An hour or so later--about nine o’clock, to be exact--the men were startled by an extraordinary noise, apparently coming from the eastern end of the island, a noise unlike anything they had ever heard before. Dropping their tools and staring towards the east, they beheld such a sight as it falls to the lot of few people to witness. There, not five hundred yards from the shore, was being waged a battle to the death--a fight between the great cow whale previously seen and a school of thresher sharks. The calf was swimming about distractedly, but the old bull had disappeared, having basely deserted his family at the first approach of danger. The sharks, as though acting in accordance with some preconcerted plan, had completely surrounded the two whales, and, apparently realizing that nothing was to be feared from the calf, concentrated all their efforts upon the cow. Again and again they charged in upon her, their jaws snapping, tearing at her mighty sides until the sea was red with blood. Meanwhile the cow lashed her tail furiously, hurling up sheets of reddened water and occasionally crashing down with terrific force upon one of her voracious opponents. Maddened with pain and rage, she dashed this way and that, but the sharks hung to her side with a persistency and ferocity that made the fascinated onlookers shudder. Now and again the wildly-lashing tail would catch one of the assailants, driving it beneath the waves--no doubt killed or disabled--but the remainder rushed in undismayed, tearing viciously at the mammal’s bleeding flanks or butting her with the force of battering-rams. [Illustration: “BY A SUPREME EFFORT SHE HURLED HER WHOLE GREAT BULK CLEAR OF THE WATER.”] Presently the spellbound spectators realized two facts--firstly, that the calf had disappeared in the _mêlée_, and secondly, that, the tortured whale was undoubtedly becoming weaker. It was obvious that the unequal struggle could have only one ending. Still, however, she fought on doggedly, winning admiration and sympathy by her exhibition of hopeless courage. Altering her tactics, by a supreme effort she hurled her whole great bulk clear of the water for a moment, and the fascinated onlookers beheld the sharks hanging from various parts of her gleaming body by their serrated teeth. Then down she went again, with a crash like thunder, and for an instant whale and sharks were buried amidst masses of foam, heavily coloured with the poor mammal’s life-blood. Rising again, she essayed another change of plan, making for the rocks and desperately striving to rub off the clinging sharks against their edges. But the threshers were equal to the occasion; while those on the outside maintained their grip, the others dived under their enemy and charged her anew, tearing at the whale’s side in an ecstasy of ferocity that was bloodcurdling to witness. [Illustration: TERRIFIC BATTLE AT BREAKSEA ISLAND. WHALE KILLED BY THRASHER SHARKS. A THREE HOURS’ FIGHT. A SEA OF BLOOD.