19 
X. 
I, William B. Pearson of Gloucester, in the County of Es¬ 
sex, merchant, depose and say: That I have, several times, seen a 
strange marine animal, that I believe to be a serpent, of great 
size. T have had a good view of him, only once, and this was on 
the 18th of August, A. D. 1817. I was in a sail boat, and 
when off Webber’s cove (so called) in the harbour of said Glou¬ 
cester, I saw something coming out of the cove ; we hove to, 
not doubting but that it was the same creature that had been 
seen several times in the harbour, and had excited much inter¬ 
est among the inhabitants of Gloucester. James P. Collins was 
the only person with me. The serpent passed out under the 
stem of our boat, towards Ten Pound Island ; then he stood in to¬ 
wards us again, and crossed our bow. We immediately ex¬ 
claimed, ‘here is the snake !’ From what I saw of him, I should 
say that he was nothing short of seventy feet in length. I dis¬ 
tinctly saw bunches on his back, and once he raised his head out 
of water. The top of his head appeared Hat, and was raised sev¬ 
en or eight inches above the surface of the water. He passed by 
the bow of the boat, at about thirty yards distance. His colour 
was a dark brown. I saw him at this time about two minutes. 
His motion was vertical. His velocity at this time was not 
great; though at times, I have seen him move with great veloc¬ 
ity, I should say at the rate of a mile in three minutes, and per¬ 
haps faster. His size I judged to be about the size of a half 
barrel. I saw Mr. Gaffney fire at him, at about the distance of 
thirty yards. I thought he hit him, and afterwards he appeared 
more shy. He turned very short, and appeared as limber and 
active as the eel, when compared to his size. The form of the 
curve when he turned in the water, resembled a staple ; his head 
seemed to approach towards his body for some feet; then his 
head and tail appeared moving rapidly, in opposite directions, 
and when his head and tail were on parallel lines, they appeared 
not more than two or three yards apart. 
Q. At what time of the day was this ? 
J. Between the hours of five and six, in the afternoon. 
