proceeded, pointed to
something in the water, just astern. Following the direction of his
finger with my eye, I saw, just beneath the surface, a large
ghastly-looking white shark, gliding stealthily along, and apparently
following the boat. Browne said that he had first noticed it about half
an hour before, since which time it had steadily followed us,
occasionally making a leisurely circuit round the boat, and then
dropping astern again. A moment ago, having fallen into a doze at the
helm, and awaking with a start, he found himself leaning over the
gunwale, and the shark just at his elbow. This had startled him, and
caused the sudden exclamation by which I had been aroused. I shuddered
at his narrow escape, and I acknowledge that the sight of this hideous
and formidable creature, stealing along in our wake, and manifesting an
intention to keep us company, caused me some uneasy sensations. He swam
with his dorsal fin almost at the surface, and his broad nose scarcely
three feet from the rudder. His colour rendered him distinctly visible.

"What a spectre of a fish it is," said Browne, "with his pallid,
corpse-like skin, and noiseless motion; he has no resemblance to any of
the rest of his kind, that I have ever seen. You know what the sailors
would say, if they should see him dogging us in this way; Old
Crosstrees, or Spot, would shake their heads ominously, and set us down
as a doomed company."

"Aside from any such superstitious notions, he is an unpleasant and
dangerous neighbour, and we must be circumspect while he is prowling
about."

"It certainly won't do to doze at the helm," resumed Browne; "I consider
that I have just now had a really narrow escape. I was leaning quite
over the gunwale; a lurch of the boat would have thrown me overboard,
and then there would have been no chance for me."

There would not, in fact, have been the shadow of a chance.

"Even as it was," resumed he, "if this hideous-looking monster had been
as active and vigilant as some of his tribe, it would have fared badly
with me. I have heard of their seizing persons standing on the shore,
where the water was deep enough to let them swim close in; and Spot
tells of a messmate of his, on one of his voyages in a whaler, who was
carried off, while standing entirely out of water, on the carcass of a
whale, which he was assisting in cutting up, as it lay alongside the
ship. The shark threw himself upon the carcass, five or six yards