Sea Monsters Unmasked, and Sea Fables ExplainedLee, Henry
History
Sea Monsters Unmasked, and Sea Fables Explained
Lee, Henry
Cephalopoda; Marine animals
The Bishop adds that in the diocese of Bergen, as well as in the manor
of Nordland, there were hundreds of persons who affirmed with the
strongest assurances that they had seen this kind of creature; sometimes
at a distance and at other times quite close to their boats, standing
upright, and formed like a human creature down to the middle--the rest
they could not see--but of those who had seen them out of water and
handled them he had not been able to find more than one person of credit
who could vouch it for truth. This informant, "the Reverend Mr. Peter
Angel, minister of Vand-Elvens Gield, on Suderoe," assured his bishop,
when he was on a visitation journey, that "in the year 1719, he (being
then about twenty years old) saw what is called a merman lying dead on a
point of land near the sea, which had been cast ashore by the waves
along with several sea-calves (seals), and other dead fish. The length
of this creature was much greater than what has been mentioned of any
before, namely, above three fathoms. It was of a dark grey colour all
over: in the lower part it was like a fish, and had a tail like that of
a porpoise. The face resembled that of a man, with a mouth, forehead,
eyes, etc. The nose was flat, and, as it were, pressed down to the face,
in which the nostrils were very visible. The breast was not far from the
head; the arms seemed to hang to the side, to which they were joined by
a thin skin, or membrane. The hands were, to all appearance, like the
paws of a sea-calf. The back of this creature was very fat, and a great
part of it was cut off, which, with the liver, yielded a large quantity
of train-oil." The author then quotes a description by Luke Debes[55] of
a mermaid seen in 1670 at Faroe, westward of Qualboe Eide, by many of
the inhabitants, as also by others from different parts of Suderoe. She
was close to the shore, and stood there for two hours and a half, and
was up to her waist in water. She had long hairs on her head, which hung
down to the surface of the water all round about her, and she held a
fish in her right hand.
[55] _Feroa Reserata_, or Description of the Faroe Islands. 8vo.
Copenhagen, 1673.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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