CHAPTER XVIII 



THE TOMB OF PEARL 



Before me, on the table at which I work in my 

 laboratory, lie four pearl shells. The name is commonly 

 used to denote the large, thick, almost flat valves of 

 the shells of pearl oysters which are eagerly sought 

 because of the pearls they sometimes contain, and 

 for the mother-of-pearl of which they themselves are 

 composed. Although the shells of other molluscs are 

 also made of mother-of-pearl, and therefore deserve 

 the same name, especially since they are sometimes 

 used in the same way, in this particular case the shell 

 has a beauty, a compactness and size which give it a 

 genuine superiority. The more so, because the pearl 

 oysters, which live in the warm seas, often gather in 

 large beds, like the oysters we eat, settle beside one 

 another, and thereby offer fishermen an opportunity 

 which they are not slow to take. 



These four shells, which have come from the 

 Caribbean Sea, where the pearl oyster beds are keenly 

 exploited, do not differ in any essential particular 

 from those we see in seaside shops with a picture 

 painted inside them. They have two faces, one 

 bulging slightly, which is the outer part when the 

 oyster is alive, greyish in colour and rather dull; the 

 other, inside, hollowed out, with the naked mother-of- 

 pearl, white and sparkling, glittering exquisitely. But, 

 on this pearly side, there is a special thickening not 

 found elsewhere, a conspicuous, rounded, winding 

 band, also made of mother-of-pearl. These four 

 shells, selected because of that band from thousands 

 of others, all have it, but it differs in size and shape. 

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