1874.] MR. W. S. KENT ON CERTAIN GIGANTIC CEPHALOPODS. 489 



14. A further Communication upon certain Gigantic Cepha- 

 lopods recently encountered off the Coast of Newfound- 

 land. By W. Saville Kent, F.L.S., F.Z.S. 



[Received May 18, 1874.] 



In my communication to the Zoological Society, dated the 1 7th 

 of February last, a description is given of a gigantic Cephalopod 

 lately encountered in Conception Bay, Newfoundland, and of which 

 a tentacle 19 feet long is preserved in the St. John's Museum. 

 Evidence is adduced at the same time of an enormous arm preserved 

 in the British Museum and which probably belonged to an animal 

 of equally large proportions. It is likewise proposed, in the same 

 communication, to provisionally distinguish the Newfoundland ex- 

 ample by the name of Megaloteuthis harveyi, both in acknowledg- 

 ment of the services rendered to science by the Rev. M. Harvey by 

 his energetic steps taken to preserve so valuable a trophy, and in 

 consideration of the apparent absence of grounds for believing the 

 same to be either generically or specifically identical with any form of 

 its class hitherto described. In a short addendum, a brief announce- 

 ment is made of a second colossal example, which became entangled 

 in a herring-net in Logie Bay, Newfoundland, a few weeks later, and 

 of which steps had been taken to secure the entire body. 



Since the date of this communication additional evidence has been 

 produced in association with these two Newfoundland examples, as 

 also with reference to other colossal specimens previously encountered 

 in the same vicinity, which enables us to indicate, with greater 

 certainty than heretofore, the position among other representatives 

 of their tribe that these oceanic monsters probably occupy. The 

 most important evidence being associated with the specimen from 

 Logie Bay, we propose to make it the subject of our first attention. 

 This example, as already observed, was enclosed in a herring-net 

 some three miles from St. John's, the creature's arms becoming so 

 entangled in the meshes of the net that its power of resistance was 

 almost entirely annihilated ; it nevertheless required the united 

 efforts of three fishermen to finally overcome it ; and it was not until 

 the monster's head was severed from its body, that they were enabled 

 to take possession of their prize. When brought to shore this body 

 or mantle-sac was found to measure over 7 feet, the sessile arms 

 6 feet, and the two tentacula as much as 24 feet in length. 

 Photographs of these separate portions were taken ; and the one em* 

 bracing the head with the arms and tentacles, which gives an 

 excellent idea of the gigantic proportions of this Cephalopod, was 

 reproduced as a wood-engraving in the ' Field ' for January 31st *. 

 The structure and mode of arrangement of the suckers on the 

 tentacular club in this specimen, as shown by Mr. Harvey's 

 descriptive text and the photographs accompanying it, indicate 



* Also in an article on "Gigantic Cuttlefish," by the present author, in the 

 ' Popular Science Review ' for April 1874. 



Proc. Zool. Soc— 1874, No. XXXII. 32 



