22 THE CURIOUS LORE OF PRECIOUS STONES
giving
evidence that the birds have not selected these objects at random. It
is strange that the attraction exercised upon the sense of sight by
anything brilliant and colored, which is at the same time easily
portable and can be handled or worn, should be overlooked by those who
are disposed to assert that all ornaments of this kind were originally
selected and preserved solely or principally because of their supposed
talismanic qualities.
The
theory that colored and brilliant stones were first collected by men
because of their beauty rather than because of their talismanic
virtues, is corroborated by the statement made that seals select with
considerable care the stones they swallow, and observers on the fishing
grounds have noted this and believe that pebbles of chalcedony and
serpentine found there have been brought by the seals.1
The popular derivation of the word "amulet" from an Arabic word hamalât, signifying
something suspended or worn, is not accepted by the best Arabic
scholars, and it seems probable that the name is of Latin origin, in
spite of the fact that no very satisfactory etymology can be given.
Pliny's use of amuletum shows that with him the word did not
always denote an object that was worn on the person, although this
later became its meaning. The old etymology given by Varrò (118-29 b.c.), who derived amuletum from the verb amoliri, "to remove,"
"to drive away," may not be quite in accord with modern philology, but
still has something to recommend it as far as the sense goes, for the
amulet was certainly believed to hold dangers aloof, or even to remove
them. Talis-
1
Lucas, " The Swallowing Stones by Seals," Science, N. S., vol. xx, No.
512, pp. 537, 538; Keport of Fur Seal Investigation, vol. iii, p, 68.
