ain base_, as it is called in the trade),
which totals $8. A four-grain pearl of this grade would be worth
4 x 4 x $2 = $32, etc. Thus it is seen that the price increases very
rapidly with increase in weight.

PRICE "PER GRAIN BASE." Some of the lower grades of pearls in small
sizes are sold by the grain _straight_, that is, the price per grain is
merely multiplied by the weight in grains to get the value, just as the
price per carat would be multiplied by the number of carats to get the
value of a diamond. This method of figuring the value of pearls is used
only for the cheaper grades and small sizes, however, and the method
first explained, the calculation per grain _base_, is the one in
universal use for fine gems. Very fine exceptional gems may be sold at a
large price _for the piece_, regardless of the weight.

It is interesting to note in this connection that Tavernier, the French
gem merchant of the seventeenth century, tells us that in his day the
price of large diamonds was calculated by a method similar to that which
we now use for pearls, that is, the weight in carats was squared and the
product multiplied by the price per carat. Such a method would give far
too high a price for diamonds to-day.

THE HIGH PRICE OF FINE PEARLS. This suggests the thought that pearls of
fine quality and great size are the most costly of all gems to-day and
yet there seems to be no halting in the demand for them. In fact,
America is only just beginning to get interested in pearls and is coming
to esteem them as they have long been esteemed in the East and in
Europe. Those who have thought that the advance in the prices of
diamonds in recent years will soon put them at prohibitive rates should
consider the enormous prices that have been obtained and are being
obtained for fine pearls.

In order to facilitate the calculating of prices of pearls, tables have
been computed and published giving the values of pearls of all sizes at
different prices _per grain base_, and several times these tables have
been outgrown, and new ones, running to higher values, have been made.
The present tables run to $50 per grain base.

There is much justification for the high prices demanded and paid for
large and fine pearls. Such gems are really exceedingly scarce. Those
who, as boys, have opened hundreds of river mussels only to find a very
few small, badly misshapen "slugs" will realize that it is only one
mollusc in a very large number that con