Sharks are sometimes eaten, but more out of bravado and revenge than because they afford a desirable food. Athenæus indeed records that the Greeks were Squalophagi, but they would eat any thing. Archistratus, the _bon-vivant_ of his book, will not allow men to object to a shark diet, merely because the shark sometimes diets upon men. Galen, on the other hand, denounces shark’s flesh, but only from its supposed tendency to produce melancholy. We do not know whether the Latins ever ate them. Among modern nations, Italians and Sicilians cook only the belly of the old fish; and fœtal sharks not much bigger than gudgeons, whenever they can procure a dish. In the still less dainty Hebrides, the _Squalus vulgaris_ is consumed entire; in England they are not relished; but in Norway and Iceland the inhabitants make indiscriminate use of every species that they capture, hanging up the carcases for a whole year that the flesh may mellow. Though no part of the shark is really wholesome, one part, the liver, very valuable in a commercial point of view from the abundance of oil squeezed from it, is highly prejudicial for food, as we learn, on the evidence of the following case of an obscure French cobbler, recorded by an eminent French physician:— Sieur Gervais, his wife and two children, supped upon a piece of shark’s liver; in less than half an hour all were seized with invincible drowsiness, and threw themselves on a straw mattress; nor did they arouse to consciousness till the third day. At the end of this long lethargy their faces were inflamed and red, with an insupportable itching of the whole body; complete desquamation of the cuticle followed, and when this flaying process was concluded, the whole party slowly recovered. ----- [4] The last compartment of the complicated network called a _mandrague_, in which the thunny are harpooned and slain. * * * * * =THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH.= The knights of España, the valiant, Sought long for the fountain of youth, And this legend of old-time they reverenced As an oracle uttered by Truth: That over the foaming Atlantic, In a kingdom of ever-bright flowers, Safely sheltered from danger, it offered To all who in faith sought its bowers, A draught from its goblet like nectar— And, thenceforth the beauties of youth, With its loves, and its joys, all unchanging, Remained with them ever, forsooth. And I have a fountain upspringing In crystalline beauty for me; I have drunk of its waters, and gladly To others now proffer them free. In a cool, shady grotto it gushes, Surrounded by sweet-perfumed flowers, I call it my shrine for devotion, There pass I my happiest hours.