150 THE CURIOUS LORE OP PRECIOUS STONES
the
eye in the feather being the baleful point. Even in our own time, and
among those for whom this primitive superstition has no terrors, the
humorous use of the idea—as shown, for instance, in the "Dick Dead-Eye"
of Gilbert and Sullivan's "Pinafore"—proves that the Evil Eye is
familiar to our thoughts. For this reason, stones such as those which
have been named the eat's-eye, the tiger's-eye, or the oculus Beli,
always possess a certain strange interest.
One
of the earliest descriptions of the opal in English is that written in
the reign of Queen Elizabeth by Dr. Stephen Batman (d. 1584). While the
passage is essentially a translation from the "De proprietatibus
rerum," of Bartolomaeus Anglicus, the English version is interesting
in itself as showing what was accepted by English readers of the time
regarding the virtues of the opal. There is, of course, no trace of the
foolish modern superstition touching the ominous quality of this
beautiful gem. Batman writes:9
Optallio is called Oppalus also, and is a stone distinguished with colors of divers precious stones, as Isid. saith. . . . This stone breedeth onely in Inde and is deemed to have as many virtues, as hiewes and colours. Of this Optallius it is said in Lapidario, that this Optallius keepeth
and saveth his eyen that beareth it, cleere and sharp and without
griefe, and dimmeth other men's eyen that be about, with a maner
elowde, and smiteth them with a maner blindnesse, that is called Amentia, so
that they may not see neither take heede what is done before their
eyen. Therefore it is said that it is the most sure patron of thReves.
The
opal seems to have appealed to Shakespeare as a fit emblem of
inconstancy, for in "Twelfth Night" he makes the clown say to the Duke:10
9 Batman, "Uppon Bartholome," London, 1582, p. 264, lib. xvi, cap. 73.
10 Shakespeare, " Twelfth Night," Act ii, Sc. 4.
