Where Sharks Face Off With Gentler Souls  Published: July 30,
1993  WE, the people, stand in darkness. They, the sharks,
circle tirelessly in the eerily lighted water. We are separated
by three inches of glass and an ocean of cognition.  The
animals' jaws never stop opening and closing. Their hundreds of
teeth are big, and as sharp as razor blades. Their restless,
unceasing purposefulness is unnerving.  "You're looking at man's
most feared predator," a docent said, "an animal that's been
around since before the dinosaurs."  Sharks are the ocean's
undertaker, specializing in savaging the old and the weak. If
you were to mix one drop of blood with a hundred million drops
of salt water, a shark could detect that drop of blood as far as
a quarter mile away. Vicious scars on female sharks -- incurred
from males during their understandably single sexual experience,
the one leaving them with enough sperm for a lifetime --
underline the animal's brutality.  So why is my chubby-faced
little son Guy, almost 3 years old