small
rubies from Ceylon, and had spread them out over a table. When he
gathered them up again, one of the stones remained hidden in a fold of
the table-cloth. In the night he remarked something like a flame
emanating from the table. Lighting a candle, he approached the table
and found there the small ruby; when this was removed and the candle
extinguished, the light was no longer visible. Garcias admits that the
gem-dealers were fond of telling good stories, but he concludes with
the dictum,'' we must trust in them nevertheless." 42
Not
only the ruby, but the emerald also had the reputation of being a
luminous stone, for, besides the shining "emerald" pillar in the temple
of Melkart at Tyre, Pliny records the tale of a marble lion, with eyes
of gleaming emeralds, which was set over the tomb of "a petty king
called Hermias." This tomb was on the coast, and the flashing light
from the emerald eyes frightened away the tunny-fish, to the great loss
of the fishermen.43 Whether the eyes of the magnificent
chryselephantine statue of Athene by Phidias were supposed to be
luminous we do not know, but they were incrusted with precious stones.44
The
collection of works by the English alchemists, published by Elias
Ashmole, contains the tale of a worthy parson who lived in a little
town near London, and who wished to immortalize himself by building
across the Thames a bridge which would always be lighted at night.
After relating several expedients which suggested themselves to him,
the poet continues:
"Garcias ab Orta, "Aromatum historia" (Lai version by Clusius), Antverpiae, 1579, lib. i, p. 174.
43 Plinii, " Naturalis historia," lib. xxxvii, cap. 17.
** Platonis, " Hippias major," ed. Didot, vol. i, p. 745.
