, and there became
acquainted with a pearl buyer who was stopping at that place to buy
fresh water pearls and "slugs" from the rivermen who gather the mussels
for the sake of their shells. The latter are made into "pearl" buttons
for clothing. It happened that the pearl buyer had accumulated some
twenty-eight ounces of slugs and a number of pearls and was leaving on
the same train with the author, who shared his seat with him. While we
were looking over the slugs together the pearl buyer put his hand in his
pocket and drew out a five-dollar bill which he unrolled, exposing a
pearl of about six grains, well shaped, but of rather dead luster.
Remarking that he had paid but $4 for it and that he had rolled it up in
the bill for safe keeping until he got time to peel it, he took out a
small penknife, opened one of the blades, put a couple of kid glove
finger tips on the thumb and first finger of his left hand and proceeded
to peel the pearl on the moving train. Holding his two hands together to
steady them, he pressed the edge of his knife blade against the pearl
until the harder steel had penetrated straight down through one layer.
Then with a flaking, lateral motion he flaked off a part of the outer
skin. Bit by bit all of the outer layer was flaked off, and that, too,
without appreciably scratching the next layer, so great was the worker's
skill. When the pearl was completely peeled it was gently rubbed with
three grades of polishing paper, each finer than the previous one, and
then the writer was allowed to examine it. The appearance had been much
improved, although it was not of extremely fine quality even when
peeled. Under a high power magnifier scarcely a trace of the peeling
could be seen. The value of the $4 pearl had been raised to at least
$100 and not many minutes had been required for the change. A slower and
more laborious, but safer, process of "peeling" a pearl, consists in
gently rubbing the surface with a very fine, rather soft, abrasive
powder until all of the outer skin has been thus worn away.

Of course, in many such cases no better skin than the outer one could
be found and disappointment would result from the peeling of such a
pearl. It should be added that it will not do to try to peel a _part_ of
a pearl in order to remove an excrescence, for then one would inevitably
cut across the layers, exposing their edges, and such a surface looks,
when polished, much like a pearl button, but not like a pearl