208 PLEASANT WA YS IN SCIENCE. 



would not have been found to have fastened in the body 

 altogether by accident Be this as it may, the fishermen 

 were so far frightened that superstition got the better of 

 curiosity ; so that, as they were evidently very foolish fellows, 

 their evidence is scarcely worth much. There are, however, 

 only two points in their narrative which do not seem easily 

 reconciled with the belief that they had captured a rather 

 young female of a species closely allied to the common seal 

 the distinct unwebbed fingers and the small arms folded 

 across the breast Other points in their description suggest 

 marked differences in degree from the usual characteristics 

 of the female seal ; but these two alone seem to differ abso- 

 lutely in kind. Considering all the circumstances of the 

 narrative, we may perhaps agree with Mr. Gosse to this 

 extent, that, combined with other statements, the story in- 

 duces a strong suspicion that the northern seas may hold 

 forms of life as yet uncatalogued by science. 



The stories which have been related about monstrous 

 cuttle-fish have only been fabulous in regard to the dimen- 

 sions which they have attributed to these creatures. Even 

 in this respect it has been shown, quite recently, that some 

 of the accounts formerly regarded as fabulous fell even short 

 of the truth. Pliny relates, for instance, that the body of a 

 monstrous cuttle-fish, of a kind known on the Spanish coast, 

 weighed, when captured, 700 Ibs., the head the same, the 

 arms being 30 feet in length. The entire weight would pro- 

 bably have amounted to about 2000 Ibs. But we shall pre- 

 sently see that this weight has been largely exceeded by 

 modern specimens. It was, however, in the Middle Ages 

 that the really fabulous cuttle-fish flourished the gigantic 

 kraken, " liker an island than an animal," according to cre- 

 dulous Bishop Pontoppidan, and able to destroy in its 

 mighty arms the largest galleons and war -ships of the four- 

 teenth and fifteenth centuries. 



It is natural that animals really monstrous should be 

 magnified by the fears of those who have seen or encoun- 

 tered them, and still further magnified afterwards by tradi- 



