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National Geographic : 1919 Jun
Contents
DEVIL-FISHING IN THE GULF STREAM provided with rows of suckers, with which it clasps and clings to its prey with uncanny strength and quickness. As a rule, it will not give battle to man unless angered or injured, but when chal lenged will fight to the last, doing its best to pull the object of its wrath beneath the surface of the waters. TIlE START FOR THE HUNTING GROUNDS From the Florida reef the run across the Gulf Stream to the nearest islands of the Bahamas is a matter of 65 miles. We started from Miami at noon, guests of James A. Allison, on board his sea-going motor yacht L'Apache, with a 25-foot motor-driven fishing boat bobbing along behind in tow. In the party of fishermen were Mr. Allison, Captain Charles H. Thompson, of Miami, the internationally known au thority on the fish of the east coast of Florida; Commodore Charles W. Kotcher, A. G. Batchelder, and the writer, to gether with the captain and crew of the L'Apache. Assisted by the northeastward pressure of the ever-moving Gulf Stream, we made splendid progress, and that evening cast anchor behind Bimini, a tiny isle which rests like a jeweled feather on a summer sea, the westernmost outrider of the Lower Bahama group. Bimini is a quaint little coral dot a few miles long and a quarter of a mile wide, quite cov ered with clusters of coconut palms and tropical plants, its tallest headland rising but a few feet above the surface of the old Atlantic-an out-of-the-world spot peopled by a few score of Bahama ne groes, who eke out a precarious existence by fishing, gathering shells, and, in a small way, cultivating sisal, the fibrous plant from which hemp rope is made. Approaching the island, the ocean bot tom for miles offshore is carpeted with snow-white sand, and so clear is the water that there is no difficulty in study ing the vast marine gardens 30 to 50 feet below the surface. Due to the white sand beneath the sea and the glorious blue of the sky, with the ever-changing cloud effects overhead, the bewildering gradations of color to be seen in these waters challenge descrip tion and fill the heart of the artist with despair, although he paint with the in spired brush of genius. OVERSEAS CEREMONY The Bahamas being colonies of Great Britain, of course her authority extends even to this little-known spot. There fore, Bimini boasts a port officer-an English gentleman, who also serves as the Crown Commissioner, Police Magis trate, Customs Collector, and Consular Official for examination of passports, as well as being physician and school teacher to the island's inhabitants. In short, he is the Twentieth Century Pooh Bah, who, with much courtesy and dignity, meets the infrequent foreign craft when it drops anchor upon arrival, inspects all qualifying documents, then sadly waves adieu from the beach when the visitor sails away. TIHE SEA SUPPLIES TIE LARDER Up to the day of our arrival, there hadn't been a piece of fresh beef or a bit of butter on the table of the Crown's Representative for nine months, much less that of a single one of Bimini's humbler inhabitants, for the isle is more than a hundred miles from Nassau, and even the mail-boat was conspicuous by its absence during the period of the Eu ropean war, when enemy submarines were in South Atlantic waters. So it is that the sea furnishes food for the Biminites, supplemented by a few vegetables, flour, and salt meats, when they can get supplies from Nassau. Conch, the marine animal which inhabits the beautiful spiral shell, so fashionable as a parlor ornament a generation ago. is the chief article of food, and the na tives consume thousands of them each year; indeed, it can be considered their main article of food. After we had received and returned the official call of the Crown's Repre sentative, we had visitations alongside from several shore boats, manned by dusky-hued merchants, each tradesman clad, on an average, in one and a half garments, who, with a happy grin and a hungry look, offered for sale varieties of sponges, brilliantly colored conch shells, sea-beans, and tortoise shell, the last named article being obtained from the 479
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