“It gives out electricity by friction. It is an indurated vegetable juice, and not produced by the laws of crystallization, but by the same causes which influence the mechanical condition of gum arabic, and other resinous substances. Insects are often found embedded in it.”—Parkes’s Chemistry.
It is a fact, that to silence such objections, a great improvement in amber, very pure and costly, was announced; this was nothing more nor less than yellow plate-glass, the same as is used in stained-glass windows. I have several specimens of these “superlative patent amber” in my possession.
[8] Dr. Neill Arnott.
[9] Dollond—Curtis.
CHAPTER V.
“Nothing extenuate or set down aught in malice.”—Shakspeare.
Some instances which have come under my own cognizance will illustrate the way in which gross imposition is practised, and the public morals materially injured, by weakening confidence in those who are, from their education and rank, looked to as guides and preceptors, and causing the mind to turn with indignation from the needy, but debased and grovelling creatures, who resort to any means, however infamous, to effect their selfish purposes.
A military gentleman, of Stonehouse, was waited upon by a renowned optical quack, who, the moment he entered the parlour, exclaimed, “Goot Got, Sar! vy, you are a’goin plind; the sight is leaving your left eye! If you don’t immejartly take to my improved classes I vill not answer for the konserkences; kataract will grow on it in a month!” The gentleman, taken by surprise, tried on some of the preservers, and finally purchased two pairs of hand-folding spectacles, for which he paid four pounds. Some time after, they were more particularly inspected, and proved to be common glass, instead of pebbles, as was represented, and of much stronger focus than the eyes required. The full London retail charge for such articles is 10s. per pair.
In the same town the same distinguished individual forced his way into the study of a reverend gentleman, and alarmed him by a similar prognostication. A pair of the “clarified crystals, ground by a peculiar process,” were purchased, price fifteen shillings. Afterwards, upon finding that one eye was irritated, and derived no assistance from the spectacles, the gentleman called upon the optician who had always previously supplied him, and was convinced of the trick which had been put upon him. They were common machine-worked glasses, each of a different focus, and neither of them suitable to his sight. Their proper price, sold in their proper place (viz., by hawkers, in the streets,) is one shilling per pair!
A gentleman of Norwich, struck with the advantages promised by some extraordinary spectacles, paid two guineas for a pair of blue steel, with blue glasses, which were warranted pebbles,[10] and had the additional vexation to be severely censured by several friends, who complained that the fellow had fixed them with similar trash by representing that he (the gentleman) had said, “After you leave mine, do you go down past the Norfolk Hotel, and say I bid you to call on Mr. and Mrs. ——, to sell them spectacles such as I have bought.” This, of course, was a manœuvre of the cheat himself.