The Lost Diamonds of the Orange River.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 897, 10 May 1889, Page 9

The Lost Diamonds of the Orange River.

(By H. A. Brtdek.) I. Many are the stories told at the outspan fires of the South African transport riders, some weird, some romantic, some of native wars, Borne of fierce encounters with the wild beasts of the land. Offceh' as X' travelled with my friends up-coUntry we stopped to have a chat with these rugged people, and some Strange and Interesting' information was obtained In this way..‘. The; transport

lider— the carrier df Africa - with hi 3 stout waggon and span of oxen travels year after year ovet the rough roads of Cape Colinly, and far beyond, in all directions, and is constantly encountering all sorts and conditions of men, white, black, and off-coloured ; and in his wanderings oi over his evening campfire he picks up great store of legend and adventure from the passing hunters, explorers, and traders. One night, after a day’s journey through the Bush-veldt, we lay at a farmhouse near which was a public outspan. At this outspan two transport riders were sitting snugly over their evening meal. They seemed a couplo of cheery good fellows, one an English Africander, the other an Englishman, an old University man, and well read, as we afterwards discovered, and nothing would suit them but that we should joiu them and take pot-luck. Supper finished, some good old Cango (the .best home-manufactured brandy of the Cape, made in the Outshoorn district) was produ sed, pipes lighted, and then we began to ■yarn.’ For an hour or more we talked upon a variety of topics—old days in England, the voyage to the Cape, the Colony, its prospacts, and its sport. ‘’Tis strange,’ said one of onr number, ‘how little is known of the Orange River at all events west of tho Falls. I don’t think I ever met a man who had been down it. One would think the Colonists would know something of their northern boundary ; as a matter of fact they don’t.’ ’ • Ah ! talking of the Orange River reminds me,’ said the younger of the transport riders, the ex-Oxonian, and the younger of the twoj ‘of a most extraordinary yarn I heard from a man I fell in with some years back, stranded in the 44 thirst-land ” north-west of Shoahong. Poor chap ! he was in a sorry plight. He was an English gentleman, who for years had, from sheer love of sport and a wild life, been hunting big game in the interior. That season he had stayed too late on the Chobe River, near where it runs into the Zambesi, and with most of his people had got fever badly. They had had a disastrous trek out, losing most of their oxen and all their horses; and when I came across them they were stack fast in the doorst-land (thirst-land), unable to move forward or back. For two and a half days they had been without water ; and from being in bad health to begin with, hadn’t half a chance ; and if I had not stumbled upon thorn, they must all have been dead within fifteen hours. I had luckilv some Water in my vatjes, and managed to pull them round ; and that night, leaving their waggon in the desert, in hope of being saved subsequently, and taking as nnich°of the ivory and valuables as we could manage, and Mowbray’s (the Englishman’s) guns and ammunition, we made a good trek, and reached water on the afternoon of the next day. I never saw a mau so grateful as Mowbray. During the short time 1 knew him I found him one of the best fellows and most delightful companions I ever met. I dosed him with quinine, and pulled him together till we got to Shoshong ; but before we had got half-way down to Griqualand, Mowbray suddenly grew worse, and died one evening in my waggon just at sunset. We buried him under a kameel-doorn tree, covering tbe grave with heavy stones, and fencing it strongly with thorns, to keep away the jackals and hyenas. ‘Many and many a talk I had with poor Mowbray before he died. One evening in particular, as we sat before the eamp-fire on the dewless ground, where I had propped him up, and made him comfortable, he told me a most strange story, a story so wonder, ful that most people would look unon it as wildly improbable. He began in this way : Felton, you have been a kind friend to me —kind and tender as any woman, and I feel I owe yon more than I am ever likely to repay. Yet, if you want wealth I believe I can put it in your way. Do you know the northern bank of the Orange River, botween the Great Falls aud the sea ? No, I don’t suppose yon do, for very few people have ever trekked down it ; still fewer have ever got down to the water from the great walls of desolate and precipitous mountain that environ its course ; and except myself and. two others, neither of whom can reveal its : ' •- -r 'i9. ' ; ft-

whereabouts, I believe no mortal soul upon this earth has ever set eyes upon the place I am going to tell you about. Listen ! In 1871, about the time tho Diamond Fields were discoveied and people began to flock to Griqualand West, I was rather bitten with the mania, and for some months worked like a nigger on tbe Fields. During that time I got to know a good deal about stones. I soon tired of tho life, however, and finally sold my claim aud what diamonds I had acquired, fit ed up a waggon, gather, d together some native servants, and trekked again for those glorious hunting-grounds of the intetioV, glad enough to resume my old and ever-dharhiiflg life; Amongst my servants was a little Bushmdn, Hlafas by name, whom I afterwards found a perfect treasure at spooring and hunting. Like all true Rushmen, he was dauntlese as a wounded lion, and determined as a rhinoceros, which is sayiug a good deal. I suppose Klaas had ba’d more varied expedience of Sotith African life than auy native 1 ovei met. Originally, ho had come as a child from tho borders of the Orange River, where he had been taken prisoner in a Boer foray, in which nearly all his relations were shot down. He had then been 4 apprenticed ’ in the family of one of his captors, where he had acquired a certain knowledge of semi-civilised life. From the Boer family of the bapk country ho had sub sequently drifted farther down into the Colony, and thence into an elephant hunter’s retinue. The western Orange River and its mysteries—for it is a mysterious region—he knew, as I afterwards disco rered, better than any man in the world. Well, we trekked up to Matabeleland, anti after some trouble got permission to hunt there ; and a fine time we had, getting a quantity of ivory, and magnificent sport among lions, elephants, buffalo, rhinoceros, aud all manner of smaller game. Klaas, who was sometimes u bit too venturesome, got caught oue day in the open by a black rhinoceros, a savage old bull. The old brute charged and slightly tossed him once, making a nasty gash in his thigh, but not fairly getting hia horn under him ; aud was just turning to finish the poor little beggar, when I luckily nicked in. I had seen the business, and had had time to rush ont on to the plain, and just as Bor6Ub charged at poor Klaas to finish him off as he lay, I got up within forty yards, let drive, and, as iuok would have it, dropped him with a *SOO express bullet behind the shoulder. Even then, the fierce brute recovered himself, and tried to charge me in turn ; but he was now disabled, and I soon settled his game. After that episode, Klaas proved himself about tlie only grateful native I ever heard of, aud seem;d as if ho couldn’t do enough for me. Sometime after he had got over his wound, he came to me aud said:—‘Sieur! you said one day that you would like to know whether there are any diamonds anywhere else than at New Rush (as Kimberley was then called). Well, sieur, I have been working at New Rush, and I know what diamonds are like, and I can tell you whe-e you can find a 3 many of them in a week’s searoh as you may like to pick up.’ 4 What do j on mean, Klaas ? ’ said I, turning sharply round to see if the Bushman was joking. But on the contrary, Klaas’ little weazened monkey face wore an expression perfectly serious, and apparently truthful. 4 Ja, sieur, it is truth. If yo will so trek with mo to the Groot (Orange) Rivier, three or four days beyond the Falls, I will show you a place where there are hundreds and hundreds of diamonds, big ones, too, many of them, to be found lying about in the gravel, f have played with them, and with other mooi steins too, often and often as a boy, when I used to poke about here and there up and down the Groot Rivier. My father and grandfather lived near the place I Bpeak of; and I know the way to the valley where these diamonds are well, though no one but myself knows of them ; for I found them by obauce, and, Belfish-like, never told of my child’s secret. I wil tako you to the place, if you like.’ ‘Are you really speaking truth, Klaas?’ aaid I, severely. 4 Ja, ja 1 sieur ; I am, I am ! ’ he earnestly and vehemently reiterated. ‘Well; Klaas,’ said I at last, ‘I believe you; and we’ll trek down to the Orange River, and see this wonderful diamond valley of yours.’ Shortly after this conversation, we came back to Shoshong, where I sold my ivory ; and then, with empty waggon and oxen refreshed by a good rest, set our faces for the river. From Shoshong in Bamangwato we went straight away across the southeastern corner of the Kalahari in an oblique direction pointing south-west. It was a frightfully waterless and tedious journey, especially after passing the Langeberg, which we kept on our left hand. Towards the end of the journey we found no water at a fountain where we had expected to obtain it, and thereby lost four out of twenty-two oxen (for I had six spare ones) ; and at last, after trekking over a burning ond most broken country, we were beyond measure thankful to strike the river some way below the Great Falls. Klaas had led us to a most lovely spot, where the ground slopes gradually to the river—the only place for perhaps thirty or forty miles where the water, shut in by mighty mountain walls, can be approached—and where we could rest aDd refresh ourselves and onr oxen. - Here* we stopped four days. It was a perfect resting; plaoe. Down the banks of the river, and following its course, grew charming avenue? of willows, mimosa, and bastard ebony. Tws or three islands densely clothed with bush and greenery dotted the broad and shining bosom of the mighty stream. Hippopotami wallowed quietly in the flood, and fish were plentiful. The mimosa was now in full bloom, and the sweet fragrance of its yellow flowers everywhere perfumed the air as we strolled by the river’B brim. I had some old scraps of fishing-tackle with mo ; and having cut myself a rod from a willow-tree, I employed some of my spare time in catching fish, and had, for South Africa—which, as you know, is not a great angling country—capital sport. The fish captured were a kind of fiat-bended barbel, fellows with dark greenish-olive backs and white bellies ; and I caught thorn with scraps of meat, bees, grasshoppers, anything I could get hold of, as fast as I could pull themjputr, for an hour or two at a time, it

After the parching atid ipont harassing trek arrows the desert, our £r./! I »mptiienS gemnp.fi a terrestrial paradise. The gi/foeSE* fowls called cons’ ant,iy with pieman 6 metallic voices from among the treeß that margined the river, and furnished capital banquet? when required. Other feathered game and small antelopes were plentiful. At nieht, na I lay in my wnggon contentedly looking into the starry blue, studded with a million points of fire, and mildly admiring the glorious effulgence of tub greater constellations. I began to conjure tip all no’rts of dreams of the future, of which the basis tint] foundations were plies of diamonds cuncui from Klaas’ wondrous valley. Having recruited from the desert joirney, and men and beasts, being in good heart and fettle we presently started away down the river for tlie v’alley of diamonds. I had, besides Klaas, foui other mon as drivers, voer-loopers, and tjftef-ri'dersr. afld. they, naturally enough, were extt'dfnbly Curious to know what on the 4 Baas . coffin wAnt to trek down the Orange Rivet 1 for—a country where no oue came, and of which fiO one had 6ver even heard. I had to tell them that 1 was prospecting for a copper mine ; for, as you probably know, there are many places in thiß region where that metal oocurs. As we were dofibtful whether we should find water at the nejft fountain that Klaas knew of, owing to the prevalence of drought, I filled the water vatjes and every other utensil T omld think of ; and then, all being ready and the ox inspanned, we moved briskly forward. YYe had now to make a detour to the right, away from tbe river, and for great part of a day picked our painful footsteps over a rough and f emi*motintaiDOUs country. Towards evening, MVe emerged upoD a dreary and interminable waste that lay outstretched before us. its far horizon barred in the dim distance by towering mountains, through which we should presently have to force our passage. That evening we outspanned in a howling wilderness of loose and scorching sand, upon which scarcely a bush or shrub found subsistence. Next nigh f , more dead than alive, we halted beneath the loom of a gigantic mountain range, whose recesses, we were to pierce on the following morning. Half a day beyond this harrier lay tho valley of diamonds, as Klaas whispered to me after supper that night with gleaming excited eyes. That night as we lay under the mountain was one of the most stifling I ever endured in South Africa, where, on the high tablelands of the Interior, nights are usually cool and refreshing. Eveu the moist hoat of the Zambesi Valley was not more trying than this torrid empty desert. The oven-like heat cast up all day from the sandy plain seemed to be returned at night by these sun-scorched rocks with redoubled intensity. Waterless we lay, sweltering in onr misery, with blackened tongues and parched and cracking 1 ipa. Tbe oxen seemed almost like dead things. Often have I inwardly thanked Pringle, the poet of South Africa, for bis aw eet and touching verse, written with the love of this strange wild land deep in him, and for his striking descriptions of itß beauties and its fauna. As I lay panting that night, cursing my luck and the folly that brought me thither, I lit a lantern and opened bis glowing pages. 'What were almost tbe first lined to greet my gaze? These !

A region of emptiness, howling and drear, Which man hath abandoned from famine and fear ; Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone, With the twilight bat from the yawning Btooe ; Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root, Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot ; And here, while the night-winds around me sigh, And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky, As I sit apart by the desert stone, Like Elijah at Horeb’s cave alone, *A still small voice’ comes through the wild (Like a father consoling his fretful child), Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear, Saying■- Man is distant, but God is near. We hailed the passage of the mountains next morning with something akin to delight. Anything to banish tho monotony of these last two days of burning toil. Klaas, as the only one of us who knew the country, directed our movements ; and with hoarse shouts and re-echoing cracks from the mightv waggon-whip, slowly our caravan was set in motion. Onr entrance to the mountains was effected through a narrow and extremely difficult pass, strewn with huge boulders, nnd overgrown with brush and underwood. It would be tedious to relate all the labour of the trying trek, among these awful mountain passes ; but on the third day we had overcome the chief difficulties and had out* spanned for a final rest before completing our work, if to complete it were possible. Shading my eyes from tbe fierce sunlight, I looked upward at the loDg slope of mountain, broken here and there, and ocasionally shaggy with bush. Over all the fierce atmosphere quivered, seething and dancing in the sun-blaze. I looked again with doubt aud dismay at the gasping oxen, many of them lying foundered and almost dead from thirst and fatigue, and my spirits, usually brisk and unflagging, sank below zero. Klaas had told me previously of a most wonderful pool of water that lay on the crown of a mountain, where we Bhould outspan finally before entering upon the portals of the diamond valley. Now ho came to me and said, pointing upwards : — 4 Sieur, de sweet water lies yonder, op de berg. It is a beautiful pool, such as ye never saw the like of ; if wo reach it, we are saved, and the oxen will soon get round again. Ye mast get them up somehow, even without the waggon.’ The tiny, yellow, blear-eyed Bushman, standing over me as I Bat on a rock, pointing with his lean arm skywards, his anxious dirt-grimed face streaming with perspiration, was hardly the figure of an angel of hope j and yet at that moment he was an. angel to me ; for we had tasted no water to speak of for close on three days, and had had besides a frightfully trying trek. ; ! - We lay panting aud grilling for an hour or

m .ire ; nn l tludi J? ic.fd my men that water iii auy qii.f(iU’-.v lay tV. ‘ike mountain top, and that «• mtist at nil 'hazard* get tho oxen up i;> ft OViy a mile > f asciJfttr, or a little more* iveuifce us ; bus so i'ee.blo were the oxen, that bad the greatest difficulty to drive the bulk of them to the top, even with- .. out tho encumbering waggon. Three utterly refused to move, and weft? feffc behind. At last we reach* 1 the krantz, find after a hundred yards’ w« k ujicn its fiat top, wa came almost suddenly i»'p'rp>"-a most wonderful and, fc ip, m o t’ soul il,ri!img sight. i.erpse inV.-fr o' mimosa-thorn and other i&rubs fl w round, here and there relieved by vfide pitches of open space. The oxen getting Gif' breez", and scenting water, suddenly S' I *?;’hi' t> display a most extra, ordinary fritsSWes' f up went their heads, their dull eye? brightened, and they trotted forwards to where the jungle apparently grew thickest. For a time they found no opening; but after following the ciroling Wall of bush, at length a broad avenue was disclosed—an avenue doubtless worn smooth by the passage of elephants, rhinoceroses, »ttfi other mighty sum* ; and then there fell upOfi btfr sight the naan refreshing prospect that mSO ever gazed upon. Thirty yards down the opening there lay a great pool of water, about two hundred feet across at its narrowest point, ami apparently of great depth. The pool was circular, its sides were of rock aud quartz, and completely fesccesfiblo from every approach save that by whiahr-vijeJijyljreached it. It was indeed completely encompassed by precipitous wall?, about thirty feet in height, which defied the advent of any other living thing than a lizard or 3 rock-rabbit. How the poor becsfca drank of that cool pellucid flood, end how -we human beings drank too ! I thought we siiottld never have finished. The oxen drank and drank till tho water literally ran out of their mouths as they at last turned away. Then I cast off my clothes and plunged into the water. It was icy cold and most invigorating, and 1 swam and splashed to my heart’s content. After my swim and a rest, I directed my men to fill the buckets we had brought; and then, leaving the horses in charge of one of their number, we drove the cattle,, loth though they were to leave the water, back to the waggon, going very carefully, so as not to Bpill the water.. At length wo reached tho valley, only -to find two of our poor foundered bullocks lying nearly dead. The distant lowing of their refreshed comrades had, I think, warned them of good news, and the smell of the water revived them r and after two buckets apiece of the cold draught had been gulped down their kilndried throats, they* got up and shook themselves and rejoined their fellows. Wo rested for a short time; and then inspanned and started for the upland pool. The oxen, wprn and enfeebled though they were, had such a heart put into them by .their drink, and seemed so well to know that their watery salvation lay up there, only a short mile distant, that they one and all bent gallantly to the yokes, and dragged their heavy burden to the margin of the bush-girt water. We now outspanned for the night, made strong fires, for the spoor of leopards was abundant, stewed some bastards, ate a good supper and turned in, I suppose we had not been asleep hours when I was awakened by the sharp barks and yelping of my dogs, the kicks and"" Scrambles of the oxen, and the shoots of the men. Snatching up my rifle and rushing out, I was just in time to see a firebaud hurled at some dark object that sped between the fires. •What is it, Klaas ?’ I shouted. ‘ Allemaghte ! it is a tiger (leopard), sieur,’ cried the Bushman, ‘aud he has clawed one of the dogs.’ True enough, on inspecting the yelping sufferer, Rooi-Kat, a brindled red dog, and one of the best of my pack, I found the poor wretch at its last gasp, with its throat and neck almost torn to ribbons. Cursing the sneaking cowardly leopard, I saw that the replenished fires blazed up, and again turned in. It mu t have been about two o’clock in the morning-—the coldest, the most silent, and dreariest of the dark hours, that fatal hour betwixt night and day when many a flickering life, unloosed by death, slips from its moorings—ivhou I was again startled from slumber by a most blood-curdling yell. Hunters, as you know, sleep light, and seem instinctively to be aware of what nasses around them, even although apparently wrapped in the-profoundest sleep. I knew in a moment that that agonised cry came from a human throat ; and I rushed ont. What a din was there, from dogs, men, and oxen, and above all those horrid human screams. I had losd-d mv rifle, and rushing up to a confused crowd struggling near the firelight, I B,aw what bad happened. The youngest of my servants, a mere Bechuana boy, was hard aud fast in the grip of an immonse leopard, which was tearing with its crnel tooth at bis throat. Klaas, bolder than bis fellows, was lunging an assegai into the brute's ribs, seemingly withont tho smallest effect. ; others were thrashing it with firebrands ; and the dogs were vainly worrying at its bead and flanks. All this I saw Thrusting my followers aside, I ran up to the leopard, and putting my rifle to its ear, fired. The express bullet did its work at once; the fiercest and most tenacious of the feline race could not refuse to yield its life with its head almost blown to atoms; and loosening’its murderous hold, the brute fell dead. But too late ! The poor Bechuana boy lay upon the sand, wounded to the death. After these horrors, sleep was banished, and as tho grey light came up, we prepared for day. The morning broke at length in ruddiest splendour; and as the terrain was slowly unfolded before my gaze, I realised the desolate magnificence of the country. Mountains, mountains, mountains of grim sublimity roiled everywhere around! Far away below, as I looked westward, a thin silvery line, only visible for a little space, told of the groat river flowing to the sea, inexorably shut in by precipitous mountain walls that guaranteed for ever its awful solitude. Klaas «’ >-vJ near, and a 3 I gazed he whispered. h>: ...y mon were not faraway; —? Sieur, yonder straight In front of you,

•five miles away, lie the diamonds. If we start directly after breakfast, we shall have four hoora’ hard climbing and walking to reach the valley.’ , . . . ‘ All right, Klaas, said I. ‘Breaktast is nearly ready, and we 11 start as soon as we have fad.’ _ , • . Breakfast was soon over, and then I spoke to my men. I told them that I intended to stay at this pool for a few days, aud that in (the meantime I was going prospeotmg in the mountains bordering the river. I despatched two of them to go and hunt for mountain (buck in the direction we had come from ; the others to ae© that the oxen fed round about the water, where pasture was good and plentiful, and generally to look after the camp. For Klaas and myself, we should be away till dusk, perhaps even all night; but we did not wish to bo fpllowod or disturbed ; and unless those at'the camp heard my signal of four consecutive rifle-shots, they were on no account to attompt to follow up our spoor. My men by this time know me and my ways Well, apd I: wa 3 oonvinced that we should not be followed-by prying eyes ; and Indeed, the lazy Africans wereonlytoo glad of an easy day in camp after their hard journey. ■" ; /• , ■ (To be continued.) -