124 MAiDRAS FISHERIES BULLETIN VOL. Xt, 



prices given prove unremunerative to the Indian exporter and the 

 trade dies out or languishes. Then after a longer or shorter 

 period another Chinese curer appears on the scene who revives the 

 trade and sets it on its feet again by the employment of honest 

 and careful methods. 



The last time a Chinaman operated on the Ramnad coast was 

 some 30 years ago according to my informants. He passed duly 

 through the experience I have outlined above and the trade had 

 reached its ebb in 1916 when I came on the scene as a variant 

 of the periodical Chinaman. I had already some knowledge of 

 the curing processes and I was soon in a position to put my finger 

 upon the irregularities which had caused the Indian product to 

 become unsaleable at remunerative prices. Before enumerating 

 these I shall furnish some details of the species esteemed and of 

 the approved methods evolved by Chinese curers for the proper 

 preparation of the Indian raw material. 



THE CHIEF SPECIES CURED. 



The only species of Holothurian found by the Chinese 

 suitable and sufficiently abundant for conversion into beche-de- 

 mer on the Ramnad coast is the one known locally as vellai aitai 

 or white beche-de-mer. This I have identified as the species 

 known to zoologists as Holothiiria scabra, Jaeger. It grows to a 

 large size, often 12 to 15 inches long, with a girth of 6 to 7 inches. 

 Although nearly cylindrical, there is a slight flattening of the 

 side upon which it lies habitually, and this part is snowy white 

 dotted with many minute black specks; the upper side or back is 

 crossed by irregular light bands and bars — white, pale-yellow, or 

 grey — outlined in dark grey upon a ground colour of paler grey. 

 In its skin are enormous numbers of minute limy spicules scarcely 

 visible when extracted even as very fine dust except with the aid 

 of the microscope. The only other species sufficiently abundant 

 to be commercially dealt with are the " green prickly-fish " {mul 

 attai, i.e., thorn-attai) and the " black-fish." The latter is very 

 numerous on the reef-flats of the coral islands along the Ramnad 

 and Tinnevelly coast, but owing to the thinness of its body-wall it 

 shrinks so greatly in curing as to be difficult to handle commer- 

 cially, particularly as its intrinsic value is very low even when sold 

 by weight. This species I identify as HolotJiuria atra, Jaeger, while 

 the " green prickly-fish " is the well-known SticUopns chloronotus, 



