290 PEOSE HALIEITTICS. 



smoothness, and weight;* and finally, how the union of 

 all in the same specimen is so rare, ' that our dainties 

 and delicates here at Rome have devised for them, the 

 name of uniones, or as we should now say paragons, 

 uniques, nonpareils, or nonsuches.' He only speaks in 

 particular commendation of pearls shaped like alabaster 

 unguent-bottles (i. e. pyriform) and called elenchi. 



Everybody has heard of the extravagant value set 

 by the ancient Romans upon those two rival productions 

 of sheU-fish, pearls and purple. 



AH beforeliand (continues the same author) was nothing in 

 comparison to the purples, precious coquiUes, and pearles, that 

 come from the sea ; it was not sufficient helike to bring them into 

 the kitchen, to let them down the throat and the beUy, unlesse 

 men and women both carried them about in their hands and 

 ears, upon the head, and all over their bodies. Oh the foUy of us 

 men ! See how there is nothing that goeth to the pampering and 

 trimming of this our carcass, of so great price and account, that 

 it is not bought with the greatest hazard, even with the venture 

 of a man's life ! But now to the purpose : the richest merchan- 

 dise of all, and the most soveraigne commoditye thro'out the 

 whole world, are these pearlea. The Indian ocean is chiefe for 

 sending them ; and yet to come by them we must go to search 

 amongst those huge and terrible monsters of the sea which we 

 have spoken of before. We must passe over farre seas and saile 

 into farre countries, so remote, and come into those partes where 

 the heate of the sunne is so excessive and extreame, and when 

 all is done we may perhaps misse (Jf them, for even the Indians 

 themselves are glad to seeke amonge the islands for them, and 

 when they have done all they can, meet with very fewe. . . . 

 These pearles, to say the truth, are of the nature (in a manner) of 

 an inheritance by descent in perpetuetie ; they followe commonly 



laoes were made from an oyster-sheU, hke pinna, but smaller, 

 about the size of ' fishes' eyes ;' but when it is remembered that 

 there are minnows, and marine monsters thirty feet long, each 

 with eyes corresponding to these proportions, we have but a very 

 vague idea of the size intended. 



* He speaks of some which weighed half an ounce and a 

 drachm. 



