DENIZENS OF THE DEEP

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 25, 29 December 1925, Page 2

DENIZENS OF THE DEEP

QUA I NTc STORIES. THE LOATHSOME CUTTLE-FISH. Even to-day, in this year of grace, with all our boasted scientific achievement, all we know of tho story, of the sea and what its mighty depths contain is of the barest possible nature (writes Flinders Barr in tho Sydney Sun). If, then, our knowledge is so small, what must have been the position of the early voyagers and discoverers, who lived in an ago >of miracles, and were ready to trace to a supernatural causo anything they did not understand?

Tho tradition of the early mammoths and their kind had been .carefuliy handed down, and this survived at sea in the form of that. faithful creature, the sea-serpent, which many people swear by at the present day—and, after all, there is no reason why they should not! For have we not in our near neighbourhood here the giant cuttle-fish, probably the most awful of Nature’s creations? We know that he grows to a length of over 70 feet from tip to tip of his tentacles, which look very like serpents. Each of these—they are eight in number—is armed with aivful suckers lined with rows of toeth, which aro very sensitive, and ready to close on tho smallest object. Then there is tho cruel parrot-liko beak, and tho two huge eyes, each at least a foot in diameter.

We may imagine him lying in wait in his cave in the rocks down in the depths where no sunlight pierces, ever alert to seize and devour anything that may serve to stay his hunger. He and his kind are well described by Michelet as “the insatiablo nightmares of tho sea.”

It is scarcely a matter for wonder, therefore, that in tho days when ships were small and frail in build, occasionally they should havo been attacked, and, in some cases, their crews devoured, by these monsters. Various tales of thesp tragedies have appeared in tho chronicles of tho Middle Ages, which till lately, when tho actual size of the creatures was realised, were thought to have been sailors’ yarns, pure and simple, with no foundation in fact. We know now that in this case what the ancient mariners said was true.

Theso giant ccphalopods are tho principal food of the greatest of living creatures, the sperm whale,' which, diving down to the sea bed, routs out his prey, seizes him in his massive jaws, and in siiite of- his titanic struggles, bears him to the surface to be devoured. Frank Bullen describes one of theso encounters, which, being at close quarters, was terrifying to Witness. - One-marvels what would happen if all the sperm whales were destroyed, and the cephalopods, increasing in vast numbers, were gradually driven to our shallower coastal waters in tho search for food. Tlvero would then be little bathing from Bondi boach. THE TREE GOOSE. A tale firmly believed in by our ancestors, and in some places in Europe still a surprisingly short time ago, was the wonderful manner in which a bird called tho “bernicle,” “baruicle,” or “tree goose,” was produced. The first phase of the popular belief was that certain trees like willows, growing more particularly in the Orkney Islands, swelled out at the ends of their branches into round buds or balls, each containing the embryo of a goose. These geese, when ripe, fell off into the sea fully fledged and took wing. Scaliger, Leslio, Olaus Magnus, Gesner and many other learned men attested to the truth of this fable. A modification of the story was that given by Boece, the eminent Scottish historian. Ho denied that the geese grew on trees, but said that as a result of his own personal researches and experience he could prove that they were first produced in the form of worms in tho substance of old trees and pieces of timber floating in the sea. Ho concluded they were produced by the sea water alone, “which is tho cause and production of many wonderful things.” Turner, a learned divine and a botanist, went even further, and declared that when any old plank or part of a ship lvad been long in the sea, it put forth little fungi or barnacles, which afterwards produced living and flying fowl. Turner, however, still believed in tho goose tree, which he said produced a different kind of bird from the barnacle goose. Gesner, writing about 1550, says that many of theso birds are produced from old wood in tho sea off tho Lancashire coast. “All those parts adjoining do so much abound therewith that one of the best is bought for threepence. For the truth hereof, if any doubt, may it please them to repaire unto me, and I shall satisfie them by tlio testimonie of good witnesses.” As a matter of fact, the actual molusc which gave rise to this quaint tale is ,of course, the well-known goose barnacle (Lefas) anatifera) which wo find growing on ships’ bottoms, wooden piles or piers, and other objects long exposed to contact with fresh seawater. THE SUCKING FISH. Then there was that firm belief in the powers of tho remora or sucking fish—wo know him to-day by the same name. Ho has a curious sucker arrangement on tho top of his long flat head which enables him to attach himsielf to any object he fancies. One of his favourite hosts is the shark, which generally has one or more small specimens attached to him, when caught. In the early and middle ages it was believed that ,if ono of these small fish —they aro only about a foot in length —fastened itself to the bottom or keel of even the largest ship or galley, it could hold the vesesl quite stationary as long as it -wished. What quaint entries would have been made if the captains had kept log books in those days! Perhaps the most difficult fish story to accept is Sir John Mandeville’s account of the very kind-hearted fish which inhabited the waters of the sea surrounding the island of Calonak, which, unfortunately, is not marked on the charts. Thero were several species of tho finny tribe round about the island, and at a certain period of the year each kind arrived in multitudes, and threw themselves -on the beaches. They took it in turn and each kind stayed ashore for three days, and then slipped back into the water again. This shore going was entirely for the sako of the inhabitants of the island, who were very fond of fish, and were supposed to help themselves to as many of each sort as they wanted in the course of three days. It may bo these good-natured fish overdid the idea ’ ,for nowadays one never comes across examples of such altruism.