34% An Account of the Pearl Fifhery at Ceylon. , 
eolours are hoifted at the flag-ftaff, and in the afternoon they 
come to an anchor; fo that the owners of the boats are’ 
thereby enabled to get their cargoes out before night, which 
niay amount to 30,000 oytters, if the divers — been active 
and fuccefsful. 
Each boat carries twenty-one men and five heavy diving- 
fiorics, for the ufe of ten divers, who are called in Tamul 
kaoly kérer; the reft of the crew: confifts of a tandel, or head 
boatman, and ten rowers, who aflift in lifting up the divers 
and their fhells. 
The diving-{tone is a piece of coarfe granite, a foot long, 
fix inches thick, and of a pyramidical fhape, rounded at the 
top and bottom. A large hair rope is put through a hole in 
‘the top. Some of the dive rs ufe another kind of ftone, thaped 
like a half moon, to bind round their belly, fo that their feet 
may be free. At prefent thefe are articles of trade at Con- 
datchey. The moft common, or pyramidical ftone, generally 
weighs about thirty pounds. If a boat has more than five 
of them, the crew are either corporally punifhed or fined. 
The diving, both at Ceylon and at Tutucorin, is not attend- 
ed with fo many difficulties as authors imagine. The divers, 
confifting of different cafts and -religions, “fthtoniga chiefly of 
Pavrawer * and Muflulmans,) neither make their ‘bodies 
fmooth with oil, nor do they ftop their ears, mouths, or 
nofes with any thing, to prevent the entrance of falt water. 
They are ignorant of the utility of diving-bells, bladders, and 
double fiedible pipes.. According to the injunctions of the 
fhark conjurer they ufe no food while at work, nor till they 
return on fhore and have bathed themfelves in frefh water. 
Thefe Indians, accuftomed to dive from their earlieft infancy, 
fearlefsly defeend to the bottom, in a depth of from five to 
ten fathoms, in fearch of treafures.. By two cords a diving- 
fione and a net are connected with the boat. The diver, 
putting the toes of his right foot on the hair rope of the 
diving-ftone, and thofe of his left on the net, feizes the two 
cords with one hand, and, fhutting his noftrils with the other, 
plunges into the water. On reaching the bottom, he hangs 
the net round his neck, and collects into it the pearl fhells 
* Fifhermen of the Catholic religion. aaa 
as 
