The Great Sea Serpent

Once there was a small fish. It was a salt-water fish of a good family. I forgot the name—you'll have to ask the knowledgeable folks. This small fish had eighteen hundred siblings, all of which were his age. They didn't know their father or mother, so they had to watch out for themselves since the beginning and swim about, but it was incredible fun. They had sufficient water to drink- the whole ocean; they didn't bother about food because it showed up when they needed it. Each behaved as it pleased, each was to tell its own story—or, rather, none of them cared about it at all.

The sun beamed down on the sea, which was as pure as crystal. It was a weird world full of odd animals, some extremely horrifying and huge, with giant gaping jaws that could gobble down all eighteen hundred brothers and sisters, but they didn't think of that because none of them had yet been devoured. The tiny ones swam closely together, like herrings and mackerel do. But when they were swimming their loveliest in the water and thinking of nothing, a long heavy thing sank with an enormous noise from above, right down through them; it extended out in all directions, and every one of the little fishes that moved was either smashed or got a crack that it couldn't stand. From the surface of the sea to the bottom, all the small fishes and the big ones were terrified. The monstrous creature sank deeper and deeper, becoming longer and longer, many miles long. Everything that swims, crawls, or is pushed by the tide witnessed this terrifying creature, this giant inexplicable sea-eel that had come down on them in this manner.

So, what was that? Ah, we remember; it was the vast unending telegraph wire that was being laid between Europe and America.

All the rightful inhabitants of the sea where the cable was installed were confused and agitated. The flying fishes flung themselves as high as they could above the surface. The blow-fish performed a gunshot-length leap above the ocean since it can do so. The other fish swam to the bottom of the sea in such a hurry that they arrived long before the telegraph was seen or heard of down there. They descended on the cod and flounders that lived quietly at the sea's bottom and ate their neighbors. Some sea anemones became so angry that they vomited, but they survived just the same, since they can do that. Many lobsters and crabs broke free from their great shells and had to wait for their bones to regrow.

In all the fear and turmoil, the eighteen hundred brothers and sisters were separated and never came across or recognized one another again. Only around 10 of them stayed in the same area, and after a few hours they had overcome their initial apprehension and were intrigued about the situation. They glanced around, up and down, and down in the depths they imagined they saw the frightening creature that had worried them—yes, had terrified everyone, large and small—lying on the bottom of the sea, as deep as their eyes could see. It was pretty thin, but they had no idea how thick or powerful it could become; it lay quite silently, but they thought that might be part of its cleverness.

"Let it alone; it won't come near us!" muttered the wariest of the little fishes, yet the smallest of them wasn't going to give up trying to figure out what it was. It dropped down from above, thus, the best place to learn about it was up above. As a result, they swam to the surface. It was utterly quiet. They came across a dolphin there. The dolphin is a lively creature that can do somersaults in the water and has eyes, so it must have observed this and known all about it. They inquired, but he had been preoccupied with himself and his somersaults; he had noticed nothing, had no response for them, and merely appeared high and powerful.