A LITTLE SCIENCE 167
would be so much more convenient, surely, than having to
dig among the rocks to find it."
"People have often tried to do so," replied Cyprien, "and
attempted the manufacture of diamonds by the crystal-
lization of pure carbon, and to a certain extent have suc-
ceeded. Despretz in 1883, and quite recently in England
another experimenter, have produced diamond dust by
employing a strong electric current in vacuo to act on
carbon cylinders free from mineral substances, and pre-
pared with sugar-candy. But up to the present, the problem
has not met with solution that would bring it into trade.
Notwithstanding, it may be only a question of time. Any
day, perhaps at this very moment, the method of making
diamonds may be discovered."
It was thus they talked as they strolled along the sandy terrace which extended by the farm, or, seated under the veranda, watched the stars twinkling in the southern sky. Sometimes Alice would leave the engineer and return to the house, at others she would take him to visit her flock of ostriches, kept in an enclosure at the foot of the knoll on which Watkins' Farm was situated. Their small, white heads craning over their black bodies, and the bunches of yellowish feathers ornamenting their wings and tails, interested the young lady, who for a year or more had kept quite a poultry-yard full of the giants.
Ostriches are very seldom tamed, and the Cape farmers leave them in a half wild state, parked in an enclosure of vast extent, surrounded by wire fencing like that in many countries running alongside the railroad. There they live all the year around in a captivity they know not of, feeding on what they can find, and seeking quiet corners wherein to deposit their eggs, which very strict laws protect against marauders. It is only at moulting time, when they throw off the feathers so much in request by the ladies of Europe, that the beaters drive them into a series of enclosures, diminishing in size, until the birds can be easily seized and made to give up their plumage.
This industry has been thriving at the Cape for many years. Every ostrich reduced to slavery brings to his proprietor without further expense a revenue of from eight to twelve pounds, nothing very extraordinary when it is remembered that a large feather of good quality will fetch
