They all peered over and saw, swimming slowly along in the translucent water, a large, whitish-colored fish with a huge protuberance of some kind sticking out from its head.
“By the plunging porpoises of Portugal,” exclaimed Dick Donovan, “what under the sun is it?”
“A sword-fish?” hazarded Jack.
“That’s right, lad, and an old slapper, too. My! That sword of his must be five feet long if it’s an inch. Look at the spikes sticking out from it!”
“Jimminy! I’d hate to get rammed by that,” cried Tom, gazing down at the great fish with its odd, bony sword.
“Gracious! If he ever took it into his head to attack us, he’d soon make a hole in the bottom,” cried Jack the next moment, as the sword-fish gave a quick twist of its tail and darted ahead.
“Plenty of cases have been known of sword-fish attacking ships,” declared the captain. “In 1894, the whale ship Mary Ambree came into New Bedford with a big sword from a sword-fish stuck into her port quarter. It had broken off and was rammed about six inches into the wood. The fish that owned it must have died on the voyage up and rotted from its weapon.”
“That’s a peril we didn’t count on,” said Mr. Chadwick. “It would be a mighty serious matter for us all if that fish was to ram us, either by intent or mistake.”
“Maybe so vee bedder go py de air up,” said the professor, a trifle nervously.
“It might be a good time to test that patch, anyhow,” declared Jack.