News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1888-06-28
SPONGING IN THE BAHAMAS.
The Exact Facts About an Interest
ing but Little Known Industry.

OFF HoLE-IN-THE- WALL LIGHT, Ba
hamas.-With the exception OF the tur
| tie reservation and compartment filled
with 600 pine apples, every foot OF avail
able space on this schooner is filled with
| spOnges. Down in the cabin and under
the hunks and piled on the floor of the
apartment are fifty strands. In the hold
are over 300 strands. On deck forward
OF the foremost are several dozen. For
ward OF the cabin roof are fifty strands.
In the yawl and on the port bow are
! fifty more. Sponges of all kinds are
represented, from the tough grass
sponge to the aristocratic glove sponge
and the equally patrician wool sponge.
Here are Key Vesters, hedgehogs, yell
low sponges, wine sponges, boquet, fin
ger and mullet, and even the rare and
curious cup sponges.
This wealth of sponges is bound for
Nassau, New Providence, the capital of
the Bahamas, which lies fifty miles to
the south and on the other side of the
noted Hole-in-the-Wal passage. 1t
represents the collective catch Of six
teen men for the past six weeks, and is
to be sold to the English brokers on ar
rival at the Exchange, Bay street, Mas
sau. All told, there are about ], 800
strands, or $4,000 separate sponges, on
board
OFF the Neapolitan coast and in other
parts of the Mediterranean, where these
elastic articles are found, diving is the
approved method of getting sponges. In
the clear white water of the Bahamas,
however, cranes are used. Cranes are
long poles, varying in length from
twenty to thirty eight feet, with curved
prCngs at one end, and are employed
tie detach the sponges from the rock to
which it clings and to convey it to the
boat in which are the fishermen. So
clear is the water that, with the aid of
water glass, s5sll or box with glass
bottom, fishermen can easily ditinguish
spongcs from other forms of marine
plant life at the depth of fifty or sixty
or more feet. When first taken from
their fastness sponges appear and feel
like pieces of raw, soft liver, being slip
perry, elastic, ugly and repulsive. In
color they range from dirty purple to
dull chocolate.
Having been brought to the deck of
the fishermen's schooner the sponges
are washed, rubbed and dried. They
are then strung on strands, dozen to a
strand, and are washed down with
buckets of sea water three times a day
until the schooner reaches one of its |
era wis.
Crawls are large, half-submerged
stockades of saplings, generally sapo-
dlllas and unfamiliar sub-tropical
growths, bound together by manila and
palmetto fibre. The catch is deposited |
IN these, and kept under water until the |
vessel makes its final round and draws
Its deposits preparatory to taking them
to Nassau.
Sponges are extraordinarily plentiful
in this part of the globe. It may sur
prise anybody who has just paid dollar
or so for a bath sponge at Broadway
drug store to learn that he could dupli-
cate it in Nassau for seven cents, or buy
a strand of similar sponges, fresh from
coral reef, for sixty cents. That IS why
so many are taken home by sagacious
tourists as ''trifies picked up in Mas
sau."
A sponge famine would be more disas-
trous in the Bahamas than the August
hurricane. The trade amounts to over
$3.50, 900 annually, and is more import
ant than the fruit growing industry.
C'SA csOOO,OOO SpOuRSS are duuudlIy
dragged from the sea. The dusky aunties
who preside over Bahama kitchens use
the articles as dish rags and towels.
oponges are used impartially for house
hold articles in ways sometimes startling.
1t is a novel sensation when sitting down
in chair to descend luxuriously, to be
sure, but UNEXPECTEDLY and precipitately,
and discover that the cushion is gigan-
tic "Key Vester." The climax is capped
when one of the dainty fingers of a cup
sponge is offered as alcigar- holder.
The prominence of the sponge industry
S shown by the cargo list of the last
York. The vessel was the Cienfuegos,
and the purser's entries We're: 1894
bales sponges, 81 rafessponge clippings,
~ barrels oranges, / 509S crates toma-
5oes, 10 crates cas5aFass, "a crates peas.
crates egg plants, 2 barrels yams, 2
boxes preserves, barrels sea shells, 4S
head green turtle, 1854 in specie, and 6
AS long cranes are unwieldy, sponges
more than thirty feet below the surface
ire generally safe from the efforts of
fishermen. The water in the Hole-in the
Wall passage, channel dividing the
nigh ocean plateau of the Bahamas, is
leep. In many places 600 fathoms of
inc have been run out without reaching
bottom. Sponging vessels en- route to
Nassau are occasionally wrecked, and
I'D Abaco salts are fond of saying that
here 100000 strands of sponges "off
in the passage.