DIAMOND AFTER CUTTING,
TOP, BOTTOM AND SIDE.
In Europe the brilliant is the usual form to give to the diamond, and the one most admired. The invention of this particular method of cutting is due to Vincenzo Peruzzi, a Venetian, who seems to have introduced the fashion in the latter half of the eighteenth century. He discovered that the utmost light and fire could be obtained by reducing the diamond to the shape of a pair of truncated cones, united at the base with thirty-two facets above and twenty-four below the girdle or largest circumference.
Reference to the illustrations will explain the following technical terms: a, the upper surface, is called the table; b, its sloping edge, the beasil; c, the girdle; d, the lower pointed portion, is called the pavilion, and the bottom plane, the collet. Of the thirty-two top facets only those are called star-facets which touch the table; all the rest, as well as those below the girdle, are called skill-facets.
The old "table diamonds," once so highly prized, may be described as having the table and collet greatly enlarged at the expense of the beasil and pavilion. The rose diamond is covered with equal facets, either twelve or twenty-four in number, the base of the stone being flat. This rule holds only for European roses; the Orientals covered their diamonds with irregular facets following exactly the shape of the stone, as with them the one object was to preserve the weight of the stone as far as possible.
Chemically speaking, the diamond is almost pure carbon, and may be said to be first cousin to ordinary coal and half-brother to the smoke of an oil lamp. If the lordly gem should refuse to acknowledge such mean relations it can always be confronted with the "black diamond," which though an undoubted diamond, looks so very like a piece of coal that the kinship is evident. The present writer once saw a very costly parure belonging to the Countess of Dudley, composed entirely of black diamonds set heavily in gold. Being a very little girl she considered it a great waste of the precious metal to employ it to set such ugly stones. She is of the same opinion still.
In ancient times the diamond was credited with a vast number of occult virtues. Thus it was said by the Romans to baffle poison, keep off insanity and dispel vain fears. The Italians believed that it maintained love between man and wife, but we have already seen one notable instance in which it signally failed to render this useful service. One is at a loss to imagine how such a belief became common, seeing the number of diamonds which belonged to royal personages, and the state of affairs prevalent in their domestic life. In England, at the same period, diamonds were looked upon as deadly poisons. The murder of Sir Thomas Overbury in the Tower of London during the reign of James I. was said to have been attempted by means of these gems ground to powder. Overbury certainly died, and presumably by foul means, but modern science has acquitted diamonds of having any share in the crime.
There is a certain rule for estimating the price of a diamond, and singular to say it is the old Indian rule by which Tavernier was guided in his purchases, and which modern commerce has been content to let stand. The current market price of a good cut diamond, one carat in weight being ascertained, the square of the weight of the diamond to be valued is multiplied by that figure. The present selling price in London of a clear and faultless cut diamond one carat in weight is one hundred dollars, one of three carats therefore would be worth 3×3×100=$900.
Were our advice asked with regard to the purchase of these valuable pebbles whose history has so long occupied our attention, we should refer our interlocutor to that Chinese philosopher who on being asked why he kept bowing and saying, "Thank you, thank you," to the gem-bedecked mandarin, replied:
"I am thanking him for buying all those diamonds and undertaking the trouble and anxiety of keeping them safe that I, undisturbed, may look at them and admire them at my leisure."