244 Pearls. 



not above one shell in a hundred may have a Pearl, 

 and of those Pearls not above one in a hundred 

 be tolerably clean, yet a vast number of fair mer- 

 chantable Pearls, and too good for the apothecary, 

 are offered to sale by these people every summer 

 assize. Some gentlemen of the country make good 

 advantage thereof, and myself whilst there, saw one 

 Pearl bought for £2 10s. that weighed 36 carats, 

 and was valued at £/\o, and had it been as clear 

 as some others produced therewith, would certainly 

 have been very valuable. Everybody abounds with 

 stories of the good Pennyworths of the country, but 

 I will add but one more : A miller took out a Pearl 

 which he sold for ;^4 \os. to a man that sold it 

 for £10 J who sold it to the late Lady Glenanly for 

 £ZOi with whom I saw it in a necklace ; she refused 

 £'^0 for it from the late Duchess of Ormond." 



Thomas Pennant in his " British Zoology " refers 

 to the Pearls found in the rivers of Tyrone and 

 Donegal, but he evidently derived most of his 

 information from Sir R. Redding's paper, to which 

 he adds nothing of importance. 



In the river Slaney, Co. Wexford, during the 

 summer months when the water is low, some ten 

 or fifteen men are (or were) in the habit of fishing 

 for Pearls. They take the mussels from the bed 



