Imitations and Reconstruction 219
cess,
and its effect upon the market for rubies, whether this be considered
desirable or otherwise, has been to lower the price of natural rubies
because the demand has been lessened for them; this applying probably
only to stones of one carat or less. When " reconstructed rubies " were
first offered to the jewelry trade in Paris, and subsequently in the
United States,' their makers encountered many disheartening rebuffs;
to-day many merchants and manufacturers who at first were horrified
by, and who resented the suggestion of using the " reconstructed
ruby," are complacently handling them in a continually increasing
market for medium grade jewelry. Mr. Oblatt describes his process as
follows:
From
the small genuine particles of ruby or " ruby sand " found with the
real rubies in Burma I select pieces that are alike in colour and
qualities; one of these chips I place upon the top of a " U "shaped
platinum iridium tube. Upon this is focussed the heat from two jets of
oxygen and hydrogen gas—for the latter can usually be substituted gas
from the street mains, as it contains a sufficient proportion of
hydrogen gas to qualify it for this use—with a pressure of eight
hundred pounds to the inch, producing a temperature of six thousand
degrees F. As soon as the first chip is melted I introduce into the
flame at the end of an
