260 NOTES WRITTEN ON A VOYAGE 
A number of boys followed the boats, swimming, and with their feet 
striking the bamboos upright in the mud in a perfectly straight line, 
though it was impossible to see an inch into the muddy water. Ina 
quarter of an hour they had laid down more than half a mile, besides 
a long piece at each end, at right angles to the main line, and moving 
up to the shore, enclosing altogether perhaps fifty or sixty acres of 
water. As soon as the water had ebbed far enough to allow the wakes 
of the larger fish to be seen as they swam about in this enclosure, the 
boys, taking advantage of the now unoccupied canoes, went paddling 
about after them with great agility, holding a long light spear, with 
the head of the paddle in the right hand, and seldom failing to trans- 
.. fix, even from a considerable distance, any unfortunate fish who ven- 
- tured near enough to the surface to show his back free for a moment. 
When the water was about three feet deep, and the tops of the bamboos 
sufficiently above water effectually to confine the fish, the men began 
their work in good earnest. The fish, in their efforts to escape to 
deeper water, travelled along the inside of the enclosure, close to the 
bamboos, and the fishermen accordingly stationed themselves at inter- 
vals of about twelve or fourteen yards, with a large bag-net open against 
the set of the tide; the water is so muddy that the fish cannot see this 
- net before they strike it, when it is immediately raised, and the captive 
: secured. The mud here is so excessively soft, that it is impossible to 
walk or even to stand upon it; and therefore every man, woman, and 
child is provided with a strange instrument of locomotion, without 
which life would be impossible for these people; it is called “ tongka," 
and is merely a piece of plank, about four feet long, and eighteen inches 
wide, rounded and slightly turned up at each end. I was much puz- 
ed at first to imagine what these planks could be, of which I saw s0 
many in every boat ; but when the tide went down the mystery was 
Soon solved. . Supported on the hands and one knee on the “ tongka," 
they paddled with the other foot in the mud, and skimmed over the 
surface with most wonderful rapidity, making the mud and water fly 
in all directions, and bespattering one another from head to foot with 
: filth, which of course cannot be washed off again until the tide rises,—@ 
matter which distresses them but little. A brisk intercourse was now 
s pet cedet senna " action ; it all looked natural enough 
Sues € naked children, but to see grey- 
