CHAPTER I
  A SHIFTING REEF

    The year 1866
        was signalised
               by a remarkable incident,
           a mysterious and puzzling phenomenon,
         which doubtless no one
            has yet forgotten.

    Not to mention rumours
          which agitated
               the maritime population and
              excited the public mind,
           even in the interior
               of continents,
         seafaring men were particularly excited.

    Merchants,
           common sailors,
         captains of vessels,
           skippers,
         both of Europe and America,
           naval officers of all countries,
         and the Governments of
              several States
                   on the two continents,
           were deeply
              interested in the matter.

    For some time past vessels
        had been met by
         "an enormous thing,"
            a long object,
         spindle-shaped,
         occasionally phosphorescent,
           and infinitely larger
               and more rapid
             in its movements
               than a whale.

    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.

    As to classing it
           in the list of fables,
         the idea
            was out of the question.

    On the 20th of July,
           1866,
         the steamer Governor Higginson,
           of the Calcutta
               and Burnach Steam Navigation Company,
         had met this
              moving mass five miles
                off the east coast
                      of Australia.

    Captain Baker thought at first
         that he
            was in the presence
                   of an unknown sandbank;
        he even prepared
              to determine its exact position
             when two columns of water,
           projected by the mysterious object,
         shot with
               a hissing noise a hundred
             and fifty feet
               up into the air.

    Now,
           unless the sandbank
            had been
                  submitted to the
                     intermittent
                        eruption of a geyser,
         the Governor Higginson
            had to do
                   neither more
                  nor less
                       than with an aquatic mammal,
           unknown till then,
         which threw
               up from its blow-holes columns
                   of water
               mixed with air and vapour.

    Similar facts
        were observed
               on the 23rd of July
             in the same year,
           in the Pacific Ocean,
         by the Columbus,
           of the West India
               and Pacific Steam Navigation Company.

    But this extraordinary creature
        could transport itself
               from one place
                   to another with
              surprising velocity;
        as,
           in an interval
               of three days,
         the Governor Higginson
               and the Columbus
            had observed it
                   at two different points
                       of the chart,
           separated by a distance of
               more than
                   seven hundred nautical leagues.

    Fifteen days later,
           two thousand miles farther off,
         the Helvetia,
           of the Compagnie-Nationale,
         and the Shannon,
        of the Royal Mail
           Steamship Company,
         sailing to windward in
             that portion of the Atlantic
                  lying between the United States
                       and Europe,
           respectively signalled the monster
               to each other
             in 42@ 15' N. lat.

    and 60@ 35' W. long.

    In these simultaneous observations
         they thought themselves
              justified in estimating
                   the minimum length
                 of the mammal at
                   more than three hundred
                       and fifty feet,
           as the Shannon and Helvetia
            were of smaller dimensions
                   than it,
         though they measured
               three hundred feet over all.