318 THE GEEAT UNKNOWN. 



was visible to the naked eye for five minutes, and with a 

 glass for perhaps fifteen more. The weather was dark 

 and squally at the time, with sea running. " * 



The pictorial sketch alluded to in Captain M/Quhae's 

 report, as well as one representing the animal in another 

 aspect, was published in the Illustrated London News, 

 of October 28, 1848, "under the supervision of Captain 

 M'Quhae, and with his approval of the authenticity of 

 the details as to position and form." These drawings 

 will be criticised presently. 



As I have already said, a good deal of popular curiosity 

 and interest was immediately awakened ; and the public 

 papers were for a while filled with strictures, objections, 

 suggestions, and confirmations. Among the last, Captain 

 Beechey, the eminent navigator, mentioned an extraor- 

 dinary appearance which had occurred to him during the 

 voyage of the Blossom, in the South Atlantic. " I took 

 it for the trunk of a large tree, and before I could get 

 my glass it had disappeared." 



Mr J. D. Morries Stirling, a gentleman long resident 

 in Norway, communicated to the Secretary to the 

 Admiralty important confirmatory evidence of the ex- 

 istence of the animal on the coasts of that country, 

 collected by a scientific body at Bergen, of which he was 

 one of the directors. In the course of this communica- 

 tion, the writer points out certain points of resemblance 

 borne by the Norwegian animal to the great fossil reptiles 

 known to geologists as the Enaliosauri : " In several of 



* Zoologist, p. 2306. 



