The creature which had so powerfully affected the feelings of the Irishman was dead; but dead and harmless though it was, it drew forth from his comrades a shout of intense surprise when they saw it, for it was no less than a cuttlefish of proportions so gigantic that they felt themselves in the presence of one of those terrible monsters of the deep, about which fabulous tales have been told, and exaggerated descriptions given since the beginning of historical time.
“Av he’s not the say-sarpint himself, boys,” panted Squill, as he pointed to him with looks of unmitigated admiration, “sure he must be his first cousin.”
And Squill was not far wrong, for it was found that the monstrous fish measured fifty-two feet between the extremities of its outspread arms. Its body was about eight feet long and four feet broad. Its great arms, of which it had ten radiating from its body, varied in length and thickness—the longest being about twenty-four feet, and the shortest about eight. The under sides of these arms were supplied with innumerable suckers, while from the body there projected a horny beak, like the beak of a parrot.
“It’s wishin’, I am, that I might see wan o’ yer family alive,” said Squill, as he turned over the dead arms; “but I’d rather not be embraced by ye. Och! what a hug ye could give—an’ as to howldin’ on—a thousand limpets would be nothin’ to ye.”
“A miser grippin’ his gold would be more like it,” suggested Grummidge.
“I don’t expect ever to see one alive,” said Little Stubbs, “an’ yet there must surely be more where that came from.”
The very next day Squill had his wish gratified, and Stubbs his unbelief rebuked, for, while they were out in the boat rowing towards one of the fishing-banks with several of their comrades, they discovered a living giant-cuttlefish.
“What’s that, boys?” cried the Irishman, pointing to the object which was floating in the water not far ahead of them.
“Seaweed,” growled Blazer.
Blazer always growled. His voice was naturally low and harsh—so was his spirit. Sometimes a grunt supplanted the growl, suggesting that he was porcine in nature—as not a few men are.