THE ISLAND OF CEYLON. 
no such accidents occur at ail. The appearance of a single 
shark is indeed sufficient to spread dismay among the whole 
body of divers ; for as soon as one of them sees a shark he 
instantly gives the alarm to his companions, who as quickly 
communicate it to the other boats ; a panic speedily seizes 
the whole, and they often return to the bay without fishing 
any more for that day. The sharks which create all this 
alarm sometimes turn out to be nothing more than a sharp 
stone on which the divers happen to alight. As false alarms 
excited in this manner prove very injurious to the progress 
of the fishery, every means is employed to ascertain whether 
they are well or ill founded ; and if the latter be the case, the 
authors of them are punished. These false alarms occurred 
more than once in the course of the last two or three seasons. 
The divers are paid differently according to their private 
agreement with the boat-owners. They are paid either in 
money, or with a proportion of the oysters caught, which 
they take the chance of opening on their own account; the 
latter is the method most commonly adopted. The agreements 
with the people who hire out the boats are conducted much 
in the same manner. They contract either to receive a certain 
sum for the use of their boats, or pay the chief farmer of the 
banks a certain sum for permission to fish on their own account. 
Some of those who pursue the latter plan are very successful 
and become rich ; while others are great losers by the specula- 
tion. Oyster lotteries are carried on here to a great extent ; 
they consist of purchasing a quantity of the oysters unopened. 
