CiiAP. I.] GEMS. 39 



neglected whilst its owners are absorbed in these specula- 

 tive and tantalising occupations. 



The products of their searches are disposed of to the 

 Moors, who resort to Saffragam ft'om the low country, 

 carrying up cloth and salt, to be exchanged for gems 

 and coffee. At the annual Buddhist festival of the 

 Pera-hara, a jewel-fair is held at Eatnapoora, to which 

 the purchasers resort from all parts of Ceylon. Of 

 late years, however, the condition of the people in Saffra- 

 gam has so much improved that it has become difficult to 

 obtain the finest jewels, the wealthier natives preferring 

 to retain them as investments : they part with them 

 reluctantly, and only for gold, which they find equaUy 

 convenient for concealment.^ 



The lapidaries who cut and pohsh the stones are 

 chiefly Moors, but their tools are so primitive, and 

 their skill so deficient, that a gem generally loses in 

 value by having passed through their hands. The 

 inferior kinds, such as cinnamon-stones, garnets, and 

 tourmahne, are pohshed by ordinary artists at Kandy, 

 Matura, and Galle ; but the more expert lapidaries, who 

 cut rubies and sapphires, reside chiefly at Caltm^a and 

 Colombo. 



As a general rule, the rarer gems are less costly in 

 Europe than in Colombo. In London and Paris the 

 quantities brought from all parts of the world are suffi- 

 cient to estabhsh something hke a market value ; but, in 

 Ceylon, the supply is so uncertain that the price is 

 always regulated at the moment by the rank and wealth 

 of the purchaser. Strange to say, too, there is often an 

 unwiUingness even amongst the Moorish dealers to sell 

 the rarest and finest specimens ; those who are wealthy 

 being anxious to retain them, and few but stones of 

 secondary value are offered for sale. Besides, the 

 Eajahs and native Princes of India, amongst whom the 



^ So eager is the appetite for 

 lioarding- in these hills, that eleven 

 rupees (equal to twenty-two shillings) 



D 4 



have frequently been given for a 

 sovereisTi. 



