As we are in the thick of a “school,” the chief intends to have a try at another before returning, although it is near sundown and we are far from home. After some skilful steering, and the rise and fall of several vain hopes, we bear down upon another dugong. A sudden leap, a splash, and the deed is done. Away swims the dugong, rising and diving, vainly endeavouring to rid itself of the painful dart. When the ungainly brute has gone to the length of its tether and then doubled, the slack rope is hauled in, and so for a short time it is “played” as a fisherman plays a salmon. Some of the crew now dive into the water, and following the struggling dugong in its movements of ascent and descent, tie a rope round its tail, by means of which it is towed to the boat. The poor beast is, however, still alive, so by main force it is held up by the tail, head downwards in the water, until it is suffocated. This second specimen is a young female, 6 feet 9 inches in length. The previous capture is a not quite full-grown male with a length of some 8 feet 6 inches, and a girth of 6 feet 10 inches.
The dugong, or sea-cow, is an animal that looks something like a porpoise, but it has a square muzzle, and there is no fin on its back. The skin is provided with very short scattered hairs, and the flippers have a distinct elbow joint, which is absent in the porpoise and other whales. The abrupt head, with its thick, bristly lips, and horny pad on the lower jaw, is very characteristic. With these the dugong nips off the marine flowering plants (Cymodocea) upon which it feeds, and this vegetable food is masticated by means of grinding teeth—very different from the pointed conical teeth of the flesh-eating porpoise.
Porpoises that feed on swiftly-swimming fish have light porous bones, so that their own weight may not be excessive; whereas the dugong never swims far with great rapidity, and as it lies on its side on the bottom of the sea when browsing on the sea-grass, its bones are very dense and heavy, heavier, in fact, than those of any other animal.
This is not the place to compare the anatomy of these two animals, which, although both live in the sea and have somewhat the same appearance, are in reality extremely different from one another.
Fig. 16. Marine Plants (cymodocea) on which the Dugong Feeds
The skin of the dugong is very thick and tough, and as it is an inch thick on the back it is not so surprising that the small dart can hold fast. Before I had actual optical evidence I could scarcely credit the statement that this was the only weapon the natives employed. Still, it must be remembered that the harpoon is only used to secure the animal; death invariably ensues by suffocation. One day during my visit it happened that two boats went out, and several darts were broken without capturing a single dugong; in the olden days of wooden darts this probably would often happen.
Formerly dugong were harpooned from canoes, or from a bamboo platform (nēĕt) erected on the reef. Both practices are now discontinued in the Straits. As I wished to know exactly how the platform was erected, I induced Waria to make one for me. This was speedily done with six bamboo poles lashed together, and surmounted with the steering board of a canoe. [Plate XI., B (p. 123)] is a drawing from the photograph I took of this erection.
The nēĕt was erected at a spot where it was evident dugong had been feeding, for they habitually return to their pasture until the supply of eel-grass in that place is exhausted. It was built end-on to the wind, so that the wind, by blowing through it, should not make a noise and frighten the dugong away. The harpoon was also held in the same direction. The nēĕt was used at night, for it is only then that the dugong approach the shore; in the daytime they keep to the open, or on the large isolated reefs.
