which
are tumbling into ruins, were built to receive iron roofs, but
Government seem to have objected to the expense of the roofs which
alone would make the pillars useful, as the Home Government have done
in the case of the Haputale railway. The capriciousness of the oysters
and the consequent uncertainty of fisheries are no doubt arguments
against expensive and substantial buildings; but the bricks ought
certainly to be utilized for a series of modest buildings, instead of
almost everything having to be done when a fishery is certain. The rush
this time has been great owing to the sudden cessations of strong
South-West monsoon winds and the dying of the oysters.
As
to attaining anything like certainty or steadiness, or being able
artificially to propagate the oysters, we seem as much in the dark as
ever. On board the guardship yesterday (whence I saw another exciting
scene of 114 boats crowding round the ship to announce their loads and
to skim shorewards, the noise and confusion being wonderful) I had the
advantage of going over the charts of the pearl banks with Mr. Tvvynam
and Capt. Donnan, who readily answered all my questions. The general
results were that an extensive area of bank, with from 6 to 8 fathoms
of water on it, extends from near Mannar to Chilaw. The apparent
conditions of bottom coral existing nearly everywhere, seems to be
generally very similar: spat and young oysters appear periodically on
all. But it is only on the limited spaces called the Modaragam and
Cheval-pars that really good fisheries are ever realized; and even in
regard to them, too often when all is most promising, millions and
millions of oysters will suddenly disappear. If it can be any comfort
to us our Indian neighbours have been much more unfortunate, a minute
parasitic shell killing off holocausts of the oysters. And this reminds
me of the theory which Capt. Phipps originated, which Mr. Thomas of the
Madras Civil Service (the great Fisherman) took up and which the
naturalists of the British Museum supported, that what had hitherto
from all time been known as the spat of the pearl oyster is the spat of
quite a different shell! All that Mr. Twynam, Capt. Donnam and other
experienced persons, natives as well as Europeans can say is, " Then we
should like to see the real spat of the pearl oyster. Destructive
criticism is ingenious, but where is the substitute t" The
disputed spat has always preceded oysters on the banks. Messrs. Twynam
and Donnan have seen the spat changing into oysters on long tall
sea-weeds, and as those long weeds have died down, the spat has gone
down, adhered to the coral and become growing oysters. If experience is
to be set aside, a more than Darwinian evolution must be substituted,
and at present the opinion in Ceylon is that all the old authorities
were right and that Capt. Phipps, Mr. Thomas, and even a British Museum
naturalist are mistaken. Shellfish which grow in millions of millions
must have spat in proportion and in that case it must be apparent. But
where is it apart from the old spat ? The forest flora of this place is
of the usual poor description in droughty places. Mimosas and other
thorny bushes, including spinifex, euphorbias and the pretty and useful
yellow-blossomed cassia, the twigs of which aro so largely used for
green manuring in Jaffna. The ubiquitous suriya exists to some extent
amongst the planted trees, but a few teaks and casuarianas do not look
happy. Mr. Twynam is, however, gradually extending a grove of coconut
palms on the sea-shore. They give agreeable shade for huts. Inland I
notice the round heads of palmyras, and there is a patch of tobacco and
some good moringa trees near the Custom House. Amongst the animal
products ot the district are good-looking sheep and donkeys.
Silavatturai is in the district of Mannar, to what the
population-bearing capacity of this arid district is, I find in the
figures on a map before me :—Mannar 480J square miles, 20,215
population ; against Jaffna 185 miles and 244,994. The population of
the Mannar district will be doubled before this fishery is over, but
the increase will be no more permanent than the fishing.
Silavatturai, April 6th, 1887.
I went out this morning to have one "last fond look" at the private
