COCHINCHINA. 355 
pecid, weighing 1331 pounds Englisb. It was calculated that 
one thousand slugs on an average weighed a pecul, and tliat 
one hundred peculs were equal to the cargo of a proa. It ap- 
peared also that, for the purpose of navigating tlie vessels and 
collecting the animal, each proa was required to carry from 
sixteen to eighteen men. Some are employed in detaching 
them from the rocks ; some in splitting them open, washing 
in fresh water and boihng them ; and others in collecting green 
wood, in the smoke of which they are dried pretty much in 
the same manner as our red herrings are usually prepared. 
That the Chinese do not themselves proceed to the coast 
of New Holland and collect the Trepan is no proof of their 
ignorance of the navigation of this coast. It appears, on tlie 
contrary, that they are well acquainted with the disadvan- 
tages with which such a voyage would be attended, by the 
necessary and unavoidable protraction of a whole monsoon or 
six months. It may besides be fairly questioned whether, from 
their aversion to cold water wliich in another work I have 
had occasion to notice, they were ever themselves the fishers 
for these animals, at the time they resorted for them to the 
coast of Cochinchina, as divers not much less expert than 
those who, on the coast of Ceylon, descend for the pearl 
muscle, or oyster as it is usually supposed to be, are equally 
required to detach the slugs from the rocks to wliich they 
adhere at the bottom of the se^. 
There can be little doubt, indeed, that the Chinese are 
and have long been acquainted with every part of the 
Eastern world ; and that in ancient times, while the greater 
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