Page 519 - Bahrain Gov Annual Reports (I)_Neat

w

!'•
-2- 517

goou profits from selling pearls, i,.ost 01
this profit is lost ana in addition there is
a constant danger of being cheated, The

necessity cl examining every pearl wmch is
purchased in a pearl testing; apparatus is
troublesome ana costly; there are still
very lev/ of these machines in London and the
fee for testing pearls is high.
a. There is still however a market lor real

pearls especially in India and the Last, It
seems that the wealthy Indian personages and

princes are still interesteu only in the real
article. The competition of the cultured
pearl has scarcely afiected the seed pearls
and small rearls. it is possible that the
Japanese find that it is not worth cultivat-

ing these grades. The price of ,,sherinH and
"Naim” during the last season was not lower
than the year before.

4. The ld53 season. The most significant
fact of the last season was that cniy Mu
boats y;ent out to the banks instead of 4^6
which Vfrs the total number diving curing the

previous season. n decrease of s?6 boats out
of a total of 436 is very serious. it does
not follow that the reduction in the number

of divers was quite in proportion to the
decrease in boats because in many cases indi­
vidual boats carried more men.
b. i have as usual examined the accounts of

the diving clerks in oraer to arrive at an
estimate of the value of the catch. in the
case of boats whose accounts are not made up