An Account of the Pearl Fifbery at Ceylon. 335 
appears that, among the wild horfes, the black is becoming 
extin@t, and that this will be the cafe alfo with the browns 
that, taking the colour as an index, we might fay, that the 
beft breed of horfes is the bay, then the brown, and next 
the black ;: all the other colours being inferior, as they are 
the refult of more diftant degradations from the primitive 
horfe, which muft have been the moft perfect. Experience 
feems, in fome meafure, to confirm thefe conjeGures; for, 
except in a few cafes, which are of little confequence, the 
bays are the moft efteemed, and the browns hold the next 
rank. He obferves, that in France a prejudice is entertained 
againft the laft-mentioned colour, which he thinks unrea- 
fonable, and which in his opinion feems to fhew that the 
French, in this refpect, have not fo much difcernment as the 
Spaniards. Thefe obfervations, and the inferences which the 
author draws from them, feem to weaken the confidence 
which might be placed in what has been faid by Buffon, on 
the authority of Herodotus, Leo Africanus, and Marco Polo, 
of wild white horfes faid to have exifted in Arabia and Nu- 
midia. We know how fufpicious the teftimony of the an- 
cients is in regard to natural hiftory, and that the authonty 
of Buffon himlele has little weight when he gives toftimasnies 
inftead of obferved facts. 
VI. An Account of the Pearl Fifbery in the Gulpbiof Manar, 
in March and April 1797. By Henry J. Le Becx, 
E/q.* 
Fro M -the accounts of the former pearl fifheries at Cey- 
lon, it will be found, that none have ever been fo produétive 
as this year’s. It was generally fuppofed that the renter 
would be infallibly ruined, as the fum he paid for the pre- 
fent fifhery was thought exorbitant when compared with 
‘what had been formerly given: but this conjecture in the 
event appeared ill- founded, as it proved extremely profitable 
-and lucrative. 
The farmer this time was a Tamul merchant, who, for 
* From the Afiatic Refearches, Vol. V. 
the 
