MODERN SPONGE GATHERING.

Colonist, Volume LVI, Issue 13420, 18 March 1914, Page 3

MODERN SPONGE GATHERING.

So far has advancement been made in scientific progress that, no longer content to fish from the surface ot the sea, we mast descend to the depths in & submarine. This statement, however, must bo so qualified as'to apply only to sponges and similar deep sea creatures that have a permanent habitation on-rocks at the bottom. The boat kx question is the indention of Abbe Raoul, of Tunis. Sponge fishing has b*eco.Tne so important an industry in Tunis that old-time methods are too slow. Formerly sponges were secured in the most primitive manner. Daring divers would descend to the rocks and, tearing off the clammy, living- mass, would bring it to the surface. This method, while having the disadvantage of being most laborious, was also injurious to the health of the workers. Later, regular diving suits were used, •which are now, however, to be superseded by the invention of this French abbe. The apparatus is made to contain two men. Jt is over sixteen feet in length, and has a displacement of nineteen thousand pounds. It is shaped soraowhat like a cylinder, curved at the ends. On top there is a. cupola, giving access to the interior, as in the ordinary naval submarine. Within are two. compressed air tanks, and three water ballast tanks. It is by means of these last that the vessel is enabled- to sink and to rise. Underneath the l-oat is a roller which enables it to travel along the bed of the ocean. When the strange craft haa descended to a rich fishing ground, the fishing apparatus is brought into play. It consists of a pair of pincers made so as to tear and grasp the sponge. An electric light at the intersection of the arms of the pincers, as well an an electric lighting system within the. submarine, furnishes illumination for the work. A telephone circuit and speaking tube fitted to the hull of the submarine enable the fishers to keep in touch with the'vessel on the surface.