The Leaping Sharks 373 
Texas, and I have taken a similar shark from the 
beach of Loggerhead Key on the extreme outer 
reef. In the summer of 1902 I was fishing for 
tarpon at Aransas, and one day after making 
several catches I had my boatman row me to the 
vicinity of some fellow-anglers, hoping to photo- 
graph a tarpon in mid-air, —a feat that has been 
accomplished by Dr. Howe of Mexico, who at 
Tampico, the centre of the winter tarpon-fishing, 
succeeded in inventing a gun camera which ac- 
complishes this work. While watching the leaps 
of the fishes, and snapping a kodak at them, gen- 
erally taking the sky, the sun, and nothing else, I 
observed: a fine leap accompanied by a most 
energetic thrashing in the air. The fish left the 
water bodily, and when three feet above the sur- 
face seemed to lash itself into a perfect curve 
before it descended, hardly touching the water 
before it went into the air again. I assumed it 
to be a very gamy tarpon, perhaps what was 
known here as “Yucatan Bill,” a wily, long, 
slender tarpon, a “ Yucatan bounder” that was 
supposed to return to this locality every summer 
for the purpose of amusing itself with certain 
innocent anglers. The “bounder” had broken 
lines and rods, shattered chairs, broken oars, 
