THE GREA T SEA SERPENT. 
87 
In a letter addressed to the Editor of the Bombay Times, 
and dated " Kamptee, January 3rd, 1849," Mr. R. Davidson, 
Superintending Surgeon, Nagpore Subsidiary Force, de- 
scribes a great sea animal seen by him whilst on board 
the ship Royal Saxon, on a voyage to India, in 1829. The 
features of this incident are consistent with his having seen 
one of the, then unknown, great calamaries. 
Dr. Scott, of Exeter, sent to the Editor of the Zoologist 
(p. 2459), an extract from the memorandum-book of Lieu- 
tenant Sandford, R.N., written about the year 1820, when 
he was in command of the merchant ship Lady Combermere. 
In it he mentions his having met with, in lat. 46, long. 3 
(Bay of Biscay), an animal unknown to him, an immense 
body on the surface of the water, spouting, not unlike the 
blowing of a whale, and the raising up of a triangular ex- 
tremity, and subsequently of a head and neck erected six 
feet above the surface of the water. This was evidently a 
great squid seen under circumstances similar to those 
described by Hans Egede (p. 67). 
In the Su7i Newspaper of July 9th, 1849, was published 
the following statement of Captain Herriman, of the ship 
Brazilia7i : 
"On the morning of the 24th February, the ship being be- 
calmed in lat. 26° S., long. 8° E. (about forty miles from the place 
where Captain M'Quh^e is said to have seen the serpent), the 
captain perceived something right astern, stretched along the 
water to a length of twenty-five or thirty feet, and perceptibly 
moving from the ship, with a steady sinuous motion. The head, 
which seemed to be lifted several feet above the water, had some- 
thing resembling a mane running down to the floating portion, 
and within about six feet of the tail. Of course Captain Herriman, 
Mr. Long, his chief officer, and the passengers who saw this came 
to the conclusion that it must be the sea-serpent. As the ' Bra- 
zilian ' was making no headway, to bring all doubts to an issue. 
