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by being gradually worked into the bottom by mere 
manual labour, and it is surprising how firmly they hold. 
To each stake is secured, with a connecting string of tie-tie 
of some length, a shrimp basket, which acts as a “hat” to 
the stake when the tide is going out, as it is so placed to 
avoid rotting or entanglement. On the flow the basket is 
lowered into the current. Shrimps, in immense shoals, are 
carried by the tide into its open mouth, thence to the 
narrow end, where they are collected in large numbers. 
From this trap there is no escape. Before the turn, two 
or three times during the flow, the stakes are visited by 
the employés or owner, and the baskets cleared. 
It is a curious sight to observe of an evening these lines 
of stakes topped by sea-gulls, all heading to the wind or 
breeze, when there is one—balmy breezes do not always 
blow in these regions—which make them their roost for 
the night. 
The catching of shrimps at Lagos represents a very 
large and extensive industry. The season lies between 
December and April. The industry includes local con- 
sumption and interior trade. 
For storage and inland traffic shrimps are smoked, or 
rather semi-cooked, as follows. A fireplace of mud is built 
either in or out of doors, and is represented by an open 
oval-shaped horseshoe mud bank or small wall, the inter- 
ruption in the shape to continuity acting as the means for 
draught and for the insertion of fuel, the enclosed area 
being the receptacle for the fire. Its size is dependent on 
proportion of industry. Across the open top are laid green 
supporting sticks, on which rest the fish to be cured, the fire 
having been first started. The process, which equally applies 
to fish, so primitive, is really a combined system of roast- 
ing and smoking. When sufficiently cured, according to 
native ideas, they are stowed away in baskets, and kept by 
