320 



CORAL AND ATOLLS 



one may be safely eaten when properly prepared. All the fish 

 which live in the warm waters about the islands are not, how- 

 ever, either useful for food or at all desirable from any point 

 of view ; and chief among the undesirables are the sharks. 

 Sharks exist in great numbers ; a large brown species, which 



Fig. 71. 



A Mixed Catch of Cocos-Keeling Fish. 



grows 10 or 1.2 feet long, inhabits the lagoon; a smaller black 

 and white species comes to the barrier in armies at certain 

 times of the year ; and a yellow " dog-fish," some 4 or 5 feet 

 in length, lives everywhere. It is a strange fact that though 

 these fish are so very abundant, and so ready to seize a bait or 

 a fish that has been hooked, no instance of their taking a man 

 has ever occurred, and their only victim that I know of was a 

 boy who, though lacerated severely in an encounter, recovered 

 from it perfectly. Notwithstanding their abundance it is 



