Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 November 1881 — A Fight Between Sea Monsters. [ARTICLE]

A Fight Between Sea Monsters.

St. John Cor. Tronto Globe. On a lovely afteroon in July I stood upon the bank of a lofty cliff on that part ofcoast between Placentl and StMary’s Bays. As I stood like everything about me, mute under the influence of the afternoon, a sound as of innumerable and gentle tappings came up from the still sea, and looking I saw that myriads of Ashes, cod and the lesaer creatures on which the former preyed, and risen to the surface and were “breaching.” The tapping sound was made by beating the water with their tails and fins. Such a scene is not uncomou ;but almost simultaneously with this 1 heard a hollow,', whistling sound, and saw a column of spray rise like a geyser, abqdt fourteen feet from the water. I saw then that a whale had risen among the fishes, and with his monster, gaping jawfc, in a fourth of the time it takes to write it, had engulfed several hundreds of the breaching fishes, aud was about to plunge under the waves again to swallow his prey piecemeal, when two other creaturei appeared upon the scene. They were the united and implacable foes of the whale, the sword-fish and the thrasher, 'the sword-fish, Xiphias gladius, is a long, lithe creature, armed with a long, hard substance protruding from its snout, resembling a sword, from which it derives its name; the thrasher is a species of sea shark 'dr fox-. Lark, scientifically known as Carrhaigas vulpes. It was evident that they had c iine for the double purpose of making war upon the whale and getting some of the feast tor themstlves. Iu the space it takes the eye to wink' the offensive apd defensive were assumed. The sword fish attacked the whale under water, the thrasl er attacked him above. As the whale made an effort to dive* be impelled himself against the armed head of Ids lithe foe, and it he remained where he was the thrasher brought its ungainly body with the precision of machinery down upon the unfortunate monster’s back. Such a “thrashing’’ I had never conceived of even in my I used to go to the hills and ron'turds' nests, and saw tbe teacher, morel terrible than a dragon, witlfa cowhide to expiate my gi.i.r. The sounds were dull thuds when the thrasher struck his antagonist, and sharper and louder when he misled his aim aud struck tbe water; The waves were beaten about in foam and spray, the whale trying to ply his tail upon his enemies, but before-he could gel his ungainly bodj* into position his enemies were out of harm’s way, and making a new attack upon an unexpected quarter. The contest continued, broken only by short intervals, when the whale went below the surface for about ten minutes. Then the sword-ffsb, as if satisfied with the part he had played, dived down into the clear, blue water, and the thrasher followed his example. The whale, too, disappeared, and. as he was the only one of tbe three tbat had to rise and breathe at stated intervals, I watched with much interest to see where he would rise and “blow,” or if he rose at all. Beyond the point,’a half mile distant, I caw the spout, and then a vigorous plunge, and knew the whale had survived his thrashing. Numbers of boatmen bad rowed up to see tbe affray, and gazed at the contest between these monsters of the unknown deep with a pleaure deeply mingled with awe.