FISHING FOR TREPAN ti. 



359 



also brought back a native of Port Essington, who 

 had gone away with them last year to Macassar. 

 This we were told was not an uncommon occurrence, 

 as the natives of Port Essington are very fond of 

 going abroad to see the world, and the Malays, 

 having a great dread of them in general, are glad 

 to humour them. The prahus anchored off Garden 

 Bay, just above the settlement, and then proceeded 

 to collect and cure the trcpang. During the day all 

 the " sampans,'' or canoes, belonging to the prahus, 

 disperse into the bays and coves of the harbour, 

 and collect the trepang (holothuriae), cither by 

 picking them up at low water, or by diving for 

 them at various depths, up to two and three fathoms. 

 The kind most commonly got is one about six or 

 eight inches long, in its contracted state, of a grey 

 colour, dark above and whitish beneath. 



At sunset they come in with their cargoes, and 

 landing the in on the beach, another set of men pro- 

 ceed to cure them. For this purpose they erect, a 

 little behind the beach, a shed, made of bamboo and 

 " attop" mats, about sixteen feet long and eight feet 

 wide ; this is covered by a gable-shaped roof of attop 

 mats, the eaves of which are about five feet from the 

 ground, at which height a stage or platform of split 

 bamboo is spread from one end of the shed to the 

 other. The ground inside the shed is excavated to the 

 depth of two or three feet, so that the flame of the fire 

 lighted in it may not catch this bamboo platform nor 

 the sides of the shed. Outside the shed they have a 



