A CHAPTER ON DlAMaND^. 



45 



Some Frencli authors, as Duter.s and Bonare, give a different 

 versjk^n of this story. They say that the diamond was one of 

 tiuo eves of a Malabarian idol, named Sheringham ; and that a 

 French grenadier, who had deserted from the Indian service, con- 

 trived so well as to become one of the priests of that idol, from 

 which he had the opportunity to steal its eye. He then ran away 

 to the English At Trichinapeuty, and thence to Madras. A ship 

 captain bought it for twenty thousand rupees ; afterwards a Jew 

 gave seventeen or eighteen thousand pounds sterhng for it ; at 

 last, a Greek merchant, named Gregory Saffras, offered it for sale 

 at Amsterdam, in 1776, and Prince Orloff made the acquisition 

 for his sovereign, the empress. The absurdity of the first part of 

 this story is manifest on the face of it; for it is not likely that a 

 French grenadier could have successfully personated the character 

 of a Braminical priest.^ 



The diamond sold at Amsterdam is described by Murray as be- 

 ing of the size of a pigeon's egg, and of a flattened oval form — a 

 faultless and perfect gem — its weight, 179 carats. This diamond 

 is also referred to in a letter from the Hague, dated 2d January, 

 1776, quoted by Boyle in the "Museum Britanicum :" — "We 

 learn from Amsterdam that Prince Orloff made one day's stay in 

 that city, where he bought a very large brilliant, for the empress, 

 his sovereign, for which he paid to a Persian merchant there the 

 sum of 1,400,000 Dutch florins. 



The Pitt, or Pegent, diamond, was purchased by Thomas Pitt, 

 Esq.. grandfather of the Right Hon. William Pitt, when governor 

 of Fort St. George, Madras, who obtained it for 12,500/.; the 

 sum of 20,000/. having been first asked for it. It was purchased 

 by the Regent Duke of Orleans, during the minority of Louis XV., 

 in the year 1748, for 135,000/. Its weight is 131 carats, (Blon- 

 deau says 136f) ; its value, as estimated by a commission of jew- 

 ellers in 1791, is twelve million of francs. It is the prime orna- 

 ment of the crown jewels of France. The kings wore it 

 in their hrits ; ISTapoleon Bonaparte had it fixed in the pom- 



* In tVni Journal des Savans for July, 1774, is inserted an extract from 

 the letter of a Frenc^li missidnary . to the lollowing effect That one of 

 the principal diamonds of France, and which was purchased of an English- 

 man, was one of the eyes of the god Juggernaut, placed in a pagoda at 

 Chandernagar, in Bengal" This is ancther version of the history of the 

 Russian diamond. 



