March 1, 1S69.] 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



55 



MONSTERS OF THE DEEP.* 



rpiIE well-known Dutch naturalist", P. Harting, 

 -*- published, in 1SC0, a memoir on certain 

 gigantic cephalopods, some extracts from which (as 

 the work is not easily accessible) may be interesting 

 to the readers of Science-Gossip. The conclusion 

 he draws, or more properly the final suggestion he 

 throws out, appears to me to be particularly valu- 

 able. " It has long been matter of notoriety," he 

 observes, " that cephalopods of an enormous size 

 exist in the sea, although no naturalist has hitherto 

 been favoured .with the opportunity of examining 

 and reporting on a complete animal at his leisure. 

 The largest individual, of which a detailed descrip- 

 tion, accompanied by figures, has been published, is 

 the Ommastrephes giganteus of D'Orbigny. Its 

 total length was II inches, that of the body alone 

 being 17'5 inches." 



The stories of Olaus Magnus's kraken, and of the 

 colossal poulpe, which Denys de Montfort repre- 

 sents as entangling iu its enormous arms a three- 

 masted frigate, are but wild exaggerations of an 

 incontestable truth. 



Aristotle assigns to the great calamary of the 

 Mediterranean Sea a length of 5 cubits (or 7 to 

 8 feet). Moreover, he assures us that one Trcbius 

 Niger had seen a polype whose body, as it lay on 

 the beach, was calculated to be equal to a 70-gallou 

 cask : each arm was 30 feet long, and so thick as 

 scarcely to be embraced by one man ; it weighed 

 about 700 pounds. On the whole, I am inclined to 

 think that this story must not be thrust aside as 

 fabulous ; the simplicity of the description and the 

 numerical data are greatly in its favour. After all, 

 the dimensions given (as we shall see presently) do 

 not much exceed those of individuals whose exist- 

 ence is well-nigh proved by modern writers. 



Sander-Pang, Peron, Quoy, and Gaimard, have 

 seen animals, or the remains of animals, on the 

 surface of the ocean, with enormous bodies, and 

 arms G to 8 feet long. Madame Graham (quoted by 

 Johnston) saw a cephalopod whose arms were 

 IS feet long; and Schwediaver reports the capture 

 of a cachalot (Physeter) hi whose gullet was found 

 an arm of a cephalopod, which, though imperfect, 

 measured 23 feet in length. In the Hunteriau 

 Museum, London, are preserved the fins, section of 

 arm, heart, and mandible of an onychoteuthis, the 

 length of which, when perfect, could uot have been 

 less than 6 feet. The remains belong to an indi- 

 vidual encountered by Banks and Solander, the 

 companions of Captain Cook, floating on the sea 

 between Cape Horn and Australia, in lat. S. 30'II, 

 and long. W. 110-33. 



One may well believe, with these descriptions 

 before us, that the fears of the pearl and coral 



* Science Gossip, Vol. iv. P. 222, 1868. 



fishers are not altogethe* without foundation. 

 These men declare that they are sometimes seized 

 by huge molluscs of this family, who endeavour to 

 entangle them in their long arms, which are studded 

 with suckers and hooks. 



In the present day M. Steenstrup has made 

 extensive and valuable researches into the history 

 of these gigantic cephalopods. A portion only of 

 these researches has been published ; but they lead 

 to the conclusion that in the Atlantic Ocean, the 

 Northern Seas, and even the entrance of the Baltic, 

 there exist cephalopods not inferior to those de- 

 scribed by T. Niger, Schwediaver, and Madame 

 Graham. M. Steenstrup demonstrates with a rare 

 sagacity that the singular animal which was cap- 

 tured in the Sound, not far from Malmo, in 1516, 

 and to which the superstition of the natives gave 

 the name of the " Sea Monk," was really a cepha- 

 lopod, allied to Loligo, of a length of 1 Danish ells 

 (8 feet), or, including the tentacular arms, 16 feet. 



In 1853 an individual, probably of the same 

 species and of nearly the same size as the " Sea 

 Monk," was cast ashore near Aalbeck, in Jutland. 

 The mandible only was recovered by M. Steenstrup, 

 who has named it Architeuthis monaclms .. More 

 recently he has received from the captain of a vessel 

 portions of an individual picked up in the Atlantic 

 — the pharynx alone is as large as a child's head — 

 to which he has given the name of Architeuthis dm, , 

 These are not the only instances brought forward 

 by M. Steenstrup. 



The question arises — Do these monstrous indi- 

 viduals differ specifically from the smaller kinds, 

 which abound in every sea, and which are perfectly 

 well known to the naturalist ? I am inclined to 

 answer in the negative. Mere size can never form 

 an element in the diiferentiatiou of species, especially 

 in the case of animals, which probably continue to 

 grow during the whole course of their lives. A 

 neglect of this caution has already led to numerous 

 mistakes. Naturalists have fancied they saw dis- 

 tinct species in individuals, which in reality differed 

 only in age: witness the history of the Orang- 

 Outang and the Salmon.* Now the number of 

 cephalopods of small size is incredibly large, and 

 would be still greater but for the incessant depreda- 

 tions of numerous enemies, such as sea-birds, dol- 

 phins, &c. It is not unlikely that a few out of the 

 multitude of survivors make their way to the 

 deeper parts of the ocean, and there in comparative 

 safety continue to increase in size, until at last 

 they acquire those gigantic dimensions, examples 

 of which occasionally come before the world. 



Itchen Abbas. "VV". W. Spicer. 



* (Witness also Bewicke's " Solitary Thrush,", which 

 proved to be the Starling in its early plumage ; also the 

 "Whitebait," long looked upon as a distinct species, but 

 lately shown by Dr. Giinther to be the young of the Herring. — 

 W. W. S.) 



