246 Pearls, 



matrix, and lead to the production of Pearls. 

 "These (eggs) are fed by the oyster against her 

 will, and they do grow according to the length of 

 time into Pearls of different bignesses, and imprint 

 a mark both on the fish and the shell." This curious 

 bit of information was obtained from a certain Dane, 

 named Henricus Arnoldi, described as " an ingenious 

 and veracious person," who had himself studied the 

 subject in Christiania ; "and with great seriousness," 

 says the writer, "assured me of the truth thereof." 



The famous Swedish naturalist, Linnaeus, or 

 Carl Von Linne, paid much attention to the Pearl- 

 mussels of the rivers of Sweden, and about the 

 middle of the last century, devised a plan for in- 

 ducing the artificial production of Pearls, by the 

 insertion of a foreign body into the shell of the 

 mollusc. Believing that his process might be pro- 

 fitably carried out, he offered, in 1761, to sell his 

 secret to the government, but his proposal was not 

 entertained ; and it is recorded that he afterwards 

 disposed of it to a merchant of Gothenburg, named 

 Bagge, for the sum of 18,000 copper dollars. It 

 seems, however, that no attempt was ever seriously 

 made to found an industry of this curious character 

 in Sweden. "In the year 1763," says Beckmann, 

 in his History of Inventions^ " it was said in the 

 German newspapers that Linnaeus was ennobled on 



