THE WHITE SHARK. 367 



great agony if its contortions may be taken as evidence, and, 

 after exhausting itself with its fury, allowed itself to drift away 

 with the tide. Expert swimmers, armed with long sharp 

 knives, have sometimes engaged the shark single-handed, diving 

 underneath it, and stabbing it before it discovered their where- 

 abouts. The Negroes of the West Indies 'are credited with 

 this hardihood, and are said to be frequently successful. 

 Sharks in "The amphibious . South Sea Islanders," says 

 the South Mr. Wood, " stand in great dread of the Shark, 

 **'■ and with good reason, for not a year elapses with- 

 out several victims falUng to the rapacity of this terrific animal. 

 Nearly thirty of the natives of the Society Islands were de- 

 stroyed at one time by the sharks. A storm had so injured 

 the canoe in which they were passing from one island to an- 

 other, that they were forced to take refuge on a raft hastily 

 formed of the fragments of their canoe. Their weight sunk 

 the raft a foot or two below the surface of the watei, and, 

 dreadful to say, the sharks surrounded them and dragged 

 them off the raft one by one, until the lightened raft rose 

 above the water and preserved the few survivors. ' ' Mrs. 

 Bowdich, who was an eye-witness of the tragic circumstances 

 she describes, says : — " Sharks abounded at Cape Coast, and 

 one day, as I stood at a window commanding a view of the 

 sea, I saw some of the inhabitants of the town bathing, and 

 the sharks hastening to seize upon them, — they being visible 

 from always swimming with part of their dorsal fin out of 

 water. I sent to warn the men of their danger, and all came 

 ashore except one, who laughed at the caution of his compan- 

 ions. A huge shark was rapidly approaching, and I sent my 

 servant again, and this time armed with half a bottie of rum, 

 to bribe the man to save himself. It was too late, the mur- 

 derous creature had seized him, and the water around was dyed 

 with his blood. A canoe was dispatched to bring him ashore, 

 but a wave threw him on to the beach ; and it was found that 

 the shark had taken the thigh bone completely out of the 



Digitized by Microsoft® 



