The year 1866 was signalised by a remarkable incident, a mysterious and
puzzling phenomenon, which doubtless no one has yet forgotten. Not to
mention rumours which agitated the maritime population and excited the
public mind, even in the interior of continents, seafaring men were
particularly excited. Merchants, common sailors, captains of vessels,
skippers, both of Europe and America, naval officers of all countries,
and the Governments of several states on the two continents, were
deeply interested in the matter.
For some time past, vessels had been met by "an enormous thing," a long
object, spindle-shaped, occasionally phosphorescent, and infinitely
larger and more rapid in its movements than a whale.
The facts relating to this apparition (entered in various log-books)
agreed in most respects as to the shape of the object or creature in
question, the untiring rapidity of its movements, its surprising power
of locomotion, and the peculiar life with which it seemed endowed. If
it was a cetacean, it surpassed in size all those hitherto classified
in science. Taking into consideration the mean of observations made at
divers times,—rejecting the timid estimate of those who assigned to
this object a length of two hundred feet, equally with the exaggerated
opinions which set it down as a mile in width and three in length,—we
might fairly conclude that this mysterious being surpassed greatly all
dimensions admitted by the ichthyologists of the day, if it existed at
all. And that it _did_ exist was an undeniable fact; and, with that
tendency which disposes the human mind in favour of the marvellous, we
can understand the excitement produced in the entire world by this
supernatural apparition. As to classing it in the list of fables, the
idea was out of the question.
On the 20th of July, 1866, the steamer _Governor Higginson_, of the
Calcutta and Burnach Steam Navigation Company, had met this moving mass
five miles off the east coast of Australia. Captain Baker thought at
first that he was in the presence of an unknown sandbank; he even
prepared to determine its exact position, when two columns of water,
projected by the inexplicable object, shot with a hissing noise a
hundred and fifty feet up into the air. Now, unless the sandbank had
been submitted to the intermittent eruption of a geyser, the _Governor
Higginson_ had to do neither more nor less than with an aquatic mammal,
unknown till then, which threw up from its blow-holes columns of water
mixed with air and vapour.
Similar facts were observed on the 23rd of July in the same year, in
the Pacific Ocean, by the _Columbus_, of the West India and Pacific
Steam Navigation Company. But this extraordinary cetaceous creature
could transport itself from one place to another with surprising
velocity; as, in an interval of three days, the _Governor Higginson_
and the _Columbus_ had observed it at two different points of the
chart, separated by a distance of more than seven hundred nautical
leagues.
Fifteen days later, two thousand miles farther off, the _Helvetia_, of
the Compagnie-Nationale, and the _Shannon_, of the Royal Mail Steamship
Company, sailing to windward in that portion of the Atlantic lying
between the United States and Europe, respectively signalled the
monster to each other in 42° 15′ N. lat. and 60° 35′ W. long. In these
simultaneous observations they thought themselves justified in
estimating the minimum length of the mammal at more than three hundred
and fifty feet, as the _Shannon_ and _Helvetia_ were of smaller
dimensions than it, though they measured three hundred feet over all.
Now the largest whales, those which frequent those parts of the sea
round the Aleutian, Kulammak, and Umgullich islands, have never
exceeded the length of sixty yards, if they attain that.
These reports arriving one after the other, with fresh observations
made on board the transatlantic ship _Pereire_, a collision which
occurred between the _Etna_ of the Inman line and the monster, a
_procès verbal_ directed by the officers of the French frigate
_Normandie_, a very accurate survey made by the staff of Commodore
Fitz-James on board the _Lord Clyde_, greatly influenced public
opinion. Light-thinking people jested upon the phenomenon, but grave
practical countries, such as England, America, and Germany, treated the
matter more seriously.
In every place of great resort the monster was the fashion. They sang
of it in the cafés, ridiculed it in the papers, and represented it on
the stage. All kinds of stories were circulated regarding it. There
appeared in the papers caricatures of every gigantic and imaginary
creature, from the white whale, the terrible "Moby Dick" of hyperborean
regions, to the immense kraken whose tentacles could entangle a ship of
five hundred tons, and hurry it into the abyss of the ocean. The
legends of ancient times were even resuscitated, and the opinions of
Aristotle and Pliny revived, who admitted the existence of these
monsters, as well as the Norwegian tales of Bishop Pontoppidan, the
accounts of Paul Heggede, and, last of all, the reports of Mr.
Harrington (whose good faith no one could suspect), who affirmed that,
being on board the _Castillan_, in 1857, he had seen this enormous
serpent, which had never until that time frequented any other seas but
those of the ancient "_Constitutionnel_."
Then burst forth the interminable controversy between the credulous and
the incredulous in the societies of savants and the scientific
journals. "The question of the monster" inflamed all minds. Editors of
scientific journals, quarrelling with believers in the supernatural,
spilled seas of ink during this memorable campaign, some even drawing
blood; for, from the sea-serpent they came to direct personalities.
For six months war was waged with various fortune in the leading
articles of the Geographical Institution of Brazil, the Royal Academy
of Science of Berlin, the British Association, the Smithsonian
Institution of Washington, in the discussions of the "Indian
Archipelago," of the Cosmos of the Abbé Moigno, in the Mittheilungen of
Petermann, in the scientific chronicles of the great journals of France
and other countries. The cheaper journals replied keenly and with
inexhaustible zest. These satirical writers parodied a remark of
Linnæus, quoted by the adversaries of the monster, maintaining "that
nature did not make fools," and adjured their contemporaries not to
give the lie to nature, by admitting the existence of krakens,
sea-serpents, "Moby Dicks," and other lucubrations of delirious
sailors. At length an article in a well-known satirical journal by a
favourite contributor, the chief of the staff, settled the monster,
like Hippolytus, giving it the death-blow amidst an universal burst of
laughter. Wit had conquered science.
During the first months of the year 1867 the question seemed buried,
never to revive, when new facts were brought before the public. It was
then no longer a scientific problem to be solved, but a real danger
seriously to be avoided. The question took quite another shape. The
monster became a small island, a rock, a reef, but a reef of indefinite
and shifting proportions.
On the 5th of March, 1867, the _Moravian_, of the Montreal Ocean
Company, finding herself during the night in 27° 30′ lat. and 72° 15′
long., struck on her starboard quarter a rock, marked in no chart for
that part of the sea. Under the combined efforts of the wind and its
four hundred horse-power, it was going at the rate of thirteen knots.
Had it not been for the superior strength of the hull of the
_Moravian_, she would have been broken by the shock and gone down with
the 237 passengers she was bringing home from Canada.
The accident happened about five o'clock in the morning, as the day was
breaking. The officers of the quarter-deck hurried to the after-part of
the vessel. They examined the sea with the most scrupulous attention.
They saw nothing but a strong eddy about three cables' length distant,
as if the surface had been violently agitated. The bearings of the
place were taken exactly, and the _Moravian_ continued its route
without apparent damage. Had it struck on a submerged rock, or on an
enormous wreck? they could not tell; but on examination of the ship's
bottom when undergoing repairs, it was found that part of her keel was
broken.
This fact, so grave in itself, might perhaps have been forgotten like
many others if, three weeks after, it had not been re-enacted under
similar circumstances. But, thanks to the nationality of the victim of
the shock, thanks to the reputation of the company to which the vessel
belonged, the circumstance became extensively circulated.
The 13th of April, 1867, the sea being beautiful, the breeze
favourable, the _Scotia_, of the Cunard Company's line, found herself
in 15° 12′ long. and 45° 37′ lat. She was going at the speed of
thirteen knots and a half.
At seventeen minutes past four in the afternoon, whilst the passengers
were assembled at lunch in the great saloon, a slight shock was felt on
the hull of the _Scotia_, on her quarter, a little aft of the
port-paddle.
The _Scotia_ had not struck, but she had been struck, and seemingly by
something rather sharp and penetrating than blunt. The shock had been
so slight that no one had been alarmed, had it not been for the shouts
of the carpenter's watch, who rushed on to the bridge, exclaiming, "We
are sinking! we are sinking!" At first the passengers were much
frightened, but Captain Anderson hastened to reassure them. The danger
could not be imminent. The _Scotia_, divided into seven compartments by
strong partitions, could brave with impunity any leak. Captain Anderson
went down immediately into the hold. He found that the sea was pouring
into the fifth compartment; and the rapidity of the influx proved that
the force of the water was considerable. Fortunately this compartment
did not hold the boilers, or the fires would have been immediately
extinguished. Captain Anderson ordered the engines to be stopped at
once, and one of the men went down to ascertain the extent of the
injury. Some minutes afterwards they discovered the existence of a
large hole, of two yards in diameter, in the ship's bottom. Such a leak
could not be stopped; and the _Scotia_, her paddles half submerged, was
obliged to continue her course. She was then three hundred miles from
Cape Clear, and after three days' delay, which caused great uneasiness
in Liverpool, she entered the basin of the company.
The engineers visited the _Scotia_, which was put in dry dock. They
could scarcely believe it possible; at two yards and a half below
water-mark was a regular rent, in the form of an isosceles triangle.
The broken place in the iron plates was so perfectly defined that it
could not have been more neatly done by a punch. It was clear, then,
that the instrument producing the perforation was not of a common
stamp; and after having been driven with prodigious strength, and
piercing an iron plate 1-3/8 inches thick, had withdrawn itself by a
retrograde motion truly inexplicable.
Such was the last fact, which resulted in exciting once more the
torrent of public opinion. From this moment all unlucky casualties
which could not be otherwise accounted for were put down to the
monster. Upon this imaginary creature rested the responsibility of all
these shipwrecks, which unfortunately were considerable; for of three
thousand ships whose loss was annually recorded at Lloyd's, the number
of sailing and steam ships supposed to be totally lost, from the
absence of all news, amounted to not less than two hundred!
Now, it was the "monster" who, justly or unjustly, was accused of their
disappearance, and, thanks to it, communication between the different
continents became more and more dangerous. The public demanded
peremptorily that the seas should at any price be relieved from this
formidable cetacean.