.372 pearl Mtscte: 



which she gave to Mark Antony, and afterwards to have drank ft. 

 We must surely suppose that she caused it to be well bruised first 3 

 before she put it intothe vinegar. It was a pearl belonging to a pair 

 of her ear rings : the fellow to it is said to have been sent to Rome, 

 and after being properly cut in two, formed a pair of pendants for 

 the ears of a celebrated statue of Venus in that city. It may not 

 be improper to observe, that the elegant manufacture of what are 

 called false or artificial pearls, which sometimes so nearly equal true 

 ones in beauty as to be very difficultly distinguished from them, is 

 Originally a French invention, and is still carried on in its greatest 

 perfection at Parts. The thin glass bubbles used for this purpose 

 have their inside lined by a pearl-coloured substance, thrown into 

 them through a small tube ; the pearl-coloured substance is pre* 

 pared by well beating the silvery scales of fishes, and particularly of 

 bleaks, in water, which being poured away, the silvery sediment un- 

 dergoes several other ablutions, and being then mixed with proper 

 agglutinating ingredients, is used in the manner just described. Th 

 inventor is said to have been a bead.maker of the name of Jacquirr, 

 and to have lived about the time of Henry the Fourth. This man 

 observed, that on washing the scales of the Bleak, a most beautiful 

 silver-coloured powder was obtained ; and it occurred to him, that 

 by introducing this substance into the inside of finely-blown glass 

 beads, slightly tinged with opaline hues, a perfect imitation of real 

 pearls might be made: (for an attempt of a similar nature had 

 some years before been made in Italy, by filling glass bubbles with 

 quicksilver; but which was immediately discouraged ; first, on ac- 

 count of the pearls so prepared wanting the true colour, and be- 

 cause they were judged to be dangerous by the physicians.) Jac- 

 quin was at first put to great difficulty in preserving the silver- 

 coloured powder, which, if not used quickly, becomes putrid, and 

 diffuses an intolerable smell. Attempts were made to preserve it in 

 spirits, but by this method the lustre was entirely destroyed. It was 

 at length found, that volatile alkati possessed the power of preserving 

 the substance without injury to its colour. Many years elapsed be- 

 fore the false pearls became very common ; and even so late as the 

 reign of Louis the Fourteenth, it is said that a French Marquis who 

 possessed very little property, but who was violently in love with a 

 particular lady, gained her affections by presenting her with a rich 

 string of these pearls, which cost him but three Louises, but which 

 the lady, supposing them to be real ones, valued at a very high sum. 



