eral
favorite. Its enduring and unassailable purity, and the blazing
splendor of its reflective and dispersive powers, are universally
attractive, and to these the magnificence of exalted and ancient
associations add a glamour which predisposes the beholder to yield to
it royal honors.
In
these days of abundance, when the young woman who earns her living
would regard the linen of ancient queens as too coarse for ordinary
wear, and the " fine raiment " of the Bible would be regarded with
derision; when the sons and daughters of labor bedeck themselves with
jewels reserved by the imperial edict of Rome for patricians, and the
only reservation which guards them is the price, it is difficult to
fully realize the feeling with which people in the old times looked
from afar upon the effulgence of the diamond, or to awaken the
imaginations which then clustered about the name.
In
those old days the diamond was the associate of might. Where it shone,
lay the power to kill or make rich. Men trembled at the frowns of one
who wore diamonds, for they were a sign that he was the lord of men. To
the onlooker there was mystery in the light that shot from under the
rough skins of the curious stones. Baubles they were, but fiercer than
the tempered blades of the princely swords whose hilts held them.
Things of beauty to lie in the soft folds of silken tunic and turban,
yet harder than the grim rocks where their princely owners perched
their fortresses. Flint, nor steel, nor any other thing could mar their
glistening faces, for in the grind with rougher and coarser things,
only they came out unharmed. This invincible light of them delighted
the dark-eyed rajahs, and when
