[ Fishing. ]
They use upon this coast to fish with harping irons, and wait upon a great fish that cometh once a day to fish along the shore, which is like a grampus. He runneth very near the shore and driveth great shoals of fish before him; and the negroes run along the shore as fast as they are able to follow him, and strike their harping irons round about him, and kill great store of fish, and leave them upon the sand till, the fish hath done feeding; and then they come and gather their fish up.
This fish will many times run himself on ground, but they will presently shove him off again, which is as much as four or five men can do. They call him Emboa, which is in their speech a dog, and will by no means hurt or kill any of them.195
Also, they use in the bays and rivers, where shoal water is, to fish with mats, which are made of long rushes, and they make them of an hundred fathoms long. The mats swim upon the water, and have long rushes hanged upon one edge of the mat, and so they draw the mat in compass, as we do our nets. The fishes, fearing the rushes that hang down, spring out of the water and fall upon the mat, that lyeth flat on the water, and so are taken.