to those
+described by Hans Egede (p. 67).
+
+In the _Sun_ Newspaper of July 9th, 1849, was published the following
+statement of Captain Herriman, of the ship _Brazilian_:
+
+     "On the morning of the 24th February, the ship being becalmed in
+     lat. 26 deg. S., long. 8 deg. E. (about forty miles from the place where
+     Captain M'Quhae is said to have seen the serpent), the captain
+     perceived something right astern, stretched along the water to a
+     length of twenty five or thirty feet, and perceptibly moving from
+     the ship, with a steady sinuous motion. The head, which seemed to
+     be lifted several feet above the water, had something resembling a
+     mane running down to the floating portion, and within about six
+     feet of the tail. Of course Captain Herriman, Mr. Long, his chief
+     officer, and the passengers who saw this came to the conclusion
+     that it must be the sea-serpent. As the 'Brazilian' was making no
+     headway, to bring all doubts to an issue, the captain had a boat
+     lowered, and himself standing in the bow, armed with a harpoon,
+     approached the monster. It was found to be an immense piece of
+     sea-weed, drifting with the current, which sets constantly to the
+     westward in this latitude, and which, with the swell left by the
+     subsidence of a previous gale, gave it the sinuous snake-like
+     motion."
+
+Captain Harrington, of the ship _Castilian_, reported in the _Times_ of
+February 5th, 1858, that:
+
+     "On the 12th of December, 1857, N.E. end of St. Helena distant ten
+     miles, he and his officers were startled by the sight of a huge
+     marine animal which reared its head out of the water within twenty
+     yards of the ship. The head was shaped like a long nun-buoy,[31]
+     and they supposed it to have been seven or eight feet in diameter
+     in the largest part, with a kind of scroll or tuft of loose skin,
+     encircling it about two feet from the top. The water was
+     discoloured for several hundred feet from its head, so much so that
+     on its first appearance my impression was that the ship was in
+     broken water."
+
+  [31] See illustration, p. 67.
+
+Evidently, again, a large calamary raising its caudal extremity and fin
+above the surface, and discolouring the water by discharging its ink.
+
+This was immediately followed by a letter from Captain Frederick Smith,
+of the ship _Pekin_, who stated that:
+
+     "On December 28th, 1848, being then in lat. 26 deg. S., long. 6 deg. E.
+     (about half-way between the Cape and St. Helena), he saw a very
+     extraordinary-looking thing in the water, of considerable length.
+     With the telescope, he could plainly discern a huge head and neck,
+     covered with a shaggy-looking kind of mane, which it kept lifting
+     at intervals out of water. This was seen by all hands, and was
+     declared to be the great sea-serpent. A boat was lowered; a line
+     was made fast to the 'snake,' and it was towed alongside and
+     hoisted on board. It was a piece of gigantic sea-weed, twenty feet
+     long, and completely covered with snaky-looking barnacles. So like
+     a huge living monster did this appear, that had circumstances
+     prevented my sending a boat to it, I should certainly have believed
+     I had seen the great sea-serpent."
+
+In September, 1872, Mr. Frank Buckland published, in _Land and Water_,
+an account by the late Duke of Marlborough, of a "sea-serpent" having
+been seen several times within a few days, in Loch Hourn, Scotland. A
+sketch of it was given which almost exactly accorded with that of
+Pontoppidan's sea-serpent, namely, seven hunches or protuberances like
+so many porpoises swimming in line, preceded by a head and neck raised
+slightly out of water. Many other accounts have been published of the
+appearance of serpent-like sea monsters, but I have only space for two
+or three more of the most remarkable of them.
+
+On the 10th of January, 1877, the following affidavit was made before
+Mr. Raffles, magistrate, at Liverpool:
+
+     "We, the undersigned officers and crew of the barque 'Pauline' (of
+     London), of Liverpool, in the county of Lancaster, in the United
+     Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, do solemnly and sincerely
+     declare that, on July 8, 1875, in lat. 5 deg. 13' S., long. 35 deg. W., we
+     observed three large sperm whales, and one of them was gripped
+     round the body with two turns of what appeared to be a huge
+     serpent. The head and tail appeared to have a length beyond the
+     coils of about thirty feet, and its girth eight feet or nine feet.
+     The serpent whirled its victim round and round for about fifteen
+     minutes, and then suddenly dragged the whale to the bottom, head
+     first.
+
+"GEO. DREVAR, Master; HORATIO THOMPSON, JOHN HENDERSON
+LANDELLS, OWEN BAKER, and WILLIAM LEWARN.
+
+     "Again, on July 13, a similar serpent was seen, about two hundred
+     yards off, shooting itself along the surface, head and neck being
+     out of the water several feet. This was seen only by the captain
+     and one ordinary seaman.
+
+"GEORGE DREVAR, Master.
+
+     "A few moments after it was seen some 60 feet elevated
+     perpendicularly in the air by the chief officer and the following
+     seamen:--Horatio Thompson, Owen Baker, Wm. Lewarn. And we make this
+     solemn declaration, conscientiously believing the same to be true."
+
+In the _Illustrated London News_, of November 20th, 1875, there had
+previously appeared a letter from the Rev. E. L. Penny, Chaplain to
+H.M.S. _London_, at Zanzibar, describing this occurrence and also the
+representation of a sketch (which I am kindly permitted to reproduce
+here), drawn by him from the descriptions given by the captain and crew
+of the _Pauline_. "The whale," he said, "should have been placed deeper
+in the water, but he would then have been unable to depict so clearly
+the manner in which the animal was attacked." He adds that, "Captain
+Drevar is a singularly able and observant man, and those of the crew and
+officers with whom he conversed were singularly intelligent; nor did any
+of their descriptions vary from one another in the least: there were no
+discrepancies." The event took place whilst their vessel was on her way
+from Shields to Zanzibar, with a cargo of coals, for the use of H.M.S.
+_London_, then the guard ship on that station.
+
+It is impossible to doubt for a moment the genuineness of the
+statement made by Captain Drevar and his crew, or their honest desire to
+describe faithfully that which they believed they had seen; but the
+height to which the snake is said to have upreared itself is evidently
+greatly exaggerated; for it is impossible that any serpent could
+"elevate its body some sixty feet perpendicularly in the air"--nearly
+one-third of the height of the Monument of the Great Fire of London. I
+have no desire to force this narrative of the master and crew of the
+_Pauline_ into conformity with any preconceived idea. They may have seen
+a veritable sea-serpent; or they may have witnessed the amours of two
+whales, and have seen the great creatures rolling over and over that
+they might breathe alternately by the blow-hole of each coming to the
+surface of the water; or the supposed coils of the snake may have been
+the arms of a great calamary, cast over and around the huge cetacean.
+The other two appearances--1st, the animal "seen shooting itself along
+the surface with head and neck raised" (p. 77), and 2nd, the elevation
+of the body to a considerable height, as in Egede's sea monster, (p.
+67), would certainly accord with this last hypothesis; but, taking the
+statement as it stands, it must be left for further elucidation.
+
+[Illustration: FIG 20.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AND SPERM WHALE AS SEEN FROM
+THE 'PAULINE.']
+
+On the 28th of January, 1879, a "sea-serpent" was seen from the s.s.
+_City of Baltimore_, in the Gulf of Aden, by Major H. W. J. Senior, of
+the Bengal Staff Corps. The narrator "observed a long, black object
+darting rapidly in and out of the water, and advancing nearer to the
+vessel. The shape of the head was not unlike pictures of the dragon he
+had often seen, with a bull-dog expression of the forehead and eyebrows.
+When the monster had drawn its head sufficiently out of the water, it
+let its body drop, as it were a log of wood, prior to darting forward
+under the water. This motion caused a splash of about fifteen feet in
+length on either side of the neck much in the 'shape of a pair of
+wings.'" This last particular of its appearance, as well as its
+movements, suggest a great calamary; but, as one with "a bull-dog
+expression of eyebrow, visible at 500 yards distance," does not come
+within my ken, I will not claim it as such.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 21.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM THE 'CITY OF
+BALTIMORE.']
+
+In June 1877 Commander Pearson reported to the Admiralty, that on the
+2nd of that month, he and other officers of the Royal Yacht _Osborne_,
+had seen, off Cape Vito, Sicily, a large marine animal, of which the
+following account and sketches were furnished by Lieutenant Haynes, and
+were confirmed by Commander Pearson, Mr. Douglas Haynes, Mr. Forsyth,
+and Mr. Moore, engineer.
+
+     "Lieutenant Haynes writes, under date, 'Royal Yacht _Osborne_,
+     Gibraltar, June 6': On the evening of that day, the sea being
+     perfectly smooth, my attention was first called by seeing a ridge
+     of fins above the surface of the water, extending about thirty
+     feet, and varying from five to six feet in height. On inspecting it
+     by means of a telescope, at about one and a-half cables' distance,
+     I distinctly saw a head, two flappers, and about thirty feet of an
+     animal's shoulder. The head, as nearly as I could judge, was about
+     six feet thick, the neck narrower, about four to five feet, the
+     shoulder about fifteen feet across, and the flappers each about
+     fifteen feet in length. The movements of the flappers were those of
+     a turtle, and the animal resembled a huge seal, the resemblance
+     being strongest about the back of the head. I could not see the
+     length of the head, but from its crown or top to just below the
+     shoulder (where it became immersed), I should reckon about fifty
+     feet. The tail end I did not see, being under water, unless the
+     ridge of fins to which my attention was first attracted, and which
+     had disappeared by the time I got a telescope, were really the
+     continuation of the shoulder to the end of the object's body. The
+     animal's head was not always above water, but was thrown upwards,
+     remaining above for a few seconds at a time, and then disappearing.
+     There was an entire absence of 'blowing,' or 'spouting.' I herewith
+     beg to enclose a rough sketch, showing the view of the 'ridge of
+     fins,' and also of the animal in the act of propelling itself by
+     its two fins."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 22.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT
+'OSBORNE.'
+
+PHASE I.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 23.--THE "SEA SERPENT" AS SEEN FROM H.M. YACHT
+'OSBORNE.'
+
+PHASE 2.]
+
+It seems to me that this description cannot be explained as applicable
+to any one animal yet known. The ridge of dorsal fins might, possibly,
+as was suggested by Mr. Frank Buckland, belong to four basking sharks,
+swimming in line, in close order; but the combination of them with long
+flippers, and the turtle-like mode of swimming, forms a zoological
+enigma which I am unable to solve.
+
+This brings us face to face with the question: "Is it then so
+impossible that there may exist some great sea creature, or creatures,
+with which zoologists are hitherto unacquainted, that it is necessary in
+every case to regard the authors of such narratives as wilfully
+untruthful, or mistaken in their observations, if their descriptions are
+irreconcileable with something already known?" I, for one, am of the
+opinion that there is no such impossibility. Calamaries or squids of the
+ordinary size have, from time immemorial, been amongst the commonest and
+best known of marine animals in many seas; but only a few years ago any
+one who expressed his belief in one formidable enough to capsize a boat,
+or pull a man out of one, was derided for his credulity, although
+voyagers had constantly reported that in the Indian seas they were so
+dreaded that the natives always carried hatchets with them in their
+canoes, with which to cut off the arms or tentacles of these creatures,
+if attacked by them. We now know that their existence is no fiction; for
+individuals have been captured measuring more than fifty feet, and some
+are reported to have measured eighty feet, in total length. As marine
+snakes some feet in length, and having fin-like tails adapted for
+swimming, abound over an extensive geographical range, and are
+frequently met with far at sea, I cannot regard it as impossible that
+some of these also may attain to an abnormal and colossal development.
+Dr. Andrew Wilson, who has given much attention to this subject, is of
+the opinion that "in this huge development of ordinary forms we discover
+the true and natural law of the production of the giant serpent of the
+sea." It goes far, at any rate, towards accounting for its supposed
+appearance. I am convinced that, whilst naturalists have been searching
+amongst the vertebrata for a solution of the problem, the great unknown,
+and therefore unrecognized, calamaries by their elongated, cylindrical
+bodies and peculiar mode of swimming, have played the part of the
+sea-serpent in many a well-authenticated incident. In other cases, such
+as some of those mentioned by Pontoppidan, the supposed "vertical
+undulations" of the snake seen out of water have been the burly bodies
+of so many porpoises swimming in line--the connecting undulations
+beneath the surface have been supplied by the imagination. The dorsal
+fins of basking sharks, as figured by Mr. Buckland, or of ribbon-fishes,
+as suggested by Dr. Andrew Wilson, may have furnished the "ridge of
+fins;" an enormous conger is not an impossibility; a giant turtle may
+have done duty, with its propelling flippers and broad back; or a marine
+snake of enormous size may, really, have been seen. But if we accept as
+accurate the observations recorded (which I certainly do not in all
+cases, for they are full of errors and mistakes), the difficulty is not
+entirely met, even by this last admission, for the instances are very
+few in which an ophidian proper--a true serpent--is indicated. There has
+seemed to be wanting an animal having a long snake-like neck, a small
+head and a slender body, and propelling itself by paddles.[32]
+
+  [32] It must be noted, however, that in almost every case, except
+  that of the _Osborne_, the paddles were _supposed_, not _seen_, and
+  were invented to account for an animal of great length progressing
+  at the surface of the water at the rate of twelve to fifteen miles
+  an hour without its being possible to perceive, upon the closest
+  and most attentive inspection, any undulatory movement to which its
+  rapid advance could be ascribed. As the great calamaries were
+  unknown, their mode of swift retrograde motion, by means of an
+  outflowing current of water, was of course unsuspected.
+
+The similarity of such an animal to the _Plesiosaurus_ of old was
+remarkable. That curious compound reptile, which has been compared with
+"a snake threaded through the body of a turtle," is described by Dean
+Buckland, in his _Bridgewater Treatise_, as having "the head of a
+lizard, the teeth of a crocodile, a neck of enormous length resembling
+the body of a serpent, the ribs of a chameleon, and the paddles of a
+whale." In the number of its cervical vertebrae (about thirty-three) it
+surpasses that of the longest-necked bird, the swan.
+
+The form and probable movements of this ancient saurian agree so
+markedly with some of the accounts given of the "great sea-serpent,"
+that Mr. Edward Newman advanced the opinion that the closest affinities
+of the latter would be found to be with the _Enaliosauria_, or marine
+lizards, whose fossil remains are so abundant in the oolite and the
+lias. This view has also been taken by other writers, and emphatically
+by Mr. Gosse. Neither he nor Mr. Newman insist that the "great unknown"
+must be the _Plesiosaurus_ itself. Mr. Gosse says, "I should not look
+for any species, scarcely even any genus, to be perpetuated from the
+oolitic period to the present. Admitting the actual continuation of the
+order _Enaliosauria_, it would be, I think, quite in conformity with
+general analogy to find some salient features of several extinct forms."
+
+[Illustration: FIG 24.
+
+_Plesiosaurus Dolichodeirus restored by The Rev. W. D. Canybeare._]
+
+The form and habits of the recently-recognized gigantic cuttles account
+for so many appearances which, without knowledge of them, were
+inexplicable when Mr. Gosse and Mr. Newman wrote, that I think this
+theory is not now forced upon us. Mr. Gosse well and clearly sums up the
+evidence as follows: "Carefully comparing the independent narratives of
+English witnesses of known character and position, most of them being
+officers under the crown, we have a creature possessing the following
+characteristics: 1st. The general form of a serpent. 2nd. Great length,
+say above sixty feet. 3rd. Head considered to resemble that of a
+serpent. 4th. Neck from twelve to sixteen inches in diameter. 5th.
+Appendages on the head, neck, or back, resembling a crest or mane.
+(Considerable discrepancy in details.) 6th. Colour dark brown, or green,
+streaked or spotted with white. 7th. Swims at surface of the water with
+a rapid or slow movement, the head and neck projected and elevated above
+the surface. 8th. Progression, steady and uniform; the body straight,
+but capable of being thrown into convolutions. 9th. Spouts in the manner
+of a whale. 10th. Like a long nun-buoy." He concludes with the
+question--"To which of the recognized classes of created beings can this
+huge rover of the ocean be referred?"
+
+I reply: "To the Cephalopoda. There is not one of the above judiciously
+summarized characteristics that is not supplied by the great calamary,
+and its ascertained habits and peculiar mode of locomotion.
+
+"Only a geologist can fully appreciate how enormously the balance of
+probability is contrary to the supposition that any of the gigantic
+marine saurians of the secondary deposits should have continued to live
+up to the present time. And yet I am bound to say, that this does not
+amount to an impossibility, for the evidence against it is entirely
+negative. Nor is the conjecture that there may be in existence some
+congeners of these great reptiles inconsistent with zoological science.
+Dr. J. E. Gray, late of the British Museum, a strict zoologist, is cited
+by Mr. Gosse as having long ago expressed his opinion that some
+undescribed form exists which is intermediate between the tortoises and
+the serpents."[33]
+
+  [33] Dr. Gray wrote in his 'Synopsis of Genera of Reptiles,' in the
+  Annals of Philosophy, 1825: "There is every reason to believe from
+  general structure that there exists an affinity between the
+  tortoises and the snakes; but the genus that exactly unites them is
+  at present unknown to European naturalists; which is not
+  astonishing when we consider the immense number of undescribed
+  animals which are daily occurring. If I may be allowed to speculate
+  from the peculiarities of structure which I have observed, I am
+  inclined to think that the union will most probably take place by
+  some newly discovered genera allied to the marine or fluviatile
+  soft-skinned turtles and the marine serpent."
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 25.--THE "SEA SERPENT," ON THE ENALIOSAURIAN
+HYPOTHESIS.
+
+_After_ Mr. P. H. GOSSE, F.R.S.]
+
+Professor Agassiz, too, is adduced by a correspondent of the _Zoologist_
+(p. 2395), as having said concerning the present existence of the
+_Enaliosaurian_ type that "it would be in precise conformity with
+analogy that such an animal should exist in the American Seas, as he had
+found numerous instances in which the fossil forms of the Old World were
+represented by living types in the New."
+
+On this point, Mr. Newman records, in the _Zoologist_ (p. 2356), an
+actual testimony which he considers, "in all respects, the most
+interesting natural-history fact of the present century." He writes:
+
+     "Captain the Hon. George Hope states that when in H.M.S. 'Fly,' in
+     the Gulf of California, the sea being perfectly calm and
+     transparent, he saw at the bottom a large marine animal with the
+     head and general figure of the alligator, except that the neck was
+     much longer, and that instead of legs the creature had four large
+     flappers, somewhat like those of turtles, the anterior pair being
+     larger than the posterior; the creature was distinctly visible, and
+     all its movements could be observed with ease; it appeared to be
+     pursuing its prey at the bottom of the sea; its movements were
+     somewhat serpentine, and an appearance of annulations, or ring-like
+     divisions of the body, was distinctly perceptible. Captain Hope
+     made this relation in company, and as a matter of conversation.
+     When I heard it from the gentleman to whom it was narrated, I
+     enquired whether Captain Hope was acquainted with those remarkable
+     fossil animals _Ichthyosauri_ and _Plesiosauri_, the supposed forms
+     of which so nearly correspond with what he describes as having seen
+     alive, and I cannot find that he had heard of them; the alligator
+     being the only animal he mentioned as bearing a partial similarity
+     to the creature in question."
+
+Unfortunately, the estimated dimensions of this creature are not given.
+
+That negative evidence alone is an unsafe basis for argument against the
+existence of unknown animals, the following illustrations will show:
+
+During the deep-sea dredgings of H.M.S. _Lightning_, _Porcupine_, and
+_Challenger_, many new species of mollusca, and others which had been
+supposed to have been extinct ever since the chalk epoch, were brought
+to light; and by the deep-sea trawlings of the last-mentioned ship,
+there have been brought up from great depths fishes of unknown species,
+and which could not exist near the surface, owing to the distension and
+rupture of their air-bladder when removed from the pressure of deep
+water.
+
+Mr. Gosse mentions that the ship in which he made the voyage to Jamaica
+was surrounded in the North Atlantic, for seventeen continuous hours by
+a troop of whales of large size of an undescribed species, which on no
+other occasion has fallen under scientific observation. Unique specimens
+of other cetaceans are also recorded.
+
+We have evidence, to which attention has been directed by Mr. A. D.
+Bartlett, that, "even on land there exists at least one of the largest
+mammals, probably in thousands, of which only one individual has been
+brought to notice, namely, the hairy-eared, two horned rhinoceros (_R.
+lasiotis_), now in the Zoological Gardens, London. It was captured in
+1868, at Chittagong, in India, where for years collectors and
+naturalists have worked and published lists of the animals met with, and
+yet no knowledge of this great beast was ever before obtained, nor is
+there any portion of one in any museum. It remains unique."
+
+I arrive, then, at the following conclusions: 1st. That, without
+straining resemblances, or casting a doubt upon narratives not proved to
+be erroneous, the various appearances of the supposed "Great
+Sea-serpent" may now be nearly all accounted for by the forms and habits
+of known animals; especially if we admit, as proposed by Dr. Andrew
+Wilson, that some of them, including the marine snakes, may, like the
+cuttles, attain to an extraordinary size.
+
+2nd. That to assume that naturalists have perfect cognizance of every
+existing marine animal of large size, would be quite unwarrantable. It
+appears to me more than probable that many marine animals, unknown to
+science, and some of them of gigantic size, may have their ordinary
+habitat in the great depths of the sea, and only occasionally come to
+the surface; and I think it not impossible that amongst them may be
+marine snakes of greater dimensions than we are aware of, and even a
+creature having close affinities with the old sea-reptiles whose fossil
+skeletons tell of their magnitude and abundance in past ages.
+
+It is most desirable that every supposed appearance of the "Great
+Sea-serpent" shall be faithfully noted and described; and I hope that no
+truthful observer will be deterred from reporting such an occurrence by
+fear of the disbelief of naturalists, or the ridicule of witlings.
+
+
+FINIS.
+
+
+
+
+  LONDON:
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+  STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+[Illustration: A MERMAID.
+
+_From a Picture by Otto Sinding._]
+
+
+
+
+  _International Fisheries Exhibition_ LONDON, 1883
+
+  SEA FABLES EXPLAINED
+
+  BY
+
+  HENRY LEE, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.
+
+  SOMETIME NATURALIST OF THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM
+  AND
+  AUTHOR OF 'THE OCTOPUS, OR THE DEVIL-FISH OF FICTION AND FACT;'
+  'SEA MONSTERS UNMASKED,' ETC.
+
+  ILLUSTRATED
+
+  LONDON
+
+  WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED
+  INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION
+  AND 13 CHARING CROSS, S.W.
+  1883
+
+
+
+
+  LONDON:
+  PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+  STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The little book 'Sea Monsters Unmasked,' recently issued as one of the
+Handbooks in connection with the Great International Fisheries
+Exhibition has met with so favourable a reception, that I have been
+honoured by the request to continue the subject, and to treat also of
+some of the Fables of the Sea, which once were universally believed, and
+even now are not utterly extinct.
+
+The topic is not here exhausted. Other sea fables and fallacies might be
+mentioned and explained; but the amount of letter-press, and the number
+of illustrations that can be printed without loss for the small sum of
+one shilling--the price at which these Handbooks are uniformly
+published--is necessarily limited. I have, therefore, thought it better
+to endeavour to make each chapter as complete as possible than to crowd
+into the space allotted to me a greater variety of subjects less fully
+and carefully discussed.
+
+I have the pleasure of acknowledging the kind assistance I have again
+received in the matter of illustrations. I gratefully appreciate Mr.
+Murray's permission to use the woodcut of Hercules slaying the Hydra,
+taken from Smith's 'Classical Dictionary,' and those of the golden
+ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycenae, and figured in the very
+interesting book in which his excavations there are described. I have
+also to thank the proprietors of the _Illustrated London News_, the
+_Leisure Hour_, and _Land and Water_, for the use of illustrations
+especially mentioned in the text.
+
+                                        HENRY LEE.
+
+SAVAGE CLUB;
+  _Sept. 4th, 1883_.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                    PAGE
+
+  THE MERMAID                          1
+
+  THE LERNEAN HYDRA                   48
+
+  SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS                59
+
+  THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES            62
+
+  THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS       76
+
+  BARNACLE GEESE--GOOSE BARNACLES     98
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+  FIG.                                                          PAGE
+
+   A MERMAID. _From a picture by Otto Sinding_        _Frontispiece_
+
+   1. NOAH, HIS WIFE AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED DEITIES.       2
+      _From a gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet_
+
+   2. HEA, OR NOAH, THE GOD OF THE FLOOD. _Khorsabad_              3
+
+   3. DAGON. _From a bas-relief. Nimroud_                          4
+
+   4. DAGON: HALF MAN, HALF FISH. _From Lamy's 'Apparatus          5
+      Biblicus'_
+
+   5. DAGON. _From an agate signet. Nineveh_                       "
+
+   6. FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU. _After Calmet and Maurice_            6
+
+   7. ATERGATIS, THE GODDESS OF THE SYRIANS. _From a               8
+      Phoenician Coin_
+
+   8. VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS. _After      9
+      Calmet_
+
+   9. VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. _From two            10
+      Corinthian Coins_
+
+  10. DITTO.                                                      11
+
+  11. SEAL, DRAWN AS A FISH. _From the Catacombs at Rome_          "
+
+  12. MERMAID AND FISHES OF AMBOYNA. _After Valentyn_             17
+
+  13. A JAPANESE ARTIFICIAL MERMAID                               27
+
+  14. AN ARTIFICIAL MERMAID. _Probably Japanese_                  28
+
+  15. PORTRAIT OF A MERMAID SAID TO HAVE BEEN CAPTURED IN JAPAN   29
+
+  16. THE DUGONG. _From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's 'Ceylon'_        43
+
+  17. THE MANATEE                                                 45
+
+  18. FIGURE OF A CALAMARY, FROM THE TEMPLE OF BAYR-EL-BAHREE     50
+
+  19. FIGURE OF AN OCTOPUS ON A GOLD ORNAMENT FOUND BY DR.        51
+      SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENAE
+
+  20. DITTO.                                                      52
+
+  21. DITTO.                                                      53
+
+  22. DITTO.                                                       "
+
+  23. HERCULES SLAYING THE LERNEAN HYDRA                          57
+
+  24. THE PHYSETER INUNDATING A SHIP. _After Olaus Magnus_        64
+
+  25. A WHALE POURING WATER INTO A SHIP FROM ITS BLOW-HOLE.       64
+      _After Olaus Magnus_
+
+  26. SPERM WHALES "SPOUTING"                                     65
+
+  27. THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) SAILING               76
+
+  28. DITTO. RETRACTED WITHIN ITS SHELL                           81
+
+  29. DITTO. CRAWLING                                             86
+
+  30. DITTO. SWIMMING                                             87
+
+  31. SHELL OF THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)              88
+
+  32. SHELL OF THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus pompilius_)         89
+
+  33. THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus Pompilius_) AND SECTION OF   90
+      ITS SHELL
+
+  34. THE GOOSE-TREE. _From Gerard's 'Herball'_                  104
+
+  35. DITTO. _Fac-simile from Aldrovandus_                       110
+
+  36. DEVELOPMENT OF BARNACLES INTO GEESE. _Fac-simile from      111
+      Aldrovandus_
+
+  37. SECTION OF A SESSILE BARNACLE. _Balanus tintinnabulum_     113
+
+  38. PEDUNCULATED BARNACLE. _Lepas anatifera_                   115
+
+  39. A SHIP'S FIGURE-HEAD PARTLY COVERED WITH BARNACLES         116
+
+  40. WHALE BARNACLE. _Coronula diadema_                         117
+
+  41. A YOUNG BARNACLE. _Larva of Chthamalus stellatus_          118
+
+
+
+
+SEA FABLES EXPLAINED.
+
+
+
+
+THE MERMAID.
+
+
+Next to the pleasure which the earnest zoologist derives from study of
+the habits and structure of living animals, and his intelligent
+appreciation of their perfect adaptation to their modes of life, and the
+circumstances in which they are placed, is the interest he feels in
+eliminating fiction from truth, whilst comparing the fancies of the past
+with the facts of the present. As his knowledge increases, he learns
+that the descriptions by ancient writers of so-called "fabulous
+creatures" are rather distorted portraits than invented falsehoods, and
+that there is hardly one of the monsters of old which has not its
+prototype in Nature at the present day. The idea of the Lernean Hydra,
+whose heads grew again when cut off by Hercules, originated, as I have
+shown in another chapter, in a knowledge of the octopus; and in the form
+and movements of other animals with which we are now familiar we may, in
+like manner, recognise the similitude and archetype of the mermaid.
+
+But we must search deeply into the history of mankind to discover the
+real source of a belief that has prevailed in almost all ages, and in
+all parts of the world, in the existence of a race of beings uniting the
+form of man with that of the fish. A rude resemblance between these
+creatures of imagination and tradition and certain aquatic animals is
+not sufficient to account for that belief. It probably had its origin in
+ancient mythologies, and in the sculptures and pictures connected with
+them, which were designed to represent certain attributes of the deities
+of various nations. In the course of time the meaning of these was lost;
+and subsequent generations regarded as the portraits of existing beings
+effigies which were at first intended to be merely emblematic and
+symbolical.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 1.--NOAH, HIS WIFE, AND THREE SONS, AS FISH-TAILED
+DEITIES.
+
+_From a Gem in the Florentine Gallery. After Calmet._]
+
+Early idolatry consisted, first, in separating the idea of the One
+Divinity into that of his various attributes, and of inventing symbols
+and making images of each separately; secondly, in the worship of the
+sun, moon, stars, and planets, as living existences; thirdly, in the
+deification of ancestors and early kings; and these three forms were
+often mingled together in strange and tangled confusion.
+
+Amongst the famous personages with whose history men were made
+acquainted by oral tradition was Noah. He was known as the second father
+of the human race, and the preserver and teacher of the arts and
+sciences as they existed before the Great Deluge, of which so many
+separate traditions exist among the various races of mankind.
+Consequently, he was an object of worship in many countries and under
+many names; and his wife and sons, as his assistants in the diffusion of
+knowledge, were sometimes associated with him.
+
+According to Berosus, of Babylon,--the Chaldean priest and astronomer,
+who extracted from the sacred books of "that great city" much
+interesting ancient lore, which he introduced into his 'History of
+Syria,' written, about B.C. 260, for the use of the Greeks,--at a time
+when men were sunk in barbarism, there came up from the Erythrean Sea
+(the Persian Gulf), and landed on the Babylonian shore, a creature named
+Oannes, which had the body and head of a fish. But above the fish's head
+was the head of a man, and below the tail of the fish were human feet.
+It had also human arms, a human voice, and human language. This strange
+monster sojourned among the rude people during the day, taking no food,
+but retiring to the sea at night; and it continued for some time thus to
+visit them, teaching them the arts of civilized life, and instructing
+them in science and religion.[34]
+
+  [34] Berosus, lib. i. p. 48.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 2.--HEA, OR NOAH, THE GOD OF THE FLOOD.
+_Khorsabad._]
+
+In this tale we have a distorted account of the life and occupation of
+Noah after his escape from the deluge which destroyed his home and
+drowned his neighbours. Oannes was one of the names under which he was
+worshipped in Chaldea, at Erech ("the place of the ark"), as the sacred
+and intelligent fish-god, the teacher of mankind, the god of science and
+knowledge. There he was also called Oes, Hoa, Ea, Ana, Anu, Aun, and
+Oan. Noah was worshipped, also, in Syria and Mesopotamia, and in Egypt,
+at "populous No,"[35] or Thebes--so named from "Theba," "the ark."
+
+  [35] Nahum iii. 8.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 3.--DAGON. _From a bas relief. Nimroud._]
+
+The history of the coffin of Osiris is another version of Noah's ark,
+and the period during which that Egyptian divinity is said to have been
+shut up in it, after it was set afloat upon the waters, was precisely
+the same as that during which Noah remained in the ark.
+
+Dagon, also--sometimes called Odacon--the great fish-god of the
+Philistines and Babylonians, was another phase of Oannes. "Dag," in
+Hebrew, signifies "a male fish," and "Aun" and "Oan" were two of the
+names of Noah. "Dag-aun" or "Dag-oan" therefore means "the fish Noah."
+He was portrayed in two ways. The more ancient image of him was that of
+a man issuing from a fish, as described of Oannes by Berosus; but in
+later times it was varied to that of a man whose upper half was human,
+and the lower parts those of a fish. The image of Dagon which fell upon
+its face to the ground before "the ark of the God of Israel," was
+probably of this latter form, for we read[36] that in its fall, "the
+head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the
+threshold: only the _stump_ (in the margin, "_the fishy part_") of Dagon
+was left to him." This was evidently Milton's conception of him:
+
+     "Dagon his name; sea-monster, upward man
+     And downward fish."[37]
+
+  [36] 1 Samuel v. 4.
+
+  [37] 'Paradise Lost,' Book i. l. 462.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 4.--DAGON. _After Calmet._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 5.--DAGON. _From an Agate Signet. Nineveh._]
+
+In some of the Nineveh sculptures of the fish-god, the head of the fish
+forms a kind of mitre on the head of the man, whilst the body of the
+fish appears as a cloak or cape over his shoulders and back. The fish
+varies in length; in some cases the tail almost touches the ground; in
+others it reaches but little below the man's waist.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 6.--FISH AVATAR OF VISHNU.
+
+_After Calmet and Maurice._]
+
+In one of his "avatars," or incarnations, the god Vishnu "the
+Preserver," is represented as issuing from the mouth of a fish. He is
+celebrated as having miraculously preserved one righteous family, and,
+also, the Vedas, the sacred records, when the world was drowned. Not
+only is this legend of the Indian god wrought up with the history of
+Noah, but Vishnu and Noah bear the same name--Vishnu being the Sanscrit
+form of "Ish-nuh," "the man Noah." The word "avatar" also means "out of
+the boat." In fact the whole mythology of Greece and Rome, as well as of
+Asia, is full of the history and deeds of Noah, which it is impossible
+to misunderstand. In all the representations of a deity having a
+combined human and piscine form, the original idea was that of a person
+coming out of a fish--not being part of one, but issuing from
+it, as Noah issued from the ark. In all of them the fish denoted
+"preservation," "fecundity," "plenty," and "diffusion of knowledge."[38]
+As the image was not the effigy of a divine personage, but symbolized
+certain attributes of Divinity, its sex was comparatively unimportant,
+although it is possible that, combined with the fecundity of the fish,
+the idea of Noah's wife, as the second mother of all subsequent
+generations, according to the widely-spread and accepted traditions of
+the deluge, may have influenced the impersonation.
+
+  [38] Some writers are of the opinion that the legend of Oannes
+  contains an allusion to the rising and setting of the sun, and that
+  his semi-piscine form was the expression of the idea that half his
+  time was spent above ground, and half below the waves. The same
+  commentators also regard all the "civilizing" gods and goddesses
+  as, respectively, solar and lunar deities. The attributes
+  symbolized in the worship of Noah and the sun are so nearly alike
+  that the two interpretations are not incompatible.
+
+Atergatis, the far-famed goddess of the Syrians, was also a
+fish-divinity. Her image, like that of Dagon, had at first a fish's body
+with human extremities protruding from it; but in the course of
+centuries it was gradually altered to that of a being the upper portion
+of whose body was that of a woman and the lower half that of a fish.
+Gatis was a powerful queen of Sidon, and mother of Semiramis. She
+received the title of "Ater," or "Ader," "the Great," for the benefits
+she conferred on her people; one of these benefits being a strict
+conservation of their fisheries, both from their own imprudent use, and
+from foreign interference. She issued an edict that no fish should be
+eaten without her consent, and that no one should take fish in the
+neighbouring sea without a licence from herself. It is not improbable
+that she and her celebrated daughter, who is said by Ovid and others to
+have been the builder of the walls of Babylon, were worshipped together;
+for that Atergatis was the same as the fish-goddess Ashteroth, or
+Ashtoreth, "the builder of the encompassing wall," we have, amongst
+other proofs, a remarkable one in Biblical history. In the first book of
+Maccabees v. 43, 44, we read that "all the heathen being discomfited
+before him (Judas Maccabeus) cast away their weapons, and fled unto the
+temple that was at _Carnaim_. But they took the city, and burned the
+temple with all that were therein. Thus was _Carnaim_ subdued, neither
+could they stand any longer before Judas." In the second book of
+Maccabees xii. 26, we are told that "Maccabeus marched forth to
+_Carnion_, and to the temple of _Atargatis_, and there he slew five and
+twenty thousand persons." In Genesis xiv. 5, this city and temple are
+referred to as "_Ashteroth Karnaim_."
+
+Fig. 7 is a representation of Atergatis on a medal coined at Marseilles.
+It shows that when the Phoenician colony from Syria, by whom that city
+was founded, settled there, they brought with them the worship of the
+gods of their country.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 7.--ATERGATIS.
+
+_From a Phoenician coin._]
+
+Atergatis was worshipped by the Greeks as Derceto and Astarte. Lucian
+writes[39]:--"In Phoenicia I saw the image of Derceto, a strange sight,
+truly! For she had the half of a woman, and from the thighs downwards a
+fish's tail." Diodorus Siculus describes (lib. ii.) the same deity, as
+represented at Ascalon, as "having the face of a woman, but all the rest
+of the body a fish's." And this very same image at Ascalon, which
+Diodorus calls Derceto, or Atergatis, is denominated by Herodotus[40]
+"the celestial Aphrodite," who was identical with the Cyprian and Roman
+Venus. Of all the sacred buildings erected to the goddess, this temple
+was by far the most ancient; and the Cyprians themselves acknowledged
+that their temple was built after the model of it by certain Phoenicians
+who came from that part of Syria.
+
+  [39] 'Opera Omnia,' tom. ii. p. 884, edit. Bened. de Dea. Syr.
+
+  [40] Lib. i. cap. cv.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 8.--VENUS RISING FROM THE SEA, SUPPORTED BY TRITONS.
+
+_After Calmet._]
+
+Thus the worship of Noah, as the second father of mankind, the
+repopulator of the earth, passed through various phases and
+transformations till it merged in that of Venus, who rose from the sea,
+and was regarded as the representative of the reproductive power of
+Nature--the goddess whom Lucretius thus addressed:
+
+    "Blest Venus! Thou the sea and fruitful earth
+    Peoplest amain; to thee whatever lives
+    Its being owes, and that it sees the sun:"
+
+and to whom refers the passage in the Orphic hymn:
+
+    "From thee are all things--all things thou producest
+    Which are in heaven, or in the fertile earth,
+    Or in the sea, or in the great abyss."
+
+Under this latter phase--the impersonation of Venus--the fish portion of
+the body was discarded, and the cast-off form was allotted in popular
+credence to the Tritons--minor deities, who acknowledged the supremacy
+of the goddess, and were ready to render her homage and service by
+bearing her in their arms, drawing her chariot, etc., but who still
+possessed considerable power as sea-gods, and could calm the waves and
+rule the storm, at pleasure.
+
+[Illustration:
+
+FIG. 9. FIG. 10.
+
+VENUS DRAWN IN HER CHARIOT BY TRITONS. _From two Corinthian coins._]
+
+Figs. 9 and 10 are from two Corinthian medals, each shewing Venus in a
+car or chariot drawn by Tritons, one male, the other female. On the
+obverse of Fig. 9, is the head of Nero, and on that of Fig. 10, the head
+of his grandmother Agrippina.[41]
+
+  [41] It is worthy of note that the fish was also adopted as an
+  emblem by the early Christians, and was frequently sculptured on
+  their tombs as a private mark or sign of the faith in which the
+  person there interred had died. It alluded to the letters which
+  composed the Greek word [Greek: Ichthys] ("a fish") forming an
+  anagram, the initials of words which conveyed the following
+  sentiment: [Greek: Iesous], Jesus; [Greek: Christos], Christ;
+  [Greek: Theou], of God; [Greek: gios], Son; [Greek: Soter],
+  Saviour. But it doubtless bore, also, the older meaning of
+  "preservation" and "reproduction," of which the fish was the
+  symbol, and betokened a belief in a future resurrection, as Noah
+  was preserved to dwell in, and populate, a new world. In 'Sea
+  Monsters Unmasked,' page 55, I gave a figure, copied by permission
+  from the _Illustrated London News_, of a rough sculpture in the
+  Roman catacombs, of Jonah being disgorged by a sea-monster. Near to
+  it was found, on another Christian tomb, one of these designs of
+  the "fish;" and it is not a little curious that, whereas the animal
+  depicted as casting forth Jonah is not a whale, but a sea-serpent,
+  or dragon, the _ichtheus_ in this instance is apparently not a
+  fish, but a seal.
+
+  [Illustration: FIG. 11.--CHRISTIAN SYMBOL. _From the Catacombs at
+  Rome._]
+
+  The article referred to appeared in the _Illustrated London News_ of
+  February 3rd, 1872, and the woodcut (fig. 11), an electrotype of
+  which was most kindly presented to me by the proprietors of that
+  paper, was one of the sketches that accompanied it.
+
+From the very earliest period of history, then, the conjoined human and
+fish form was known to every generation of men. It was presented to
+their sight in childhood by sculptures and pictures, and was a
+conspicuous object in their religious worship. By the lapse of time its
+original import was lost and debased; and, from being an emblem and
+symbol, it came to be accepted as the corporeal shape and structure of
+actually-existent sea-deities, who might present themselves to the view
+of the mariner, in visible and tangible form, at any moment. Thus were
+men trained and prepared to believe in mermen and mermaids, to expect to
+meet with them at sea, and to recognise as one of them any animal the
+appearance and movements of which could possibly be brought into
+conformity with their pre-conceived ideas.
+
+Accordingly, and very naturally, we find that from north to south this
+belief has been entertained. Megasthenes, who was a contemporary of
+Aristotle, but his junior, and whose geographical work was probably
+written at about the period of the great philosopher's death, reported
+that the sea which surrounded Taprobana, the ancient Ceylon, was
+inhabited by creatures having the appearance of women. AElian stated that
+there were "whales," or "great fishes," having the form of satyrs. The
+early Portuguese settlers in India asserted that true mermen were found
+in the Eastern seas, and old Norse legends tell of submarine beings of
+conjoined human and piscine form, who dwell in a wide territory far
+below the region of the fishes, over which the sea, like the cloudy
+canopy of our sky, loftily rolls, and some of whom have, from time to
+time, landed on Scandinavian shores, exchanged their fishy extremities
+for human limbs, and acquired amphibious habits. Not only have poets
+sung of the wondrous and seductive beauty of the maidens of these
+aquatic tribes, but many a Jack tar has come home from sea prepared to
+affirm on oath that he has seen a mermaid. To the best of his belief he
+has told the truth. He has seen some living being which looked
+wonderfully human, and his imagination, aided by an inherited
+superstition, has supplied the rest.
+
+Before endeavouring to identify the object of his delusion, it may be
+well to mention a few instances of the supposed appearance of mermen and
+mermaidens in various localities.
+
+Pliny writes[42]: "When Tiberius was emperor, an embassy was sent to him
+from Olysippo (Lisbon) expressly to inform him that a Triton, which was
+recognised as such by its form, had shown itself in a certain cave, and
+had been heard to produce loud sounds on a conch-shell. The Nereid,
+also, is not imaginary: its body is rough and covered with scales, but
+it has the appearance of a human being. For one was seen upon the same
+coast; and when it was dying those dwelling near at hand heard it
+moaning sadly for a long time. And the Governor of Gaul wrote to the
+divine Augustus that several Nereids had been found dead upon the shore.
+I have many informants--illustrious persons in high positions--who have
+assured me that they saw in the Sea of Cadiz a merman whose whole body
+was exactly like that of a man, that these mermen mount on board ships
+by night, and weigh down that end of the vessel on which they rest, and
+that if they are allowed to remain there long they will sink the ship."
+
+  [42] _Naturalis Historia_, Lib. ix. cap. v.
+
+AElian in one of his short, jerky, disconnected chapters,[43] which
+rarely exceed a page in length, and some of which only contain two
+lines, writes: "It is reported that the great sea which surrounds the
+island of Taprobana (Ceylon) contains an immense multitude of fishes and
+whales, and some of them have the heads of lions, panthers, rams, and
+other animals; and (which is more wonderful still) some of the cetaceans
+have the form of satyrs. There are others which have the face of a
+woman, but prickles instead of hair. In addition to these, it is said
+there are other creatures of so strange and monstrous a kind that it
+would be impossible exactly to explain their appearance without the aid
+of a skilfully drawn picture: these have elongated and coiled tails,
+and, for feet, have claws[44] or fins. And I hear that in the same sea
+there are great amphibious beasts which are gregarious, and live on
+grain, and by night feed on the corn crops and grass, and are also very
+fond of the ripe fruit of the palms. To obtain these they encircle in
+their embrace the trees which are young and flexible, and, shaking them
+violently, enjoy the fruit which they thus cause to fall. When morning
+dawns they return to the sea, and plunge beneath the waves."
+
+  [43] _De Natura Animalium_, Lib. xvi. cap. xviii.
+
+  [44] "_Forfices_," literally "shears," or "nippers," like the claws
+  of a lobster.
+
+AElian seems to have derived this information from Megasthenes, already
+referred to; but in another chapter,[45] he writes with greater
+certainty concerning these semi-human whales, and claims divine
+authority for his belief in the existence of tritons. "Although," he
+says, "we have no rational explanation nor absolute proof of that which
+fishermen are said to be able to affirm concerning the form of the
+tritons, we have the sworn testimony of many persons that there are in
+the sea cetaceans which from the head down to the middle of the body
+resemble the human species. Demostratus, in his works on fishing, says
+that an aged triton was seen near the town of Tanagra, in Boeotia, which
+was like the drawings and pictures of tritons, but its features were so
+obscured by age, and it disappeared so quickly, that its true character
+was not easily perceptible. But on the spot where it had rested on the
+shore were found some rough and very hard scales which had become
+detached from it. A certain senator--one of those selected by lot to
+carry on the administration of Achaia and the duties of the annual
+magistracy" (the mayor, in fact,) "being anxious to investigate the
+nature of this triton, put a portion of its skin on the fire. It gave
+out a most horrible odour; and those standing by were unable to decide
+whether it belonged to a terrestrial or marine animal. But the
+magistrate's curiosity had an evil ending, for very soon afterwards,
+whilst crossing a narrow creek in a boat, he fell overboard and was
+drowned; and the Tanagreans all regarded this as a judgment upon him for
+his crime of impiety towards the triton--an interpretation which was
+confirmed when his decomposing body was cast ashore, for it emitted
+exactly the same odour as had the burned skin of the triton. The
+Tanagreans and Demostratus explain whence the triton had strayed, and
+how it was stranded in this place. I believe," continues AElian, "that
+tritons exist, and I reverentially produce as my witness a most
+veracious god--namely, Apollo Didymaeus, whom no man in his senses would
+presume to regard as unworthy of credit. He sings thus of the triton,
+which he calls the sheep of the sea:
+
+  [45] Lib. xiii. cap. xxi.
+
+    '_Dum vocale maris monstrum natat aequore triton,
+    Neptuni pecus, in funes forte incidit extra
+    Demissos navim_';"
+
+which I venture to translate as follows:
+
+    A triton, vocal monster of the deep,
+    One of a flock of Neptune's scaly sheep,
+    Was caught, whilst swimming o'er the watery plain,
+    By lines which fishers from their boat had lain.
+
+"Therefore," AElian concludes, "if he, the omniscient god, pronounces
+that there are tritons, it does not behove us to doubt their existence."
+
+Sir J. Emerson Tennent, in his 'Natural History of Ceylon,' quoting
+from the _Histoire de la Compagnie de Jesus_, mentions that the annalist
+of the exploits of the Jesuits in India gravely records that seven of
+these monsters, male and female, were captured at Manaar, in 1560, and
+carried to Goa, where they were dissected by Demas Bosquez, physician to
+the Viceroy, "and their internal structure found to be in all respects
+conformable to the human." He also quotes Valentyn, one of the Dutch
+colonial chaplains, who, in his account of the Natural History of
+Amboyna,[46] embodied in his great work on the Netherlands' possessions
+in India, published in 1727,[47] devoted the first section of his
+chapter on the fishes of that island to a minute description of the
+"Zee-Menschen," "Zee-Wyven," and mermaids, the existence of which he
+warmly insists on as being beyond cavil. He relates that in 1663, when a
+lieutenant in the Dutch service was leading a party of soldiers along
+the sea-shore in Amboyna, he and all his company saw the mermen swimming
+at a short distance from the beach. They had long and flowing hair of a
+colour between grey and green. Six weeks afterwards the creatures were
+again seen by him and more than fifty witnesses, at the same place, by
+clear daylight. "If any narrative in the world," adds Valentyn,
+"deserves credit it is this; since not only one, but two mermen together
+were seen by so many eye-witnesses. Should the stubborn world, however,
+hesitate to believe it, it matters nothing, as there are people who
+would even deny that such cities as Rome, Constantinople, or Cairo,
+exist, merely because they themselves have not happened to see them. But
+what are such incredulous persons," he continues, "to make of the
+circumstance recorded by Albrecht Herport[48] in his account of India,
+that a merman was seen in the water near the church of Taquan on the
+morning of the 29th of April, 1661, and a mermaid at the same spot the
+same afternoon? Or what do they say to the fact that in 1714 a mermaid
+was not only seen but captured near the island of Booro, five feet,
+Rhineland measure, in height; which lived four days and seven hours,
+but, refusing all food, died without leaving any intelligible account of
+herself?" Valentyn, in support of his own faith in the mermaid, cites
+many other instances in which both "sea-men and sea-women" were seen and
+taken at Amboyna; especially one by a district visitor of the
+church, who presented it to the Governor Vanderstel. Of this
+"well-authenticated" specimen he gives an elaborate portrait amongst the
+fishes of the island,[49] with a minute description of each for the
+satisfaction of men of science.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 12.--MERMAID AND FISHES OF AMBOYNA. _After
+Valentyn._]
+
+  [46] One of the Dutch spice-islands in the Banda Sea, between
+  Celebes and Papua.
+
+  [47] _Beschrijving van Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien_, etc., 5 vols.
+  folio, Dordrecht and Amsterdam, 1727, vol. iii. p. 330.
+
+  [48] _Itinerarium Indicum_, Berne, 1669.
+
+  [49] With the permission and assistance of Messrs. Longman, the
+  accompanying wood-cut of this picture, and that of the Dugong, on
+  page 43, are copied from Sir J. Emerson Tennent's book published in
+  1861.
+
+The fame of this creature having reached Europe, the British minister in
+Holland wrote to Valentyn on the 28th of December, 1716, whilst the
+Emperor Peter the Great, of Russia, was his guest at Amsterdam, to
+communicate the desire of the Czar that the mermaid should be brought
+home from Amboyna for his inspection. To complete his proofs of the
+existence of mermen and merwomen, Valentyn points triumphantly to the
+historical fact that in Holland, in the year 1404, a mermaid was driven,
+during a tempest, through a breach in the dyke of Edam, and was taken
+alive in the lake of Purmer. Thence she was carried to Haarlem, where
+the Dutch women taught her to spin, and where several years after, she
+died in the Roman Catholic faith;--"but this," says the pious
+Calvinistic chaplain, "in no way militates against the truth of her
+story." The worthy minister citing the authority of various writers as
+proof that mermaids had in all ages been known in Gaul, Naples, Epirus,
+and the Morea, comes to the conclusion that as there are "sea-cows,"
+"sea-horses," "sea-dogs," as well as "sea-trees," and "sea-flowers,"
+which he himself had seen, there are no reasonable grounds for doubt
+that there may also be "sea-maidens" and "sea-men."
+
+In an early account of Newfoundland,[50] Whitbourne describes a
+"maremaid or mareman," which he had seen "within the length of a pike,"
+and which "came swimming swiftly towards him, looking cheerfully on his
+face, as it had been a woman. By the face, eyes, nose, mouth, chin,
+ears, neck and forehead, it appeared to be so beautiful, and in those
+parts so well proportioned, having round about the head many blue
+streaks resembling hair, but certainly it was no hair. The shoulders and
+back down to the middle were square, white, and smooth as the back of a
+man, and from the middle to the end it tapered like a broad-hooked
+arrow." The animal put both its paws on the side of the boat wherein its
+observer sat, and strove much to get in, but was repelled by a blow.
+
+  [50] Whitbourne's 'Discourse of Newfoundland.'
+
+In 1676, a description was given by an English surgeon named Glover, of
+an animal of this kind. The author did not designate it by any name, but
+the incident has the honour of being recorded in the _Philosophical
+Transactions_.[51] About three leagues from the mouth of the river
+Rappahannock, in America, while alone in a vessel, he observed, at the
+distance of about half a stone-throw, he says, "a most prodigious
+creature, much resembling a man, only somewhat larger, standing right up
+in the water, with his head, neck, shoulders, breast and waist, to the
+cubits of his arms, above water, and his skin was tawny, much like that
+of an Indian; the figure of his head was pyramidal and sleek, without
+hair; his eyes large and black, and so were his eyebrows; his mouth very
+wide, with a broad black streak on the upper lip, which turned upwards
+at each end like mustachios. His countenance was grim and terrible. His
+neck, shoulders, arms, breast and waist, were like unto the neck, arms,
+shoulders, breast and waist of a man. His hands, if he had any, were
+under water. He seemed to stand with his eyes fixed on me for some time,
+and afterwards dived down, and, a little after, rose at somewhat a
+greater distance, and turned his head towards me again, and then
+immediately fell a little under water, that I could discern him throw
+out his arms and gather them in as a man does when he swims. At last, he
+shot with his head downwards, by which means he cast his tail above the
+water, which exactly resembled the tail of a fish, with a broad fane at
+the end of it."
+
+  [51] Glover's 'Account of Virginia,' ap. Phil. Trans. vol. xi. p.
+  625.
+
+Thormodus Torfaeus[52] maintains that mermaids are found on the south
+coast of Iceland, and, according to Olafsen,[53] two have been taken in
+the surrounding seas, the first in the earlier part of the history of
+that island, and the second in 1733. The latter was found in the stomach
+of a shark. Its lower parts were consumed, but the upper were entire.
+They were as large as those of a boy eight or nine years old. Both the
+cutting teeth and grinders were long and shaped like pins, and the
+fingers were connected by a large web. Olafsen was inclined to believe
+that these were human remains, but the islanders all firmly maintained
+that they were part of "a marmennill," by which name the mermaid is
+known among them.
+
+  [52] _Historia rerum Norvegicarum._
+
+  [53] _Voyage en Islande_, tom. iii. p. 223.
+
+Of course the worthy bishop of Bergen, Pontoppidan, has something to
+tell us about mermaids in his part of the world. "Amongst the sea
+monsters," he says,[54] "which are in the North Sea, and are often seen,
+I shall give the first place to the Hav-manden, or merman, whose mate is
+called Hav-fruen, or mermaid. The existence of this creature is
+questioned by many, nor is it at all to be wondered at, because most of
+the accounts we have had of it are mixed with mere fables, and may be
+looked upon as idle tales." As such he regards the story told by Jonas
+Ramus in his 'History of Norway,' of a mermaid taken by fishermen at
+Hordeland, near Bergen, and which is said to have sung an unmusical song
+to King Hiorlief. In the same category he places an account given by
+Besenius in his life of Frederic II. (1577), of a mermaid that called
+herself Isbrandt, and held several conversations with a peasant at
+Samsoe, in which she foretold the birth of King Christian IV., "and made
+the peasant preach repentance to the courtiers, who were very much given
+to drunkenness." Equally "idle" with the above stories is, in his
+opinion, another, extracted from an old manuscript still to be seen in
+the University Library at Copenhagen, and quoted by Andrew Bussaeus
+(1619), of a merman caught by the two senators, Ulf Rosensparre and
+Christian Holch, whilst on their voyage home to Denmark from Norway.
+This sea-man frightened the two worshipful gentlemen so terribly that
+they were glad to let him go again; for as he lay upon the deck he spoke
+Danish to them, and threatened that if they did not give him his liberty
+"the ship should be cast away, and every soul of the crew should
+perish."
+
+  [54] 'Natural History of Norway,' vol. ii. p. 190.
+
+"When such fictions as these," says Pontoppidan, "are mixed with the
+history of the merman, and when that creature is represented as a
+prophet and an orator; when they give the mermaid a melodious voice, and
+tell us that she is a fine singer, we need not wonder that so few people
+of sense will give credit to such absurdities, or that they even doubt
+the existence of such a creature." The good prelate, however, goes on to
+say that "whilst we have no ground to believe all these fables, yet, as
+to the existence of the creature we may safely give our assent to it,"
+and, "if this be called in question, it must proceed entirely from the
+fabulous stories usually mixed with the truth." Like Valentyn, he argues
+that as there are "sea-horses," "sea-cows," "sea-wolves," "sea-dogs,"
+"sea-hogs," etc., it is probable from analogy, that "we should find in
+the ocean a fish or creature which resembles the human species more than
+any other." As for the objection "founded on self-love and respect to
+our own species which is honoured with the image of God, who made man
+lord of all creatures, and that, consequently, we may suppose he is
+entitled to a noble and heavenly form which other creatures must not
+partake of," he thinks "its force vanishes when we consider the form of
+apes, and especially of another African creature called 'Quoyas Morrov'
+described by Odoard Dapper" in his work on Africa, and which appears to
+have been a chimpanzee. Pontoppidan regarded it as being the Satyr of
+the ancients. He therefore claims that "if we will not allow our
+Norwegian Hastromber the honourable name of merman, we may very well
+call it the 'Sea-ape,' or the 'Sea-Quoyas-Morrov;'" especially as the
+author already quoted says that, "in the Sea of Angola mermaids are
+frequently caught which resemble the human species. They are taken in
+nets, and killed by the negroes, and are heard to shriek and cry like
+women."
+
+The Bishop adds that in the diocese of Bergen, as well as in the manor
+of Nordland, there were hundreds of persons who affirmed with the
+strongest assurances that they had seen this kind of creature; sometimes
+at a distance and at other times quite close to their boats, standing
+upright, and formed like a human creature down to the middle--the rest
+they could not see--but of those who had seen them out of water and
+handled them he had not been able to find more than one person of credit
+who could vouch it for truth. This informant, "the Reverend Mr. Peter
+Angel, minister of Vand-Elvens Gield, on Suderoe," assured his bishop,
+when he was on a visitation journey, that "in the year 1719, he (being
+then about twenty years old) saw what is called a merman lying dead on a
+point of land near the sea, which had been cast ashore by the waves
+along with several sea-calves (seals), and other dead fish. The length
+of this creature was much greater than what has been mentioned of any
+before, namely, above three fathoms. It was of a dark grey colour all
+over: in the lower part it was like a fish, and had a tail like that of
+a porpoise. The face resembled that of a man, with a mouth, forehead,
+eyes, etc. The nose was flat, and, as it were, pressed down to the face,
+in which the nostrils were very visible. The breast was not far from the
+head; the arms seemed to hang to the side, to which they were joined by
+a thin skin, or membrane. The hands were, to all appearance, like the
+paws of a sea-calf. The back of this creature was very fat, and a great
+part of it was cut off, which, with the liver, yielded a large quantity
+of train-oil." The author then quotes a description by Luke Debes[55] of
+a mermaid seen in 1670 at Faroe, westward of Qualboe Eide, by many of
+the inhabitants, as also by others from different parts of Suderoe. She
+was close to the shore, and stood there for two hours and a half, and
+was up to her waist in water. She had long hairs on her head, which hung
+down to the surface of the water all round about her, and she held a
+fish in her right hand.
+
+  [55] _Feroa Reserata_, or Description of the Faroe Islands. 8vo.
+  Copenhagen, 1673.
+
+Pontoppidan mentions other instances of similar appearances, and says
+that the latest he had heard of was of a merman seen in Denmark on the
+20th of September, 1723, by three ferrymen who, at some distance from
+the land, were towing a ship just arrived from the Baltic. Having caught
+sight of something which looked like a dead body floating on the water,
+they rowed towards it, and there, resting on their oars, allowed it to
+drift close to them. It sank, but immediately came to the surface again,
+and then they saw that it had the appearance of an old man,
+strong-limbed, and with broad shoulders, but his arms they could not
+see. His head was small in proportion to his body, and had short,
+curled, black hair, which did not reach below his ears; his eyes lay
+deep in his head, and he had a meagre and pinched face, with a black,
+coarse beard, that looked as if it had been cut. His skin was coarse,
+and very full of hair. He stood in the same place for half a quarter of
+an hour, and was seen above the water down to his breast: at last the
+men grew apprehensive of some danger, and began to retire; upon which
+the monster blew up his cheeks, and made a kind of roaring noise, and
+then dived under water, so that they did not see him any more. One of
+them, Peter Gunnersen, related (what the others did not observe) that
+this merman was, about the body and downwards, quite pointed, like a
+fish. This same Peter Gunnersen likewise deposed that "about twenty
+years before, as he was in a boat near Kulleor, the place where he was
+born, he saw a mermaid with long hair and large breasts." He and his two
+companions were, by command of the king, examined by the burgomaster of
+Elsineur, Andrew Bussaeus, before the privy-councillor, Fridrich von
+Gram, and their testimony to the above effect was given on their
+respective oaths.
+
+Brave old Henry Hudson, the sturdy and renowned navigator, who thrice,
+in three successive years, gave battle to the northern ice, and was each
+time defeated in his endeavour to discover a north-west or north-east
+passage to China, though he stamped his name on the title-page of a
+mighty nation's history, records the following incident: "This evening
+(June 15th) one of our company, looking overboard, saw a mermaid, and,
+calling up some of the company to see her, one more of the crew came up,
+and by that time she was come close to the ship's side, looking
+earnestly on the men. A little after a sea came and overturned her. From
+the navel upward, her back and breasts were like a woman's, as they say
+that saw her; her body as big as one of us, her skin very white, and
+long hair hanging down behind, of colour black. In her going down they
+saw her tail, which was like the tail of a porpoise and speckled like a
+mackarel's. Their names that saw her were Thomas Hilles and Robert
+Rayner."
+
+Steller, who was a zoologist of some repute, reports having seen in
+Behrings Straits a strange animal, which he calls a "sea-ape," and in
+which one might almost recognise Pontoppidan's "Sea-Quoyas-Morrov." It
+was about five feet long, had sharp and erect ears and large eyes, and
+on its lips a kind of beard. Its body was thick and round, and it
+tapered to the tail, which was bifurcated, with the upper lobe longest.
+It was covered with thick hair, grey on the back, and red on the belly.
+No feet nor paws were visible. It was full of frolic, and sported in the
+manner of a monkey, swimming sometimes on one side of the ship and
+sometimes on the other. It often raised one-third of its body out of the
+water, and stood upright for a considerable time. It would frequently
+bring up a sea-plant, not unlike a bottle-gourd, which it would toss
+about and catch in its mouth, playing numberless fantastic tricks with
+it.
+
+Somewhat similar accounts have been brought from the Southern
+Hemisphere, two, at least, of which are worth transcribing.
+
+Captain Colnett, in his 'Voyage to the South Atlantic,' says:--"A very
+singular circumstance happened off the coast of Chili, in lat. 24 deg. S.,
+which spread some alarm amongst my people, and awakened their
+superstitious apprehensions. About 8 o'clock in the evening an animal
+rose alongside the ship, and uttered such shrieks and tones of
+lamentation, so much like those produced by the female human voice when
+expressing the deepest distress as to occasion no small degree of alarm
+among those who first heard it. These cries continued for upwards of
+three hours, and seemed to increase as the ship sailed from it. I never
+heard any noise whatever that approached so near those sounds which
+proceed from the organs of utterance in the human species."
+
+Captain Weddell, in his 'Voyage towards the South Pole' (p. 143), writes
+that one of his men, having been left ashore on Hall's Island to take
+care of some produce, heard one night about ten o'clock, after he had
+lain down to rest, a noise resembling human cries. As daylight does not
+disappear in those latitudes at the season in which the incident
+occurred, the sailor rose and searched along the beach, thinking that,
+possibly, a boat might have been upset, and that some of the crew might
+be clinging to the detached rocks.
+
+    "Roused by that voice of silver sound,
+    From the paved floor he lightly sprung,
+    And, glaring with his eyes around,
+    Where the fair nymph her tresses wrung,"[56]
+
+guided by occasional sounds, he at length saw an object lying on a rock
+a dozen yards from the shore, at which he was somewhat frightened. "The
+face and shoulders appeared of human form and of a reddish colour; over
+the shoulders hung long green hair; the tail resembled that of a seal,
+but the extremities of the arms he could not see distinctly."
+
+    "As on the wond'ring youth she smiled,
+    Again she raised the melting lay,"[56]
+
+  [56] John Leyden.
+
+for the creature continued to make a musical noise during the two
+minutes he gazed at it, and, on perceiving him, disappeared in an
+instant.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 13.--A JAPANESE ARTIFICIAL MERMAID.]
+
+The universality of the belief in an animal of combined human and
+fish-like form is very remarkable. That it exists amongst the Japanese
+we have evidence in their curious and ingeniously-constructed models
+which are occasionally brought to this country. I have one of these
+which is so exactly the counterpart of that which my friend Mr. Frank
+Buckland described, originally in _Land and Water_, and which forms the
+subject of a chapter in his 'Curiosities of Natural History,'[57] that
+the portrait of the one (Fig. 13) will equally well represent the other.
+The lower half of the body is made of the skin and scales of a fish of
+the carp family, and fastened on to this, so neatly that it is hardly
+possible to detect where the joint is made, is a wooden body, the ribs
+of which are so prominent that the poor mermaid has a miserable and
+half-starved appearance. The upper part of the body is in the attitude
+of a Sphinx, leaning upon its elbows and fore-arms. The arms are thin
+and scraggy, and the fingers attenuated and skeleton-like. The nails are
+formed of small pieces of ivory or bone. The head is like that of a
+small monkey, and a little wool covers the crown, so thinly and untidily
+that if the mermaid possessed a crystal mirror she would see the
+necessity for the vigorous use of her comb of pearl. The teeth are those
+of some fish--apparently of the cat-fish, (_Anarchicas lupus_). These
+Japanese artificial mermaids have brought many a dollar into the pockets
+of Mr. Barnum and other showmen.
+
+  [57] Third Series, vol. ii. p. 134, 2nd ed.
+
+Somewhat different in appearance from this, but of the same kind, was an
+artificial mermaid described in the _Saturday Magazine_ of June 4th,
+1836. Fig. 14 is a facsimile of the woodcut which accompanied it. This
+grotesque composition was exhibited in a glass case, some years
+previously, "in a leading street at the west end" of London. It was
+constructed "of the skin of the head and shoulders of a monkey, which
+was attached to the dried skin of a fish of the salmon kind with the
+head cut off, and the whole was stuffed and highly varnished, the better
+to deceive the eye." It was said to have been "taken by the crew of a
+Dutch vessel from on board a native Malacca boat, and from the reverence
+shown to it, it was supposed to be a representative of one of their idol
+gods." I am inclined to think that it was of Japanese origin.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 14.--AN ARTIFICIAL MERMAID, PROBABLY JAPANESE.]
+
+Fig. 15 is described in the article above referred to as having been
+copied from a Japanese drawing, and as being a portrait of one of their
+deities. Its similarity to one of those of the Assyrians (Fig. 2, page
+3) is remarkable. The inscription, however, does not indicate this. The
+Chinese characters in the centre--"_Nin giyo_"--signify "human fish;"
+those on the right in Japanese _Hira Kana_, or running-hand, have the
+same purport, and those on the left, in _Kata Kana_, the characters of
+the Japanese alphabet, mean "_Ichi hiru ike_"--"one day kept alive." The
+whole legend seems to pretend that this human fish was actually caught,
+and kept alive in water for twenty-four hours, but, as the box on which
+it is inscribed is one of those in which the Japanese showmen keep their
+toys, it was probably the subject of a "penny peep-show."
+
+We need not travel from our own country to find the belief in mermaids
+yet existing. It is still credited in the north of Scotland that they
+inhabit the neighbouring seas: and Dr. Robert Hamilton, F.R.S.E.,
+writing in 1839, expressed emphatically his opinion that there was then
+as much ignorance on this subject as had prevailed at any former
+period.[58]
+
+  [58] Naturalist's Library, Marine Amphibiae, p. 291.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 15.--A MERMAID. _From a Japanese picture._]
+
+In the year 1797, Mr. Munro, schoolmaster of Thurso, affirmed that he
+had seen "a figure like a naked female, sitting on a rock projecting
+into the sea, at Sandside Head, in the parish of Reay. Its head was
+covered with long, thick, light-brown hair, flowing down on the
+shoulders. The forehead was round, the face plump, and the cheeks ruddy.
+The mouth and lips resembled those of a human being, and the eyes were
+blue. The arms, fingers, breast, and abdomen were as large as those of a
+full-grown female," and, altogether,
+
+    "That sea-nymph's form of pearly light
+    Was whiter than the downy spray,
+    And round her bosom, heaving bright,
+    Her glossy yellow ringlets play."[59]
+
+  [59] John Leyden.
+
+"This creature," continued Mr. Munro, "was apparently in the act of
+combing its hair with its fingers, which seemed to afford it pleasure,
+and it remained thus occupied during some minutes, when it dropped into
+the sea." The Dominie
+
+                "saw the maiden there,
+    Just as the daylight faded,
+    Braiding her locks of gowden hair
+    An' singing as she braided,"[60]
+
+  [60] The Ettrick Shepherd.
+
+but he did not remark whether the fingers were webbed. On the whole, he
+infers that this was a marine animal of which he had a distinct and
+satisfactory view, and that the portion seen by him bore a narrow
+resemblance to the human form. But for the dangerous situation it had
+chosen, and its appearance among the waves, he would have supposed it to
+be a woman. Twelve years later, several persons observed near the same
+spot an animal which they also supposed to be a mermaid.
+
+A very remarkable story of this kind is one related by Dr. Robert
+Hamilton in the volume already referred to, and for the general truth of
+which he vouches, from his personal knowledge of some of the persons
+connected with the occurrence. In 1823 it was reported that some
+fishermen of Yell, one of the Shetland group, had captured a mermaid by
+its being entangled in their lines. The statement was that "the animal
+was about three feet long, the upper part of the body resembling the
+human, with protuberant mammae, like a woman; the face, forehead, and
+neck were short, and resembled those of a monkey; the arms, which were
+small, were kept folded across the breast; the fingers were distinct,
+not webbed; a few stiff, long bristles were on the top of the head,
+extending down to the shoulders, and these it could erect and depress at
+pleasure, something like a crest. The inferior part of the body was like
+a fish. The skin was smooth, and of a grey colour. It offered no
+resistance, nor attempted to bite, but uttered a low, plaintive sound.
+The crew, six in number, took it within their boat, but, superstition
+getting the better of curiosity, they carefully disentangled it from the
+lines and a hook which had accidentally become fastened in its body, and
+returned it to its native element. It instantly dived, descending in a
+perpendicular direction." Mr. Edmonston, the original narrator of this
+incident, was "a well-known and intelligent observer," says Dr.
+Hamilton, and in a communication made by him to the Professor of Natural
+History in the Edinburgh University gave the following additional
+particulars, which he had learned from the skipper and one of the crew
+of the boat. "They had the animal for three hours within the boat: the
+body was without scales or hair; it was of a silvery grey colour above,
+and white below; it was like the human skin; no gills were observed, nor
+fins on the back or belly. The tail was like that of a dog-fish; the
+mammae were about as large as those of a woman; the mouth and lips were
+very distinct, and resembled the human. Not one of the six men dreamed
+of a doubt of its being a mermaid, and it could not be suggested that
+they were influenced by their fears, for the mermaid is not an object of
+terror to fishermen: it is rather a welcome guest, and danger is
+apprehended from its experiencing bad treatment." Mr. Edmonston
+concludes by saying that "the usual resources of scepticism that the
+seals and other sea-animals appearing under certain circumstances,
+operating upon an excited imagination, and so producing ocular illusion,
+cannot avail here. It is quite impossible that six Shetland fishermen
+could commit such a mistake." It would seem that the narrator demands
+that his readers shall be silenced, if unconvinced; but
+
+    "He that complies against his will
+    Is of his own opinion still."
+
+This incident is well-attested, and merits respectful and careful
+consideration; but I decline to admit any such impossibility of error in
+observation or description on the part of the fishermen, or the further
+impossibility of recognising in the animal captured by them one known to
+naturalists. The particulars given in this instance, and also of the
+supposed merman seen cast ashore dead in 1719 by the Rev. Peter Angel
+(p. 22), are sufficiently accurate descriptions of a warm-blooded marine
+animal, with which the Shetlanders, and probably Mr. Edmonston also,
+were unacquainted, namely, the rytina, of which I shall have more to say
+presently; and these occurrences afford some slight hope that this
+remarkable beast may not have become extinct in 1768, as has been
+supposed, but that it may still exist somewhat further south than it was
+met with by its original describer, Steller.
+
+Turning to Ireland, we find the same credence in the semi-human fish,
+or fish-tailed human being. In the autumn of 1819 it was affirmed that
+"a creature appeared on the Irish coast, about the size of a girl ten
+years of age, with a bosom as prominent as one of sixteen, having a
+profusion of long dark-brown hair, and full, dark eyes. The hands and
+arms were formed like those of a man, with a slight web connecting the
+upper part of the fingers, which were frequently employed in throwing
+back and dividing the hair. The tail appeared like that of a dolphin."
+This creature remained basking on the rocks during an hour, in the sight
+of numbers of people, until frightened by the flash of a musket, when
+
+    "Away she went with a sea-gull's scream,
+    And a splash of her saucy tail,"[61]
+
+  [61] Tom Hood. 'The Mermaid at Margate.'
+
+for it instantly plunged with a scream into the sea.
+
+From Irish legends we learn that those sea-nereids, the "Merrows," or
+"Moruachs" came occasionally from the sea, gained the affections of men,
+and interested themselves in their affairs; and similar traditions of
+the "Morgan" (sea-women) and the "Morverch" (sea-daughters) are current
+in Brittany.
+
+In English poetry the mermaid has been the subject of many charming
+verses, and Shakspeare alludes to it in his plays no less than six
+times. The head-quarters of these "daughters of the sea" in England, or
+of the belief in their existence, are in Cornwall. There the fisherman,
+many a time and
+
+            "Oft, beneath the silver moon,[62]
+    Has heard, afar, the mermaid sing,"
+
+and has listened, so they say, to
+
+    "The mermaid's sweet sea-soothing lay
+    That charmed the dancing waves to sleep."[62]
+
+  [62] John Leyden.
+
+Mr. Robert Hunt, F.R.S., in his collection of the traditions and
+superstitions of old Cornwall,[63] records several curious legends of
+the "merrymaids" and "merrymen" (the local name of mermaids), which he
+had gathered from the fisher-folk and peasants in different parts of
+that county.
+
+  [63] 'Romances and Drolls of the West of England.' London: Hotten,
+  1871.
+
+And, in a pleasant article in 'All the Year Round,'[64] 1865, "A Cornish
+Vicar"[65] mentions some of the superstitions of the people in his
+neighbourhood, and the perplexing questions they occasionally put to
+him. One of his parishioners, an old man named Anthony Cleverdon, but
+who was popularly known as "Uncle Tony," having been the seventh son of
+his parents, in direct succession, was looked upon, in consequence, as a
+soothsayer. This "ancient augur" confided to his pastor many highly
+efficacious charms and formularies, and, in return, sought for
+information from him on other subjects. One day he puzzled the parson by
+a question which so well illustrates the local ideas concerning
+mermaids, and the sequel of which is, moreover, so humorously related by
+the vicar, that I venture to quote his own words, as follows:--
+
+  [64] Vol. xiii. p. 336.
+
+  [65] The "Cornish Vicar" was, evidently, the Rev. Robert Stephen
+  Hawker, M.A., Vicar of Morwenstow, and author of 'Echoes from Old
+  Cornwall,' 'Footprints of Former Men in Cornwall,' etc.
+
+"Uncle Tony said to me, 'Sir, there is one thing I want to ask you, if
+I may be so free, and it is this: why should a merrymaid, that will ride
+about upon the waters in such terrible storms, and toss from sea to sea
+in such ruckles as there be upon the coast, why should she never lose
+her looking-glass and comb?' 'Well, I suppose,' said I, 'that if there
+are such creatures, Tony, they must wear their looking-glasses and combs
+fastened on somehow, like fins to a fish.' 'See!' said Tony, chuckling
+with delight, 'what a thing it is to know the Scriptures, like your
+reverence; I should never have found it out. But there's another point,
+sir, I should like to know, if you please; I've been bothered about it
+in my mind hundreds of times. Here be I, that have gone up and down
+Holacombe cliffs and streams fifty years come next Candlemas, and I've
+gone and watched the water by moonlight and sunlight, days and nights,
+on purpose, in rough weather and smooth (even Sundays, too, saving your
+presence), and my sight as good as most men's, and yet I never could
+come to see a merrymaid in all my life: how's that, sir?' 'Are you sure,
+Tony,' I rejoined, 'that there are such things in existence at all?'
+'Oh, sir, my old father seen her twice! He was out one night for wreck
+(my father watched the coast, like most of the old people formerly), and
+it came to pass that he was down at the duck-pool on the sand at
+low-water tide, and all to once he heard music in the sea. Well, he
+croped on behind a rock, like a coastguardsman watching a boat, and got
+very near the music ... and there was the merrymaid, very plain to be
+seen, swimming about upon the waves like a woman bathing--and singing
+away. But my father said it was very sad and solemn to hear--more like
+the tune of a funeral hymn than a Christmas carol, by far--but it was so
+sweet that it was as much as he could do to hold back from plunging into
+the tide after her. And he an old man of sixty-seven, with a wife and a
+houseful of children at home. The second time was down here by Holacombe
+Pits. He had been looking out for spars--there was a ship breaking up in
+the Channel--and he saw some one move just at half-tide mark, so he went
+on very softly, step by step, till he got nigh the place, and there was
+the merrymaid sitting on a rock, the bootyfullest merrymaid that eye
+could behold, and she was twisting about her long hair, and dressing it,
+just like one of our girls getting ready for her sweetheart on the
+Sabbath-day. The old man made sure he should greep hold of her before
+ever she found him out, and he had got so near that a couple of paces
+more and he would have caught her by the hair, as sure as tithe or tax,
+when, lo and behold, she looked back and glimpsed him! So, in one moment
+she dived head-foremost off the rock, and then tumbled herself
+topsy-turvy about in the water, and cast a look at my poor father, and
+grinned like a seal.'" And a seal it probably was that Tony's "poor
+father" saw.
+
+What, then, are these mermaids and mermen, a belief in whose existence
+has prevailed in all ages, and amongst all the nations of the earth?
+Have they, really, some of the parts and proportions of man, or do they
+belong to another order of mammals on which credulity and inaccurate
+observation have bestowed a false character?
+
+Mr. Swainson, a naturalist of deserved eminence, has maintained on
+purely scientific grounds, that there must exist a marine animal uniting
+the general form of a fish with that of a man; that by the laws of
+Nature the natatorial type of the _Quadrumana_ is most assuredly
+wanting, and that, apart from man, a being connecting the seals with the
+monkeys is required to complete the circle of quadrumanous animals.[66]
+
+  [66] 'Geography and Distribution of Animals.'
+
+Mr. Gosse[67] argues that all the characters which Mr. Swainson selects
+as marking the natatorial type of animals belong to man, and that he
+being, in his savage state, a great swimmer, is the true aquatic
+primate, which Mr. Swainson regards as absent. Mr. Gosse admits,
+however, that "nature has an odd way of mocking at our impossibilities,
+and" that "it _may be_ that green-haired maidens with oary tails, lurk
+in the ocean caves, and keep mirrors and combs upon their rocky
+shelves;" and the conclusion he arrives at is that the combined evidence
+"induces a strong suspicion that the northern seas may hold forms of
+life as yet uncatalogued by science."
+
+  [67] 'Romance of Natural History,' 2nd Series.
+
+That there are animals in the northern and other seas with which we are
+unacquainted, is more than probable: discoveries of animals of new
+species are constantly being made, especially in the life of the deep
+sea. But I venture to think that the production of an animal at present
+unknown is quite unnecessary to account for the supposed appearances of
+mermaids.
+
+We have in the form and habits of the _Phocidae_, or earless seals, a
+sufficient interpretation of almost every incident of the kind that has
+occurred north of the Equator--of those in which protuberant _mammae_ are
+described, we must presently seek another explanation. The round, plump,
+expressive face of a seal, the beautiful, limpid eyes, the hand-like
+fore-paws, the sleek body, tapering towards the flattened hinder fins,
+which are directed backwards, and spread out in the form of a broad fin,
+like the tail of a fish, might well give the idea of an animal having
+the anterior part of its body human and the posterior half piscine.
+
+In the habits of the seals, also, we may trace those of the supposed
+mermaid, and the more easily the better we are acquainted with them. All
+seals are fond of leaving the water frequently. They always select the
+flattest and most shelving rocks which have been covered at high tide,
+and prefer those that are separated from the mainland. They generally go
+ashore at half-tide, and invariably lie with their heads towards the
+water, and seldom more than a yard or two from it. There they will often
+remain, if undisturbed, for six hours; that is, until the returning tide
+floats them off the rock. As for the sweet melody, "so melting soft,"
+that must depend much on the ear and musical taste of the listener. I
+have never heard a seal utter any vocal sounds but a porcine grunt, a
+plaintive moan, and a pitiful whine. But another habit of the seals has,
+probably more than anything else, caused them to be mistaken for
+semi-human beings--namely, that of poising themselves upright in the
+water with the head and the upper third part of the body above the
+surface.
+
+One calm sunny morning in August, 1881, a fine schooner-yacht, on board
+of which I was a guest, was slowly gliding out of the mouth of the river
+Maas, past the Hook of Holland, into the North Sea, when a seal rose
+just ahead of us, and assumed the attitude above described. It waited
+whilst we passed it, inspecting us apparently with the greatest
+interest; then dived, swam in the direction in which we were sailing, so
+as to intercept our course, and came up again, sitting upright as
+before. This it repeated three times, and so easily might it have been
+taken for a mermaid, that one of the party, who was called on deck to
+see it, thought, at first, that it was a boy who had swam off from the
+shore to the vessel on a begging expedition.
+
+Laing, in his account of a voyage to the North, mentions having seen a
+seal under similar circumstances.
+
+A young seal which was brought from Yarmouth to the Brighton Aquarium
+in 1873, habitually sat thus, showing his head and a considerable
+portion of his body out of water. His bath was so shallow in some parts
+that he was able to touch the bottom, and, with his after-flippers
+tucked under him, like a lobster's tail, and spread out in front, he
+would balance himself on his hind quarters, and look inquisitively at
+everybody, and listen attentively to everything within sight and
+hearing. When he was satisfied that no one was likely to interfere with
+him, and that it was unnecessary to be on the alert, he would half-close
+his beautiful, soft eyes, and either contentedly pat, stroke, and
+scratch his little fat stomach with his right paw, or flap both of them
+across his breast in a most ludicrous manner, exactly as a cabman warms
+the tips of his fingers on a wintry day, by swinging his arms vigorously
+across his chest, and striking his hands against his body on either
+side. He was very sensitive to musical sounds, as many dogs are, and
+when a concert took place in the building a high note from one of the
+vocalists would cause him to utter a mournful wail, and to dive with a
+splash that made the water fly, the audience smile, and the singer
+frown.
+
+Captain Scoresby tells us that he had seen the walrus with its head
+above water, and in such a position that it required little stretch of
+imagination to mistake it for a human being, and that on one occasion of
+this kind the surgeon of his ship actually reported to him that he had
+seen a man with his head above water.
+
+Peter Gunnersen's merman (p. 24), who "blew up his cheeks and made a
+kind of roaring noise" before diving, was probably a "bladder-nose"
+seal. The males of that species have on the head a peculiar pad, which
+they can dilate at pleasure, and their voice is loud and discordant.
+
+The appearance and behaviour of Steller's "sea-ape," described on p.
+25, may, I think, be attributed to one of the eared seals, the so-called
+sea-lions, or sea-bears. Every one who has seen these animals fed must
+have noticed the rapidity with which they will dive and swim to any part
+of their pond where they expect to receive food, and how, like a dog
+after a pebble, they will keenly watch their keeper's movements, and
+start in the direction to which he is apparently about to throw a fish,
+even before the latter has left his hand. This may be seen at the
+Zoological Gardens, Regent's Park, and, better than anywhere else in
+Europe, at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, Paris. It would be quite in
+accordance with their habits that one of these _Otaria_ should dive
+under a ship, and rise above the surface on either side, eagerly
+surveying those on board, in hope of obtaining food, or from mere
+curiosity.
+
+The seals and their movements account for so many mermaid stories, that
+all accounts of sea-women with prominent bosoms were ridiculed and
+discredited until competent observers recognised in the form and habits
+of certain aquatic animals met with in the bays and estuaries of the
+Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, the west coast of Africa, and sub-tropical
+America, the originals of these "travellers' tales." These were--first,
+the _manatee_, which is found in the West Indian Islands, Florida, the
+Gulf of Mexico, and Brazil, and in Africa in the River Congo,
+Senegambia, and the Mozambique Channel; second, the _dugong_, or
+_halicore_, which ranges along the east coast of Africa, Southern Asia,
+the Bornean Archipelago, and Australia; and, third, the _rytina_, seen
+on Behring's Island in the Kamschatkan Sea by Steller, the Russian
+zoologist and voyager, in 1741, and which is supposed to have become
+extinct within twenty-seven years after its discovery, by its having
+been recklessly and indiscriminately slaughtered.[68] Then science, in
+the person of Illeger, made the _amende honorable_, and frankly
+accepting Jack's introduction to his fish-tailed _innamorata_, classed
+these three animals together as a sub-order of the animal kingdom, and
+bestowed on them the name of the _Sirenia_. This was, of course, in
+allusion to the Sirens of classical mythology, who, in later art, were
+represented as having the body of a woman above the waist, and that of a
+fish below, although the lower portion of their body was originally
+described as being in the form of a bird.
+
+  [68] Almost all that is known of the living rytina is from an
+  account published in 1751, in St. Petersburg, by Steller, who was
+  one of an exploring party wrecked on Behring's Island in 1741.
+  During the ten months the crew remained on the island they pursued
+  this easily-captured animal so persistently, for food, that it was
+  all but annihilated at the time. The last one there was killed in
+  1768.
+
+It has been found difficult to determine to which order these _Manatidae_
+are most nearly allied. In shape they most closely resemble the whales
+and seals. But the cetacea are all carnivorous, whereas the manatee and
+its relatives live entirely on vegetable food. Although, therefore, Dr.
+J. E. Gray, following Cuvier, classed them with the cetacea in his
+British Museum catalogue, other anatomists, as Professor Agassiz,
+Professor Owen, and Dr. Murie, regard their resemblance to the whales as
+rather superficial than real, and conclude from their organisation and
+dentition that they ought either to form a group apart or be classed
+with the pachyderms--the hippopotamus, tapir, etc.--with which they have
+the nearest affinities, and to which they seem to have been more
+immediately linked by the now lost genera, _Dinotherium_ and
+_Halitherium_. With the opinion of those last-named authorities I
+entirely agree. I regard the manatee as exhibiting a wonderful
+modification and adaptation of the structure of a warm-blooded land
+animal which enables it to pass its whole life in water, and as a
+connecting link between the hippopotamus, elephant, etc., on the one
+side, and the whales and seals on the other.
+
+The _Halitherium_ was a Sirenian with which we are only acquainted by
+its fossil remains found in the Miocene formation of Central and
+Southern Europe. These indicate that it had short hind limbs, and,
+consequently, approached more nearly the terrestrial type than either
+the manatee, the rytina, or the dugong, in which the hind limbs are
+absent. The two last named tend more than does the manatee to the marine
+mammals; but there is a strong likeness between these three recent
+forms. They all have a cylindrical body, like that of a seal, but
+instead of hind limbs there is in all a broad tail flattened
+horizontally; and the chief difference in their outward appearance is in
+the shape of this organ. In the manatee it is rounded, in the dugong
+forked like that of a whale, in the rytina crescent-shaped. The tail of
+the _Halitherium_ appears to have been shaped somewhat like that of the
+beaver. The body of the manatee is broader in proportion to its length
+and depth than that of the dugong. In a paper read before the Royal
+Society, July 12th, 1821, on a manatee sent to London in spirits by the
+Duke of Manchester, then Governor of Jamaica, Sir Everard Home remarked
+of this greater lateral expansion that, as the manatee feeds on plants
+that grow at the mouths of great rivers, and the dugong upon those met
+with in the shallows amongst small islands in the Eastern seas, the
+difference of form would make the manatee more buoyant and better fitted
+to float in fresh water.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 16.--THE DUGONG. _From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's
+'Ceylon.'_]
+
+In all the _Manatidae_ the mammae of the female, which are greatly
+distended during the period of lactation, are situated very differently
+from those of the whales, being just beneath the pectoral fins. These
+fins or paws are much more flexible and free in their movements than
+those of the cetae, and are sufficiently prehensile to enable the animal
+to gather food between the palms or inner surfaces of both, and the
+female to hold her young one to her breast with one of them. Like the
+whales, they are warm-blooded mammals, breathing by lungs, and are
+therefore obliged to come to the surface at frequent intervals for
+respiration. As they breathe through nostrils at the end of the muzzle,
+instead of, like most of the whales, through a blow-hole on the top of
+the head, their habit is to rise, sometimes vertically, in the water,
+with the head and fore part of the body exposed above the surface, and
+often to remain in this position for some minutes. When seen thus, with
+head and breast bare, and clasping its young one to its body, the female
+presents a certain resemblance to a woman from the waist upward. When
+approached or disturbed it dives; the tail and hinder portion of the
+body come into view, and we see that if there was little of the "_mulier
+formosa superne_," at any rate "_desinit in piscem_." The manatee has
+thence been called by the Spaniards and Portuguese the "woman-fish," and
+by the Dutch the "manetje," or mannikin. The dugong, having the muzzle
+bristly, is named by the latter the "baardmanetje," or "little bearded
+man." There are no bristles or whiskers on the muzzle of the manatee;
+all the portraits of it in which these are shown are in that respect
+erroneous. The origin of the word "manatee" has by some been traced to
+the Spanish, as indicating "an animal with hands." On the west coast of
+Africa it is called by the natives "Ne-hoo-le." By old writers it was
+described as the "sea-cow." Gesner depicts it in the act of bellowing;
+and Mr. Bates, in his work, "The Naturalist on the Amazon," says that
+its voice is something like the bellowing of an ox. The Florida
+"crackers" or "mean whites," make the same statement. Although I have
+had opportunities of prolonged observation of it in captivity, I have
+not heard it give utterance to any sound--not even a grunt--and Mr.
+Bartlett, of the Zoological Gardens, tells me that his experience of it
+is the same. His son, Mr. Clarence Bartlett, says that a young one he
+had in Surinam used to make a feeble cry, or bleat, very much like the
+voice of a young seal. This is the only sound he ever heard from a
+manatee.[69]
+
+  [69] For a full description of the habits of this animal in
+  captivity, see an article by the present writer in the 'Leisure
+  Hour' of September 28, 1878; from which the illustration, Fig. 17,
+  is borrowed by the kind consent of the Editor of that publication.
+
+I believe the dugong to be more especially the animal referred to by
+AElian as the semi-human whale, and that which has led to this group
+having been supposed by southern voyagers to be aquatic human beings. In
+the first place, the dugong is a denizen of the sea, whereas the manatee
+is chiefly found in rivers and fresh-water lagoons; and secondly, the
+dugong accords with AElian's description of the creature with a woman's
+face in that it has "prickles instead of hairs," whilst the manatee has
+no such stiff bristles.
+
+In the case of either of these two animals being mistaken for a
+mermaid, however, "distance" must "lend enchantment to the view," and a
+sailor must be very impressible and imaginative who, even after having
+been deprived for many months of the pleasure of females' society, could
+be allured by the charms of a bristly-muzzled dugong, or mistake the
+snorting of a wallowing manatee for the love-song of a beauteous
+sea-maiden.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 17.--THE MANATEE. ITS USUAL POSITION.]
+
+Unfortunately both the dugong and the manatee are being hunted to
+extinction.
+
+The flesh of the manatee is considered a great delicacy. Humboldt
+compares it with ham. Unlike that of the whales, which is of a deep and
+dark red hue, it is as white as veal, and, it is said, tastes very like
+it. It is remarkable for retaining its freshness much longer than other
+meat, which in a tropical climate generally putrefies in twenty-eight
+hours. It is therefore well adapted for pickling, as the salt has time
+to penetrate the flesh before it is tainted. The Catholic clergy of
+South America do not object to its being eaten on fast days, on the
+supposition that, with whales, seals, and other aquatic mammals, it may
+be liberally regarded as "fish." The "Indians" of the Amazon and Orinoco
+are so fond of it that they will spend many days, if necessary, in
+hunting for a manatee, and having killed one will cut it into slabs and
+slices on the spot, and cook these on stakes thrust into the ground
+aslant over a great fire, and heavily gorge themselves as long as the
+provision lasts. The milk of this animal is said to be rich and good,
+and the skin is valuable for its toughness, and is much in request for
+making leathern articles in which great strength and durability are
+required. The tail contains a great deal of oil, which is believed to be
+extremely nutritious, and has also the property of not becoming rancid.
+Unhappily for the dugong, its oil is in similarly high repute, and is
+greatly preferred as a nutrient medicine to cod-liver oil. As its flesh
+also is much esteemed, it is so persistently hunted on the Australian
+coasts that it will probably soon become extinct, like the rytina of
+Steller. The same fate apparently awaits the manatee, which is becoming
+perceptibly more and more scarce.
+
+I fear that before many years have elapsed the Sirens of the
+Naturalist will have disappeared from our earth, before the advance of
+civilization, as completely as the fables and superstitions with which
+they have been connected, before the increase of knowledge; and that the
+mermaid of fact will have become as much a creature of the past as the
+mermaid of fiction. With regard to the latter--the Siren of the
+poets,--the water-maiden of the pearly comb, the crystal mirror, and the
+sea-green tresses,--there are few persons I suppose, at the present day
+who would not be content to be classed with Banks, the fine old
+naturalist and formerly ship-mate of Captain Cook. Sir Humphry Davy in
+his _Salmonia_ relates an anecdote of a baronet, a profound believer in
+these fish-tailed ladies, who on hearing some one praise very highly Sir
+Joseph Banks, said that "Sir Joseph was an excellent man, but he had his
+prejudices--he did not believe in the mermaid." I confess to having a
+similar "prejudice;" and am willing to adopt the further remark of Sir
+Humphry Davy:--"I am too much of the school of Izaac Walton to talk of
+impossibility. It doubtless might please God to make a mermaid, but I
+don't believe God ever did make one."
+
+
+
+
+THE LERNEAN HYDRA.
+
+
+The mystery of the Kraken, of which I treated in a companion volume to
+the present, recently published, is not difficult to unravel. The clue
+to it is plain, and when properly taken up is as easily unwound, to
+arrive at the truth, as a cocoon of silk, to get at the chrysalis within
+it. It was a boorish exaggeration, a legend of ignorance, superstition,
+and wonder. But when such a skein of facts has passed through the hands
+of the poets, it is sure to be found in a much more intricate tangle;
+and many a knot of pure invention may have to be cut before it is made
+clear.
+
+Nevertheless, we shall be able to discern that more than one of the most
+famous and hideous monsters of old classical lore originated, like the
+Kraken, in a knowledge by their authors of the form and habits of those
+strange sea-creatures, the head-footed mollusks. There can be little
+doubt that the octopus was the model from which the old poets and
+artists formed their ideas, and drew their pictures of the Lernean
+Hydra, whose heads grew again when cut off by Hercules; and also of the
+monster Scylla, who, with six heads and six long writhing necks,
+snatched men off the decks of passing ships and devoured them in the
+recesses of her gloomy cavern.
+
+Of the Hydra Diodorus relates that it had a hundred heads; Simonides
+says fifty; but the generally received opinion was that of Apollodorus,
+Hyginus, and others, that it had only nine.
+
+Apollodorus of Athens, son of Asclepiades, who wrote in stiff, quaint
+Greek about 120 B.C., gives in his 'Bibliotheca' (book ii. chapter 5,
+section 2) the following account of the many-headed monster. "This
+Hydra," he says, "nourished in the marshes of Lerne, went forth into the
+open country and destroyed the herds of the land. It had a huge body and
+nine heads, eight mortal, but the ninth immortal. Having mounted his
+chariot, which was driven by Iolaus, Hercules got to Lerne and stopped
+his horses. Finding the Hydra on a certain raised ground near the source
+of the Amymon, where its lair was, he made it come out by pelting it
+with burning missiles. He seized and stopped it, but having twisted
+itself round one of his feet, it struggled with him. He broke its head
+with his club: but that was useless; for when one head was broken two
+sprang up, and a huge crab helped the Hydra by biting the foot of
+Hercules. This he killed, and called Iolaus, who, setting on fire part
+of the adjoining forest, burned with torches the germs of the growing
+heads, and stopped their development. Having thus out-manoeuvred the
+growing heads, he cut off the immortal head, buried it, and put a heavy
+stone upon it, beside the road going from Lerne to Eleonta, and having
+opened the Hydra, dipped his arrows in its gall."
+
+If we wish to find in nature the counterpart of this Hydra, we must
+seek, firstly, for an animal with eight out-growths from its trunk,
+which it can develop afresh, or replace by new ones, in case of any or
+all of them being amputated or injured. We must also show that this
+animal, so strange in form and possessing such remarkable attributes,
+was well known in the locality where the legend was believed. We have it
+in the octopus, which abounded in the Mediterranean and AEgean seas, and
+whose eight prehensile arms, or tentacles, spring from its central body,
+the immortal head, and which, if lost or mutilated by misadventure, are
+capable of reproduction.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 18.--FIGURE OF A CALAMARY. _From the temple of
+Bayr-el-Bahree_.]
+
+That a knowledge of the octopus existed at a very early period of man's
+history we have abundant evidence. The ancient Egyptians figured it
+amongst their hieroglyphics, and an interesting proof that they were
+also acquainted with other cephalopods was given to me by the late Mr.
+E. W. Cooke, R.A. Whilst on a trip up the Nile, in January, 1875, he
+visited the temple of Bayr-el-Bahree, Thebes (date 1700 B.C.), the
+entrance to which had been deeply buried beneath the light, wind-drifted
+sand, accumulated during many centuries. By order of the Khedive, access
+had just at that time been obtained to its interior, by the excavation
+and removal of this deep deposit, and, amongst the hieroglyphics on the
+walls, were found, between the zig-zag lines which represent water,
+figures of various fishes, copies of which Mr. Cooke kindly gave me, and
+which are so accurately portrayed as to be easily identified. With them
+was the outline of a squid fourteen inches long, a figure of which, from
+Mr. Cooke's drawing, is here shown. As this temple is five hundred miles
+from the delta of the Nile, it is remarkable that nearly all the fishes
+there represented are of marine species.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 19.--FIGURE OF AN OCTOPUS ON A GOLD ORNAMENT, FOUND
+BY DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENAE.]
+
+That the octopus was a familiar object with the ancient Greeks, we know
+by the frequency with which its portrait is found on their coins, gems,
+and ornaments. Aldrovandus describes "very ancient coins" found at
+Syracuse and Tarentum bearing the figure of an octopus. He says the
+Syracusans had two coins, one of bronze, the other of gold, both of
+which had an octopus alone on one side. On the reverse of the bronze one
+was a veiled female face in profile, with the inscription [Greek: SURA].
+I have one of these bronze Syracusan coins; it was kindly given to me,
+some years ago, by my friend, Dr. John Millar, F.L.S. The octopus is
+really well depicted. On the gold coin the female head was differently
+veiled, and at the back of the neck was a fish. The inscription on this
+coin was [Greek: SURAKOSION]. Goltzius was of the opinion that the head
+was that of Arethusa. The coins found at Tarentum had on one side a
+figure of Neptune seated on a dolphin, and holding an octopus in one
+hand and a trident in the other.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 20.--GOLDEN ORNAMENT IN FORM OF AN OCTOPUS, FOUND BY
+DR. SCHLIEMANN AT MYCENAE.]
+
+Lerne, or Lerna, the reputed home of the Hydra, was a port of Southern
+Greece, situated at the head of the Gulf of Nauplia, and between the
+existing towns of Argos and Tripolitza. Within a few miles of it was
+Mycenae; and it is remarkable that Dr. Schliemann, during his excavations
+there in 1876, found in a tomb a gold plate, or button, two and a half
+inches in diameter (Fig. 19), on which is figured an octopus, the eight
+arms of which are converted into spirals, the head and the two eyes
+being distinctly visible. In another sepulchre he discovered fifty-three
+golden models of the octopus (Fig. 20), all exactly alike, and
+apparently cast in the same mould. The arms are very naturally carved.
+By the kindness of Mr. Murray, his publisher, I am enabled to give
+illustrations of these and two other handsome ornaments.
+
+Having ascertained that the octopus was a familiar object in the very
+locality where the combat between Hercules and the Hydra is supposed to
+have taken place, let us compare the animal as it exists with the
+monstrous offspring of Typhon and Echidna.
+
+[Illustration:
+
+FIG. 21. FIG. 22.
+
+FIGURES OF THE OCTOPUS ON GOLD ORNAMENTS FOUND BY DR. SCHLIEMANN AT
+MYCENAE.]
+
+It is a not uncommon occurrence that when an octopus is caught it is
+found to have one or more of its arms shorter than the rest, and showing
+marks of having been amputated, and of the formation of a new growth
+from the old cicatrix. Several such specimens were brought to the
+Brighton Aquarium whilst I had charge of its Natural History Department.
+One of them was particularly interesting. Two of its arms had evidently
+been bitten off about four inches from the base: and out from the end of
+each healed stump (which in proportion to the length of the limb was as
+if a man's arm had been amputated halfway between the shoulder and the
+elbow), grew a slender little piece of newly-formed arm, about as large
+as a lady's stiletto, or a small button-hook--in fact just the
+equivalent of worthy Captain Cuttle's iron hook, which did duty for his
+lost hand. It was an illustrative example of the commencement of the
+repair and restoration of mutilated limbs.
+
+This mutilation is so common in some localities, that Professor
+Steenstrup says[70] that almost every octopus he has examined has had
+one or two arms reproduced; and that he has seen females in which all
+the eight arms had been lost, but were more or less restored. He also
+mentions a male in which this was the case as to seven of its arms. He
+adds that whilst the _Octopoda_ possess the power of reproducing with
+great facility and rapidity their arms, which are exposed to so many
+enemies, the _Decapoda_--the _Sepiidae_ and Squids--appear to be
+incapable of thus repairing and replacing accidental injuries. This is
+entirely in accord with my own observations.
+
+  [70] Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. August, 1857.
+
+This reparative power is possessed by some other animals, of which the
+starfishes and crustacea are the most familiar instances. In the case of
+the lobster or crab, however, the only joint from which new growth can
+start is that connected with the body, so that if a limb be injured in
+any part, the whole of it must be got rid of, and the animal has,
+therefore, the power of casting it off at will. The octopus, on the
+contrary, is incapable of voluntary dismemberment, but reproduces the
+lost portion of an injured arm, as an out-growth from the old stump.
+
+The ancients were well acquainted with this reparative faculty of the
+octopus: but of course the simple fact was insufficient for an
+imaginative people: and they therefore embellished it with some fancies
+of their own. There lingers still amongst the fishermen of the
+Mediterranean a very old belief that the octopus when pushed by hunger
+will gnaw and devour portions of its arms. Aristotle knew of this
+belief, and positively contradicted it; but a fallacy once planted is
+hard to eradicate. You may cut it down, and apparently destroy it, root
+and branch, but its seeds are scattered abroad, and spring up elsewhere,
+and in unexpected places. Accordingly, we find Oppian, more than five
+centuries later, disseminating the same old notion, and comparing this
+habit of the animal with that of the bear obtaining nutriment from his
+paws by sucking them during his hybernation.
+
+    "When wintry skies o'er the black ocean frown,
+    And clouds hang low with ripen'd storms o'ergrown,
+    Close in the shelter of some vaulted cave
+    The soft-skinn'd prekes[71] their porous bodies save.
+    But forc'd by want, while rougher seas they dread,
+    On their own feet, necessitous, are fed.
+    But when returning spring serenes the skies,
+    Nature the growing parts anew supplies.
+    Again on breezy sands the roamers creep,
+    Twine to the rocks, or paddle in the deep.
+    Doubtless the God whose will commands the seas,
+    Whom liquid worlds and wat'ry natives please,
+    Has taught the fish by tedious wants opprest
+    Life to preserve and be himself the feast."
+
+  [71] The octopus is still called the "preke" in some parts of
+  England, notably in Sussex. The translation of Oppian's
+  'Halieutics,' from which this passage and others are quoted is that
+  by Messrs. Jones and Diaper, of Baliol College, Oxford, and was
+  published in 1722.
+
+The fact is, that the larger predatory fishes regard an octopus as very
+acceptable food, and there is no better bait for many of them than a
+portion of one of its arms. Some of the cetacea also are very fond of
+them, and whalers have often reported that when a "fish" (as they call
+it) is struck it disgorges the contents of its stomach, amongst which
+they have noticed parts of the arms of cuttles which, judging from the
+size of their limbs, must have been very large specimens. The food of
+the sperm whale consists largely of the gregarious squids, and the
+presence in spermaceti of their undigested beaks is accepted as a test
+of its being genuine. That old fish-reptile, the Ichthyosaurus, also,
+preyed upon them; and portions of the horny rings of their suckers were
+discovered in its coprolites by Dean Buckland. Amongst the worst enemies
+of the octopus is the conger. They are both rock-dwellers, and if the
+voracious fish come upon his cephalopod neighbour unseen, he makes a
+meal of him, or, failing to drag him from his hold, bites off as much of
+one or two of his arms as he can conveniently obtain. The conger,
+therefore, is generally the author of the injury which the octopus has
+been unfairly accused of inflicting on itself.
+
+Continuing our comparison with the hydra, we have in the octopus an
+animal capable of quitting its rocky lurking-place in the sea, and going
+on a buccaneering expedition on dry land. Many incidents have been
+related in connection with this; but I can attest it from my own
+observation. I have seen an octopus travel over the floor of a room at a
+very fair rate of speed, toppling and sprawling along in its own
+ungainly fashion; and in May, 1873, we had one at the Brighton Aquarium
+which used regularly every night to quit its tank, and make its way
+along the wall to another tank at some distance from it, in which were
+some young lump-fishes. Day after day, one of these was missing, until,
+at last, the marauder was discovered. Many days elapsed, however, before
+he was detected, for after helping himself to, and devouring a young
+"lump-sucker," he demurely returned before daylight to his own quarters.
+
+Of this habit of the octopus the ancients were, also, fully aware.
+Aristotle wrote that it left the water and walked in stony places, and
+Pliny and AElian related tales of this animal stealing barrels of salt
+fish from the wharves, and crushing their staves to get at the contents.
+An octopus that could do this would be as formidable a predatory monster
+as the Lernean Hydra, which had the evil reputation of devouring the
+Peloponnesian cattle.
+
+Whoever first described the counter-attack of the Hydra on Hercules must
+have had the octopus in his thoughts. "It twisted itself round one of
+his feet"--exactly that which an octopus would do.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 23.--HERCULES SLAYING THE LERNEAN HYDRA.
+
+_From Smith's 'Classical Dictionary.'_]
+
+Finally, according to the legend, Hercules dipped his arrow-heads in the
+gall of the Hydra, and, from its poisonous nature, all the wounds he
+inflicted with them upon his enemies proved fatal. It is worthy of
+notice that the ancients attributed to the octopus the possession of a
+similarly venomous secretion. Thus Oppian writes:
+
+    "The crawling preke a deadly juice contains
+    Injected poison fires the wounded veins."
+
+The accompanying illustration (Fig. 23) of Hercules slaying the Hydra
+is taken from a marble tablet in the Vatican. It will be immediately
+seen how closely the Hydra, as there depicted, resembles an octopus. The
+body is elongated, but the eight necks with small heads on them bear
+about the same proportion to the body as the arms to the body of an
+octopus.
+
+The Reverend James Spence, in his 'Polymetis,' published in 1755, gives
+a figure, almost the counterpart of this, copied from an antique gem, a
+carnelian, in the collection of the Grand Duke of Tuscany at Florence.
+Only seven necks of the hydra are, however, there visible, and there are
+two coils in the elongated body. On the upper part are two spots which
+have been supposed to represent breasts. This was probably intended by
+the artificer; but that the idea originated from a duplication of the
+syphon tube is evident from the figures (Figs. 21, 22) of the octopus on
+the smaller gold ornaments found by Dr. Schliemann at Mycenae. In the
+same work is also an engraving from a picture in the Vatican Virgil,
+entitled 'The River, or Hateful Passage into the Kingdom of Ades,'
+wherein an octopus-hydra, of which only six heads and necks are shown,
+is one of the monsters called by the author "Terrors of the
+Imagination."
+
+
+
+
+SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS.
+
+
+In the description given by Homer, in the twelfth book of the 'Odyssey,'
+of the unfortunate nymph Scylla, transformed by the arts of Circe into a
+frightful monster, the same typical idea as in the case of the Hydra is
+perceptible. The lurking octopus, having its lair in the cranny of a
+rock, watching in ambush for passing prey, seizing anything coming
+within its reach with one or more of its prehensile arms, even
+brandishing these fear-inspiring weapons out of water in a threatening
+manner, and known in some localities to be dangerous to boats and their
+occupants, is transformed into a many-headed sea monster, seizing in its
+mouths, instead of by the adhesive suckers of its numerous arms, the
+helpless sailors from passing vessels, and devouring them in the abysses
+of its cavernous den.
+
+Circe, prophesying to Ulysses the dangers he had still to encounter,
+warned him especially of Scylla and Charybdis, within the power of one
+of whom he must fall in passing through the narrow strait (between Italy
+and Sicily) where they had their horrid abode. Describing the lofty rock
+of Scylla, she tells him:
+
+    "Full in the centre of this rock displayed
+    A yawning cavern casts a dreadful shade,
+    Nor the fleet arrow from the twanging bow
+    Sent with full force, could reach the depth below.
+    Wide to the west the horrid gulf extends,
+    And the dire passage down to hell descends.
+    O fly the dreadful sight! expand thy sails,
+    Ply the strong oar, and catch the nimble gales;
+    Here Scylla bellows from her dire abodes;
+    Tremendous pest! abhorred by man and gods!
+    Hideous her voice, and with less terrors roar
+    The whelps of lions in the midnight hour.
+    Twelve feet deformed and foul the fiend dispreads;
+    Six horrid necks she rears, and six terrific heads;
+
+           *       *       *       *       *
+
+    When stung with hunger she embroils the flood,
+    The sea-dog and the dolphin are her food;
+    She makes the huge leviathan her prey,
+    And all the monsters of the wat'ry way;
+    The swiftest racer of the azure plain
+    Here fills her sails and spreads her oars in vain;
+    Fell Scylla rises, in her fury roars,
+    At once six mouths expands, at once six men devours."[72]
+
+  [72] Homer's 'Odyssey,' Pope's Translation, Book XII.
+
+Circe then describes the perils of the whirling waters of Charybdis as
+still more dreadful; and, admonishing Ulysses that once in her power all
+must perish, she advises him to choose the lesser of the two evils, and
+to
+
+        "shun the horrid gulf, by Scylla fly;
+    'Tis better six to lose than all to die."
+
+Ulysses continues his voyage; and as his ship enters the ominous strait,
+
+    "Struck with despair, with trembling hearts we viewed
+    The yawning dungeon, and the tumbling flood;
+    When, lo! fierce Scylla stooped to seize her prey,
+    Stretched her dire jaws, and swept six men away.
+    Chiefs of renown! loud echoing shrieks arise;
+    I turn, and view them quivering in the skies;
+    They call, and aid, with outstretched arms, implore,
+    In vain they call! those arms are stretched no more.
+    As from some rock that overhangs the flood,
+    The silent fisher casts th' insidious food;
+    With fraudful care he waits the finny prize,
+    And sudden lifts it quivering to the skies;
+    So the foul monster lifts her prey on high,
+    So pant the wretches, struggling in the sky;
+    In the wide dungeon she devours her food,
+    And the flesh trembles while she churns the blood."
+
+
+
+
+THE "SPOUTING" OF WHALES.
+
+
+One of the sea-fallacies still generally believed, and accepted as true,
+is that whales take in water by the mouth, and eject it from the
+spiracle, or blow-hole.
+
+The popular ideas on this subject are still those which existed hundreds
+of years ago, and which are expressed by Oppian in two passages in his
+'Halieutics':
+
+    "Uncouth the sight when they in dreadful play
+    Discharge their nostrils and refund a sea,"
+
+and
+
+    "While noisy fin-fish let their fountains fly
+    And spout the curling torrent to the sky."
+
+Eminent zoologists and intelligent observers, who have had full
+opportunities of obtaining practical knowledge of the habits of these
+great marine mammals, have forcibly combated and repeatedly contradicted
+this erroneous idea; but their sensible remarks have been read by few,
+in comparison with the numbers of those to whom a wrong impression has
+been conveyed by sensational pictures in which whales are represented
+_with their heads above the surface_, and throwing up from their
+nostrils columns of water, like the fountains in Trafalgar Square. One
+can hardly be surprised that the old writers on Natural History were
+unacquainted with the real composition of the whale's "spout." Those of
+them who sought for any original information on marine zoology, obtained
+it chiefly from uninstructed and superstitious fishermen; but they
+generally contented themselves with diligent compilation, and thus
+copied and transmitted the errors of their predecessors, with the
+addition of some slight embellishments of their own. Accordingly, we
+find Olaus Magnus[73] describing, as follows, the _Physeter_, or, as his
+translator, Streater, calls it, the _Whirlpool_. "The _Physeter_ or
+_Pristis_," he says, "is a kind of whale, two hundred cubits long, and
+is very cruel. For, to the danger of seamen, he will sometimes raise
+himself above the sail-yards, and casts such floods of waters above his
+head, which he had sucked in, that with a cloud of them he will often
+sink the strongest ships, or expose the mariners to extreme danger. This
+beast hath also a large round mouth, like a lamprey, whereby he sucks in
+his meat or water, and by his weight cast upon the fore or hinder deck,
+he sinks and drowns a ship."
+
+  [73] 'Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus,' lib. xxi. cap. vi.
+  A.D. 1555.
+
+Figures 24 and 25 (p. 64) are facsimiles of the illustrations which
+accompany the above description. It will be seen that, in the first, the
+_Physeter_ is depicted as uprearing a maned neck and head, like that of
+a fabled dragon; whilst in Fig. 25 it is shown as a whale flinging
+itself on board a ship, which is sinking under its ponderous weight. In
+both, torrents of water are issuing from its head, and it is evident
+that they are merely exaggerated misrepresentations of the "spouting" of
+whales.
+
+Gesner copies many of Olaus Magnus's illustrations, and improves upon
+Fig. 25 by putting a numerous crew on board the ship. The unfortunate
+sailors are depicted in every attitude of terror and despair, and seem
+to be incapacitated from any attempt to save themselves by the flood of
+water which the whale is deliberately pouring upon them from its
+blow-holes.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 24.--THE PHYSETER INUNDATING A SHIP. _After Olaus
+Magnus._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 25.--A WHALE POURING WATER INTO A SHIP FROM ITS
+BLOW-HOLE. _After Olaus Magnus._]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 26--SPERM WHALES SPOUTING.]
+
+These old pictures appear, no doubt, ridiculous, but they are, really,
+very little more absurd and untrue to nature than many of those which
+disfigure some otherwise useful books on Natural History of the present
+day. I could refer to several, in which whales are represented as
+spouting from their blow-holes one or more columns of water, which,
+after ascending skyward to a considerable distance, fall over gracefully
+as if issuing from the nozzle of an ornamental fountain. I select one
+from amongst them (Fig. 26), not with any disrespect for the artist,
+author, or publisher of the work from which it is taken, but because,
+whilst it shows correctly the position of the blow-hole of the sperm
+whale, it also exhibits exactly that which I wish to confute. The
+publishers of the valuable work in which this picture appeared have
+generously consented to my reproducing it here.
+
+When, in describing, in 1877, the White Whale then exhibited at the
+Westminster Aquarium, I said that whales do not spout water out of their
+blow-holes, and that the idea that they do so is a popular error, the
+statement was so contrary to generally-accepted notions that I was not
+surprised by receiving more than one letter on the subject. One very
+reasonable suggestion made to me was that, although the lesser whales,
+such as the porpoises, which I had had opportunities of watching in
+confinement at Brighton for two years, and the _Beluga_, which had been
+observed for a similar period at the New York Aquarium, and also at
+Westminster, did not "spout," the respiratory apparatus of the larger
+whales might be so modified as to permit them to do so. Let us consider
+the construction of the breathing apparatus which would have to be thus
+modified, as shown in the porpoise.
+
+In the first place, there is a pair of lungs as perfect as those of any
+land mammal, fitted to receive air, and to bring the hot blood into
+contact with the air, that it may absorb the oxygen of the air, and so
+be purified. But this air cannot well be breathed through the mouth of
+an animal which has to take its food from and in water; so it has to be
+inhaled only by the nostrils. If these were situated as they are in land
+mammals, near the extremity of the nose, the porpoise would be obliged
+to stop when pursuing its prey, or, escaping from its enemies, to put
+the tip of its nose above the surface of the water every time it
+required to breathe. A much more convenient arrangement has, therefore,
+been provided for it, and for almost all whales, by which that
+difficulty is removed. Instead of running along the bones of the nose,
+the nostrils are placed on the top of the head, and the windpipe is
+turned up to them without having any connection with the palate. The
+upper jaw is quite solid. Thus the mouth is solely devoted to the
+reception of food, and the animal is enabled to continue its course when
+swimming, however rapidly, by rising obliquely to the surface, and
+exposing the top of its head above it. On the blow-hole being opened,
+the air, from which the oxygen has been absorbed, is expelled in a
+sudden puff, another supply is instantaneously inhaled, and rushes into
+the lungs with extreme velocity, and then the porpoise can either
+descend into the depths, or remain with its spiracle exposed to the air,
+as it may prefer. In this act of breathing the spiracle is normally
+brought above the water, the breath escapes, and the immediate
+inhalation is effected almost in silence. But frequently, and in some
+whales habitually, the blow-hole is opened just below the surface, and
+then the outrush of air causes a splash upwards of the water overlying
+it.
+
+I may here mention that I have frequently seen the porpoises at the
+Brighton Aquarium lying asleep at the surface, with the blow-hole
+exposed above it, breathing automatically, and without conscious effort.
+Aristotle was acquainted with this habit of the cetacea 2,200 years ago,
+for he wrote: "They sleep with the blow-hole, their organ of
+respiration, elevated above the water."
+
+The apparatus for closing the blow-hole, so that not a drop of water
+shall enter the windpipe, even under great pressure, is a beautiful
+contrivance, complex in its structure, yet most simple in its working.
+The external aperture is covered by a continuation of the skin, locally
+thickened, and connected with a conical stopper, of a texture as tough
+as india-rubber, which fits perfectly into a cone or funnel formed by
+the extremity of the windpipe, and closes more and more firmly as the
+pressure upon it is increased. Whilst the orifice is thus guarded, the
+lower end of the tube is surrounded by a strong compressing muscle,
+which clasps also the glottis, and thus the passage from the blow-hole
+to the lungs is completely stopped.
+
+There is nothing in this which indicates the possibility of the spouting
+of water from the nostrils; but as assertions that water had been seen
+to issue from them were positive and persistent, anatomists seem to have
+felt themselves obliged to try to account for it somehow. Accordingly
+the theory was propounded by F. Cuvier that the water taken into the
+mouth is reserved in two pouches (one on each side), until the whale
+rises to blow, when, the gullet being closed, it is forced by the action
+of the tongue and jaws through the nasal passages, somewhat as a smoker
+occasionally expels the smoke of his cigar through his nostrils.
+Although these pouches, or sacs analogous to them, are found at the base
+of the nostrils of the horse, tapir, etc.,--animals which do not "spout"
+from the nostrils water taken in by the mouth--the explanation was
+accepted for a time.
+
+Mr. Bell held this opinion when the first edition of his 'British
+Quadrupeds' was published in 1837, but before the issue of the second
+edition, in 1874, he had found reasons for taking a different view of
+the matter; and, under the advice of his judicious editors, Mr. Alston,
+and Professor Flower (the latter of whom supervised the proofs of the
+chapters on the Cetacea) his sanction of the illusion was withdrawn as
+follows:--"The results of more recent and careful observations, amongst
+which we may notice those of Bennett, Von Baer, Sars and Burmeister, are
+directly opposed to the statement that water is thus ejected; and there
+can now be no doubt that the appearance which has given rise to the idea
+is caused by the moisture with which the expelled breath is
+supercharged, which condenses at once in the cold outer air, and forms a
+cloud or column of white vapour. It is possible indeed that if the
+animal begins to 'blow' before its head is actually at the surface, the
+force of the rushing air may drive up some little spray along with it,
+but this is quite different from the notion that water is really
+expelled from the nasal passages. We may add that on the only occasion
+when we ourselves witnessed the 'spouting' of a large whale we were much
+struck with its resemblance to the column of white spray which is dashed
+up by the ricochetting ball fired from one of the great guns of a
+man-of-war."
+
+The simile is admirable, and nothing could better describe the
+appearance of a whale's "spout"; but, in the previous portion of the
+passage (except with reference to the sperm whale, the nostrils of which
+are not on the top of the head), I think sufficient importance is not
+conceded to the volume of water propelled into the air by the outrush of
+breath from the submerged blow-hole. I do not know how many cubic feet
+of air the lungs of a great whale are capable of containing, but the
+quantity is sufficient to force up to a height of several feet the water
+above the valve when the latter is opened, not only in "some little
+spray," but, for some distance in a good solid jet--enough, in fact, to
+give the appearance of its actually issuing from the blow-hole, and to
+account for the erroneous belief of sailors that it does so. It must be
+remembered that the escape of air is not by a prolonged wheeze, but by a
+sudden blast, and thus when the spiracle is opened just beneath the
+surface, an instant before it is uncovered to take in a fresh supply of
+air, the water above its orifice is thrown up as by a slight subaqueous
+explosion, or as by the momentary opening under water of the
+safety-valve of a steam boiler. Some idea of the force and volume of the
+blast of air from the lungs of even the common porpoise may be formed
+when I mention that one of the porpoises at the Brighton Aquarium,
+happening to open its spiracle just beneath an illuminating gas jet
+fixed over its tank, blew out the light.
+
+In the sperm whale the nostrils are placed near the extremity of the
+nose, and therefore this whale has to raise its snout above the surface
+when it requires to breathe; but instead of this being necessary, as in
+the case of the porpoise twice or thrice in a minute, the sperm whale
+only rises to "blow" at intervals of from an hour to an hour and twenty
+minutes. Mr. Beale says[74] that in a large bull sperm whale the time
+consumed in making one expiration and one inspiration is ten seconds,
+during six of which the nostril is beneath the surface of the water--the
+expiration occupying three seconds, and the inspiration one second. At
+each breathing time this whale makes from sixty to seventy expirations,
+and remains, therefore, at the surface ten or eleven minutes, and then,
+raising its tail, it descends perpendicularly, head first. In different
+individuals the time required for performing these several acts varies;
+but in each they are minutely regular, and this well-known regularity is
+of considerable use to the fishers, for when a whaler has once noticed
+the periods of any particular whale which is not alarmed, he knows to a
+minute when to expect it to come to the surface, and how long it will
+remain there. The "spout" of the sperm whale differs much from that of
+other whales. Unlike, for instance, the straight perpendicular twin jets
+of the "right whale," the single, forward-slanting "spout" of the sperm
+whale presents a thick curled bush of white mist. Each whale has a
+different mode and time of breathing, and the form of the "spout"
+differs accordingly.
+
+  [74] 'Natural History of the Sperm Whale.' Van Voorst, 1839.
+
+It is said that the blowing of the _Beluga_, or "White Whale," is not
+unmusical at sea, and that when it takes place under water it often
+makes a peculiar sound which might be mistaken for the whistling of a
+bird. Hence is derived one of the names given to this whale by
+sailors--the "Sea-canary." Though I have had opportunities of
+attentively watching the breathing and other actions in captivity of two
+specimens of this whale I have never been able to detect the sound
+alluded to.
+
+Besides the opinions cited by Mr. Bell concerning whales spouting water
+from their blow-holes, we have other evidence which is most clear and
+definite, and which ought to be convincing.
+
+We will take first that of Mr. Beale, who as surgeon on board the
+"Kent" and "Sarah and Elizabeth," South Sea whalers, passed several
+seasons amongst sperm whales. He says:--"I can truly say when I find
+myself in opposition to these old and received notions, that out of the
+thousands of sperm whales which I have seen during my wanderings in the
+South and North Pacific Oceans, I have never observed one of them to
+eject a column of water from the nostril. I have seen them at a
+distance, and I have been within a few yards of several hundreds of
+them, and I never saw water pass from the spout-hole. But the column of
+thick and dense vapour which is certainly ejected is exceedingly likely
+to mislead the judgment of the casual observer in these matters; and
+this column does indeed appear very much like a jet of water when seen
+at the distance of one or two miles on a clear day, because of the
+condensation of the vapour which takes place the moment it escapes from
+the nostril, and its consequent opacity, which makes it appear of a
+white colour, and which is not observed when the whale is close to the
+spectator. It then appears only like a jet of white steam. The only
+water in addition is the small quantity that may be lodged in the
+external fissure of the spout hole, when the animal raises it above the
+surface to breathe, and which is blown up into the air with the 'spout,'
+and may probably assist in condensing the vapour of which it is
+formed.... I have been also very close to the _Balaena mysticetus_ (the
+Greenland, or Right whale) when it has been feeding and breathing, and
+yet I never saw even that animal differ in the latter respect from the
+sperm whale in the nature of the spout.... If the weather is fine and
+clear, and there is a gentle breeze at the time, the spout may be seen
+from the masthead of a moderate-sized vessel at the distance of four or
+five miles."
+
+Captain Scoresby, who was a veteran and successful whaler, a good
+zoologist, and a highly intelligent observer, says:--"A moist vapour
+mixed with mucus is discharged from the nostrils when the animal
+breathes; but no water accompanies it unless an expiration of the breath
+be made under the surface."
+
+Dr. Robert Brown, who communicated to the Zoological Society, in May,
+1868, a valuable series of observations on the mammals of Greenland,
+made during his voyages to the Spitzbergen, Iceland, and Jan Mayen Seas,
+and along the eastern and western shores of Davis's Strait and Baffin's
+Bay to near the mouth of Smith's Sound, remarks, in a chapter on the
+Right whale (_Balaena mysticetus_):--"The 'blowing,' so familiar a
+feature of the _Cetacea_, but especially of the _Mysticetus_ is, quite
+analogous to the breathing of the higher mammals, and the blow-holes are
+the homologues of the nostrils. It is most erroneously stated that the
+whale ejects water from the blow-holes. I have been many times only a
+few feet from a whale when 'blowing,' and, though purposely observing
+it, could never see that it ejected from its nostrils anything but the
+ordinary breath--a fact which might almost have been deduced from
+analogy. In the cold arctic air this breath is generally condensed, and
+falls upon those close at hand in the form of a dense spray which may
+have led seamen to suppose that this vapour was originally ejected in
+the form of water. Occasionally, when the whale blows just as it is
+rising out of or sinking in the sea, a little of the superincumbent
+water may be forced upwards by the column of breath. When the whale is
+wounded in the lungs, or in any of the blood-vessels immediately
+supplying them, blood, as might be expected, is ejected in the
+death-throes along with the breath. When the whaleman sees his prey
+'spouting red,' he concludes that its end is not far distant; it is then
+mortally wounded."
+
+Captain F. C. Hall, the commander of the unfortunate "Polaris"
+Expedition, thus describes, in his 'Life with the Esquimaux,' the spout
+of a whale:--"What this blowing is like," he says, "may be described by
+asking if the reader has ever seen the smoke produced by the firing of
+an old-fashioned flint-lock. If so, then he may understand the 'blow' of
+a whale--a flash in the pan and all is over."
+
+Captain Scammon, an experienced American whaling captain, who, like
+Scoresby, could wield well both harpoon and pen, in his fine work on
+'The Marine Mammals of the North-Western Coast of America,' writes to
+the same effect.
+
+Mr. Herman Melville, who is not a naturalist, but has served before the
+mast in a sperm-whaler and borne his part in all the hardships and
+dangers of the chase, writes, in his remarkable book, 'The Whale':--"As
+for this 'whale-spout' you might almost stand in it, and yet be
+undecided as to what it is precisely. Nor is it at all prudent for the
+hunter to be over curious respecting it. For, even when coming into
+slight contact with the outer vapoury shreds of the jet, which will
+often happen, your skin will feverishly smart from the acrimony of the
+thing so touching you. And I know one who, coming into still closer
+contact with the spout--whether with some scientific object in view or
+otherwise I cannot say--the skin peeled off from his cheek and arm.
+Wherefore, among whalemen, the spout is deemed poisonous; they try to
+evade it. I have heard it said, and I do not much doubt it, that if the
+jet were fairly spouted into your eyes it would blind you."
+
+The only other eye-witness I will cite is Mr. Bartlett, of the
+Zoological Gardens, whose experience and accuracy as an observer of the
+habits of animals is unsurpassed. He spent an autumn holiday in
+accompanying the late Mr. Frank Buckland and his colleagues, Messrs.
+Walpole and Young, in a tour of inquiry into the condition of the
+herring fishery in Scotland. When the commissioners left Peterhead, he
+remained there for a few days as the guest of Captain David Gray, of the
+steam whaler, "Eclipse," and as it was reported that large whales had
+been seen in the offing, his host invited him to go in search of them,
+and pay them a visit in his steam-launch. When about twelve miles out,
+they saw the whales, which were "finners," at a distance of four or five
+miles. Fourteen were counted--all large ones--some of which were seventy
+feet in length. On approaching them the captain shut off steam, and the
+launch was allowed to float in amongst them. So close were they to the
+boat that it would not have been difficult to jump upon the back of one
+of them had that been desirable. Mr. Bartlett tells me that he was
+greatly astonished by the immense force of the sudden outrush of air
+from their blow-holes, and the noise by which it was accompanied. He
+believes that the blast was strong enough to blow a man off the spiracle
+if he were seated on it. He authorizes me to say that having seen and
+watched these whales under such favourable circumstances, he entirely
+agrees with all that I have here written concerning the so-called
+"spout." The volume of hot, vaporous breath expelled is enormous, and
+this is accompanied by no small quantity of water, forced up by it when
+the blow-hole is opened below the surface.
+
+An effect similar in appearance to the whale's spout is produced by the
+breathing of the hippopotamus. When this great beast opens its nostrils
+beneath the surface, water and spray are driven and scattered upward by
+the force of the air, but, of course, do not issue from the nasal
+passages. I have, also, seen this effect produced, though in a less
+degree, by the breathing of sea-lions.
+
+I repeat, therefore, that not a drop of sea-water enters or passes out
+of the blow-hole of a whale. If the spiracle valve were in a condition
+to allow it to do so the animal would soon be drowned. Everyone knows
+the extreme irritation and the horrible feeling of suffocation caused to
+a human being, whilst eating or drinking, by a crumb or a little liquid
+"going the wrong way"--that is, being accidentally drawn to the
+air-passages instead of passing to the oesophagus. If water were to
+enter the bronchi of a whale it would instantly produce similar
+discomfort.
+
+The neck of a popular error is hard to break; but it is time that one
+so palpable as that concerning the "spouting" of whales should cease to
+be promulgated and disseminated by fanciful illustrations of instructive
+books.
+
+
+
+
+THE "SAILING" OF THE NAUTILUS.
+
+
+One of the prettiest fables of the sea is that relating to the Paper
+Nautilus, the constructor and inhabitant of the delicate and beautiful
+shell which looks as if it were made of ivory no thicker than a sheet of
+writing paper.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 27.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) SAILING.]
+
+It is an old belief that in calm weather it rises from the bottom of
+the sea, and, elevating its two broadly-expanded arms, spreads to the
+gentle air, as a sail, the membrane, light as a spider's web, by which
+they are united; and that, seated in its boat-like shell, it thus floats
+over the smooth surface of the ocean, steering and paddling with its
+other arms. Should storm arise or danger threaten, its masts and sail
+are lowered, its oars laid in, and the frail craft, filling with water,
+sinks gently beneath the waves.
+
+When and where this picturesque idea originated I am unable to discover.
+It dates far back beyond the range of history; for Aristotle mentions
+it, and, unfortunately, sanctioned it. With the weight of his honoured
+name in its favour, this fallacy has maintained its place in popular
+belief, even to our own times; for the mantle of the great father of
+natural history, who was generally so marvellously correct, fell on none
+of his successors; Pliny, and AElian, and the tribe of compilers who
+succeeded them, having been more concerned to make their histories
+sensational than to verify their statements.
+
+Naturally, the Paper Nautilus has been the subject of many a poet's
+verses. Oppian wrote of it in his 'Halieutics':--
+
+    "Sail-fish in secret, silent deeps reside,
+    In shape and nature to the preke[75] allied;
+    Close in their concave shells their bodies wrap,
+    Avoid the waves and every storm escape.
+    But not to mirksome depths alone confined;
+    When pleasing calms have stilled the sighing wind,
+    Curious to know what seas above contain,
+    They leave the dark recesses of the main;
+    Now, wanton, to the changing surface haste,
+    View clearer skies, and the pure welkin taste.
+    But slow they, cautious, rise, and, prudent, fear
+    The upper region of the watery sphere;
+    Backward they mount, and as the stream o'erflows,
+    Their convex shells to pressing floods oppose.
+    Conscious, they know that, should they forward move,
+    O'erwhelming waves would sink them from above,
+    Fill the void space, and with the rushing weight,
+    Force down th' inconstants to their former seat.
+    When, first arrived, they feel the stronger blast,
+    They lie supine and skim the liquid waste.
+    The natural barks out-do all human art
+    When skilful floaters play the sailor's part.
+    Two feet they upward raise, and steady keep;
+    These are the masts and rigging of the ship:
+    A membrane stretch'd between supplies the sail,
+    Bends from the masts, and swells before the gale.
+    Two other feet hang paddling on each side,
+    And serve for oars to row and helm to guide.
+    'Tis thus they sail, pleased with the wanton game,
+    The fish, the sailor, and the ship, the same.
+    But when the swimmers dread some dangers near
+    The sportive pleasure yields to stronger fear.
+    No more they, wanton, drive before the blasts,
+    But strike the sails, and bring down all the masts;
+    The rolling waves their sinking shells o'erflow,
+    And dash them down again to sands below."
+
+  [75] The octopus.
+
+Montgomery also thus exquisitely paraphrases the same idea in his
+'Pelican Island':--
+
+    "Light as a flake of foam upon the wind,
+    Keel upwards, from the deep emerged a shell,
+    Shaped like the moon ere half her orb is filled.
+    Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose,
+    And moved at will along the yielding water.
+    The native pilot of this little bark
+    Put out a tier of oars on either side,
+    Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail,
+    And mounted up, and glided down, the billows
+    In happy freedom, pleased to feel the air,
+    And wander in the luxury of light."
+
+Byron mentions the Nautilus in his 'Mutiny of the Bounty' as follows:--
+
+    "The tender Nautilus, who steers his prow,
+    The sea-born sailor of his shell canoe,
+    The ocean Mab--the fairy of the sea,
+    Seems far less fragile, and alas! more free.
+    He, when the lightning-winged tornadoes sweep
+    The surge, is safe: his port is in the deep;
+    And triumphs o'er the armadas of mankind
+    Which shake the world, yet crumble in the wind."
+
+The very names by which this animal is known to the science which some
+persons erroneously think must be so hard and dry are poetic. In
+Aristotle's day it was called the _Nautilus_ or _Nauticus_, "the
+mariner," and though two thousand two hundred years have passed since
+the great master wrote, the name still clings to it. As the Pearly
+Nautilus, a very different animal, also bears that name, Gualtieri
+perceived the necessity of distinguishing the Paper Nautilus from it,
+and was followed by Linnaeus, who therefore entitled the genus to which
+the latter belongs, _Argonauta_, after the ship _Argo_, in which Jason
+and his companions sailed to Colchis to carry off the "Golden Fleece"
+suspended there in the temple of Mars, and guarded by brazen-hoofed
+bulls, whose nostrils breathed out fire and death, and by a watchful
+dragon that never slept. According to the Greek legend, the _Argo_ was
+named after its builder Argus, the son of Danaus, and was the first ship
+that ever was built. Oppian ('Halieutics,' book I.) expresses his
+opinion that the Nautilus served as a model for the man who first
+conceived the idea of constructing a ship, and embarking on the
+waters:--
+
+    "Ye Powers! when man first felled the stately trees,
+    And passed to distant shores on wafting seas,
+    Whether some god inspired the wondrous thought,
+    Or chance found out, or careful study sought;
+    If humble guess may probably divine,
+    And trace th' improvement to the first design,
+    Some wight of prying search, who wond'ring stood
+    When softer gales had smoothed the dimpled flood,
+    Observed these careless swimmers floating move,
+    And how each blast the easy sailor drove;
+    Hence took the hint, hence formed th' imperfect draught,
+    And ship-like fish the future seaman taught.
+    Then mortals tried the shelving hull to slope,
+    To raise the mast, and twist the stronger rope,
+    To fix the yards, let fly the crowded sails,
+    Sweep through the curling waves, and court auspicious gales."
+
+Pope, too, in his 'Essay on Man' (Ep. 3), adopted the idea in his
+exhortation--
+
+    "Learn of the little Nautilus to sail,
+    Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale."
+
+Poetry, like the wizard's spell, can make
+
+    "A nutshell seem a gilded barge,
+    A sheeling seem a palace large,"
+
+but the equally enchanting wand of science is able by a touch to dispel
+the illusion, and cause the object to appear in its true proportions. So
+with the fiction of the "Paper Sailor."
+
+I have elsewhere described the affinities of the Nautili and their place
+in nature, therefore it will only be necessary for me here to allude to
+these very briefly, to explain the great and essential difference that
+exists between the two kinds of Nautilus which are popularly regarded as
+being one and the same animal.
+
+The _Pearly_ Nautilus (_Nautilus pompilius_) and the Argonaut, which
+from having a fragile shell of somewhat similar external form is called
+the _Paper_ Nautilus, both belong to that great primary group of animals
+known as the _Mollusca_, and to the class of it called the
+_Cephalopoda_, from their having their head in the middle of that which
+is the foot in other mollusks. In the Cephalopoda the foot is split or
+divided into eight segments in some families, and in others into ten
+segments, which radiate from the central head, like so many rays. These
+rays are not only used as feet, but, being highly flexible, are adapted
+for employment also as prehensile arms, with which their owner captures
+its prey, and they are rendered more perfect for this purpose by being
+furnished with suckers which hold firmly to any surface to which they
+are applied. The Cephalopods which have the foot divided into ten of
+these segments or arms are called the _Decapoda_, those which have only
+eight of them are called the _Octopoda_. All of these have _two_
+plume-like gills--one on each side--and so are called _Dibranchiata_;
+and in the eight-armed section of these is the argonaut or Paper
+Nautilus. Of the Pearly Nautilus and the four-gilled order I shall have
+more to say by-and-by: at present we will follow the history of the
+argonaut.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 28--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_) RETRACTED
+WITHIN ITS SHELL.]
+
+Notwithstanding all that has been written of it, it is only within the
+last fifty years that this has been correctly understood. An eight-armed
+cuttle was recognised and named _Ocythoe_, which, instead of having,
+like the common octopus, all of its eight arms thong-like and tapering
+to a point, had the two dorsal limbs flattened into a broad thin
+membrane. Although this animal was sometimes seen dead without any
+covering, it was generally found contained in a thin and slightly
+elastic univalve shell of graceful form, and bearing some resemblance to
+an elegantly shaped boat. It did not penetrate to the bottom of this
+shell; it was not attached to it by any muscular ligament, nor was the
+shell moulded on its body, nor apparently made to fit it. Hence it was
+long regarded as doubtful, and even by naturalists so recent and eminent
+as Dumeril and De Blainville, whether the octopod really secreted the
+shell, or whether, like the hermit-crab, it borrowed for its protection
+the shell of some other mollusk. Aristotle left the subject with the
+faithful acknowledgment: "As to the origin and growth of this shell
+nothing is yet exactly determined. It appears to be produced like other
+shells; but even this is not evident, any more than it is whether the
+animal can live without it." Pliny, as usual, instead of throwing light
+on the matter, obscured it. He regarded the shell as the property of a
+gasteropod like the snail, and the octopod as an amateur yachtsman who
+occasionally went on board and took a trip in the frail craft, and
+assisted its owner to navigate it for the fun of the thing. This is what
+he says about it[76]: "Mutianus reports that he saw in the Propontis a
+shell formed like a little ship, having the poop turned up and the prow
+pointed. An animal called the _Nauplius_, resembling an octopus, was
+enclosed in the shell with its owner, for its amusement in the following
+manner. When the sea is calm the guest lowers his arms, and uses them as
+oars and a helm, whilst the owner of the shell expands himself to catch
+the wind; so that one has the pleasure of carrying and sailing, and the
+other of steering. Thus, these two otherwise senseless animals take
+their pleasure together; but the meeting them sailing in their shell is
+a bad omen for mariners, and foretells some great calamity."
+
+  [76] Naturalis Historia, lib. ix. cap. 30.
+
+Although the animal was never found in any other shell, and the shell
+was never known to contain any other animal, and though, when the shell
+and the animal were found together they were always of proportionate
+size, this octopod, as I have said, was looked upon by some
+conchologists as a pirate who had taken possession of a ship which did
+not belong to him, until Madame Jeannette Power, a French lady then
+residing in Messina, having succeeded in keeping alive for a time an
+argonaut the shell of which had been broken in its capture, discovered
+that the animal quickly repaired the fracture, and reproduced the
+portions that had been broken off. Induced by this to make further
+experiments, she kept a number of living argonauts in cages sunk in the
+sea near the citadel of Messina, and in 1836 laid before the "Academy"
+at Catania the following results of her observations of them:--
+
+1st. That the argonaut constructs the shell which it inhabits.
+
+2nd. That it quits the egg entirely naked, and forms the shell after its
+birth.
+
+3rd. That it can repair its shell, if necessary, by a fresh deposit of
+material having the same chemical composition as its original shell.
+
+4th. That this material is secreted by the palmate, or sail, arms, and
+is laid on the outside of the shell, to the exterior of which these
+membranous arms are closely applied.
+
+Madame Power was mistaken on two points. Firstly, the construction of
+the shell does not commence after the birth of the animal, but, as has
+been shown by M. Duvernoy, its rudimentary form is distinctly visible by
+the aid of the microscope in the embryo, whilst still in the egg; and
+secondly, she continued to believe in the use of the membranous arms as
+sails, and of the others as oars. This fallacy was exploded by Captain
+Sander Rang, an officer of the French navy, and "port-captain" at
+Algiers, who carefully followed up Madame Power's experiments, and
+confirmed the more important of them. Thus were set at rest questions
+which for centuries had divided the opinions of zoologists.
+
+The "Paper Nautilus" is, in fact, a female octopod provided with a
+portable nest, in which to carry about and protect her eggs, instead of
+brooding over them in some cranny of a rock, or within the recesses of a
+pile of shells, as does her cousin the octopus. From the membranes of
+the two flattened and expanded arms she secretes and, if necessary,
+repairs her shell, and by applying them closely to its outer surface on
+each side, holds herself within it, for it is not fastened to her body
+by any attaching muscles. When disturbed or in danger she can loosen her
+hold, and, leaving her cradle, swim away independently of it. It has
+been said that, having once left it, she has not the ability nor perhaps
+the sagacity to re-enter her nest, and resume the guardianship of her
+eggs.[77] From my own observations of the breeding habits of other
+octopods I think this most improbable. The use and purpose of the shell
+of the argonaut will be better understood if I briefly describe what I
+have witnessed of the treatment of its eggs by its near relative, the
+octopus.
+
+  [77] Appendix to Sir Edward Belcher's 'Voyage of the "Samarang,"'
+  by Mr. Arthur Adams, assistant surgeon to the expedition.
+
+"The eggs of the octopus," as I have elsewhere said, "when first laid,
+are small, oval, translucent granules, resembling little grains of rice,
+not quite an eighth of an inch long. They grow along and around a common
+stalk, to which every egg is separately attached, as grapes form part of
+a bunch. Each of the elongated bunches is affixed by a glutinous
+secretion to the surface of a rock or stone (never to seaweed, as has
+been erroneously stated), and hangs pendent by its stalk in a long white
+cluster, like a magnified catkin of the filbert, or, to use Aristotle's
+simile, like the fruit of the white alder. The length and number of
+these bunches varies according to the size and condition of the parent.
+Those produced by a small octopus are seldom more than about three
+inches long, and from twelve to twenty in number; but a full-grown
+female will deposit from forty to fifty of such clusters, each about
+five inches in length. I have counted the eggs of which these clusters
+are composed, and find that there are about a thousand in each: so that
+a large octopus produces in one laying, usually extended over three
+days, a progeny of from 40,000 to 50,000. I have seen an octopus, when
+undisturbed, pass one of her arms beneath the hanging bunches of her
+eggs, and, dilating the membrane on each side of it into a boat-shaped
+hollow, gather and receive them in it as in a trough or cradle which
+exhibited in its general shape and outline a remarkable similarity to
+the shell of the argonaut, with the eggs of which octopod its own are
+almost identical in form and appearance. Then she would caress and
+gently rub them, occasionally turning towards them the mouth of her
+flexible exhalent and locomotor tube, like the nozzle of a fireman's
+hose-pipe, so as to direct upon them a jet of the excurrent water. I
+believe that the object of this syringing process is to free the eggs
+from parasitic animalcules, and possibly to prevent the growth of
+conferva, which, I have found, rapidly overspreads those removed from
+her attention."[78]
+
+  [78] 'The Octopus,' 1873, p. 57.
+
+It has been suggested that the syringing may be for the purpose of
+keeping the water surrounding the eggs well aerated; but this is
+evidently erroneous, for the water ejected from the tube has been
+previously deprived of its oxygen, and consequently of its health-giving
+properties, whilst passing over the gills of the parent. Week after
+week, for fifty days, a brooding octopus will continue to attend to her
+eggs with the most watchful and assiduous care, seldom leaving them for
+an instant except to take food, which, without a brief abandonment of
+her position, would be beyond her reach. Aristotle asserted that while
+the female is incubating she takes no food. This is incorrect; but in
+every case of the kind that has come under my observation the mother
+octopod, whenever she has been obliged to leave her nest, has returned
+to it as quickly as possible; and so I believe can, and does, the female
+argonaut to her shell, and that, too, without any difficulty. In her
+case the numerous clusters of eggs are all united at their origin to one
+slender and tapering stalk which is fixed by a spot of glutinous matter
+to the body-whorl of the spiral shell.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 29.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)
+CRAWLING.]
+
+This "paper-sailor," then, whom the poets have regarded as endowed with
+so much grace and beauty, and living in luxurious ease, is but a fine
+lady octopus after all. Turn her out of her handsome residence, and,
+instead of the fairy skimmer of the seas, you have before you an object
+apparently as free from loveliness and romance as her sprawling,
+uncanny-looking, relative. Instead of floating in her pleasure boat over
+the surface of the sea, the argonaut ordinarily crawls along the bottom,
+carrying her shell above her, keel uppermost; and the broad extremities
+of the two arms are not hoisted as sails, nor allowed when at rest to
+dangle over the side of the "boat;" but are used as a kind of hood by
+which the animal retains the shell in its proper position, as a man
+bearing a load on his shoulders holds it with his hands. When she comes
+to the surface, or progresses by swimming instead of walking, she does
+so in the same manner as the octopus: namely, by the forcible expulsion
+of water from her funnel-like tube.
+
+But if truth compels us to deprive her of the counterfeit halo conferred
+on her by poets, we can award her, on behalf of science, a far nobler
+crown; namely, that of the Queen of the whole great Invertebrate Animal
+Kingdom. For, the _Cephalopoda_, of which the argonaut is a highly
+organised member, are not only the highest in their own division, the
+_Mollusca_, but they are as far superior to all other animals which have
+no backbones, as man stands lord and king over all created beings that
+possess them.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 30.--THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta argo_)
+SWIMMING.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 31.--SHELL OF THE PAPER NAUTILUS (_Argonauta
+argo_).]
+
+Although in outward shape the spiral shell of the Pearly Nautilus
+(_Nautilus pompilius_) somewhat resembles that of the argonaut, its
+internal structure is very different. A section of it shows that it is
+divided into several chambers, each of which is partitioned off from the
+adjoining ones, the last formed or external one, in which the animal
+lives, being much larger than the rest. The object and mode of
+construction of these chambers is as follows. As the animal grows, a
+constant secretion of new material takes place on the edge of the shell.
+By this unceasing process of the addition of new shell in the form of a
+circular curve or coil around the older portion, the whole rapidly
+increases in size, both in diameter, and in the length of the chamber.
+The Nautilus, requiring to keep the secreting portion of its mantle
+applied to the lip of the shell, finds the chamber in which it dwells
+gradually becoming inconveniently long for it, and therefore builds up a
+wall behind itself, and continues its work of enlarging its premises in
+front. Each of these walls, concave in front, towards the mouth of the
+shell, and concave behind, acts as a strong girder and support of the
+arch of the shell against the inward pressure of deep water: and it was
+formerly supposed that each successive chamber so constructed and
+vacated remained filled with air, and _thus_ became an additional float
+by which the constantly increasing weight of the growing shell was
+counter-balanced. By this beautiful adjustment of augmented floating
+power to increased weight, the buoyancy of the shell would be secured
+and its specific gravity maintained as nearly as possible equal to that
+of the surrounding water. This adjustment does probably take place, but
+in a somewhat different manner. As the Nautilus inhabits a depth of from
+twenty to forty fathoms, it is evident that the air within its shell
+would be displaced by the pressure of such a column of water.[79]
+Accordingly, in every instance of the capture of a Nautilus the chambers
+of its shell have been found filled with water. It is not improbable
+that the fluid they contain may be less compressed, and exert less
+pressure from within outwards than that of the external superincumbent
+column of water, and that by this unbalanced pressure--under the same
+hydro-dynamic law which governs its mode of self-propulsion when
+swimming, and possibly in some degree within the control of the
+animal--the latter is relieved of much of the weight of its shell. When
+the Nautilus is at the bottom of the sea its movement is like that of a
+snail crawling along upon the ground with its shell above it. The shell,
+in proportion to the size of the animal that inhabits it, is a heavy
+one, and unless it were rendered semi-buoyant, its owner's strength
+would be severely taxed by the effort to drag it along. By the means
+indicated this portable domicile is borne lightly above the body of the
+Nautilus, without in any way impeding its progress.
+
+  [79] "At 100 fathoms the pressure exceeds 265 lbs. to the square
+  inch. Empty bottles, securely corked, and sunk with weights beyond
+  100 fathoms, are always crushed. If filled with liquid the cork is
+  driven in, and the liquid replaced by salt water; and in drawing
+  the bottle up again the cork is returned to the neck of the bottle,
+  generally in a reversed position."--Sir F. Beaufort, quoted by Dr.
+  S. P. Woodward in his 'Manual of the Mollusca.'
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 32.--SHELL OF THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus
+pompilius_).]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 33.--THE PEARLY NAUTILUS (_Nautilus pompilius_), AND
+SECTION OF ITS SHELL. _After Professor Owen._
+
+_a a_, Partitions; _b b_, chambers; _b'_, the last-formed chamber, in
+which the animal lives; _c c_, the siphuncle; _d_, attaching muscle; _e
+e_, the hollow arms; _f f_, retractile tentacles; _g_, muscular disk, or
+foot; _h_, the eye; _i_, position of funnel.]
+
+The chambers are all connected by a membranous tube slightly coated with
+nacre, which is connected with a large sac in the body of the animal,
+near the heart, and passes through a circular orifice and a short
+projecting tube in the centre of each partition wall, till it ends in
+the smallest chamber at the inner extremity of the shell. Dean Buckland
+believed this "syphon" to be an hydraulic apparatus acting as a "fine
+adjustment" of the specific gravity of the shell, by admitting water
+within it when expanded, and excluding it when contracted. As it
+contains an artery and vein near its origin at the mantle, Professor
+Owen has regarded it as subservient to the maintenance of a low vitality
+in the vacated portion of the shell. Dr. Henry Woodward is of the
+opinion that, whilst in the early life of the Nautilus this siphuncle
+forms the main point of attachment between the animal and its shell, it
+is in the adult "simply an aborted embryonal organ whose function is now
+filled by the shell-muscles, but which in the more ancient and
+straight-shelled representatives of the group (the Orthoceratites) was
+not merely an embryonal but an important organ in the adult."
+
+Every one knows the shell of the Pearly Nautilus. It may be purchased
+at any shell-shop in a seaside watering-place, and is imported by
+hundreds every year from Singapore.[80] It is abundant in the waters of
+the Indian Archipelago, especially about the Molucca and Philippine
+Islands, and on the shores of New Caledonia and the Fiji and Solomon
+Islands. It has also been found alive on Pemba Island, near Zanzibar. It
+seems strange, therefore, that until about half a century ago hardly
+anything was known of the animal that secretes and inhabits it.
+Rumphius, a Dutch naturalist, in his 'Rarities of Amboyna,' published,
+in 1705, a description of one with an engraving, incorrect in drawing,
+and deficient in detail; and until 1832 this was the only information
+which existed concerning it. The great Cuvier never saw one, and being
+acquainted only with the two-gilled cephalopods, he regarded the
+head-footed mollusks as absolutely isolated from all other animals in
+the kingdom of nature, even from the other classes of the mollusca. It
+seemed, however, to Professor Owen, then only nineteen years of age,
+that in the only living representative of the four-gilled order,
+_Nautilus pompilius_, might be found the "missing link." When,
+therefore, in the year 1824, his fellow-student, Mr. George Bennett, was
+about to sail from England to the Polynesian Islands, young Richard Owen
+earnestly charged his friend to do his utmost to obtain, and bring home
+in alcohol, a specimen of the much-coveted Pearly Nautilus. The
+opportunity did not occur till one warm and calm Monday evening, the
+24th of August, 1829, when a living Nautilus was seen at the surface of
+the water not far distant from the ship, in Marekini Bay, on the
+south-west coast of the Island of Erromango, New Hebrides, in the South
+Pacific Ocean. It looked like a dead tortoise-shell cat, as the sailors
+said. As it began to sink as soon as it was observed, it was struck at
+with a boat-hook, and was thus so much injured that it died shortly
+after being taken on board the ship. The shell was destroyed, but the
+soft body of the animal was preserved in spirits, and great was the joy
+of Mr. Owen when, in July, 1831, Mr. Bennett arrived with it in England,
+and presented it to the Royal College of Surgeons. Mr. Owen was then
+Assistant-Conservator of the Museum of the College under Mr. Clift, who
+was afterwards his father-in-law. He immediately commenced to anatomise,
+describe, and figure his rare acquisition, and in the early part of 1832
+published the result of his work in the form of a masterly treatise,
+which proved to be the foundation of his future fame.[81]
+
+  [80] I need hardly say that before the nacreous layer of the shell
+  from which this animal takes its name is made visible, an outer
+  deposit of dense calcareous matter has to be removed by
+  hydrochloric acid: the pearly surface thus exposed is then easily
+  polished.
+
+  [81] It is so interesting to most of us to know something of the
+  early work of our greatest men, and of the tide in their affairs,
+  which, taken at the flood, led on to fortune, that I hope I may be
+  excused for referring to the period when the distinguished chief of
+  the Natural History Department of the British Museum, the great
+  comparative anatomist, the unrivalled palaeontologist, the
+  illustrious physiologist, the venerable and venerated friend of all
+  earnest students, was beginning to attract the attention, and to
+  receive the approbation of his seniors as a promising young worker.
+  In Messrs. Griffith and Pidgeon's Supplement to Cuvier's 'Mollusca
+  and Radiata,' published in 1834, the treatise in question is thus
+  mentioned: "We have much pleasure in referring to a most excellent
+  memoir on _Nautilus pompilius_, by Mr. Owen, with elaborate figures
+  of the animal, its shell, and various parts, published by direction
+  of the Council of the College of Surgeons. The reader will find the
+  most satisfactory information on the subject, and the scientific
+  public will earnestly hope that the present volume will be the
+  first of a similar series." This hope has been more than fulfilled.
+  Dean Buckland, in his 'Bridgewater Treatise,' wrote of this work:
+  "I rejoice in the present opportunity of bearing testimony to the
+  value of Professor Owen's highly philosophical and most admirable
+  memoir--a work not less creditable to the author than honourable to
+  the Royal College of Surgeons, under whose auspices the publication
+  has been so handsomely conducted."
+
+Mr. Owen's investigations confirmed his previous supposition that the
+Pearly Nautilus is inferior in its organisation to octopus, sepia, or
+any other known cephalopod; that it is not isolated, but that it recedes
+towards the gasteropods, to which belong the snail, the periwinkle, &c.,
+and that in some of its characters its structure is analogously related
+to the still lower _annulosa_, or worms. Mr. Owen was just about to
+start for Paris with the intention of presenting a copy of his book to
+his celebrated contemporary and friend, and of showing him his
+dissections of the Nautilus which had been the subject of his research,
+when he heard of Baron Cuvier's death. It must have been to him a great
+sorrow and a grievous disappointment.
+
+The Pearly Nautilus, then, is a true cephalopod, in that it has its foot
+divided and arranged in segments around its head, but the form and
+number of these segments are very different from those of any other of
+its class. Instead of there being eight, as in the argonaut and octopus,
+or ten, as in sepia and the calamaries, the Nautilus has about ninety
+projecting in every direction from around the mouth. They are short,
+round, and tapering, of about the length and thickness of the fingers of
+a child. Some of them are retractile into sheaths, and they are attached
+to fleshy processes (which might represent the child's hand), overlying
+each other, and covering the mouth on each side. They have none of the
+suckers with which the arms and tentacles of all the other cuttles are
+furnished, but their annulose structure, like the rings of an
+earthworm's body, gives them some little prehensile power. None of these
+numerous finger-like segments of the foot are flattened out like the
+broad membranous expansions of the argonaut, and, in fact, the Nautilus
+is without any members which can possibly be regarded as sails to hoist,
+or as oars with which to row. It has a strong beak, like the rest of the
+cuttles; but it has no ink-sac, for its shell is strong enough to afford
+it the protection which its two-gilled relatives have to seek in
+concealment.
+
+The Pearly Nautilus usually creeps, like a snail, along the bed of the
+sea. It lives at the bottom, and feeds at the bottom, principally on
+crabs; and, as Dr. S. P. Woodward says, in his 'Manual of the Mollusca,'
+"perhaps often lies in wait for them, like some gigantic sea-anemone,
+with outspread tentacles." The shape of its shell is not well adapted
+for swimming, but it can ascend to the surface, if it so please, in the
+same manner as can all the cuttles--namely, by the outflow of water from
+its locomotor tube. The statement that it visits the surface of the sea
+of its own accord is at present, however, unconfirmed by observation.
+
+But, if the Pearly Nautilus is the inferior and poor relation of the
+argonaut, it lives in a handsome house, and comes of an ancient lineage.
+The Ammonites, whose beautiful whorled and chambered shells, and the
+casts of them, are so abundant in every stratum, especially in the lias,
+the chalk, and the oolite, had four gills also. These Ammonites and the
+Nautili were amongst the earliest occupants of the ancient deep; and,
+with the Hamites, Turrilites, and others, lived upon our earth during a
+great portion of the incalculable period which has elapsed since it
+became fitted for animal existence, and in their time witnessed the rise
+and fall of many an animal dynasty. But they are gone now; and only the
+fossil relics of more than two thousand species (of which 188 were
+Nautili) remain to tell how important a race they were amongst the
+inhabitants of the old world seas. They and their congeners of the
+chambered shells, however, left one representative which has lived on
+through all the changes that have taken place on the surface of this
+globe since they became extinct--namely, _Nautilus pompilius_, the
+Nautilus of the pearly shell--the last of the Tetrabranchs.
+
+I need offer no apology for endeavouring to explain the difference
+between the Nautilus of the chambered shell and the argonaut with the
+membranous arms which it was supposed to use as sails, when Webster, in
+his great standard dictionary, describes the one and figures the other
+as one and the same animal; and when a writer of the celebrity of Dr.
+Oliver Wendell Holmes also blends the two in the following poem,
+containing a sentiment as exquisite as its science is erroneous. I hope
+the latter distinguished and accomplished author, whose delightful
+writings I enjoy and highly appreciate, will pardon my criticism. I
+admit that the beauty of the thought might well atone for its
+inaccuracy, (of which the author is conscious,) were it not that the
+latter is made so attractive that truth appears harsh in disturbing it.
+
+        "THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS."
+
+    "This is the ship of pearl, which poets feign
+                Sails the unshadowed main,
+                The venturous bark that flings
+    On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings,
+    In gulfs enchanted, where the siren sings,
+                And coral reefs lie bare,
+    Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair.
+
+    Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl,
+                Wrecked is the ship of pearl!
+                And every chambered cell,
+    Where its dim, dreaming life was wont to dwell,
+    As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,
+                Before thee lies revealed,
+    Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!
+
+    Year after year beheld the silent toil
+                That spread his lustrous coil;
+                Still, as the spiral grew,
+    He left the past year's dwelling for the new,
+    Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
+                Built up its idle door,
+    Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.
+
+    Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,
+                Child of the wandering sea,
+                Cast from her lap forlorn!
+    From the dead lips a clearer note is born
+    Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn!
+                While on mine ear it rings,
+    Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:--
+
+    'Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
+                As the swift seasons roll!
+                Leave thy low vaulted past;
+    Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
+    Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,
+                Till thou at length art free,
+    Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea.'"
+
+
+
+
+BARNACLE GEESE--GOOSE BARNACLES.
+
+
+The belief that some wild geese, instead of being hatched from eggs,
+like other birds, grew on trees and rotten wood has never been surpassed
+as a specimen of ignorant credulity and persistent error.
+
+There are two principal versions of this absurd notion. One is that
+certain trees, resembling willows, and growing always close to the sea,
+produced at the ends of their branches fruit in form like apples, and
+each containing the embryo of a goose, which, when the fruit was ripe,
+fell into the water and flew away. The other is that the geese were bred
+from a fungus growing on rotten timber floating at sea, and were first
+developed in the form of worms in the substance of the wood.
+
+When and whence this improbable theory had its origin is uncertain.
+Aristotle does not mention it, and consequently Pliny and AElian were
+deprived of the pleasure they would have felt in handing down to
+posterity, without investigation or correction, a statement so
+surprising. It is, comparatively, a modern myth; although we find that
+it was firmly established in the middle of the twelfth century, for
+Gerald de Barri, known in literature as Giraldus Cambrensis, mentions it
+in his 'Topographia Hiberniae,' published in 1187. Giraldus, who was
+Archdeacon of Brecknock in the reign of Henry II., and tried hard, more
+than once, for the bishopric of St. David's, the functions of which he
+had temporarily administered without obtaining the title, was a vigorous
+and zealous reformer of Church abuses. Amongst the laxities of
+discipline against which he found it necessary to protest was the custom
+then prevailing of eating these Barnacle geese during Lent, under the
+plea that their flesh was not that of birds, but of fishes. He writes:--
+
+     "There are here many birds which are called Bernacae, which nature
+     produces in a manner contrary to nature, and very wonderful. They
+     are like marsh-geese but smaller. They are produced from fir-timber
+     tossed about at sea, and are at first like geese upon it.
+     Afterwards they hang down by their beaks, as if from a sea-weed
+     attached to the wood, and are enclosed in shells that they may grow
+     the more freely. Having thus, in course of time, been clothed with
+     a strong covering of feathers, they either fall into the water, or
+     seek their liberty in the air by flight. The embryo geese derive
+     their growth and nutriment from the moisture of the wood or of the
+     sea, in a secret and most marvellous manner. I have seen with my
+     own eyes more than a thousand minute bodies of these birds hanging
+     from one piece of timber on the shore, enclosed in shells and
+     already formed. Their eggs are not impregnated _in coitu_, like
+     those of other birds, nor does the bird sit upon its eggs to hatch
+     them, and in no corner of the world have they been known to build a
+     nest. Hence the bishops and clergy in some parts of Ireland are in
+     the habit of partaking of these birds on fast days, without
+     scruple. But in doing so they are led into sin. For, if any one
+     were to eat of the leg of our first parent, although he (Adam) was
+     not born of flesh, that person could not be adjudged innocent of
+     eating flesh."
+
+This fable of the geese appears, however, to have been current at least
+a hundred years before Giraldus wrote, for Professor Max Muller, who
+treats of it in one of his "Lectures on the Science of Language,"
+amongst many interesting references there given, quotes a Cardinal of
+the eleventh century, Petrus Damianus, who clearly describes, that
+version of it which represents the birds as bursting, when fully
+fledged, from fruit resembling apples.
+
+It is a curious fact that these Barnacle geese have troubled the
+priesthood of more than one creed as to the instructions they should
+give to the laity concerning the use of them as food. The Jews--all
+those, at least, who maintain a strict observance of the Hebrew Law--eat
+no meat but that of animals which have been slaughtered in a certain
+prescribed manner; and a doubt arose amongst them at the period we refer
+to, whether these geese should be killed as flesh or as fish. Professor
+Max Muller cites Mordechai,[82] as asking whether these birds are
+fruits, fish, or flesh; that is, whether they must be killed in the
+Jewish way, as if they were flesh. Mordechai describes them as birds
+which grow on trees, and says, "the Rabbi Jehuda, of Worms (who died
+1216) used to say that he had heard from his father, Rabbi Samuel, of
+Speyer (about 1150), that Rabbi Jacob Tham, of Rameru (who died 1171),
+the grandson of the great Rabbi Rashi (about 1140), had decided that
+they must be killed as flesh."
+
+  [82] Riva, 1559, leaf 142.
+
+Pope Innocent III. took the same view; for at the Lateran Council, in
+1215, he prohibited the eating of Barnacle geese during Lent. In 1277,
+Rabbi Izaak, of Corbeil, determined to be on the safe side, forbade
+altogether the eating of these birds by the Jews, "because they were
+neither flesh nor fish."
+
+Michael Bernhard Valentine,[83] quoting Wormius, says that this
+question caused much perplexity and disputation amongst the doctors of
+the Sorbonne; but that they passed an ordinance that these geese should
+be classed as fishes, and not as birds; and he adds, that in consequence
+of this decision large numbers of these birds were annually sent to
+Paris from England and Scotland, for consumption in Lent. Sir Robert
+Sibbald[84] refers to this, and says that Normandy was the locality from
+which the French capital was reported to be principally supplied; but
+that in fact the greater number of these geese came from Holland. The
+date of this edict is not given.
+
+  [83] 'Historia Simplicium,' lib. iii. p. 327.
+
+  [84] Prodrom. Hist. Nat. Scot. parts 2, lib. iii. p. 21, 1684.
+
+Professor Max Muller says that in Brittany, Barnacle geese are still
+allowed to be eaten on Fridays, and that the Roman Catholic Bishop of
+Ferns may give permission to people out of his diocese to eat these
+birds at his table.
+
+In Bombay, also, where fish is prohibited as food to some classes of the
+population, the priests call this goose a "sea-vegetable," under which
+name it is allowed to be eaten.
+
+Various localities were mentioned as the breeding-places of these
+arboreal geese. Gervasius of Tilbury,[85] writing about 1211, describes
+the process of their generation in full detail, and says that great
+numbers of them grew in his time upon the young willow trees which
+abounded in the neighbourhood of the Abbey of Faversham, in the county
+of Kent, and within the Archiepiscopate of Canterbury. The bird was
+there commonly called the _Barneta_.
+
+  [85] Otia Imperialia, iii. 123.
+
+Hector Boethius, or Boece, the old Scottish historian, combats this
+version of the story. His work, written in Latin, in 1527, was
+translated into quaint Scottish in 1540, by John Bellenden, Archdeacon
+of Murray. In his fourteenth chapter, "Of the nature of claik geis, and
+of the syndry maner of thair procreatioun, and of the ile of Thule," he
+says:--
+
+     "Restis now to speik of the geis generit of the see namit clakis.
+     Sum men belevis that thir clakis growis on treis be the nebbis. Bot
+     thair opinioun is vane. And becaus the nature and procreatioun of
+     thir clakis is strange we have maid na lytyll laubore and deligence
+     to serche ye treuth and verite yairof, we have salit throw ye seis
+     quhare thir clakis ar bred, and I fynd be gret experience, that the
+     nature of the seis is mair relevant caus of thir procreatioun than
+     ony uther thyng."
+
+From the circumstances attending the finding of "ane gret tree that was
+brocht be alluvion and flux of the see to land, in secht of money pepyll
+besyde the castell of Petslego, in the yeir of God ane thousand iiii.
+hundred lxxxx, and of a see tangle hyngand full of mussill schellis,"
+brought to him by "Maister Alexander Galloway, person of Kynkell," who
+knowing him to be "richt desirus of sic uncouth thingis came haistely
+with the said tangle," he arrives at the conclusion, by a process of
+reasoning highly satisfactory and convincing to himself, that,
+
+     "Be thir and mony othir resorcis and examplis we can not beleif
+     that thir clakis ar producit be ony nature of treis or rutis
+     thairof, but allanerly be the nature of the Oceane see, quhilk is
+     the caus and production of mony wonderful thingis. And becaus the
+     rude and ignorant pepyl saw oftymes the fruitis that fel of the
+     treis (quhilkis stude neir the see) convertit within schort tyme in
+     geis, thai belevit that thir geis grew apon the treis hingand be
+     thair nebbis sic lik as appillis and uthir frutis hingis be thair
+     stalkis, bot thair opinioun is nocht to be sustenit. For als sone
+     as thir appillis or frutis fallis of the tre in the see flude thay
+     grow first wormeetin. And be schort process of tyme are alterat in
+     geis."
+
+In describing the bird thus produced, Boethius declares that the male
+has a sharp, pointed beak, like the gallinaceous birds, but that in the
+female the beak is obtuse as in other geese and ducks.
+
+According to other authors, this wonderful production of birds from
+living or dead timber was not confined to England and Scotland.
+Vincentius Bellovacensis[86] (1190-1264) in his 'Speculum Naturae,' xvii.
+40, states that it took place in Germany, and Jacob de Vitriaco (who
+died 1244) mentions its occurrence in certain parts of Flanders.
+
+  [86] For this quotation and the following one I am indebted to
+  Professor Max Muller's Lecture before referred to.
+
+Jonas Ramus gives a somewhat different version of the process as it
+occurs in Norway. He writes:[87] "It is said that a particular sort of
+geese is found in Nordland, which leave their seed on old trees, and
+stumps and blocks lying in the sea; and that from that seed there grows
+a shell fast to the trees, from which shell, as from an egg, by the heat
+of the sun, young geese are hatched, and afterwards grow up; which gave
+rise to the fable that geese grow upon trees."
+
+  [87] 'Chorographical Description of Norway,' p. 244.
+
+But, strange to say, if any painstaking enquirer, wishing to investigate
+the matter for himself, went to a locality where it was said the
+phenomenon regularly occurred, he was sure to find that he had
+literally, "started on a wild-goose chase," and had come to the wrong
+place. This was the experience of AEneas Sylvius Piccolomini, afterwards
+Pope Pius II., who complained that miracles will always flee farther and
+farther away; for when he was on a visit (about 1430) to King James I.,
+of Scotland,[88] and enquired after the tree which he most eagerly
+desired to see, he was told that it grew much farther north, in the
+Orkney Islands.
+
+  [88] AEneas Sylvius gives us information concerning the personal
+  appearance of his royal host, whom he describes as, "_hominem
+  quadratum et multa pinguedine gravem_,"--literally, "a square-built
+  man, heavy with much fat."
+
+Notwithstanding the suspicious fact that the prodigy receded like Will
+o' the Wisp, whenever it was persistently followed up, Sebastian
+Munster, who relates[89] the foregoing anecdote of AEneas Sylvius,
+appears to have entertained no doubt of the truth of the report, for he
+writes:--
+
+  [89] 'Cosmographia Universalis,' p. 49, 1572.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 34.--THE GOOSE TREE. _Copied from Gerard's
+'Herball,' 1st edition._[90]]
+
+  [90] The original of this picture is a small wood-cut in Matthias
+  de Lobel's 'Stirpium Historia,' published in 1870. The birds within
+  the shells were added by Gerard. Aldrovandus, in copying it, gave
+  leaves to the tree, as shown on page 110.
+
+     "In Scotland there are trees which produce fruit, conglomerated of
+     their leaves; and this fruit, when in due time it falls into the
+     water beneath it, is endowed with new life, and is converted into a
+     living bird, which they call the 'tree-goose.' This tree grows in
+     the Island of Pomonia, which is not far from Scotland, towards the
+     north. Several old cosmographers, especially Saxo Grammaticus,
+     mention the tree, and it must not be regarded as fictitious, as
+     some new writers suppose."
+
+Julius Caesar Scaliger[91] (1540) gives another reading of the legend, in
+which it is asserted that the leaves which fall from the tree into the
+water are converted into fishes, and those which fall upon the land
+become birds.
+
+  [91] Exercit. 59, sect. 2.
+
+Thus this extraordinary belief held sway, and remained strong and
+invincible, although from time to time some man of sense and independent
+thought attempted to turn the tide of popular error. Albertus Magnus
+(who died 1280) showed its absurdity, and declared that he had seen the
+bird referred to lay its eggs and hatch them in the ordinary way. Roger
+Bacon (who died in 1294) also contradicted it, and Belon, in 1551,
+treated it with ridicule and contempt. Olaus Wormius[92] seems to have
+believed in it, though he wrote cautiously about it. Olaus Magnus (1553)
+mentions it, and apparently accepts it as a fact, occurring in the
+Orkneys, on the authority of "a Scotch historian who diligently sets
+down the secrets of things," and then dismisses it in three lines.
+
+  [92] 'Museum,' p. 257.
+
+Passing over many other writers on the subject, we come to the time of
+the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when (in 1597) "John Gerarde, Master in
+Chirurgerie, London," published his "Herball, or Generall Historie of
+Plants gathered by him," and in the last chapter thereof solemnly
+declared, that he had actually witnessed the transformation of "certaine
+shell fish" into Barnacle Geese, as follows.
+
+
+     _Of the Goose tree, Barnacle tree, or the tree bearing Geese._
+
+     _Britanicae Conchae anatiferae._
+
+     THE BREED OF BARNACLES.
+
+     ¶ _The Description._
+
+     Hauing trauelled from the Grasses growing in the bottome of the
+     fenny waters, the Woods, and mountaines, euen vnto Libanus itselfe;
+     and also the sea, and bowels of the same, wee are arriued at the
+     end of our History; thinking it not impertinent to the conclusion
+     of the same, to end with one of the maruels of this land (we may
+     say of the World). The history whereof to set forth according to
+     the worthinesse and raritie thereof, would not only require a large
+     and peculiar volume, but also a deeper search into the bowels of
+     Nature, then my intended purpose will suffer me to wade into, my
+     sufficiencie also considered; leauing the History thereof rough
+     hewen, vnto some excellent man, learned in the secrets of nature,
+     to be both fined and refined; in the meane space take it as it
+     falleth out, the naked and bare truth, though vnpolished. There are
+     found in the North parts of Scotland and the Islands adjacent,
+     called Orchades, certaine trees whereon do grow certaine shells of
+     a white colour tending to russet, wherein are contained little
+     liuing creatures: which shells in time of maturity doe open, and
+     out of them grow those little liuing things, which falling into the
+     water do become fowles, which we call Barnacles; in the North of
+     England, brant Geese; and in Lancashire, tree Geese: but the other
+     that do fall vpon the land perish and come to nothing. Thus much by
+     the writings of others, and also from the mouthes of people of
+     those parts, which may very well accord with truth.
+
+     But what our eies haue seene, and hands haue touched we shall
+     declare. There is a small Island in Lancashire, called the Pile of
+     Foulders, wherein are found the broken pieces of old and bruised
+     ships some whereof haue beene cast thither by shipwracke, and also
+     the trunks and bodies with the branches of old and rotten trees,
+     cast vp there likewise; whereon is found a certaine spume or froth
+     that in time breedeth vnto certaine shells, in shape like those of
+     the Muskle, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish colour; wherein
+     is contained a thing in forme like a lace of silke finely wouen as
+     it were together, of a whitish colour, one end whereof is fastened
+     vnto the inside of the shell, euen as the fish of Oisters and
+     Muskles are: the other end is made fast vnto the belly of a rude
+     masse or lumpe, which in time commeth to the shape and forme of a
+     Bird: when it is perfectly formed the shell gapeth open, and the
+     first thing that appeareth is the foresaid lace or string; next
+     come the legs of the bird hanging out, and as it groweth greater it
+     openeth the shell by degrees, til at length it is all come forth,
+     and hangeth onely by the bill: in short space after it commeth to
+     full maturitie, and falleth into the sea, where it gathereth
+     feathers, and groweth to a fowle bigger than a Mallard, and lesser
+     than a Goose, hauing blacke legs and bill or beake, and feathers
+     blacke and white, spotted in such manner as is our Magpie, called
+     in some places a Pie-Annet, which the people of Lancashire call by
+     no other name than a tree Goose: which place aforesaid, and all
+     those parts adjoyning do so much abound therewith, that one of the
+     best is bought for three pence. For the truth hereof, if any doubt,
+     may it please them to repaire vnto me, and I shall satisfie them by
+     the testimonie of good witnesses.
+
+     Moreover, it should seeme that there is another sort hereof; the
+     History of which is true, and of mine owne knowledge; for
+     trauelling vpon the shore of our English coast betweene Douer and
+     Rumney, I found the trunke of an old rotten tree, which (with some
+     helpe that I procured by Fishermen's wiues that were there
+     attending their husbands' returne from the sea) we drew out of the
+     water vpon dry land; vpon this rotten tree I found growing many
+     thousands of long crimson bladders, in shape like vnto puddings
+     newly filled, before they be sodden, which were very cleere and
+     shining; at the nether end whereof did grow a shell fish, fashioned
+     somewhat like a small Muskle, but much whiter, resembling a shell
+     fish that groweth vpon the rockes about Garnsey and Garsey, called
+     a Lympit: many of these shells I brought with me to London, which
+     after I had opened I found in them liuing things without forme or
+     shape; in others which were neerer come to ripenesse I found liuing
+     things that were very naked, in shape like a Bird: in others, the
+     Birds couered with soft downe, the shell halfe open, and the Bird
+     ready to fall out, which no doubt were the Fowles called Barnacles.
+     I dare not absolutely auouch euery circumstance of the first part
+     of this history, concerning the tree that beareth those buds
+     aforesaid, but will leaue it to a further consideration; howbeit,
+     that which I haue seene with mine eies, and handled with mine
+     hands, I dare confidently auouch, and boldly put downe for verity.
+     Now if any will object that this tree which I saw might be one of
+     those before mentioned, which either by the waues of the sea or
+     some violent wind had beene ouerturned as many other trees are; or
+     that any trees falling into those seas about the Orchades, will of
+     themselves bear the like Fowles, by reason of those seas and
+     waters, these being so probable conjectures, and likely to be true,
+     I may not without prejudice gainsay, or endeauour to confute.
+
+     ¶ _The Place._
+
+     The bordes and rotten plankes whereon are found these shels
+     breeding the Barnakle, are taken vp in a small Island adioyning to
+     Lancashire, halfe a mile from the main land, called the Pile of
+     Foulders.
+
+     ¶ _The Time._
+
+     They spawn as it were in March and Aprill; the Geese are formed in
+     May and June, and come to fulnesse of feathers in the moneth after.
+
+     And thus hauing through God's assistance discoursed somewhat at
+     large of Grasses, Herbes, Shrubs, Trees, and Mosses, and certaine
+     Excrescenses of the Earth, with other things moe, incident to the
+     historie thereof, we conclude and end our present Volume, with this
+     wonder of England. For the which God's name be euer honored and
+     praised.
+
+Gerard was probably a good botanist and herbalist; but Thomas Johnson,
+the editor of a subsequent issue of his book, tells us that
+
+     "He, out of a propense good will to the publique advancement of
+     this knowledge, endeavoured to performe therein more than he could
+     well accomplish, which was partly through want of sufficient
+     learning; but," he adds, "let none blame him for these defects,
+     seeing he was neither wanting in pains nor good will to performe
+     what hee intended: and there are none so simple but know that
+     heavie burthens are with most paines vndergone by the weakest men;
+     and although there are many faults in the worke, yet iudge well of
+     the Author; for, as a late writer well saith:--'To err and to be
+     deceived is human, and he must seek solitude who wishes to live
+     only with the perfect.'"
+
+It is difficult to comply with the request to think well of one who,
+writing as an authority, deliberately promulgated, with an affectation
+of piety, that which he must have known to be untrue, and who was,
+moreover, a shameless plagiarist; for Gerard's ponderous book is little
+more than a translation of Dodonaeus, whole chapters having been taken
+verbatim from that comparatively unread author without acknowledgment.
+
+After this series of erroneous observations, self-delusion, and
+ignorant credulity, it is refreshing to turn to the pages of the two
+little thick quarto volumes of Gaspar Schott.[93] This learned Jesuit
+made himself acquainted with everything that had been written on the
+subject, and besides the authors I have referred to, quotes and compares
+the statements of Majolus, Abrahamus Ortelius, Hieronymus Cardanus,
+Eusebius, Nierembergius, Deusingius, Odoricus, Gerhardus de Vera,
+Ferdinand of Cordova, and many others. He then gives, firmly and
+clearly, his own opinion that the assertion that birds in Britain spring
+from the fruit or leaves of trees, or from wood, or from fungus, or from
+shells, is without foundation, and that neither reason, experience, nor
+authority tend to confirm it. He concedes that worms may be bred in
+rotting timber, and even that they may be of a kind that fly away on
+arriving at maturity (referring probably to caterpillars being developed
+into moths), but that birds should be thus generated, he says, is simply
+the repetition of a vulgar error, for not one of the authors whom he has
+examined has seen what they all affirm; nor are they able to bring
+forward a single eye-witness of it. He asks how it can be possible that
+animals so large and so highly-organised as these birds can grow from
+puny animalcules generated in putrid wood. He further declares that
+these British geese are hatched from eggs like other geese, which he
+considers proved by the testimony of Albertus Magnus, Gerhardus de Vera,
+and of Dutch seamen, who, in 1569, gave their written declaration that
+they had personally seen these birds sitting on their eggs, and hatching
+them, on the coasts of Nova Zembla.
+
+  [93] 'Physica Curiosa, sive Mirabilia Naturae et Artis,' 1662, lib.
+  ix. cap. xxii. p. 960.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 35.--THE BARNACLE GOOSE TREE. _After Aldrovandus._]
+
+In marked and disgraceful contrast with this careful and philosophical
+investigation and its author's just deductions from it, is 'A Relation
+concerning Barnacles by Sir Robert Moray, lately one of His Majesty's
+Council for the Kingdom of Scotland,' read before the Royal Society, and
+published in the 'Philosophical Transactions,' No. 137, January and
+February, 1677-8.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 36.--DEVELOPMENT OF BARNACLES INTO GEESE. _After
+Aldrovandus._]
+
+Describing "a cut of a large Firr-tree of about two and a half feet
+diameter, and nine or ten feet long," which he saw on the shore in the
+Western Islands of Scotland, and which had become so dry that many of
+the Barnacle shells with which it had been covered had been rubbed off,
+he says:--
+
+     "Only on the parts that lay next the ground there still hung
+     multitudes of little Shells, having within them little Birds,
+     perfectly shap'd, supposed to be Barnacles. The Shells hung very
+     thick and close one by another, and were of different sizes. Of the
+     colour and consistence of Muscle-Shells, and the sides and joynts
+     of them joyned with such a kind of film as Muscle-Shells are, which
+     serves them for a Hing to move upon, when they open and shut....
+     The Shells hang at the Tree by a Neck longer than the Shell, of a
+     kind of Filmy substance, round, and hollow, and creased, not unlike
+     the Wind-pipe of a chicken, spreading out broadest where it is
+     fastened to the Tree, from which it seems to draw and convey the
+     matter which serves for the growth and vegetation of the Shell and
+     the little Bird within it. This Bird in every Shell that I opened,
+     as well the least as the biggest, I found so curiously and
+     compleatly formed, that there appeared nothing wanting as to
+     internal parts, for making up a perfect Seafowl: every little part
+     appearing so distinctly that the whole looked like a large Bird
+     seen through a concave or diminishing glass, colour and feature
+     being everywhere so clear and neat. The little Bill, like that of a
+     Goose; the eyes marked; the Head, Neck, Breast, Wings, Tail, and
+     Feet formed, the Feathers everywhere perfectly shap'd, and blackish
+     coloured; and the Feet like those of other Water-fowl, to my best
+     remembrance. All being dead and dry, I did not look after the
+     internal parts of them. Nor did I ever see any of the little Birds
+     alive, nor met with anybody that did. Only some credible persons
+     have assured me they have seen some as big as their fist."
+
+It seems almost incredible that little more than two hundred years ago
+this twaddle should not only have been laid before the highest
+representatives of science in the land, but that it should have been
+printed in their "Transactions" for the further delusion of posterity.
+
+Ray, in his edition of Willughby's Ornithology, published in the same
+year as the above, contradicted the fallacy as strongly as Gaspar
+Schott; and (except that he incidentally admits the possibility of
+spontaneous generation in some of the lower animals, as insects and
+frogs) in language so similar that I think he must have had Schott's
+work before him when he wrote.
+
+Aldrovandus[94] tells us that an Irish priest, named Octavianus, assured
+him with an oath on the Gospels that he had seen and handled the geese
+in their embryo condition; and he adds that he "would rather err with
+the majority than seem to pass censure on so many eminent writers who
+have believed the story."
+
+  [94] 'Ornithologia,' lib. xix. p. 173, ed. 1603.
+
+In 1629 Count Maier (Michaelus Meyerus--these old authors when writing
+in Latin, latinized their names also) published a monograph 'On the
+Tree-bird'[95] in which he explains the process of its birth, and states
+that he opened a hundred of the goose-bearing shells and found the
+rudiments of the bird fully formed.
+
+    So slow Bootes underneath him sees,
+    In th' icy isles, those goslings hatched on trees,
+    Whose fruitful leaves, falling into the water,
+    Are turned, they say, to living fowls soon after;
+    So rotten sides of broken ships do change,
+    To barnacles, O, transformation strange!
+    'Twas first a green tree; then a gallant hull;
+    Lately a mushroom; then a flying gull.[96]
+
+  [95] 'De Volucri Arborea,' 1629.
+
+  [96] Du Bartas' "Divine Week" p. 228. Joshua Sylvester's
+  translation.
+
+Now, let us turn from fiction to facts.
+
+[Illustration: FIG 37.--SECTION OF A SESSILE BARNACLE. _Balanus
+tintinnabulum._]
+
+Almost every one is acquainted with at least one kind of the Barnacle
+shells which were supposed to enclose the embryo of a goose, namely the
+small white conical hillocks which are found, in tens of thousands,
+adhering to stones, rocks, and old timber such as the piles of piers,
+and may be seen affixed to the shells of oysters and mussels in any
+fishmonger's shop. The little animals which secrete and inhabit these
+shells belong to a sub-class and order of the Crustacea, called the
+_Cirrhopoda_, because their feet (_poda_), which in the crab and lobster
+terminate in claws, are modified into tufts of curled hairs (_cirri_),
+or feathers. When the animal is alive and active under water, a crater
+may be seen to open on the summit of the little shelly mountain, and, as
+if from the mouth of a miniature volcano, there issue from this
+aperture, from between two inner shells, the _cirri_ in the form of a
+feathery hand, which clutches at the water within its reach, and is then
+quickly retracted within the shell. During this movement the
+hair-fringed fingers have filtered from the water and conveyed towards
+the mouth within the shell, for their owner's nutriment, some minute
+solid particles or animalcules, and this action of the casting-net
+alternately shot forth and retracted continues for hours incessantly, as
+the water flows over its resting-place. The animal can live for a long
+time out of water, and in some situations thus passes half its life.
+Under such circumstances, the shells, containing a reserve of moisture,
+remain firmly closed until the return of the tide brings a fresh supply
+of water and food. These are the "acorn-barnacles," the _balani_,
+commonly known in some localities as "chitters."
+
+Barnacles of another kind are those furnished with a long stem, or
+peduncle, which Sir Robert Moray described as "round, hollow, and
+creased, and not unlike the wind-pipe of a chicken." The stem has, in
+fact, the ringed formation of the annelids, or worms. The shelly valves
+are thin, flat, and in shape somewhat like a mitre. They are composed of
+five pieces, two on each side, and one, a kind of rounded keel along the
+back of the valves, by which these are united. The shells are delicately
+tinted with lavender or pale blue varied with white, and the edges are
+frequently of a bright chrome yellow or orange colour.
+
+It is not an uncommon occurrence for a large plank entirely covered with
+these "necked barnacles" to be found floating at sea and brought ashore
+for exhibition at some watering-place; and I have more than once sent
+portions of such planks to the Aquaria at Brighton, and the Crystal
+Palace.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 38.--PEDUNCULATED BARNACLES. (_Lepas anatifera._)]
+
+It is most interesting to watch a dense mass of living cirripedes so
+closely packed together that not a speck of the surface of the wood is
+left uncovered by them; their fleshy stalks overhanging each other, and
+often attached in clusters to those of some larger individuals; their
+plumose casting-nets ever gathering in the food that comes within their
+reach, and carrying towards the mouth any solid particles suitable for
+their sustenance. How much of insoluble matter barnacles will eliminate
+from the water is shown by the rapidity with which they will render
+turbid sea water clear and transparent. The most common species of these
+"necked barnacles" bears the name of "_Lepas anatifera_," "the
+duck-bearing _Lepas_." It was so entitled by Linnaeus, in recognition of
+its having been connected with the fable, which, of course, met with no
+credit from him.
+
+Fig. 39 represents the figure-head of a ship, partly covered with
+barnacles, which was picked up about thirty miles off Lowestoft on the
+22nd of October, 1857. It was described in the _Illustrated London
+News_, and the proprietors of that paper have kindly given me a copy of
+the block from which its portrait was printed.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 39.--A SHIP'S FIGURE-HEAD WITH BARNACLES ATTACHED TO
+IT.]
+
+Others of the barnacles affix themselves to the bottoms of ships, or
+parasitically upon whales and sharks, and those of the latter kind often
+burrow deeply into the skin of their host. Fig. 40 is a portrait of a
+_Coronula diadema_ taken from the nose of a whale stranded at
+Kintradwell, in the north of Scotland, in 1866, and sent to the late Mr.
+Frank Buckland. Growing on this _Coronula_ are three of the curious
+eared barnacles, _Conchoderma aurita_; the _Lepas aurita_ of Linnaeus.
+The species of the whale from which these Barnacles were taken was not
+mentioned, but it was probably the "hunch-backed" whale, _Megaptera
+longimana_, which is generally infested with this _Coronula_. This very
+illustrative specimen was, and I hope still is, in Mr. Buckland's Museum
+at South Kensington. It was described by him in _Land and Water_, of May
+19th, 1866, and I am indebted to the proprietors of that paper for the
+accompanying portrait of it.
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 40.--WHALE BARNACLE (_Coronula diadema_), WITH THREE
+_Conchoderma aurita_ ATTACHED TO IT.]
+
+[Illustration: FIG. 41.--A YOUNG BARNACLE. (_Larva of Chthamalus
+stellatus._)]
+
+The young Barnacle when just extruded from the shell of its parent is a
+very different being from that which it will be in its mature condition.
+It begins its life in a form exactly like that of an entomostracous
+crustacean, and, like a Cyclops, has one large eye in the middle of its
+forehead. In this state it swims freely, and with great activity. It
+undergoes three moults, each time altering its figure, until at the
+third exuviation it has become enclosed in a bivalve shell, and has
+acquired a second eye. It is now ready to attach itself to its
+abiding-place; so, selecting its future residence, it presses itself
+against the wood, or whatever the substance may be, pours out from its
+two antennae a glutinous cement, which hardens in water, and thus fastens
+itself by the front of its head, is henceforth a fixture for life, and
+assumes the adult form in which most persons know it best.[97]
+
+  [97] If any of my readers wish to observe the development of young
+  barnacles they may easily do so. The method I have generally
+  adopted has been as follows: Procure a shallow glass or earthenware
+  milk-pan that will hold at least a gallon. Fill this to within an
+  inch of the top with sea-water, and place it in any shaded part of
+  a room--not in front of a window. Put in the pan six or eight
+  pebbles or clean shells of equal height, say 1-1/2 or 2 inches, and
+  on them lay a clean sheet of glass, which, by resting on the
+  pebbles, is brought to within about 2-1/2 inches of the surface of
+  the water. Select some limpets or mussels having acorn-barnacles on
+  them; carefully cut out the limpet or mussel, and clean nicely the
+  interior of the shell; then place a dozen or more of these shells
+  on the sheet of glass, and the barnacles upon them will be within
+  convenient reach of any observation with a magnifying glass. If
+  this be done in the month of March, the experimenter will not have
+  to wait long before he sees young _Balani_ ejected from the summits
+  of some of the shells. Up to the moment of their birth each of them
+  is enclosed in a little cocoon or case, in shape like a
+  canary-seed, and most of them are tossed into the world whilst
+  still enclosed in this. In a few seconds this casing is ruptured
+  longitudinally, apparently by the struggles of its inmate, which
+  escapes at one end, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis,
+  and swims freely to the surface of the water, leaving the split
+  cocoon or case at the bottom of the pan. Some few of the young
+  barnacles seem to be freed from the cocoon before, or at the moment
+  of, extrusion. From three to a dozen or more of these escape with
+  each protrusion of the cirri of the parent, and as the parturient
+  barnacle will put forth its feathery casting net at least twenty
+  times in a minute for an hour or more, it follows that as many as
+  ten thousand young ones may be produced in an hour. These, as they
+  are cast forth at each pulsation of the parent's cirri, fall upon
+  the clean sheet of glass, and may be taken up in a pipette, and
+  placed under a microscope, or removed to a smaller vessel of
+  sea-water, for minute and separate investigation. It seems strange
+  that animals which, like the oyster and the barnacles, are
+  condemned in their mature condition to lead so sedentary a life,
+  should in the earlier stages of their existence swim freely and
+  merrily through the water--young fellows seeking a home, and when
+  they have found it, although their connubial life must be a very
+  tame one, settling down, and not caring to rove about any more for
+  the remainder of their days. These young _Balani_ dart about like
+  so many water-fleas, and yet, after a few days of freedom, they
+  become fixed and immovable, the inhabitants of the pyramidal shells
+  which grow in such abundance on other shells, stones, and old wood.
+
+It is unnecessary for me to describe more minutely the anatomy of the
+Cirripedes; I have said enough to show the nature of the plumose
+appurtenances which, hanging from the dead shells, were supposed to be
+the feathers of a little bird within; but it is difficult to understand
+how any one could have seen in the natural occupant of the shell, "the
+little bill, like that of a goose, the eyes, head, neck, breast, wings,
+tail, and feet, like those of other water-fowl," so precisely and
+categorically detailed by Sir Robert Moray. As Pontoppidan, who
+denounced the whole story, as being "without the least foundation," very
+truly says, "One must take the force of imagination to help to make it
+look so!"
+
+As to the origin of the myth, I venture to differ entirely from
+philologists who attribute it to "language," and "a similarity of
+names," for, although, as Professor Max Muller observes in one of his
+lectures, "words without definite meanings are at the bottom of nearly
+all our philosophical and religious controversies," it certainly is not
+applicable in this instance. Every quotation here given shows that the
+mistake arose from the supposed resemblance of the plumes of the
+cirrhopod, and the feathers of a bird, and the fallacious deductions
+derived therefrom. The statements of Maier (p. 112), Gerard (p. 106),
+Sir Robert Moray (p. 110), &c., prove that this fanciful misconception
+sprang from erroneous observation. The love of the marvellous inherent
+in mankind, and especially prevalent in times of ignorance and
+superstition, favoured its reception and adoption, and I believe that it
+would have been as widely circulated, and have met with equal credence,
+if the names of the cirripede and of the goose that was supposed to be
+its offspring had been far more dissimilar than, at first, they really
+were.
+
+Setting aside several ingenious and far-fetched derivations that have
+been proposed, I think we may safely regard the word "barnacle," as
+applied to the cirrhopod, as a corruption of _pernacula_, the diminutive
+of _perna_, a bivalve mollusk, so-called from the similarity in shape of
+its shell to that of a ham--_pernacula_ being changed to _bernacula_. In
+some old Glossaries _perna_ is actually spelt _berna_.
+
+To arrive at the origin of the word "barnacle," or "bernicle," as
+applied to the goose, we must understand that this bird, _Anser
+leucopsis_, was formerly called the "brent," "brant," or "bran" goose,
+and was supposed to be identical with the species, _Anser torquatus_,
+which is now known by that name. The Scottish word for "goose" is
+"clake," or "clakis,"[98] and I think that the suggestion made long ago
+to Gesner[99] (1558), by his correspondent, Joannes Caius, is correct,
+that the word "barnacle" comes from "branclakis," or "barnclake," "the
+dark-coloured goose."
+
+  [98] See the quotation from Hector Boethius, p. 101.
+
+  [99] 'Historia Animalium,' lib. iii. p. 110.
+
+Professor Max Muller is of the opinion that its Latin name may have been
+derived from _Hibernicae_, _Hiberniculae_, _Berniculae_, as it was against
+the Irish bishops that Geraldus wrote, but I must say that this does not
+commend itself to me; for the name _Bernicula_ was not used in the early
+times to denote these birds. Giraldus himself described them as
+_Bernacae_, but they were variously known, also, as _Barliates_,
+_Bernestas_, _Barnetas_, _Barbates_, etc.
+
+I agree with Dr. John Hill,[100] that "the whole matter that gave
+origin to the story is that the 'shell-fish' (cirripedes), supposed to
+have this wonderful production usually adhere to old wood, and that they
+have a kind of fibres hanging out of them, which, in some degree,
+resemble feathers of some bird. From this slight origin arose the story
+that they contained real birds: what grew on trees people soon asserted
+to be the fruit of trees, and, from step to step, the story gained
+credit with the hearers," till, at length, Gerard had the audacity to
+say that he had witnessed the transformation.
+
+  [100] 'History of Animals,' p. 422. 1752.
+
+The Barnacle Goose is only a winter visitor of Great Britain. It breeds
+in the far north, in Greenland, Iceland, Spitzbergen, and Nova Zembla,
+and probably, also, along the shores of the White Sea. There are
+generally some specimens of this prettily-marked goose in the gardens of
+the Zoological Society in the Regent's Park, London; and they thrive
+there, and become very tame. In the months of December and January these
+geese may often be seen hanging for sale in poulterers' shops; and he
+who has tasted one well cooked may be pardoned if the suspicion cross
+his mind that the "monks of old," and "the bare-footed friars," as well
+as the laity, may not have been unwilling to sustain the fiction in
+order that they might conserve the privilege of having on their tables
+during the long fast of Lent so agreeable and succulent a "vegetable" or
+"fish" as a Barnacle Goose.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
+STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
+
+
+  Transcriber's note:
+
+  _Underscores_ have been used to indicate _italic_ fonts.
+  Inconsistent hyphenation has been left as written.
+  Missing end quote marks have been inserted.
+  The word irreconcileable has been left as written: "I
+  need scarcely point out how utterly irreconcileable is the"
+  The word gowden has been left as written: "Braiding her
+  locks of gowden hair"
+  The word fane has been left as written: "exactly resembled
+  the tail of a fish, with a broad fane"
+  The word engulphed has been left as written: "were all
+  suddenly engulphed in the waves on the night of the battle"
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables
+Explained, by Henry Lee
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