That the West is rapidly assuming many of the sacred prerogatives of the East was clearly demonstrated the other day by the news from Tacoma, Wn., that there had been captured in Hood’s Canal, Puget Sound, two sea serpents.
    Heretofore the East has monopolized the sea serpent industry, but in its bravest days it never ventured the claim of having seen two sea serpents at the one time, let alone capturing them. In fact, heretofore the East contented itself by thrilling reports’ from time to time by its sea captains, of the magnitude of the sea serpents which had been sighted. Sometimes these sea serpents were only sixty feet long, and again they reached the stupendous length of 600 feet. One captain of an excursion barge which was kept out all night in Long Island Sound, so that the manager of the bar on board could sell all of his beer to the thirsty passengers, reported passing a sea serpent 1,000 feet long, and some of the passengers were quite sure it was 2,000 feet long. It is necessary to state that this sea serpent was sighted after every drop of beer and whisky on board had been consumed.
    The Tacoma sea serpents, as far as length go, are very mild in comparison with their Eastern brothers and sisters. One measured ten feet and the other eight feet. This, of course, is disappointing, but their capture proves beyond all peradventure that sea serpents actually exist. A number of scientists have examined them without being able to classify them. One of the sea serpents was killed during the capture, but the other, a female, was alive and well at last accounts.

    She is not a pretty creature by any means. She has a head like a big bulldog and an extraordinarily thick and long neck measuring about twenty-six inches in circumference. Her body is like that of a huge rattlesnake, striped and spotted and tapering to a point at the tail. A colossal fin runs the entire length of the vertebrae, and a similar fin underneath runs along the stomach to the tail. She has great fangs like those of a tiger and heavy molar teeth. Behind the gills are inside fins, and but for these she would never be recognized as bearing any kinship to the fish family.
    If this sea serpent had not been captured the fishermen who first saw it would doubtless be classed with what is generally termed the grand army of sea serpent liars. When the news of its capture reaches all parts of the world it will doubtless cause something of a sensation, as scientists have fought and wrangled over what is called the sea serpent myth for many years. Yet on the books of the United States and British navies are many records furnished by captains of warships of sea serpents which had been seen. Furthermore, it is known, for instance, that monsters exactly corresponding with the descriptions of the sea-serpent by people who claim to have seen it existed in, past ages. In the museum of Yale College are the skeletons of many of these creatures, dug out of rocks and from the beds of dried-up seas, where they had reposed for ages.

    Geologists all know that certain strata are almost certain to disclose the skeletons of great sea monsters, hundreds of feet in length, which in far remote ages swam the oceans of the world and bred numerously. The vertebrae, the ribs, the skull, the jaws of these sea serpents of a bygone age are as well known to scientists as the bones of the megatharium and the mastodon. Coming upon such bones or traces of them in rock formation, the scientist classifies them instantly, knowing that they are the remains of the sea serpent.

    One of these antediluvian sea serpents had a neck at least fifty feet long, according to the scientists of the British Museum, where the skeleton of such a specimen is to be seen. It had a large head, with immense eyes, and it swam through the water something like a giant snake.
    Judging from the records on the subject the sea serpent was more plentiful a century ago than he is to-day. For instance: Captain Laurence de Ferry made oath before a magistrate in 1746 that he had chased a sea serpent with a crew of sailors in a rowboat, but that the monster escaped. The captain described the creature as a formidable specimen, fully 600 feet long, whose coils above water looked like a row of hogs-heads. It had the head of a horse, with a sort of mane, and it was gray or brown in color.
    Eleazer Crabtree, “a man of unimpeachable veracity,” who dwelt on Fox Island, in Penobscot Bay, in 1778, said be saw a sea serpent 500 feet long. His description was very much like that of Captain de Ferry’s, and the monster he saw had a large black mouth. The same Crabtree saw another sea serpent near Mount Desert in 1793.

    The adventure of Commodore Preble, U. S. N., when he gave chase to a sea serpent took place in 1779. He was then a midshipman, and when the sea serpent was sighted from the deck of the sloop of war he was placed in command of a boat manned by twelve seamen and sent in pursuit. The monster is said to have been 100 feet long and possessed of a large head. Its motion was so rapid that it could not be overtaken, but it was observed by the officers and men for over an hour.
    Captain Little, U. S. N., swore that while in Penobscot Bay, in 1780, on board of a “public armed ship,” he saw a sea serpent at sunrise one morning. He had a boat lowered, and took the tiller himself, but before he could get near enough for the marines to shoot, the animal sank out of sight.
    Abraham Cummings reported a sea serpent in Penobscot Bay in 1802, and another in 1808. In the same year the Rev. Mr. Maclean, a clergyman, of Eigg, sent a careful description of a sea serpent, with “a head somewhat broad,” that swam “with his head above water for about half a mile.” He described the creature as about eighty feet long.
    In 1817 Captain Tappan, of the schooner Laura, and his whole crew told of seeing a sea serpent off Gloucester. They said it looked like a string of buoys, with a head like a serpent and a long tongue that stuck out of its mouth like a harpoon. Its motion was more rapid that that of a whale.

    Several persons made affidavits in 1818 to having seen a sea monster off Cape Ann. In 1822 the sea serpent was reported from the fjords of Norway, and in 1831 it was seen off Portsmouth, N. H. In 1848 the British ship Daedalus, Captain McQuahae, encountered a sea serpent which was distinctly seen by many of the passengers and afterward described by them, with much care. The captain and passengers of the ship Silas Richards reported encountering a monster on June 7, 1826, in latitude 41 and longitude 67, and described the serpent as of a brownish color and seventy feet long.
    Three Maine fishermen, “all reliable and God-fearing men,” sailed far out to sea one summer’s day in 1823 and came across a sea serpent basking near the surface. Two of the fishermen were so badly scared that they went below, leaving the third, a Mr. Gooch, to face the intruder. Mr. Gooch is authority for the statement that the boat passed within fifty feet of the serpent and that he had a good view of it. It raised its head and looked at Mr. Gooch, and then dived out of sight.
    There were many kinds of sea serpents in that year. The steamship Connecticut reached port several days overdue, and explained the delay by saying that much time had been consumed in chasing sea serpents. The passengers and crew were unanimous in their description of the monster, which fled across the sea in spirals. The people on land became very much excited, and three days later the Connecticut put to sea with a hundred excusionists who wanted to get a glimpse of the snake.
    Countless other instances could be cited in which mariners belonging to every nation on the globe made solemn, and in some cases sworn, statements of having seen sea serpents, but those already mentioned cover the ground quite fully. It can be seen that in every case the sea serpent escaped, although in some instances the monster was fired at by gun and cannon. Tacoma can justly be proud of the fishermen who made the capture, as the specimen should set at rest forever the disputes which have survived a century or more.

From— The Topeka State Journal. (Topeka. Kan.). 01 Aug. 1896. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.