194 THE OCEAK 



swimmer, who endeavoured to return ; but in sight 

 of his comrades was presently overtaken, the crea- 

 ture throwing over him one of its huge fins, and thus 

 carrying him down. In the following record, which 

 was inserted in a late Barbadoes paper, though the 

 description is not drawn up exactly as a Naturalist 

 would have done it, one has no difficulty in recognis- 

 ing an enormous Cei^lKdoptera : — " On the 22nd of 

 August [IS-iS], the Brig Eowena was lying in La 

 Guayra Eoads, the weather perfectly calm : I dis- 

 covered the vessel moving about among the shipping 

 I could not conceive what could be the matter. 1 

 gave orders to heave in, and see if the anchor was 

 gone, but it was not : but to my surprise, I found a 

 tremendous monster entangled fast in the buoy-rope, 

 and moving the anchor slowly along the bottom. I 

 then had the fish towed on shore. It was of a flat- 

 tish shape, something like a devil-fish, but very 

 curious shape, being wider than it was long, and 

 having two tusks, one on each side of the mouth, 

 and a very small tail in proportion to the fish, and 

 exactly like a bat's tail. The tail can be seen on 

 board the Brig Eowena. Dimensions of the fish 

 were as follows : — length from end of tail to end of 

 tusks, 18 feet ; from wing to wing, 20 feet ; the 

 tnouth, 4 feet wide ; and its weight, 3,502 lbs." 



Every one may imagine how much the tedium of 

 a long voyage is relieved by the company of other 

 vessels, or even by the speaking of a passing ship ; 

 but few who have only seen vessels lying in tiers, 

 side by side, at quays, or wharfs, are at all aware of, 

 or can readily understand, the anxious care with 



