Zoology.'] NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. {Fishes 



The smaller proportional depth of the body compared to the 

 total length in the fresh specimen I have examined, than in that 

 caught in Filey Bay, and named the type of G. Banksi, may perhaps 

 be a sexual peculiarity of the male. The depth published of the 

 Filey Bay specimen, 13 ft. long, is 1 ft., and probably includes the 

 fin ; in our specimen of the same length the fin is 2 in., and the 

 body 1\ in., or 2| in. less. The example caught in a shallow pool, 

 in 1800, at the outer Fern Islands, was only 1 ft. deep, with a 

 length of 18 ft. ; the one measured in 1845, at Alnmouth, was 

 16 ft. long, and 11 in. deep. The greatest length recorded is 24 ft., 

 found on the Yorkshire coast, near Redcar, in 1850. The spines 

 on the crest are cylindrical, hollow, and slightly rough. The 

 granules on the body are like little seed pearls, largest on the 

 ventral line. 



I have little doubt that this fish is the " Sea Serpent " of 

 the popular accounts in the newspapers of observations made 

 far out at sea by captains of ships, perfectly trustworthy, but not 

 sufficiently instructed in zoology to give good descriptions. The 

 Regalecus, like the Trachypterus^ is so excessively fragile that it is 

 obvious it could only live in the depths of the ocean, far from land, 

 where the water is still and free from the turbulence of the shallow 

 soundings near the coasts, in which the majority of ordinary fishes 

 flourish ; and the few specimens which have been caught were dead 

 or dying, and much damaged in the shallow waters. As one 

 recorded measured 24 ft. with a depth of about 1, we have here no 

 inconsiderable approach to the dimensions reported of the " Sea 

 Serpent." Making some reasonable allowance for the portion not 

 exposed above the surface, and bearing in mind that many fishes 

 continue to grow as long as they live, we may reasonably expect 

 far longer specimens to exist in their proper habitats far from land, 

 and occasionally showing on the surface there with just the appear- 

 ance usually described, namely, a small head, with a " tall crest " 

 and a fin along the back. Now there are Sea Snakes, well known, 

 of small size, but no snakes or serpents have a crest and fin along 

 the back ; while the description is fairly matched by our fish. I think 

 captains of ships are too familiar with Seals, Conger Eels, or long 

 stretches of ocean seaweeds to mistake any of them, as different 



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