A16 THE VARIOUS EXPLANATIONS. [‘The 10th.] 
rities are quite sufficient to distinctive appellations. The Orkney 
animal, in fact, bears a curious resemblance to a Plesiosaurus, 
with siz legs. Nevertheless, anatomists have decided that a shark 
it really was, the anomalies being accounted for by the circum- 
stance of the drawing having been taken from hearsay and under 
the supervision of persons who only saw the original in a very 
imperfect state. The “Animal of Stronsa” and the “Scoliophis at- 
lanticus” leave us equally in the dark with regard to the physical 
economy of the sea-serpent; that is, unless the solution offered by 
Drs. Mantell and Melville (Zool. 2310) shall prove to be correct.” 
(See our 7th. explanation.) | 
“From what precedes it is evident, Jrs¢t, that the notion of 
the sea-serpent is not a mere growth of unlettered and credulous 
superstition, since it has been repeated and confirmed by parties 
than whom it would be difficult to select any more worthy of 
confidence, with this sole objection — that none of them have 
been naturalists. The critical eye of a Miller or an Owen would 
determine its true affinities in a moment. Secondly, that if we do 
the justice of rejecting all extraneous ideas, and confine ourself to 
what strictly relates to the object m question, there is a consistent 
tendency in nearly all the different narratives to invest it with the 
true characters of the reptilian class. 7'42rdly, that if there be any 
truth in the idea that the animal spends most of its time under 
water, only rising to the surface in calm weather during the sum- 
mer months, this — however difficult to conceive of an air-breath- 
ing creature — in a great measure accounts for the infrequency 
of its occurrence. But are there no other forms, even of the high- 
est stage of organization, which have been able to conceal them- 
selves from the scrutinizing of naturalists? Not to speak of the minor 
accessions of unknown species, coming in to adorn our collections 
and extend the limits of science, it deserves to be borne in mind 
that perhaps the very chief of all the quadrumana (L'roglodytes 
gorilla of Savage), the being that holds the foremost rank in the 
scale next to man, is one of the most recent contributions of the 
African Fauna. At the beginning of this century a cetaceous ani- 
mal (Physeter bidens of Sowerby), sixteen feet long, was cast ashore 
on the coast of Elginshire, the species has been previously undes- 
cribed, and not another example is commonly believed to have 
since occurred. From the difficulty of assigning it a place, it has 
been the subject of no fewer than four or five generic appellations, 
and it is finally referred, by my friend Dr. Melville, to the Ded- 
