pickle bottles full of pearls in his cabin, which he would sit and
gloat over for hours like a miser with his gold. He kept on saying
that there MUST be more of these black pearls to be obtained; the
three we had found could not possibly be isolated specimens and so
on. Accordingly, we kept our divers at work day after day as
usual. Of course, I did not know much about the awful dangers to
which we were exposing ourselves by remaining out in such uncertain
seas when the cyclones were due; and I did not, I confess, see any
great reason why we should NOT continue pearling. I was
inexperienced, you see.

The pearl-fishing season, as I afterwards learned, extends from
November to May. Well, May came and went, and we were still hard
at work, hoping that each day would bring another haul of black
pearls to our store of treasure; in this, however, we were
disappointed. And yet the captain became more determined than ever
to find some. He continued to take charge of the whale-boat
whenever the divers went out to work, and he personally
superintended their operations. He knew very well that he had
already kept them at work longer than he ought to have done, and it
was only by a judicious distribution of more jewellery, pieces of
cloth, &c., that he withheld them from openly rebelling against the
extended stay. The serang told him that if the men did once go on
strike, nothing would induce them to resume work, they would simply
sulk, he said; and die out of sheer disappointment and pettishness.
So the captain was compelled to treat them more amiably than usual.
At the very outside their contract would only be for nine months.
Sometimes when he showed signs of being in a cantankerous mood
because the haul of shells did not please him, the serang would say
to him defiantly, "Come on; take it out of me if you are not