to the eldest boy, who is tacitly acknowledged as the head of this little band.  By him it is carefully examined, and then passed to his neighbor, who, having also inspected it, transmits it to the next boy.  The stone is thus passed from hand to hand, amid unbroken silence, until it returns to that of the eldest, who then asks the price and makes the bargain.  If the little man is thought by his comrades to have given too high a price, he must keep the stone on his own account.  In the evening the children take account of stock, examine their purchases, and class them according to their water, size, and purity, putting on each stone the price they expect to get for it; they then carry the stones to the masters, who have always assortments to complete, and the profits are divided among the young traders, with this difference in favor of the head of the firm, that he receives one-fourth per cent. more than the others.  These children are so perfectly acquainted with the value of all sorts of gems, that, if one of them, after buying a stone, is willing to lose one-half per cent. on it, a companion is always ready to take it.”

Master Tavernier discourses at some length on the ingenious methods adopted by the laborers to conceal diamonds which they have found, sometimes swallowing them,—­and he tells of one miner who hid in the corner of his eye a stone of two carats!  Altogether, his work is one worthy to be turned over, even in that vast collection, the Imperial Library, for its graphic pictures of gem-hunting two hundred years ago.

Professor Tennant says, “One of the common marks of opulence and taste in all countries is the selection, preservation, and ornamental use of gems and precious stones.”  Diamonds, from the time Alexander ordered pieces of flesh to be thrown into the inaccessible valley of Zulmeah, that the vultures might bring up with them the precious stones which attached themselves, have everywhere ranked among the luxuries of a refined cultivation.  It is the most brilliant of stones, and the hardest known body.  Pliny says it is so hard a substance, that, if one should be laid on an anvil and struck with a hammer, look out for the hammer! [Mem.  If the reader have a particularly fine diamond, never mind Pliny’s story:  the risk is something, and Pliny cannot be reached for an explanation, should his experiment fail.] By its own dust only can the diamond be cut and polished; and its great lustre challenges the admiration of the world.  Ordinary individuals, with nothing to distinguish them from the common herd, have “got diamonds,” and straightway became ever afterwards famous.  An uncommon-sized brilliant, stuck into the front linen of a foolish fellow, will set him up as a marked man, and point him out as something worth looking at.  The announcement in the papers of the day, that “Mademoiselle Mars would wear all her diamonds,” never failed to stimulate the sale of tickets on all such occasions.  As it may interest our readers to know what treasures an actress of 1828 possessed, we copy from the catalogue of her effects a few items.