The pearling industry has had a marked effect on the industrial and social condition of the natives of the Australian coast and the adjacent islands. Many of these natives now have boats of their own, and others seek employment on other vessels. Law and order and decent respect for property have arisen, with schools and churches. The result is all the more remarkable when it is considered that scarcely more than a generation has passed since labor among the men was unknown, the women doing all the work necessary to meet their scanty requirements.
As now carried on in Australia, pearling is a hard life, the men working for two thirds of the season in a dead calm and oppressive heat, while in the remaining months they are rolling day and night. The members of the crew are not allowed ashore without a written permission from the captain of the boat, and men and luggage are searched on leaving the vessel. In addition to these objections, life on board is not unusually made intensely disagreeable by the myriads of inch-long cockroaches, which are attracted by and multiply rapidly on the shreds of muscle left on the pearl shell stored in the hold. Storms are frequent on the coast. In February, 1899, three schooners and eighty smaller vessels were wrecked, and eleven white and four hundred colored men were drowned.
At the end of each day’s fishing, the oysters are cleaned of submarine growths. Sometimes this is by no means an easy task, as many of the shells are so covered with weeds, coral, and sponge as to bear little resemblance to oysters. After they have been scrubbed and the edges have been chipped, they are washed and stored on deck. Early the following morning they are opened and examined for pearls. This opening is done carefully to avoid injury to any pearl that may be within. The hinge of the shell is placed on the deck and a broad knife forced down so as to sever the adductor muscle, causing the shells to spring open and permitting the removal of the soft parts. The flesh is carefully examined, both by sight and by feeling, to locate all pearls, which are picked out by hand and placed in a suitable receptacle. Within the adductor muscle are found seed-pearls and small baroques; the large pearls are found embedded in the mantle, where their presence may be detected as soon as the shell is opened, the pearly gleam contrasting with the light blue of the mantle. Sometimes, though rarely, large pearls are found loose within the shell, whence they roll out when the shell is opened. Valuable pearls are occasionally removed from blisters on the surface of the shell, or from within the body of the nacre itself. Even when empty, these blisters are valuable, and are especially adapted for brooches and other ornaments requiring a broad and relatively flat surface.
After the flesh has been carefully examined throughout, it is discarded, as it is not considered suitable for food, and the shell is dried for half a day or so to make the hinge brittle in order that it may be broken without injury to the mother-of-pearl. After the shell has been roughly cleaned, it is placed in the hold, if the vessel is operating from a shore station, as is commonly the case in Torres Straits. Since long exposure to the sun affects the quality of the mother-of-pearl, it is important that it be kept under cover. On returning to the station, it is thoroughly cleaned, assorted, dried, the dark edges clipped off, and the cleaned shell is packed in shipping cases, each containing from 250 to 325 pounds. On the west coast, where the vessels at times operate 200 or 300 miles from port, the shell is cleaned, assorted and crated on the vessels; whence it may be delivered direct to the steamers. The Northwest shell is somewhat smaller than the mature shell of Torres Straits, averaging about 1100 to the ton, whereas that of Thursday Island runs about 725 to the ton.
It is very difficult to prevent the theft of pearls by the fishermen as they are liable to treat them as perquisites if not carefully watched. Indeed, on the Torres Straits vessels it has come about that pearls do not constitute a recognized source of income to the proprietors. There the fishery is now conducted almost exclusively for the shells, as the wage-earners secrete probably as many valuable pearls as they turn over to the rightful owners. The hot sun causes many of the oysters to open, and deft fingers quickly pick out such pearls as may be visible. An oyster may be induced to open its shell by being held near the galley fire on the lugger, and the insertion of a piece of cork holds it open while a pearl is shaken out or hooked out by means of a piece of wire. Then the cork is removed and the oyster closes again with no evidence of robbery. The proprietors of boats who themselves open the oysters almost invariably secure larger yields of fine pearls than those who depend on paid employees, who rarely have the luck to find choice pearls, judging from what they turn in. The government of Queensland has endeavored to put a stop to pearl stealing, and by enactment[[261]] of 1891, it restricted all selling or buying of pearls within the fishing region except through regularly licensed dealers, whose transactions are open to examination.
But the fishermen seem to have little difficulty in evading the laws, and throughout the fleet the men have become so adept that they regard the pearls as their contraband perquisites. And the ease with which these may be secreted is surpassed only by the facility with which they may be sold, notwithstanding legislation to the contrary. Indeed, some employers make no claim to the pearls found, thus enabling them to secure fishermen at lower rates of wages.
As previously noted, the pearls constitute only an incidental catch in the fisheries on the Australian coast, but in the aggregate the yield is very large. The yield in the northwest Australian fishery in 1906 is estimated at £50,000, local valuation; in the Queensland fishery £33,000; in that of South Australia £5000, a total of £88,000 or $440,000.[[262]] Relatively few seed-pearls are obtained, and some of the pearls are of great size. Some beautiful specimens have been found, but usually they have less luster and are more irregular in form than the Persian or the Indian output.
Among the remedies suggested for improving the condition of the Australian pearl reefs may be mentioned the establishment of six inches as the minimum size of the shell that may be taken (five inches is now permitted in Queensland, and there is no restriction in Western Australia), the closure of certain areas for stated periods from time to time, and a limit on the number of vessels employed. The government resident at Thursday Island, Mr. Hugh Milman, who has had long acquaintance with the industry, strongly recommends the adoption of a system of artificial culture; and in the meantime, to foster the industry, “licenses should be granted to a reduced number of boats and certain sheltered areas should be closed altogether for a few years to give the beds time to recover. This latter procedure, however, the pearlers themselves are not in favor of, as they are of the opinion that the weather conditions against which they have to contend are sufficient protection to prevent the denudation of the principal grounds.”
A few years ago certain areas in Torres Straits were proclaimed closed for a period against the removal of pearl shell; but, owing to the want of effective patrol, the shell was poached to a very large extent, and consequently the good that should have resulted from the experiment was not apparent. Owing to the impracticability of continuous patrol, and the want of proper legislation to bring die offenders to book, it was decided to remove the restrictions.
The Sharks Bay fishery, to which we have previously referred,[[263]] is prosecuted by means of small sail-boats using light dredges, except in the case of the very shallow or “pick-up banks,” where the oysters are commonly removed by hand. Some years ago this fishery was of much local importance; but the developing scarcity of the oysters, and the present low value of this grade of shell in Europe, due to the competition with Mississippi shell, have resulted in a great reduction. In 1905, the industry gave employment to 17 small boats and 42 men, of whom 18 were Europeans, 13 Asiatics, and 11 aboriginal natives. The yield of pearls, according to official report of the government of Western Australia, approximated £2000 in value, and of pearl shell there was 88 tons, with a declared value of £607. In 1896 the government of Western Australia surveyed the Sharks Bay reefs, and opened them to preëmption in small areas for cultivating this species of pearl-oyster. At present they are mostly held under exclusive licenses for a period of fourteen years. The business is under an elaborate system of regulations; but as appears from the above figures the results have not been important.