The Seeker's Garden


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The Begging Place


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Pearls


Book Description

Pearl: Natural, Cultured and Imitation discusses some aspects, distinction, and authenticity of pearl. This book is divided into 10 chapters that cover the origin, anatomy, sources, and prices of this precious gem. The first five chapters are devoted to natural pearls, their unique features, origin, history, structure, anatomy, and source. The next two chapters cover cultivation and testing of cultured pearls, as well as their market value. A chapter focuses on the properties of various imitation pearls. The concluding chapters deal with the pricing of pearls, primarily based on an elaborate method using a base price referred to as the "unit base price. These chapters also consider other pearl uses other than necklaces, such as borders to brooches and festoons. This book will be of great value to pearl traders, manufacturers, and users.




Seekers of the Naked Truth


Book Description

Why would I spend a good portion of my time over the last 35 years gathering information on the Gymnosophists? The story begins even earlier. As an undergraduate student in the Flint College of the University of Michigan, I pursued an English major with a strong history minor-always looking for something between the two, and rarely finding it. Then in my practice teaching, I happened into one of the early experimental high school courses in Interdisciplinary Humanities. With the exciting interrelationships between art, literature, music, philosophy and history, I said YES-this was what I had been looking for. So I pioneered in teaching high school Humanities for the next few years. Interdisciplinary Humanities was a bottom-up movement. Gradually, colleges began offering Masters programs to give teachers the rich background they needed. I decided I was not tied to Michigan where it was cold; I would find the best Masters program in Humanities anywhere in the world, and go there. Well, it turned out that the best Masters program in the world was at Wayne State University in Detroit, of all places. Unlike other programs that were really just double majors, Wayne offered truly interdisciplinary classes. Moreover, they offered an Eastern track and a Western track. Knowing that I would never find that Eastern track anywhere else, I studied interdisciplinary courses in the cultures of India, China, Japan, and Egypt. (The middle-eastern professor was on sabbatical when I was there.) I especially liked India-perhaps because I had already travelled around the world, and India impressed me the most.




The Publisher


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Escape on the Pearl


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The largest mass escape of fugitive slaves in American history is thrillingly chronicled in this “readable . . . valuable account” (Kirkus). On the evening of April 15, 1848, nearly eighty enslaved Americans attempted one of history's most audacious escapes. Setting sail from Washington, D.C., on a schooner named the Pearl, the fugitives began a daring 225-mile journey to freedom in the North—and put in motion a furiously fought battle over slavery in America that would consume Congress, the streets of the capital, and the White House itself. Mary Kay Ricks's vivid history brings to life the Underground Railroad's largest escape attempt, the seemingly immutable politics of slavery, and the individuals who struggled to end it. Escape on the Pearl reveals the incredible odyssey of those who were onboard, including the remarkable lives of fugitives Mary and Emily Edmonson, the two sisters at the heart of this true story of courage and determination. The volume concludes with a thorough overview of the fates of the escapees and their descendants.




The American Naturalist


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Pearls of Wisdom


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Enter the mystical and magical world of the internet sensation ME Pearl, the psychic squirrel deity who created the universe and longs to open it up for you! Pearl is a dead squirrel who knows everything. With the aid of her earthly mouthpiece Georgette Spelvin (YouTube's famous "Opossum Lady"), Pearl has been sharing her psychic wisdom with her human disciples for years, delving into topics as varied and complex as love, money, work, health, and etiquette. Once hidden in the delightful corners of the internet for the canniest lurkers and most sacred seekers on the website MEPearl.com, Pearl's cosmology now comes to life in print for the first time ever, revealing for the masses the Secret for Everlasting Happiness, the Seven Deadly Virtues (like the Seven Deadly Sins . . . but more fun), and the Pearlestine Prophecies, in addition to a newly-unearthed trove of Pearl's bewitching, incisive, and illuminating advice that makes sense of every ancient--and current--mystery. With the same "delightfully peculiar" (New York magazine) flair that has made Pearl and Georgette sensations online, Pearls of Wisdom welcomes readers into the bewildering and addictive world of ME Pearl--one rife with Jackie O. glamour, David Lynch lunacy, marsupial melodrama, and psychedelic spirituality. Proffering new insights on everything from wildlife to the afterlife, Pearls of Wisdom is a true sacred text for the internet age--if not eternity.




Pearls, People, and Power


Book Description

Pearls, People, and Power is the first book to examine the trade, distribution, production, and consumption of pearls and mother-of-pearl in the global Indian Ocean over more than five centuries. While scholars have long recognized the importance of pearling to the social, cultural, and economic practices of both coastal and inland areas, the overwhelming majority have confined themselves to highly localized or at best regional studies of the pearl trade. By contrast, this book stresses how pearling and the exchange in pearl shell were interconnected processes that brought the ports, islands, and coasts into close relation with one another, creating dense networks of connectivity that were not necessarily circumscribed by local, regional, or indeed national frames. Essays from a variety of disciplines address the role of slaves and indentured workers in maritime labor arrangements, systems of bondage and transoceanic migration, the impact of European imperialism on regional and local communities, commodity flows and networks of exchange, and patterns of marine resource exploitation between the Industrial Revolution and Great Depression. By encompassing the geographical, cultural, and thematic diversity of Indian Ocean pearling, Pearls, People, and Power deepens our appreciation of the underlying historical dynamics of the many worlds of the Indian Ocean. Contributors: Robert Carter, William G. Clarence-Smith, Joseph Christensen, Matthew S. Hopper, Pedro Machado, Julia T. Martínez, Michael McCarthy, Jonathan Miran, Steve Mullins, Karl Neuenfeldt, Samuel M. Ostroff, and James Francis Warren.