$endian -eq 0 means nothing and the line above is pretty much magic. Please find a better name for this variable and consider extending the comment to explain what you are doing in some detail.

Also, test the three possible cases for the variable value: 0, whatever the "else" branch currently expects, and the case where the command above produces a failure.

1_eb is cryptic... and it's not orthogonal with the other file name. 1_big_endian... would be better, and then rename the other file to 1_little_endian.

Agreed... This variable should likely be called "big_endian" and should be either "true" or "false", then tested like:

if $big_endian; then
    # Use big endian file.
else
    # Use little endian file.
fi

It seems like this should be a general purpose program usable for all tests.

+1