Part 11
“I am told by a gentleman whose brother was on board the ship (the Barham) referred in the following extract from “The Times” newspaper of November 17, 1852, that the occurrence there related took place between 35° and 40° S. lat. and 40° and 45° E. long., being about 650 miles due south of Madagascar. I understand that the particulars of the event as there stated closely agree with those furnished to my informant, and further, which is perhaps the most interesting part of the whole circumstance, that the animal was observed to “blow” or “spout” in the same manner that a whale does.”
“_Extract from an Officer’s Letter written between the Cape and Madras._ You will be surprised to hear that we have actually seen the great sea-serpent, about which there has been so much discussion. Information was given by a sailor to the captain, just as we were going to dinner. I was in my cabin at the time, and from the noise and excitement, I thought the ship was on fire. I rushed on deck, and on looking over the side of the vessel I saw a most wonderful sight, which I shall recollect as long as I live. His head appeared to be about sixteen feet above the water, and he kept moving it up and down, sometimes showing his enormous neck, which was surmounted with a huge crest in the shape of a saw. It was surrounded by hundreds of birds, and we at first thought it was a dead whale. He left a track in the water like the wake of a boat, and from what we could see of the head and part of his body, we were led to think he must be about sixty feet in length, but he might be more. The captain kept the vessel away to get nearer to him, and when we were within a hundred yards he slowly sank into the depths of the sea. While we were at dinner he was seen again, and a midshipman took a sketch of him, of which I will send you a copy.”--_The Times._
Mr. GOSSE, in his _Romance of Natural History_, 1^{st} Series, p. 311, says of these rapports:
“The descriptions, however, show great discrepancy with that of the creature, seen from the _Daedalus_” (see report n^o. 118 in the next chapter) “and cannot be considered confirmatory of the former account, otherwise than as proving that immense unrecognized creatures of elongate form roam the ocean.”
“Mr. Alfred Newton, of Elveden Hall, an excellent and well-known naturalist, adds the guarantee of his personal acquaintance with one of the recipients of the above letters.”
“I note this, because discredit has been undeservedly cast on the phenomena observed, by foolish fabulous stories having been published under fictitious names, for the purpose of hoaxing.”
“If it were not for the spouting--which is not mentioned by one observer, and may possibly have been an illusion,--I should be inclined to think that this may have been one of the scabbard fishes, specimens of which inhabit the ocean of immense size. They carry a high serrated dorsal fin, and swim with the head out of the water.”
By inserting these reports in the present chapter, I already show my readers, that I agree with Mr. GOSSE, that this animal cannot have been a sea-serpent.
I confess that I am unable to give a decisive answer to the question as to what kind of animal it really was. _Apparently_ the most plausible explanation is that given by Mr. Gosse, viz., that it was a riband or scabbard fish. The dorsal fin which in these kind of fishes begins at the occiput, is red or crimson coloured, and serrated, so that it may have given rise to the expressions of “a crest like a cock’s comb”, and “a huge crest in the shape of a saw”. But riband fishes are deep-sea fishes. When floating on the surface they are dying or already dead. They never “swim with their head above the surface”! Moreover the green colour does not agree with the common silvery hue of these animals. A riband fish is delineated in fig. 13, p. 93.
But wonderful it may seem that after having uttered this opinion, a few pages further on Mr. GOSSE uses this report amongst others to fix the class of living creatures to which the sea-serpent belongs. And what is the conclusion he arrives at?--that it belongs to the group of _Plesiosauri_, or at least is related to it!
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1858, July 9.--_Another Sea-Serpent._--(_Zoologist_, 1859, p. 6492.)--“The Amsterdamsche Courant of October 6, 1858, inserts the following letter from Captain L. Bijl, of the Dutch bark “Hendrik Ido Ambacht”, to the “Jorn-Bode”:--“Sailing in the South Atlantic, in 27° 27′ N. Lat., and 14° 51,′ E. long., we perceived on July the 9th., between twelve and one o’clock in the afternoon, a dangerous sea monster, which during nine days constantly kept alongside of us to 37° 55′ S. lat., and 42° 9′ E. long. This animal was about 90 feet long and 25 to 30 feet broad, and, most of the time, it struck the ship with such a force as to make it vibrate. The monster blew much water, which spread an unpleasant stench over the deck. The captain, fearing lest the animal might disable the rudder, did his utmost to get rid of his fearful antagonist, but without success. After it had received more than a hundred musket-balls, a harpoon and a long iron bar, blood was seen to flow from various wounds, so that at last from loss of strength, the monster could swim behind our vessel no longer, and we were delivered of it. By its violent blows against the copper the animal’s skin had been damaged in several places.”--J. H. van Lennep, Zeist.”[2]
[2] _Jorn Bode_ is most probably a misprint for _Java-Bode_. _Zeist_ is the well-known charming village, east of Utrecht, the fourth town of the Netherlands.
As to the animal, seen from the _Hendrik Ido Ambacht_, I think it must have been a sick spermwhale, which was out of temper; why else should it have been so angry that it followed the bark nine days, cuffing it “most of the time”? Moreover the nature of spermwhales is well enough known as angry and war-like.
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1860?--In the _Zoologist_ for this year we read p. 6934:
“_A sea-serpent in the Bermudas._--I beg to send you the following account of a strange sea-monster captured on these shores, the animal being, in fact, no less than the great sea-serpent which was described as having been seen by Captain M’Quhae, of H. M. S. “Daedalus”, a few years since. Two gentlemen named Trimingham were walking along the shore of Hungary Bay, in Hamilton Island, on Sunday last, about eleven o’clock, when they were attracted by a loud rushing noise in the water, and, on reaching the spot, they found a huge sea-monster, which had thrown itself on the low rocks, and was dying from exhaustion in its efforts to regain the water. They attacked it with large forks which were lying near at hand for gathering in sea-weed, and unfortunately mauled it much, but secured it. The reptile was sixteen feet seven inches in length, tapering from head to tail like a snake, the body being a flatfish oval shape, the greatest depth at about a third of its length from the head, being eleven inches. The colour was bright and silvery; the skin destitute of scales but rough and warty; the head in shape not unlike that of a bull-dog, but it is destitute of teeth; the eyes were large, flat, and extremely brilliant, it had small pectoral fins, and minute ventral fins, and large gills. There were a series of fins running along the back, composed of short, slender rays, united by a transparent membrane, at the interval of something less than an inch from each other. The creature had no bone, but a cartilage running through the body. Across the body at certain intervals were bands, where the skin was of a more flexible nature, evidently intended for the creature’s locomotion, screw like, through the water. But its most remarkable feature was a series of eight long thin spines of a bright red colour springing from the top of the head and following each other at an interval of about an inch; the longest was in the centre: it is now in the possession of Colonel Munro, the acting Governor of the Colony; and I had the opportunity of examining it very closely. It is two feet seven inches long, about three eighth of an inch in circumference at the base, and gradually tapering, but flattened at the extreme end, like the blade of an oar. The shell of these spines is hard, and, on examination by a powerful glass, appeared to be double, some red colouring matter being between the shells; the outside, which to the touch and natural eye was smooth, being rough and much similar to the small claws or feelers of the lobster or crayfish. The centre was a wide pith, like an ordinary quill. The three foremost of these spines were connected for about half their length by a greasy filament; the rest being unconnected; the serpent had the power of elevating or depressing the crest at pleasure. The serpent was carefully examined by several medical and scientific gentlemen; the head, dorsal spine, and greater part of the crest are in the possession of J. M. Jones Esq., an eminent naturalist, who will, doubtless, send home a more learned description of this “wonder of the deep”. I regret that the immediate departure of the mail for England prevents my preparing you any more careful drawing of this great “sea-serpent” than that I enclose.”
Mr. NEWMAN, the Editor of the _Zoologist_, adds hereto the following note:
“Written by Captain Hawtaigne, of Her Majesty’s 39 Foot. I place implicit reliance on the narrative, except as to the animal being identical with that seen by Capt. M’Quhae, of which I think there is no evidence. Mr. J. M. Jones is an old subscriber to the _Zoologist_, and a most intelligent; but the query occurs to me, “Is not _this_ sea-serpent a ribband fish?”--
Yes, _this_ sea-serpent was a ribband fish. And the “eminent naturalist”, Mr. J. M. JONES, soon afterwards described this species for the _Zoologist_, p. 6986. Here we read that the Editor, Mr. EDWARD NEWMAN has “received the following particulars of this most interesting capture from an old and valued correspondent of the _Zoologist_. It must be read in connection with a previous note on the same animal in the April number of the _Zoologist_. (Zool. p. 6934)”.
Now follows the description of the animal, by Mr. J. MATHEW JONES, with which we will not trouble our readers, only referring them to our fig. 13, p. 93, of a ribband fish, closely allied to the specimen, captured in the Bermudas.
Mr. JONES adds comparisons of this fish with the great sea-serpent seen by Captain M’QUHAE (see report n^o. 118), and concludes that part of the reports concerning the great sea-serpent originated from the appearance of ribband fishes. His views of the matter, however, will be treated of in our chapter on the various explanations.
Immediately after this article Mr. NEWMAN wrote another, in which he shows that this fish is a _new species_, giving it the name _Regalecus Jonesii_, NEWMAN. How far Mr. NEWMAN was right in doing so, I am unable to decide. He gives a full description of his new species, and adds that he is not competent to express an opinion upon the similarity of _Regalecus Jonesii_ to Capt. M’QUHAE’S sea-serpent.
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1878.--The _Scotsman_ of September 6th. of this year has inserted in its columns the following account.
“A Baby Sea-Serpent.--From Van Diemen’s Land comes news of the capture of a queer fish. It is fourteen feet long, fifteen inches deep from the neck to the belly, tapering two inches to the tail, and eight inches in diameter in the thickest place. There are no scales, but the skin is like polished silver, with eighteen dark lines and rows of spots running from the head to the tail each side. There is a mane on the neck twenty inches long, and continues from the head to the tail; small head, no teeth, protrusive mouth, capable of being extended four inches like a sucker; eyes flat, about the size of a half crown, and like silver, with black pupils. There are two feelers under the chin, thirty-two inches long. The fish was alive when captured.”
Mr. ANDREW WILSON who communicated this capture in _Nature_ of the 12th. of September, 1878, Vol. XVIII, thinks that this account “seems explicable only on the tape fish theory.” I think he might have written “_is_ explicable only on the tape fish theory”, or in short: “this was evidently a tape fish.” A tape fish is identical to a ribband fish. Though these fishes are deep-sea fishes, some species evidently don’t live at great depth, and are occasionally cast ashore after a storm, as had also happened, in 1860, on the Bermudas (see hereabove).
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1879, December 23.--(G. VERSCHUUR, _Eene reis rondom de wereld in 480 dagen_, p. 51.)
On the 21st. of December, 1879, Mr. VERSCHUUR on board the _Granada_, left Mazatlan, a harbour on the western coast of Mexico, for San Francisco. Probably on the 23d. the _Granada_ passed Cape San Lucas at 23° N. lat. Mr. VERSCHUUR says:
“Past Cape San Lucas, one afternoon, as I am gazing at the ocean surface, I see a long neck rising out of the water very close to the ship. I beckon some other passengers who are on deck, and after a few minutes the object in question appears a second time. It is the neck of a snake, one would say, and we estimate the length of the visible part of the animal at about a meter. The thickness is about that of the upper-arm of a full-grown man and the head ends in a point, and is as large as a child’s head”.
“We call the whole crew, and the captain as well as some officers run to. But the animal does not appear again. Nevertheless five of us had seen the animal distinctly, so that a violent altercation arose, when one of the officers said we evidently were mistaken, because the sea-serpent did not exist.”
“Nobody of us, it is true, could affirm that it was a sea-serpent. We could only firmly maintain that what we had seen, agreed in all respects with the shape of a serpent.”
“The second officer, who joined in the conversation, declared to have observed in 1871 near the coast of Australia, a sea-serpent which was several meters in length, and when this statement too was called in question, the quarrel got warmer and warmer, and, as it generally happens in such cases, every one kept his own opinion, and the world did not get any the wiser for it.”
“Does the sea-serpent exist, or does he not? This is a problem which has been answered more than once in the most affirmative manner, and also in a negative sense. I have heard the question disputed on more than one voyage.”
In order to obtain more particulars about the animal, I wrote to Mr. VERSCHUUR Oct. 26th., 1889, directing to him the following questions:
“Did the features of the “snake” make on you the impression to be those of a mammal, like those of a seal or sea-lion, though the pointed head more resembled that of a snake?”
“Or had the head, though being much larger, more the shape of that of an eel?”
“Were there just behind the head a pair of fins, as eels have?”
“Why did the visible part make on you the impression to be a “neck”. You speak of a “neck” of a snake. Was the diameter near the head smaller than that just above the water, as if the animal was still thicker under water?”
“Or did you observe the contrary?”
“Was the “snake” perfectly round, or was it provided on its back with a fin, as in eels?”
“What colour had your snake, and had the belly and the back the same colour?”
“Did you observe any eyes, nostrils, ears, ear holes, gills, whiskers, or any other appendages?”
“These are all questions which a zoologist wants to have answered in order to determine somewhat, what animal may have been seen by you.”
Mr. VERSCHUUR had the courtesy to send me an early answer Oct. 30th., 1889. The part of this letter referring to my questions runs as follows:
“I greatly regret to say that my answers will not help you much. The distance at which I saw this strange animal was too great, and the appearance too short, to observe anything of the particulars stated by you.”
“The part which we saw rise out of the sea had, if my memory does not deceive me, the thickness of a full-grown upper-arm, and the length of from 1 to 1¹⁄₂ meter.”
“The head seemed to be round, and of the common shape of a snake’s head, i. e. having nearly the tapering shape of the “cobra” or of the rattlesnake.”
“Of scales, eyes, fins, etc., I could observe nothing, during this short appearance. The colour seemed to me to be a greyish one.”
“I regret not being able to give you more details than those written by me in my book of travels.”
I think this animal was of the eel-tribe, the dimensions were too small even to admit the supposition that it was a spawn of the sea-serpent.
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We observe that many so-called great sea-serpents are to be explained by reference to _known_ animals. There are, however, a great many sea-serpents which don’t answer to the description of any _known_ being at all, unless we venture upon a suggestion which is either wrong, forced, or premature, and which can be accepted only with a smile or a shrug of the shoulders.
Some sea-serpent explainers are in the habit of explaining _one single_ sea-serpent, say by reference to a row of porpoises, and then try to account for others by this suggestion, the upshot of which is that the explainer does no longer see his way clear of the difficulties which beset him, and driven to his wits’ end, cuts the Gordian knot, leaving a great many sea-serpents unexplained.
Others, like Mr. GOSSE, Mr. ANDREW WILSON, and Mr. HENRY LEE, were prepossessed with opinions which made of every sea-serpent a _Plesiosaurus_, an extraordinarily developed _Hydrophis_, or a large Calamary (_Architeuthis_).
But none of them hit on the plan to put all the accounts, tales, and reports of this great unknown animal side by side, to point out the statements which are immediately recognizable as strange, or explicable by reference to some known animal, and finally to decide which of the known animals may have been bold enough to present itself as a deceitful serpentine creature, or, if the result is negative and leads to the conclusion that the sea-serpent does not belong to any known species of animal, to decide, what kind of animal does exist, though _unknown_ to zoologists! And to this inquiry we pass now.
IV.
The various accounts and reports concerning observations of Sea-Serpents, chronologically arranged and thoroughly discussed; and criticisms of the papers written about the subject.
An account of the appearance of a Sea-Serpent, published in _Nature_ of Nov. 18, 1880, induced me to make a study of that subject. A few months afterwards I wrote a little paper for the _Album der Natuur_, a Dutch periodical, designed to bring the latest progress and problems of Science in a very popular manner under the eyes of non-scientific readers.
In that paper I discussed the probability of the existence of an animal which was unknown to zoologists, but which nevertheless existed, and gave rise to all the narratives of the Great Sea-Serpent.
In January, 1889, I happened to come across a paper on the same subject by Mr. HENRY LEE. In this work “_Sea Monsters Unmasked_” the sea-serpent is explained in several manners, as having been a row of porpoises following one another, as some gigantic sea-weed, as huge calamaries, and though hesitatingly as any still unknown animal belonging to a genus of reptiles, the representatives of which are only known in the fossil state.
Having given another explanation in my above-mentioned paper, and seeing that Mr. LEE did not mention my supposition, I am now so bold as to repeat my attempt at explaining the Sea-Serpent in another manner; I have chosen the English language as being known to all zoologists and to all navigators.
The Sea-Serpents and other serpents of extraordinary dimensions, quoted by ARISTOTELES (_History of Animals_, Book 8, chapt. 28), PLINIUS (_Naturalis Historiae_, Lib. 4, cap. 23, Lib. 8, cap. 14), VALERIUS MAXIMUS (_de Factis Dictisque Memorabilibus_, Lib. 1, cap. 8, 1st. century), FLORUS (Lib. 2), SENECA (litt. 82), SILVIUS ITALICUS (Lib. 6), AULUS GELLIUS (Lib. 6, cap. 3), OROSIUS, ZONARES, DIODORUS SICULUS, VOLETERRANUS (_Commentariorum Urbanorum_ libri 38, book 12), PETR. MARTYR (_Decad._ 1, lib. 10), BAKIUS (_Posidonii Vita et Reliquiae_, p. 115), AELIANUS, VERGILIUS, etc., were most probably nothing but pythons.
The various kinds of _Serpens marinus_ alluded to by ARISTOTELES and PLINIUS, and afterwards described and figured by many other authors, evidently belong to the sea-eels, e. g. those of _Père_ JEAN BAPTISTE LABAT in 1722, or were doubtless real sea-snakes, which reach no greater length than about twelve feet.
For these reasons we will pass all the descriptions of these different animals, and review only reports of no earlier date than the year 1500 A. D.
Having examined all the descriptions and figures of the Great Sea-Serpent published from 1500 A. D. up to this day, we come to the conclusion, as we have already stated above, that some of the so-called sea-serpents were fishes of slender form, others were cuttles of extraordinary dimensions (_Cephalopoda Decapoda Chondrophora_). In all these cases it is not impossible, and sometimes not difficult for a zoologist, who is familiar with these creatures and their habits, to explain those observations, but the greater part of the accounts of Great Sea-Serpents do _not_ agree with the well-known shape of sea-weeds and cuttles, _nor_ with the habits of porpoises. Mr. LEE tries a few times to identify the Sea-Serpent with these kinds of animals, but all who saw the sea-serpent moving with vertical undulations, and figured it thus, knew the habits of those animals, and some of them testified, that it could not have been porpoises, which they knew well enough to be sure of it. I will add here that porpoises move irregularly and have dorsal fins, which must of course be visible whenever they appear on the surface, whilst in none of the accounts mentioning the sea-serpent moving in vertical undulations, there is any question of dorsal fins visible on the coils of the sea-serpent.
But let us now pass to the accounts that have come within our reach, and peruse them in order of their date.
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=1=.--1522.--(See OLAUS MAGNUS, _Historia de gentibus_, etc.) “There is also another serpent of an astonishing size in an island called Moos, in the diocese of Hammer: which portends a change in the Kingdom of Norway, as a comet does in the whole world, as it was seen, anno 1522, raising itself high above the surface of the water and circling like a spire. Seen from afar this serpent was estimated by conjecture to be fifty cubits long; this event was followed by the banishment of King Christiernus and by a great persecution of the Bishops; and it also showed the destruction of the country, as Isidorus tells us of the birds of Diomedes.”
In the original Latin we read _atque in modum sphaerae convolvens_ (and wrinkling like a ball), but as this has no sense, I am convinced that we have to do with a misprint, and that the author evidently wrote _atque in modum spirae convolvens_, which I have translated above “and circling like a spire”. This evidently signifies that the observer saw the animal swimming with vertical undulations, parts of which were visible above the surface of the water.
Further we must direct our attention to the statement that the animal raised itself high above the surface of the water.
Finally that it was estimated to be fifty cubits long, i. e. about seventy-five feet.
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OLAUS MAGNUS, the Archbishop of Upsala wrote in 1555 as follows: