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Updated: June 21, 2025
Emerson tells us that "no gold-mining country is traversed by good roads, nor are there good schools on the shore where pearls are found!" As if in verification of this assertion, nothing can exceed the desolation of the shore in the neighborhood of the pearl-fishing banks near Aripo, on the west coast of Ceylon.
The object of the young chief in this expedition, was to ascertain the fate of an elder brother, who had sailed for Anaa, or Chain island, several months before, with the intention of returning immediately, but who had never since been heard from: that of Mr Barton, was to engage a number of Hao-divers, for a pearl-fishing voyage, contemplated by him in connection with another foreign trader.
We set sail towards those islands where pepper grows in great plenty. I exchanged my cocoas in these two islands for pepper and wood of aloes, and went with other merchants a pearl-fishing. I hired divers, who fetched me up those that were very large and pure.
Then he clapped him on the shoulder. "My Passavente," he cried, "you have gone far on your pearl-fishing and dived deeper than most of us, but by our hope of salvation you have found a jewel of price! And ah, Madonna," he said, with his burning eyes on the girl, "you have brought the sun into Italy.
When he reached the coast near the mouth of the river, he took the masts out of his little vessel, and rowed quietly toward the pearl-fishing fleet, as if he had intended to join them on some entirely peaceable errand; and, in fact, there was no reason whatever why the Spaniards should suppose that a boat full of buccaneers should be rowing along that part of the coast.
The breeze freshened rapidly, and when Pierre and his men saw that the man-of-war was coming toward them at a good rate of speed, showing plainly that she had suspicions of them, they gave up all hope of running alongside of her and boarding her, and concluded that the best thing they could do would be to give up their plan of capturing the pearl-fishing fleet, and get away with the ship they had taken, and whatever it had on board.
Here grow all kinds of rare plants and trees, especially cedars and cocoas. There is also pearl-fishing in the mouth of its river, and in some of its vallies there are found diamonds. I made, by way of devotion, a pilgrimage to the place where Adam was confined after his banishment from Paradise, and had the curiosity to go to the top of it.
This will, of course, be the case until the Dervish power is crushed, and the Soudan opened out for more legitimate trade. As we sailed along we passed hundreds of these pearl-fishing boats engaged in this dual trade, and nothing could be more propitious for their pursuits than the absolutely lawless condition of the tribes by the coast.
Of course, I did not know much about the awful dangers to which we were exposing ourselves by remaining out in such uncertain seas when the cyclones were due; and I did not, I confess, see any great reason why we should not continue pearling. I was inexperienced, you see. The pearl-fishing season, as I afterwards learned, extends from November to May.
Steele is examining it minutely; the Baron leans over to me and says low, in German: "It shall be set for you in diamonds, Fräulein; it will remind you of spilt cocoanut milk and pearl-fishing in Acapulco's shining bay it will mean to me a woman, Blanca, fine and fair, I found on the ocean.
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