THE FRENCH BLUE. 125
one
hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Little or nothing was thought about
it until the death of the Duke of Brunswick, the mad diamond-miser who
used to sleep surrounded with mechanical pistols which were warranted
to go off with such fatal facility that it is a marvel they did not
shoot his Grace in mistake for a burglar. In 1874, the Brunswick
diamonds came to the hammer and amongst them a blue stone of six carats
weight. Mr. Streeter, than whom there exists no better authority on
diamonds, had this stone and the Hope Blue put into his hands together.
He found that they were identical in color and quality, that the sides
of cleavage matched as nearly as could be determined after the cutting,
while the united weights plus the calculated less from re-cutting
amounted to the weight of the French Blue. He immediately drew the very
natural conclusion that both these stones were once united and formed
the Blue Diamond brought from India by Tavernier. He, it will be
remembered, called it of a "lovely
