'...The facts relating to this apparition (entered in various log-books) agreed in most respects as to the shape of the object or creature in question the untiring rapidity of its movements its surprising power of locomotion and the peculiar life with which it seemed endowed. If it was a whale it surpassed in size all those hitherto classified in science. Taking into consideration the mean of observations made at divers times rejecting the timid estimate of those who assigned to this object a length of two hundred feet equally with the exaggerated opinions which set it down as a mile in width and three in length we might fairly conclude that this mysterious being surpassed greatly all dimensions admitted by the learned ones of the day if it existed at all. And that it DID exist was an undeniable fact; and with that tendency which disposes the human mind in favour of the marvellous we can understand the excitement produced in the entire world by this supernatural apparition...