CHAPTER VI. 



THE PEARL — FISHERIES OF CEYLON — THE MUSSEL — THE SOLAN. 



With the oyster is associated that singular natural 

 production called the pearl, to which there is sup- 

 posed to be an allusion in Scripture. The learned 

 Bochart concludes that the word rendered, in imitation 

 of the original, bdellium, was the pearl. This opinion 

 is countenanced in the Arabic version, and, by a refe- 

 rence to the place where it is said by the sacred writer 

 to have been found, in the land of Havilah, which bor- 

 dered upon the Persian Gulf, or Erythrean Sea, from 

 whence the largest and best oriental pearls are obtained 

 at this day. Pearls, though procured in great numbers 

 about Cape Comorin and the island of Ceylon, are 

 generally smaller in size than those brought from the 

 Persian Gulf. Those that are found in different parts 

 of America, and in the islands of the South Sea, as well 

 as those which are met with in oysters and mussel shells 

 on the coasts of France and Britain, have a milky coat, 

 and are very inferior to such as are brought from the 



