The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1873-01-23
A STORY ABOUT PEARLS,

"A IEAhIHS,
We belonged to the same club. pre-
terred his game of whist to that of any
one else, though he invariably won nv
money. Why now, when I happen to
see MN, he is always on the other side
OIL the street, or just turning round the
corner cannot imagine. What I am
". TW.rltlng about happened some years ago.
iG ~ was Summer afternoon when I met
clap Won Trap in the park. "Here, {"
SAID he to me, "is the chance 7 have
oeen waiting for some time that of see
ing you again and talking to you alone, Z"
and with this he drew small velvet
covered box from his pantaloons pocket
and, opening it, displayed some ex-
quslte pearls. "Here is richness, he
continued. They came from Caiifor-
MA. Oysters-pearl oysters-there in
greater quantity than the edible ones in
chesapeake Bay. It's only question
OF how many bushels, not of shells. but
OF pearls, we want. Divers, bu-os they
call them, do the business now. Here.
take this one and look at it. 1t is not
worth more than 800. There is lust
", 100 III this box. Take this one and
give 1t to your wife, with my compli-
ments. Know the place where they are
found? Don't 1? These come direct
from the bed. The original Spaniards
used to fish there two centuries ago. but
the very existence of the place has been
lost to the whole world, excepting to
three men, and [ am one of them. You
have heard of ''La Pepegrina, the most
beautiful pearl in the world, given to
Phlip L., King of Spain. and now in
the royal treasures of Madrid, only
equaled by the one belonging to the
Princess fousoppoff? Seen the Pere-
grina when you We're in Spain? OF
course you did; as big as a pigeons egg
worth $150,000. Queen Isabella, they do
say, tried to swallow it when she was
driven out, but could not bolt it.
and SO was forced to disgorge. That
pearl is fool to what we can find. and
that pearl was discovered as far as ira
dltlon goes exactly where our beds are.
nave been waiting for the last three
weeks trying to find one good, solid fell
low. to embark in MS enterprise.
Don't talk to me about your fortune.
Here it is. We could, if we wanted to,
make pearls as cheap as glass beads, but
we are too clever for that; we will only
let them out as they are wanted; no
breaking down of the pearl market
Every difficulty has been overcome"
he continued. " There has been no end
of ingenuity lavished on matters of this
KIND. There were lots of people, during
the war, who racked their brains in
venting subaqueous machines for hui
man destruction. All of them failed
either they would not work, or the men
IN them could not be kept alive-all save
one, and 1 have secured the patent of
that one. All you have to do is to build
your boat, puG dozen men in her-I
am willing to make the first trip in her
and down, down we go, to any depth
under water, and We can sail around
quite as comfortably one hundred IA
thoms deep as yatch would on the sur
face of the North River. Then there IS
such an ingenious method for letting
the men out so that they can work under
water. Don't ask me about the air to
keep them alive with that is the first
problem We had to solve. We are not
so stupid as to suppose that human be-
lngs could live under water without air.
All modern inventions of this character
start with the idea of supplying air from
the outside. Maybe, he went on, still
toying with the pearls, "you have read
those wonderful letters of Otto Plasms.
You think L am not reading man, but
L am. He declares somewhere that on
shipboard the time must come when, in
stead OF slowing away huge tanks of
water for the use of the sailors, or even
dlstllling sea-water, something else
must be done. He even asserts that
water in the Great Desert of Sahara will
be sooner or later supplied to those that
use 1t by those simply natural but ever
progressive laws of science.
BY combining oxygen and hydrogen
IN certain well-known and definite pro-
portions, we can manufacture water. If
water can be produced, what is to pre-
vent our manufacturing air? Funny,
wouldn't it be, if that particular case
mentioned by old Adam Smith should
really turn up, that of a man having the
monopoly of air? Now follow me-. All
, We have to do is to take in q cargo of
oxygen and nitrogen. But you say, and
very properly, why not take in air at
once? Because it would occupy too
much space, and make us so buoyant,
that no matter how we condensed it. we
would never sink. We take our sub
marine boat, then, freight her with pick
axes. rakes, put our men on board, and
with our twenty-five, fifty, or hundred
pounds of chemicals, down, down we
go. Here / remember Won Trap plung-
ed his stick, an elegant Malacca, into
the ground, and L followed suit with my
cane, thrusting it into the soft sod away
above the ferule. "You grapple with
the OYSTER" continued my friend, mov-
ing round his stick in the dirt, "select-
ing only the biggest and fatteSt We
collect five-ten-ffty tons of them.
Then up we come, and dump them on
the shore, and back again We go for
more and more. Here does not, howev-
er, end the business. The East, my
boy, and Ceylon, Coromandel, and Con-
datchy We will monopolize the trade.
Then what say you to coral, and the
Mediterranean, and the tons on tons of
that delicate blush pink shade, worth
its weight in gold, and then the more
vulgar but useful sponge; and, then my
scheme is imitless in its extent. con-
e II