54 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



an accompaniment of jeers from his observers. 

 They discovered, however, that it is not safe to 

 predict failure merely from the premise that the 

 venturer is an amateur. With as much precision 

 as though he had made a life-long study of har- 

 pooning, he hurled the spear not only into, but 

 straight through the shark and the half-hour 

 struggle to hold the creature was sufficiently ex- 

 citing to satisfy the most exigent of big-game fish- 

 ermen. 



The other three sharks were not alarmed by the 

 fate of the first. They lingered on the scene of 

 his disaster, and from the boom we paid out string 

 with pieces of meat for bait. They came as easily 

 to this toll as a donkey following a proffered car- 

 rot and by pulling in the tempting morsel two feet 

 in front of the eager blunt snouts, we brought them 

 to the surface directly under our feet, so that we 

 could watch the movements of the brilliant blue 

 pilotfish, that, with uncanny prescience, antici- 

 pated every movement of their huge patrons. One 

 of the big fellows had three of these little satelhtes 

 that unfailingly held their formation, one just 

 above his head, the other two in perfect alignment 

 a few inches in front of his jaws. So exactly 

 synchronized are the movements of such a marine 

 galaxy, that it is impossible to tell whether the 

 shark follows the pilotfish, or the pilotfish the 

 shark. It is evidently a profitable arrangement for 

 the pilots, since we meet with few cases of philan- 

 thropy in marine life, and whether they actually 

 lead the sharks to food, or are merely hopeful 



