FISHES 



141 



occupants of a small boat, though their fears would be 

 little justified. Though quite capable of capsizing a small 

 craft, the Whale Shark's courage is not proportionate 

 to its size. The mouth could well engulf a man, but the 

 teeth are almost microscopic, the largest in a full-sized 

 specimen being only one-tenth of an inch in length. 

 The teeth, 250 to the row, are arranged in about 15 rows, 

 and their tiny size has led to the assumption that Rhineodon 



Whale Shark 



was a herbivore. It is now known, however, that the 

 food almost wholly consists of minute forms of animal 

 life known as plankton, the enormous gill rays serving 

 to strain off the sea-water just as do certain plates of the 

 Whalebone Whales, which feed in the same manner. 



The Whale Shark appears to be more or less cosmo- 

 politan, its immense size rendering travel more or less 

 independent of the ocean currents which largely dictate 

 the migrations of smaller forms. Apparently a solitary 



