THE GREAT SEA SERPENT. 415 



opinion, it met with little favour from the public, and has 

 been slurred over much too superciliously by some sub- 

 sequent writers. It was generally felt, however, that, 

 although the head of the animal, as shown in the enlarged 

 drawing, was wonderfully seal-like, Professor Owen's sug- 

 gested explanation, that it might have been a great seal, 

 such as the leonine seal, or the sea-elephant, was unsatis- 

 factory and untenable. 



Captain M'Quhse's reply was promptly given in the 

 Times of the 2ist of November, 1848, as follows : 



" Professor Owen correctly states that I evidently saw a large 

 creature moving rapidly through the water very different from anything 

 I had before witnessed, neither a whale, a grampus, a great shark, an 

 alligator, nor any of the larger surface-swimming creatures fallen in 

 with in ordinary voyages. I now assert neither was it a common seal 

 nor a sea-elephant, its great length and its totally differing physio- 

 gnomy precluding the possibility of its being a * Phoca ' of any species. 

 The head was flat, and not a ' capacious vaulted cranium ; ' nor had it 

 a stiff, inflexible trunk a conclusion at which Professor Owen has 

 jumped, most certainly not justified by the simple statement, that no 

 portion of the sixty feet seen by us was used in propelling it through 

 the water either by vertical or horizontal undulation. 



"It is also assumed that the ' calculation of its length was made 

 under a strong preconception of the nature of the beast ; ' another con- 

 clusion quite contrary to the fact. It was not until after the great 

 length was developed by its nearest approach to the ship, and until 

 after that most important point had been duly considered and debated, 

 as well as such could be in the brief space of time allowed for so doing, 

 that it was pronounced to be a serpent by all who saw it, and who are 

 too well accustomed to judge of lengths and breadths of objects in the 

 sea to mistake a real substance and an actual living body, coolly and 

 dispassionately contemplated, at so short a distance, too, for the ' eddy 

 caused by the action of the deeper immersed fins and tail of a rapidly 

 moving gigantic seal raising its head above the surface of the water,' as 

 Professor Owen imagines, in quest of its lost iceberg. 



" The creative powers of the human mind may be very limited. 

 On this occasion they were not called into requisition ; my purpose 

 and desire throughout being to furnish eminent naturalists, such as the 



