458 THE VARIOUS EXPLANATIONS. [The ‘17h 
crabs, varying from the size of a shilling to that of a man’s hand, 
were collected from it, and that this quantity of such animal life 
could be furnished with a refuge in the mats of snaky-looking 
creatures which constitued the moving monstrous-looking external 
will assist those who read my account in believing what I before 
stated that even when the object was laid on deck we had diffi- 
culty in making out what it was. Now, sea-weeds of gigantic 
growth abound near the islands of the group of Tristan d’Acunha. 
From decay or other causes, these will from time to time be de- 
tached at the roots, and with their living attachment will then, 
floating horizontally, be carried by the well-known currents, into 
the very positions where the sea-serpent delights in exhibitmg him- 
self. It is not disputed that such was the monster picked up by 
the boat’s crew of my ship. I do not doubt that more monstrous 
specimens may be seen from time to time, and I expect that your 
insertion of this correspondence will cause more attention to be 
given to their capture than, as on board of Her Majesty’s Ship 
Daedalus, to the forming of “sundry guesses’, causing the obser- 
vers to “settle down” to the conclusion: “This must be the ani- 
mal called the sea-serpent.” Had the monster I described not been 
taken, I should have believed, as firmly as Captain Harrington 
does, that I could confirm the statement of the commander of the 
Daedalus and that “the animal belonged to the serpent tribe.” 
“Everybody knows what different notions are generated by mo- 
mentary and unexpected appearances of things as compared with 
the things themselves when examined. Perhaps the nostril of the 
Daedalus sea-serpent was seen in the recollection of one spectator, 
the mouth in that of another, and so on. I take leave to question 
the possibility of these being “most distinctly visible”, when the 
object at its “nearest position” was 200 yards distant, the sea 
getting up, and the observers travelling in an opposite direction, 
the passing of the two being apparently at the rate of 20 miles 
an hour. Naturalists will say whether an animal to answer to the 
habits and attributes of that in question would have a nostril.” 
“I am sure that Captain Harrington, of the Castilian, saw an 
extraordinary object, and described it according to his impression, 
and having a great respect for “a first-class certificate in the mer- 
cantile marine” (as I hold a “first-class extra’? myself), and also for 
“Sir Colin Campbell, now in the Hast’’, to whom Capt. Harrington 
is so well known, I feel equally sure that, so accredited, he has 
published his account with no other than a good object. Never- 
