ANTIQUITY OF THE PEARL
the difference consists in the magnitude and duration of the processes only.
To
the child, pearls are playthings; to youth, pretty baubles; to mature
years, important gems; to age, most beautiful and wonderful creations,
and the more intelligent and refined the individual, the more quickly
are these stages of regard reached.
So
probably, in countries where they were found, pearls have risen with
the evolution of a great nation out of a primitive race, from the rude
favor of toilers of the sea, to a high place in the esteem of the
princes of a cultivated people. It is quite probable that when the
Aryans from the north spread over India, they found pearls among the
possessions of the natives of the Madras and Malabar coasts, if not of
the interior and north, as Spain found them among the natives of South
America. Having a higher order of intelligence, they would naturally
estimate the gem as of greater value than the aborigines would.
As
the invaders in the course of centuries gradually divided themselves
into castes, the gem would come largely into the hands of the
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