Fish-Monsters and Myths. 1 1 1 



further inquiry is made, the wider become the differences 

 between the inhabitants of the water and the earth. 



"Where, like our moderns so profound, 

 Engag'd in dark dispute, 

 The cuttles cast their ink around 

 To puzzle the dispute. 



Where sharks like shrewd directors thrive, 

 Like lawyers rob at will, 

 Where flying fish, like trimmers live, 

 Like soldiers, swordfish kill. 



Where on the less the greater feed, 

 The tyrants of an hour, 

 Till the huge royal whale succeed 

 And all at once devour. 



Thus, in the moral world we now 



Too truly understand 



Each monster of the sea below 



Is match'd by one at land." Ch. Pitt. 



Sailors and fishermen still retain many of the old names, 

 and popular usage has familiarised us more or less with the 

 sea-horse the quaint little creature, so like a knight on a 

 chess-board sea-lion, sea-bear, sea-cat, sea-eagle, sea-bat, 

 sea-hedgehog, sea-leopard, sea-mouse, sea-scorpion, sea- 

 snipe, sea-swallow, sea-parrot, and so forth, while heralds 

 are responsible for the perpetuation of many amphibious 

 hybrids. But this tendency to see in the water a reflection 

 of everything on land is only an instance of human self- 

 consciousness, for if we were to be just to our seniors in 

 creation, and more modest, we should call ourselves land- 

 manatees, our elephants land-whales, and our tigers land- 

 sharks. As Sir Thomas Browne says " If we concede 

 that the animals of one element might bear the names ot 

 those in the other, the watery productions should have the 

 pre-nomination." 



The poets' sea-horses are veritable things of saddle and 

 harness, that "snort amayne, and from their nostrils blow 



