io6 Pearls, 



it is occasionally employed as a decorative material 

 in architecture. Thus, in Manila, the verandahs of 

 the houses are ornamented with Pearl-shells, while 

 in Panama the cathedral and some of the churches 

 are similarly adorned. Even in our own Channel 

 Islands, where the lustrous ear-shells or *' ormers " 

 (Haliotis tuberculatd) are abundant, the shells are 

 utilized by being let into the walls of some of the 

 houses and disposed in symmetrical patterns. The 

 brilliant effect of nacreous shells when massed together 

 on a large scale, was well illustrated by the column 

 of Mother-of-Pearl shells, which formed so con- 

 spicuous a trophy in the Western Australian Court 

 of the Colonial Exhibition of 1886. 



The present value of Mother-of-Pearl varies 

 from £60 to ;^200 per ton, and the Australian 

 fisheries of Torres Straits and the North West Coast 

 and those of the Sooloo seas, contribute about one 

 half of the total supply. 



