THE SINISTER GEPHALOPODS 



similar animals to be published in the English language 

 for over eighty years. 



The cephalopodan ink-sac is the subject of a classic 

 study by Paul Girod, published in France in 1882. 

 It is a small, pear-shaped organ situated between the 

 creature's gills, and ends in a long neck which leads into 

 the funnel-like aperture from which the ink is discharged. 

 The ink, or sepia, is possessed by nearly all cephalopods. 

 Only the nautilus and some octopuses that live in the 

 deep seas are without it. It is a thick, black gummy fluid 

 that has been famous for writing purposes from time 

 immemorial. Ink from cephalopods which died and were 

 fossilized millions of years ago can be liquefied from its 

 dry state and used for writing today. The substance owes 

 its blackness to melanin, the abnormal development of 

 a dark pigment in the hair, feathers, skin, etc., of animals, 

 as opposed to albinism. Thus the cephalopod's sepia is 

 associated with one of mankind's most crucial problems, 

 racialism, for it is related to the pigments in the skins of 

 the coloured races. 



The colour of the ink varies with different species. 

 The late Ronald Winckworth, a British expert on the 

 Mollusca, described it as sepia-brown in squids, blue- 

 black in cuttle-fish and jet-black in octopuses, but its 

 basic substance in all cases consists of pigment granules 

 similar to those which develop in the melanocytes of the 

 human epidermis, and in enormous quantities in the 

 skin of the negro. 



We read in the ancient satires that the Romans used 

 sepia as an ink. Cicero calls it ''atramentum". The 

 Chinese, many thousands of years ago, used it as ink, 

 and Chinese ink is still noted for its blackness today. 

 Pliny declared that sepia was the blood of the cuttle-fish. 

 Rondelet (1507-66), famous for his investigation of the 

 fishes of the Mediterranean, stated that it was the cuttle- 

 fish's bile. 



Numerous writers in modern times have said that 



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