412 WHALES, SEALS, AND SEA-SERPENTS 



were great globes 15 inches in diameter ; and Pro- 

 fessor Verrill has collected notes of a considerable 

 number observed from time to time, chiefly on New- 

 foundland, whose arms ranged from 30 to 42 feet 

 in length, and whose entire length, body and arms 

 and all, were in some cases over 50 feet. We have 

 every reason to suppose that these few stragglers that 

 have been stranded and measured give us but a very 

 imperfect idea of the dimensions that may actually 

 be attained. Again, in Japanese pictures and carvings 

 we have portrayed, with evident good faith and 

 accuracy, precisely similar monsters of the cuttle-fish 

 kind. As has been already mentioned in these pages, 

 the Prince of Monaco has on several occasions dis- 

 covered in^the stomach of the Sperm Whale the half- 

 digested remains of cuttle-fish, great, if not so great, 

 as these ; and it may be remembered that many stories 

 of the sea-serpent describe it as in combat with the 

 whale, and wrapping its long coils about the Cetacean's 

 body. Dr. Andrew Wilson and (afterwards, and in 

 greater detail) Mr. Henry Lee have shown that many 

 stories of the sea-serpent might be so interpreted as to 

 correspond to just such gigantic cuttle-fish as Owen, 

 Verrill, and the other naturalists have proved the 

 existence of. Thus in Hans Egede's drawing and 

 description of his monster, with its spouting head and 

 writhing tail, both elevated high above the surface of 

 the sea, we seem to see the tail and one of the sinuous 

 tentacles of a great cuttle, whose head and remaining 

 tentacles were still submerged. 



Then, again, there are many other accounts, which 

 describe a more serpent-like animal, floating in huge 

 coils upon the sea, such as that reported from the 

 Indian Ocean by the Captain of H.M.S. " Daedalus " in 

 1848, by the officers of the barque " Pauline " in 1877, 



