Some incidental allusions to this famous stone have occurred in the correspondence or consultations already quoted, but I have kept back most of the letters connected with its history, in order to present the narrative, so far as I can trace it, in something of a continuous form.

In the British Museum are preserved three thin folios of transcripts of invoices of merchandise shipped from Madras by Thomas Pitt, during his government there (Addl. MSS. Nos. 22, 854–56). They extend from the latter part of 1698 to January 1708–9, after which probably (as may be gathered from his own words, supra p. cxiv) he gave up trade. But even for that period there is a large gap in the record, extending over several years. These invoices embrace goods to very considerable amounts, shipped chiefly to Europe, but also occasionally to Bengal, Pegu, China, etc., both on his own account and on commission from friends at home. These shipments consist of diamonds (and a few other stones), piece-goods, China-goods, opium, brass and tutenague, cotton, chank-shells, beaver hats (to Pegu and Achin), and minor sundries, in amounts ranging roughly in the order here set down. Diamonds seem to have constituted one of the most usual means of remittance to Europe, and by far the largest part of Pitt's shipments on account of other parties consists of diamonds.