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THE PEARL
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that
there were not sufficient oysters for profitable fishing after that
until i860, when the government netted £20,000, and a fishing the
following year, 1861, was equally successful. The banks failed in 1862
and there was no fishery until 1874. Pollution of the water from the
Indian shores has been detrimental to these banks and they are now of
little importance.
On
the Ceylon side, the banks lie six to eight miles off the west shore
and a little south of the island of Manaar. Fishing has been an
industry from early times before history began. There are records of
these fisheries under the kings of Kandy and later by the Portuguese
after they took possession of Ceylon about 1505, to 1655 when the
island passed into the hands of the Dutch. In old times they were
called the fisheries of Aripo after a fort on the coast. Not until the
English gained control were the fisheries so managed that definite
knowledge of the results could be obtained.
After
the Dutch gave way to the English, until 1903, these fisheries had
yielded a net income to the government of over £1,000,000. This covered
a period of over one hundred
216
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