The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1892-07-21
IN AN AMBER MINE.
A Queer Industry In Which Hon.
esty Is at Premium.
Valuable Deposits Displaced by propItious
Gales md Carried Ashore by tho
Waves Some Interesting
Particulars

Deep down in the .'blue earth" along
the shores of and beneath the treacher-
Gus breakers of the Baltic sea are found
In bits and fragments OF fossllizcd wood
the traces of vast forests that in ares
long past had covered nearly the entire
coast line of what is now known rs
East Prussia, says the New York Press.
Large tracts of land have sunk there
below sea level and in time were COW
cred with the rank submarine growths
OF seawood and algac. Whenever n
storm churns and lashes the waves then
large masses of this green tanglc are
torn from the bottom, and often carry
with them pieces Of amber, the resin of
fossil pines, which, being but slightly
heavier than salt water, will float in
the network Of weeds. Upon bringing
the floating meadows, that cover the
sea after propitious gale, ashore at
given points, there depends frequently
an enormous gain to the amber fisher,
who has rented certain portions of the
shore from the crown.
AT those times the villages on the sea-
board are all astir with excitement.
Nobody thinks of rest day nor night,
and everyone is on the alert, ready to
alarm from the watchers. Men defy
the roaring breakers, and, standing up
to their shoulders in the seething foam,
catch wisps of seaweed in long nets
and fling them shorcward, where the
women and children gather from them
the yellow jewels of the sea. In this
manner as much as fourteen thousand
dollars worth is known to have been
gathered in n single night. But in spite
of the most rapid work it is not always
possible to bring all the castcup amber
ashore; the larger pieces, especially,
are apt to sink. They are gathered by
means of long-handled nets called
"catchers," when bright day and a
placid sea enables the amber fishers
sight to penetrate the limpid water.
Inusmuch as it is often necessary to
turn over huge rocks this work is very
laborious, yet case is known where
Six hundred dollars worth of amber
amply repaid four men for q summer
days drudgery. Recently, however,
this mode has been entirely abandoned
In favor of one more in keeping with
modern ingenuity and inventions.
The company now having charge of
the industry recognized some twenty
years ago the fact that the largest
pieces of amber could not be easily
moved by the waves on account of their
weight, and that therefore q lucrative
harvest could be gathered directly from
the submerged portion of the amber
bearing stratum. Accordingly divers
were imported from France, but the
very first attempt, though thoroughly
E,.f fcf on tO ~
view, demonstrated that Frenchmen
were not able to stand tho rigid climate
of eastern Prussia, and Lithuanians
were substituted for them
Naturally the cleaning of the bot
tom of the sea along the coast eventual
~ exhausted the accessible supply of the
valuable resin, and from twenty-eight
thousand four hundred pounds in 1881
the treasure dropped to five thousand
two hundred pounds in 1890, so that div
ing had to be discontinued and will not
be resumed until the government permits
submarine amber mining. The rapid
action Of dynamite is then to take the
plaecs Of the work Of divers, whose
Movements are hampered by the stiff
and heavy rubber suit and brass helmet.
Every miner has strapped to him n
bag, in which he collects the pieces of
amber. Before miner is permitted to
leave the premises after each days
work he is searched Scrupulously
honest men have had strangely per-
verified conception of right and wrong
Is regards amber. 1t seems to be con-
sidered as gift of nature to which he
who finds it is entitled. In the Baltic
amber fields such thcfts were formerly
punishable by death, and occasion still
required quite frequent infiction of
curious and ingenious ways and means
in which men have attempted to cir
cumvent the vigilance of the examiners
would add highly interesting chapter
to the history of fraud.
The amber gathered in the mine and
the smaller pieces collected from the
shelves are washed with sand in revolv-
ing drums Next the pieces are sorted
into nearly one hundred classes. each.
one representing some particular adap-
tation of the raw material, fiat pieces
that are made into smokers utensils;
round pieces for beads and jcwelry, and
small fragments out of which amber
varnish is made. The output of last
year was manufactured In four hundred
thousand dollars worth of smokers
utensils, and the balance of some
eighty thousand dollars worth into jew
elry and varnish
A Painful Experience.
A bashful and youthful bridal couple