ASA THE VARIOUS EXPLANATIONS. [The 10th. ] 
seum, a strict zoologist, is cited by Mr. Gosse as having long ago 
expressed his opinion that some undescribed form exists which is 
intermediate between the tortoises and the serpents.” 
“Prof. Agassiz, too, 1s adduced by a correspondent of the Zoo- 
logist (p. 2395), as having said concerning the present existence 
of the Enaliosaurian type that “it would be in precise conformity 
with analogy that such an animal should exist in the American 
Seas, as he had found numerous instances in which the fossil forms 
of the Old World were represented by living types in the New.” 
It is obvious that of all animals, now living or extinct, the 
outlines of the Plesiosaurus fit best to the descriptions and figures 
of the great sea-serpent. Abandoning the possibility of still living 
Plesiosaurt, 1 reply to the question “Why cannot the sea-serpent 
be a Plesvosaurus?” 
Plesiosaurt with such an enormous tail as the sea-serpent has, 
are hitherto unknown to palaeontologists, but, as to me, this can- 
not be of much importance; for there is no reason why in the 
course of ages this appendage should not have been developed to 
gigantic dimensions. The difference between the place of the nos- 
trils in the two animals cannot claim any weight either (the Ple- 
siosaurus had its nostrils both before its eyes and not at the end 
of its snout, as is the case in the sea-serpent) for this place may 
have changed in process of time. But there are two other differen- 
ces which are of very great importance, and settle the question: 
1. The neck of the Plesiosaurus must have been fit to be bent in 
all directions, but I think no palaeontologist will ever admit that 
its trunk or backbone could be bent in such vertical undulations , 
as is the case with the sea-serpents. 2. The Plestosaurus may have 
been destitute of scales, and may have had a smooth skin, it can 
never have been provided with a hairy skin as seals have, and at 
all events it had no mane, and no whiskers. 
An eleventh explanation is properly a negative one. In the 
American Journal of Science and Arts, of 1835, viz: Prof. Bmnga- 
MIN Sruuiman, the Editor, published a report of one of his acquaint- 
ances, wherein the eye-witness declared: “nothing like a fin was 
seen”. Now Prof. Sinumman in a Remark of the Haditor says: 
“The absence of paddles or arms forbids us from supposing that 
this was a swimming saurian.”’ 
I need not observe that this explanation was premature, and — 
