Odd Find of the Day

While taking a quick break from "Ye Olde Moutaine of Home-worke", I followed a relatively convoluted clicking path to a site chronicling British maritime history. I was poking around, and found this gem:

The first ship to be sunk by a torpedo was the Blanco Encalada in 1891 during the Chilean revolutionary war. Hit by a single torpedo, she sank immediately. The captain, Don Luis Goni, was ejected up a ventilation shaft and into the sea by the explosion, and was last seen swimming ashore with his arm around the ship's mascot, a Llama. The creature was taken onboard HMS Warspite as a mascot, until, having eaten the epaulettes off an Admiral's dress uniform, it was banished to London Zoo in disgrace.

Now, I know that, in reality, this probably wasn't actually that funny at the time. However, at this point in history, I think we can safely find this abso-frickin'-lutely hilarious. Let's break this down, shall we?

1. A Chilean ship had a llama as its mascot. This, in and of itself, is pretty damn funny. With all respect to llamas, they're not really an animal that I typically associate with ships— a llama therefore strikes me as a comically odd choice of mascot.


2. Said llama was actually on board the ship, as opposed to simply being represented as a carved figurehead or a painting or something. Imagine the logistics to having a large, stubborn, and opinionated quadruped on board a sailing ship. Brings a smile to the face, doesn't it?


3. During a torpedo attack (the first one in recorded maritime history, apparently), the captain was "ejected up a ventilation shaft and into the sea". Wile E. Coyote, anybody?


4. Rather than simply swimming for shore, the captain of the sinking ship tried to make it ashore with the aforementioned llama. It's unclear from this description which of the pair was doing more of the swimming, or if the good captain was simply using the llama as some sort of four-legged floatation device.


5. When captured, the llama was adopted by the British ship as... a mascot. Tragedy struck, however, when the critter ate part of an admiral's uniform! Just picture it! The mental image is priceless!


6. After the unfortunate epaulet incident, rather than simply putting the llama ashore, eating it, selling it, etc., the master of the HMS Warspite transported the poor animal all the way back to London to put in the London Zoo ("in disgrace", no less).

Really, the entire incident is pure comedic gold. My day has officially Been Made. Now, back to the homework.