430 The Commercial Products of the Sea. 



These British pearls were well known to the Romans, 

 who, nevertheless, complained that they were small and 

 ill-coloured. History has preserved the tradition that it 

 was this source of wealth that tempted the Romans to our 

 shores, and more than one ancient writer refers to the 

 shield, studded with British pearls, which Caesar suspended 

 as an offering in the temple of Venus, at Rome. Tacitus 

 mentions pearls among the products of our island, but adds 

 that they were generally of a dusky, livid hue. This, he 

 suggests, was owing to the carelessness and inexperience of 

 the persons who collected them, who did not pluck the 

 shell-fish alive from the rocks, but were content to gather 

 what the waves cast on the beach. Pliny and others also 

 describe them as inferior, on account of their dulness and 

 cloudiness, to the jewels of the East. Coming down to 

 times less remote, we find Hector Bcece, in the sixteenth 

 century, expatiating upon the pearls of Caledonia with much 

 enthusiasm. They were, he says, very valuable, " bright, 

 light, and round, and sometimes of the quantity of the nail 

 of one's little finger." 



It seems known that Sir Richard Wynn, chamberlain 

 to the queen of Charles II., presented her Majesty with a 

 pearl taken from the river Conway, which, it is affirmed, 

 is still honoured with a place in the regal crown. In the 

 sixteenth century, several of great size were fished from 

 the Irish rivers. One that weighed 36 carats was valued at 

 ^40, and other single pearls were sold at from 4. los. up 

 to ;io. This last was disposed of a second time to Lady 

 Glenlealy, who put it into a necklace and refused So for 

 it from the Duchess of Ormond (" Philos. Trans. Abr.," 



P- 83). 



Oliver Goldsmith, in his " Natural History," refers to a 

 pearl fishery rented on the Tay ; and Hugh Miller has 



