I have not had the opportunity of consulting this work, but the passage about the sea-serpent runs m
- Date of account
- Late nineteenth-century survey
- Source
- The great sea-serpent: an historical and critical treatise
- Reference
- The great sea-serpent: an historical and critical treatise · selected passage 227
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English edition of a European scholarly compilation
- Translation
- English edition of A. C. Oudemans's historical survey
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
s, that a few days before, as he was taking a ride with his wife in a chair, the road taking them close to a bank which overlooks the harbour (and is nearly a perpendicular precipice), he saw an uncommon appearance, which induced him to descend from the carriage, when he saw the sea-serpent, in which until then he had …
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlys, that a few days before, as he was taking a ride with his wife in a chair, the road taking them close to a bank which overlooks the harbour (and is nearly a perpendicular precipice), he saw an uncommon appearance, which induced him to descend from the carriage, when he saw the sea-serpent, in which until then he had been an unbeliever. The animal was stretched out, partly over the white sandy beach, which had four or five feet of water upon it, and lay partly over the channel. He desired his wife to get out of the chair, which she did. He said he had made up his mind as to the length of the snake, but wished the opinion of his wife on the same subject. He asked her what she should consider his length; she answered that she could not undertake to say how many feet in length he was, but that she thought him as long as the wharf behind their house, an object with which she had always been familiar. Mr. Mansfield said he was of the same opinion. The wharf is one hundred feet in length.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis is a historical compilation of unusual-animal reports and argument. Witness testimony, repetition between publications and the author's zoological assumptions all affect independence and reliability.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares morphology, behaviour and setting while keeping misidentification, folklore, exaggeration, error and known animals available as alternatives.
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