DIAMONDS.

Northland Age, Volume VIII, Issue 11, 3 November 1911, Page 2

DIAMONDS.

HOW THEY ARE RESCUED AT KIMBERLEY.

Kimberley is a curious place, not beautiful either in itself or its surrounding counti-y, but interesting as the centre of the world’s diamond supply, which it entirely controls, and also as the centre of a certain gambling spirit which seems to pervade South Africa.

When the hard blue clay has been dug from the mine and spread out to break and crumble under the African sun, it is difficult to believe that diamond toaras and necklaces are hiding in those uninviting fields behind their wire fences. There is something rather fascinating about the actual extraction of the stones. The crushing of the clay in the great central “pulsator” is noisy and unpleasant, as is all machinery on a large scale to anyone got accustomed to it; but when the finally crushed stuff comes pouring out of the huge machine and is thrown in little handfuls upon the sloping tables, down which it is washed by running water, the spirit of “shikar” of the chase, enters into

As you stand by the side of one of the tables and watch, you see the little throbbing shallow stream carrying down bits of iron pyrites and other matter, which slide or roll into a receptacle at the bottom of the table. The tables are covered with a coating of grease, but it does not seem able, as a rule, to bold these against the slight force of the water. Suddenly a little whitish object drops upon the top of the table with the rest of the handful, turns over, and sticks, the water running round it but failing to dislodge it. You look closely and see that it is a diamond—a clean, regularly shaped, eight-sided figure, with one flat side lying against the slope. The smoothness of its surface or some other quality makes it cling to the grease, and the water fails to move it. A certain proportion of the rubbish also sticks.

After various processes the selected crushings are finally picked over by hand. I was invited to sit down before a long table, not greased or sloped, and a sheet of paper was put down before me. Upon this was poured a handful of blackish stuff, and with a little pair of pincers I set to work to pick out the diamonds. As a rule it was easy, as they were of fair size, quite regular in shape, and colourless, or very slightly tinged with yellow. In a minute or two I had twenty. But the stones are often irregular, or small or coloured, and then the work requires the skill of an expert ; and even an expert’s eye is apt to get tired and overlook some of the stones.—Sir Mortimer Durand, in “Blackwood’s Magazine.”