A SHADY CREW
T
HE Japanese divers
of the Jap-owned luggers had for months been prospecting and had been
fortunate enough to locate new pearl oyster beds which yielded large
quantities of well-matured silver-lipped sound shell, and also
exquisite pearls of more than average size. The Filipino and Moro
divers on boats owned by non-Japanese followed their lead, to their
great disgust; but the seas are free and the sea-bottom too, so the
Japs could do nothing but work as fast as the divers could descend and
come up.
These
new finds and the high price of shell in the home markets, together
with the fact that the waters had been rid of the pirates, meant that
now really big money was daily being paid for pearls and that everyone
on the island who was able began to take a practical interest in the
industry.
Some
of the larger native craft were being converted by the Moros into
pearling boats equipped with diving gear; the Sultan, his prime
minister, the prime minister's son and several other notables now owned
and ran boats for profit. Several American Government officials
likewise financed a boat or two, and the Chinese traders backed any
Japanese diver who was willing to break away from his own people. All
this was to the good, because the more luggers sailed out the greater
the area of sea bottom which could be prospected, and the greater the
quantity of shell and pearls which would come on the local market.
The
Sulu pearling grounds have, I believe, a great advantage over most
pearling grounds in other waters—such as, for instance, in the Gulf of
Manaar in Ceylon or in Panama and Venezuela—where the beds after a
certain time get cleaned out of mature shell and have to be given a
spell of two
or three years to allow them to recover. In Sulu waters and
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