Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/199

 THE ORIQUALAND DIAMOND FIELDS. 151 beasts and birds. On tho camping grounds the mortulity was even greater. Ilere the bud diet, the hick of comfort, overwork, excessive drink, produced the epidemic of typhus known us the '* miner's fever," which rapidly filled the cemeteries of every rising settlement. Pm'ci, on the left bunk of the Vual, where the sands were first successfully wushed for diumonds, hus ceased to be one of the chief centres of attraction for speculutors. The dejxjsits huve been imjwverished, and reckless competition having ceased, the Government has been able to increase the size of the claims offered to purchasers. Here two or three hundred Pluropean and native miners still work on their isoluttHl plots, independent, however, of any great monopolising companies. The town of liarhli/, formerly Klip-ilrift, on the opposite side of the Vaal over against Pniel, is a busy market])lace for all the diggers engaged in the mining districts for the space of 60 miles along the course of the stream. The annual yield of these river-diggings in the Vual basin at present exceeds £40,000, and during the jxjriod from 1870 to 1880 the total product of the diamantiferous sands of this river exceeded £'2,000,000. The diamonds of this district are distinguished above all others for their purity and lustre. They are generally found in associa- tion with other stones, such as garnets, agates, quartz, and chalcedony. About the end of the year 1870 it was suddenly reported that diamond " placers " had been discovered on the plateau some 24 miles to the south-east of Pniel, fur from the fluvial alluvia. A new rush was at once made towards this " land of promise ; " the Dutch fanners were fain to sell their lands, and, as if by enchant- ment, there sprang up hundreds of tents and cabins, humble beginnings of the city which in South Africa now ranks in order of importance next to Cape Town and Port Elizabeth. Geological research has shown that in this region of the plateau the ground, uniformly covered with a layer of red sand overlying a be<l of calcareous tufa, conceals in its bosom extensive augite porphyry formations, which are pierced to a depth of over 1,000 feet by still unexplored *' pipes" or natural shafts. These pipes, which ore faced with a wall of basalt, are supposed to be nothing more than ancient craters. The earth now filling them is precisely the diamantiferous formation which bus been forced to the surface by the pressure of the subterranean gases, and shich towards the surface has become yellow and friable, while remaining blue and compact in the lower depths impenetrable to atmospheric influences. There also occurs a good deal of fire-damp, esj>eciully in the neighbourhood of the rocky walls, where the explosive gases are dangerous enough to require the construction of underground galleries to protect the miners. The basalts are overlain by carboniferous schists, and the question has been raised by geologists whether these schists may not have supplied the carbon required for the formation of the diamonds. Within a space of about 11 miles in circumference there exist four of these underground crater-like openings, all full of the earth in which the diamonds are distributed in a certain order known to experienced miners. These four diaman- tiferous pipes are liiilffonfein, lie Jloi r, l)ii ToH Pan, and Kimbfrhy, the last of which, lying close to the town of like name, is the richest diamond-bearing