A great sea monster has been washed ashore on the coast of Florida, and men who study natural history are much interested in it. What is left of the creature is said to weigh eight tons, and no one can tell exactly what kind of a fish it is, because it appears to have been tossed by the waves for a long time, and has been partly destroyed by them.
Those people who have seen it think that it is a kind of cuttlefish, but that the arms, or tentacles, as they are called, have been broken away from it. These arms must have been from one to two hundred feet long. It is now only a huge body without much shape to it. Photographs and careful descriptions of it have been sent to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and to Yale College, and the scientific men there expect to be able to decide what it is by comparing it with other known kinds of mollusks. Scientists study these things so carefully, that they can tell what the exact size of an animal was, and what it looked like, if but a small portion is left; we may therefore expect to hear all about this great creature ere long.
The size of this wonderful creature can be better realized, when we learn that it took four strong horses, a dozen men, and three sets of tackle to move it.
At first it seemed impossible to believe that such a terrific monster really existed. Sailors have told so many yarns for the sake of making a good story, that people are a little afraid to believe the wonderful tales of the sea, but The Great Round World took pains to find out that this eight-ton cuttlefish story was true, so we need have no doubts about it.
The cuttlefish, which supplies the bone we buy for our canaries, is a very terrible fish indeed.
The bone, as we call it, is not really bone, but a sort of half-formed shell which the cuttlefish wears under its skin.
It has a large round body, surrounded by eight arms, which are many times the length of the body, and which it can twist or turn in any direction. The mouth is in the centre of these arms. Professor Winchell describes this ugly creature for us. He says:
"Staring out from either side of the head (the head and body are really one) is a pair of large, glassy eyes, which send a shudder over the beholder. At the bottom of the sea the creature turns its eight arms down, and walks like a huge submarine spider, thrusting its arms into the crevices of the rocks, and extracting thence the luckless crab that had thought itself secure from so bulky a foe. Each of the arms is covered with what are called suckers. Each sucker consists of a little round horny ridge, forming a little cup, which is attached to the arm by a stem. When the arm is pressed upon an object, the effort to escape from the grasp of the arm causes a suction which effectually retains the object."
Professor Winchell goes on to tell that these cuttlefish or octopods sometimes attain a very great size, and that sailors tell wonderful stories about them. In one of these stories, the captain of a ship declared that, while sailing off the African coast, he sent three of his men over the side of the ship to scrape it. While they were at their work one of these monsters reached its long arms up from the water and drew two of them into the sea.
Professor Winchell says that while this may be only a sailor's yarn, it is at the same time well known that these creatures do attain a fearful size.