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THE PEARL
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round
or pear-shape pearls and are in good demand. Larger pieces can rarely
be made to appear other than baroque and do not therefore command as
good figures. They seldom bring more than five dollars per grain flat,
in sizes from ten to twenty grains. Fresh-water pearls likewise fetch
better prices reckoned by the multiple in the smaller sizes, though
they are usually quoted by the grain flat at five to twenty-five cents
under ten grains, and twenty-five cents to three dollars per grain in
larger sizes.
Iridescent,
finely tinted, very lustrous, strawberry, and rose baroques of large
size, are worth five dollars per grain and very exceptional pieces
bring even more. Slugs, or ordinary baroques, are sold all the way from
six dollars an ounce to ten cents per grain. Good wing-pearls can be
bought at one to five cents per grain; small wings and rejections are
sold by the ounce.
Perfectly
round fresh-water pearls of good quality and even skin are rare and
prices are advancing steadily. Good buttons have advanced fully
twenty-five per cent, in the last
280
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