Part 16

After the perusal of this work my readers will know why I am disposed to believe that the animal struck by Captain RICH was really a Sea-Serpent. As far as I can judge, after having read all that I have found about the sea-serpent, this is the only time that the animal was struck with a harpoon. Balls have often been fired at it, but it has never been killed yet. In the same copy of the Report of the Committee of 1817, there was a letter from Mr. ANDREWS NORTON to Mr. GEORGE BANCROFT, at that time a resident at Göttingen. I give here an extract from this letter concerning the matter in question.

“Last Friday morning upon going to breakfast at Dr. Ware’s, I found there the papers of the day, in which was announced the most interesting fact, that the Sea-Serpent had been taken by the expedition fitted out for that purpose. In the Daily Advertiser in particular nearly a column was filled with the circumstances of his capture, and of the manner in which the information had been received, viz. from a person whose name was given, and who had come express from Gloucester, the evening before, to bring the news. He was said to be 120 feet long, and the Board of Health had sent down two boats to stop him in the Harbour. After talking about it all breakfast time, I immediately went to Reed’s stable, got a horse and chaise, put a news-paper in my pocket, rode to Professor Peck’s, showed him the paper, and offered to carry him into Boston, and to procure a boat to go out with him into the Harbour, that he might examine it. He was not well, and said at first that he could not go; but gradually grew warm upon the subject, and concluded at last that it would never do for him not to see it. When I had fairly got him into the chaise, his spirits rose with the exertion he had made, with the thoughts of the memoir and letters which he should write, and with the triumph which he anticipated over the Linnaean Society and their “diseased black snake”, as he contemptuously called it (meaning the small serpent, killed near the shore at Gloucester); for he pledged himself that we should find that the sea-serpent had no bunches on his back. I too anticipated with great satisfaction the honorable mention of me, which his gratitude would induce him to make in his memoir upon the subject, and expected confidently to float down to posterity behind Mr. Peck, upon this enormous animal. We entered Boston, and rode immediately to the end of Central Wharf to the store of a Mr. Rich, who had fitted out the expedition. The first person we saw was Judge Davis, whose countenance foreboded evil. His first words were to inform us that we had come in to be disappointed, for that the serpent was not taken! (I am not in the habit of using notes of admiration, but the present occasion seems to require one). The sailors, however, affirmed, as he said, that they had taken some most extraordinary fish of very large size, which he was going to see. I had little appetite left for seeing extraordinary fishes, but went to accompany Mr. Peck. We proceeded a wharf to the South End, and making our way through a croud, obtained admission into the dark lower room of a store where we found a considerable number of other gentlemen waiting. After some delay the fish was dragged in from the small vessel in which it had been brought, wrapped in sail. As soon as it was uncovered and fairly exposed to view, it was pronounced by all who knew any thing on the subject to be nothing but a Thunny, or Horse Mackerel, of a common size.--We had been gradually prepared for the disappointment, so that the shock was not so great as you might suppose. The report in the morning’s paper had arisen from a mystification performed upon the person who brought it to Boston, by the crew of the vessel engaged in the expedition. The sailors who dragged in the fish were part of this crew; and instead of their being tossed over the wharf into the water, by way of punishment for their imposition, and to teach them better morals, as they infallibly would have been by any mob out of Boston, there was actually a collection made to reward them for their trouble in taking the fish and bringing it to exhibit. This fact, I think, deserves to be recorded for the honor of Boston, and particularly of us gentlemen present.--I have only to add that if you should learn that any one of the German literati is writing a volume upon Sea-Serpents, I beg you will assure him, that we do not consider the circumstance, connected with the deception just mentioned, as affecting the evidence before obtained for their real existence.--In the Messenger of this week which I will send by the next opportunity you will find one or two notices of this affair p. 756 and p. 758.”

I have had no opportunity to consult the above mentioned passage from this Messenger. I think most of my readers know a tunny (Thynnus thynnus (Linn.)). For those, however, who don’t, I give here a figure of it.

In the Philosophical Magazine, Vol. LIII, p. 71, of January 1819, we read:

“T. Say, Esq., of Philadelphia, in a letter received from him by Dr. Leach, announces that a Captain Rich had fitted out an expedition purposely to take this leviathan, of which so much has been said in the newspapers and even in some scientific journals. He succeeded in “fastening his harpoon in what was acknowledged by all the crew to be the veritable Sea-serpent (and which several of them had previously seen and made oath to): but when drawn from the water, and full within the sphere of their vision, it proved that this serpent, which fear had loomed to the gigantic length of 100 feet, was no other than a harmless Tunny (Scombrus Thynnus) nine or ten feet long!”

We see that Mr. NORTON and Prof. PECK immediately recognized the whole story as a Yankee-trick, but that Prof. T. SAY was the dupe of it!

From a letter from Prof. JACOB BIGELOW to Prof. BENJAMIN SILLIMAN (Am. Journ. Sc. Arts, Vol. II, Boston, 1820) I conclude that Prof. SAY’S letter was printed in THOMSON’S Annals for Jan. 1819. If anybody can tell me the exact title of THOMSON’S Annals, he will oblige me, indeed. I have had no opportunity to consult it. A part of this letter was translated into German, and inserted in OKEN’S Isis of 1819, p. 653. I will try to translate this part into English again:

“I regret that many scientific journals in Europe have in good earnest treated of the absurd story of the Great Sea-Serpent, which is nothing but a result of defective observation connected with an extravagant degree of fear. You will already know, that Capt. RICH has thrown light upon the subject; out of his own means he fitted out a ship to catch this Leviathan. He succeeded.....” (etc., the rest of the letter runs like the part from the Philosophical Magazine, quoted above).

Mr. RAFINESQUE SCHMALTZ, however, says, (see Phil. Mag. Vol. LIV, 1819):

“The Pelamis megophias, or Great Sea-Snake, appears to have left the shores of Massachusetts, and to have baffled the attempts to catch it, probably because those attempts were conducted with very little judgment. But a smaller snake, or fish, nine feet long, and a strange shark, have been taken, of which the papers give no description: let us hope that they will be described by the naturalists at Boston”.

And Prof. JACOB BIGELOW, of Boston (SILLIMAN’S Am. Journ. Sc. Arts, Vol. II, Boston, 1820):

“In the following year” (1818) “Capt. Rich of Boston, went on an expedition fitted out for the purpose of taking the Sea-Serpent, and after a fruitless cruise of some weeks, brought into port a fish of the species commonly known to mariners and fishermen by the name of Tunny, Albicore or Horse Mackerel, the Scomber Thynnus of Linnaeus, and which fish he asserted to be the same as that denominated Sea-Serpent. This disappointment of public curiosity was attended at the time by a disbelief on the part of many, of the existence of a distinct marine animal of the serpent-kind, or of the dimensions and shape represented by the witnesses of Gloucester and elsewhere.”

“It is hoped that the unsuccessful termination of Capt. Rich’s cruise will not deter others from improving any future opportunities which may occur for solving what may now perhaps be considered the most interesting problem in the science of Natural History.”

This was written in 1820, and the problem is not quite solved yet!

The trick of Capt. RICH is also mentioned in the paper of Mr. MITCHILL, spoken of further on.

Again Colonel T. H. PERKINS relates in the Boston Daily Advertiser of November 25, 1848, the trick of Capt. RICH as follows (copied from the Zoologist of 1849, p. 2361).

“As it happened, a circumstance took place which did not do much credit to the actors in it, but which served to fortify the unbelief of our southern brethern. Believing that the possession of the sea-serpent would be a fortune to those who should have him in their power, many boats were fitted out from Cape Ann and other places in the neighbourhood of his haunts, armed with harpoons and other implements, and manned with persons used to the whale fishery, in hopes of getting near enough to him to fasten their harpoons in his side. Among others a Captain Rich (not Benjamin Rich), of Boston, took command of a party, which was fitted out at some expense, and went into the bay, where they cruised along shore two or three days without seeing the serpent. With a view, however, to keep the joke from themselves, they determined to throw or attempt to throw it upon others, though at the expense of truth! They spread a report that they had caught the serpent, or what had been taken for one, and that he was to be seen at a place mentioned in the advertisement.”

“Thousands were flocking to see this wonder, when it was found to be no other than a large horse macquerel, which (though a great natural curiosity, weighing sometimes 600 or 700 pounds) very much disappointed those, who had been induced to visit it. Those who had declared their disbelief of the existence of the Sea-serpent amongst ourselves were delighted to find their opinions were confirmed, and gave themselves great credit for their judgment and discrimination. The report spread from Boston to New Orleans, that what had been thought by some persons to be a sea-serpent had proved to be a horse macquerel, and even those who had been believers now supposed that those who had reported that they had seen the serpent had either misrepresented or had been themselves deceived. As no report of the snake having been seen after the capture of the macquerel was made, during that year, Captain Rich had the laugh with him, until circumstances, which have transpired since, have borne rather against him. Thus much for the transactions of the past years.”

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The Lake Erie Serpent.--In Mr. RAFINESQUE’S Dissertation on Sea-Snakes, we read (See Phil. Mag. Vol. LIV, 1819):

“It appears that our large lakes have huge serpents or fishes, as well as the sea. On the 3d. of July, 1817, one was seen in Lake Erie, three miles from land, by the crew of a schooner, which was 35 or 40 feet long, and one foot in diameter; its colour was a dark mahogany, nearly black. This account is very imperfect, and does not even notice if it had scales; therefore it must remain doubtful whether it was a snake or a fish. I am inclined to believe it was a fish, until otherwise convinced: it might be a gigantic species of eel, or a species of the above genus Octipos. Until seen again, and better described, it may be recorded under the name of Anguilla gigas or Gigantic Eel.”

And in the Additions to this dissertation:

“The Water-Snake of Lake Erie has been seen again, and described to be of a copper colour, with bright eyes, and 60 feet long. It is added, that at a short distance balls had no effect on him: but it is omitted to mention whether it was owing to have hard scales (in which case it might be a real snake of the genus Enhydris or Pelamis), or to the indexterity of the marksman.”

Every one feels that Mr. RAFINESQUE was the dupe of a hoax, and that he was so, indeed, will be seen from Mr. MITCHILL’S dissertation (see below) in which more hoaxes are to be found.

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Unbelievers not only invented tales to play a trick to believers, but when scientific men, they even read papers before learned assemblies, with a view of ridiculing the matter. I believe there has been no greater attempt to throw discredit on the sea-serpent, than that of Mr. SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. I am obliged to communicate to my readers his whole paper, even at the risk of wearying them. It was published in SILLIMAN’S Am. Journ. Sc. Arts, 1829, and runs as follows:

“The History of Sea-Serpentism, extracted from Samuel L. Mitchill’s Summary of the progress of Natural Science within our United States, for a few years past; read before the New York Lyceum, at a succession of sittings during October, 1828.--N^o. 35.--The Sea-Serpent. (Communicated for this Journal).”

“This subject, the author observed, would scarcely be worthy of notice, before this learned and respectable assembly, if it had not happened, that during several years, it, or something so imagined and so called, had frequently been presented for public consideration; and that paragraphs and statements in the newspapers and journals, do yet, from time to time, attract the attention of their readers.”