Manchester Memoirs, Vol. Lx. (19 16), No. 12. 33 



the night," " pearls lighting like the moon," inter alia, 

 are current in considerable numbers in the native litera- 

 ture. Allusions are made to pearls so brilliant that they 

 were visible at a distance of nearly a thousand yards. 

 Rice, it is alleged, could be cooked by the light from them. 

 One found about the beginning of the Christian era, near 

 Yangchow-fu, province of Kiang-su, was reported so 

 lustrous as to be visible in the dark for a distance of 

 three miles. 88 



The " Ch'eng Yii K'ao," compiled by Ch'iu Chin, 

 alias Wen Chuang, a famous scholar of the Ming dynasty 

 (born A.D. 1419 ; died 1495), 89 contains several interesting 

 references to pearls, some of the most curious being that 

 " pearls can ward off the calamity of fire " ; " the mermaid 

 wept tears that became pearls" ; " Ma Ku threw grains of 

 rice which became pearls " ; and : " He who cut open his 

 stomach to hide the pearl loved mammon more than his 

 life." T'ai Tsung of the T'ang dynasty (a.d. 627 — 650), 

 when warning his minister against covetousness, and 

 licentiousness, said that those who were guilty of these 

 offences were as worthy of ridicule as the merchant from 

 Syria, who opened his stomach to hide the pearl. One 

 Chinese work states that when the whale dies, its eyes 

 are changed into pearls. 90 



Regarding the origin of pearls many fantastic theories 

 are to be found in ancient Chinese literature. By some 

 writers they are credited as originating in the brain of 

 the fabled dragon, and frequent allusions are made to 

 pearls under the throats and in the mouths of these 

 creatures. In China and Japan, as well as in India, pearls 

 were considered to be in the special possession of dragon- 



8S De Grool, op. cit., p. 277 ; Kunz and Stevenson, op. cit , p. 5. 

 so See translation by J. H. Stewart Lockhart in "A Manual of Chinese 

 Quotations," Hong Kong, 2nd Ed., 1903. 

 90 Ibid., pp. 395 and 402. 



