The Unnatural History of the Sea 179 



and Olaus Magnus and Pontoppidan. It matters nothing 

 about nothing, so long as the stuff will sell, and especially 

 if it is bought wholesale by the schools. 



It is true that the unnatural author disclaims having seen 

 these miracles, but he gives them to the easy American pub- 

 lic with the guarantee that he has spared no pains to make 

 these stories accord, so far as the natural history facts are 

 concerned, with the latest scientific information. 



It is some years since I saw a giant squid, and four or five 

 since I handled, kept alive and examined specimens eight 

 feet long; but it is evident, if this is true, that in the interim, 

 glove stretchers have become the fashion in the deep sea, 

 or the squids have laughed so heartily at modern fish stories 

 that their mouths have stretched from a few inches to seven 

 or eight feet. 



Does our modern Magnus stop here ? Not he. Notwith- 

 standing the fact that the squid is, as a rule, the open-water 

 dweller of the group, he confuses their habits, and shows 

 us the giant squid creeping into a cave, then into the cabin 

 of a ship. Then the squid, one of the most timid of all 

 animals, is endowed with all the habits of the octopus, a 

 cave-loving creature, also very timid, and, doubtless, would 

 not attack a diver unless cornered. This monster is seen to 

 crush a glass plate in a diver's electric light. Nothing is 

 said about its using a hammer, so it is assumed to be main 

 strength. Finally the giant squid is destroyed by the great 

 killer, or orca, a creature so useful in the water that it ought 

 to be introduced on land. 



These fish stories are a new brand of unnatural history 

 fish stories, yet we are told they are true to science. Some 

 day when the author of them decides to go down to the sea, 

 to see real squids, real orcas, and perhaps talk with the men 

 who know them, like Verrill, mayhap he will find a chair 

 on the Porch Club in the vale of Avalon, and perhaps the 

 owner of the Candelaria will tell him of the melting reel, 

 and show him the scars on the launch in which they fought 



