2io PLEASANT WAYS IN SCIENCE. 



been at the creature's mercy a quality which, by all ac- 

 counts, the cuttle-fish does not possess to any remarkable 

 extent. 



Turn we, however, from the half fabulous woman -fish, 

 and the exaggeratedly monstrous cuttle-fish, to the famous 

 sea-serpent, held by many to be the most utterly fabulous oi 

 all fabled creatures, while a few, including some naturalists 

 of distinction, stoutly maintain that the creature has a real 

 existence, though whether it be rightly called a sea-serpent 

 or not is a point about which even believers are extremely 

 doubtful 



It may be well, in the first place, to remark that in 

 weighing the evidence for and against the existence of this 

 creature, and bearing on the question of its nature (if its 

 existence be admitted), we ought not to be influenced by 

 die manifest falsity of a number of stories relating to sup- 

 posed encounters with this animal. It is probable that, but 

 for these absurd stories, the well-authenticated narratives 

 relating to the creature, whatever it may be, which has been 

 called the sea-serpent, would have received much more 

 attention than has heretofore been given to them. It is also 

 possible that some narratives would have been published 

 which have been kept back from the fear lest a truthful 

 (though possibly mistaken) account should be classed with 

 the undoubted untruths which have been told respecting the 

 great sea-serpent. It cannot be denied that in the main the 

 inventions and hoaxes about the sea-serpent have come 

 chiefly from American sources. It is unfortunately supposed 

 by too many of the less cultured sons of America that (to use 

 Mr. Gosse's expression) " there is somewhat of wit in gross 

 exaggerations or hoaxing inventions." Of course an 

 American gentleman using the word " in that sense in which 

 every man may be a gentleman," as Twemlow hath it would 

 as soon think of uttering a base coin as a deliberate untruth 

 or foolish hoax. But it is thought clever, by not a few in 

 America who know no better, to take any one in by an 

 invention. Some, perhaps but a small number, of the news- 



