Small boats carrying from five to fifteen men fish the shallows near the coast, but larger boats, manned by from twenty to fifty men, put out for the banks further from shore into deep water. These remain out during the entire season coming into port once or twice only for supplies. The owners of the boats are generally poor. They depend upon the dealers for advances at the beginning of the season for supplies, and many of them are therefore practically in a state of bondage.
When the deep-water boats reach the fishing grounds, half the crew is selected for diving. The diver uses a small braided mat basket as a receptacle for the shells and has a long line attached to him by which he can signal to the man in the boat who manages it. There is a man to each diver's line. Except for the short intervals at the surface necessary for air and rest, the divers remain in the water for hours. The oyster-beds vary in depth from six to eighteen feet in the shallows, to forty feet at the banks.
The duration of the fishing season depends on the temperature of the water. It lasts usually through July, August, and September, though some of the larger boats remain out from the end of June until the beginning of October.
The pearls are sold by weight, sales being made sometimes while at sea and a duty equalling about twenty per cent. is levied on the spot. A large number of Hindu traders come during the season to buy, returning to India at the close as they have done for centuries.
No exact statistics of the output of these fisheries are to be had but the yield is said to average well; some authorities placing the value of the fisheries of the entire district in the sixties at nearly two millions of dollars per annum, and the number of boats engaged at 4,000 to 5,000.
Copyright, 1906, by The Century Company.
EAST INDIAN PEARL-DIVERS RESTING
As ancient as those of the Arabian sea and even more important are the pearl fisheries of India. These are also fished for the pearls, the shells of these waters being smaller than those of the Persian Gulf and valueless for mother-of-pearl. The pearls however average whiter than those of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. Although equally fine pearls are found in other waters the Ceylon, or Madras pearls as they are called, have long been esteemed the best because of their good average color and quality. These banks are situated in the Gulf of Manaar between the southern point of India and the island of Ceylon.