94 EDIBLE BRITISH MOLLUSCA. 



roques, and these "malformations were ingeniously 

 utilized by the fanciful taste of the cinque-cento 

 period.* 



No doubt many of my readers will remember the 

 specimens exhibited in the loan collection at the South 

 Kensington Museum. One was a cinque-cento pen- 

 dant in the form of a siren ; the head, neck, and arms, 

 of white enamel, the body made of a very large pearl 

 barroque, and a fish-tail enamelled, and set with 

 rubies. It belonged to Colonel Guthrie, and is of fine 

 Italian work of the sixteenth century. Another, in 

 the possession of Messrs. Farrer, was a gold pendant 

 jewel in the form of a ship with three masts, a large 

 pearl barroque forming the hull, &c. The wedding 

 dress of Anne of Cleves was " a gown of rich cloth of 

 gold, embroidered with great flowers of large orient 

 pearls." The unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots, pos- 

 sessed pearls which were considered the finest in 

 Europe, and these were purchased, in a most iniquitous 

 manner, by Queen Elizabeth, from the Earl of Moray, 

 for a third part of their value. Miss Strickland states 

 (in her f Lives of the Queens of Scotland/ pages 82 

 and 83, vol. vi.), that if anything further than the 

 letters of Drury and Throckmorton be required to 

 prove the confederacy between the English govern- 

 ment and the Earl of Moray, it will only be necessary 

 to expose the disgraceful fact of the traffic for Queen 

 Mary's costly parure of pearls, her own personal pro- 

 perty, which she had brought from France. A few 

 days before she effected her escape from Lochleven 

 Castle, the Regent sent these, with a choice selection of 

 her jewels, very secretly, to London, by his trusty 



* • Precious Stones/ &c, by the Rev. C. W. King. 



