io6 LEISURE-TIME STUDIES. 



The body was about forty-five or fifty feet long, and of an oval shape, 

 perfectly smooth, but there may have been a slight ridge along the 

 spine. The back rose some five feet above the surface. An immense 

 tail, fully one hundred and fifty feet in length, rose a few inches above 

 the water. This tail I saw distinctly from its junction with the body to 

 its extremity ; it seemed cylindrical, with a very slight taper, and I 

 estimate its diameter at four feet. The body and tail were marked with 

 alternate bands of stripes, black and pale yellow in colour. The stripes 

 were distinct to the very extremity of the tail. I cannot say whether 

 the tail terminated in a fin or not. The creature possessed no fins or 

 paddles so far as we could perceive. I cannot say if it had legs. It 

 appeared to progress by means of an undulatory motion of the tail in a 

 vertical plane (that is, up and down). 



Mr. Anderson, the surgeon, confirmed the captain's account 

 in all essential respects. He regarded the creature as 

 an enormous marine salamander. ' It was apparently of 

 a gelatinous (that is, flabby) substance. Though keeping 

 up with us, at the rate of nearly ten knots an hour, its 

 movements seemed lethargic. I saw no eyes or fins, and 

 am certain that the creature did not blow or spout in the 

 manner of a whale. I should not compare it for a moment 

 to a snake. The only creatures it could be compared with 

 are the newt or frog tribe.' " * 



Placing these two latter narratives side by side with that 

 of Captain M'Quhoe, we may firstly remark the singular coin- 

 cidence that in all three narratives mention is made of 

 the head of the animal being elevated above water, this 

 feature in the animal's mode of progression having evidently 

 struck the observers as a noticeable point ; whilst the coin- 

 cidence, viewed as a piece of internal evidence, speaks 

 strongly in favour of the implied truthfulness of the narra- 

 tives. I think one may fairly assume that the supposition 

 that the parties concerned were deceived into mistaking 



* It is just possible that the "flabby" or "gelatinous" creature 

 mentioned in this narrative was a giant cuttle-fish, whose manner of 

 swimming, colour, absence of limbs, etc., would correspond with the 

 details of the narrative. The " immense tail" might be the enormous 

 arms of such a creature trailing behind the body as it swam backwards, 

 propelled by jets of water from the breathing "funnel." 



