On the 26th of July, 1864, a magnificent yacht was steaming along the North Channel at full speed, with a strong breeze blowing from the northeast. The Union Jack was flying at the mizzenmast, and a blue standard bearing the initials E.G., embroidered in gold, and surmounted by a ducal coronet, floated from the topgallant head of the mainmast. The name of the yacht was the Duncan, and the owner was Lord Glenarvan, one of the sixteen Scotch peers who sit in the upper house of Parliament, and the most distinguished member of the Royal Thames Yacht Club, so famous throughout the United Kingdom.
Lord Edward Glenarvan was on board with his young wife, Lady Helena, and one of his cousins, Major McNabbs.
The Duncan was newly built, and had been making a trial trip a few miles outside the Firth of Clyde. She was returning to Glasgow, and the Isle of Arran already loomed in the distance, when the sailor on watch caught sight of an enormous fish sporting in the wake of the ship. Lord Edward, who was immediately apprised of the fact, came up onto the poop a few minutes after with his cousin, and asked John Mangles, the captain, what sort of an animal he thought it was.
"Well, since Your Lordship asks my opinion," said Mangles,
"I think it is a shark, and a fine large one too."
"A shark on these shores!"
"There is nothing at all improbable in that," returned the captain. "This fish belongs to a species that is found in all latitudes and in all seas. It is the 'balance fish,' or hammerhead shark, if I am not much mistaken. But if Your Lordship has no objections, and if it would give the smallest pleasure to Lady Helena to see a novelty in the way of fishing, we'll soon haul up the monster and find out what it really is."
"What do you say, McNabbs? Shall we try to catch it?" asked Lord Glenarvan.
"If you like; it's all one to me," was his cousin's cool reply.
"The more of those terrible creatures that are killed, the better, at all events," said John Mangles, "so let's seize the chance, and it will not only give us a little diversion, but be doing a good action."
"Very well, set to work, then," said Glenarvan.
Lady Helena soon joined her husband on deck, quite charmed at the prospect of such exciting sport. The sea was splendid, and every movement of the shark was distinctly visible.
In obedience to the captain's orders, the sailors threw a strong rope over the starboard side of the yacht, with a big hook at the end of it, concealed in a thick lump of bacon.