The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1880-09-30
Catching AbaIones in Turtle Bay.

In St. Bartholomew alias Turtle,
Bay we lay four months, taking abalones.
All hands were called every morning at
four o'clock. Breakfast was quickly dis
patched, their noon lunch prepared, and
everybody was away from the vessel by
five. The abalone clings to the surf
washed rocks by suction. 1t has but
one outer shell. San Francisco is very
familiar with their prismatic hues in
side, and the same outside when ground
and polished. Heaps of those shells.
three feet in height and bleached dead
white by the sun, lay on the beaches
about us. OF unbleached and lively
hued shells we took on board several
tons. They were sent to Europe and
there used for inlaid work. The live
abalone must be pried off the rock with
stout iron chisels or wedges. 1t was
rough work collecting them from the
rocky lodges in d heavy surf. Carried
to the curing depot on shore, the en-
trails were cut away, and the round,
solid chunck of meat left was first boiled
and then dried in the sun. An inferior
pearl is often found within the body of
the abalone. Our one Chinaman, All
Sam, was chef of the abalone-curing
kitchen on shore. He was shipped Tor
that purpose. One live abalone will
cling to the back of another too tightly
to be pulled off easily by hand, and you
may in this way pile them on top of one
another. and thus erect column OF
abalone as many feet in height as you
choose to build. These fish were in
tended for the Chinese market, and the
projectors of the voyage expected to
get forty cents per pound for them In
San Francisco. When some forty tons
had been cured we heard from pass
ing steamer that the English had insti-
tuted another of their Christian wars
with China, for which reason abalOneS
in San Francisco brought only ten cents
per pound. Then we stopped cooking
abalones, hauled up our anchor and
hunted the sea-lion and the whale.
But while in St. Bartholomew Bay
l was left alone on the vessel all day
with no companions save the gulls in
the air and the sharks in the water.
Both were plentiful. The gulls made
themselves especially sociable. They
would come boldly on board and feast
on the quarters of turtle-meat hung up
in the rigging. Once | found one in
the cabin pecking away at the crumbs
on the table. His gullible mind got
into terrible state on seeing me. L
whacked him to my hearts content
with the table-cloth. He experienced
great trouble in flying up the cabin
stairway. In fact, he couldn't steer
himself straight up stairs. His aim on
starting himself was correct enough,
like that of many a young man or
woman in commencing life but instead
of going the straight and narrow path
up the companionway he would bring
up against a deck beam. There is no
limit to the feeding capacity of these
Pacifc-coast gulls. The wonder is
where it all goes to. l have expert
mentally cut and thrown in small pieces
to gull as much fat pork as would
make a meal for two men, and the gull
has promptly swallowed it all, waited
for more, and visibly got no bigger.
They never get fat. Sometimes l tied
a bit of meat to either end of long
string and flung it overheard. Barely
it had touched the water when the meat
at either end was swallowed by two of
these bottomless scavengers, and they
would fly away, each pulling hard at
the latest received contents of the
other sstomach. The picture reminded
me OF some married lives. They pulled
together, but they didn't pull the right
way.-Prentjce Milford, IN the San
Francisco Chronicle