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CALLAIS AND CALLAINA.
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Owing to
a corrupt reading in Pliny, xxxvii. 33, the Callais is now universally
understood by modern mineralogists to have represented our Turquois ;
but this identification seems hardly borne out by Pliny's description
of the Callais or Callaina. "Next to the Topazion (Peridot) in
appearance, though not in value, comes the Callaina, of a pale yellow
mixed with green.1 It is produced beyond the remoter parts
of India, amongst the tribes of Mount Caucasus—of remarkable
dimensions, but full of holes, and of dross (fistulosa). A clearer and
better kind is that obtained in Carmania. In both countries it is found
adhering to the surface of the rocks, and protuberant therefrom, in the
figure of an eye. These being inaccessible, they knock down the gem
with bullets from slings, with all the moss that surrounds it. The gem
is shaped by cutting (with the chisel), being too brittle to be worked
in any other nianner. The best have the colour of the Emerald, so it is
plain that th'ey please with a borrowed beauty. No gem is more improved
by setting in gold, and gold itself is better set off by no gem. The
better kind lose their colour by wetting with oil, grease, or wine ;
but the inferior retain it more permanently. No other stone is so
easily imitated by deceptive paste."2
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