CHAP. VIII.] 



BASKING SHARK. 



119 



water, or as stuffed in a museum. The annexed figure represents 

 the outline of the Squalus maximus, of which when immersed, 

 but swimming near the surface, three points only could be seen 

 above water at the same time, namely, the prominence of the 

 back, with the first dorsal fin, a; secondly, the second dorsal fin, 

 b ; and thirdly, the upper lobe of the tail, c. 



Fig. 3. 



Squalus maximus, Basking Shark, or Hockinar. 

 a. First dorsal fin ; b. Second dorsal fin ; c. Caudal fin. 



Dr. Melville informed me that he once saw a large species of 

 shark, swimming at the rate of ten miles an hour, in Torres 

 Strait, off Australia ; and, besides the lateral flexures of the tail, 

 which are the principal propelling power, the creature described 

 as it advanced a series of vertical undulations, not by the actual 

 bending of the body itself, but by the whole animal first rising 

 near to the surface and then dipping down again, so that the 

 dorsal fin and part of the back were occasionally lifted up to a 

 considerable height. Now it strikes me, that if a very huge 

 shark was going at the rate of twenty miles an. hour, as stated 

 by some of the observers, that portion of the back which emerged 

 in front might easily be taken for the head, and the dorsal fin 

 behind it for the mane ; and in this manner we may explain the 

 three projecting points, a, b, c, fig. 1, p. 109. given in the 

 drawing, sketched from memory, by Mr. Barry of Nova Scotia. 

 The smaller undulations seen by the same person, intervening be 

 tween the three larger, may very well be referred to a series of 

 waves raised in the water by a rapid passage through it of so 

 bulky a body. Indeed, some of the drawings which I have seen 



