148 J. HORNELL ON 



varieties possessing some special detail or more frequently applied according to the 

 work they are engaged upon. In size a typical hody may be anything from 22 to 40 

 feet in length by 2 1 to 8 ft. beam, with a register tonnage of from ^ to 6 tons. They 

 represent a widened copy of the ordinary West Coast dug-out, called toni in Bombay, 

 built up of planks ; indeed in the case of the very small ones, the boat is actually a 

 dug-out. An ordinar}' rudder is fitted to the stern post by lashings or by iron gud- 

 geons and pintles in some boats. Stem and stern are curved at about the usual 

 angle adopted in dug-outs. These boats are quite open and unlined, but from the 

 stem-head to a point just abaft the mast a weatherboard about one foot wide is 

 fitted along the gunwale to keep out the seas and spray. At times they employ an 

 outrigger of the same form as we shall see is employed by the smaller Ratnagiri boats, 

 to increase stability ; this locality {Bombay) marks the northward limit of the habitual 

 use of this device on the west coast of India. 



From Bombay to Jaigarh some 100 miles south, machwas and hodys of the 

 Bombay pattern, manned almost entirely by Hindu fishermen, continue the charac- 

 teristic fishing craft in common use. From this point (Jaigarh) southwards to the 

 Kanarese border, Muhammadan influence prevails except in Portuguese territory, 

 where the fishermen are mostly Christian. The coast along the whole of this stretch 

 is particularly well-adapted for fishing, the shore line indented with creeks and shel- 

 tered coves, and with numerous harbours and estuaries which provide shelter for 

 fishing craft and coasters of every size and of varied description. The bottom right 

 to the shore is usually sandy and hence inshore net fishing is practised to a far greater 

 extent than to the northward of Jaigarh. 



Ratnagiri and Raj pur are the two great fishing centres on this part of the coast 

 north of Ooa ; the Muhammadan fishermen (Daldis) of these ports have made the 

 name of Ratnagiri famous along the whole west coast by reason of their intrepidity 

 and skill, in which qualities they far exceed the fishermen of Kanara and Malabar. 

 For deep-sea work they employ a beamy single-masted lateen-rigged machwa of low 

 freeboard, while for inshore fishing they are fond of outrigger canoes of varied form 

 and size. 



The deep-sea Ratnagiri and Rajpur boats are of three sizes, and many of them 

 fish for part of the year, usually on contract, on the Kanarese and North Malabar 

 coasts, regularly coming as far south as Mount Deli and occasionally to Cannanore. 



These boats are employed almost exclusively in drift-netting ; the two larger 

 sizes are single-masted lateen-rigged open boats, very broad in the beam, handsome 

 in their lines, with long overhanging bow, round stern and raked stern post. Like 

 Danish and Xordland open fishing boats they are low in the waist — to facilitate hand- 

 ling of the nets — and have therefore comparatively low freeboard ; both alike fit a 

 weatherboard when heavily laden and both depend on a single mast and single sail. 

 The smaller of the two large Ratnagiri boats returns daily to port, but the larger, 

 which is used in deep-sea shark and ray fishing, frequently keeps the sea for several 

 days. 



The smallest type of Ratnagiri deep-sea boats is an extremely interesting develop- 



