File:Outing (1885) (14796498113).jpg

Identifier: outing58newy (find matches)
Title: Outing
Year: 1885 (1880s)
Authors:
Subjects: Leisure Sports Travel
Publisher: (New York : Outing Pub. Co.)
Contributing Library: Tisch Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries

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flowers of coral, and sponges ofstrange shapes. Sometimes there glides beneath thecraft a creature spotted like a leopardand beautiful as a butterfly, from oneto eight feet across the back. It iscalled a whip-ray, and the tail fromwhich it takes its name is many feetlong, smooth as ivory and slim as acoach whip. Attached to the base ofthe tail are half a dozen serrated dag-gers, a blow from which might not kill you, but would probably make youwish you were dead. You could hardlymiss the creature with your harpoon,and if you did strike and the barb ofyour little harpoon held in its tough hide,you would have a joyous ride till yourline parted. But you must hold yourhand and not waste your time whenyou are hunting tarpon. Those ugly things, there are plentyof them, with wicked eyes and cruelmouths, are sharks. If you strike one ofthem you will lose your harpoon, forthe brute will roll up your line for acouple of turns and then bite it in two. See those three big fins in tandem or- (399)
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HARPOONING THE TARPON 401 der sailing majestically in the shoalwater above that flat? They are worthlooking into, just for curiosity. Theybelong to a fifteen-foot sawfish, and arejust disappearing in the channel. Wemay find the creature, for it was head-ing this way. There it comes, glidingunder the canoe! See the big weapon,four feet long, four inches wide, withfifty-two teeth, backed by near a thou-sand pounds of energy! Better notstrike it, for it might strike back, andthen where would be you and yourcanoe? Your craft would crumple likepaper beneath the slash of that sword. But there is what we are looking for,the bayonet fin of a tarpon! It is mov-ing slowly through the water as thegreat fish seeks his prey. Your canoe-man makes a circuit to get in the rearof the fish and cautiously approaches it.His paddling would do credit to an In-dian, as foot by foot he nears the quarry.The tarpon is swimming high, showingthe big dorsal fin and a foot of the backabove water. You are within th

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