"CHATHAM BILL."

Otago Witness, Issue 2983, 17 May 1911, Page 3

"CHATHAM BILL."

ISLAND FISHING STORIES. (From Our Own Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, May 8. Fish stories seem to be expected from those who go down to the Chathams in ships, and the fishermen on tho steam trawler Nora Niven usually bring back a choice assortment. The Chatham people could not sport a Pelorus Jack, but they had a rival in " Chatham Bill," a 30ft long shark, who made his home at Owenga, the Chatham Island Fishing Company's blue cod fishing settlement. Cod are always plentiful in that vicinitty, and the shark found it unnecessary to seek his diet further afield. "Chatham Bill", constituted a menace to the fishermen who ventured out to *2a in their small boats. It was therefore urgently desirable that " Chatham Bill " should be removed. An enticingly baited extra large shark hook with chain attached hung to an oil drum as a buoy, had been ignored by " Chatham Bill" for months past. In a weaker moment on the day of his rapture he attempted to swallow the blue cod which hid the big book. For two hours Messrs H. 0. Wilkins and Odey struggled with the monster, who was eventually hauled into shallow water, where he was stranded. The shark's mouth, when opened to its fullest extent, would have encircled the body of a in&n. On the passage to the Chathains the Nora Niven very nearly ran on top of a large whale, which was apparently a.«leep on°the surface. The vessel's helm was (says the New Zealand Times) jjuickly put hard over, and as the steamey slewed away the whale " sounded." T\e cetacean came to the surface again within 200 ft of the vessel. Those on t' & bridge