104 WILD LIFE OF SCOTLAND 



sharks will take the hook, or occasionally plunge 

 into a net, they are so difficult to get on board, 

 that a capture has been an event causing no little 

 commotion. The trawl promises to be a much 

 more efficient instrument, not unlikely to increase 

 the available supply, and reveal the presence of 

 larger numbers in our summer waters than we were 

 before aware of. Already they have lost much 

 of their strangeness, and are becoming so easily 

 procurable, that there is no reason why they should 

 not shortly appear in our fishmongers' windows, 

 as a substantial addition to our food-supply. An 

 experiment was made here the other day, and the 

 flesh was found to be as palatable as that of the 

 flat shark, or skate. 



,The long claspers immediately proclaimed the sex; 

 and, as among sharks the male 'is usually smaller 

 than the female, his size of fourteen feet was con- 

 siderable. The lower surface was a beautiful 

 marbled white. The pectoral fins were large, 

 doubtless to make up, in some measure, for the 

 modification of the extremity into a weapon of 

 offence. The upper lobe of the tail, which is about 

 as long as the body, in this case about seven feet, 

 tapers away in a whip-like fashion, with a thicken- 

 ing or projection at the end, which may serve the 



