TURTLE FISHING
“Turtles or tortoises constitute one of the orders of reptiles, the
_Chelonia_. They are characterised by having the trunk of the body
incased in a more or less ossified carapace, which consists of a dorsal
more or less convex portion, and of a flat ventral one, the so-called
plastron.”
If you could see a turtle panting for breath, sighing in fat breathless
agony, or swallowing nothing, in the manner of a nervous singer, you
would conclude that this description should be wrapped in more
sympathetic terms. I can imagine nothing more absolutely pitiable than
the sight of a full hundred turtle overturned, belly upwards, in the
full glare of a noon sun, awaiting shipment over the four thousand miles
of rolling Atlantic weather, to meet a doom intimately associated with
the beginning, the first course, of an Aldermanic dinner. The soulful
eyes of a panting turtle express knowledge of impending doom, and only
half conquer agony. It is a sight to turn away from--one which must
always be remembered at the first reading of a rich menu. But, really,
in his native haunts, the turtle is an elusive beast, a kind of marine
De Wet, who wants a lot of catching, but who, once caught, proves
himself or herself to be good all round. Good, that is, if belonging to
the succulent green species, for the Hornbilled variety is of little use
save for the production of tortoise-shell, and the Loggerhead is a
truculent rascal who is best left alone. Strictly speaking, of course,
the turtle is not a beast at all, but a reptile, dear to lovers of
callipee and turtle eggs, and otherwise useful in a score of ways.
Although this most succulent of all reptiles frequents all tropical
oceans more or less, his true home may be said to be at the
alligator-shaped island of Grand Cayman or Cairman, called by Columbus
Las Tortugas because of the hosts of turtle that he found there. Grand
Cayman is a dependency of Jamaica, and passed into the possession of the
Crown soon after the conquest of the Queen of the West India islands.
Hunting the turtle is carried on in different ways according to the
locality; the simplest plan, of course, is to waylay the female when she
leaves the shore after depositing her eggs, and then just turn her on
her back and wait until it is convenient to remove her to a kraal. There
is no risk or sport about this proceeding, which, in nine cases out of
ten, is successful; occasionally, however, a round-backed turtle will
roll over and make tracks for the sea with unexpected swiftness. Another
plan is to spear or harpoon the reptiles in open sea, and yet another to
entangle them in nets when they come to the surface to breathe.
[Illustration: BOATS OFF DOMINICA]
The inhabitants of Grand Cayman are born seamen and turtle hunters, and
they favour the last course. Their plan is to make large webbed fishing
nets from the leaves of the thatch palm, first denuding the leaf of a
certain membranous substance at the back, and then twisting into almost
unbreakable cords and drying. This laborious task is all done by hand,
and when the net is finished the strongest turtle vainly tries to
release his head or fin from its meshes. The folks of Grand Cayman are
their own boat-builders, and their custom is to sail in small fleets to
the banks off the coast of Nicaragua, and cast their heavily-weighted
nets in the direction the turtle is sure to take when intent upon an
egg-laying expedition. Often enough the boats are out for weeks before
enough turtle are captured to repay the boatmen for their labour. But,
once caught, it is easy enough to hoist the net-entangled turtle into
the schooners, where he is stored, shell downwards, in the hold, and fed
on sea-grass and weed. At one time the trade suffered greatly because
the Spaniards persistently destroyed the females before the eggs were
deposited, simply for the sake of obtaining calipee. But nowadays the
turtle is hunted with greater wisdom, and our civic fathers need not
tremble for the future of their beloved delicacy.
With their cargo of turtles aboard the schooners make tracks for
Jamaica, where their catch is deposited in kraals to await shipment to
Europe.
It is a commonplace story when reduced to a bare description, but really
the fishing is full of romance. The sailing amidst the golden islands
of the west, the anchorage off the sandy coast of Nicaragua; the casting
of the wide-meshed nets and the catching of heavy two or three hundred
pound turtles, desperately savage. The turning of a half-exhausted
turtle on to his shell-armoured back; the noise of the heavy flapping of
over two hundred fins stronger than a strong man’s arm; the pathos of
continual sighing, uncanny, half human, wholly unnerving. The journey to
the Jamaica jetty. The flopping of the catch into a deep-sea pool,
boarded off from the open bay; the feeding of the brutes with curious
grass which, seemingly ignored, somehow disappears gradually, when no
one is by to witness. Then the romantic drudgery of turtle fishing ends,
and the dangerous part begins. The danger lies in the fishing from the
pool, the turning on the hot wooden slab, the shipment, in a steamer
homeward bound, and--the dinner table.
Of late there has been some excitement over Jamaica turtle fishing. The
British fishers claim the right of fishing in places Nicaragua called
her very own. Schooners were detained and a British ship of war
journeyed to the fishing grounds to see that the game was played with
fairness. The affair has blown over now, at least so the black Jamaican
turtle fisherman told me. Not that he would care anyway; for his work is
only that of fishing up the turtle from the pool. He does not bother
about the troubles of schooners. His is pretty work, filled to
overflowing with dangerous possibilities. Still there are compensations.
The feeding of the turtle is employment entailing the expenditure of
very little bodily exertion; the thrusting of a few heaps of weed
through a loose board; and the fishing comes but seldom, once a week
perhaps, or once in two weeks. And, after all, a little danger is a good
thing for a man who must swagger before his women folk as one in
authority over more than a hundred turtle.
He will invite you to the fishing with all the joy of a young child
conscious of an audience before whom he knows he can carry himself with
distinction. First he strips in the full glare of noonday, and glories
in the exhibition of his nudity. “I go among all those savage fishes
with no knife, no, not even a gun,” he will tell you. Though why a gun
should be mentioned I cannot imagine, since his work is under water. He
strides to the loose board with the air of an African chieftain in his
village among his women and little children. And after all some
weakness, if weakness it be, is permissible in a man who has to play a
man’s part in the fullest meaning of the phrase.
With a single rope in his left hand he falls, feet first, into the pool,
in which the turtle are jostling each other for room. He disappears
absolutely; the surface of the pool is bare save for the half hidden
shells of a group of the turtle. After two minutes, it may be a little
less or perhaps a few seconds more, the man’s head reappears, and he
shouts to his watching mates the order to pull. They haul at the rope
the other end of which sank with the man, the fisher meanwhile floating
quietly and keeping a bright look out for the snapping heads of the
beasts he could not avoid disturbing. The result of the hauling shows
the white belly of a turtle as it is hoisted upwards, head first, out of
the water. The noise of the heavy sighs, and the heavier noise of the
sighing chorus in the pool, disturbs the whole jetty. Blood comes on the
giant fins in the places where they touch the back shell. First the
thrust head appears above the boarding, a head which at once resembles
the face of a flat-nosed snake and the top of a mammoth branch of
asparagus. The eyes roll like a drunken man to whom the shame of his
drunkenness has suddenly become apparent. Then come the flapping fins,
the broad white belly, and lastly the other fins. Then two hundred
pounds of soup flesh is flung upwards and crashed on to its hard back
shell; the rope which encircled its breast just below the fore fins is
unloosed, and the poor beast is left to sigh and flap and shake in
peace. It is almost impossible for a turtle to regain its legs once it
has been turned fairly on its back. Then the fishing game begins afresh.
I saw just one hundred fish brought to light in this manner. One beast
turned the scale at three hundred pounds. He was the giant of his tribe,
and he showed his high breeding when the time came for his uplifting.
All his fins flapped blood at each stroke and his sighing resembled the
noise of a young cow who has lost her first calf.
[Illustration: NIGHT, ANOTTA BAY, JAMAICA]
THE WOMEN OF WILD MAN STREET