e heads of Dumaresq and myself, stared intently
down at the fish for a few seconds, and then resumed his seat,
remarking:

"Ay, mates, what Mr Bowen says is true enough; there's two of 'em; and
that means that two of this here party is goin' to lose the number of
their mess afore long; you mark my words and see if they don't come
true. As to catchin' either of them sharks, why, we haven't got no hook
to catch 'em with. And, if we had, 'twouldn't be of no use to try; them
fish ain't to be caught; they're astarn of us for a purpose; and there
they'll stay until that purpose have come to pass. I've knowed this
sort of thing to happen afore. I was once aboard of a brig called the
_Black Snake_, hailin' from Liverpool, and tradin' between the West
Injies and the Guinea coast. We'd made a fine run across from
Barbadoes, and was within a week's run of the Old Calabar river when it
fell calm with us, just as it have done now.

"There wasn't nothing the matter with none of us at the time; but a'ter
we'd been becalmed about a week--which, let me tell ye, mates, ain't
nothing so very much out of the common in them latitoods--the second
mate fell sick, and took to his bunk. He hadn't been there not two
hours when somebody sings out as there was a shark under the counter;
and we goes to work to try and catch him. But, mates, he wasn't to be
caught, though we tried him all ways, even to pitchin' the bait right
down atop of his ugly snout. Mind you, he was ready enough to swaller
as much pork as ever we chose to give him, so long as there wasn't no
hook in it; but if there was a hook buried in it he wouldn't so much as
look at it.

"Well, we was obliged to give it up at last; and as we was haulin' in
the line and unbendin' the hook I heard the chief mate say to the
skipper:--

"`That settles poor Hobbs' hash, anyhow!'

"`How d'ye mean?' says the skipper, short and angry-like.

"`Why,' says the mate, `I means that Hobbs won't get better, and that
shark knows it. He's just waitin' for him!'

"`Oh, nonsense,' says the skipper; `I'm surprised, Mr Barker, to hear a
hintelligent man like you sayin' such things.'

"And he marches off down below, and goes into the second mate's cabin to
see how the poor chap was gettin' on. About twenty minutes a'terwards
he comes up on deck again, and tells the mate as poor Mr Hobbs have got
the yaller fever. And, mates, I takes notice that the skipper weren't
just then lookin' so extra