SOURCES OF PEARLS	81
	pearl-washers, watchmen, cooks, laborers, etc. In the Ceylon pearl fishery of 1906, for instance, our estimate shows 18,500 fishermen; but there were 40,000 persons engaged at the pearl camp alone, and many others were given employment in boat-building, supplying pro­visions, selling the pearls, etc., and this does not include the wives and children depending on the industry for sustenance. Indeed, it seems not unreasonable to estimate that instead of only the 18,500 fishermen, 85,000 persons were in a large measure dependent for their livelihood on the Ceylon fishery in 1906. Estimated on the same basis, we have a total of 500,000 persons de­pending largely on the pearl fisheries of the world for their support. Thus we see that pearl buyers and pearl wearers not only gratify a commendable admiration for the beautiful, but contribute largely to the economic balance whereby one class of humanity either sustains or is dependent upon another, even though these classes be so widely separated as the crown of Russia from the half-starved diver of the tropical seas. How strange is the providence of God, who, by grant­ing the pearl to the poor Arab, the Tamil of India, the South Sea Islander, and the forgotten Selang of Mergui, makes the greatest and wealthiest in the world contribute to their support.