But hath from thy most perfect beams
The virtue and the lustre;
The diamond the king of gems
The first is to be placed,
That glory is of diadems,
Them gracing, by them graced;
In whom thy power the most is seen
The raging fire refelling."
If I may interrupt Drayton I should like to remark that the combustibility of this glorified piece of carbon is no longer questioned. "It burns," writes Madame de Barrera,[1] "with an undulating bluish flame; it will evaporate entirely in a coppel with a less degree of heat than is necessary to fuse silver, and leave no residue."
"The emerald then most deeply green,
For beauty most excelling,
Resisting poison often prov'd
By those about that wear it."
—a property which I may say, by the way, was attributed to most of the precious stones.
"The cheerful ruby then much lov'd,
That doth revive the spirit,
Whose kind to large extensure grown,
The colour so enflamed,
Is that admired mighty stone
The carbuncle[2] that's named,
Which from it such a flaming light,
And radiency ejecteth,
That in the very darkest night
The eye to it directeth."
Even Dr. Thomas Browne[3] did not dispute the possibility of the carbuncle's shining in the dark, though he suspected a metaphor was involved in the assertion that it did. In many tales of enchantment we find ourselves in apartments which are illuminated by these precious stones, and Madame de Barrera[4] remarks that the "splendour of the ruby in the absence of light is, up to a certain point, confirmed
