The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1879-01-24

Two little boys in Ceylon have found
sapphire weighing, says the report,
two whole pounds; it's value is esti-
mated at $50, 200, and it is, if the report
be true, the largest sapphire yet found.
Ceylon was famous place for sapphi-
res in old times, so that those who
know its history are not surprise that
this stone should have been picked up
there. A writer in the Telegraph Lion
dong recalls that the island has for ages
been vast treasure store of gems, and
that even the energetic rapacity of the
old Roman Adventures failed to ex-
hdust its riches. OF all the brilliant
gems extracted from the soil of this
richly endowed island, hardly any was
more highly esteemed by the ancients
than the sapphire. Its exquisite tint
recalled to the exiled Roman the clear,
cloudless azure of the heavens over the
Imperial City. 1t was known to them
as hyacinthus, because its color was
like that of the blue flower. Then as
now the hyachinthi were got by gem
hunters out of the beds of the Cinga-
lese streams, among pebbles mingled
with gravel.
The engraving of sapphires was
hardly known before the days of the
Roman Empire, and probably the
most celebrated of all engraved sap
phires in the great signet of the Empe-
ror Constantine, which weighs IS car
ats. When the world was young,
sapphires were supposed to possess
extraordinary moral and spiritual
influences. They were thought not
only to be beyond injury from fire,
but to have the power of putting it
out. 1t was beloved that this gem was
extremely sensitive to all moral influ-
cnces, and that if worn by a wicked
person, or by one given to impure
thoughts and evil practices, it would
gradually become lustreless and cease
to shine. Physicians fancicd it was
endowed with many wonderful virtues
1t is usual for travellers to dwell upon
the desolation of Babylon, and to paint
its site as strip of desert, especially
| woc-begonc and unfertile. But the
eloquent gentlemen who dwell upon
this aspect of the place could not have
seen it in the middle of April. The
date groves and gardens along the
banks of the Euphratcs are then things
of beauty in their fresh spring verdure,
and the plain itself is laid down with
! crops. Irrigation canals cross it here
and there and give trouble to the horse
man. No grass grows upon the mounds,
and there are patches of the level white
with the nitre which is 10 be found
here as in other parts of Mesopotamia
but the surface of the soil is on the
whole green and pleasant to the eye.
The glad waters of the river flow on in
the bright morning sunshine, with
palm and mulberry hanging over its
banks, drinking in sap and life. The
great city which counted its population
by millions and filled the world with a
rencwn not yet forgotten, has disap-
peared under the dust of twenty centu-
ries, but nature is as fresh and jocund
as when Babylon was still unbuilt.
Birds sing overhead in the pleasant
spring air; butterflies flutter about in
search of flowers; balmy odors regale
the senses. 1t is difficult under the
circumstances to feel as one ought to
feel for the great capital which once
numbered this ground. Nature does
not mourn for it, and it is hard to be
sad at the bidding of sentiment when
the bright spring hides its grave.