710 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEUA. [chap. 



as play, than to the severer but surer labours of agriculture, and 

 when at any time a rich find is made, it is speedily squandered, 

 without a thought of saving for the times when the yield is 

 little or nothing. A large number of the precious stones are 

 polished at special polishing places at Ratnapoora, but the work 

 is very bad, so that the stones which come into the market are 

 often irregular, and have uneven, curved, ill-polished surfaces. 

 Most of them perhaps are sold in the Eastern and Western 

 Indian peninsulas and other parts of Asia, but many are 

 also exported to Europe. The precious stones which are 

 principally found at Ratnapoora, consist of sapj^hires, com- 

 monly blue, but sometimes yellow or violet, sometimes even 

 completely colourless. In the last case they have a lustre 

 resembling that of the diamond.^ Rubies I saw here only in 

 limited numbers. 



The precious stones occur in nearly every river valley Avhich 

 runs from the mountain heights in the interior of the island 

 down to the low land. According to a statement by 

 Mr. Tennent (i. p. 33), the river-sand at many places contains 

 so much of the harder minerals that it may be used directly 

 for the polishing of other stones. The same writer, or more 

 correctly Dr. Gygax, who appears to have written the rather 

 scanty mineralogical contributions to Tennent's famous work, 

 states that a more abundant yield ought to be obtained by 

 working in the solid rock than by the usual method. This idea 

 is completely opposed to the experience of mineralogy. The 

 finest gems, the largest gold nuggets, as is well known, are 

 never, or almost never, found in solid rock, but in loose earthy 

 layers. In such layers in Ceylon the abundance of precious 

 stones, that is to say, of minerals which are hard, translucent, 

 and strongly lustrous, is very great, and enormous sums would 

 be obtained if we could add up the value of the mass of 

 precious stones which have been found here for thousands of 

 years back. Already Marco Polo says of Ceylon : " In ista 

 insula nascuntur boni et nobiles rubini et non nascuntur in 

 aliquo loco plus. Et hie nascuntur zafiri et topazii, ametisti, 

 et aliquse alise petrse pretiosse, et rex istius insulse habet 

 pulcriorem rubinum de mundo." 



But some one perhaps will ask, where is the mother-rock of 

 all these treasures in the soil of Ceylon ? The question is 

 easily answered. All these minerals have once been imbedded 

 in the granitic gneiss, which is the principal rock of the 

 region. 



In speaking of granite or gneiss in southern lands, or at least 



^ Diamonds are wanting in Ceylon. And neither gold nor platinum 

 appears to occur in noteworthy quantity in the gem gravel. 



