Dr. Hamilton[262] states that an animal of similar appearance was again seen, in August 1819, off Nahant, Boston, and remained in the neighbourhood for some weeks. Two hundred persons witnessed it, thirteen folds were counted, and the head, which was serpent-shaped, was elevated two feet above the surface. Its eye was remarkably brilliant and glistening. The water was smooth, and the weather calm and serene. When it disappeared, its motion was undulatory, making curves perpendicular to the surface of the water, and giving the appearance of a long moving string of corks. It appeared again off Nahant in July 1833. “It was first seen on Saturday afternoon, passing between Egg Rock and the Promontory, winding his way into Lynn Harbour; and again on Sunday morning, heading for South Shores. It was seen by forty or fifty ladies and gentlemen, who insist that they could not have been deceived.”
The Zoologist for May 1847 contains an account of a sea-serpent seen in Mahone Bay, about forty miles east of Halifax, by five officers of the garrison, when on a fishing excursion:—“We were surprised by the sight of an immense shoal of grampuses, which appeared in an unusual state of excitement, and which in their gambols approached so close to our little craft that some of the party amused themselves by firing at them with rifles. At this time we were jogging at about five miles an hour, and must have been crossing Margaret’s Bay, ‘when suddenly,’ at a distance of from a hundred and fifty to two hundred yards on our starboard bow, we saw the head and neck of some denizen of the deep, precisely like those of a common snake, in the act of swimming, the head so far elevated and thrown forward by the curve of the neck, as to enable us to see the water under and beyond it. The creature rapidly passed, leaving a regular wake, from the commencement of which to the fore part, which was out of water, we judged in length to be about eighty feet, and this within rather than beyond the mark. It is most difficult to give correctly the dimensions of any object in the water. The head of the creature we set down at about six feet in length, and that portion of the neck which we saw the same; the extreme length, as before stated, at between eighty and one hundred feet. The neck in thickness equalled the bole of a moderate-sized tree. The head and neck of a dark brown or nearly black colour, streaked with white in irregular streaks. I do not recollect seeing any part of the body.”
Considerable interest was excited in 1848 by the account of a sea-serpent seen by the captain and officers of Her Majesty’s ship Dædalus while on her passage from the Cape of Good Hope to St. Helena, in lat. 24° 44′ S. and long. 9° 22′ E. In this case the usual concomitants of calm weather and absence of swell are wanting. The official report to the Admiralty is as follows:—
H.M.S. Dædalus,
Hamoaze, Oct. 11.
Sir,—In reply to your letter of this day’s date, requiring information as to the truth of a statement published in the Times newspaper, of a sea-serpent of extraordinary dimensions having been seen from Her Majesty’s ship Dædalus, under my command, on her passage from the East Indies, I have the honour to acquaint you, for the information of my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, that at 5 o’clock P.M. on the 6th of August last, in latitude 24° 44′ S. and longitude 9° 22′ E., the weather dark and cloudy, wind fresh from the N.W., with a long ocean swell from the S.W., the ship on the port tack, heading N.E. by N., something very unusual was seen by Mr. Sartoris, midshipman, rapidly approaching the ship from before the beam. The circumstance was immediately reported by him to the officer of the watch, Lieutenant Edgar Drummond, with whom and Mr. William Barrett, the master, I was at the time walking the quarter-deck. The ship’s company were at supper.
On our attention being called to the object, it was discovered to be an enormous serpent, with head and shoulders kept about four feet constantly above the surface of the sea; and as nearly as we could approximate by comparing it with the length of what our main topsail-yard would show in the water, there was at the very least sixty feet of the animal à fleur d’eau, no portion of which was, in our perception, used in propelling it through the water, either by vertical or horizontal undulation. It passed rapidly, but so close under our lee quarter that had it been a man of my acquaintance I should have easily recognized his features with the naked eye; and it did not, either in approaching the ship or after it had passed our wake, deviate in the slightest degree from its course to the S.W., which it held on at the pace of from twelve to fifteen miles per hour, apparently on some determined purpose. The diameter of the serpent was about fifteen or sixteen inches behind the head, which was, without any doubt, that of a snake; and it was never, during the twenty minutes that it continued in sight of our glasses, once below the surface of the water; its colour, a dark brown with yellowish white about the throat. It had no fins, but something like the mane of a horse, or rather a bunch of sea-weed, washed about its back. It was seen by the quarter-master, the boatswain’s mate, and the man at the wheel, in addition to myself and officers above mentioned.
I am having a drawing of the serpent made from a sketch taken immediately after it was seen, which I hope to have ready for transmission to my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty by to-morrow’s post.
I have, &c.,
Peter M’Quhœ, Capt.
To Admiral Sir W. H. Gage, G.C.B.,
Devonport.
