360 



ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1916. 



American palate. The octopus is caught in various ways, one of the most inter- 

 esting of which is by the use of earthenware pots, wliich are lowered to the 

 bottom by means of cords ; they are entered by the octopuses, which, having 

 insinuated themselves, are reluctant to withdraw, so that the pots may be 

 piilled to the surface before the animals try to escape. I bring up this fishery 

 in order to refer to a very ingenious corollary, whicli was first mentioned to me 

 by a professor in the imperial university and later verified by myself. More 



than a century ago a vessel laden with a very valuable cargo 

 of porcelains from Korea destined for the imperial household 

 M^as wrecked in the Inland 8ea ; the captain and other 

 officers did what seems to have been a favorite amusement of 

 the olden days ; namely, they committed suicide just before 

 the vessel sank in deep water. Recently the fishermen have 

 been recovering pieces of this pottery, which now has an ap- 

 preciated value, by tying strings to octopuses and lowering 

 them in the vicinity of the wreck. The animals enter the 

 vessels and retain their hold of them while being drawn to 

 the surface. Several pieces of this porcelain which I saw 

 Avere gems, seeming but little the worse for their prolonged 

 submergence. 



To show liow extensive the octopus fisheries 

 are we again quote from Vice Consul Green's re- 

 port in Simmonds's Commercial Products of the 

 Sea, who furnishes some interesting particulars 

 as to the fishing and trade in cephalopods in the Tunis waters: 



Octopodia and polypi are the trade names mider which these cephalopods are 

 known in the Levant and Greek markets, where they are solely imported for 

 consumption during Lent, the Orthodox Church not including them in the pro- 

 hibition against the use of flesh in seasons of religious abstinence. In a good 

 season the several villages on the island of Karkenah supply about 3,000 hun- 

 dredweight, and the Jubah waters a third part of this quantity. In an average 

 year the yield will be under 2,000 hundredweight, and in one of scarcity 1,000 

 hundredweight. On the shores from the village of Luesa to that of Chenies. in 

 the Gulf of Khabs, the natives collect from 4 to 5 hundredweight of cuttlefish a 

 day during the season, but this supply generally serves for the consumption of 



Fig. 4. — Fishing 

 for octopus ou 

 the reef at 

 Guam. 



