Elsie at Nantucket

"I hadn't thought anything about it," replied Zoe.

"Well, think now, if you please; wouldn't you go if you had an invitation? Don't you want to go?"

"Yes, if it's the proper thing; I'd like to go everywhere with my husband. I'll ask him about it. Here he comes, mamma with him."

She waited till the two were comfortably settled by her side, then said, with her most insinuating smile, "I'd like to go sharking, Ned; won't you take me along to-morrow?"

"Why, what an idea, little wife!" he exclaimed in surprise. "I really hate to say no to any request of yours, but I do not think it would be entirely safe for you. We are not going on the comparatively quiet waters of the harbor, but out into the ocean itself, and that in a whaleboat, and we may have very rough sailing; besides, it is not at all impossible that a man-eating shark might get into the boat alive, and, as I heard an old fisherman say yesterday, 'make ugly work.'"

"Then I don't want to go," Zoe said, "and I'd rather you wouldn't; just suppose you should get a bite?"

"Oh, no danger!" laughed Edward; "a man is better able to take care of himself than a woman is of herself."

"Pooh!" exclaimed Betty; "I don't believe any such thing, and I want to go; I want to be able to say I've done and seen everything other summer visitors do and see on this island."

"Only a foolish reason, is it not, Betty?" mildly remonstrated her Cousin Elsie. "But you will have to ask my father's consent, as he is your guardian."

"No use whatever," remarked Bob, who had joined them a moment before; "I know uncle well enough to be able to tell you that beforehand. Aren't you equally sure of the result of such an application, Ned?"

"Yes."

"Besides," pursued Bob, teasingly, "there wouldn't be room in the boat for a fine lady like my sister Betty, with her flounces and furbelows; also you'd likely get awfully sick with the rolling and pitching of the boat, and leaning over the side for the purpose of depositing your breakfast in the sea, tumble in among the sharks and give them one."

"Oh, you horrid fellow!" she exclaimed, half angrily; "I shouldn't do anything of the kind; I should wear no furbelows, be no more likely to an attack of sea-sickness than yourself, and could get out of the way of a shark quite as nimbly as any one else."

"Well, go and ask uncle," he laughed.

Betty made no move to go; she knew as well as he how Mr. Dinsmore would treat such a request.

The weather the next morning was all that could be desired for sharking, and the gentlemen set off in due time, all in fine spirits.

They were absent all day, returning early in the evening quite elated with their success.

Max had a wonderful tale to tell Lulu and Grace of "papa's" skill, the number of sand-sharks and the tremendous "blue dog" or man-eater he had taken. The captain was not half so proud of his success as was his admiring son.

"I thought all the sharks were man-eaters," said Lulu.

"No, the sand-sharks are not."

"Did everybody catch a man-eater?"

"No; nobody but papa took a full-grown one. Grandpa Dinsmore and Uncle Edward each caught a baby one, and all of them took big fellows of the other kind. I suppose they are the most common, and it's a good thing, because of course they are not nearly so dangerous."

"How many did you catch, Maxie?" asked Grace.

"I? Oh, I helped catch the perch for bait; but I didn't try for sharks, for of course a boy wouldn't be strong enough to haul such big fellows in. I tell you the men had a hard tug, especially with the blue-dog.

"The sand-sharks they killed when they'd got 'em close up to the gunwale by pounding them on the nose with a club – a good many hard whacks it took, too; but the blue-dog had to be stabbed with a lance; and I should think it took considerable courage and skill to do it, with such a big, strong, wicked-looking fellow. You just ought to have seen how he rolled over and over in the water and lashed it into a foam with his tail, how angry his eyes looked, and how he showed his sharp white teeth. I thought once he'd be right in among us the next minute, but he didn't; they got the lance down his throat just in time to put a stop to that."

"Oh, I'm so glad he didn't!" Grace said, drawing a long breath. "Do they eat sharks, Maxie?"

"No, indeed; who'd want to eat a fish that maybe had grown fat on human flesh?"

"What do they kill them for, then?"

"Oh, to rid the seas of them, I suppose, and because there is a valuable oil in their livers. We saw our fellows towed ashore and cut open and their livers taken out."

CHAPTER IV

"There is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved." —Acts 4: 12.

It was down on the beach Max had been telling his story; the evening was beautiful, warm enough to make the breeze from the sea extremely enjoyable, and the whole family party were gathered there, some sitting upon the benches or camp-chairs, others on rugs and shawls spread upon the sand.

Max seemed to have finished what he had to say about the day's exploits, and Gracie rose and went to her father's side.

He drew her to his knee with a slight caress. "What has my little girl been doing all day?"

"Playing in the sand most of the time, papa. I'm so glad those horrid sharks didn't get a chance to bite you or anybody to-day. Such big, dreadful-looking creatures Maxie says they were."

"Not half so large as some I have seen in other parts of the world."

"Oh, papa, will you tell us about them? Shall I call Max and Lulu to hear it?"

"Yes; if they wish to come, they may."

There was scarcely anything the children liked better than to hear the captain tell of his experiences at sea, and in another moment his own three. Rosie, Walter, and several of the older people were gathered around him, expecting quite a treat.

"Quite an audience," he remarked, "and I'm afraid I shall disappoint you all, for I have no yarn to spin, only a few items of information to give in regard to other varieties of sharks than are to be found on this coast.

"The white shark, found in the Mediterranean and the seas of many of the warmer parts of the world, is the largest and the most feared of any of the monsters of the deep. One has been caught which was thirty-seven feet long. It has a hard skin, is grayish-brown above and whitish on the under side. It has a large head and a big wide mouth armed with a terrible apparatus of teeth – six rows in the upper jaw, and four in the lower."

"Did you ever see one, papa?" asked Grace, shuddering.

"Yes, many a one. They will often follow a ship to feed on any animal matter that may be thrown or fall overboard, and have not unfrequently followed mine, to the no small disturbance of the sailors, who have a superstitious belief that it augurs a death on board during the voyage."

"Do you believe it, captain?" queried little Walter.

"No, my boy, certainly not; how should a fish know what is about to happen? Do you think God would give them a knowledge of the future which He conceals from men? No, it is a very foolish idea which only an ignorant, superstitious person could for a moment entertain. Sharks follow the ships simply because of what is occasionally thrown into the water. They are voracious creatures, and sometimes swallow articles which even their stomachs cannot digest. A lady's work-box was found in one, and the papers of a slave-ship in another."

"Why, how could he get them?" asked Walter.

"They had been thrown overboard," said the captain.

"Do those big sharks bite people?" pursued the child.

"Yes, indeed; they will not only bite off an arm or leg when an opportunity offers, but have been known to swallow a man whole."

"A worse fate than that of the prophet Jonah," remarked Betty. "Do the sailors ever attempt to catch them, captain?"