Abstract
OF precious gems the opal and the pearl take pride of place, for they seem to become part of their wearers, throwing up their beauty and receiving from them additional lustre. Our author has tried both, for he once ran a pearling fleet from Torres Straits to Timor-Laut, but sold out in favour of developing the opal, which seems to him to be alive and almost as precious as a rose or daffodil. This expresses the motive of the book, the author a naturalist first- a true Wollaston-secondarily, the exploiter of the Australian gem, which he clearly regards as primarily connected with living organisms.
Opal: the Gem of the Never Never.
By T. C. Wollaston. Pp. xi + 164 + 15 plates. (London: T. Murby and Co., 1924.) 10s. 6d. net.
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GARDINER, J. The Australian Opal . Nature 115, 292–293 (1925). https://doi.org/10.1038/115292a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/115292a0