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XXVI.
THE TAVERNIER BLUE DIAMOND.
A
Precious Colour in Diamonds—"D'un Beau Violet"— Famous Mines in History
and Tradition—Misfortune follows Tavernier—The Old Idea of Great
Diamonds being Unlucky—One Stone with a Treble History.
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HIS
stone is described as "D'un beau violet," and at once attracts the
attention of every connoisseur. There are diamonds of a blue sapphire hue,
and one of a ruby red, which are of high value ; there are also green,
white olive, black, yellow, and fire-coloured ; but the red and blue
are the rarest of all natural productions. An affluent of the Coleroon
somewhat north of the Palqhat Pass in the South-Western Ghauts is said
to be the locality where this unique specimen was found.
It
must strike students as very wonderful that the places in which great
diamonds were said to be discovered are not the extensive mines at the
base of the Neela-Mulla mountains, in the vicinity of the Krishna and
Pomart rivers, where a hundred thousand miners, labourers,
and merchants dwelt in the time of Methold ; nor the mines of Golconda,
described by Jean Baptiste Tavernier ; nor those of Raulconda; rior the
Gani or Coloor, seven days journey from the same capital, where, in
Tavernier's time, sixty thousand labourers were at work, and where, we are
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