The Sea Raiders sea monsters include Scylla and Charybdis of Greek mythology, and the kraken of medieval times which is thought to have been a giant squid. Previous fictional encounters with giant squids are described in chapter 59 of Herman Melville's "Moby-Dick" of 1851, and in Jules Verne's "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" of 1870. The narrator describes a recent period when a new sort of giant squid, a species named "Haploteuthis ferox", became known. (This fictitious name can be compared with the genus name "Architeuthis" of the giant squid.) As a part of the survey of the period, including early encounters
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea title; the French title actually means "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas"). In the Argyle Press/Hurst and Company 1892 Arlington Edition, the translation and editing mistakes attributed to Mercier are missing. Scaphandre is correctly translated as "diving apparatus" and not as "cork-jackets". Although the book cover gives the title as "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", the title page titles the book "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas; Or, The Marvelous and Exciting Adventures of Pierre Arronax, Conseil His Servant, and Ned Land a Canadian Harpooner". A modern translation was produced in 1966 by Walter James Miller and published by