The Pearl of India - Maturin Murray Ballou (readict .txt) 📗
- Author: Maturin Murray Ballou
- Performer: -
Book online «The Pearl of India - Maturin Murray Ballou (readict .txt) 📗». Author Maturin Murray Ballou
Though sharks are known to be common all along the coast of the island, still in the harbor of Trincomalee they are particularly so, where the huge saw-fish also abounds, from ten to twelve feet in length, including the powerful weapon from which it derives it name. Many lives have been sacrificed, first and last, to the man-eating sharks in this beautiful harbor and along the neighboring coast, where Europeans have been tempted to bathe in the cool, refreshing waters of sheltered inlets. Some tragic stories are related to the stranger as to the murderous doings of these monsters of the deep. It is a singular fact that the dreaded sharks rarely if ever attack the natives, and so far as we could learn no lives are sacrificed to them by the pearl divers in the season of their operations. The author has observed the same discrimination exercised between the whites and the blacks by this destructive creature in the waters of the West Indies. Inhabitants of St. Thomas, for instance, dive for sixpences thrown into that land-locked harbor, with entire immunity from danger, but certainly no white man would dare to bathe in the same place. Knowing that sharks abound in the neighboring waters, one actually hesitates when tempting the negro lads to dive for coins, though assured that the sharks never molest them.
So also at Aden, situated at the mouth of the Red Sea, the copper-colored natives of the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb dive with entire confidence in those waters, for silver coin thrown from the ship's deck; but were the body of a European sailor to strike the water, it would be devoured by the sharks in a moment; at least, so we were assured by our captain. Like the tiger and the crocodile, it is said that a shark which has once tasted human blood neglects henceforth all other sources of food supply in order to watch for the bodies of men, women, and children. A shark has been known to follow a ship closely five thousand miles across the ocean, from San Francisco to Yokohama. The identity of the creature was established by the fact that a part of a whale-lance protruded from its body, showing that it had been wounded in some former encounter with seamen, perhaps in their effort to rescue a comrade from its terrible jaws.
It may be proper to mention in this connection that the shark referred to was finally captured before entering the harbor of Yokohama, by means of a stout line and shark-hook baited with a large piece of salt pork, and was promptly dispatched.
A special industry among certain natives in the vicinity of Trincomalee is the collection and classification of marine shells, which they do with a certain degree of scientific knowledge. They are placed in neatly made satin wood boxes, and either sold to visiting strangers or shipped to European markets. Sometimes the covers of the boxes are beautifully inlaid with small shells. The profusion and variety of these mineral sea flowers of Ceylon have long been known. Conchologists visit the island solely to collect examples of their favorite study. An earnest and intelligent collector might add many treasures of species heretofore unknown, or rather undescribed, by employing a dredge from a common boat, just off the northeast shore of the island.
The edible oysters obtained hereabouts are really enormous, measuring eight inches and more in length, and four or five in width. Such giant oysters are not so inviting to the palate as those found on our own shores, but they are cooked and eaten both by the natives and by European residents. The natives make great use of shrimps or prawns, which they mingle with other ingredients in forming their favorite dishes of rice and curry.
The tortoises taken on this shore are thought to yield the best and finest shell for combs. It was necessary, in behalf of a spirit of humanity, to promulgate a law forbidding the roasting of tortoises alive, and taking off their shells during the process, which was done in order to obtain the shell of a finer lustre than is yielded after the animal's death. It seems that a people whose religion forbids the taking of life even in the case of the meanest insect can draw the line at fish, and, calling the tortoise a fish, can proceed to be thus outrageously cruel.
Tortoise-shell forms one of the most universal and attractive items of native manufacture, and great skill is evinced by the natives in the production of combs of various shapes, together with bracelets and charms, the latter often mounted in silver. The workmen of Trincomalee and Point de Galle have made a specialty of tortoise-shell manufactures since the time of the Romans. Strabo, the Greek geographer and historian, speaks of this. The pale yellow shell is the rarest and most expensive. Like the choicest jewels, specimens of this sort find the best market in continental India, but the home consumption of shell combs is enormous; every male Singhalese of any pretension in the southern part of Ceylon wears one, and the majority wear two in their long, straight hair.
The manner of dress among the Singhalese, the mode of wearing their hair, and the assumption of shell combs by the men afford singular evidence of the unchanging habits of an Eastern race. Seventeen hundred years ago, Ptolemy, speaking of these people, designates the same peculiarities which exist to-day. "The men," he says, "who inhabit Ceylon allow their hair an unlimited growth, and bind it on the crown of their heads, after the manner of women." It is also curious that this custom should be confined to the Singhalese of the southwest coast near Colombo. It is not a custom of the interior, or of the northern portion of the island.
Almost every stranger, upon first landing at the capital, speaks of the effeminate appearance of the men. With their delicate features, their lack of beards, their use of hair-combs and earrings, together with the wearing of an article of dress almost precisely similar to a petticoat, it is often difficult at first to distinguish them from the other sex.
CHAPTER XVI.Point de Galle.—An Ancient Port, now mostly deserted.—Dangerous Harbor.—Environs of the City a Tropical Garden.—Paradise of Ferns and Orchids.—Neptune's Gardens.—Tides of the Ocean.—Severe Penalties.—Floating Islands of Seaweed.—Fable, like History, repeats itself.—Chewing the Betelnut.—An Asiatic Habit.—All Nations seek Some Stimulant.—Soil near Galle.—Cinnamon Stones.—Diamonds.—Workers in Tortoise-Shell.—Millions of Fruitful Palms.—Sanitary Conditions of Galle.
Next to Colombo, Point de Galle, with a population of about thirty-three thousand, is the most important town in the island. The port is somewhat difficult of access, and requires a local pilot to effect a safe entrance, owing to the fact that there are several sunken rocks very near the narrow channel. It is a treacherous harbor, as all seamen trading upon this coast are well aware, and has, first and last, swallowed up many a gallant vessel. Those early navigators, the Phœnicians, the first really commercial people of whom history informs us, made voyages to and from this port, and more than one authority identifies it with the Tarshish of the Scriptures. Ptolemy speaks of the Avium Promontorium,—"The Promontory of Birds,"—which marks the entrance to Galle, and here the Arabians, in the reign of Haroun al Raschid, came to meet the junks from China, and to interchange merchandise with them. Sir Emerson Tennent, after describing the charming first view of the place when he landed here, says: "Galle is by far the most venerable emporium of foreign trade now existing in the universe; it was the resort of merchant ships at the earliest dawn of commerce. In modern times it was the mart of Portugal and afterwards of Holland; and long before the flags of either nation had appeared in these waters, it was one of the entrepôts whence the Moorish traders of Malabar drew the productions of the remoter East with which they supplied the Genoese and Venetians, who distributed them over the countries of the West."
It is quite different at Point de Galle to-day. A significant state of dullness reigns supreme in the ancient port, while the town seems to be in a Rip Van Winkle sleep. How the early navigators so successfully avoided the rocks and shoals of this coast, how they managed to weather the confusing tides, hurricanes, and monsoons, is a mystery, while so many of our stoutest ships, guided by experienced seamen, and protected by all modern appliances, have been lost in the same tracks. Is it possible that we of to-day are no better navigators than those who sailed the Indian Ocean three thousand years ago? Were the voyages of Columbus and his followers across the Atlantic in small, half-decked caravels, miracles, or was the waste of waters so much less tumultuous four centuries ago? A few steamships still make of this place a coaling station, but these grow less in number annually, though to maintain this small branch of business every facility is freely given by the local authorities. If it were not that the English officials devote all available pecuniary means and their tireless energy to the advancement of the business interests of Colombo, quite to the neglect of Point de Galle, the rocks which impede the entrance of the latter port would long since have been treated to a liberal dose of dynamite. Strangers express great surprise that these rocks, which could so easily be demolished by well-known and inexpensive means, should still be permitted to threaten navigation. We have seen a record of thirteen steamships, up to January, 1893, which were wrecked and entirely lost at various times, in attempting to enter the harbor of Point de Galle. This is the more surprising because of the general promptness of the English government in liberally furnishing all possible marine improvements to her distant colonies.
The town is finely situated, crowning a steep, narrow, and rocky promontory, on a bay opening to the south. The name Galle means, in Singhalese, "a rock." The place is facetiously called, on the coast, the metropolis of false stones and real glass gems. The snug harbor is bordered by tropical vegetation to the very water's edge, including an endless number of palms. The town is divided, like Colombo, into European and native sections; the promontory, jutting southward, is entirely occupied by the former, and is called the Fort. The immediate environs of Galle form a natural tropical garden, over which botanists never fail to grow eloquent, both on account of its variety and its abundance of floral gems. One striking beauty in this connection is the marvelous development of the fern family, which is here seen as a low-growing creeper, and from that size to the proportions of considerable trees, the feathery fronds varying from lace-like consistency and size to that of broad and beautiful leaves of various shades of green. As to orchids, the hothouse climate of Ceylon develops them in marvelous beauty, both in the jungle and in the open fields. Nowhere else has the author seen the extensive and interesting family of ferns in such a state of thrift, except in New Zealand.
The climate is equable, damp, and hot, thus forming a paradise for ferns and orchids, which revel in their very opposite styles of beauty. There are less than twenty degrees variation between the warmest day and the coldest night of the year at Galle. The rankness of the vegetation surrounding the town, and also its undrained, swampy character, render it in some degree objectionable in point of health to Americans and Europeans, though it is not nearly so much affected in this respect as
Comments (0)