140 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



that occurred on the bathing beaches of New Jersey from July 6 to 12, 1916.^' A Car- 

 charodon also may have been responsible for the fatal attack on a swimmer at Mattapoisett 

 on Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts, on July 25, 1936;"° in this case the shark was driven 

 away and not identified. However, these are the only recently recorded instances any- 

 where on the eastern seaboard of the United States in which Carcharodon is under suspi- 

 cion. Hence, while the possibility of attack by it on bathers is always present, since White 

 Sharks do occasionally come close inshore near populous sectors of the coast line, it is 

 exceedingly remote. The most recent report of an attack by this species (fatal in this in- 

 stance) was of a 6- to 7-foot specimen on a swimmer in Panama Bay, the species being 

 identified by a well known ichthyologist on the basis of fragments of its teeth taken from 

 wounds by the surgeon attending the victim." 



In spite of its ferocity and its muscular power, the White Shark does not put up as 

 spectacular a resistance as the Mako when hooked (p. 129), not having the habit of 

 jumping. Nor does it seem to make as strong a fight, pound for pound, as the tuna or 

 the swordfish. For example, it is recorded that a 1,329-pound specimen was landed on rod 

 and reel by an angler after fifty-three minutes in Australia j"* another of 2,176 pounds 

 was landed in South Africa from the shore in five hours,"' the latter one of the largest, if 

 not the largest, fish ever landed on rod and reel.°° 



Range. Oceanic; widespread in tropical, subtropical and warm temperate belts of all 

 the oceans, including the Mediterranean; exceedingly irregular in its occurrence; appar- 

 ently most numerous in Australian waters, but nowhere abundant. 



Occurrence in the Atlantic. Although this shark has been so long known and so much 

 discussed because of its ill repute, very little detailed information is available as to its 

 geographic distribution anywhere. While repeatedly reported from the Mediterranean 

 and from many other localities, it certainly is not common there. It appears to be decidedly 

 scarce on the eastern side of the open Atlantic, it being positively recorded, so far as we can 

 learn, only from the Cape of Good Hope region, from Morocco, Rio de Oro, Mauritania, 

 Senegal, the Canaries, and from the coast of the Iberian Peninsula, with nominal records 

 from the vicinity of Teneriffe and Madeira. 



The list of positively identified captures for the tropical-subtropical belt in the v/est 

 is limited to one record for Brazil (several times repeated by subsequent authors) ; one 

 from St. Lucia in the West Indies; one from the vicinity of Nassau in the Bahamas; four 

 from the west coast of Florida; and one or two from the east coast. Reputedly, however, 



25. Nichols and Murphy, Brooklyn Mus. Quart., 4, 1916; 157. 



26. The victim was taken to the hospital in New Bedford, where he died. 



27. Reported in J. Amer. med. Ass., July 22, 1944, and in Science News Letter, July 29, 1944: 73. Identification by 

 J. T. Nichols. 



28. Whitley, Fish. Aust., i, 1940: 126. 



29. London lUustr. News, July 14, 1928: 53, photograph; recorded as a Mako, but identifiable by the teeth as a 

 Carcharoion. 



30. For a graphic account of the capture of one 9 feet 2 inches long oflF Virginia by an angler, see Wise (Tigers of 

 the Sea, 1937: 61). 



