SOME FACTS ABOUT SHARKS.

Patea Mail, Volume V, Issue 432, 4 June 1879, Page 2

SOME FACTS ABOUT SHARKS.

[“ Once a Week.”} The size of the shark has been immensely exaggerated, but as to the dangerous nature ot the creature there can be no manner of doubt. Ancient mariners are prone to long stories, which it is their delight to "dress up and magnify. Tales are told of sharks that have reached 30, 35, 40,- aind even 50 feet. We may take such -measurements for what they are worth. The white shark, the most dangerous ol its kind; is ssluoro. nici~

than ten or twelve feet from head to tail; No shark that ever yet swam could bite a man in two, or cut oft'his leg. The teeth of the shark, no donbt, are very terrible. They are arranged row behind row, and the muscles of itsjaw. areof enormous strength. Bat they are fitted for rending and lacerating rather than cutting or severing. The action is not that of the shears, but rather of the harrow or scarifier. A shark of ten feet, or even' eight, will seize a man by the thigh, and strip the flesh from oft’his leg down to the heel, or. with a firm grasp of the limb, and a powerful twist of the body in the water, it may possibly tear the log out of the socket. Such an injury, of course, is as instantly fatal as if the assailant had bit its victim in half. There is, indeed, no need to exaggerate the size of the shark ; for a small shark, if hungry, is practically as dangerous as a large one. Any old fisherman knows that a dogfish will attack a cod or a ling twice its size, and with five or six well directed bites, tear it to pieces. It is thus that a shark deals with a man. Following him, and descending before him, it rolls over, and mounting/ with its jaws uppermost, inflicts ft wound sufficiently deadly to cause instant collapse. It is the old story of the wolf attacking the deer or the buffalo. Indeed, the highly-colored stories among sailors as to the size, strength, and voracity of the shark, do much, to create a dangerous sense of security. When a ship is swinging at anchor in the tropics, the hands will think nothing of venturing overboard for a plunge, if such few sharks as are seen about are little, if at all bigger than men; or late at night, they will drop noiselessly over the side and swim ashore. Their simple faith is, that unless a shark he almost large enough to swallow a man, he will not attack him ; while it is also a part of the forecastle creed that the shark sleeps at night. Many au English sailor has paid the penalty of his life for rashness of (his kind ; and the ignorance current among sailors of the shark and its habits is, when we remember how the brute sworms in tropical seas, something almost astonishing. The old story of the two pilot fish which always accompany the shark and guide him to his prey, is still gravely repeated, and as gravely believed. It is also an article of nautical faith that the shark knows when there is a dying man on board ship, and will follow the vessel for miles, guided by some sinister and demoniacal instinct. A.s a matter of fact, there are always some pilot fish to be seen in the wake of a vessel, only that they are not noticed unless a shark in their company calls attention to them ; while a shark will, for reasons of its own, invatiably follow a vessel, whether there be a sick man on it or not.