Opar

“ I had made an appointment with Oreepyah for him to go with me to Oparre this morning; but the accident just mentioned caused him to break his engagement, he having gone, I was informed, in search of what had been stolen. ”

“ For a time in sheer exuberance of animal spirit he raced swiftly through the middle terrace, swinging perilously across wide spans from one jungle giant to the next, and then he clambered upward to the swaying, lesser boughs of the upper terrace where the moon shone full upon him and the air was stirred by little breezes and death lurked ready in each frail branch. ”

“ Even Opal's name is peculiarly fitted to her character and personality. The stone is both transparent and opaque, and nothing better describes our Opal. The last definitely heard of her she had been accepted as a princess of India, through an alleged marriage of Henri d'Orleans, the angel father of the diary. The opal is believed by many to have magical qualities. How appropriate if Opal came out of India, land of magic and mystery, of glitter and glamor, a perfect setting for the fairy world in which this master of make-believe always lived. ”

“ Hundreds of times before had Tarzan been to this secluded spot, which was so densely surrounded by thorn bushes and tangled vines and creepers of huge girth that not even Sheeta, the leopard, could worm his sinuous way within, nor Tantor, with his giant strength, force the barriers which protected the council chamber of the great apes from all but the harmless denizens of the savage jungle. ”

“ Through the trees raced Tarzan of the Apes until the darkness of night had settled upon the jungle, then he lay down and slept, with no thought beyond the morrow and with even La but the shadow of a memory within his consciousness. ”

“ Seizing the lion by the mane, Taglat buried his yellowed fangs deep in the monster's throat, growling hideously through the muffled gag of blood and hair. Mixed with the ape's voice the lion's roars of rage and pain reverberated through the jungle, till the lesser creatures of the wild, startled from their peaceful pursuits, scurried fearfully away. ”

“ This was the olive-skinned, dark-haired, dark-eyed maid who, a few years later, as the author of The Story of Opal: The Journal of an Understanding Heart, published under the auspices of the Atlantic Monthly, staid beacon light of literature, was to precipitate the literary controversy of the century; was to present in that story a foster-parentage fantasy that drew into the controversy psychologists, scientists, astrologers, psychists, editors, ministers of the gopel, literary critics, and every person who had at any time known Opal ”

“ Whole sections are the beautiful, innocent, sincere un veiling of the heart of a precocious tot in composition childishly expressive; fact and fancy so cleverly inter woven as to be almost inseparable; improbable and probable imagery told with the same naive charm, humor, tragedy, human interest; everything a story should contain for sustained interest. These were enough to have assured Opal a niche in the hall of fame, to have proclaimed her a literary genius, to have brought her a welcome from the literati. ”

“ Opal could walk as an unknown person into a gathering of notables and with a childish, naive charm interrupt whatever was going on to introduce herself to each of those present. This was not discourtesy nor lack of breeding—it was Opal.
These several traits had considerable bearing upon the preparation of the tattered and torn diary in the manner in which I believe it was prepared, upon the accidental request for it from the Atlantic Monthly editor, and upon various things that happened during its publication. ”

“ A man who had no more upon him than a well-worn suit of clothes and a Swiss lever watch in a silver case, such as I carry invariably, would scarce be quarry for the most venturesome shop-hawk that the history of knavery has made known to us. I could risk nothing by going to the house, I was sure; but I might get the opal, and for that I longed still with a fever for possession which could only be accounted for by the beauty of the gem. ”

“ These lines of light are sometimes numerous and narrow, alternating with the common opal forming a very beautiful gem. Many again, even of large size, are uniform in structure, and exhibit a play of colors as brilliant as the finest opals from Hungary. The hill in which they are found is about two hundred and fifty feet high, and two or three miles in length, and for a width of half a mile for its whole length opals have been found wherever excavations have been made. The rock in which they occur is a hard, brittle trachyte of a vitreous lustre, and splintering into acute fragments when struck ”

“ The color of the opal is white or pearl grey, and when held between the eye and the light is pale red, or wine yellow, with a milky translucency. By reflected light it exhibits, as its position is varied, elegant, and most beautiful iridescent colors, particularly emerald green, golden yellow, flame and fire red, violet purple, and celestial blue, so beautifully blended, and so fascinating, as to captivate the admirer. ”

“ I have no superstition, but I don't want to give her an opal. If her mother did, or anybody like that, why, all right. But not from me. D' yu' understand, ma'am?”
Mrs. Henry did understand this subtle trait in the wild man, and she rejoiced to be able to give him immediate reassurance concerning opals.
“Don't worry about that,” she said. “The opal is said to bring ill luck, but not when it is your own month stone. Then it is supposed to be not only deprived of evil influence, but to possess peculiarly fortunate power. Let it be an opal ring.” ”

“ Opal, with its iridescence, gleams not so perfectly soft and lovely. The azure vault of heaven itself has not the dainty delicacy of that pearly tint. It is, in a word, exceeding beautiful; and it must be seen to be understood. No man can describe it adequately. ”

“ Some Opals which are dull and lusterless when dry exhibit considerable play of color when immersed in water, and this fact seems to favor the first theory of the cause of the iridescence, but the subject is not understood. The character of the play of colors differs in different Opals, and this gives rise to different varieties. The true noble Opal has the color quite uniformly distributed. When the color appears in flashes of red, yellow, etc., the stone is known as fire Opal ”

“ The song died away just in time or Opal might have screamed. She was easily wrought up. And then this strange anomoly of a girl, her young hostess, turned to her with a natural smile just as if nothing extraordinary had been going on and said:
“Now, shall we say good-night and go upstairs? I know you must be tired after your long ride, and I know father has had a hard day and would like to get the house settled for the night.”
Opal arose with a wild idea of screaming and running away, but she caught the twinkle of Laurie's eyes and knew he was laughing at her. ”

“ Every mineralogist and man of science will rejoice to learn that Queen Victoria exhibits sterling good sense in selecting the opal among her choicest family gifts, thereby presenting a pleasing contrast to the superstitious and foolish fancies of the Empress Eugénie.
To the amateur who loves the rare and beautiful, with a feeling untrammelled by any of the misty traditions of the past or the caprices of fashion of the present, the opal is the dearest of all the gems. ”

“ They told an involved story of Opal's parentage that gave a perfect background for the diary running in the Atlantic and for the cleverly concealed acrostics in French adroitly brought into the diary and discovered by accident after the diary had gone into book form. These acrostics pointed directly to Henri d’Orleans as the father of Opal. One of them is as follows:
I did sing it le chant de fleurs that Angel Father did teach me to sing of Hiacinthe, Eclaire, Nenufar, Rose, Iris, et Dauphinelle et Oleandre, et Romarin, Lis, Eglantier, Anemone, Narcisse et Souci. ”

“ The peculiarity of the opal is that it presents a play of delicate tints. There are precious opals, which emit a brilliant light; and fire opals, which shine with a red and yellow flame; and common opals, which are simply milk white. All are lovely. For a badge, each member might wear a bit of red ribbon, with the letter O embroidered upon it in yellow silk, and the members of the club might be styled "Opalescents." There is no advantage in belonging to a club unless your being thus united shall make you better, kinder, and more helpful, as young people, than you would otherwise be. ”

“ Opal, sitting in the front pew, where she had dropped to wait till her escort should be satisfied, watched him at first discontentedly, turning her eyes to the girl, half wondering, half sneering, till all at once she perceived that the girl was not hearing the hot words of admiration poured upon her, was not impressed in the least by the man, did not even seem to know who he was—or care. ”

“ It is also quite certain that an opal would scarcely hold its play of color or compactness for twenty centuries, for most opals lose their water—slowly perhaps, but surely—within a lesser space of time. Even the finest Hungarian opals show some loss of life and color within a century or even less, and some transparent Mexican opals lose their color and are filled with flaws within a few years’ time. ”

“ Here was the last stronghold of the old gods, driven from the table-lands of Anahuac; here smoked anew those altars overturned by the Conquistadores; here shrieked the victim on the terrible stone of sacrifice; and here was the shrine of the famous Opal, the Chalchuih Tlatonac, the very mention of which thrilled the hearts of all far and wide with superstitious dread.
The sacred city was admirably situated for all purposes. Nothing could be more beautiful than this majestic work of man, set like a jewel within the green circle of the forest-clad mountains. ”

“ As a gem of the Sun it exhibits flows of fire like the sun at midsummer—as a gem of Venus its delicate beauty radiates her colourful charms, and as a gem of Uranus its refusal to submit to the all-embracing law of mineral structure harmonizes with the iconoclastic character of that planet according to astro-philosophy. Ancient and modern poets unite in singing the praises of the opal. Onomacritus, known as the religious poet of the ancient Greeks, over 2,400 years ago wrote that “the delicate colour and tenderness of the opal reminded him of a loving and beautiful child.” ”

“ He is of a new genus and calld [] of which we took another species who had no beauty to boast, but this which we called opalinum shone in the water with all the splendor and variety of colours that we observe in a real opal; he livd in the Glass of salt water in which he was put for examination several hours; darting about with great agility, and at every motion shewing an almost infinite variety of changeable colours. ”

“ The splendors of the opal are best seen when exposed to the direct rays of the sun, and viewed through a magnifying glass of low power. The dazzling scene has no equal in art or nature, for the vivid hues of the solar spectrum are here displayed with the most charming effect. The colors are in broad patches and not blended with their complementary hues as seen in the continuous spectrum, and the effects of the pure green, red, blue, and yellow, flashing forth in perfect purity and intensity, without definite arrangement, remind the observer of the brilliancy of the kaleidoscope. ”

“ Also, the seams in rock sometimes are cut so that the thin layer is exposed on a 45 thicker backing of the adjoining rock. Precious opal, or gem opal, is classified as white opal when the color flashes are in a whitish or light background, black opal when the background material is gray, blue-gray, or black, and fire opal when the background is more translucent and red, reddish orange, or reddish yellow. ”

“ They would not rejoice with pagan abandonment in the beauty of those fires in black opal, realising that, like the fires of life, they owed their brilliance, their transcendental glory, to the dark setting. But every day the opals made worshippers of sightseers. They mesmerised beholders who came to look at them.
When the coach rattled to a standstill outside the hotel, Peter Newton went to the door of the bar. He knew John Armitage by the size and shape of his dust-covered overalls. Armitage dismounted and pulled off his gloves. Peter Newton went to meet him. ”

“ But Elizabeth cherished both the ruby and the portrait, so she sent Marie Stuart a diamond instead.
Poets have lavished their fancies upon the origin of the opal, but no one seems to know why it is considered unlucky. Women who laugh at superstitions of all kinds are afraid to wear an opal, and a certain jeweller at the head of one of the largest establishments in a great city has carried his fear to such a length that he will not keep one in his establishment—not only this, but it is said that he has even been [Pg 143] known to throw an opal ring out of the window. ”

“ As it is, many want to know how a child of six could have a nimble familiarity with French yet never use a word of that language in conversation or at any other time; they want to know why The Fairyland Around Us contained many of the odd references and classical names later found in the diary when pieced together; they want to know why Opal couldn't re member at any time in her life the name of her father when at six or seven she constructed involved acrostics that named her father and all his family ”

“ In the Middle Ages the opal mines of Cernowitz, in Hungary, were very actively exploited, and at the opening of the fifteenth century more than three hundred men are said to have been employed here in the search for opals. At that time, and for many centuries after, no breath of suspicion ever tarnished the fame of the opal as not only a thing of rare beauty, but also a talisman of the first rank. We are told that blond maidens valued nothing more highly than necklaces of opals, for while they wore these ornaments their hair was sure to guard its beautiful color. ”