MONSTERS AND SUPERSTITIONS. 



769 



sea-serpent. The author does not rest satisfied with 

 giving a description of this creature; he dehneates it, and 

 in his engravings we see the reptile issuing from the waves, 



336. Sea-serpent.— Facsimae token from Glaus Magnus : DeGentihus SeptentrionaUhus,155o. 



and launching itself upon the ships in order to devour 

 the crews. ^ 



Elsewhere the Bishop of Upsala represents Cetacea 

 which crush ships in their formidable jaws! 



And yet though it seems incredible, our epoch, in 

 respect to the history of marine monsters, leaves the old 

 legends of the middle ages and of the Eenaissaiice far 

 behind. In fact it is impossible to dream of anything 



' "The old Scandinavian writers attribute to the sea-serpent a length of (50(1 

 feet, -with a head closely resembling that of a horse, black eyes, and a kind of 

 ■white mane. According to them, it is only met with in the ocean, where it 

 suddenly rears itself up like a mast of a ship-of-the-line, and gives vent to hissing 

 noises which appal the hearer, like the tempest roar. The Norwegian poets 

 compare its progress to the flight of a swift arrow. When the fishermen descry 

 it, they row in the direction of the sun, the monster being unable to see them 

 when its head is turned towards that planet. They say that it revoh'es some- 

 times in a circle around the doomed vessel, whose crew thus find themselves 

 assailed on every side." — The Mysteries of the Ocean, by Mangin. — Tr. 



