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THE PEARL
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Eden, equally beautiful though it takes more
license:
Now Morn, her rosy steps in th' eastern clime Advancing, sow'd the earth with orient pearl.
In
his "Epitaph on the Marchioness of Winchester," a couplet shows that
he was familiar with the superstition of sorrow connected with them:
And those pearls of dew she wears, Proove to be presaging tears.
Herrick also associated pearls and tears though more happily as in "Corinna's Maying."
Besides, the childhood of the day has kept, Against you come, some orient pearls unwept.
The same poet makes charming reference to pearls in his poem entitled: "To Daffodils."
Or as the pearls of morning dew Ne'er to be found again.
Shakespeare
made frequent reference to the gem, sometimes to illustrate the
magnificence of wealth and station but more frequently in connection
with dew and tears. Oberon says:
And that same dew, which some time on the buds Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls.
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