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THE ANCIENT ADAMAS
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witness
of the sacrilege of the French grenadier, masquerading as a devotee on
the black and stormy night when he plucked out the precious stone eye
and ran off through the British army lines to Madras. Here the captain
of an English ship gave him £2,000 for his
prize, but it cost Prince Orloff more than fifty times this sum when he
bought it in Amsterdam to win back the favor of the Empress Catherine.
The
Regent lies in state, most lustrous and precious of the gems of the old
French crown. The slave who found it buried in the bank of the Kistna
River, a.d. 1701, cut
his leg deeply to pouch the stone in his flesh, and wrapped the wound
in a thick bandage. At the first opening he ran away to the sea-coast
and found refuge on an English merchant ship. But the lure of the big
diamond was too tempting to the captain. When his ship was in the open
sea, he flung the slave overboard to drown, and took the stolen diamond
to sell to an Indian merchant, from whom it passed to the governor of
Fort St. George, Thomas Pitt, grandfather of the great Earl of Chatham.
It
was one of the largest of all known diamonds, the rough stone weighing
410 carats, and Thomas Pitt would not suffer it to be out of his sight
or touch day or night, though he was racked by the fear of thieves and
murderers. While the alarm-ful gem was in his keeping, it is said that
he never slept twice under the same roof, and moved from place to place
in disguise, at a moment's caprice, to cover his tracks. Fortunately
for his peace of mind, as well as his purse, he was able to sell his
prize for £135,000 to the Duke of Orleans, Regent of France in the minority of Louis XV. (a.d. 1715-1723).
So the splendid stone made the fortune of the house of Pitt, and came
to glitter in the most prodigal and luxurious court of Europe. It was
held by the Bourbons until the French Revolution, and in 1792 it was
stolen by the robbers who carried off the Sancy and thrown into
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