6730 



Reptiles. 



centre of the body. Brought the schooner close alongside, and to our great astonish- 

 ment found it to be a living monster. The large part of the body, or shell, was about 

 fifty feet long and sixteen feet high, conical shape and sharpening to the fore part, 

 with a long neck, and jaws about fourteen feet from the body. At the junction of the 

 neck with the body was a large horn. It had large white fins, something like the 

 wings of a bird, under the middle of the shell. We were scarcely thirty feet distant 

 when we saw the head come above water and turn towards our boat, when we hauled 

 off, tacked, and stood in on the other side for a further survey. The right fin was 

 more under the water than the left, and the horn we could see distinctly. It was very 

 long and blood-red. The neck and head again moved towards the boat, when we got 

 somewhat alarmed, and made all sail from this floating monster. We counted the 

 streaks from the centre of the back to the water fifteen to a side, and the top of the 

 shell was partly covered with birds' dung. The shell was of a dark colour, and came 

 down in wash with the water. Under the shell we could plainly see a curve, and then 

 a second projection. The hind part very much the shape of a turtle, but the fore part 

 was sharper. At 5.30 a.m., soon after we hauled off, saw an American schooner 

 passing very close to it".— Quebec Chronicle. From the 1 Times' of September 22. — 

 [Communicated by Mr. Gosse, who adds the following apposite note.'] 



What shall we say to this new American story ? My first idea on reading it was 

 that of a rorqual, dead or nearly dead, floating belly upward. The plica? of the throat 

 and belly would be the semblance of the planks of a clinker-built craft. The length 

 and height would agree well enough, especially if we suppose the small of the body 

 and the tail to have been under water. This, too, would make the pectoral fins come 

 near the middle of the (visible) body, and their white hue would agree with their 

 reversed position. It might have been mortally wounded in some of those misadven- 

 tures which whales are liable to, perhaps having run a tilt against some ship, as a 

 cachalot once did to the good ship ' Essex ;' and if so, there might well be "a good 

 deal of red about the head." 'Tis true this hypothesis will not account for the neck 

 and jaws, " about fourteen feet from the body," nor for the large horn, " very long 

 and blood-red," at the junction of the neck with the body. May the latter have been 

 the membrum virile, a little mis-stated as to position ? And may we take the liberty 

 of supposing that possibly the two extremities of the body may have been confounded, 

 and that the flukes of the tail-fin, indistinctly seen in the wash of the sea, were the 

 "jaws," and the small of the body the "neck"? In this case the " red about the head " 

 would require some other explanation. I may add, from my own observation, that 

 rorquals are quite common in that part of the Atlantic alluded to. Of course much 

 allowance must be made for imperfect observation and still more imperfect descrip- 

 tion, for the influence of surprise and terror, and for a natural love of the marvellous. 

 Whether, with this allowance, my hypothesis is tenable, I leave you and your readers 

 to judge. I am far from thinking that Science has yet chronicled all the monsters 

 that " make the deep to be hoary but I doubt whether this was one of the " great 

 unknown." Pray keep a sharp look out for the report of the American schooner. — 

 P. H. Gosse ; Torquay, September 23, 1 859. 



A new British Snake. — The Hon. Arthur Russell has sent to the British Museum 

 a specimen of the female Coronella austriaca, which was taken by a resident near the 



