"INESTIMABLE STONES."
THE fascination of previous stones goes far deeper than is thought by those who have only seen them in the shops of the jewellers and on the necks of women. A friend of the present writer, who visited the ruby mines in Burma some years ago and brought back with her a handful of unset rubies, sapphires, and aquamarines, has never reconciled herself to having them made into conventional ornaments, but keeps them by her in the rough to feed her eye at these little fountains of pure colour. She would probably say, with that other fine soul Dorothea in Aliddlentarch : "It is strange how deeply colours seem to penetrate one, like scent. I suppose that is the reason why gems are used as spiritual emblems in the Revelation of St. John. They look like fragments of heaven." It is a notable fact that the names of the precious stones are, almost without exception, as beautiful as the stones themselves. Few passages in literature illustrate this better than St. John's description of the New Jerusalem. "The first foundation was jasper ; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony ; the fourth, an emerald; the fifth, sardonyx ; the sixth, sardius ; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl ; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus ; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst. And the twelve gates were twelve pearls ; every several gate was of one pearl." To these we may add diamond and ruby, turquoise and opal, avanturine, carnelian, lapis lazuli, and tourmaline. A friend reminds us that the Jews, with their racial instinct for beauty, have often adopted surnames derived from gems, like those of Rubinetein the musician, and the Austrian satirist Saphir.
Dr. George Frederick Kunz, who is the expert lapidary of the famous house of Tiffany in New York, and has garnered the learning of a lifetime in his delightful book on The Curious Lore of Precious Stones, acutely suggests that the charm of jewels lies not only in their brilliance, but in their durability—a quality which always possesses a mysterious attraction for us mutable creatures of the moment. "All the fair colours of flowers and foliage, and even the blue of the sky and the glory of the sunset clouds, only last for a short time, and are subject to continual change, but the sheen and- coloration of precious stones are the same to-day as they were thousands of years ago, and will be for thousands of years to come." In a world of change and decay and deterioration, these symbols of eternity remind us that there is something fixed- to cling to amidst the clashing waves of illusion, and many • Th. Curibui lore of Precious Hones. By George F;ederkek Kunz, London;
J, B. 1..inannstt Coninsay. eat.) have held them to be in some way ineeParalty associated with the one essential entity which knows no variableness, neither Shadow of turning. There is, of course, a third and—in the logician's sense—a more accidental reason for the high estimation put on precious stones; this is their rarity and their consequent market-value. The man who has made a board of •
'flags of fiery opals, sapphires, amethysts, Jacinths, hard topaz, grass-green emeralds,
• Beauteous rubies, sparkling diamonds, - • And sold-seen costly stones of so great price,"
cannot but be moved by the thought of the dormant forces which lie -waiting to be called into action if he chooses to throw them on the market. As jie turns over these little sparks of fiery light, be dreams of the envied and ambitions, the activities and labours, even the crimes and violences, to which they would give birth if released from their captivity. More than any other kind of portable property, precious stones convey the idea of "infinite riches in a little room," and so flatter the sense of power which is dear to even the least assuming of millionaires.
The inquiring critical faculty, which is perhaps the most strongly marked characteristic of the modern age, is not content with knowing that a thing is, but always tries to find out how it came to be. Even if we take the fascination of precious stones as sufficiently explained by their beauty and eternal lustre, we want to know how men built op the extraordinary wealth of what may here be aocurately called "superstition" that has grown up about them. It is hardly enough to say, as Byron said of the similar belief about the influence- of the stars on human life), that diamonds and rubies, emeralds and opals, are "A beauty and a mystery, and create - In us such love and reverence from afar ,
That Fortune, Fame, Power, Life, have named themselves" s. tutelary and directive jewel. Dr. Kunz makes a careful examination of all these ideas-;-often curious and far-fetched in appearance—and shows that "they have their roots either in some intrinsic quality of the stones or else in an instinctive appreciation of their symbolical significance." Folk-lorists, it seems, are not yet agreed whether the custom of wearing gems in jewellery did not originate in the idea of their occult virtues and influence on the wearer's character and fortune, rather than in the mere wish for personal adornment; though what we know of the swiage taste for bright and sparkling orna- ments, fortified by the habits of the magpie and the bower-bird, inclines us to bold that the talismanic use of gems must have been a secondary growth. In the Middle Ages, at any rate, the belief in the occult influence of precious stones had come to be stronger even than the admiration of their beauties. An English lapidary, writing in the tniddle of the seventeenth century, gives an imposing list of the effects of "gemms and pretions stones," amongst which he enumerates "the making of men rich and eloquent, to preserve men from thunder and lightning,- from plagues and diseases, to move dreams, to procure sleep, to foretell things to some, to make men wise, to strengthen memory, to procure honours, to hinder fas- cinations and witchcrafts, to hinder slothfulness, to put coinage Into men, to keep men chaste, to increase friendship, to hinder difference and dissention, and to make men invisible."
Alas I if we really believed that all these fine things could be achieved by the mere wearing of the appropriate stones, should we not ruin ourselves in buying jewels and go about bedizened like the denizens of Hatton Garden and Park Lane—who, for all the good it seems to do them, might an well wear their Inoome Tax receipts as their diamonds P It is easy to understand, with the learned assistance of Dr. Kunz, how some of the precious stones have acquired their reputation for occult virtues. The world-wider belief in "sympathetic" magic accounts for many of them ; it is a form-of. homoeopathy based on the maxim that
eurOntur, but unscientifically accepting any trace of similarity an adequate. Thus yellow stoned, like the beryl or topaz, were thought to cure jaundice. Any red stone would check haemorrhage), though the bloodstone par excellence is a dark. green-chalcedony or jasper, splashed with red markings like blood-drops. We may hazard a geese that the well-known power of the amethyst to prevent- diatikenness, hitherto inlet. pained, may have originated in its reneniblates in colour to tpe nose 'IT the confirmed drunkard. But there are many Other beliefs which it in well-nigh impossible to explain; we mint euppose that, like the immortal Topsy, they "growed.4 There seems no reason in the nature of things Why the agate Should make its wearer agreeable and persuasive : the beryl bring success in litigation (what about contempt Of Court P)-t the carnelian stimulate the timid order: the cat's-eye drive away evil spirits: the emerald foreshow coming events: the jacinth ensure a warm welcome at an inn—we should pin on* faith in modern days to diamonds for this purpose: the moon- stone arouse love: the ruby guard a vineyard from destructive hail-storms: or the sapphire protect its wearer from envy-, nowadays it often attracts it. On the other hand, we can readily understand why the pearl should be not merely the emblem but the protector of purity : why the diamond, hardest and strongest of all stones, should endow its wearer with fortitude, strength, and courage: why the loadstone (which is seldom or never worn in these cold-hearted days) should make all women fall in love with its possessor. The intimate association of the turquoise with its wearer's health is explained by the undoubted fact that it sometimes changes colour when its owner is ran down, though its power to prevent the breaking of a limb rests on less good authority. "A lady prominent in the London 'world" is said to have the power of restoring the colour to a faded turquoise, but Dr. Kunz doubts this ; nor does he believe much in the reputed sickness of pearls. Lastly, we may note that the opal—that most adorable of "captain jewels in the earcanet," which foolish people to-day often hold to be unlucky—was formerly thought to combine all the virtues of the various gems, the hues of which are united in its many-twinkling light.
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