PLINY THE ELDER. 93 



As might be expected, many wonderful tales are 

 related of the dolphin, which was a special favour- 

 ite with the ancients, on account of its supposed at- 

 tachment to the human species. One of these ani- 

 mals, if we may credit Pliny and his authorities, car- 

 ried a boy daily to school and home again, from Baia- 

 num to Puteoli ; another, who used to mount a child 

 on his back, having one day suffered him to be 

 drowned, brought back his body, and out of grief 

 thrust himself ashore, where he of course died ; and, 

 lastly, a king of Caria having caught a dolphin, and 

 kept him prisoner within the harbour, a whole mul- 

 titude of the same species came to beg his release, 

 and remained until their prayer was granted. 



The most interesting chapters in this book are 

 those on pearls and the shell- fish that furnished 

 the purple dye so highly esteemed by the Romans. 

 This oyster, he says, which is the mother-of-pearl, at 

 a certain season of the year, gapes and receives one 

 or more drops of a kind of dew, which are ulti- 

 mately converted into pearls. According to the na- 

 ture of this dew, or the state of the weather at the 

 time of its being received, the pearl is dusky or 

 white, dull or possessed of a brilliant lustre. These 

 ornaments were very highly esteemed in Pliny's 

 days. The ladies wore them dangling at their 

 fingers and ears, took great delight in hearing 

 them rattle, and not only appended them to their 

 upper garments, but even embroidered their bus- 

 kins with them. It will not suffice them, says 

 he, nor serve their turn, to carry pearls about them, 

 but they must tread upon pearls, go among pearls, 

 and walk as it were on a pavement of pearls. Lol- 

 lia Paulina, the wife of Caligula, was seen by him. 



