Science: The Romantic Zoologist

Big-Game Hunter Willy Ley* has returned from safari. Having tracked his prey through the dank undergrowth of large public libraries, he has put his trophies on exhibition in a newly published book, The Lungfish, the Dodo and the Unicorn (Viking; $3.75).

Ley calls his book “an excursion into romantic zoology.” It is a lighthearted excursion. A man of deep zoological faith, Ley believes that animal myths are based on actual fact, and that many fearful and wonderful creatures, undreamed of (and unlisted) by more unromantic zoologists, may still roam the earth.

Gentle Unicorn. The unicorn, King of (nonexistent) Beasts, was reputed to be a graceful, strong animal that could not be taken by force. But like the “gentil knights” of the troubadours’ verses, it would lay its head in a virgin’s lap. A pity, says Ley, to believe that the unicorn is only an ugly rhinoceros, dimly and distantly seen. Perhaps the noble beast had a pleasanter prototype. Modern scientists know, Ley points out, that the horn buds of a calf can be transplanted to the middle of its forehead, where they develop together into a “unicorn” (single horn). The bull with such a horn becomes the leader of the herd. Confident of his strength and position, he can afford to be as gentle as a unicorn.

Evil Kraken. Another mythical beast, says Ley, has really come to life: the kraken, a gigantic octopus that flourished in the imagination of medieval Scandinavians. Evidence has been accumulating, he says, to prove that there are several species of giant squid or octopus which come to the surface only rarely. Ley thinks that Scylla, of the Odyssey, must have been a kraken, with her six toothy necks reaching out of a sea cave. So was Medusa, with her “snakes” (octopus arms) writhing around her face.

Ley believes in sea serpents too; he marshals an impressive panel of ministers, sea captains and other reliable witnesses to testify that they exist. They are not “serpents”, he thinks, but some large reptile or mammal from an earlier age.

There are other strange beasts in the sea, says Ley, that zoologists do not recognize. For example, there is a turtle-like creature, much bigger than known sea turtles, called a niuhi in Easter Island and a moha-moha in Queensland. It may range all over. Last winter, says Ley, a large unknown animal tried to climb a sea wall in Florida, leaving great moha-moha like tracks in the sand.

Modern Dinosaur? Are any dinosaurs still around? Ley tells of the Ishtar Gate in the ruins of Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon, which is decorated with portraits of the sirrush, a scaly, tall-walking reptile with clawed hind feet like a bird. The drawing is singularly detailed, and like nothing known to modern man until he dug up fossil dinosaurs. Ley thinks that the ancients may have seen something like, a living dinosaur. Perhaps modern man may still see one. Ley cites many descriptions of a dinosaur-like creature that may be roaming the Central African swamps.

There may be anthropoid apes in Venezuela, Ley says optimistically, and little furry men in Africa. Ley admits that the dodo, most extinct of birds, is gone for good—and so is the great auk.

But more living fossils, he says, may turn up any day. Not ten years ago, South African fishermen caught a latimeria, a large primitive fish that was supposed to be extinct 60 million years ago. Who knows what fossils may yet come to life—what myths turn to fact? Meanwhile, zoology is richer for Willy Ley’s researches.

*German-born Willy Ley is better known as a writer on rockets and interplanetary travel. His present book is an expansion of an earlier work, The Lungfish and the Unicorn, which became a war casualty when published in 1941.