90 Beautiful Shells. 



recorded of one ricli molliisk^ tliat tliore were found 

 in liis possession no less than one hundred and fifty 

 precious jewels ; he must have been a miser^ or 

 perhaps he had taken them in pledge from his less 

 provident neighbours. 



From the earliest time, pearls have been con- 

 sidered as valuable ornaments ; they are mentioned 

 in the book of Job (see chap, xxviii. verse 18), 

 and are often alluded to by Greek and Eoman 

 writers. Various attempts have been made to 

 imitate them, and one mode of producing them, 

 practised, it is said, more than a thousand years 

 ago, is still carried on in China. In the shells of 

 Pearl Oysters, holes are bored, into which pieces of 

 iron are introduced ; these wounding and irritating 

 the animal, cause it to deposit coat upon coat of 

 pearly matter over the wounded part, and so the 

 pearl is formed. Artificial pearls are made of 

 hollow glass globules or little globes, covered on 

 the inside with a liquid called pearl-essence, and 

 filled up with white wax. Historians speak of an 

 ancient traffic in native pearls carried on by this 

 country; and in modern times, British pearls of 

 considerable value have been discovered — one not 

 many years since, by a gentleman who was eating 

 oysters at Winchester, was valued at two hundred 



