The Opelousas courier., 1884-02-23
Man.Eating Shark.

Several able seamen, mates, and ex-
captains were found in a shipp ng of,
flee on South treet, and seemed to be
shocked in 0 silence at fir t by such a
prepo5tet Gus inquiry as, "Do sharks
| Oite?"
81 saw a boys leg BITTEN off at Bar
acoa," said one, finally, "Dy a shark.
The bog was swim ming, when the
shark came along. took a morthful Of
him and dragged him DIVA. There
were boat about, and they got what
was left of hi n before the shark had a
chance for another bite, but. of course.
the boy was dead"
"They're not very apt to Lite unless
they're hungry" sail one, apologeti-
caIly.
NO." affirmed another, promptly,
"there's a kinl of them that is very
ravenous whether they are hungry or
not, and will devour a man just as you
would a ripe peach after dinner, only
because you liked the ia tie of it. Years
ago, coming from Calcutta to Boston,
abig shark-must have been twelve
feet long-followed us for anumber Of
days, always somewhere near the YES
sci, day and night. We threw a heap
of slush, an garbage, AMI stuff over,
and ne TOOK it all in and was ready for
more, We tried to catch him, but he
was so cunning that he wouldn't touch
a bait. One day one of our men fell
overheard from ayard, and before a
boat could be lowered and any assist
ance rendered, that big shark had &c
voured him. Some sailors believe that
a shark has some wayof knowing that
somebody is going to fall overheard
when it follows a vessel, and just keeps
on hand to be ready for him."
GLOW does the shark operate when
lunching on the a cidental and appe-
thing sailor ?" asked the reporter.
when a shark goes for anything
floating i'll the water, if it can swim
above the thing, a man or anything
else, it bites without turning over; but
to grab a man who is swimming at the
surface the shark has TO turn over, be-
cause his big mouth is cut across a
good deal aft Of his nose. If he went
for it straight his nose would push it
away, but by turning On his back, or
perhaps only on his side. if he sees he
can get hold that way, he just slides
his jaws up on the thing and takes
hold. One nip of his powerful jaws
and many long keen teeth will take a
mans leg Off as Clearly as it could
be done by an ak. At the same
time while crunching him the shark
drags him down. There may be an
other shark there to take a piece, or
perhaps the original bitter is gu OK
enough to get another leg or arm be-
fore the mangled loly a rise to the
surface
Three or four of the men affirmed
that they had repeatedly zen raven
Jus sharks dart up out of the water
and try to clutch men who were work
ing on staging alongside vessels, and
they had not any doubt that if a man
hal gone in swimming about there the
question would have been very quick
ly settled: do sharks bite swim
mers !" A curious thing they had no.
ticed was that of the Sandwich
Islands, where the water was full of
sharks, the native Kanakas, men,
women and children, would go in
among them bathing without the
slightest fear, and the sharks never
touched them; bat if a white man
went in bathing there a shark woul |
dispose of him quicker than a girl
would of a cream caramel.
Captain Mitchell remarked that in
the Northern Pacific there is a pecu-
liar sort of sharks, very different from
any he hal ever seen in the Western
ocean, about the Bahamas and e,se-
where. They are called the "blue'
sharks, and their chief peculiarly is
in the possession of two back fms.
They are more tapering than the 9th
ers, swifter in their movements, and
grow ever larger than the famous
"Tibaroon," or m%an-eater, OF the Car
ibbean sea. but are not SO rayenous as
other varieties. Perhaps one of them
wouldn't bite a swimmer especially
providing that it wasn't h~ungry-but
it could il it Would.-NeU York Sun