during calm and bright weather. As one of the two instances of the 
supposed animal itself having been found, occurred in connection with the 
earliest of the above-recorded appearances, it is copied here from the 
Naturalists’ Library:— 
“ The Boston Society of Natural History has the merit of having first 
brought this serpent under the notice of zoologists; and the committee 
who described it, unhesitatingly regarded it as a specimen of one of the 
young of the great sea serpent. It was seen and hilled in September 
1817, near Sandy Bay, between a salt lake and the sea, at no great dis¬ 
tance from the shore, and was speedily brought to Boston for the exami¬ 
nation of the society. It was a yard long all but half an inch. The 
contour of the back exhibited its most singular feature, for here was 
found a waving line, produced by a series of permanent risings, which 
commenced near the head, and extended, almost without interruption, to 
the tail, their total number being 40. The body could be bent with the 
greatest facility in the vertical direction, especially at the undulations, 
but not without great difficulty laterally. The society applied to this 
animal the name of scoliophis atlanticus.” * 
The records of the sea serpent’s appearance off the coasts of Norway 
during the present century, will now be presented in an abridged form:— 
The fishermen of Segerstad told Sir Arthur de Capell Brooke that it 
was seen in 1818 in Folden Fiord. In July, 1819, Captain Schilderness 
assured Sir Arthur that it made its appearance at Otersun, being seen 
almost daily during the whole month, and continued while the warm 
weather lasted. When he (Captain S.) first saw it, he was in a boat dis¬ 
tant 200 yards, and supposes the length to have been 600 feet. The 
bishop of Nordland had seen two of them about eight miles from Dron- 
theim, being not far from them, and considered the largest to be about 
100 feet. 
In 1822, one, in bulk like an ox, and very long, made its appearance 
off the island Sorce, near Finmark, and was seen by many islanders. 
The last account was published in the newspapers of Drontheim, hav¬ 
ing been communicated to the editor by an enlightened and credible man. 
He asserted that since the beginning of the dog days the serpent had been 
* A representation of this scoliophis atlanticus, with drawings of several of its parts 
appeared in the London Illustrated News of October 28 , 1848 . 
