528 SQUAL1D.E. 



I am indebted to J. Hutcliinson, Esq. of Durham, for the 

 knowledge of the occurrence of an example of this species on 

 the coast of Durham in April 1840, and this specimen has 

 been preserved for the Durham University Museum. Mr. 

 Hutchinson's very obliging communication contained various 

 interesting particulars, with a penciled sketch of the fish, the 

 fins, the teeth, and the spinous asperities on the skin, to be 

 hereafter noticed in the description. 



This Shark appears to be well known to several Northern 

 zoologists ; and the following account is derived from the va- 

 luable work on the Arctic Regions by Captain W. Scoresby. 



" The Squalus borealis is twelve or fourteen feet in 

 length, sometimes more, and six or eight feet in circumfer- 

 ence. The opening of the mouth, which extends nearly 

 across the lower part of the head, is from twenty-one to twen- 

 ty-four inches in width. The teeth are serrated in one jaw, 

 and lancet-shaped and denticulated in the other. It is with- 

 out the anal fin, but has the temporal opening ; the spiracles 

 on the neck are five in number on each side. The colour is 

 cinereous grey. The irides are blue, the pupil emerald 

 green." 



" This Shark is one of the foes of the Whale. It bites 

 it and annoys it while living, and feeds on it when dead. 

 It scoops hemispherical pieces out of its body, nearly as big 

 as a person's head ; and continues scooping and gorging lump 

 after lump, until the whole cavity of its belly is filled. It 

 is so insensible of pain, that though it has been run through 

 the body with a knife and escaped, yet, after a while, I have 

 seen it return to banquet again on the Whale, at the very 

 spot where it received its wounds. The heart is very small ; 

 it performs six or eight pulsations in a minute, and continues 

 its beating for some hours after being taken out of the body. 

 The body, also, though separated into any number of parts, 

 gives evidence of life for a similar length of time. It is 



