41 6 The Commercial Products of the Sea. 



Experimental divings made during the last few years 

 showed there was on the banks which are now being fished 

 a harvest of some 10,000,000 oysters. The average number 

 of pearls to be expected from this quantity of oysters is 

 about two per cent. The average value per 1000 oysters 

 depends, of course, upon the size of the gems. The theory 

 is that pearl oysters in the last year of their existence 

 double their value all round. If 1000 oysters produce 

 pearls — large and small together — worth £20, the catch is 

 considered a very good one. A hundred tiny pearls the 

 size of a pin's head are not worth one of the size of a small 

 dried pea, so that the fishing is practically a lottery, in 

 which the prizes are very few and the blanks may be 

 numbered by millions. Indeed, the manner in which the 

 boats are selected, and the order in which they fish, are 

 arranged by lots, the boats being placed in divisions of 

 about 50 each, and sent out one division at a time, till all 

 have had an equal number of chances. About 250 boats 

 are generally employed in the actual fishing operations, 

 and no fewer than 10,000 people are directly or indirectly 

 engaged in the industry. In the great fishery in 1874 

 the number of oysters taken in one bank alone was 

 1,250,000, which sold for about 101,200 rupees, or ;^I0,I20. 

 These figures will give some idea of the importance of 

 the fishery, and the desirability of restoring, if possible, its 

 productive powers, since the Government, as well as the 

 divers themselves, derive a considerable revenue from the 

 sale of the pearls. 



After the pearls are collected they are classed, weighed, 

 and valued. The method of classing them is by passing 

 them through a succession of brass cullenders, called 

 baskets, of the size and shape of large saucers. There 

 are 10, and sometimes 12, of these cullenders : the first has 



