GIGANTIC CUTTLE-FISHES. m 



body 7 inches each in breadth, and mentions one seen by Mrs. 

 Graham, which had arms 28 feet long. 



In the Musemn of the Royal College of Surgeons are portions 

 of an Onychoteuthis or Enoploteuthis (a squid, the suckers of which 

 are furnished with prehensile hooks), found floating by Drs. Banks 

 and Solander between Cape Horn and the Polynesian Islands, 

 and described as having been 6 feet in length, including the 

 tentacular arms.'" The loAver portion of the body, with the fins 

 attached, in a dried and shrunken condition, is 18 inches long; 

 the beak, 3 J inches. A part of one of its arms, with the hooked 

 suckers, is also to be seen, which, however, being only the tip of 

 one, gives no clue to its entire length. 



Still there remained a residuum of doubt in the minds of 

 naturalists and the public concerning the existence of gigantic 

 cuttle-fishes until, towards the close of the year 1873, two spe- 

 cimens were encountered on the coast of Newfoundland, and a 

 portion of one and the whole of the other were brought ashore 

 and preserved for examination by competent zoologists. 



The circumstances under which the first was seen, as sensation- 

 ally described by the Rev. M. Harvey, Presbyterian minister of 

 St. John's, Newfoundland, in a letter to Principal Dawson, of 

 McGill College, were, briefly and soberly, as follows :— Two fisher- 

 men were out in a small punt on the 26th of October, 1873, near 

 the eastern end of Belle Isle, Conception Bay, about nine miles 

 from St. John's. Observing some object floating on the water at a 

 short distance they rowed towards it, supposing it to be the debris of 

 a wreck. On reaching it one of the men struck it with his " gafi"" 

 when immediately it showed signs of life, and shot out its two 

 tentacular arms, as if to seize its antagonists. One of the men 

 severed both amis with an axe as they lay on the gunwale of the 

 boat, whereupon the animal moved off, and ejected a quantity of 

 inky fluid which darkened the surrounding water for a consider- 

 able distance. 



* This is the specimen described by Molina. 



