218 THE VARIOUS ACCOUNTS, ‘NE. gi] 
“The officers selected for this duty were the sailingmaster of the 
ship, Wm. TT. Malbone, and the Rev. Cheever Felch, the instructor 
of the midshipmen.” 
“To assist i the service several of the most competent and elder 
midshipmen were designated. As they alternated periodically with 
other gentlemen of the same grade, I cannot with any degree of 
precision venture to name them. I hope that some of them are 
yet living, and, further, that they have advanced in professional 
distinction. There were also added a sufficient number of seamen 
and boys.” 
“Commodore Bainbridge, Mr. Malbone and Mr. Felch died some 
years ago.” 
“I recollect that on the first occasion, when the Lynx returned 
to the Independence, of which ship she was the tender, that Mr. 
Malbone reported as having seen a monstrous sea-animal, not before 
known to him, of the snake species; the length doubtful, but 
estimated at some eighty or more feet; and added as an accident, 
that the officers and men employed in a small boat to carry out the 
soundings had returned in haste, and indeed alarm, to the Lynx, 
which was at anchor.” 
“These statements were corroborated by Mr. Felch, the officers 
and crew.” 
“Subsequently it was seen several times, by some of the party, 
who, being soon satisfied that it was harmless approached compa- 
ratively near, and no doubt gave me a minute description of its 
appearance as it presented itself to them; but if so, the particular 
details have escaped my memory.” 
“These facts are all that I can with distinctness and certainty 
mention. Wm. Compton Bolton, Captain in the Navy of the United 
States, Saratonga Springs, July 14, 1846; to Hon. T. H. Perkins, 
Boston.” — 
It cannot surprise us that in some particulars, as “in the year 
1817”, and in some others this letter does not agree with the 
foregoing letter from the Rev. Cugzver Frencu himself, as twenty- . 
seven years had since elapsed. ) 
<0. — 1819, September? — Dr. Francis Boorr in a letter to 
Dr. Hooker, dated London, Nov. 4, 1826, and published in the 
Edinb. Journ. Sc., VI, 1827, says: 
