The Quest of the Pearl.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLII, Issue 6, 10 February 1909, Page 28

The Quest of the Pearl.

By

C. BRYSON TAYLOR.

Author of • |n the Dwelling* of the Wil deme**.*’ “Xicanor. Teller of Tales,” etc. (Photograph* by A. W. ANDREE.)

x*W ROI'XT) liei throat wa* a laqx* of / I pearl*. each <nu* larger than the 1 I tip of her dainty finger, each J perfectly matched to it* fellows, each shedding around it its tiny aura of pinki*h light. The\ gleamed white again*t her dusky l»rea*t : they were caught like primmed moonbeams in the black meshe* of her hair: in her ear* were golden loop* from which *wung huge pearl pendant*. The couch on which *be lay wa* ebony, inlaid with mother-of-pearl: her sandals were beaded with pearls, and pearl* and rubies and misshapen turquoises studded the golden goblet at her hand. Eor she was X'oiirmahal. the rajah’* favourite: and for her gratification hi* slaves searched earth ami *ea for treasure.

She ha* long *ince turned to du*t. this dark *kinned Indian prince*s. but since her long gone day. men with the same reckle**ne** have spent their substance on the trca*ure* of earth and *ca tor some woman’s adorning: and women have loved with the *ame barbaric pa**ion the preciou* thing that beyond all other thing* i* reckoned a* I HE SYMBOL OF \\ oM AX’Hool). THE PEARL. Look .it it. lying in it* black velvet ca>e upon the counter, the ohle*t gem

known to history. Think of the women who have worn it Egypt'* queens. Chaldean and Assyrian princesses. Roman matrons, noblewomen of the Renaissance women of all the courts of all the world. And coming down to out own time, think of the fortunes that have been spent on the matched pearls of a *ingle rope or collar: while even among women of moderate wealth there are few who have not at least a string or a pin of pearls. Why *hould the pearl have won the high place it holds? It is hardly even *howy. compare! with most of the other preciou* stones. Perhaps one reason i* that even more indissolubly than the diamond, it is connected with woman.

PAR EXCELLENCE IT l< THE WOMANS JEWEL. feminine in it* essence, in its spirituality. in its (lawless purity. Pew men care for pearl*: when they do. they are apt to be connoisseurs. and better judge* of them than even women. 'There wa* a time when diamonds were not known, when the ruby was but a blackish stone, and gave no hint of the blood ami lire within it. but there has never been a time since history was. when pearl* were not considered things of price. So far back wa* their value

recognised that men—who left the scant record of their live* carven on the shinbones of reindeer—bored them with sharp slivers of hone, strung them on a shred of fish-skin, and called them white bones —and exchanged them for what pleased them better. Away to the East, on the island of

Ceylon. a ragged little brown village, rank with the smell of decaying fish, sits dipping its feet in the Gulf of Mannar. It is Aripu, the oldest barter-ing-place for pearls, and the most famous fishing-ground for them in existence. 'Tradition tells that Cleopatra’s pearls were brought from here: and it is still the largest and most important pearl market in the world. For Oriental pearls, you will understand: for there are pearl* and pearl?—Oriental (the most valuable I ami fresh water. Madras and Panama. (The pearl that lies in its black velvet case upon the counter came from Aripu. and is almost perfect. Perfect in lustre it is —hold it against the light, and you will see that the colours are on it. not in it —but at one end it is slightly flattened, so slightly that only an expert’s eye could detect it. The most perfect pearl known is La Pellegrina. It weighs 112 grains, is perfectly round, and so lustrous that it appears transparent.) Upon a time, before the British investment of the island in 1847. the Kings of Kandy, in their cheerful native fashion, did their best to ruin the oy-ster-beds: but since then the fisheries have been under government supervision, and science. wit’.! its magical preservative measures, has come to the aid of the oyster*. It wa* high time. for. while formerly the oysters were abundant enough to provide good fishing everv two years, now. so depleted have the beds become through unsystematic fishing, it is only every three or four years that sufficient returns to

IT H A <»l AIN I AXD CURIOI s SIGHT make the fishing pay can b.» counted on one of these pearl-fishing expeditions. 1 In search for the treasure of earth and se« has led men into strange corners of tin world, but into no place stranger thai that ancient, dirty little village tha

basks in the tropic sun. Stretching away across the Gulf, off the rotth-wes-tern coast of the island, are paars, or beds, the oysters' breeding grounds. Flats they are in reality; long plateaux of rock, shelving out from the island, and covered with anywhere from five to fifty fathoms of green water. The shells usually live in narrow channels between groups of islands, where the current is swift and the bottom hard: and these paars are ideal place* for them. The Periya Paar is perhaps the most celebrated pearl-ground in the world, but it is peculiarly exposed to the danger of the monsoon. More than once it has been swept clean by the fierce tides of all save a pitiful few of its toughest and most fiiinly clinging shells. W hen it i* decided by Government inspectors that the paars are in condition, official notice is sent out that a certain paar will be fished on a date usually about two weeks ahead. Forthwith the drowsy village wakes to life. From all the East come merchants, hawk-eyed and swarthy — Hindoo, Arabian. Egyptian: buyers for tin* great princes of India, who will have the best that gold can purchase: small traders buying for themselves. From the West come* agents of the great jewellers of l?ond-street and Fifth Avenue, getting their firm*' supplies at first hand, meeting the craft and guile of the East with cool-headed assurance: wealthy private collectors, with an eye for freak as well as first-water gems; and tourists who are in everybody's way. And from East and West also come men

to sell a* well as to buy —peddlers, native jewellers, artificers in wood and "tone, bazaar-keepers, shrewd-faced ankees. stumbling into this remote village Heaven, and they alone know how or why. with cheap ginicracks that are displayed side by >ide with the marvels of oriental handiwork. A NETWORK OF NARROW STREET" SPRING IT, unnamed, unpaved, wallowing in tilth that steams in the blinding sunlight, lined

with booths and hovels where grave, turbaned men sit behind their outspread wares. From bazaars, going night and day in lull blast, come the throb of drums, the clash of cymbals, ami the shrill minor plaint of reeds, rhythmic, monotonous. barbaric. Here a pearl-driller, his ebon body shining with sweat, squats with his primitive outfit, piercing pearls that are to be strung: here an in layer, with his little charcoal forge, is gravely tapping with his blunt-nosed mallet: yonder a man in shabby European clothes

is trying to sell a trayful of jangling alarm clocks to a group of chattering, curious blacks. Government men in putties ami pith helmets; divers am! boatmen— Arabs. Malays. Japanese. Chinese — they throng and gibe and chatter. It is the East, the gorgeous, changeless, mysterious East, the filthy, squalid, verminous East, of strange perfumes and

vile smells; ami over it the copper sun is >inking into the western sea. turning to orange the sails of the hordes ot clumsy, sturdy little boats that are stranded on the beach or from far and near are scattering into harlxnir. For at midnight the fleet will start for the paars, that with the first light the divers may begin work. So. as the sun goes down, the uproar on the beach increases. The kottus—thatched warehouses, surrounded by close stockades, where the shells are taken from the boats

—are watched warily by officials, that no thief may slip in and conceal himself. The Government boats that are to convoy the fishing-fleet are getting up steam. On the beach tires are blazing, and groups, gathered around huge kettles of goat's flesh and rice, are silhoutted blackly against the leaping Hames. Eating is an important business to-night: for to-mor-row will be an enforced fast day. No diver who knows his business will take food on the day of diving — unless the hours are to be very late —that the action

of the heart and lungs may not be interfeitd with and the danger of cramps may be reduced to a minimum. Farther away from the groups around the tire ai\» other smaller groups, clustered close around the-Jiark-diarmers. the piilal karias. in whose power the native believes implicitly, and whose spell will waid off the danger of being eaten alive.

But. contrary to p q ular belief, and even to native *uper*t it ion. diver* run small danger from these tigers o f the seaSharks are notorious coward*: ami un-

less a man is wounded or rendered somehow helpless, a vigorous splashing is usually sufficient to drive them oft. For all that, and because old beliefs are hardest of all to kill, each iharmer has his circle of devotees waiting for the touch and the muttered word that will mean protection. Somewhere around midnight the fleet gets under way. in dire and shrieking confusion, which the (iovernineiit boats make gallant ami perfectly hopeless attempts to quell. But for all the mad excitement, surprisingly few casualties occur. DAWN COMES Will! A FLAMING RUSH : a burst of crimson far-flung over the sleeping waters, and the sun is striding

up the sky. Twenty miles out at *et tiie lleet heaves to. hovering over the chosen ground, and when the sun comes, the work begins. Pearl shells live at depths of from eight to twenty or more fathoms: for the naked native diver, twenty to thirty feet is good diving, an I forty to fifty feet is the maximum. IL* can remain under water from sixty to eighty seconds; in tdiis time he must make hi* descent and ascent, and fill with shell* the netted bag he carries slung around his waist. In diving-dress, which is the method employed by Au* tralians. a man can. of course, descend to greater depths, and. when at eight to fifteen fathoms, can remain at the bottom for two hours or more, but at any greater depth, for no longer than fifteen minutes. Diving as a profession is dangerous, not so much from the chances of accidents though these must alway* he reckoned with as from the fact that it is ultimately most injurious to health, deafness and incipient paraly *i* resulting if the work is not given up in time. I he boundary of the area to be tidied over is marked out by Government launches. and a heavy tine is the penalty of tin boat that fishes beyond it. The work is in charge of the Superintendent of the Fishery. wh<»*e tug must be in as maiiv places at once as is possible. Each of the hundred odd boats *cattcred over the banks within the pre scribed limit- cairie* twenty or thirty

diver*, and eadi diver K allowed tw man iak*. or i"d*tant«. Each bo.it u lie* al*«» a Government guard, who* duty it i* t<> *ee that the precious bi

valve*, lying in their tens of thousands, are not tampered with. THE MEI HODS OF Dl\ ING \RE MANY. Here a stocky little -Japanese, naked save for a narrow strap around his wai*t. slips his feet foremost into the water. two netted bags slung to the strap. with a weight in each bag to take him down. His mandaks hold the rope attached to his belt by which at his signal they will haul him up with his load of shells. The water doses quietly over his round, black head: there is nothing spectacular in his performance, but all through the working hours he will go popping up and dow n like a -lack-in-t he box. every two minutes, regular a* clockwork, blow-

ing like a porpoi.-c as he rises to the surface, but remaining only long enough to be relieve.! of his load ot shells. Here an elderly Malax. Iran and wrinkle.!, run* catlike out on the springboard that readies out from the boat's side, and goe* over with a *pla*h. He. too. has his weighted bags, and a rope. \ young \rab pushes through the crowd to the boil'* rail, a lithe, dean limbed fellow, powerfully built, and taller by half .i head than most of his mates. ILleaps to the rail and poise* there, a living stat ue of bronze.

in.S SPLENDID BODY SHINING WITH GREASE, with which these divers coat themselves Lefore entering the water, gathering itself for its spring. He carries the inevitable bags, but he needs no weights to sink him, nor does he wear a rope. A flash, and down he goes, head fin-t, graceful as a panther, straight as a die, without a splash, and swims to the bottom. Wonderful swimmers these Arabs are, recklessly daring, and with incredible powers of endurance, but their worth js seriously discounted by their intractability and hatred of discipline. And in thin connection it is a curious fact that •when under water men will invariably become irritable and extremely bad tempered. All through the morning the work goes on. Men disappear in the green depths, and reappear, clambering, dripping, up the ladders that swing over the boats’ sides; and always, with astonishing rapidity, the piles of shells grow larger. Sharp at noon the superintendent’s boat whistles; the last diver is pulled up; dingy sails are spread, and the fleet starts for home. Inshore the boats race, piling themselves up on the beach like a school of stranded fish. The mandaks stagger through the shallows Jaden with baskets of shells, which, under police guard, they take to the kottus. By this time Pandemonium reigns upon the beach. A hunderd tongues mingle in the clamour; Arabic, Malay, frantic Chinese chattering, Hindoostanee, profane and exasperated English. A thousand naked mandaks sweat and strain ankle deep through the shifting sand under the heavy baskets; angry guards menace and hustle unruly trouble-makers; merchants and spectators hurry toward the guarded kottus. Ami always the sun beats down on the shimmering sands with their shifting riot of colour, and oir the ocean that glares white hot, like molten metal; and presently, mingled with the odours of the village, there rises a faint, deadly stench from the million dead shellfish. Faint at first, but, as the hours go by, gaining in power and volume, until by the third or fourth day one's senses are drowned in it. It takes a long time and strong nerves to accept it with equanimity ; one wonders how the Government men can stand it as they must. As for the natives, they seem not to mind it in the least. Now the first stage of the quest is over: the oysters are gathered, and by sundown the eight hugh kottus, each one containing 25 subdivisions, are filled to the brim. First the divers receive their’ shares, to each man going the portion that is decreed to him by the Law of the Fishing. This he carries outside the stockade, and disposes of in small lots of 10, 20, CO, or 100 shells to the swarm of merchants and small buyers who jam and crowd and jostle in the open space before the stockades. Everywhere deals are going on between half naked divers and stately, dirty merchants, whose robes flap about their lean shins as they hury from one man to another and back again, hawk-eyed for bargains, shrieking that Allah must bear witness that they are poor men. and cannot stand such Woody extortion. But none the less, •fliey buy and buy. Here an old fellow with a beaked nose end fierce, eagle eyes, bearded, and turbaned .and villainously dirty, has possessed himself of 30 or 40 fine, large shells. Down he squats,“beneath the very feet of tile pressing thousands, wrenches open a shell, and pokes with his clawlike fingers into the mass of flesh. In a moment he finds a pearl—not a very good specimen, but into his pouch it goes, while with his free hand he reaches for another shell from his pile? Sometimes rage and disgust inflame his swarthy features; he flings the oyster from him, cur-ing its fathers and it« mothers for four generatiodts back; it has contained no pearl at all. But suddenly, opening « peculiarly large shell, he stops s’zort. Triumph, eagerness, ami grteed incarnate flash into his face, and are gone, replaced instantly by craft and cunning. 11.- holds a pearl worth more than a prime's ransom, perfect, lustrous, a gracious thing of beauty. He fondles it lovingly in his skinny hands, gueming shrewdly as to its weight-. It

came from the last shell in his pile; with a swift glance around to see whether his prize has been observed, he drops it carefully into his greasy pouch, and flaps off after more shells, loudly complaining that never—no, never—before did Allah create such an utterly worthless lot of oysters. Pearls—bah! who could expect to get pearls from such swines of oysters ’ ALREADY THE PEARL DRILLERS ARE AT WORK, their enormous black hand’s and crude tools manipulating lire tiny globules with a marvellous deftness and dexterity. Boats are being repaired, and sails and baskets mended in preparation for the next day’s work; fires are starting up here and there, and evoking is going on. The divers are tired! and hungry, and must be well fed, since again no food may be taken until the next night; and the thousands of shells in the kottus must be disposed of as rapidly as possible to make room for the-morrow's eatch. So all the beach hums with activity; the crowd around the kottus seems to increase momently; and through and under all the frenzied racket, one is aware, -ud-’enly, that the tom-toms are throbbing and the reeds are shrilling their barbaric discord, insistent, suggestive, the dominant under-note of the East. After dinner, at nine o’clock or thereabouts, the bulk of the shells is put up at auction by the Government Agent, who is overlord of the Fisheries and all that pertains thereto. The sale takes place in the courthouse, or other government building, and the shells are put up in lots of a thousand. A merchant holds up both hands, the fingers outspread; his name is put down for ten lots, or ten thousand shells. Not a few of the Indian merchants buy as many’ as a million. The largest number known to have been offered on a single night is 1,867,600; the smallest, 400,000. Every night the same men are on hand —until their limit is reached, or the fishing is over. Every night, too, they are joined by a sprinkling of new’ arrivals. The game is much of a lottery-, since the purchaser cannot tell what percentage of his shells will contain pearls. From the government the buyers purchase the shells; from each other, such pearls as they want, effecting thus a double system of exchange. An Englishman, who perhaps is matching pearls that later will be made into a necklace which his king will give to a royal bride, is a centre of attraction. Hundreds of pearls are brought to him for examination: are weighed and rigorously- tested as to colour and sphericity-. An agent for one of the big New York jewellers holds equal attention; he Ts looking for pink pearls for the necklace of an American heiress who will shortly- become, if not royal, at least as near it as she can. And here is a satire, dusky gentleman, low-voiced, always courteous, buying for, let us say, the Rajah of Lahore, and outbidding everyone in sight for any gem that takes his fancy, with perfect nonchalance and a credit that is obviously inexhaustible. For the Nourmahal of to-day must have her whims fulfilled; and her latest longing is for an entire robe of pearls—a garment of gauze sewn so thickly with pierced gems that scarcely an inch of it will be seen. Its weight will make it cling close to her slender limbs; its lustre will enhance the dark softness of her beauty- and the gleam of her shadowed eyes, and its cost yill quite positively and satisfactorily preclude her rivals from haying anything in the least like it. And she will get it, too, since her lord and master loves her with sufficient unreason, and since it is for her pleasure alone that the fisheries exist at all, and the oysters in their tens of millions yield up their sluggish spark of life—that yet is vital enough to produce a thing perfect enough to please her wayward fancy. WHEN THE PEARLS ARE TAKEN FROM THE DEAD FISH. they are first sorted according to size. This is done by passing them through a set of ten small brass sieves, called baskets, with meshes* of varying sizes. Pearls of the first class that are perfect both in sphericity and in lustre are called ani. Those of the second class, that to the average observer seem equally withthe great Southern Cross Pearl, which is out flaw, are anitari; and most of the pearls we see in the West and on general •ale come under this head; Of the third

class, called ma-auku, are those that are somewhat irregular in shape, and a trifle “off” in colour, but that are valuable for use in elusters, and are largely used by Eastern artificers in mountings of Various sorts. Kural is the double or twinned pearl, which when of good lustre and sufficiently freakish shape, is sometimes enormously valuable. In this class the mo.-t wonderful specimen on record is in reality nine pearls, naturally grown together, and forming a perfect cross an inch and a half long. It was found off the eoast of Western Australia in 1874. Many seed pearls and rejections—called vadivu—are generally ground into chunam and used as an ingredient in a favourite sweatmeat. From Cnina also comes a heavy demand for seed pearls’, and in India bushels of them, literally, are used in the decoration of idols and sacred images, anil of weapons as well. Pearl oysters l are of two varieties — the large white shell, and a smaller black species; but which produces the best pearls is an undecided question. Probably there is little choice. One rule that does seem to hold good, however, is that the deeper the water from w-hieh the shell is taken, the larger and finer will be the pear). Popular belief long held that the nucleus of the pearl was a grain of sand, or some minute foreign body, that got wedged into the oyster’s shell, and, if the inmate were unable to expel it, gradually became coated with the milky, lime-like secretion of the fish. Lately, science has turned its merciless searchlight on this theory-, and, as with many others of our old-time, tenderly cherished notions, has rudely disproved it. Even more humble than a grain of sand is the pearl’s origin—a lowly Platyelmian parasite that dies within the shell, and is entombed in its wonderful sarcophagus. Out of several hundred pearls decalcified with intent to probe their inner mystery, not more than three or four revealed any other core than the remains of these tiny worms; and in the white as well as the blaek shells, in coloured pearls as w-ell as orientals, this has been found to be the case. The fishing may- last a month, or two months, and its average value to the government is a million rupees—about £64,000. In Australia, where equally extensive operations are carried on, the average value is £296,000, or 1,438,560 dollars. Singapore is the centre for labour and supplies of the Queensland fisheries, and is one of the largest pearl markets in the world. Now the fishing is over. The fleet of smelly boats departs; the crowds dwindle and disappear, each unit richer by a pouchful of jewels. And the pearls are gone too—gone to be mounted or strung together as playthings for women the wide world over. The beat of the tomtom and the plaint of the reeds are no longer heard, and fires on the beach die down; and the ragged little brown village settles down once more into its ageold tranquillity-. All the excitement is over —until the next time.