["The Pearling Industry", The West Australian, Friday 06 October 1911, page 8]
THE PEARLING INDUSTRY.
A RISING MARKET FOR SHELL.
SOME VALUABLE DISCOVERIES.
(By J.T.)
With a sharp rise of £19 per ton for mother-o'-pearl at this month's sales in London, the highly remunerative price of £226, packed at Broome, has been reached. Pearlers who have had to face a succession of terrific cyclones and great losses of boats and tackle, are perfectly satisfied with existing conditions, of the industry, but naturally view with much uneasiness the proposed legislation by the Federal Government, under which only white divers and tenders will have to be employed. Mr. Bert Miller, owner of the pearling lugger Donna Elsie, recently found a £3,000 pearl, and his views on the industry are interesting. The pearl was of perfect shape, and in form known as the double-button. It was of the extra ordinary weight of 178 grains, and but for the fact that it was slightly faulty in the matter of scarcely perceptible rings and spots, would have realised even a higher price than the famous pearl sold by Joe Eacott, of Frazier Downs Station, for over £5,000. The Eacott pearl was found on a lugger in charge of Mr. Miller, who obtained the handsome commission of £500 on the transaction, and on the 20th ult. he followed that success up by the discovery on his own lugger of the gem under notice. It was found among other shell in 12 fathoms of water a bit north of Cape Latouche, which is 30 miles south of Broome. The oyster was opened on the lugger, and the remarkable lustre and beauty of the pearl at once satisfied Mr. Miller that he possessed "a gem of purest ray serene." The pearl was sold to Mr. Davies, of Davies and Rubins, for the sum named, and sent to London to be cleansed and further beautified. According to Mr. Miller, who is at present visiting Perth, there are about ten schooners and 325 luggers actively engaged in and around Broome alone in pearling operations, and along the coast there must be many more. In addition to Mr.Miller's valuable find, Walter Wallace recently found a pearl, disposed of for £1,300; L. Warton one of £1,130, and J. J. Taylor an other of £900, in addition to others of less value. Pearl openers, who are white men in charge of the luggers, receive 10 per cent commission, so that when the owner opens the oysters himself a substantial saving is effected. Mr. Miller holds the unique record of having drawn the highest commission on any pearl found, and also finding for himself the most valuable pearl on which commission had not to be paid. With respect to the proposed exclusion of coloured divers and their tenders, Mr. Miller is emphatically of opinion that the scheme is unworkable. The Pearlers' Association, whose headquarters are at Broome, would be only too pleased to work with white men only, but the question at once arises - where are 300 or 400 white divers to be found, and how are they to be broken in and drilled to the work? It is the desire of the Association to assist the Federal Government in the furtherance of the white labour policy, and to that end they have arranged to fit out a fleet of five luggers and a schooner, offering special terms to Britishers who will take the job on. The work is, however, of an exceedingly slow and monotonous character, and not likely to prove at all attractive to men of the virility of Australians. To coop up half a dozen white men of British descent on a 12-ton lugger under a sweltering tropical sun and rolling Indian Ocean swell for five or six weeks at a stretch would drive them mad. Australians are not a seafaring nation, and about the last thing in the world they would tackle is traversing the ocean bed in search of the pearl oyster in 100ft. of water. Should the experiment of the Pearlers' Association be unsuccessful and the Federal Government persist in its avowed policy, pearling operations will have to be suspended and Broome will be practically obliterated from the map of Western Australia. That, at any rate, is the opinion entertained by men who have had more than a quarter of a century's experience of pearling in this State. As Mr. Miller remarks, "Western Australia is altogether different from Thursday Island in regard to pearling. Here the pearling industry is entirely in the hands of Australians - in Thursday Island Chinese and Japanese run the show. All the same, we should not be penalised for abuses that may exist on the Queensland side. In every way possible Broome and other pearling ports are kept clean and wholesome. White men are employed to the utmost extent, and although a distant outpost, all Australians feel themselves as much at home as in Perth, Melbourne, or Sydney." Mr. Miller is of the opinion that should the enactment be enforced, a general break-up of the pearling fleet at Broome will inevitably result, and the industry will be transferred to the Dutch, who will be only too pleased to register all the vessels under their flag and encourage pearling in waters outside the narrow limit of Commonwealth jurisdiction.
