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Page 4
I most go seek some dewdrops here
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
_Midsummer Night's Dream_, Act ii, sc. 1.
First Folio, "Comedies", p. 148, col. A, line 38.
And later still we have the lines:
That same dew, which sometime on the buds
Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls.
_Midsummer Night's Dream_, Act iv, sc. 1.
"Comedies", p. 157, col. B, line 10.
The pearl as a simile for great and transcendent value, perhaps
suggested by the Pearl of Great Price of the Gospel, is used of Helen
of Greece in the lines (_Troilus and Cressida_, Act ii, sc. 2):
She is a pearl
Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships.
At end of "Histories", page unnumbered
(p. 596 of facsimile), Col. A, line 19.
This being an allusion to the Greek fleet sent out under Agamemnon and
Menelaus to bring back the truant wife from Troy. The idea of a
supremely valuable pearl is also apparent in the lines embraced in
Othello's last words before his self-immolation as an expiation of the
murder of Desdemona, where he says of himself:[1]
Whose hand
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe.
_Othello_, Act v, sc. 2.
"Tragedies", p. 338, col. B, line 53.
[Footnote 1: For a Venetian tale that may have suggested these lines
to Shakespeare, see the present writer's "The Magic of Jewels and
Charms", Philadelphia and London, 1915, p. 393. The text of the First
Folio gives "Iudean", instead of "Indian".]
Although the term "Orient pearl" is that used by Shakespeare, and
undoubtedly many of the older pearls of his day were really of
Cinghalese or Persian origin, the principal source of supply was then
the Panama fishery discovered by the Spaniards about a century earlier
and actively exploited by them.[2] However, through the old
inventories made by experts familiar with the real sources of precious
stones and pearls--though not always correctly with those of the
latter--the term "Orient pearl" came in time to denote one of fine
hue, so that the "orient" of a pearl is still spoken of as signifying
a sheen of the first quality.
[Footnote 2: On the pearls brought to Europe from both North and South
America in Shakespeare's time, see the writer's "Gems and Precious
Stones of North America", New York, 1890, pp. 240-257; 2d. ed., 1892.]
Many fine pearls of the fresh-water variety, not the marine pearls,
were found in the Scotch rivers. It was these that are mentioned as
having been obtained by Julius C�sar to ornament a buckler which he
dedicated to the shrine of the Temple of Venus Genetrix. It was also
this type of pearl that was so eagerly sought by the late Queen
Victoria when she visited Scotland. Many of these pearls exist in old,
especially in ecclesiastical jewelry, and several are in the
Ashburnham missal now in the J. Pierpont Morgan library.[3]
[Footnote 3: See "The Book of the Pearl", by George Frederick Kunz and
Charles Hugh Stevenson, New York, 1908, colored plate opposite p. 16.]
Of the glowing ruby Shakespeare seems to have known little, since he
uses its name only in the conventional way to signify a bright or
choice shade of red. In _Measure for Measure_ (Act ii, sc. 4) the
"impression of keen whips" produced ruby streaks on the skin; even
more materialistic is the nose "all o'er embellished with rubies,
carbuncles and sapphires" (_Comedy of Errors_, Act iii, sc. 2). The
common employment of the designation carbuncle for a precious stone
and also for a boil was usual from ancient times. At least, we might
gather from this passage that the poet was aware of the distinction
between ruby and carbuncle (pyrope garnet). Rubies as "fairy favors"
is a dainty mention in the fairy drama _Midsummer Night's Dream_ (Act
ii, sc. 1). C�sar's wounds "ope their ruby lips" (_Julius C�sar_, Act
iii, sc. 1). Macbeth speaks of the "natural ruby of your cheeks", in
addressing his wife at the apparition of Banquo's ghost; with her this
is unchanged, while with him terror or remorse has blanched it
(_Macbeth_, Act iii, sc. 4). Lastly, the term "ruby lips", so often
used by poets, is employed by Shakespeare with consummate art in
_Cymbeline_ (Act ii, sc. 2) where he writes:
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