The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1886-06-26 00:00:00

GEMMING.

Art enterprise (writes a correspondent) in which
the general public seems entirely left out in the cold
is that of gemming. The most casual glance at the
Ceylon Court of the Indian and Colonial Exhibition
cannot fail to strike any one with the immense value
of stones yet unfound even in this one productive
island. A good deal of business also is cal ried on in
this court, sapphires and rubies being bought and
ordered by many ladies attracted by lower prices than
are usually asked by jewellers. Why a company has
never been formed for the purchase and working of
gemming land in Ceylon and India strikes me as
strange. If a few ounces of gold were to be found in
any new region the noise of it would be blown abroad,
and the wildest hopes entertained—especially by some
well-known company promoters—of fortunes to be
speedily unearthed. And yet the value of the gems
other than diamonds sold yearly in this country alone
must be considerable. From whom do the jewellers
procure these gems? We presume they have agents
in the different countries who barter direct with the
native dealers, or else are supplied by " middle-men"
in the form of gem merchants. The native dealers
again—we can answer for those in Colombo and
flalle—never own any pit or plot themselves, but
again deal through agents, whose time is span:, pur-
chasing stones from villagers up in the gem-produc-
ing districts. Every intermediate profit made is
immense. In the districts of Saffragam and Ratna-
pura the wretched Cingalese, who own small pieces of
land beside the streams, where they work like slaves,
often up to their waists in water, derive but a pre-
carious income from their really valuable labours.
The travelling moormen who command a little ready
money frequently purchase sapphires, rubies, and
cats'-eyes upon which a profit of a thousand per
cent. is deemed to be erring on the side of
'moderation. Ready money could purchase tracts of
gemming land in the most favourable localities,
and a systematic plan of jewel-digzing be entered on
under European supervision. Many of the best
rubies never reach this country, but are bartered to
native chiefs in a clumsily cut state, often to be
buried, lost, or hoarded away by some dying miser.
Many a fine stone, worth some hundreds in London
as a brilliant, has been cut into thin plates resembling
glass, changing its value to almost nil. No European
mineralogist has devoted himself to finding out from
where these stones spring which are washed down the
streams and deposited in layers of gravel under the
river bed. We cannot help indulging in fascinating
dreams of some huge matrix of jewels high up among
the mountains, whose splendour one charge of dyna-
mite might expose. All the gem pits are in low
ground. The gems become more and more triturated
during their decent down stream, until they are
termed " tusi," or dust. This ruby dust can only be
used for cutting and polishing. The fact that the
supply of these gems is not yearly decreasing points
most plainly to the conclusion that somewhere a
matrix exists. Leaving, however, these Utopian ideas
alone, the ordinary process of gemming in the low
ground is one which should commend itself from its
prospect of really handsome profits. If all these
dealers, agents, and merchants, both native and
European, can manage to make a living from the
enterprise in addition to the heavy profits made by
London jewellers on coloured stones, then it would
seem rational to suppose that shareholders of a well-
managed company might find they had not embarked
in an unreinunerative venture. I expect at no distant
date to find the chief gem enterprises worked by Eng-
lish companies in the East Indies, just as has been
effected with the gold mines, but perhaps with more
profitable results. A geologist who can discover the
real matrix of the ruby and the sapphire will no
longer need to write pamphlets or read lectures in
order order to gain an income, but will soon be heard of in
financial circles as the "Jewel King."

The wife of a—Boston man has worn one bonnet
twenty-two years. The only part which is worn out
is the elastic which goes underneath the chin.
There has been revived lately recollections of a
plan of Franklin's for making the coinage a moral
force. He would have had on each piece of money
a proverb or moral precept. On some he would put
" The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,"
or "honesty is the best policy, "A penny saved
is a penny got," "Early to bed and early to rise will
make a man healthy, wealthy, and wise," and other
good tnalims.

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

The HOUSE or LORDS held a brief sitting on June
19 for the purpose of receiving and giving a first reading
to a number of bills which had been sent up from the
other House. Among them were the Metropolitan
Board of Works (Money) Bill, the Westminster
Abbey Restoration Bill, and the Shop Hours Regula4
tion Bill.

In the HOUSE OF LORDS, June 21, several bills
were passed through Committee and their remaining
stages.

INDIAN SELECT COMMITTEE.

Lord K;mberley, in moving to discharge the order for
the appointment of a Select Committee of the Govern-
ment of India, severely commented on the action of
Lord Randolph Churchill, whom he accused of having
obstructed and prevented the proposed inquiry.
Lord Salisbury objected to the very unusual course
taken by Lord Kimberley, and pointed out that the
attack on Lord Randolph Churchill might have been
made by the Under-Secretary for India in that noble
lord's presence. Further, he charged the Government
with having failed to provide an opportunity for dis-
cussing in the House of Commons the number and
composition of the Joint Committee. The motion was
then agreed to.