The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1894-08-27

To nave hio,OOO worth of Tiny Trihes In
His Clothes-There Is No such Thing as
Bargain In Diamonds.
One Of the most surprising lines Of bust
ness that man can 20 into-surprising,
that il, until you have time to think about
it, and then II isn't surprising at all--is the
peddling Of diamonds.
Men go about the country with from S10,-
900 TO $4,000 worth Of the costly, tiny tri-
fles in their clothes hunting for customers
in all sorts Of place where they are likely to
find customers, and they make. at least
some OF them make, good living out Of It.
And one real. curious thing about 1t is
81 very few oi I'm own the goods they
carry. They do not IN some cases even give
bonds or put up any sort of security except
ing that Of their own personal character.
They are known or believed to be thor
oughly honest and reliable. and the mer-
chants who really have money invested In
the goods trust them fully and freely.
New York man, who travels almost
continually, met one of these peddlers in
the reading room OF hotel in Hartford
some time ago and told afterward how as
tonshed he WAS when the stranger ap-
preached him and began showing his goods.
"He was a tail, good looking young fell
low" said the New Yorker "and was
dressed very quietly and tastefully no
tlced that there wasn't "A single article OF
jewelry visible on his person, not even
gold button or a watch chain.
"The only thing that looked like jewelry
was a key chain, and observed afterward
that that was made very strongly and APP
peared to be. as presume IL was, made OF
the very finest steel
"He sat down beside me, and pulling at
his chain drew out of his pocket a chamois
leather bag or purse. Out Of this he took
what looked like handful Of small pack
ages, each wrapped up in fine white tissue
paper. These lie uuwrapped one after an
other and showed me the contents.
I'm each one was "A gem There were
diamonds, rubios and omeralds and two or
three pearls, but nearly all Of them were
diamonds, and only three or four were
what would call unusually large stones.
They were without settings, and as he un-
folded the papers he rubbed each stone
gently and deity with a small piece OF
flannel.
Naturally, he was talking while he did
all this, and ! soon got very much interest
ed, the speaker continued. He began by
asking if he could not sell me diamond,
and told him thought not hut ! said il
hesitatingly because wanted tn hear what
he had to say.
4 have them here said the peddler,
all the way from $50 up to s. so, but ! can
sell you one that any gentleman would be
pleased to wetr for $500 or $500 Most per-
sons. even those who can afford It, do not
care to wear very large ones, though | have
some customers who won't look at n small
stone.'"
"Gou have regular customers thent-
asked the man from New York, and he an
swered: "Oh, yes. My trade is mostly
among actors and hotel men, and | know
nearly all the prominent ones east Of the
Mississippi"
And then he took out a powerful glass
and asked the New Yorker to look at "a
beautiful brilliant he had just unwrapped
II looked at it and admired it. but told
him was no judge of diamonds, the New
Yorker went on. "All stones of the same
size looked pretty much alike to me, though
! could see that some seemed to be more
brilliant than Others. He laughed little
and said that he found that comparatively
few people were judges, but that a great
many were reluctant to own ii aud either
believed or pretended to believe that they
could tell "A genuine diamond from the best
possible imitation and good stone from a
bad one.
"'Such people, he said, buy diamonds
whenever they can be made to believe that
they are getting bargains, but as rule
they pay more than they need to- Strictly
speaking, there il no such thing as a bar
gain in diamonds, excepting in buying one
from somebody who is ignorant or careless
Of the true value OF what he has, because
diamond has an intrinsic value as well de-
fined a. that of gold.
However he continued i am always
glad to meet anybody who Is on the look
out for bargains because generally man
age to sell them something at a good price
Then he went ON to tell me that he only
carried the other stores as a sort of side
show. Once in great while he would sell
pearl or ruby, but nearly all his bust
ness consisted OF sales of diamonds and
watches.
He kept on chatting, even after | had
satisfied him that | didn't intend to buy
anything, and he kept some Of his parcels
open for a considerable time while he was
slowly wrapping up the Others.
II thought at first that he seemed to be
careless about it, but "a watched him |
noticed that he never looked anywhere ex-
cepting either at his goods or straight in
my eye, and could see that his vigilance
was never relaxed for an instant"
This description affords a very fair no.
tion OF the business these peddlers do, and
there are more of them going around the
world than most people have any notion Of
The stuff they take with them, too, is OF
a kind that it would be practically impos-
sible to trace, for diamonds, even good
sized ones, are hard to identify, as a rule.
There are cases, of course, in which some
popularity of cutting or the accident OF
great size renders Identification possible,
but the stones that could be positively
sworn to are very re.--New York News