The Sponge Fishery of tfie Bahamas. 1 75 



through which the tide flows, and left to soak from four to 

 six days, when it is beaten with a flat piece of stick, and 

 then becomes quite clean. A few years ago the practice 

 was to bury the sponge for 20 days, by which time the 

 gelatinous animal matter was destroyed or eaten away by 

 the insects that swarm in the sand. This has been entirely 

 done away with ; the present custom is more simple, and 

 cleans the sponge better. The sponge is then assorted and 

 compressed in powerful presses like cotton. Each bale or 

 package has fastened to it outside a sample to show the 

 quality. 



Strange to say, spongers, as a rule, are not very good 

 judges of the quality of the sponge they gather. They 

 seldom seem to know good from bad sponge. The conse- 

 quence is that much of very inferior quality is brought to 

 market, and realizes very low prices. This is an evil which 

 could easily be remedied. The gathering and cleaning of 

 common sponge entails as much trouble and fatigue as the 

 collecting of what is valuable and good. Spongers should 

 be more observant of the various qualities of sponges. 

 They ought to know a sound from a sucked sponge a 

 sponge of fine texture and good shape from one of bad 

 shape and coarse. 



Bahamas sponge is classified into 1 1 sorts. From the 

 south-eastern extremity of Andros Island, and all over 

 the Exuma banks, the fine large sheep-wool or honeycomb 

 sponge is chiefly found. This kind is known as the bath 

 sponge, and is by far the most valuable and merchantable. 

 The other kinds are the reef or fine toilet, the boat, the 

 velvet, yellow, hard head, Long Island, grass, common or 

 glove, and refuse. None of these are very valuable, ex- 

 cepting the velvet sponge, which is obtained from the west 

 end of Bahamas and William's Cay. From these two 



