Pearl Fishing. 107 



good cook would be necessary. The eel, however, seems to have 

 quite a differeut idea, and the drag-ging of an opsn shell through 

 the water soon puts him in motion and on the outlook. 



The using of the pearl mussel in the forming- of pearls by the 

 Naturalist Linna;us has just come under my notice, but it seems, 

 althoug'h taken up by the Swedish Government, to have turned out 

 a failure. But the scientist is seldom well adapted for the practical 

 work, and I am still under the belief that the matter is of a practi- 

 cal kind. 



The aquarium, or a fountain like that used by a late member 

 of this Society, is the most likely method of learning the life history 

 of the mussel and its offspring-, the pearl, and I trust that some one 

 of our many members will use this means to elucidate some of the 

 problems in its life history. 



A paper upon pearls would not be complete unless Cleopatra 

 and her famous pearl were introduced. The famous banquet, the 

 dissolving a pearl worth £80,000 in vineg-ar, and the drinking of 

 this costly mixture, has always been introduced to point a moral. 

 I have tried a good many experiments upon pearls to test the effect 

 of vinegar upon them ; have steeped for hours small oriental pearls 

 in strong vinegar, then in strong acetic acid, then nitric acid, with 

 very little result. I handed a pearl about a grain and half in 

 weight to Mr Xeilson, of Dumfries Academy, with the same result as 

 regards vinegar. Spirits of salt were then tried for two hours, 

 and the pearl was reduced a very little. Something must be 

 wrong in the telling of this charming bad story about Cleopatra's 

 pearl. From the value, I should say it was at least 200 grains in 

 weight, and you can compute for yourselves, if it took five hours 

 to reduce a pearl one grain in weight in spirits of salt, how long- 

 would it take to reduce one of 200 grains or more in weight. If 

 dissolved it certainly was not by vinegar. If it was drunk at the 

 banquet, the probabilities are that it was ground down or crushed 

 and then swallowed, a costly but nauseous draught. 



