Chapter III: Part 3

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_)."

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.