Method of iiishiriff for r earls. 383 



pay the impostors.* They levy a tribute of ten oysters upon 

 each boat. 



Accidents with sharks are of rare occurrence : the noise of 

 1000 divers on the water at once seeming to scare the 

 animals. Moreover, the dark colour of the skin of their 

 bodies, acts as a considerable protection to the divers, so that 

 there are numbers who blacken their legs, in order still more 

 to alarm the monster.f 



After these preliminaries, the divers go down into the 

 water, each carrying a basket-shaped net, in which to bring 

 up the oysters, when selected — a stone of from ISlbs. to 251bs. 

 weight being fastened round the body, so as more readily to 

 enable him to sink to the bottom. When at a depth of some 5 

 or 6 fathoms, the diver unfastens the stone, which is forthwith 

 hauled up. He now throws himself forward on liis face, and 

 keeps- himself as close as he can to the ground, while he 

 rapidly rakes up and collects together all that is within his 



* In 1857, the cliief shark-charmer was a Roman Catholic ! 



f An encounter in the water between a shark and an exi^ert s^vimmer, armed only 

 with a knife, is not so unequal an affair as might at first be supposed. The pearl 

 fishers of tlie Gulfs of Panama and Nicoya only use a short stick, mth which, if the 

 sharks get above tliem, they stir up the mud, under cover of which they SA^dm along 

 the bottom for a little distance, and then shoot up to the surface. Of tlie equahty in 

 which a good sw imm er armed -ndth a knife feels himself in encoimtering a shark, 

 there ai-e niunerous instances. Many years ago, when shipping was more plentiful 

 in Kingston Harbour, Jamaica, than at the present day, vessels had occasionally 

 to put up with somewhat awkward berths, when they used regularly to "foiil their 

 anchors," whereupon it became necessary, of coiu'se, to send some one do-mi to free 

 the cable. For this pm-pose, negi'o divers were employed, and one man attained a 

 wide reputation from having liimself, unscathed, slain in fair combat at different times, 

 no less than five sharks ! Ultuuately the sharks steered clear of any black man who 

 had a knife suspended round his neck. 



