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Glancing round this anatomical workshop (the oyster), we find, amongst other things, some preparations shewing the nature of pearls. Examine them, and we find that there are dark and dingy pearls, just as there are handsome and ugly men; the dark pearl being found on the dark shell of the fish, the white brilliant one upon the smooth inside shell. Going further in the search, we find that the smooth, glittering lining, upon which the fish moves, is known as the nacre, and that it is produced by a portion of the animal called the mantle; and, for explanation's sake, we may add that gourmands practically know the mantle as the beard of the oyster. When living in its glossy house, should any foreign substance find its way through the shell to disturb the smoothness so essential to its ease, the fish coats the offending substance with nacre, and a pearl is thus formed. The pearl is, in fact, a little globe of the smooth, glossy substance yielded by the oyster's beard; yielded ordinarily to smooth the narrow home to which his nature binds him, but yielded in round drops, real pearly tears, if he is hurt. When a beauty glides among a throng of her admirers, her hair clustering with pearls, she little thinks that her ornaments are products of pain and diseased action, endured by the most unpoetical of shell-fish.—Leisure Hours.