ANTIQUITY OF THE PEARL
boring,
and reckoned them of little value as compared with the European idea,
they nevertheless esteemed them as jewels and must have done so for
ages, for the invaders found them in the sepulchres of the dead, so
altered by the processes of time that they retained nothing of their
original beauty.
From
these premises therefore it can be said of the antiquity of the pearl
in this hemisphere, that it had been used as a jewel for some centuries
before the early part of the sixteenth century.
The
European regard for the pearl at this time may be estimated by the
eagerness with which pearls were sought on the American continent by
the adventurers of Spain, and by the pains they took on the arrival
here of a new expedition, to convey assurances to the King of Spain
that pearls were to be had in the new conquest. In the commission
appointing De Soto to the governorship of Cuba, and as adelantado of
Florida, Charles V. stipulated that of the gold, silver, stones and
pearls, obtained by barter or in battle or otherwise, a certain portion
should be reserved for the Crown.
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