Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1891-08-08
Gems of the Ocean Of Any Size
Turned Out by Article.
SOME WONDERS IN PEARLS
Plating With Mother-of-Pearl Instead Of
Silver-A Pink Pearl Big rs q Pigeons Egg
With . Nucleus Of Beeswax-Curious struct-
ure of Pearls and Pearl Shells.
PROCESS FOR MAKING real. PEARL

means were poverty. The material of which
pearls are composed is cheap enough. Take
the shell OF pearl oyster and remove by grind
ing or with an acid the rough outer coat What
have you lcft2 A sheet Of perhaps an eighth
of an inch in thickness Of pure pearl, the pre-
else substance which the bivaive deposits
around any foreign body, like grain of sand
or occasionally a little fish, that gets caught
under its mantle, thus producing the pearls Of
commerce. Why not take this sheet Of nacre,
dissolve it in acid and then redeposit the
pearl in layers about buckshot suspended
in the solution, thus initiating as nearly
as possible the method of nature? If it
were practicable to make pearls at all
in this way perfect ones could be
formed every time, of any shape desired.
There would be no difficulty in turning them
out as big as billiard balls. The trouble is
that the connections thus obtained would be
mere Jumps of carbonate Of lime, lacking en-
tirely the irridescence which in the pearls due
to structure. 1t is claimed, however, by this
inventor that he has overcome the diffculty. SO
| as to be able not only to manufacture pearls,
but also to plate articles with the material as
forks and spoons are coated with silver.
PEARLS MADE ON WAX.
Conchologist Dali of the Smithsonian Insti-
tuition, speaking yesterday about the practical
bility of pearl manufacture, exhibited very
remarkable treasure. 1t was pearl as big as
pigeons egg, Of a most exquisite rose color,
and the receptacle containing it was the fresh
water mussel, wherein it. had been originally
| formed. Explanation was made that the nu-
cleus Of this Incompatible gem was nothing
more nor less than an oval lump OF beeswax,
| which had been placed few years ago
| between the valves of the mollusk. To pro-
| tect itself against irritation by this foreign
body the animal surrounded it with the pink
nacre it secreted for lining its SHE'LL thus trans
| forming the bit of wax into an ornament tit for
| q royal crown. The mussel which produced
this thing of beauty grew in an Ohio river and
was kept In an aquarium while performing Its
unwilling task 1t is a species OF bivalve plen-
| tifui in streams all over the United States and
there Is no reason whatever why any
one cannot make pearls in this way
by keeping q few ''unios," as they are
called, in a tank at home. Care should be
taken to introduce the intended nuclei well
under the mantle Of the fish, not making them
! will acquire q thickness of nacre much more
rapidly than If there is q greater surface to be
covered.
1t seems rather curious that this method Of
making pearls should not have proved COM
Rss bees snsvn in t Europe , xhere
centuries, Linnaeus the famous nat
uralist received knighthood in 1857 for his dis
covery OF the process, but the trouble appears
| to be that it is too slow to be satisfactory as
| means Of turning out pearls on any scale for
market.
Nevertheless, it is surely very interesting as
illustrating the only real success which man
has thus far achieved in manufacturing gems
after natures own methods. The rubies OBJ
tanned recently in Paris by melting together
ruby sparks" which SO alarmed the French
jewellers that they secured the passage Of a law
prohibiting their fabrication, are but imita-
tons effectively crystallized, while the almost
| microscopic diamonds which Prof. Maskelyne
claimed to have produced in the laboratory
few years ago are now believed by Chem
lists not to be true stones. For thousands Of
| years the Chinese have known how to cause
oysters and mussels to form pearl to order.
The monks at Pu ss CHI fang place inside the
shells small figures of Buddha, cut out Of
very thin lead foil These are soon made part
Of the shell itself, by being covered over with
deposit OF nacre, and the valves thus adorned
with sacred pictures in relief are sold by the
willy priests to pilgrims, who suppose them to
be OF miraculous origin
STRUCTURE OF THE PEARL SHE'LL.
The structure of the pearl shell is study in
itself. Its outer coat is a sort of skin Of lime,
very hard and dense in texture, designed to
protect the animal from the action of carbonic
acid in the water. Beneath this skin is coat
formed from a secretion Of the fish, which has
undergone specialization, so that when viewed
under the microscope it is seen to be composed
OF multitude OF little prisms stood
on end side by side. On the under
side Of the layer of prisms is the pearly
| substance itself, which is made up Of
sheets so thin that $50 of them are required to
| make an inch in thickness. These sheet are not
laid on top of one another like bed clothes. but
slant at an angle toward the surface. SO that
| what you see when you look at the inside of
| such a shell is their edges only, which. with
their wavy parallel lines. interrupt the light
| that strikes them and thus produce the beauti-
full irridescent effect. Not long ago it was
| found out that by scratching many parallel
and wavy lines across piece of
| glass, say 1000 in an inch, an effect
precisely similar was obtained, and artificial
pearl buttons have actually been made lately
without using pearl at all. steel being the ma
| terial employed Lines were cut across the
steel surface very close together by machine,
| thus giving to it the same brilliant sheen of
rainbow hues as is exhibited by the finest
mother-of-pearl OF course, the material was
much cheaper, but unfortunately buttons made
| of 1t were found to tarnish almost immediately
and lose their beauty, SO that their manufactur
| has been abandoned.
| Uses OF PEARL SHELLS.
The most valuable product OF the pearl fish.
cries of the world today Is not the pearls them
selves but the shells from which they are OBJ
tanned, which are used to the extent Of many
millions Of dollars worth annually in the man.
ufacture Of buttons, knife handles. &c. Troll
ling spoons, employed as lures for fish, are
among the numerous articles Of commercial
| value turned out from this material. For such
purposes the valves of the pearl oys
tiers are mostly utilized, although various
other nacreous shells, including the famous
nautilus, are turned similarity to account
The first process is to remove the rough outer
coat. This was formerly done with muriatic
acid, but it was found that the pearly surface
was apt TO be injured by that method, and SO
grinding has been adopted instead. The work.
man holds the shell against an emery wheel I'M
til all the rough part is removed, leaving
| merely a sheet OF mother-of-peari. The latter
| is then placed in contact with a rapidly revolv-
ing brush carrying emery, which smooths it.
and the final polish is given with rouge
Next the shell is cut up into pieces of the shape
and size desired by means OF a small circular
saw. SO skillfully is this work performed and
with SO little waste of the pearl that q shell
from which buttons have been thus turned GU,
is lett but q skeleton, with mere threads of itl
substance remaining between the round holes
Even this residue is not thrown away but il
ground up and mixed with paste of rubber OF
other substances for molding into buttons O.
the sort which show bright speckles Of pearl i,
them.
| THE PEARLY NAUTILUS.
The most beautiful mother-o pearl, unles
that Of the abalone be excepted. is obtaine.
l frorn tha ntilua which il copha1o,n1 -.