PRODUCTS FROM THE SEA
353
Verde Islands.
’A very similar red co’ralis found off. the
coast of Japan.
'
.
.
,
f
Coral has been prized by mankind.from the very earliest
times, not only as an ornament but_asa oharm against
pests, an antidote to poisons and enchantm‘ents and as a
kind of universal panacea.
The story is told. in Greek
Mythology of how after Perseus had slain the Medusa and
had thrown her head’on the sea shore, the sea—nyr‘nphs
threw pieces of sea—
_
_
'
'
.
..
weed at the head and
.
watched
them
turn
,
-
into
stone.
'When
.
,
:,î
these
stony
weeds
.
_
.
_
were washed back into
_
.
,
,
'
_
the sea they produced
.
—
-
'
seeds which developed
'
_"
_—_—:._ _.
_
.
.
,
into coral for, as the
Ÿ
-
-
X
Greeks had observed,
-
.
;
.‘
_
.
red…coral is
soft inf
f
:
water
but turns' to
"
j" ;'"_3_°.
hard stone when ex—r
.
'
.
.
posed to the air…
.
'
.
.
ï
'
-'
'
There - appears“ to.
:
_
_
:
.—
have been an exten—
.
'
:
:
siye
trade
in
…1
With
the
Eastern
Ax,“axis of. “red coral ;
A, feeding polyp;
peoples who valued it '
.
(x 4).".
.
as a jewel more highly than
rubîes, and pearls
_
they were willing to giVe in exchange for it;—‘and this trade
penetrated as far as India and China.
The early Celtic
__
population of Britain ,and Ireland also—. pr‘ized,coral very
highly, -pmbablyobtaining
it from the :M6diterranean by
.
Gaul.
An interesting evidence 'of:this ‘early__trade,
.
Whichfappareny
Roman -Çon‘quest,: Wai