534 BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 
side of the 3-mile limit, and the waiting sponge fishermen found themselves at 
once in competition with vessels equipped with diving machines and armed with 
rifles, revolvers, and sabers. A crew of naked divers from Kalymnos were fired 
upon, and in response to complaint of the captain the Egyptian Government 
apprehended 110 men with 9 diving machines 26 miles off the coast and brought 
them to Port Said. Instead of prosecuting them, however, and inflicting the 
punishment that was deserved; notwithstanding that arms and ammunition 
were found on board their boat; notwithstanding also that they were Turkish 
subjects and therefore liable to the laws of Turkey and Egypt against diving 
machines, they were allowed to depart, after twenty-four hours, in full possession 
of diving equipment, arms, and ammunition. 
The hardship upon the original occupants of the sponge grounds was great. 
After paying their fees of 8 to 4 Egyptian pounds (200 to 100 francs) for per- 
mission to fish, they were driven away, and in Syria, whither they resorted, 
they must pay an equal fee. The banks of Port Said are thus, moreover, left 
at the mercy of the machine divers. I have appealed to the International 
Life Saving Congress, held at Frankfort on the Main, and now urge the Inter- 
national Fishery Congress at Washington to give support and sympathy to the 
unfortunate sponge fishermen who have undergone such loss this season at 
Port Said. 
SPAIN, ALGERIA, AND MOROCCO. 
Sponge fishing is not remunerative in Spain, Algeria, and Morocco on 
account of lack of good sponges. Those to be found there are mostly funnel- 
shaped, called elephant’s ears and simply ears by the Greek fishermen. Ten 
sailing vessels worked in Spain in 1903 with diving apparatus, coming from 
Kalymnos, Syme, and A‘gina; in 1904 there were only two sailing vessels from 
Kalymnos and none since then. 
ITALY. 
Official statistics of the sponge fisheries were attempted in Rome earlier 
than in Athens, and the Italian Naval Office has for twenty years detailed a 
small war vessel each summer for the supervision of sponge fishing in Italian 
waters. The commanders of these vessels see to the maintenance of order, 
give medical assistance and remedies to the diseased sponge fishermen, supply 
them with drinking water, and send in reports to the Naval Office. Articles 
based on these reports are there prepared for publication in the ‘‘Condizioni 
della Marina Mercantile Italiana,’ published each year by the Ministry of 
Merchant Marine, in a section devoted to the sponge fisheries. We find in 
these ‘“‘Condizioni’’ abundant material on the sponge trade as carried on in 
Italy by natives and foreigners, and this material contains naturally some 
