Evening star., 1925-05-24

an inch. The rife was all ready
one might almost say the decks were
cleared for action. Al the height of
our anticipation the line dropped
slack 1t was quite obvious what
| had happened-the fish had gone.
! We pulled in the dangling line and
were staggered to see what | am
sure TO many will appear past be-
| lief. Two inches from where the eye
of the hook was fastened to the chain
| the steel shank was bitten in two.
1t must be remembered that this
was half-inch spring steel. 1t would
seem impossible that anything could
sever il, yet we had actually had on
| some ma rine leviathan that had gone
through it as easily as IL il had been
a carrot
What the strength of jaw must
| have been to cut this through is be-
| yond imagination. OF course, one
| knows what the jaw power of the Ash
must be when they can sever hu-
man thigh as clean as If cut by a
| razor. This with an adult U believe
l am correct in saying) requires a
| pressure of not less than one and a
quarter tons. But to cut through
| flesh and bone is totally different
| from biting through half-inch spring
TO face with the almost Irresistible
strength of the monsters of the deep.
The loss of the fish in this unprece-
dented way was certainly a rude shock
to my belief in my big tackle: but a
day or two later we went after saw
| fish. Anchoring the yacht as usual,
we entered the f1at-bottomed panGa
which we always had to tow with us.
as it was impossible to search for
these fish without il.
Reaching the locality where they
should be, we proceeded to drift. look
ing eagerly over the side through the
clear water, in the hope of seeing a
shape outlined on the bottom. Sudden
ly the harpooner. who was standing
up in the bow. called out in Spanish:
Back water.
Excitedly he then cried:
Pull ahead hard
As our little craft shot forward.
down went the long pole with its
sharp steel weapon. plunged with its
full strength towards the bottom. Mo-
mentarily | noticed that about , feet
of the wood remained above the sur
face before, with a terrific rush. the
line was tearing over the bow of the
panga.
There were four of us in the little
boat and. seizine the rope, we ex-
pended our utmost strength TO ease
the shock before the end was reached,
fearing the seat TO which it was tied
would be torn out with a wrench.
The boat suddenly shot ahead so
violently as to fling us all backward
on the bottom. Two of the natives
Immediately got. out the oars and
started to pull as hard as they could
in the opposite direction TO the one in
which we were travelling. In bad
Spanish | asked:
What are we fast in?'
big sawfish,' was the reply.
| signaled to the yacht to start the
engine up, so that they could follow
us and render assistance If necessary.
Travelling at well over 6 knots an
hour. the fish passed the rocky
promontory. and now swan strongly
| in the direction of Flamenco Island,
but soon changed its mind. and, as
we could not help ourselves. we fol.
| lowed. In a semicircle 1t travelled.
and now looked as If 1t were making
for Taboga 1t continued in this di-
rection for some time. when once more
| il altered its course and proceeded
almost straight back to where We
had struck it.
Arriving there. it at once started
to sulk, hugging the bottom. nor could