FISHING. 



9 



parison of the letter S mounted on 'No. 11.' The 

 old Arab geographers seem to have been struck 

 by the piscatorial peculiarities of these coasts. 

 El Idrisi (1st climate, 7th section) informs us 

 that ' the people supply themselves from the 

 sea without craft or without standing upon the 

 shore. They use, whilst swimming or diving, 

 little nets which they themselves make of woven 

 grass ; they tie them to their feet, and by 

 slip-knots and lashings held in their hands, 

 they draw fast the snare when they feel that a 

 fish has entered it. All this they do with ex- 

 ceeding art and with a cunning bred by long 

 experience: they also teach land reptiles to 

 drive their prey ' — possibly the iguana. 



The tide, which hereabouts rises from twelve 

 to thirteen feet, was then rapidly ebbing. At 

 high water large boats run up under the walls 

 of Chak-Chak ; during the ebb the creek 

 within several yards of the landing-place is a 

 quaking bog, which receives a man to his waist. 

 After three hours of persistent grounding, and 

 nearly despairing to reach our mark, a sharp 

 turn showed us the fort almost above our heads : 

 we disembarked and waded up to the landing- 

 place. 



Ascending the sea-slope, I was struck, even 



