much overladen, and on the outrigger grating were four children. These
the chief's daughter was endeavouring to shield from the rain by
covering them with a mat, when one of them, a little girl, endeavoured
to steady herself by holding to one of the thin pieces of grating; it
broke, and her arm fell through and struck the water, and in an instant
she gave a dull, smothered wail. Palu, the woman, seized her by her
hair and pulled the child up to a sitting posture, and then shrieked
with terror--the girl's arm was gone.


* * * * *


And then in the blackness of night, lightened now by the white,
seething, boiling surge, the people saw in the phosphorescent water
countless hundreds of the savage terrors of the Tia Kau darting hither
and thither amongst the canoes--for the smell of blood had brought them
together instantly. Presently a great grey monster tore the paddle from
out the hands of the steersman of the canoe wherein were the terrified
Palu and the four children, and then, before the man for'ard could
bring her head to the wind, she broached to and filled. Like ravening
wolves the sharks dashed upon their prey, and ere the people had time
to give more than a despairing cry, those hideous jaws and gleaming
cruel teeth had sealed their fate. Maddened with fear, the rest of the
people threw everything out of the six other canoes to lighten them,
and as the bundles of mats and baskets of food touched the water the
sharks seized and bit, tore and swallowed. Then, one by one, every
paddle was grabbed from the hands of the paddlers, and the canoes
broached to and filled in that sea of death--all save one, which was
carried by the force of the wind away from the rest. In this were the