ther made the lounge on deck in the
balmy evening air and the well-filled pipe of peace doubly sweet.

Our next day's work completed the skinning of the haul we had made, the
last of the carcasses going overboard with a thunderous splash at
four in the afternoon. The assemblage of sharks round the ship on
this occasion was incredible for its number and the great size of the
creatures. Certainly no mariners see so many or such huge sharks as
whalemen; but, in spite of all our previous experience, this day touched
high-water mark. Many of these fish were of a size undreamed of by the
ordinary seafarer, some of them full thirty feet in length, more like
whales than sharks. Most of them were striped diagonally with bands
of yellow, contrasting curiously with the dingy grey of their normal
colour. From this marking is derived their popular name--"tiger sharks,"
not, as might be supposed, from their ferocity. That attribute cannot
properly be applied to the SQUALUS at all, which is one of the
most timid fish afloat, and whose ill name, as far as regards
blood-thirstiness, is quite undeserved. Rapacious the shark certainly
is; but what sea-fish is not? He is not at all particular as to his
diet; but what sea-fish is? With such a great bulk of body, such
enormous vitality and vigour to support, he must needs be ever eating;
and since he is not constructed on swift enough lines to enable him
to prey upon living fish, like most of his neighbours, he is perforce
compelled to play the humble but useful part of a sea-scavenger.

He eats man, as he eats anything else eatable because in the water man
is easily caught, and not from natural depravity or an acquired taste
begetting a decided preference for human flesh. All natives of shores
infested by sharks despise him and his alleged man-eating propensities,
knowing that a very feeble splashing will suffice to frighten him away
even if ever so hungry. Demerara River literally swarms with sharks, yet
I have often seen a negro, clad only in a beaming smile, slip into its
muddy waters, and, after a few sharp blows with his open hand upon the
surface, calmly swim down to the bottom, clear a ship's anchor, or
do whatever job was required, coming up again as leisurely as if in a
swimming-bath. A similar disregard of the dangerous attributes awarded
by popular consent to the shark may be witnessed everywhere among the
people who know him best. The cruelties perpetrated upon sharks by
seamen