17 
in some seasons. The hours of diving are confined to 
the hours between 7 A.M. and 1 p.M., and if calms 
prevail the divers must either stay ashore and lose their 
eatire day or must fatigue themselves rowing their boat 
the six to twelve miles that intervene between the shore 
and the fishing grounds, where too they may not arrive 
till 10 a.m. or even later. When the Government 
took over the actual working of the fishery, a small 
schooner, the ‘ Margaret Northcote ” eine with 
auxiliary steam, belonged to the Pearl Fishery Depart- 
ment and this vessel in spite of her low horse-power, 
12 only, did useful work in towing the divers’ canoes to 
sea when calms prevailed—a great boon to the divers. 
In 1893 the paddle-wheel steamer “ Margarita” replaced 
the “ Margaret Northcote” but as her working was 
costly in fuel, she was seldom used for towage. 
When the Fisheries Department took control in 19009, 
one of the first steps taken was to sell the ‘ Margarita” 
and obtain a motor launch specially adapted for the 
towage of canoes, as it was recognized as vitally impor- 
tant that the great losses caused by morning calms must 
be remedied as far as possible if the fishery were to be 
improved in its financial results. Not only was the 
direct loss, due to the smaller number of shells collected, 
in question ; the discouragement felt by the divers as 
day after day they saw lovely fishing weather wasted 
through their inability toreach the beds in time, was a 
more serious matter. The new arrangement proved so 
satisfactory, after two seasons’ trial, that a still more 
powerful launch, the “ Sutherland,” was stationed (1911) 
at Tuticorin, in order to further expedite the arrival of 
the divers on the fishing grounds when sail-power was 
useless. 
The danger from man-eating sharks is slight ; sharks 
of dangerous species are seldom seen in the neighbour- 
hood of the chank beds but when a suspicious fin is 
really seen, the divers stop work and are disinclined to 
resume for several days. Tamil divers never make any 
effort to kill or drive away ashark themselves. In some 
cases, particularly if the season is drawing to a closeand 
they are willing to see it end, they use the appearance of 
a shark as an excuse to clamour for the closure of the 
fishery—indeed I have strong reason to believe they 
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