Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

The quantities of large and beautiful pearls stored in the treasure-houses of Hindu princes suggest that they have existed as jewels in India for a very long period, but for how many centuries cannot be definitely stated. The probability is that in very remote ages, rude fishermen of tropic seas all over the world, while fishing for food were attracted by the lustrous objects found occasionally in the oysters which they gathered and that they saved them as things likely to please some maid or matron of their affections. A favor for them once established, they would be sought, and with the growth of intelligence and refinement would come increased appreciation. There is a close analogy in all things between the development of the individual and nations, and even of the world. Each progresses on the same lines, the difference consists in the magnitude and duration of the processes only.

To the child, pearls are playthings; to youth, pretty baubles; to mature years, important gems; to age, most beautiful and wonderful creations, and the more intelligent and refined the individual, the more quickly are these stages of regard reached.

So probably, in countries where they were found, pearls have risen with the evolution of a great nation out of a primitive race, from the rude favor of toilers of the sea, to a high place in the esteem of the princes of a cultivated people. It is quite probable that when the Aryans from the north spread over India, they found pearls among the possessions of the natives of the Madras and Malabar coasts, if not of the interior and north, as Spain found them among the natives of South America. Having a higher order of intelligence, they would naturally estimate the gem as of greater value than the aborigines would.

As the invaders in the course of centuries gradually divided themselves into castes, the gem would come largely into the hands of the highest and its value would increase with the affluence of the ruling class, according to the ratio existing between their wealth and that of the average community; for the centralization of wealth establishes a price for its imperishable forms which debars the masses from ownership. So, probably, the Aryans from the north acquired the pearls they found in the possession of the Dasyus. When the shepherd invaders were settled in the territory they had conquered and became divided into castes of Vaisyas, Kshattriya and Brahman, pearls gravitated to the upper classes, to be garnered later by their princes as the government assumed a tyrannical form; and so it is that the great pearls of India found in ancient times are among the jewels of the princes of India, or of the Shah of Persia and the Afghan Ameers, who in turn looted some of the richest treasuries of India.

In countries east of India one can only imagine the history of pearls for there are no records of them. Year after year, for centuries and cycles, in undiscovered deeps, the beds of the sea were strewn with noble gems that through all their years of beauty lay neglected: the soft luster of succeeding charms appealed in vain for eyes which never came, and when the slow processes of time had brought decay they passed unseen to the catacombs of Nature.

So it was in many a tropic sea, on unknown shores and about islands holding strange creatures and stranger men. In the still, clear waters of far-away lagoons, treasures of pearls, released by the death of their creators, have rolled to a resting-place on coral reefs, to lie there until the sea, atom by atom, devoured them. Could all the pearls hoarded by every nation on earth be gathered together, the mighty sum would be small compared with the number of those which lie buried beneath the ocean.

But, one by one, slant-eyed Celestials, Maoris, Malays, Papuans, Polynesians and others, discovering, learned to prize and hoard the pearl. Then came men from far-off wonderlands, whose great ships spread their sails to the winds of the deep waters and who could endure for many days the solitudes of the great seas. These in the early days made war to plunder, but were replaced as the centuries passed, by others who gave gaudy beads and cloths of many colors and water that fired the soul and other wonderful things, in exchange for the white beads of the sea, and so the pearls of the unenlightened children of the South Seas passed to the princes of the West, even as the same restless spirits, spreading their sails to the winds of the great seas in the opposite direction, brought them east from more barbarous shores far away to the westward.

Our knowledge of pearls reaches back about twenty-three hundred years, through the writings of Pliny, who nearly nineteen hundred years ago gathered the facts of his day and the rumors of traditions concerning them. Beyond that we can only surmise that in prehistoric ages, with the dawn of intelligence in the infantile period of the race, men dwelling near tropic seas were attracted by them as children are by bright and pretty baubles; and that as humanity by families, tribes and nations, grew out of savagery to the mental stature of a man, so pearls grew to be jewels very precious.

THE FASHION OF PEARLS

Although the pearl like all other jewels, has had its periods of extreme and general public favor, unlike other gems if it is once appreciated by an individual or a nation it is never utterly discarded by either. If not the fashion, pearls are always in fashion. Far as we can look back among the dim, uncertain figures of the mystic past whose shades stand where the unknown multitudes have fallen, we find pearls.

The princes of India through all their generations, the dynasties of Egypt, the royalties of Persia, the wild chiefs of Arab tribes, the potentates of Greece, Rome and Venice, the houris of Turkey, the Queens of every European court, from the time they found a place in history until now, all wear pearls. At first thought this seems strange, for of all gems the origin of the pearl is most humble. No titanic forces, groaning in the travail of subterranean convulsions, crushed and ground and fired its particles to shape and beauty. It grew, a few fathoms deep, where the waters are at peace, in the embrace of a mollusk and out of its exudations.

( _From the painting by Vitelleschi _)]

From this lowly parentage it rises at once to a place among the noblest, for it is the aristocrat of gems and finds its warmest admirers among the aristocrats of all nations. The favorites of fortune the world over in all ages have succumbed to the modest beauty of the pearl. Its ascendancy marks not alone the refinement of the individuals with whom it finds favor, but the high status of the nation where it is widely appreciated. The pearl is the favorite of those who are surfeited with jewels. One may become tired of the diamond's splendor, but those who learn to appreciate the unobtrusive loveliness of the pearl, seldom lose that fondness for them which it develops. It is the one gem which does not satiate. The love of pearls usually marks a connoisseur of gems and one accustomed to the possession of jewels. Diamonds emblazon the gates of luxury but pearls are the familiars of the luxurious. Glittering gems are admired by all classes but usually the pearl is fully appreciated only by old countries and persons "to the manor born." It is in the treasure-houses of the princes of the Orient and among the jewels of great and noble families that one must look for the pearls gathered during the centuries. Except in Italy and Arabia, where all classes prize them, the pearl is not a jewel of the people, but of the gentry and the very rich who come in contact with them.

It is essentially a jewel for the wealthy. Unostentatious, exquisite, it is insufficient for those who have no other jewels and unfit for common wear. Of a nature too delicate for rough usage, it must be well cared for and properly housed. Even then the hand of time bears heavily upon it for it is susceptible to many influences which do not affect other gems. Comparatively soft, the lustrous skin is injured by rough and careless contact with other jewels. The gold of the setting, in time, cuts into the surface where it binds, or if it is pierced and strung, the rings of nacre about the orifices gradually peel away. Hot water injures it; gases discolor it. As the cheek of beauty grows dim with age, so gradually the brilliancy of youth fades from the pearl and the complexion of it is changed. And yet it retains a certain loveliness which may well be compared to the exquisite serenity with which the maturer years of some women are adorned.

The pearl, therefore, being essentially a jewel of the rich, is not affected as others by the whims of fashion. In Oriental countries, where the lives of the masses and what little property they hold are practically at the mercy of their rulers, the centuries make little change in conditions and less in fashions. The nobles have always possessed the jewels of the various eastern countries and the fashion continues through generations and dynasties, to accumulate and hold them until some stronger power takes them away by force. As the people hammered heavy bracelets and anklets out of the precious metals, not alone for display, but also to hoard them, so their princes hoarded jewels.

In the old times these hoards of the precious metals were periodically gathered by the requisitions of the princes on the people, and of jewels by the demands of a successful invader upon the princes; but while the possessors changed, the fashion remained always the same, and whether the Shah of Persia, the Ameer of Afghanistan, or the Mogul, there has been no variation in the constant desire to obtain more jewels, pearls among them, and to display them after the same fashion through all the generations.

To some extent this is true of pearls in the Occident also. Since Rome set the fashion there has not been a time in the history of any European nation, once it had risen to the pearl-wearing eminence, when the upper classes did not wear pearls. There is this difference between the East and the West however; whereas the men of the East wear them, in the West, pearls are worn almost entirely by women alone. The more rugged life of European men, the coarser fabrics of their garments to suit climatic needs, and their virile distaste for effeminate display, all combine to bar them from a jewel suited only to soft silks and linens or the touch of softer flesh.

In ancient times, among Asiatics, fashion probably did not culminate in any direction, as to-day, in a vogue. The inability of the masses to follow a fashion of the upper classes, both for lack of means and permission to do so; the absence of all rapid methods of communication between sections of country within and without national borders, with the consequent limitations of a knowledge of men and things to community affairs, and the paucity of manufacturing possibilities, all combined to make fashions permanent. With the awakening of the vigorous barbarian tribes of Europe to a knowledge of their power, and their rapid civilization, came the frenzied desire of men new to the situation, to crowd as much as possible into the span of life.

Rome rioted in the accumulations of ages. With an appetite whetted by an heredity of unsatisfied desire, she drank the finest vintages and gourmandized the choicest morsels of the world, immune from present punishment for excess by a long ancestry of hard and simple life. Every land that she could reach, sent to her the best of all their products, and from the incoming tide of things new to her experience, she adopted many fashions, among them that of wearing pearls. For several centuries they were in vogue, so much so that edicts were issued restricting them to certain classes. Since that time, the very general use of them by persons of high station in Europe, beyond all other gems, seems to have been confined to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and is now being revived at the opening of the twentieth.

There is one fashion of wearing pearls which is common to all ages and races, viz. strung as beads in chains to hang about the neck. The mound-builders of North America, the Indians of the Mississippi Valley, of Virginia, of the coasts of Florida, of the lands around the Gulf of Mexico and everywhere in New Spain, all wore them so. Egyptians, Persians, Arabians, Hindus, Singhalese and South Sea islanders, many of them without knowledge of countries or peoples beyond their own or very near territory, alike adopted this fashion. And it has been followed by every newer people, as they acquired by trade or the sword, the pearls with which to so adorn themselves.

In lands of tropic heat the women wound these strings of pearls about their arms, wrists and ankles also. Nor was the fashion confined to women. When the Spaniards first reached these shores, the caciques of Florida and the incas of Peru, on occasions of State, wore ropes of pearls around their necks, and so to this day do the rajahs and princes of India and the eastern islands. The more civilized peoples used round pearls, and became more critical about the quality and perfection of the gems as they grew in wealth and refinement.

The necklaces found in the Indian mounds are made principally of baroques, some of them rounded, but many of them long, slender pieces, bored a short distance from the thinner end, so that they hung in pendant festoons. As with all primitive races, the magnificence of size appealed to the Indians of this hemisphere, as it did also to the Spanish adventurers who first landed on the coasts of America. A chronicler of events during the time when De Soto was governor of the province which now forms several of the Southern States, mentions that a cacique brought as a present to the governor at the town of Ichiaha, a string of pearls as large as filberts, five feet long.

It is noticeable, that in all the accounts given of the wealth of pearls discovered in the possession of the natives, the Spaniards rarely say anything about the shape or quality of the pearls seen or taken, but always mention the size when large. They do, however, constantly deplore the discoloration caused by the use of fire in the process of boring them. One may imagine the chagrin of these freebooters on finding heaps of royal gems wrecked by the ignorance of the plundered; the value burned out of them, like bank notes for millions mutilated beyond redemption. The pearls composing this five-foot string were all discolored,—good enough for Indians, but of little value in Spain and Europe.

Round baroques are strung for necklaces to this day, especially in Italy, where the peasantry save from their small earnings the equivalent of two to three hundred dollars, to them an enormous sum, to buy the coveted necklace of pearls. These necklaces are composed usually of several strands of small rounded baroques weighing about one to two grains each and connected by bars. Usually there are three to five strands, but some are made with as many as eleven or twelve. Necklaces are made also in the same way, of small round pearls, and the bars, of which there are generally four, including that containing the clasp, are studded with diamonds.

The Asiatics prefer strings of large pearls, graduating in size on either side from a large central one. A number of these of increasing length and fastened together at the clasp are worn by Oriental royalties, so that each string festoons below the preceding one, the lowest and longest string sometimes hanging to the waist. There are few however even among the Hindu princes whose store of large pearls is equal to such prodigality.

When pearl necklaces were adopted by the Romans after their conquests in Egypt, Persia and India, they vied with the monarchs they had conquered, some of their rulers acquiring pearls of enormous value. The wife of Caligula owned pearls worth two million dollars, but Oriental treasure-houses held greater accumulations. The pearls of the late Rana of Dholpur in Upper India, were valued at seven and a half million dollars. From Rome the fashion spread with the advance of civilization through all the nations of Europe and followed their colonizations westward. Only in the last decade has the use of pearls in the United States become sufficiently general to place them in the list of things that are a fashion.

Many large pearls of pear, egg, or drop shape, and some round, are used as pendants, to be hung on slender gold neck chains, or suspended from brooches of diamonds. They are bored at the smaller end to a depth of about one-eighth of an inch, the hole is filled with a composition which hardens rapidly, and in this a gold wire, looped at one end for connecting, is inserted. Formerly the pearl was drilled quite through and the suspending wire riveted, but this is rarely done now as it lessens the value of the pearl and destroys the perfect pendant effect. This is a European fashion. The Chinese mount pearls by boring into the body of the pearl at two, three or four points and inserting the bent ends of spreading wires so that the gem is clasped as by spreading finger tips.

Pear-shaped pearls were used in Rome for pendant purposes as now and were known as "elenchi." After the Roman fashion of "crotalia" or "castanet" eardrops had passed, drop pearls continued in more or less favor throughout succeeding centuries as eardrops, the matching of one nearly doubling the value of both. Of late, egg and pear-shaped pearls have been used largely as heads for scarf pins. They are drilled and set on a gold wire or "pegged" as it is called, in the manner described for pendants but with the smaller end resting upon a light gold ring soldered to the scarf pin, or in a small cup, so that the pressure, while inserting the pin, is distributed over the body of the pearl and upon the end, instead of upon the inner wall in contact with the end of the pin.

The Persians used pearls largely in the jewelling of royal headgear, for Pompey is said to have brought home twenty crowns of pearls with the loot from his eastern raid. Hindu princes strung them on straight wires of equal length and bound a number of them together, to be fastened as pompons or aigrettes, to their turbans. They encrusted and edged their robes with them as also did the royalties and nobles of Europe during the middle ages. Seed pearls were strung in lengths of four to six feet and the strands twisted together like a rope. This fashion continues to this day, such ropes of pearls sometimes measuring five feet in length.

The semi-barbarous Indian tribes of America did not confine the use of pearls altogether to personal adornment. They decorated their idols, state canoes, the handles of the paddles, and the figures in their temples with them, and they buried enormous quantities in the sepulchres with their dead. There is no evidence that this latter form of extravagance was at any time general in Asia or Europe, but Julius Cæsar made a buckler of British pearls which he hung up in the temple of Venus Genetrix after dedicating it to her.

Among the ancients it does not appear that pearls were used in connection with the precious metals to a great extent. Collars of gold and silver with large pearls as pendants were sometimes seen upon the necks of Indians by the Spaniards when they landed on this continent, but in Asia, Africa, and upon their first introduction into Europe, pearls were not used with the metals as freely as other gems. As the art of the jeweller developed however, they came into more general use and are now utilized with gold in every form of jewelry. Round and button pearls with diamonds or other stones, or alone, are set in gold as brooches, ear-rings, finger-rings, bracelets, hair-ornaments, scarf-pins, dress-pins, studs, cuff and dress buttons, etc., and baroques are also used for the same purposes. Brooches, lockets and pendants are paved with solid masses of half pearls.

Some ancient swords of Hindu warriors betray a curious custom. A groove with over-lapping edges was sunk in the blade and into this pearls were introduced from the hilt end to represent the tears of enemies. There are blades so constructed in the collection of Indian swords presented to King Edward of England when, as the Prince of Wales, he visited India.

Jewellers frequently avail themselves of the odd shapes in which baroques occur to construct unique jewels. Nature frequently gives them a resemblance to animals, and sometimes to the human figure and face, which may be accentuated by the jeweller's art so as to make the resemblance striking. In one notable instance lately, a baroque was so mounted that it might easily pass as a modelled portrait of Queen Victoria. Baroques resembling bird's wings are common and are often made effective by mounting them on a bird of gold. Others remind one of fish, birds, insects, and beasts of various kinds. Clustered pearls enveloped together sometimes look like dog's heads, in which two of the enveloped pearls near the surface pass for eyes. Long, slender baroques are set to resemble the petals of a chrysanthemum, and others, mounted singly in sepals of gold, are suggestive of the buds of various flowers, roses, lilies, etc.

1-5 Abalone Baroques. 6 Blister. 7-10 Twinned Pearls. 11-21 Baroques. 22-29 Round Baroques. 30-31 Wing Pearls. 32-35 Button Pearls. 36-37 Colored Round Pearls. 38-41 White Round Pearls. 42 Jockey Cap.]

Round and button pearls are used extensively now, and have been at various periods formerly, as centres for circles, or "clusters" of diamonds mounted as scarf-pins, finger-rings and formerly, when they were worn, as ear-rings. The pearls are sometimes drilled and set on a peg; sometimes they are held by claws or prongs as the diamonds surrounding them are.

Pearls are very generally used now as studs by men for evening dress, usually mounted on pegs so as to avoid the display of any gold.

But all fashions of wearing pearls except as necklaces, are ephemeral. The fashion of pearl necklaces has been constant for thousands of years, though it is only brought to general public notice when some new country with its great and rapid accretions of wealth, adopts it. The markets of the world are then affected, the price of the gem rises, and this in turn tempts ancient and impoverished families to unlock their jewel cases to the bidding of the nouveau riche. That this condition has existed from the beginning of this century is shown by the sales which are being made constantly in Europe at the great public auctions of jewels. In 1901 the Comtesse de Castiglione necklace was sold for $84,000. At the sale of the Princess Mathilde jewels in Paris, a three strand necklace of 133 pearls weighing 3320 grains, once the property of Queen Sophie of Holland, brought 885,000 francs, which with the taxes to the purchaser made the cost $188,000. At the same sale, a seven strand collar given by Napoleon I. to the Queen of Westphalia, weighing 4,200 grs., brought $89,000, and another collar once owned by the same Queen containing thirty-three black pearls, weighing 1040 grs. was sold for $20,240. Several fine strings were sold in London in 1903. Among them a three-row necklace from the Aquila Jewels for $22,400. A string of 198 finely matched gem pearls, round and graduated, was sold at Christie's for 6,500 pounds. A triple row of 153 of the same kind brought 6,500 pounds. Many important sales have been made in the States, during the last ten years especially, but as they were made privately, and as buyers here are averse to any publicity they are not chronicled. It is a fact well known to jewellers, that Americans in their home market are extremely difficult. They demand a degree of perfection, not only in the gems themselves, but also in the matching of them, rarely exacted in other countries. There are strings of pearls in this country which if less magnificent, for extreme perfection and beauty are seldom equalled by the more notorious jewels of Europe, and princely sums have been paid for single pieces of great size and purity. Greater quantities of the coveted treasures of the earth are pouring into the lap of the United States of America through the channels of peaceful industry, than were ever gathered to a nation in the olden times by the marauders of the sword, and the jewel cases of our princes of commerce will soon eclipse those held by the scions of ancient freebooters.

VARIETIES

True pearls are divided primarily into two classes, "oriental," and "fresh-water." By true pearls those creations are meant which consist of concentric layers of nacre or mother-of-pearl, as distinguished from similar formations by mollusks out of material that is not pearly.

In the early days pearls brought from the Orient were therefore called "Oriental" pearls. For the same reason the fine mellow luster which characterized and made them superior to others came to be known as the "orient" of the pearl. These pearls were taken from oysters found on the coasts of Ceylon, Arabia, and the Red Sea. Later, when the same kind of oysters containing similar pearls were found in other seas, they were also classified with them, until the term "oriental" is now applied usually to all true pearls taken from salt water mollusks, to distinguish them from those found in the fresh water mussels and other products of ocean shell-fish which, though similar in construction and composition, are not nacreous. Occasionally, however, the term is still applied specifically to pearls from the Indian Seas, though their "orient" or luster is not always finer than that of like pearls found in many other localities.

Pearl oysters are varieties of the Avicula Margaritifera, of which the Meleagrina Margaritifera is the most prolific of mother-of-pearl and pearls combined, and, the Indian excepted, yields the finest pearls. All pearl oysters do not produce sufficient mother-of-pearl to make their shells valuable, nor do they all contain pearls. The name therefore applies to all oysters whose secretions are productive, in some degree, of mother-of-pearl and therefore under favorable conditions of pearls also.

"Fresh-water" or "sweet-water" pearls are, as the name signifies, those found in the mollusks of inland waters. This mollusk is a mussel. The name "mussel" in Anglo-Saxon signifies something which retires on being touched. It is known as "Unio" of which there are many pearl-bearing varieties.

In both the sea oyster and the fresh-water mussel, other nacreous formations occur of irregular shape called "baroque" pearls. The orientals approach more nearly to the globular and hemispherical form of true pearls, having frequently the lumpy rotundity of a snowball and sometimes sections which are smooth and round. The fresh-water baroques are usually very irregular, often fantastically so. Many resemble the incisor teeth of man or distorted grains of corn. Slender pieces similar to the wing of a bird and therefore called "wing" pearls, or "hinge" pearls because they are found near the hinge of the shell, are common. Some are shaped like a flat spike nail. Unlike oriental baroques, the surface of a large proportion of the fresh-waters is grooved or indented and some show a beautiful iridescence. Large button baroques of fine luster and iridescent, especially when they have a decided tinge of pink, have come to be known of late as "rose" pearls. Another variety of pink baroques having a fairly regular shape with a lustrous and finely irregular pimply surface are known as "strawberry" pearls. These terms are applied indiscriminately to the two varieties however.

Another nacreous formation found in the mother-of-pearl oyster shells is the "blister." It is produced by the raising of the nacreous deposits above the level of the shell to cover some intruder of considerable size. This results in a growth similar in shape to a blister on the flesh, hence the name. It is cut out of the shell and used in various ways as a set for jewelry, or to imitate the bodies of insects or small animals. Others with a slightly higher dome and rounded oval shape, regular in form, are called "turtlebacks."

Some of these hollow shells of pearl have been found to cover small fish, lizards, etc. The writer saw one which appeared to be a large button-pearl. On lifting, it proved to be a shell of several thicknesses of nacre covering a small shell-fish about a half-inch in diameter. The imprisoned mollusk was shrunken and crumbling so that the nacreous covering could be lifted from over it, a hollow dome of pearl. Mud blisters are common in some waters and depreciate the quality of the shell and are otherwise useless. A typical mud-blister appears in the shell illustrated herewith.

The Abalone pearl occurs usually as a baroque or blister but occasionally it is found solid and spherical. Although it is not classed among true pearls, a few globular pieces found are entitled to a place among them because they are sometimes identical in construction and have a similar pearly luster, it is however very liable to crack and break and can seldom be pierced with safety.

The shell-fish from which it takes the name is the Haliotis, called here the Abalone. It is known under many names—ear-shell, Venus's ear, etc. In the English Channel Islands it is the ormer, and on the adjacent coast of France where it is very abundant the name for it is similar—"ormier." The Aelonians called it the "Ear of Venus." The shell is ear-shaped, flattened, slightly spiral and has a series of round holes near the edge curving with the last whorl toward the boss. As it grows, the oldest of these are successively filled up and the last remaining open, serves as the anal channel. The exterior is very rough and unsightly, but the mother-of-pearl interior is one of the most exquisite pieces of color work painted by the hand of nature and to this is added an enlivening iridescence most fascinating. Like it, the pearl formations are deeply tinted. Brownish reds, peacock greens, and dark grays are the prevailing colors. They are seldom of even color or luster, many of them having but one lustrous point where a pearly glaze seems to have been incorporated with the earthenware like surface.

Usually the pearls when round and lustrous are not constructed as compactly as those of the bivalves. The texture of the skins vary in quality and the frequent presence of intermediary strata of black conchiolin which shrink, makes them liable to crack and break. The blisters run very even in these two qualities of color and luster and though seldom quite as brilliant as the nacre of the shell, are very beautiful and often curiously formed. These blister-baroques are like two blisters joined at the edges, and are liable to separate there. The interior consists chiefly of black conchiolin, rough and somewhat shiny.

The "Conch" pearl, found in the Conch (Strombus gigas) of the West Indies, also is not a true pearl. The shell is used largely for ornamental purposes, especially for the cutting of cameos, and also in porcelain works. It is a large shell, sometimes weighing four or five pounds. Formerly great quantities were exported to England from the Bahamas; in one year as many as three hundred thousand. Conch pearls are devoid of nacreous luster, the surface having an appearance like china. They are slightly transparent and show under the surface a series of delicate wavy markings.

The silky sheen of these lines causes them to appear lighter than the body color of the pearl, and they seem to branch toward the surface, changing kaleidoscopically as the pearl is turned. Almost without exception the shape is ovoid, or a flattened ovoid, though some are distorted. In color they range from very pale to deep pink and coral red, the ends being usually much lighter than the body and often white. In the deeper tints they are more uniform in color, and as they are apt to be less lustrous and transparent as the shade deepens to red they show less plainly the distinguishing wavy lines, and may be easily mistaken for pieces of coral cut to the shape and polished. They are very delicate and therefore easily fractured or cracked. As the natives usually obtain the pearls by cooking the fish, for which they have a great liking, a large proportion of the few which come into the market are cracked. It is claimed also that the color fades with time. They are sometimes called "Nassau" pearls.

Pearls similar in appearance to the Conch, except that the wavy lines are absent and the skin rarely as brilliant, are taken with true pearls from the small varieties of the Avicula, especially about the coast of Venezuela. Some are white as chalk, many are tinted in various shades of gray, yellow and brownish reds. They have the shining appearance of china in different degrees, but no nacreous luster. The skins of many of these are peculiarly constructed, they show modified characteristics of various parts of the shell. The surface wave lines are present to some extent, together with curious malformations of prisms and conchiolin.

The hexagonal faces look as though they had been doubled up upon themselves together with a layer of conchiolin, the latter appearing as thick black V or U shaped marks in the faces of the distorted hexagons. Heretofore these have been considered valueless, but it is possible that with the increasing vogue of pearls and the growing desire for oddities, they will be utilized in the cheaper forms of jewelry.

Creations similar in construction to pearls are found occasionally in the common oyster and clam. Though entirely devoid of the pearly texture and luster, some of them are very perfect in shape and smoothness of skin. Whether taken from the oyster or clam they are usually called "clam pearls." The color of the oyster pearl is generally a light drab. The clam pearls are mostly purplish red or blue, often dark enough to appear black. Those taken from the oyster are generally round; those from the clam are more frequently ovoid. Occasionally one or both ends of the oval are lighter in color, as the Conch pearl is, changing there to a dark red or purple. When the color is very dark and the skin uncommonly good, they have been sold for black pearls by unscrupulous dealers. They are accounted of little value, though exceptionally large pieces will sometimes sell for as much as one hundred to a hundred and fifty dollars. Similar to these, pearly formations characterized by a glazed, or glassy, or shiny surface, are found in many molluscan varieties, bivalves and univalves, but none of these are true pearls.

Pearls similar to the pink Conch are found in the shank or chank of Ceylon (Turbinella scolymus). This is the sacred shell of the Hindus and the national emblem of Travancore in the Madras presidency, India. Vishnu carries a chank called "Devadatta" in his hand. It is said his first incarnation was for the purpose of destroying Shankhásura (the giant chank shell), and thereby regaining the Vedas, which had been stolen and taken to ocean deeps.

COLOR

The ideal color for a pearl is white. Although all fine white pearls show by comparison a tint of some color, a fine white must be free from an appearance which can only be described as "dark." It is not color always but a certain density which makes the gem appear dead by comparison with the soft, warm, life-like white of the perfect pearl. The layers or skins of some pearls are more transparent than others and this imparts a liveliness which is absent in the more dense.

Upon looking at a string of pearls held between the eye and the light, some will appear much lighter than others and show a translucent band about one-fifth the diameter of the pearl, extending from the edge of the circumference inward. Such pearls upon examination will be found much finer in color and texture than those which have the appearance beside them of dark opaque spots when held against the light.

There is also a white which is not dark and is yet dead. To some extent it is characteristic of all fresh-water pearls. It is a chalky, milky white that even when lustrous, carries a reminder of chalk in the texture and lacks the essential life of the ideal pearl. Color in the highest perfection is found in the pearls of the Ceylon and Australian waters, the former being also very lustrous, and such are sometimes termed by the trade "Madras," after the city where the Indian pearls have been marketed for ages. It must not be inferred however that pearls equally good are not found in other localities, but that the color averages better, and the number of gems of ideal color and luster is greater from the Ceylon fisheries than elsewhere. The color and texture, and therefore luster, of fine Indian pearls is seldom equalled, never surpassed.

To those who are without experience, and see for the first time a large quantity of pearls apparently alike in color, it would seem an easy matter to match any required number; but in attempting to gather sufficient for a single strand necklace, one would learn that a parcel or series of pearls, seemingly all white, contains a surprisingly great variety of shades or tones of color; that which appears at first sight quite easy becomes in the attempt extremely difficult. Probably nothing requires a sharper eye, a more delicate sense of color and greater patience, than the assembling of a finely matched string of pearls. Bearing in mind that size, shape, color, and perfection, must all correspond, it is not surprising that few strings exist which are above criticism.

Those who buy them seldom realize what enormous quantities of pearls, and skilful and painstaking effort is necessary, to match perfectly, thirty or more, especially of large size. Pearls which, separated by a few inches seem alike, when brought close together reveal differences of texture and tone of color sufficiently pronounced to arrest the eye and destroy that ideal perfection of purity which permits no spot to mar the symmetry of an assemblage of these emblematic gems. It was said in old times that to match a pearl perfectly was to double the value of both; one may imagine therefore the difficulty which confronts the modern jeweller when he undertakes in this critical age to match thirty or forty.

The color most common in pearls of all seas is yellow, but it is not so with fresh-water ones. Other colors are seldom found except as tints in white pearls, but distinctly yellow oriental pearls are abundant. The tones of color in the white are, yellow, blue, pink and green. They are so slight that it is difficult to recognize them except by comparison. The blue and pink are considered best, the champions of each being about equal. The green come next in favor and the yellow last. This order applies fully however to the Occident only. Some Oriental peoples do not draw such fine distinctions, and the Chinese prefer the creamy yellow to any other.

The "blue" pearls, or "Panama" pearls as they are sometimes called in the trade, must not be confounded with the blue white pearls just mentioned. "Blue" pearls are of a dingy, slaty blue tint. They have a dark appearance and the luster is seldom good. As many of this character are found in the Panama waters such pearls are often sold as "Panama" pearls. They are even less desirable than those which are decidedly yellow, though persons of a little knowledge will often buy them in preference to others which are better, because they are not yellow and are cheap.

"Fancies" include all decided colors, or those having a rare and beautiful tint. Yellow pearls as generally found are not classed among them because the color is not fine, but dark,—"brackish" one might term it. A clean buttercup yellow, or an orange yellow, would be "fancy" however. On the other hand a deep pink is seldom fine as the color is then almost invariably muddy, whereas the clean delicate light pink pearls are rare and highly esteemed. A clear grass green is never seen but the color occurs in very beautiful bronze and peacock shadings. Various shades of blue, rose, copper, and red with bronze effects, and black are included in this classification.

Black pearls are much prized, and the term covers a wide range of dark shades of gray, slate, brown and red. The ideal color however is sufficiently deep to be, as the name indicates, black, though it has not the metallic appearance of hematite, nor the polished shine of the black clam pearl. Black pearls having a bronze effect are open to suspicion, especially if they are pierced, as many of them are artificially colored and are liable to fade. Such pearls have a somewhat metallic appearance, are seldom very lustrous, and if there is a rough chalky place in the skin it will be blacker there than elsewhere.

It is difficult to give rules by which to judge color, but there is a quality which can only be described as "clean." It is free from muddiness and is desirable in pearls as in all other gems.

The proportion of fancy colors is greater in fresh-water pearls than in the orientals. In the United States the fisheries which have yielded the finest "fancies" are those of Wisconsin, Kentucky and Tennessee. Of sea pearls, most of the fine black ones come from the coasts of Mexico. Beautiful colored pearls are found in fisheries of the Oceanic Islands, for instance at the Isles of New Caledonia and Gambier, and in China and Japan.

To make close comparisons of color in pearls, place them on white cotton under or opposite a strong natural light. To judge shape and luster, roll them on black cloth. These are the most trying conditions and it should be remembered by those who test them thus, that no position as jewels when worn can be so unfavorable or trying.

IMPERFECTIONS

Few pearls are perfect. The great majority of small pearls even, fail in one or more of the ideal qualities, and as the size increases perfection becomes more rare. A perfect pearl is not necessarily of the finest luster, but it must be lustrous and of even luster all over. If round, it must be spherically round; if pear or ovoid, symmetrically so, and the skin must be free from blemishes.

Baroque and button pearls are naturally imperfect pearls, the former being fantastically irregular in shape and the latter partially deformed. Imperfections of shape in what are termed round pearls are more numerous than those unaccustomed to handling them would suppose.

A lot of pearls which to the casual glance seem to be all quite round, will be found often on close examination to contain many, if not a majority, that are not. Upon rolling them separately, irregularities will appear which the luster and contiguity of others concealed. It will be discovered that the domes of some are slightly flattened at one part of the sphere; in others at two opposite points so as to form a double domed disk. Very many have slight protuberances above the contour of the sphere, or places in the spherical line, which though not flat, are depressed. While these minor imperfections of shape do not materially hurt the beauty of the pearl, they do decrease the value somewhat, and as they are quite common even among fine selected pearls they accentuate the rarity of the perfectly spherical.

The adventures of a pearl from the moment when the mollusk begins to cover its nucleus with nacre, until the fisher squeezes it from the folds of the creature's mantle, are many and varied. A few only escape untoward happenings. The fortunate, born where the mollusk gathers and spreads its choice secretions of mother-of-pearl, with room to grow on every side, are nursed in the lap of good fortune and uncheckered, round out layer by layer to perfection.

But some are not so fortunate. In some way cramped, they are held against the unyielding shell and grow flat on one side. These are the button pearls. Others either from an irregular rolling, or unequal action of the mollusk's mantle, become imperfectly round. Sometimes foreign particles attach themselves to a growing pearl and becoming enveloped with it in future layers, make an uneven surface.

Not infrequently two round pearls grow side by side until they touch, and together are enveloped by succeeding deposits; a twinned pearl is the result. For some reason, drop and pear-shaped pearls are seldom imperfect in shape. They may not be ideal but the form is usually good and the contour even and regular. This would imply that the simple rolling motion by the fish is more regular than the more complicated movements necessary to form a sphere.

Imperfections in the texture and luster of the skin are said to be due to the movement of the growing pearl among the zones of the mollusk's mantle supplying the varied material for the epidermis, middle shell, and lining. The difficulties confronting this theory are explained in the chapter on the "Genesis of Pearls." These imperfections consist generally of dead white chalky spots and streaks, distributed over the surface of the pearl, oftentimes so small as to escape notice except under the loup. Sometimes these imperfections take the form of rings or bands which encircle the pearl. Pearls so marked are rarely if ever round, but ovoid, capsule, or cartridge shaped, and these chalky lines always encircle the cylinder; they never cross the dome. Rings around the dome occur, but the surface over them is of equal luster. Frequently the entire outer skin is without luster. Whether this arises from lack of some element in the exudations of the mollusk from which the pearl is created, or from an imperfect crystallization of the calcium carbonate, is not known. Such skins have the usual nacreous surface wave lines and are often lustrous immediately under the outer plates of the skin.

It is possible that these chalky skins may result from the extraction of the pearl from the mollusk during a transitional stage, and that the presence of spots and streaks of that character, scattered over an otherwise lustrous surface, indicates that the secretions of the creature's mantle did not hold some essential ingredient in sufficient quantity to secure perfect crystallization and thereby cover the entire surface with transparent plates of calcium carbonate. It may be also that a lack of essential elements in the creature's exudations, causes a cessation of the mantle's action which by all signs appears necessary for the production of transparent plates of nacre.

"Peelers" are pearls of imperfect skins having indications of a better one underneath. Speculators buy these pearls at a low price and skin them. Sometimes they are rewarded by a smaller, but much more valuable pearl. Many times the under skins are no better or worse, or if better, the loss in size and weight, together with the cost of the work, make it unprofitable.

Peeling should not be attempted with cylindrical shaped pearls having chalky bands or rings around them, as such imperfections usually penetrate to the interior in pearls of that character. Cylindrical pearls are almost invariably fresh-waters. The imperfections disclosed in the under skins by peeling, are commonly irregularities of shape which have been rounded over to the improvement of the sphericity of the pearl.

It is currently reported among the pearl hunters who fish the western and southern streams, that the finding of soft pearls is not infrequent. Upon opening the mussel, they sometimes see through the mantle of the creature, an apparently fine pearl which upon being taken out proves to be a soft jelly-like substance, the form of which is usually destroyed in squeezing it out. These men do not believe that a pearl is formed in layers, but think that all pearls are originally globules of a similar soft substance, hardening later to a compact solid ball and they call them "mussel eggs."

Many pearls taken from the small thin-shelled varieties of the ocean mollusk, as for instance those of Venezuela, are devoid in part, or wholly, of the nacreous luster and instead have a china-like or waxy luster, or a dead chalky skin. A large proportion of the Abalone pearls and baroques are lustrous only in part, one section having an earthenware appearance. Many appear to be formed of interstratified layers of nacre and conchiolin. This construction is very distinct in a formation peculiar to the Abalone, consisting of two nacreous shells joined perfectly at the edges, the inside walls of both being covered with rough black conchiolin.

Peculiarities in the quality of the nacre sometimes give an appearance of uneven shape which does not exist in reality. The light falling upon such pearls produces a knobby effect, as though there were protuberances on the surface. The texture of others is such that when looked at squarely from the front they appear pyramidal in form, the rounded apex pointing toward the observer. Such pearls have a soft, waxy appearance generally.

Another common imperfection consists of pits in the surface. These may result from various causes: in many cases from the dislodgement and rolling of a pearl which has been flattened during earlier stages by pressure in one position against the shell. Freed from this hindrance to spherical growth, the later concentric layers would round over the edge of the flat spot and thereby leave a pit, or cavity, in the centre.

In other cases pressure against the pearl, or the partial inclusion of foreign substances, especially of an organic nature which decay before being entirely covered, are possible causes. The reverse of this also occurs; grains of sand or other minute particles adhering to the surface are covered by succeeding layers, thereby producing knobs, more or less observable according to the lapse of time between their inclusion and the taking of the pearl from the oyster.

If undisturbed, the fish will by the deposit of sufficient layers of nacre, fill the intervals and round the surface again. That this is done in time is shown by the occurrence of pearls having an even dome over a nucleus formed by a cluster of small round and irregular pearls enveloped together. In the process of skinning, or the removal of one or more of the layers of nacre, it is sometimes found that a depression has been filled by a thickening of the deposits in the hollow; at other times extra layers fill the space, and these flaking out with the outer skin reveal the hidden irregularity which lay beneath the round surface, thus necessitating the removal of several entire skins before a sphere is reached again. The under skins of some pearls appear to have failed to completely envelop the nucleus. The cavity resulting is then filled to an even surface and is succeeded by fully developed skins. It is, therefore, not certain that a pearl, perfect in form and skin when found, has been so at all stages of its growth. Broken pearls sometimes show not only differences of color but of thickness in the successive layers. The skins of fresh-water pearls especially are often very irregular in thickness.

Many pearls have cracks in them. These generally escape the observation of inexpert persons, as they are usually under the outer layer. The fact that they rarely extend to the surface suggests that the solidification, or drying out of the confined interior layers, may be the cause. These are considered detrimental and dangerous by dealers, so that pearls with cracks in them will not bring as high a price as they would if free from them.

As cracked pearls are liable to break, especially when pierced for stringing, it is well to avoid them, though the percentage of those which do break is small. In reality these cracks are more of an imperfection than a danger. Occasionally they are quite noticeable and are then a bad imperfection, but frequently a sharp eye or the loup only will detect them. Surface cracks however are quite perceptible. They are dangerous and are considered a serious imperfection.