On the following day the same party again went out, making two trips to the shoal, one in the morning, and one in the afternoon, thus continuing for a fortnight, by which time their saucer-like depression in the rock was full, while about half of the entire catch was in a sufficiently advanced stage of decomposition to admit of being examined and the pearls abstracted therefrom. This, as will be supposed, was a most disgusting and intensely disagreeable task, but the returns were so unexpectedly rich that the revolting character of the work was quickly lost sight of in the interest with which discovery after discovery was made of pearls that, for size, shape, and purity of colour, promised to prove priceless. Their first day's work among the putrid fish resulted in their taking on board at night an ordinary ship's bucket nearly half-full of pearls, a considerable proportion of which might be ranked as specially valuable. The proportion of seed pearls was singularly small, and, toward the close of the second day's work, was considered of so little value, comparatively, as to be not worth the time and trouble of collecting. To attempt to put anything more than the merest approximate estimate of value upon their catch was of course quite out of the question; but when the result of their third day's labour was added to that of their first and second, von Schalckenberg, who claimed to be something of an authority in such matters, declared that the whole must be worth not far short of one hundred thousand pounds, if indeed it did not exceed that value. The enthusiasm with which the men had been working at their highly unpleasant task of extracting the pearls from their loathsome envelopment had so far cooled by the end of the third day that it had been unanimously resolved to take a change of occupation on the following day by again going out to the shoal and securing a further supply of oysters. The suggestion emanated from von Schalckenberg in the first instance; he made it upon the plea that such a change was very highly desirable in the interests of their health; and the proposal had been eagerly welcomed by all hands, most of whom had already begun to complain of nausea, and to exhibit a more or less marked distaste for food.