Chinese River-Pearls.
Pearls
have been highly valued in China, for purposes of personal adornment,
from a very early period. Many of the Pearls frequently mentioned by
Chinese historians, as remarkable for size and brilliancy, were no
doubt marine Pearls ; but nevertheless it seems certain that the most
ancient Chinese Pearls were of fresh-water origin. Thus, the earliest
dictionary, which was compiled eleven centuries before our era, by
Chan, the inventor of the compass, makes mention of Pearls as one of
the precious productions of Shensi. Now as Shensi is an inland
province, in the very heart of China, it is evident that the Pearls of
this country must have been obtained from the rivers by which it is
watered.
Fresh-water
Pearls are largely used by the Chinese at the present day ; and these
ingenious people, not content with the Pearls which the
