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METHODS OF FISHING
do
better work always, but one could depend on them more safely. This was
true of the divers in Torres Straits between Queensland and New Guinea.
Before
dress-diving was introduced these naked natives would dive into ten or
twelve fathoms and bring up an oyster under each arm. The shells were
large, weighing three to six pounds together and sometimes ten, but
they contained few pearls and those were generally small. As they were
brought up the oysters were searched for pearls and the fish used for
food. The shells sold in Sydney then for eight to nine hundred dollars
the ton. Years ago the women of Chile about the Bay of Concepcion
claimed as a right the fishing for mussels. The men rowed them out to
the beds and stuck long poles into the shoal below, down which the
women would slide, returning with both hands full of mussels. The
fishing was done from canoes, each holding one man and one woman. The
women did not consider this a hardship but a privilege of which they
were quite jealous, for they devoted the proceeds of their catch to the
purchase of finery.
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