In another work, _The New Survey of Old Greenland_, Egede speaks of the
same monster, with the addition that the body was full as thick and as big
in circumference as the ship that he sailed in. The drawing (which I
reproduce, Fig. 68) appears to have been taken by another missionary, Mr.
Bing, who stated that the creature's eyes seemed red, and like burning
fire. The paws mentioned by Egede were probably paddles like those of the
Liassic Saurians.
[Illustration: FIG. 68.--SEA-SERPENT SEEN BY HANS EGEDE, IN 1734, OFF THE
SOUTH COAST OF GREENLAND.]
Pontoppidan considers this to be a different monster from the Norway
sea-serpent, of which he gives a figure furnished him by the Rev. Hans
Strom, made from descriptions of two of his neighbours at Herroe, who had
been eye-witnesses of its appearance.
Lawrance de Ferry, a captain in the Norwegian Navy, and commander in
Bergen in Pontoppidan's time, actually wounded one of the Norwegian
serpents, and made two of his men, who were with him in the boat at the
time, testify upon oath in court to the truth of the statement which he
himself made, as follows:--
"The latter end of August, in the year 1746, as I was on a voyage, in my
return from Trundheim, in a very calm and hot day, having a mind to put in
at Molde, it happened that when we were arrived with my vessel within six
English miles of the aforesaid Molde, being at a place called Jule-Næfs,
as I was reading in a book, I heard a kind of murmuring voice from amongst
the men at the oars, who were eight in number, and observed that the man
at the helm kept off from the land. Upon this I inquired what was the
matter; and was informed that there was a sea-snake before us. I then
ordered the man at the helm to keep to the land again, and to come up with
this creature, of which I had heard so many stories. Though the fellows
were under some apprehensions, they were obliged to obey my orders. In the
meantime this sea-snake passed by us, and we were obliged to tack the
vessel about, in order to get nearer to it. As the snake swam faster than
we could row, I took my gun, that was ready charged, and fired at it; on
this he immediately plunged under the water. We rowed to the place where
it sank down (which in the calm might be easily observed) and lay upon our
oars, thinking it would come up again to the surface; however, it did not.
When the snake plunged down, the water appeared thick and red; perhaps
some of the shot might wound it, the distance being very little. The head
of this snake, which it held more than two feet above the surface of the
water, resembled that of a horse. It was of a greyish colour, and the
mouth was quite black and very large. It had black eyes and a long white
mane,[255] that hung down from the neck to the surface of the water.
Besides the head and neck, we saw seven or eight folds or coils of this
snake, which were very thick, and, as far as we could guess, there was
about a fathom distance between each fold.--Bergen, 1751."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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