Shell -Bearers 



extenso. After a preliminary inspection of the oyster- 

 beds by the government officials and the marking out of 

 the ground, advertisements are published, announcing that 

 a fishery is about to take place. " As a result of these 

 advertisements divers, gem-buyers, speculators, money- 

 lenders, petty merchants and persons of very diverse 

 occupations make speedy arrangements for attending the 

 fishery. 



" Stories of mushroom growth of towns wherever gold is 

 found, or diamonds discovered, or oil struck, have become 

 quite commonplace. Tales of the uprising of Klondike, 

 Coolgardie and South African cities fade beside Marich- 

 chikkaddi the city with no foundation. This place, with 

 its unpronounceable name, is the pearl metropolis of the 

 universe. Probably there is not a stocked jewel-case that 

 does not contain gems that have filtered through this 

 unique city by the sea. A sand-drifted waste lying 

 between the jungle of the hinterland and the ocean is 

 transformed by the c open sesame ' of a fishing proclamation 

 into a seething mass of working humanity in a few weeks. 

 For ten or twelve weeks Marichchikkaddi is one of Asia's 

 busiest marts. One would hardly think that these 

 Easterners, squatting on mats in open-front stalls, could 

 judge the worth of a gem with a wonderful precision. 

 Usually they have learned by long experience every 

 * point ' that a pearl can possess, know whether it be 

 precisely spherical, and has a good ' skin ' and a lustre 

 appealing to connoisseurs. A mental colander or simple 

 scale enables them to know to the fraction of a grain the 

 weight of a pearl, and experience and the trader's instinct 

 tell them everything further that may possibly be known 

 of a gem. 



" Each fishing-boat is a hive of competitive noise and 

 activity. All around are disappearing and reappearing 

 seal-like heads. By noon most of the divers are tired out 

 and, if it has been a successful day, the boats are fairly 

 loaded up. The signal is then given for pulling up 



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