136 
SURVEY OF THE INTERTROPICAL' 
ISIS, for this fishery ; it sails in January during the wes- 
june terly monsoon, and coasts from island to island, 
5—13 ‘ until it reachestheN.E. endofTimor,whenitsteers 
S.E. and S.S.E., which courses carry them to the 
coast of New Holland ; the body of the fleet 
then steers eastward, leaving here and there a 
division of fifteen or sixteen proas, under the com- 
mand of an inferior rajah, who leads the fleet, and 
is always implicitly obeyed. His proa is the 
only vessel that is provided with a compass ; it 
also has one or two swivels or small guns, and is 
perhaps armed with musquets. Their provisions 
chiefly consist of rice and cocoa-nuts ; and their 
water, which during the westerly monsoon is 
easily replenished on all parts of the coast, is 
carried in joints of bamboo. ‘ 
The method of curing the trepang is thus de- 
scribed by Captain Flinders:— “ They get the 
trepang by diving, in from three to eight fathoms 
water ; and where it is abundant, a man will bring 
up eight or ten at a time. The mode of preserving 
it is this : the animal is split down on one side, 
boiled, and pressed with a weight of stones; 
then stretched open by slips of bamboo, dried in 
the sun, and afterwards in smoke, when it is fit 
to be put away in bags, but requires frequent ex- 
posure to the sun. A thousand trepang make a 
picol, of about 125 Dutch pounds; and 100 picols 
