Chapter 13

Of The Chondropterygii, And Other Uncouth Hordes Infesting The South Seas

At intervals in our lonely voyage, there were sights which
diversified the scene; especially when the constellation Pisces was
in the ascendant.

It's famous botanizing, they say, in Arkansas' boundless prairies; I
commend the student of Ichthyology to an open boat, and the ocean
moors of the Pacific. As your craft glides along, what strange
monsters float by. Elsewhere, was never seen their like. And nowhere
are they found in the books of the naturalists.

Though America be discovered, the Cathays of the deep are unknown.
And whoso crosses the Pacific might have read lessons to Buffon. The
sea-serpent is not a fable; and in the sea, that snake is but a
garden worm. There are more wonders than the wonders rejected, and
more sights unrevealed than you or I ever ever dreamt of. Moles and
bats alone should be skeptics; and the only true infidelity is for a
live man to vote himself dead. Be Sir Thomas Brown our ensample; who,
while exploding "Vulgar Errors," heartily hugged all the mysteries in
the Pentateuch.

But look! fathoms down in the sea; where ever saw you a phantom like
that? An enormous crescent with antlers like a reindeer, and a Delta
of mouths. Slowly it sinks, and is seen no more.

Doctor Faust saw the devil; but you have seen the "Devil Fish."

Look again! Here comes another. Jarl calls it a Bone Shark. Full as
large as a whale, it is spotted like a leopard; and tusk-like teeth
overlap its jaws like those of the walrus. To seamen, nothing strikes
more terror than the near vicinity of a creature like this. Great
ships steer out of its path. And well they may; since the good craft
Essex, and others, have been sunk by sea-monsters, as the alligator
thrusts his horny snout through a Carribean canoe.

Ever present to us, was the apprehension of some sudden disaster from
the extraordinary zoological specimens we almost hourly passed.

For the sharks, we saw them, not by units, nor by tens, nor by
hundreds; but by thousands and by myriads. Trust me, there are more
sharks in the sea than mortals on land.

And of these prolific fish there are full as many species as of dogs.
But by the German naturalists Muller and Henle, who, in christening
the sharks, have bestowed upon them the most heathenish names, they
are classed under one family; which family, according to Muller,
king-at-arms, is an undoubted branch of the ancient and famous tribe
of the Chondropterygii.

To begin. There is the ordinary Brown Shark, or sea attorney, so
called by sailors; a grasping, rapacious varlet, that in spite of the
hard knocks received from it, often snapped viciously at our