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THE PEARL
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youth
fades from the pearl and the complexion of it is changed. And yet it
retains a certain loveliness which may well be compared to the
exquisite serenity with which the maturer years of some women are
adorned.
The
pearl, therefore, being essentially a jewel of the rich, is not
affected as others by the whims of fashion. In Oriental countries,
where the lives of the masses and what little property they hold are
practically at the mercy of their rulers, the centuries make little
change in conÂditions and less in fashions. The nobles have always
possessed the jewels of the various eastern countries and the fashion
continues through generations and dynasties, to accumuÂlate and hold
them until some stronger power takes them away by force. As the people
hammered heavy bracelets and anklets out of the precious metals, not
alone for display, but also to hoard them, so their princes hoarded
jewels.
In
the old times these hoards of the precious metals were periodically
gathered by the requisitions of the princes on the people, and of
jewels by the demands of a successful invader
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