38 DEVIL FISIIINO. 



pants, whom he would undo ibtedly have left to the care 

 of Providence among the breakers, but for the arrival of 

 friends just in time to save the shivering adventurers from 

 the gripe of their adversary. It was also said, on the 

 very best authority, that a fisherman once ran his boat 

 aground on 



" * Him haply slumbering on the Norway foam,' 



and was about ' casting anchor on his scaly rind/ ' deem- 

 ing him some island/ when dash went the oars, and away 

 bounced the insulted monster, leaving the 'night-foundered 

 skiff ' tilting and trembling like a nut-shell in his wake. 

 Credat Judaus Appdla. All this, however, moved men 

 not a little. No one dared to approach him in his slum- 

 ber, or to disturb his solitary gambols over the banks, until 

 within a week or so, when he was harpooned outright in 

 in Skull Creek channel, as he was ' taking his pleasure ' 

 there, and after some hours of hot pursuit, escaped only 

 by the barbs of the weapon tearing out of his body in the 

 very crisis of complete conquest. But ' Piscator' was there; 

 what wonder if the shaft took effect which was wielded by 

 such a hand ! 



" But paulo major a canamus. The devil-fish might be 

 taken ; and we resolved to delay the adventure not a 

 moment. On the morning of the 25th of August, three 

 boats might be descried moving briskly from .the Bay 

 Point shore across Broad Eiver, two of them furnished 

 each with a harpoon, lances, cordage, etc., manned by 



