The northern tribune. [volume] (Bath, Me.) 1847-1855, 1847-12-17

calm moonlight night, the turtle raises her
head from the water to reconnoitre. If all is
quiet, she emits loud Kissing sound, and
landing upon the beach creeps along the sand
till she finds feasible place. Here she again
looks round, but this time in profound silence
and if convinced of her security, she sets to
work to scoop out hole in the sand with her
hind hippers, sometimes to the depth of more
than two feet. The eggs are dropped one by
one, it may be to the number of two hundred,
and the loose sand then scraped over them in
such way, that passer-by would not sus-
pect the mystery. Although the eggs are de-
posted during the night, the turtle hunters,
when sure CT the haunt, have little difficulty
in falling in with stragglers, whom they have
merely to turn on their backs on which they
lie heplessly till their captors have time to
carry them off. This applies. however only
to the green species for another kind, with
rounder back, and more active movements,
require to be anchored with a stone, if not
killed on the spot. .l8.#..8
A more wholesale mode of capture is to set
nets in the water with strong but wide mesh
es, along the place where they are expected to
land and when the animals are on their night
ly journey to deposite their eggs, they are en-
| tangled by the head or paddles, and being thus
prevented from rising to breathe, are drowned.
The harpoon Is a more sportsmanlike instru-
ment of death. 1t has not the barb of the
common harpoon but when darted into the
| shell, when the victim rises to breathe, or is
lying asleep on the surface, it remains fixed,
like nail driven into a board. A calm, still
night is chosen for this purpose-the enemy
having previously ascertained, by the frag-
ments of sea-weeds scattered on the surface,
the spot where their prey are peacefully pas
turing beneath. The boat creeps to its work
through the sluggish waters, with no other
noise than the dip of the mufhed oars; and
the leader standing on the bow, harpoon in
hand, and bending bis eager eyes upon the
water, makes signals how to steer, like the
master of a steamer, without turning his head.
A bubbling of the water by and by leads him
to the spot where turtle is about to rise and
as soon as the unhappy denizen Of the deep.
which cannot live without atmospheric air,
shows himself above the surface, the iron mes
senger of fate flashes through the air, and
quivers in his back. Now commences scene
resembling, on a smaller seal, that presented by
the struggles of whale. The shaft of har-
poon is recovered by its thrower, and the point,
which is attached by rope to the bow of the
boat, secures effectually the terrified animal,
who, in his flight, may drag the whole cortege
with him a considerable distance; but yields
in the end, either dying of his wound, or suf-
located in the water, from which he dares not,
or cannot rise.
The following account, referring to these
modes of fishing in Brazil, is given by Mr. Ed
wards THE turtles are still greater bles-
sing to the jewellers upon the upper rivers
In the early part of the dry season these ami
mails ascend the Amazon, probably from the
sea, and assemble upon the sandy islands and
beaches left dry by the retiring waters in the
Japura and other tributaries. They deposit
their eggs in the sand, and at this season all
the people, for hundreds of miles round about,
resort to the river banks as regularly as to a
fair. The eggs are collected into montarias, FOR
other proper receptacles, and broken. The oil
floating upon the surface is skinned off with
the valves of the large shells found in the riv-
err, and is poured into pots, each holding about
six gallons. 1t is computed that turtle lays
one hundred and fifty eggs in season.
Twelve thousand eggs make one pot of oil,
and six thousand pots are annually sent from
the most noted localities ; consequently sew
enty-two millions of eggs are destroyed, which
require four hundred and eighty thousand
turtles to produce them. And yet but small
portion of the whole number of eggs are bro
ken. When fifty days have expired, the
young cover the ground, and march in mil
lions to the water, where swarms of enemies
more destructive than man await their coming.
Every branch of the Amazon is resorted to,
more or less, in the same manner and the
whole number of turtles is beyond all conjec-
ture. Those upon the Madeira are little mo-
Tested, on account of the unhealthiness of the
locality in which they breed. They are said
to be Of a different and smaller variety from
those upon the Amazon. We received a diff
ferent variety still from the Branco, and there
may be many more yet undistinguished. The
turtles are turned upon their backs when
found upon the Shore picked up at leisure,
and carried to different places upon the river.
Frequently they are kept the year round in
pens properly constructed and one such that