5 i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



these articles is therefore so brisk that the danger of a glut in the 

 market can hardly be feared. Holothurias are even fished in the 

 Bermudas and the West Indies, and exported, chiefly from Boston, 

 to China. They are probably not sold there as products of the 

 Atlantic ports of the New World, but mixed with real Indian tre- 

 pangs. For about eighty years also trepangs caught near Cey- 

 lon and the Isle of France have been marketed in China, and 

 have sold well ; but are ranked — not being well enough prepared 

 for the most delicate Chinese tastes — among the most inferior 

 qualities of the Moluccan supply. 



The principal trepang fishers are the Buginese and the inhab- 

 itants of the island of Goram. There go out together flotillas of 

 from thirty to forty small, apparently fragile, but really quite 

 seaworthy boats — called proas in the East Indies — with a com- 

 plement of about a thousand men. The fishermen receive no 

 wages, but are supplied with all the necessaries for the expedi- 

 tion — provisions, etc. — by Dutch and Chinese traders ; these then 

 have the right to the whole catch, for a previously determined 

 price, to be paid on delivery, of which each participant in the 

 voyage is entitled to his share. The dangers connected with 

 such an expedition appear not to be small. But the business is a 

 lucrative one. While we can not examine the accounts of the 

 Malays and Chinese, we have evidence of this from another 

 source. An American, Captain Eagleston, sent out five success- 

 ive expeditions, which brought him 4,467 pikols (a pikol is 61 '5 

 kilogrammes) of trepang, or, at 1,100 to the pikol, 4,913,700 indi- 

 viduals. The enterprise cost $10,337, and returned a clear profit 

 of $67,924. 



This fishing is conducted in a rather primitive manner. The 

 most of the " fish " are caught, in shallow water, by spearing the 

 larger ones and diving for the smaller ones ; in deeper water an 

 extremely simple drag-net is used, which is fastened to a long 

 handle of bamboo. 



A suitable number of trepang having been caught, the fisher- 

 men repair to the nearest island to put them up. The trepang 

 are first opened and disemboweled ; then the water is pressed 

 out, and they are rubbed within and without with dry lime, 

 which the Malays call tsilumam. They are next dried, either in 

 the sun — which gives an inferior product — or in special crates, 

 beneath which a smoking fire is kept burning ; and, lastly, they 

 are packed in bags. According to Mr. Wallace's description, 

 they look like sausages that have been rolled in mud and dragged 

 through a sooty chimney. The kind which I have occasionally 

 tried at our delicatessen shops does not present quite so bad an 

 appearance as that, but it is probably not one of the best qualities. 



The dressed trepang are next taken to an appointed place 



