between the stones found in Old de Beers and those found in Kimberley that affords the least ground for considering that there is any subterranean communication between the two diggings. At the river-diggings I believe that one or more crater-mouths existed in the vicinity of the river bed above Bloemhof.
The palmy days of the diamond-diggings were in 1870 and 1871, when, if report be true, a swaggering digger would occasionally light his short pipe with a 5l. note, and when a doctor’s assistant was able to clear 1100l. in seven months. But since 1871 the value of the diamonds has been constantly on the decline; and although the yield has been so largely increased that the aggregate profits have not diminished, yet the actual expenses of working have become tenfold greater. Notwithstanding the fall in the value of the stones, the price of the land has risen immensely. At the first opening of the Kimberley kopje, the ordinary claim of 900 square feet could be had for 10l. It is true that the purchase only extended to the surface of the soil; but now that the excavations are made to the depth of about 200 feet, some of the richer pits fetch from 12,000l. to 15,000l., a proof that the real prosperity of the diamond-fields has not deteriorated, because (just as in the gold diggings) the rush of adventurers eager for sudden wealth has been replaced by the application of diligent and systematic industry.
As time has progressed, the mode of obtaining the
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