Victoria,
July 3, 1850. It weighed one hundred and eighty-six and one-half
carats, but was afterwards recut to one hundred and six and one-fourth
carats. It is a beautiful stone, but not of the finest color or
quality. Drawings of it are in Plates XVI. and XIX.
The
" Orloff" is a fine, clean, and very brilliant stone of one hundred and
ninety-four and three-fourths carats, set in the sceptre of the Russian
emperor. It is said to have been at one time the eye of a Brahmin
statue, and is thought by some to be the " Koh-i-noor" of Hindoo
legends and tradition. Tradition says it was stolen by a French
soldier in the early part of the eighteenth century and carried to
Europe. It was finally sold at Amsterdam, in 1791, to Count Orloff for
the Empress Catherine II., of Russia, for one million four hundred
thousand Dutch gulden. (Plate XVII.)
Another
Russian crown diamond of one hundred and twenty carats is often
confounded with the " Orloff." It was purchased by the Empress
Catherine of an Armenian named Schafras, in 1774, for four
hundred and fifty thousand rubles, a life pension of four thousand
rubles (Mawe says four thousand pounds), and a patent of nobility. This
stone belonged to Nadir Shah, Sultan of Persia, and is said to be
flawless, of a flattened ovoid, the size of a pigeon's egg. Mawe quotes the weight at one hundred and ninety-three carats, but he probably confounded it with the " Orloff."
The
" Great Diamond Table" seen by Tavernier in Gol-conda, India, in 1642,
has disappeared. (Plate XVIII.) Weight, two hundred and forty-two and
three-sixteenths carats.
The " Shah" (Plate XVIII.) was presented
to the Emperor Nicholas, of Russia, by the Persian Prince Cosroes, son
of Abbas Mirza, in 1829. It is a stone of fine color and quality, and
before recutting had the names of three Persian kings engraved upon it.
It weighed eighty-six carats.
The Nizam of Hyderabad possesses a fine stone of two
