CARETTA, or SEA-TORTOISE.
Among the natural productions of the Red Sea, which either have been or are at present articles of commerce, I shall just speak a little of that species of the Testudo or Tortoise, called the Caretta or Hawk’s-bill. It is greatly inferior in size to the West Indian or American sea-tortoise. The extreme length of the shell of this was 3 feet 7 inches, and which was esteemed a large one. Simple as it is, I do not know one good figure of it. This which I have submitted to the reader may be depended upon for its exactness, otherwise the animal is well known, and has often been described.
Its back is covered like the rest of other turtles, with a bony substance, and this again is covered by lamina, or scales of a thin transparent texture, variegated with dark brown streaks, disposed in each scale as radii proceeding from a centre. The outer rows of the great scales are irregular pentagons. The row that runs down the middle between these are regular hexagons, and round the whole circumference the large scales are inclosed by a kind of quadrangular frame firmly united; the broadest and largest of these scales being nearest the tail. The lowest of all, as it were in the centre of the lowest part of the figure, is notched, the centre of this division answering to a line drawn through the middle of the oval, and the head or occiput.
This fish lays a multitude of eggs. Some have said that these are laid among stones, contrary to the practice of the large sea-turtle, which lays them upon sand. All I can say to this is, that I have seen them but seldom, and always upon sand, but never among stones. The fish itself is a very dry and coarse food, very different from that delicate species which comes from the West Indies, if the difference does not lie a great deal in the cookery. At the time that I ate of this animal, I was going to view the junction of the Indian Ocean without the Straits of Babelmandeb, and the wind setting in contrary, we were in great fear of not being able to return, as the reader will have seen in our voyage. Particularly, I did not observe any of the green fat, so well known to our epicures, nor indeed any fat at all. When roasted, it tasted to me much like old veal new killed. It is only an inhabitant of the mouth of the Gulf. They seldom come up the length of Mocha; when they do, they are few in number, are probably sick, and not able to bear the agitation of the waves from the south-westers.
The Egyptians dealt largely with Rome in this elegant article of commerce. Pliny tells us, the cutting them for fineering or inlaying, was first practised by Carvilios Pollio, from which we would presume that the Romans were ignorant of the Arabian and Egyptian art of separating the lamina by fire, placed in the inside of the shell when the meat is taken out; for these scales, though they appear perfectly distinct and separate, do yet adhere, and oftener break than split where the mark of separation may be seen distinct. Martial[92] says, that beds were inlaid with it. Juvenal[93], and Apuleius, in his tenth Book mentions that the Indian bed was all over shining with tortoise-shell in the outside, and swelling with stuffing of down within. The immense use made of it in Rome may be guessed by what we learn from Velleius Paterculus[94], who says, that when Alexandria was taken by Julius Cæsar, the magazines, or ware-houses, were so full of this article, that he proposed to have made it the principal ornament of his triumph, as he did ivory afterwards when triumphing for having happily finished the African war.
This, too, in more modern times, was a great article in the trade to China, and I have always been exceedingly surprised, since near the whole of the Arabian Gulf is comprehended in the charter of the East India Company, that they do not make an experiment of fishing both pearls and tortoises; the former of which, so long abandoned, must now be in great plenty and excellence, and a few fishers put on board each ship trading to Jidda, might surely find very lucrative employment with a long-boat or pinnace, at the time the vessels were selling their cargo in the port, and while busied in this gainful occupation, the coasts of the Red Sea might be fully explored.
Pearls.
London Published Decr. 1st. 1789, by G. Robinson & Co.