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Loch Ness Monster
Loch Ness monster in Scotland, is the reputed home of a monster that has been chronicled, with varying degrees of credibility over the past 1400 years. The loch is the largest mass of fresh water in Britain and perhaps the most sinister, even when the sun shines on its murky, peat-stained waters. According to his biographer, St Adamnan, writing a century later, a disciple of Columba was swimming across the mile wide loch to fetch a boat for his master from the opposite shore, when the monster suddenly rose to the surface "with a great roar and open mouth". The onlookers, converts and heathen alike,were,according to Adamnan, "stricken with a very great terror". But St,Columba ,making the sign of the cross and invoking the Almighty, is said to have repelled the monster with the words "Think not to go further, nor touch thou that man, Quick, go back..."The beast obeyed and has never hurt anyone since.
"Powerful Argument towards Adamnan Account"Adamnan's account may have been a powerful argument for the efficacy of prayer, but it was somewhat vague as a portrait of the monster. Indeed, no clear picture of it emerged until 14 centuries--and innumerable sightings--later. Then in 1933, a London surgeon, driving past the lake on vacation secured the first photograph of the monster-or what was claimed to be one. It showed a long neck, arched over the water from a thick body, and was taken according to the surgeon, from a distance of about 200 to 300 yards,near Invermoriston. At that point the road runs 200 feet above the loch. The road was then newly built, which may have had some kind of connection with the spate of sightings reported around that time. There were frequent explosions as engineers blasted a path for the road. "Did the noise disturb the Loch Ness monster from the depths of the Loch lake? Or was it just that. With the coming of the road, new vistas were opened up,enabling tourists to see, for the first time in centuries, something that had always been living in the water?" Whatever the answer , the first photograph was published in the London Daily Mail and provoked an argument that was to rage for years.Skeptics claim that it portrays either a mass of decaying vegetable matter lifted to the surface by trapped gases or the tip of the tail of a diving otter photographed out of scale. On the other hand, true believers in the monster say that the picture tallies with the description given by many people who claim to have seen the creature and that, in any case an eminent surgeon would hardly be likely to risk his reputation for a hoax. The last argument may indicate a touching faith in the medical profession. All the same, many people who are convinced that they have seen the Loch Ness monster belong to groups normally known to be truthful witnesses: schoolmasters,naval officers, Benedectine monks, One noble prize winner, two town clerks and many dour Scottish professional men- none of whom are inclined by nature to risk ridicule or to court publicity for its own sake. |
