The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1894-10-06
A TRUTHFUL SAILOR.
RELATES THE EXPERIENCE IN WHICH
HE SWORE NEVER TO LIE.

by a Shark, but Both Were Rescued In
a Marvellous Manner-A Day That Was
Certainly Very Hot.
''Have ever seen a shark? Ask my
mate-him that's rowing that 'erc cou-
pie out yondor. We were shipmates to-
gether aboard the Raiapootah India
man. His father, who is dead and gone
this 20 year or more, was carpenter
aboard of her.
| ''Well, one day we were becalmed on
tho line when, says young Bill-he was
young Bill then, him as l just pointed
out to you-says he, L shall have a
swim round for cooler, for, believe
me, the sun was that hot we had to
throw buckets of water on the deck to
keep it from catching fire.
I'm fact pig we killed tho day
afore we hung aloft and roasted him in
the sun, catching the gravy in a bucket,
and he was done beautifully.
$50 in he goes head first, with his
clothes on, and mo and his old man
looked over the side just abaft the fore
rigging to see him come to the top Of
the water again.
But no Bill could we SEQ, and in
stead of him up came tremendous
shark, with his sides sticking ont as if
he had cargo inside over and above
his regular bill OF lading
1T was then us clear to us as the
nose on our faces that poor Bill had
dived clear down his throat.
The poor old man had a fit right
away aud we carried him below and
put him in his hammock and then ran
up on deck again in the hope that we
should be able to catch the follow.
"Dut it was nowhere to be seen, so
after watching some time to no pur-
pose wo went down below to see how
the old man was getting on, and to our
astonishment and sorrow we found his
body nearly cold and as stiff as the fly
ing jibboom.
"We sewed him up in his hammock,
putting the grindstone that he used to
grind his tools with inside to make it
sink and laid the body on a hatch, with
the union jack spread over it for pail.
"Then the skipper read the funeral
service all of us standing round dread
fully cut up, me especially, for young
+, Bill was my messmate, and l was very
fond of the old man.
"As soon as the skipper had finished
the last words, which shall never for
get, they was so solemn, the hatch was
tipped up, and overheard the body went
with splash, and all was over, at least
we thought so.
"But almost Immediately nfterward
up comes another shark, bigger one,
it seemed, than the first.
1.-The boatswain at once ran for the
shark hook and baited it with q hunk of
pork and slung it over the stern, and it
was not many minutes afore we had
him hooked and hauled on deck.
| "Well, the first thing we did was to
cut his tail of, for he was tapping it
about so that it shook the ship from
stem to stern, that we were afraid it
would shake her to pieces.
After we had done that we thought
we heard very strange noise inside of
him-a sort of grating sound, like boat
being dragged over a shingly beach.
80 we set to and cut off his head
and then ripped him up, when, what
dye think? What should we see, to our
great astonishment and delight, but Bill
and his father sitting upright like two
Jonahs, the youngster turning the grind
stone and the old man sharpening his
knife, intending to cut their way out of
tho creatures belly.
"You say | said the old man was
dead? Please don't interrupt me, and
Ill tell you all about it.
"There's no doubt but what he SEEM
ed dead, but it was only his blood froze
with horror, and the shark warmed him
to life again. What made him most I'M
comfortable, Bill said, was the slip
peryness and topsy turvyness of the
place, for there was no rest at all, for
one minnie he was standing on his
head and tho next on his feet, and then
he would be tossed from one side to the
other, sometimes getting jammed be-
| tween the ribs, and he wondered the
meal didn disagree with the fish itself.
But at last came the climax, and
Bill thought il was all over with him,
| for down its throat was shot heavy
body like that of sack of coal right
atop of him, nearly smotheiing him, so
that he had scarcely room to move or
breathe, and he must have been some
time inseusible, he said, when he was
woke up with a loud report.
"He thought for q moment the crea-
ture had swallowed powder barrel and
it had exploded, but it was only the
bursting of the canvas shroud the old
man was sewed up in, which had blown
up like paper bag.
THE noise in its inside Bill said,
must have astonished the shark, for he
again found himself standing upon his
head, SO he knew it was making for the
| surface, and on reaching there II opened
Its enormous jaws for air, when flood
Of light entered between the rows Of
teeth which enabled Bill on gaining his
feet to take stock Of his lodgings, and
the very first thing that he saw was his
old father crawling out from under the
canvas like q chick from its shell.
The old man had caught sight Of
tho grindstone and soon put it into
working order, and on the fish once
moro coming to the top and again ad-
mitting light Bill at once saw what
was in tho wind and they commenced
business at once, when they We're star
tied by a sudden change in the sharks
movements, and soon they distinctly
heard the sound of human voices, and
they knew they were saved.
tWell, we all was SO thankful at
their miraculous escape from the jaws
of death that every mothers son of us
on board took our solemn effldavits that
we'd never tell lie or anything Of that
kind again, and me and my mate have