THE GREENLAND SHARK. I83 



tions; it is about four feet in length, and is a frequent visitor 

 to the British seas. The Dog-Fish is the most common of the 

 minor members of the shark family. The Spinous Shark, so 

 named from its " prickles," which resemble those on the 

 istems of a rose-bush, is not, happily, a frequent visitor to 

 British waters, though of inferior size to most of the family, 

 being from four to eight feet. The Angel-Fish, or Monk- 

 Fish, or Shark-Ray, closes our list of the " ocean pirates/' 

 The depressed form, rounded head, with the eyes on the up- 

 per surface, and the singularly expansive pectoral fins (which 

 may, under the imaginative form of wings, have originated 

 the designation of" angel") distinguish this strange, and, on 

 the whole, uncouth fish, w^hich partakes something of the 

 •character of the ray and the shark. It is not unfrequent on 

 British coasts, and attains a considerable size, some weighing 

 a hundred-weight. It is a fierce and dangerous fish to con- 

 tend with, and fishermen tell strange stories of its strength 

 and fury. 



The Greenland Shark which abounds in the Northern 

 seas, although smaller than his powerful relative, being 

 usually about fourteen feet long and six or eight feet in 

 girth, partnkes of his ferocity, and is a fearful enemy to the 

 w^hale, whom he frequently worries to death, and feasts upon 

 afterwards, scooping out pieces from his body as large as a 

 man's head. The blubber appears to be a peculiarly '^dainty 

 dish" to this Arctic monster, and, while the crew of a ship 

 are employed in cutting up a whale, he will come in for his 

 ;share, and is so greedy for his favorite food that the men 

 consider themselves safe from his gripe. Insensible to pain 

 tind tenacious of life as are all the larger sharks, the Arctic 

 member of this ferocious tribe has been proved to be so in 

 a remarkable degree. A few ugly wounds do not spoil his 

 appetite, and even when pierced through the body with a 

 sailor's knife, he does not desert the whale's carcass until his 

 appetite is fully satisfied. Even w^hen the body is cut into 



