Book 4-Lesson 17

LESSON 17
PEARL-FISHING
IN the New World, the sunlit waters on either side of the Isthmus of Panama
were once rich in the precious shells in which pearls are found. In such
abundance did they yield their treasures to the Spanish conquerors, that in one
year Seville imported six hundred and ninety-seven pounds weight of pearls,
some of them of great beauty!
But the hands of the gold-seekers, red with the blood of their fellow-men,
whose lovely lands, rich in the palm-tree, the plantain,(1) and the maize,(2) they
cruelly laid waste, were equally unsparing beneath the waters, and equally
ruthless(3) to the miserable race of pearl-fishers. The poor Indians, insufficiently
fed, and forced into the sea by their cruel masters, oftentimes never reappeared,
having fallen a helpless prey to the hungry sharks. The pearl-banks themselves,
unceasingly stripped of their shells, soon became exhausted. Land and water,
cursed by the Spaniards' greed of gain, alike lay desolate.
But it is not so in the East. There, pearl-fisheries still flourish. At Babre in,
in the Persian Gulf, renowned in times past, is the largest pearl-fishery in the
world. The annual amount of wealth which it produces is estimated at a quarter
of a million sterling.
Another celebrated pearl-fishery in the East is at the island of Ceylon; an
island of which Pliny, the learned naturalist of ancient Rome, extolled the "pure
gold and peerless pearls;" an island crowned with the never-dying palm, sitting
as a queen upon the sunlit waves, while from her cinnamon groves the spicy
odours float afar.
With pearls, as with corals, there are appointed fishing-grounds for
successive years. Certain divisions are made of the great pearl-banks stretching
between the island and the continent of India. The principal of these divisions
lies about twenty miles from the shore of Ceylon.
This spot, a desert all the year round except in February and March, is then
alive with treasure-seekers. Ever-shifting, miscellaneous crowds of people are
there, from all countries, of many tongues and many colours, of every gradation
of rank and infinite varieties of occupation, yet all engrossed with the search for
pearls.
Some are drawn by business, and some by curiosity. The merchant is there,
and the traveller, as well as crowds of busy native workmen.
But, hark! a gun fires. 'Tis sunset, and the boats are launched, each with its
twenty men, —ten to row and ten to dive, five of whom at a time go down into
the deep. Night passes, but when morn comes the diving begins.
In the bottom of each boat are five huge red stones. Through a hole in each
a rope has been passed. Each diver plants his right foot firmly on one of these
stones, while with his right hand he grasps a rope; and weighted by the huge red
stone, he speedily sinks to the bottom. To hold the shells, he bears with him a
basket, or he hangs a net-work bag around his neck. As soon as he reaches the
bottom—and not daring to glance around, lest the monster he dreads may be
near—he quickly gathers all the shells within his reach. Generally speaking, in
about two minutes he pulls the rope, which his right hand has never let go, and is
swiftly drawn up again into the boat.
Each diver makes from forty to fifty plunges in a day, bringing up perhaps a
hundred shells at a time. But remaining under water for one minute—two, four,
five minutes—has a terrible effect on the human frame. When the divers come
up, not only water, but sometimes blood, pours from their nostrils, mouths, and
ears! But of this they take no heed. In the blue waters themselves as the only
enemy they dread—the fierce and cruel ground-shark.
When noontide arrives, again the gun fires, and, with colours flying, the
boats return, bearing their treasures to the shore.
But the shells are closed fast. The oyster is yet alive, and to force the shell
open with violence might injure the pearl that lies hidden within.
The pearl shells are put into pits dug in the earth, where mats are spread to
receive them. They are left there till the creatures within them die, when the
shells, opening of themselves, allow of the pearls being safely removed.
The chemist and the microscope have shown the secret of the composition
of the pearl. It is formed of alternate layers of membrane(4) (animal substance),
and carbonate of lime (mineral substance), in the same way as the lustrous
internal coating of the shell. These layers are slowly and successively produced
by the animal itself. Some injury, probably, has happened to the outside of the
shell, and the hole must be filled up; or a grain of sand or other irritating
substance has entered inside the shell (sometimes by the cunning design of man),
and this must be covered over, that it may no longer wound. —and lo, the result!
By a creature ranking amongst the lowest in the scale of creation is produced a
marvel of beauty—an incomparable gem, to glisten in a monarch's diadem,(5)
and to be the poet's symbol for all that is most precious and most pure!

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(1) Plantain, a valuable food-plant in tropical countries.
(2) Maize, Indian corn.
(3) Ruthless, pitiless.
(4) Membrane, tissue or film.
(5) Diadem, crown.