The Pearl, its story, its charm, and its value

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Wallis Richard Cattelle. The Pearl, its story, its charm, and its value

The Pearl, its story, its charm, and its value

Table of Contents

ILLUSTRATIONS

AT THE BOTTOM OF THE. DEEP BLUE SEA

A PEARL OF LEGEND

ANTIQUITY OF THE PEARL

THE FASHION OF PEARLS

VARIETIES

COLOR

IMPERFECTIONS

GENESIS OF PEARLS

METHODS OF FISHING

HABITAT OF THE PEARL OYSTER

PEARL FISHERIES

PRICE

IMITATION AND DOCTORED PEARLS

FACTS AND FANCIES

PEARLS IN LITERATURE

GLOSSARY

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF PEARLS AND SHELLS FROM THE VARIOUS FISHERIES

INDEX

Отрывок из книги

Wallis Richard Cattelle

Published by Good Press, 2021

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From that day, when the fishermen dived for the chank, they sought also for shells like unto that in which the King's pearl was found, and after great rains many more pearls were brought from the depths of the sea, and fishermen following the coast, found them on the shoals between India and Kandy in great plenty. These were carried to the King, for no man dared to sell them, yet did the King reward the finders very liberally. So the store of them in the King's treasury grew, and for that there were no gems like them in all the earth, the fame of them spread, and travellers came from many and far-off lands to look upon the pearls of Travancore.

Much of the literature of pearls is founded on the statements of Pliny regarding them: many, if not most, of the absurd beliefs as to their origin and superstitions concerning them, may be traced to the same source; and though these ancient errors have been repeatedly exposed by later scientists and naturalists the poetic absurdities of the industrious Roman compiler, gathered from contemporaneous writers and tradition are current to-day, for they appeal more to the child-like human love of the indefinite wonderful than the exact statements of research, though the latter are really more marvellous.

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