? 
12 ATTEMPTS TO DISCREDIT THE SEA-SERPENT. 
affidavits printed in the newspapers, they swear that when on 
their next voyage they meet with it, they will bring it home! 
But on the next voyage, though they are constantly on the watch, 
the sea-serpent does not appear, and the time for returning home 
arrives. One of the sailors, perhaps even the captain hits upon an 
idea, a splendid one! Though he did not meet with the serpent, 
yet he has seen it with his own eyes! but the beast swam so rapidly 
that he could not pursue it! So in a moment he is resolved on | 
hoaxing the gullible! 
It is clear that the unbeliever must have had a great pleasure 
in inventing the hoax upon the subject, and in playing some 
splendid tricks on the believers! 
Some of these hoaxes are admirably set up, and I will begin 
by telling my readers some of them, which I met with in the 
various works | had the opportunity to consult. 
The earliest hoax or exaggerated report is that, published for 
the first time in the Report of 1817. There we find in a letter 
from the Rev. Mr. Wir11am Junxs the following: 
“He” (Mr. Srapuus of Prospect) “told me also that about 1780, 
as a schooner was lying at a mouth of the river, or in the bay, 
one of these enormous creatures leaped over it between the masts — 
that the men ran into the hold for fright, and that the weight 
of the serpent sunk the vessel “one streak” or plank. The schooner 
was of about eighteen tons.” | 
Now follows the hoax of a Josepx Woopwarp, who had reason 
to be satisfied, for his tale appeared in many newspapers at Boston, 
New York, etc. It runs as follows: 
“Another sea-serpent, different to the one first seen near Cape 
Anne, is said to have been seen, and the following declaration has 
been drawn up and attested in proper form.” 
“I, the undersigned, Joseph Woodward, captain of the Adamant 
schooner of Hingham, being on my route from Penobscot to 
Hingham, steering W. N. W., and being about 10 leagues from 
the coast, perceived last Sunday, at two P. M. something on the 
surface of the water, which seemed to me to be of the size of a 
large boat. Supposing that it might be part of the wreck of 
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