Show dea ca serpent pure and i Bl for a century the scientific world has looked at sea serpents askance and yet there to ie one professional field in life whose members have supplied more data concerning sea serpents and given more profuse information in regard to them than all the skippers and travelers who have ever circled the globe from the earliest earl leat umes umea it haa remained for the ministry to supply us with our greatest number of facts regarding the marine descendant ocen ant dant of adams happiness deacons priests and bishops have seen been sea serpents galore and there are on file the names of at least a dozen clerical men who are involved in tho colls coils of bog serpent stories from olaus IJ magnus anul the archbishop of up uleala I down to rev P W damboldt Dem boldt archdeacon of molde molda rev william jenks rev alden bradford rev mr cummings of sullivan and rev alexander maclean all good names and hont eat some of them from puritanical now new england the bishop of another worthy divine believed implicitly in sea serpents and even altered the descriptions script ions and drawings of other men to gratify bis big own enthusiasm in regard to them the bishop of ponto ponta bidden who lived in the middle of the eighteenth century advanced the theory that the mermaids of mediaeval media eval lore were nothing more nor less than sea cows cowa that browse upon salt water greens with their front flippers and open their mouths sideways nut but in regard to sea serpents the bishop was not so BO skeptical lie he described them on hearsay as an numerous lengthy and terrible often feet in length possibly with eyes as large as pewter plates lilac or blue in color and sometimes fiery red with anger the good divine even made a journey down the scandinavian coast to investigate a tole tale that a tablecloth had bad been made by a fis hermans family from the skin of a sea serpent which the reptile had sloughed elough ed off in the pleasant waters of at the harbor of the bishop was honest enough to state that he had been gulled in this respect but did not alter his opinion regarding sea serpents in general the illustration in 16 his bis book showing a sea serpent reared on his tall tail squirting profuse gallons of water out of his snout was drawn and exaggerated by the bishop of Pont dan from the sketch made by ding who had bad forever immortalized a sea serpent behold beheld by hans hang egede it Is notable that hang haas egede was vias himself an evangelist chobo work as a missionary was taking ghim him to the wilds of greenland when the sea serpent appeared before him claua magnus the archbishop of up sata ala writes at length of at a sea serpent ascribing to it a length of at feet and a L girth of 20 and stating the beliefs of the sailors of his time regarding it how bow it was fond of at calves and sheep and swine and used to snap the seamen from the decks of their own vessels I 1 roy rev mr cummings cummungs of sullivan describes a whopping sea serpent that he be saw not far from long island in july of 1808 thirty seven years later another divine rev P W damboldt made the startling statement that not only had bad he bo seen the sea serpent in the water near his home on the norwegian coast but that he had shot at it with a musket and evidently wounded it quite badly from the ruction that took place in the water afterward rev alexander maclean who flourished at about the samo same time as rev mr cummings observed off the island of coll what he be first called in his clerical manner an object it appeared like a small email rock he said but after looking at it tor for some time he saw it elevated above the surface of the sea and move in his direction with a measured and dignified motion in latense intense alarm the minister steered for shore with the soa sea serpent apparently pursuing him it drew so near that r am A A tip Y as Y N ig C V CA 3 4 0 N K 0 DL r 1 aea SERPENT THAN AY Y 0 mem L wm mae be could see aee its shining eye but on finding the water shallow it apparent 1 ly became discouraged and moved off to sea again where ater according to the ministers story itwara it war reported afi a having frightened nearly to death the crevis crews of half a dozen fishing vea tea eels belo these accounts of the findings of reverend gentlemen were ga gathered therod together by anthony Ou demana 3 who published a voluminous book on sea serpents penta this book contains alt all rc ported appearances dr Clude maus from whose volume part 1 ot of this material has been gather gallier td od not only goes into all the vo veracious raci reports of the sea serpents enVa appearance pe arance but into all tho the hoaxes that have ave been played in regard to it he has haa even described a hoax that was perpetrated against the sea serpent by a learned writ who desired to show ellow that he reptile was nonexistent non existent and in conw action with this place piece of false work the present writer unearthed a fraud that has haa lain dormant for or 60 50 years nearly years ago agg a certain sam uel L mitchell Ml wrote a pap paper or designed to throw discredit on the sea serpent stories that were current at that date the paper appeared in the american journal of arts and sciences for 1829 almost a century later dr Oud Ou demana emans rakes up mr Ml chella article and aadi baya that mr mitchell Ml lied 0 quoting that gent lemans entire paper to prove it it butchis But this quotation was responsible for the discovery of at even another fraud than the one laid at the door of mr mitchell Ml for in 1862 there appeared in leisure hour an article en titled aea serpent stories by john who after praising mr matchell Ml for the first honest exposure of bf the sea serpent and quoting him tor for a paragraph proceeds to steal his hie article verbatim and use it as his bis own which was ascertained by the present writer kihen comparing tho the quotation Mitchells of article with the article by mr ono one of the most famous pro pra sea serpent hoaxes according to dr oude mans Is a fraud that was achieved by the correspondent ofa of a french newspaper who gives a thrilling account of at a sea serpent behold beheld by C renard and seven others from the deck of the royal mail don on the evening of the of august 1881 M renard and the others were sitting bitting on deck so BO it Is alleged enjoying a perfect io and the gleam of a moonlit sea when a horrible and nauseating monster came to the surface af at no great distance from the ship while at the same time an overpowering stench attacked the nostrils of the travelers the monster runs the report measured from 40 to 60 meters in so tar far as the numerous colls coils made measurement possible from the dorsal ridge to the middle of the belly the body bodi appeared to be covered by ranges of scales and the general roughness of the surface and the moss grown skin appeared to indicate a great and assured age the head was pointed with teeth sharp and enormous and from the throat attached to a kind of at cushion there projected a hard tongue pointed provided with suckers and glittering like steel this horrible brute stayed on the surface of the water in full view for at least ten minutes when it sank again beneath the surface of the water the alleged beholders of the terrible sight gave solemn testimony of their experience to the editor by letter in which it was stated with roost most remarkable assurance that all these facts were truths of at refined and intrinsic purity A sketch accompanied the letter and Is printed here but after all tho the cavil and false hood pro and con regarding enormous serpents of tho ocean a residue of 0 truth remains in some of the tales of the sea bea serpents ants ay ap arance that cause the present day clentis ts to shrug their shoulders some of the reports of the monster are not easily explained away and in the early ear ly part of the nineteenth century so BO many reputable witnesses are said to have behold beheld it that even tho conservative encyclopedia britannica admits that some strange sea monster must have existed and put in his appearance at that time so many times did the sea serpent show itself off ob the now new england coast that it gained for itself the name of the american sea serpent and so BO many sturdy old puritans testified to its general shape size and appearance that a pretty good idea has been gained of the kind of animal that showed itself according to most moot descriptions the sea serpent was about 60 feet long dark in color but lighter below in tho the manner of an eel with a flat head bead and a neck about 16 inches in diameter an english naval officer ameer captain of H M S in sorted in his official report to admiral sir WH W H gage in 1846 the statement that thai he be had seen been an animal of this description rapidly approaching his bis ship in 24 degrees 44 minutes south latitude by 9 degrees degree s 22 minutes east long longitude iture he described it as an enormous serpent eriV with its head raised about four feet above the water swimming along at an even and speedy rate and at least 60 feet in length captain account encouraged other officers to tell of similar experiences where previously they had not dared for tear fear of ridicule the sea serpent has appeared too often to mention in detail but in 1906 it was waa reverted reported by meade waldo and two members of the royal zoological society who insist that they saw the sea bea serpent yards away while cruising in the earl of craw fords yacht the valhalla off the tho coast of brazil braell on december 7 1905 while Bt andine together on deck the two zoologists declare that suddenly they saw a great fin come out of the water yards from the ship field glasses were brought to bear and mr meade waldo behold beheld an enormous head rise slowly followed by a neck that was about the thickness of a mans body the head the zoologists say bay was distinctly turtle esque in its ita appearance buts but as the animal came no nearer and shortly disappeared its exact size could not be ascertained A long flock of birds skimming the waves once gave the effect of at a serpent swimming at considerable speed and trailing seaweed has been approached and even harpooned in the belief bellef that it was a serpent i giant s squid quid which are as tearful and wonderful as the serpent itself have been mistaken for the latter and it Is probable that the serpent rl cl lebed to td have been seen been by claus egede was of this variety in an tact fact in spite of all the ridicule and all the hoaxes that have been given forth in the name of this strange animal there Is no reason after all to deny that it may be living holder has bag commented on the fact that the bivalves of the mesozoic ago age have been preserved to the present time why then Is it not possible for mother earth to have stored in her sea caverns some uncouth cretaceous monster that occasionally shows itself and each time elicits the well known and highly redi ridiculous culous cry the sea serpent |