Sea Monsters Unmasked and Sea Fables Explained Part 6

[Ill.u.s.tration: 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 surpa.s.ses 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 a.n.a.logy to find some salient features of several extinct forms."

[Ill.u.s.tration: 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 cla.s.ses 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 astonis.h.i.+ng 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."

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 25.--THE "SEA SERPENT," ON THE ENALIOSAURIAN HYPOTHESIS.

_After_ Mr. P. H. GOSSE, F.R.S.]

Professor Aga.s.siz, 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 a.n.a.logy 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 ill.u.s.trations 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 s.h.i.+p, 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 s.h.i.+p 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 a.s.sume 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.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 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.

ILl.u.s.tRATED

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.