SHAEKS. 433 , 



brew word ' tannanim/ translated ' whale/ but evidently 

 designating, as its Latin equivalent ' cete,' any beavy 

 fish ; size, not species, determining either appellation.* 



Cruel as all squali undoubtedly are, reasons perhaps 

 might be suggested, if not wholly exculpatory of their 

 conduct, sufficiently so at least to obtain for them an ac- 

 quittal before any French or Italian court of judicature. 

 The French verdict would be, as usual, ' meurtre, avec cir- 

 constances attenuantes.' An Italian jury would at once 

 pronounce the criminal ' arrabbiato' — in a passion ; and 

 holding this sufficient excuse, would summarily dismiss 

 the case. Such lenient judgments might be baSed on 

 the grounds of their having teeth unusually numerous, 

 efficient, and long, or on temperament ; but sharks pos- 

 sess also enormous abdominal viscera ; full one-third of 

 the body is occupied by spleen or liver if the bile and 

 other digestive juices thus secreted from such an immense 

 apparatus, and poured continually into the stomach, must 

 stimulate appetite prodigiously, and what hungry animal 

 was ever tender-hearted? We read in the 'Anaba^s,' 

 that the Greeks would not treat with the Persians about 

 a truce tiU after dinner ; and every one knows that to be 

 the time most propitious to charity and good neighbour- 

 hood ; a hungry man is ever a churl, and ' ventre affame 



* That great fish generally were termed ' cete,' is clear from 

 the name ' oetarius' given to tlie trader wlio dealt in them, and 

 who sold turbot, and not whales. The distinction implied by this 

 appellation appears to have provoked great jealousy among re- 

 tailers oi pisciculi, or ' little fish,' and led them to annoy both the 

 cetarii and their customers. Aristophanes represents a sprat- 

 seller, who, in the genuine spirit of a French Socialist, seeing a 

 gentleman buying sturgeon, 



' Bawls from his booth in accents fierce and rude, 

 There goes a tyrant even to his food.' — Athencms. 



f The size of the liver in a middle-sized shark may be inferred 

 from its yielding two tons and a half of oil. 



