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150 THE BLACK PRINCE'S RUBY.
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of
course supposed to be endowed with miraculous powers and affinities by
the ancients; as, for instance, "the Osculan," dedicated by the Lady
Hildegarde to St. Adelbert of Egmund. Of this stone, says a
sixteenth-century writer:
"In
the night-time it so lighted up the entire chapel on all sides that it
served instead of lamps for the reading of the Hours late at night, and
would have served the same purpose to the present day, had not the hope
of gain caused it to be stolen by a runaway Benedictine monk, the most
greedy creature that ever went on two legs."
The
Black Prince's Ruby is only by courtesy called a ruby. It is in reality
a "spinel," a stone of inferior hardness and less intense color and
brilliancy thatvthe true ruby. All the large historic stones which are
called rubies are declared by Mr. King to be undoubted spinels. There
is yet another class of rubies of an inferior type known as " balais,"
a name probably derived from the place in India whence they came. The
inferior ruby is found in all parts of the world ;
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