SPERM WHALE’S FOOD. 
63 
prey they enclose when they are drawn together, as to 
render it incapable of exerting its strength ; for, however 
feeble these branches or arms may be singly, their power 
united becomes surprising ; and, we are assured, nature 
is so kind to these animals, that if in their struggles any 
of their arms are broken off, after some time they will 
grow again, of which a specimen at the British Museum 
is an undoubted proof, for a little new arm is there seen 
sprouting forth in the room of a large one which had 
been lost. “It is evident,” he continues, “from what 
has been said, that the sea polypus, or octopus, must 
be terrible to the inhabitants of the waters in proportion 
to its size (and Pliny mentions one whose arms were 
thirty feet in length), for the close embraces of its arms 
and adhesion of its suckers must render the efforts of its 
prey ineffectual, either for resistance or escape, unless it 
be endued with an extraordinary degree of strength.” 
Of the smaller genera of these animals the reader will 
find some interesting details, by referring to the appen- 
dix to Tuckey’s Voyage to the Congo, vol. iii. There is 
also an account of a newly-discovered Cephalopod in the 
appendix to Sir J. Boss’ Voyage to the Antarctic Regions. 
A gigantic cephalopod was discovered by Drs. Bank 
and Solander, in Captain Cook’s first voyage, floating 
dead upon the sea, surrounded by birds, who were feed- 
ing on its remains. From the parts of this specimen 
which are still preserved in the Hunterian Collection, and 
which have always strongly excited the attention of 
naturalists, it must have measured at least six feet from 
the end of the tail to the end of the tentacles. 
