246 SPOKT IN NORTH AMERICA. 



Messrs. Quoy and Gaymard found in the Atlantic 

 Ocean, near the equator, the remains of a monster 

 belonging to this family, the weight of which they 

 estimated at nearly three hundred pounds ; and in 

 the same waters Rang saw one of a red colour, 

 which was of the bigness of a large cask. M. 

 Streenstrup, of Copenhagen, has published some 

 interesting observations upon a Cephalopod to which 

 he gave the name of Architeuthis Dux, which was 

 thrown, in the year 1853, upon the coast of Jutland. 

 The body, which was cut up and divided among 

 the fishermen for bait, filled several barrows. The 

 pharynx was preserved, and was as large as a child's 

 head. A section of an arm, which was shown to 

 M. Dumeril, was as large as an average thigh. 

 Finally, in 1860, M. Hartiug figured and described 

 several parts of a gigantic creature of this kind 

 which is preserved in the Utrecht Museum ; but all 

 these accounts yield in interest to that which was 

 communicated a winter ago to the Academie des 

 Sciences. 



On the 30th of November, 1861, at two o'clock 

 in the afternoon, the steam despatch-boat Alecto 

 (commanded by Lieutenant Bowyer) going between 

 Madeira and Teneriffe, and then being about forty 

 leagues to the north-east of the latter, met with an 

 enormous Cephalopod, swimming upon the surface 

 of the water. 



The creature was from eighteen to twenty feet 



