88 THE OYSTEK. 



larly formed mother-of-pearl, where the grooves are 

 often circular, and have every possible direction, the 

 coloured images appear irregularly scattered round the 

 ordinary image." 



In the regular pearl these are crowded, from its 

 spherical form, into a small space ; hence its marvellous 

 appearance of white unformed light, and hence its 

 beauty and value. 



To prove the ti'anslucency of the pearl, we have only 

 to hold one which is split to a candle, where, by inter- 

 posing coloured substance or light, we shall have the 

 colour transmitted through the pearl. Curious as is 

 the formation of the pearl, we have yet a cognate sub- 

 stance to it. What we call lezoar, and the Hindoos 

 faduj, is a concretion of a deepish olive-green colour 

 found in the stomach of goats, dogs, cows, or other 

 animals : the hog bezoar, the bovine bezoar, and the 

 camel bezoar ; this last the Hindoos turn into a yellow 

 paint ; but the harder substances the Hindoo jewellers 

 polish and thread and use as jewels ; so that from the 

 stomach of the lower animals, and from the secretions 

 of a shell-fish, the still grasping, prying, worrying, 

 proud, vain-glorious, busy man gets him an ornament 

 for her whom he most loves, for him whom he most 

 honours. 



The question of obtaining pearls and of slaying 

 divers, of feeding sharks with human limbs, of the eye- 

 balls starting and the tympanum of the ear biu'sting, of 

 the pains, perils, and penalties of the pearl divers, must 

 be touched incidentally in any true account of this pre- 

 cious gem. 



