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CHAPTER XIII.
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The American Pearl-Fisheries.
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"
The floor is of sand like the mountain drift, And the Pearl-shells
spangle the flinty snow; From coral-rock^ the sea-plants lift
Their boughs where 'the tides and· billows flow."
—James Percival (American Poet).
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MONG
the treasures of the Western Hemisphere, which were first brought to
the notice of Europeans by the discovery of America, at the close of
the fifteenth century, not the least remarkable were the vast hordes of
Pearls. Garcilaso de la Vega and other old Spanish chroniclers, make
frequent mention of the surprising number of Pearls which they found in
the possession of the various tribes of Indians, who used them as
personal ornaments.
But we have evidence that ages prior to the
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