The Regency Library
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The Sea Serpent The Annual Register or a View of the History and Politics of the Year 1848 London: F & J Rivington, 1849 "The existence of this animal, which has been the subject of so much controversy, and whose appearances to wandering navigators, especially American have passed into a standing joke, has now received a confirmation from a quarter which puts any doubt as to the good faith of the testimony entirely at rest. The following official letter from one of Her Majesty's post-captains to the Board of Admiralty, excited very great interest. 'His Majesty's Ship Daedalus '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 Daedalus, under my command, on her passage from the East Indies, I have the honour to acquaint you, for the information of my Lord's Commissioners of the Admiralty, that at 5 o'clock P.M. on the 6th of August last, in latitude 24 degrees 44 minutes S. and longitude 9 degrees 22 East, the weather dark and cloudy wind fresh from the N.W., with a long ocean swell from the SW, the ship on the port track heading N.E. by N. something very unusual was seen by Mr. Sartoris, midshipman, rapidly approaching the s hip before the beam. The circumstance was immediately reported by him to the officer of the watch, Lieutenant Edgar Drummond, with whom Mr. William Barrett, the Master and 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 maintopsail yard would show in the water, there was at the very least 60 feet of the animal . . . no portion of which was, to our perception, used in propelling it through the water, either by vertical or horizontal indulation. 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 12 to 15 miles per hour . . . . 'The diameter of the serpent was about 15 or 16 inches behind the head, which was, without any doubt, that of a snake, and it was never, during the 20 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 a mane of a horse, or rather a bunch of sea-weed, washed about its back. It was seen by the quartermaster, 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 Lord's Commissioners of the Admiralty by tomorrow's post.' Signed Peter M'Quhae, Captain. "To Admiral Sir W.H. Gage, G.L.H. Devonport." "A very spirited drawing, made from memory immediately after the occurrence, by the officers of the ship, was published in the Illustrated London News. This letter and pictorial representation drew forth a very admirable criticism from Mr. Owen, the celebrated Professor of Comparative Anatomy in which the conclusions of the gallant Captain were controverted. From the form of the head, the situation of the mouth, the size and position of the eye, and from the colour and surface of the skin, the Professor argued that the creature seen was a warm-blooded animal;--in fact, a very large seal which had been floated down on an iceberg, and which, the iceberg having netted beneath him, was now swimming in search of a resting place.-It was swimming at a very great rate by means of its paddles and tail, which would be entirely submerged and that the great apparent continuation of the animal was, in fact, the eddy caused by the passage of so large a body through the water. . . . "Captain M'Quhae, in a second letter, repeated his statement with explanations. The creature-seal or serpent-seems to have been seen by other vessels about the same time. |
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