94 



per head ; the usual advance ranges between Rs. lOO to 

 Rs. 200. Whenever an exceptional need arises for the 

 expenditure of a considerable sum — it may be a marriage 

 in the family or the cost of death ceremonies, a further 

 advance from the employer is relied upon to meet the 

 emergency. The excess beyond a certain sum will be 

 gradually liquidated thereafter, leaving a standing ad- 

 vance at the debit of the workman which on both sides 

 is not expected to be repaid unless the emplovee decides 

 to quit the service of his master, a virtual impossibility 

 in the case of such improvident people as these cutters 

 are, unless he takes service with another employer who 

 is willing to pay up the whole indebtedness and so take 

 over the debt as well as the workman. 



Hitherto the Dacca and other shell cutters have 

 employed no machine saws. They believe that no 

 machinery is capable of cutting the shells without 

 damage, basing their belief on the results of an experi- 

 ment with some form of machine saw tried some years 

 ago. The cutters allege that the impact of the saw 

 upon the shell was to cause innumerable small fractures 

 which rendered bracelets made from the sections thus 

 cut fragile and liable to break much more readily than 

 when the sections are cut by means of the hand-saw. 

 It is probable that the effect named was produced by 

 the machine used, but it does not follow that there 

 are no machme saws on the market capable of cutting 

 shells without ill effect on their substance. Possibly the 

 machine used had a saw carrying teeth too coarse or too 

 large in size. I noted as a striking and characteristic 

 feature of the hand-saw employed, the extreme minute- 

 ness of the teeth alonor the edsfe and further that their 

 form is dentate not serrate, that is, that the axis of the 

 point is vertical and not oblique. This characteristic 

 enables the saw to cut equally well whether sawing 

 from right to left or conversely. As already noted so 

 small and w^eak are the teeth that to sharpen such a saw 

 a series of taps along the edge of the blade with a chisel 

 set hammerwise in a handle is sufficient for the purpose. 



The further staoes in the manufacture of chank 

 bangles vary within wide limits, dependent upon the 

 market to be served. Some of the processes require no 

 great skill and may be carried out by cheaply paid 



