e spanker-sheet and throw a running-bowline round the
line, so's we can get it down over his fins. That's your sort, Ned;
don't let him get it into his jaws. Cleverly done; haul taut. _Now_ we
have him safe. Lead the sheet for'ard, let all hands tail on to it, and
we'll run him up out of the water and in on deck."

The bowline in the end of the sheet having been successfully passed over
the fish's shoulders and under his fins, the rope was laid along the
deck, and the watch, leaving one by one the line to which the hook was
attached, got hold of the sheet, and then with a joyous shout of "Stamp
and go, boys; walk away with him," they dragged the monster, still
struggling furiously, up out of the water and in on deck over the
taffrail.

For a moment the huge fish lay perfectly still, then he began to plunge
about and lash right and left with his tail in a manner which caused the
whole ship to resound with the terrific blows; rousing the watch below,
and causing them to "tumble up" _en masse_ to ascertain the nature of
the disturbance.

"'Ware tail," exclaimed the second mate warningly. "If any of you chaps
catches a smack with it across your shins it'll snap 'em like
pipe-stems. Where's the cook's axe?"

The question was promptly answered by the appearance of cookie himself,
his sable visage beaming and his eyeballs rolling with delight as he
danced nimbly about the deck, dodging the strokes of that terrible tail,
with his gleaming axe upraised in readiness to deal a blow at the first
opportunity. At length there was a momentary pause in the tremendous
struggles, a pause of which Snowball (all black cooks who go to sea seem
to be dubbed "Snowball") promptly availed himself. A quick flash of his
axe-blade in the sun, a dull crunching thud, and the back-bone was
severed at the junction of the tail with the body; a lightning-like
stroke of his long keen knife followed, and the severed tail was flung
quivering aside as a long thin jet of blood spouted out from the body,
broadly staining the snow-white deck-planks.

But the shark had plenty of fight left in him still, as one of the men
speedily discovered when, on thrusting a handspike into the great jaws,
the strong, stout wooden bar was promptly bitten in two.

"Here, lay hold, two or three of you, and capsize him," ordered Ritson;
"we must make an end of the beast, or some of yer'll get hurted yet, I
can see. Now then," as three of the men seized the shark b