The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1891-08-27
PEARLS TO ORDER.
Gems of the Ocean Of Any size
Made by an Artificial
Process.

artificial means is the basis of an APP
plication for a patent recently fled by
an ingenious person, who expects to
find in his invention a source OF
wealth compared with which Monte
Cristo's means were poverty. The
material of which pearls are com
posed is cheap enough. Take the
she'll of a pear oyster and remove by
grinding OF with an acid the rough
outer coat. What have you lefty
A sheet of perhaps an eight OF an
inch in thickness of pure pearl, n
precise substance which the bivalve
deposits around any foreign body,
like a grain of sand or occasionally q
little fish, that gets caught under It's
mantle, thus producing the pearls OF
commerce.. Why not take this sheet
of nacre, dissolve it in acid n then
redeposit the pearl in layers about q
buckshot suspended in the solution.
thus initiating as nearly as possible
the method of natureY III 1t were
practicable to make pearls at all IN
this way perfect mes coulY be formed
every time Of any shape desired.
There would be no difficulty in turn
ing them out as big as billiard balls.
The trouble is that h connections
thus obtained would be mere Jumps
of carbonate Of lime, lacking entirely
the irridescence which in the pearls Is
due to structure. 1t Is claimed, now
ever, by this inventor that he has
overcome the difficulty, so as to De
able not only to manufacture pearls,
but also TO plate articles with the ma.
terial a forks and spoons are coated
with silver.
Conchologist Dali of the Smithsoni-
an Institution. speaking Yesterday
about the p~racticability OF pearl man
ufacture, exhibited q very remarkable
treasure. 1t was a pearl as big as a
pipeon's egg, of a most exquisite rose
color. and the receptacle containing It
was the freshwater mussel, wherein IL
had been originally formed. Explain
alton was made that the nucleus oil
this Incompatible gem was nothing
more nor less than an oval lump OF
beeswax, which had been placed a few
years ago between the valves OF the
inullusk. q
To protect itself against irritation
by this foreign body the animal sur
rounded it with the pink nacre it Sc
GREETED for lining its shell, thus trans
forming the bit of wax into an orn
menr fit for a royal crown. The mus
sic which produced this thing OF
beauty grew in an Ohio river and was
kent in an aquarium while perform
ing its unwilling task. 1t is a species
of bivalve plentiful in streams all over
the United States. and there isno rea-
son whatever why anyone cannot
make pearls in this way by keeping a
few s'nnios," as they are called, In a
tank at home. Care should be taken
TO introduce the intended nuclei we'll
under the mantle of the fish, not max
ing them too large, because an object
the size of a pea will acquire a thick
ness of nacre much more rapidly than
il there is a greater sacrifice to be COW
cred.
1t seems rather curious that this
method of making pearls should not
have proved a commercial success IN
Europe. where it has been known for
more than TWO centuries. Llnn@us,
the famous naturalist, received knight
hood in 1857 for his discovery of the
process, but the trouble appears to be
that it is too slow to be satisfactory as
a means of turning out pearls on any
scale for market.
Nevertheless. it is surely very inter
esting as illustrating the only real
! success which man has thus far
achieved in manufacturing gems after
natures own methods. The rubies
| obtained recently in Paris by melting
together ruby sparks which SO
alarmed'the French jewelers. that they
secured the passage of a law prohibit
ing their fabrication, are but imita-
| tions effectively crystalized, while
| the almost microscopic diamonds
which Professor Maskelyne claimed
| to have produced in the laboratory a
few years ago are nov believed by
chemists 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 sa CHI i p'ang place in
side the shells small figures of Bud
dha, cut out of very thin lead foil.
These are soon made part of the shell
itself, by being covered Owe with a
deposit of nacre, and the valves thus
| adorned with sacred pictures in relief
are sold by the willy priests to pill
grims, who suppose them to be of
miraculous origin Washington Star.
She Is Turning to Bone.
Mrs. Mollie Hughes, a highly re-
spected widow lady, living near
Camerville, Ida, is afflicted with a
unique and distressing disease. Little
by little the flesh of her entire body
is turning to solid bone, or in other
words, she is becoming ossified. The
disease was first noticed IN 1886 when
Mrs. Hughes was Miss Duychink, OF
Canyon Rapids. At that time only q
single finger was affected. Within q
month after the time when Miss Duy-