Olaus Magnus (Vol. iii., p. 370.).
—I have before me an English version of this most singular writer, by J. S., printed by J. Streater, London, 1658, 1 vol. folio, pp. 342. The marvellous description of the sea serpent by Olaus Magnus is well known, but during the controversy recently raised as to the reappearance of this monster to the officers of the Dædalus, the following testimony to its existence in later times was perhaps overlooked. It is extracted from the notes of Frederick Faber, the celebrated Iceland ornithologist, describing a zoological expedition to the islands in the Cattegat, and published in Oken's Isis for 1829, p. 885.:
"As I was returning in a boat from Endelave to Horsens, the old helmsman, observing that I took great interest in natural history, asked me if I had ever seen the sea serpent. On my replying in the negative, he told me that about two years ago, while he and his companion were fishing near Thunoe, they observed the head of a large creature lying quite on the surface of the water, and in close proximity to their boat. The head was like that of a seal, though they immediately perceived that it belonged to no animal of that kind. A gull flew towards the monster, and made a pounce upon him, when the huge creature raised its body at least three fathoms high into the air, and made a snap at the bird, which flew away in terror. They had time, before it disappeared, to notice that the monster had a red throat, and that its body was about twice the thickness of a boat's mast."
EDWARD CHARLTON.
The Word "Couch" (Vol. v., p. 298.).
—The word is French: coucher par écrit. Ménage says, coucher, in its common sense, is derived from collocare in Latin, of which he gives instances as early as Catullus; he might have gone back to Terence. Hence, says he, "coucher bien par écrit, pour dire écrire avec ordre:" and quotes Salmasius, to show that coucher par écrit answered to digerere, in the sense of writing a digest.
The sense is the same as our expression "lay down," "lay down the law," &c., but we do not confine that to writing.