"What is wrong?" I asked, thinking that perhaps the log line had carried away.
"A black fin on the starboard quarter, sir."
"What is that?" said the Captain, throwing the sail aside and walking aft.
"It is a shark, sir," said I, "and a black one."
Instantly all love and human kindliness left him. Jumping down onto the poop deck and looking over the rail.
"By Heavens, you are right," he cried, "he must be twenty feet long. Run to the pork barrel and get a chunk of meat while I get the shark hook."
"Aye, aye, sir." In the excitement it did not take me long to reach the cook's salt pork barrel, and grabbing about ten pounds of salt horse I was aft again in a minute. The Captain was bending a three-inch rope into a swivel on a chain. The chain is about six feet from the hook. When the shark comes down with his six rows of teeth on each jaw, it takes more than manila rope to stop him, hence the quarter-inch chain.
The Captain was very much excited. "Here, damn it. No, he will nibble it off the hook if you put it there. That is it. The center. Now over the side with it. Slack away on your line there. That is enough. Make fast."
"All fast, sir," said I.
In our excitement of the morning we had forgotten to take our observation for latitude. It was now past eight bells with the cook ringing the bell for dinner. The black fin was swimming around the salt horse, and it was easy to decide between them.