THE WORK OF THE "ALBATROSS' 



245 



and the bottom. One consisted of a heavily weighted ten-foot iron ring 

 to which was lashed a lined bag of fine mesh. This net was wrecked in 

 a typhoon encountered off the coast of northern Luzon, as it stood 

 lashed to the fore rigging, and was replaced by a net of Norwegian 

 model. The bag of the latter was made with a shear board at each 

 corner of its triangular month, set so as to draw the net down as it 

 was towed, and at the same time to hold the mouth open for thirty feet 

 on a side. 



These dredges and tow nets are put over the starboard side of the 

 ship by a heavy boom swung from the foremast. The steel dredging 

 cable, five or six thousand fathoms of which are wound on a huge drum 

 on the berth-deck below, passes over a sheave at the heel of this boom so 

 geared as to indicate upon a dial the number of fathoms of cable paid 

 out. To relieve the severe tension on the dredging cable, which often 

 amounts to four or five tons, two sets of rubber buffers are inserted in 

 the rigging of the boom. One of these, fastened perpendicularly to the 

 foremast, moves a pointer over a scale, indicating roughly in tons the 

 strain upon the cable. Fisherman's luck prevails on the Albatross, as 

 elsewhere, and often the dredge is brought to the surface with a great 

 hole torn in the side; or occasionally the whole bag gives way under a 

 big load as the dredge is being lifted aboard, and the collector sees all 

 his expected treasures float rapidly astern or disappear into the dark 

 blue water beneath the ship. 



A Set of Sounding Instruments. 1, water bottle; 2, thirty-five-pound shot; 3, 



Thompson bail-cutting sounding rod ; 4, bottom specimen cup ; 5, sixty-pound 



shot; 6, deep-sea thermometer. (Photograph by DeLong.) 



