PEARLS AND PEARL-DIVING 



done by people endowed with delicacy of touch. The 

 men engaged in this are watched as closely as diamond- 

 field negroes. Many employers will not even allow them 

 to remove their hands from the tub except to give up 

 a "find." When every perceptible pearl has been ex- 

 tracted, the putrid fish is laid out to dry, and then sorted 

 all over again for the sake of any treasures that may 

 have been allowed to pass unnoticed. 



The sorting or sifting of the pearls is the next pro- 

 cess ; and this is done by means of a large brass colander. 

 The pear-shaped and the larger spherical pearls are set 

 aside for subsequent drilling, the smaller sifted and re- 

 sifted and classed according to their size ; the smallest of 

 all are packed away for export to China, where a far 

 greater trade in "seed-pearls" is done than the local 

 fisheries can possibly keep supplied. Among other ways 

 of utilising them, the Chinese physicians calcine them and 

 employ them in their medicines. 



The Ceylon pearl-fisheries are probably the least 

 reliable of any, and one year's returns are in no way 

 a guarantee for those of another. This, no doubt, is 

 largely accounted for by the fact that the varying depths 

 make only a great number of small oyster-beds instead of a 

 few large ones ; so that, even without taking into account 

 the cod and other ground-fish that feast on shell and 

 oyster whenever occasion arises, the number of " brood " 

 must necessarily fluctuate when at any time the spat as it 

 is cast is liable to float away to depths beyond reach 

 of even a " dressed " diver. 



On the other hand, the Arabian fisheries, that are 

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