five
to ten in each, and a diver can easily gather one hundred in the short
length of time he remains submerged. In other localities they may be
somewhat firmly attached individually to the bottom, so that some force
is necessary to release them, thus reducing the possible quantity.
Ordinarily one dive clears a space of several square yards.
Since
1904, a steamer has been employed each season by the government for
dredging oysters in connection with experiments in oyster-culture. The
officer in charge of this work concludes that "dredging is economically
a more sound method of fishing than is diving."1 This
view is disputed by the superintendent of the fishery, who points out
that the average catch by the steamer when dredging mature oysters only
slightly exceeds that of. an ordinary diving boat, and the cost of
maintenance and operation is vastly greater.2 A remarkable
tribute to the skill of the nude divers, brought out by this
discussion, is that, during some days when they were at work, the sea
was too rough for dredging by the steamer, notwithstanding that she was
a typical Grimsby or North Sea trawler of 150 tons measurement, built
in 1896.3
A
rough comparison of the Ceylon method of catching pearl-oysters with
that practised by the American oyster-growers may not be
uninteresting. On a basis of 400 to the bushel, the total Ceylon catch
of 81,580,716 pearl-oysters in 1905 represents a trifle more than
200,000 bushels, or about the quantity annually produced by each of the
half dozen leading oyster-growers of this country. Each one of these
growers requires only about three steamers, at a total cost, maybe, of
$25,000, and manned by twenty-five men ; instead of one steamer at a
cost of $25,000 and 318 diving boats manned by 10,000 men, which was
the equipment in Ceylon. To be sure, the conditions under which the
work is prosecuted are different—however, not so entirely unlike as
might be supposed—and the American season is about six months long
instead of the two months in Ceylon ; but the comparison is presented
simply as a suggestion of the possibilities of dredging on the Ceylon
reefs.
Until 1885, one of the most novel features of the fishery was the employment of shark-charmers or "binders of sharks" (kadal-kotti in the Tamil language, hai-banda in
Hindustani), whose presence was rendered necessary by the superstition
of the Indian divers. The fishermen placed implicit reliance upon the
alleged supernatural powers of these impostors, resembling in some
respects that reposed in the "medicine men" by the American Indians,
and would not dive without their supervision. It is unknown at what
period the influence of these
1" Reports on the Pearl Fishery for 1904," * "Reports on the Pearl Fishery for 1905,"
P. 7·
p. 23.
3Ibid., p. 22.
