268 



monious in gratifying bis appetite, is designated by the same 

 terms; while the Lion, merely from some poetical and 

 fictitious notion, that has been long current, of standing in 

 awe of mankind, is invested with a character for nobleness 

 and generosity to which he has no title whatever. 



" The shark is perhaps more undistinguishing in his 

 appetite than any other fish, and is sometimes observed to 

 swallow matters from which he can derive no nutriment; but 

 this goes merely to prove, that whatever may be the nature 

 of his appetites, he has not always the power of gratifying 

 them ; for no person can be so weak as to believe that the 

 shark swallows lumps of rusty iron by way of a relish. The 

 fact is, that his form is so awkward, and his motion so 

 sluggish, that there is hardly any species of fish but can 

 easily evade his attacks. He is thus condemned to many 

 long fasts, which urge him to snatch at every thing animate 

 and inanimate that comes in his way. A large shark one 

 day knocked the rudder of our boat off its hinges, with a 

 stroke of his tail, and made repeated attempts to bite it as it 

 floated along. But this ought not to be regarded so much 

 as a proof of the animal's voracity, as of his want of the 

 faculty of discrimination. From all I could observe, every 

 other species offish seemed equally ravenous with the shark; 

 and as they were much more active in their movements, 

 could glut themselves with less trouble. The whole appeared 

 a scene of unceasing carnage, — the small falling a prey to the 

 large, and the weak to the vigorous. It was nothing uncom- 

 mon with us, after hooking a small fish, to pull up also a 

 large one, that had swallowed it, hook and all, on its way. 

 Nature employs various means to qualify this universal rage 

 for destruction. The projecting snout of the shark, often 

 gives the alarm to its prey, and pushes it out of its reach ; 

 the teeth of the Boskop, and of several others of the larger 

 Spari, are mere hemisphaerical stumps, ill adapted for taking 

 a firm hold; but the greatest protectors are the scales, by 

 means of which the prey, if too large to be gorged at once, 

 disengages itself from its enemy by a jerk, leaving many of 

 them sticking in its teeth. 



