SHARKS— MAN-EATERS AND OTHERS 



349 



Scientific names of fish are not always 

 expressive of ol)vi()us habits or structure, 

 but Somiiiosus microccphahis (Bloch & 

 Schneider), or the "sniall-headcd sleep- 

 er," aptly describes a lar^e l)()real 

 shark that makes occasional \isits to our 

 coasts as far south as Cape Cod and 

 Oregon. Its body seems to have devel- 

 oped at the expense of its brain, for it is 

 a sluggish stupid glutton that reaches a 

 length of twenty-five to thirty feet. 

 It is said to be a very active foe of whales. 

 When caught in the fisheries of western 

 Europe, the sleeper shark is brought in 

 by the fishei'men and offered for sale as 

 food, although its market value is small. 

 The writer has seen it in the markets of 

 Grimsby, CiLxhaven, and Hamburg. 



One of the rarest and at the same 

 time most strongly differentiated sharks 

 on the coasts of the United States is 



thrown over the side was seized by the largest of the 

 school. The line offered httle resistance to this big 

 fellow and he disappeared, taking bait and hook with 

 him. During the time that elapsed while another 

 hook was being secured and baited, the rest of the 

 school came up under the stern of the ship, showing 

 no fear of the men in the cockpit a few feet above 

 them. Apparently the sharks were very hungry and 

 were prepared to grasp anything that might fall to 

 them in the nature of food. When the second hook 

 was thrown over, it was seized by one of the school. 

 This shark, which was killed and brought on deck, was 

 eight and two-thirds feet in length. For the second 

 time this hook was thrown overboard and soon another 

 specimen, ten and one-twelfth feet in length was cap- 

 tured and hung from the end of the boom with its head 

 out of the water. On the third cast, another, nine and 

 one-sixth feet in length, was captured. About this time 

 a shark, larger than any of those taken, swam up to the 

 one hanging from the boom, and raising its head partly 

 out of the water, seized the dead shark by the throat. 

 As it did so, the captain of the " Fish Hawk " began 

 shooting at it, with a 32-caliber revolver, as rapidly as 

 he could take aim. The shots seemed only to infuriate 

 the shark, and it shook the dead one so viciously as to 

 make it seem doubtful whether the boom would with- 

 stand its onslaught. Finally it tore a very large sec- 

 tion of the unfortunate's belly, tearing out and devour- 

 ing the whole liver, leaving a gaping hole across the 

 entire width of the body large enough to permit a small 

 child easily to enter the body cavity. At this instant 

 one of the bullets struck a vital spot, and after a lively 

 struggle on the part of the launch's crew, a rope was 

 secured around its tail. The four specimens, all 

 females, were brought to the laboratory for examina- 

 tion. The last shark was twelve feet in length, and 

 the liver of the smaller one was still in its stomach, the 

 estimated weight of which was forty pounds. 



the COW shark [Hexa)ichus griseus 

 (Gmelin)], at once recognizable by its 

 single dorsal fin, and its six gill aper- 

 tures (see page 351). The dentition 

 also is peculiar.^ There appears to be 

 only one instance of the occurrence of 

 this shark in our waters, although it is 

 said by Poey to be often found about 

 Cuba. An individual ten feet two 

 inches long was taken in 1886 at Curri- 

 tuck Inlet, N. C, a plaster cast of 

 which is in the United States National 

 Museum. On the shores of western 

 and southern Europe, where the cow 

 shark is most common, it attains a 

 length of twenty-six feet or over. 



Among the most interesting sharks of 

 the world are the deep-sea species. The 

 extreme depth at which sharks have been 

 found is about one and one-sixth miles. 

 The deep-sea forms are for the most part 

 small, of a blackish or dark brownish 

 color, and do not exhibit any marked 

 structural differentiation from the lit- 

 toral and pelagic species. There have 

 been taken off the east coast of Africa and 

 in the Gulf of Aden (on the " Valdivia" 

 cruise), at a maximum depth of 1,006 

 fathoms, several specimens of a hither- 

 to unknown shark [Apristurus indie us 

 (Brauer)]. The largest is thirteen inches 

 long. This species inhabits a greater 

 depth than any other shark, as far as 

 known.- 



One of the most striking of the deep- 

 sea sharks is a form taken h\ the 



1 In the front of the upper jaw there are four pointed 

 teeth, on each side of which are three with one or several 

 cusps, and laterally the teeth have many cusps; while 

 in the middle of the lower jaw there are a small tooth 

 with or without a cusp, and lateral serrated teeth with 

 many cusps. 



'A. profundorum (Goode & Bean) comes from a 

 depth of 816 fathoms off the middle Atlantic coast. 

 Another member of the same family, HaMurus can- 

 escens (Giinther), was taken from 400 fathoms off the 

 southwestern coast of South America by the "Chal- 

 lenger," while Halsehirus alcocki Garman comes from 

 620 to 690 fathoms in the Arabian Sea. Among the 

 Squalida;, the family to which our common spiny 

 dogfish belongs, there are several deep-sea species: 



