28 



* BLUE SHARK. 



Squalns glancas, LiNU^EUS. 



" " Gray; Catalogue of British Museum, p. 125. 



Carcharias c/lancus, CuviEii. 



" " Flemikg; British Animals, p. 167. 



" " Jentns; Manual, p. 499. 



" " Tabrell; British Fishes, 2nd. Ed., vol. ii, 



p. 498. 



The Blue Shark is a restless and wandering fish, which mi- 

 grates to our coasts in summer, and is even found at that time 

 to stray so far north as the Orkney Islands; but it leaves us 

 again on the approach of winter; and if, with the commentators 

 on the Halieuticon of the poet Oppian, we are to believe that the 

 fish Glaucus of that writer is the same with the Glaucus of 

 ^lian, the season when it abounds with us is the time when 

 it has disappeared from the seas of Italy. I have known it 

 thrown on shore in Cornwall so early as the first week in 

 March, but it is rarely seen before the month of June; when 

 its arrival is made known by the injuries it inflicts on the nets 

 and lines of fishermen. This is done in hunting after the fish 

 that have become entangled, and so are more easily seized; and 

 as the drift-nets are stretched out for pilchards or herrings, it 

 will pass along their course from one end to the other, and 

 cut out every separate fish with the portion of net that held 

 it; all of which it swallows together. If it is entangled for a 

 moment, its keen and serrated teeth soon effect an escape, whether 

 from the net or hook; but the latter case is sometimes attended 

 with difficulty, and then it is that its instinctive efforts often 

 lead to a curious complication of circumstances. 



It is the habit of such of the family of Sharks as swim high 

 in the water, when they seize their prey to do it with the action 

 of turning the head and fore parts of the body; which method 



