Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1888-06-16
SEA MONSTERS.
SOME STRANGE STORIES FROM
CREDITARLE SOURCES.
Those Sea Serpents-Reptilian Mon
stcrs-Devil-Fish Sixty Feet
Long-Ribbon Fish-Etc.

PROF. Richard A. Proctor, in Courier Journal
The sea serpent has long been regarded
as free sport for the buccaneers of the press
Folk of that very class who freely invent
| wild stories to tickle the foolish minds,
assume severe solemnity of tone in talking
of the reports of sea captains who have
seen strange sea monsters, and because
| they can lie themselves without much pain,
they conclude that it is so with others.
| The consequence Is, that the history of the
unknown monsters of the deep is affected
by two serious evils. In the first place,
many stories are invented for no worthier
purpose than to take people in, and in the
second place, those who have true stories
to tell are unwilling to tell them, fearing
they should be laughed at, and not know
ing that those who would laugh at them
most loudly are as likely as not the very
folk who have invented the wild stories
which have brought sea monsters into con-
tempt. If they are not the same, they be-
long to the same order.
A few years ago a sea monster, CORE
spending in appearance to the famed sea
serpent as often described (which is not
saying that the creature was serpent),
was seen by Captain Austin Cooper and the
officers and crew of the Carlisle Castle,
then bound for Melbourne. A description
and sketch of the monster appeared in tt
Argus When this reached London the
story was scofIed at and bullyragged by
one of the buccaneers of the press who, in
the columns of the daily Telegram, tried to
be funny at the expense of the worthy sea-
| man. Captain Cooper was unfortunately
unaware of the small value attached by
men of sense to lucubrations of this sort,
usually to be regarded as the product of
juvenility stirred by unwonted supplies of
stimulant. So he became very angry. a.
don't see any more sea serpents," he
said. at is too much to hold that one
of Green's commanders can't tell the diff
ference between piece of sea weed and
live body in water. If twenty sea serpents
come on the starboard, all hands shall he
ordered to port. No London penny-a-liner
shall say Austin Cooper is liar and
| fool" OF course, it was weak of the gal
liant Captain to care what shallow fools OF
the sort might say To a man of sense. as
he undoubtedly is, the laughter of fools
should be no more seriously annoying than
the cracking IF thorns under Z, pot"
But the fact remains that many an honest
seaman has been prevented from telling
his experiences by the idiotic outlaws Of
/ tenth-rate scribblers, who are as certain to
be called in to supply such matter as one
might expect from them in the dull season
as the dull season is to arrive.
1t should be remembered that there has
scarcely been a discovery relative to any
thing at all wonderful which has not been
| similarly haw-hawed by the foolish. 1t
was so with the ancient travellers, who, GO
ing far south, came back with the story
! perfectly true) that the sun travels from
, right to left across the sky, instead of
travelling from left to right as in their
northern home. 1t was so with the first
| accounts of the giraffe, which was shown
by the penny-a-liners of the day to be i'm
possible. 1t was so with half dozen
/ stories told by Bruce (who was made to do
duty for Baron Munchausen), all subse-
quently confirmed. 1t was so with the
| gorilla, DuChaillu being grossly insulted
! by more than one dullard who supposed
his own stupidity could tell him the lin
its of the possible.
| 1t was so In the most striking degree of
| the cutie fish, sea monster long rejected
as impossible One writer on natural his
tory, who should have known better, main
| tanned that no cutie fish ever existed
| whose tenacles exceeded twenty feet in
| length. But now it is known that not
only are there cutie fish mot Octopoda,
but belonging to the sub-order Decapoda)
having tenacles more than twice this
length, but there are several varieties in
which these enormous dimensions are at
tanned.
Let us examine some of the accounts of
sea monsters, which, despite the mischiev-
Gus influence of press bufioonery, have
been reported by sea captains less suscep-
tible than their fellows to noisy but sense
less cachinnation.
On September 1lth, at 1890 A. NJ, the
third officer of the British steamship
Nestor, then in the Malacca Straits, an
nounced shoal. Surprised to find
shoal in such well-known track, Captain
Webster watched the object and found that
it was in motion, keeping up the same
speed as the ship, and retaining about the
same distance as when first seen. "The
shape of the creature" said the Captain
lin an affidavit before Donald Spence,
Acting Law Secretary to the British Su-
preme Court at Shanghai,), al would
compare to that of a gigantic frog. The
lread, of a pale yellowish color, was about
twelve feet IN length, and six feet of the
crown was above the water | tried in
vain to make out the mouth" he proceeds,
but the mouth may have been below
water. The head was Immediately con-
nected with the body without any indica-
ton of neck. The body was about 45
or fifty feet long, and of an oval shane.
perfectly smooth, but there might have
been slight ridge along the back. The
back rose some five feet above the surface.
An immense tail, fully $50 feet in length.
rose few inches above the water. This
tail | saw distinctly from its junction with
the body to its extremity; it seemed
cylindrical, with a very slight taper, and
i estimate its diameter at four feet. The
body and tail were marked with alternate
bands or stripes, black and pale yellow
in color. The stripes were distinct to
the very extremity of the tail. | can
not say whether the tail terminated in a
fin or not. The creature possessed no fins
vi pduules, 50 lar as we cOulu perceive. 4
cannot say if it had legs. 1t appeared to
progress by means of an undulatory motion
of the tail in a vertical plane"
Now, it is obvious from this description
that the monster belonged to the Ray
tribe, being either member of some I'M
known variety of that tribe (the Batoidei,
which with the sharks or Stakeholder,
form the sub-order Plagiostomata), or else
an abnormally enormous specimen of the
sixth Ray family, the Myliobatide, famili-
arly known as the eagle-rays, sea devils
or devil-fsh land surely what Cap
tain Webster describes was devil
of fish,. These creatures attain..a great
size, though until Captain Webster
saw his shoal no devil-fsh 200 feet
in length had ever been heard of The
largest ever captured weighed 1,250
pounds. In the British Museum there is
a specimen five feet long and weighing
twenty pounds, which tells something
of the enormous dimensions which full
grown devil fish may attain, since this
young devil fish was yet unborn having
been taken from the body of the mother.
(The eagle rays are vivlparous) The
mothers body measured fifteen feet in
length and breadth. The span of the