ARNOTT’S OBSERVATION: EXTREME HARDNESS: BOYLE AND DU FAY PROVE ELECTRICAL QUALITIES: DR. KUNZ AND PHOSPHORESCENCE: SIR WILLIAM CROOKS ON RADIUM AND THE DIAMOND: EXPERIMENTS IN ARTIFICIAL PRODUCTION BY MARDEN, MOISSAN AND CROOKS: SIR CHARLES PARSONS’ CONCLUSIONS: “SEARCH FOR THE ABSOLUTE”: DISCOVERY OF A LARGE DIAMOND AT JACOB’S FARM ON THE ORANGE RIVER: SIR WILLIAM WODEHOUSE’S PURCHASE: DIAMONDS IN MUD BRICKS: AUSTRALIAN DIAMONDS: FIRST DIAMOND BROUGHT TO EUROPE: GOLCONDA: BRAZIL: FLORENTINE DEMONSTRATION OF THE TRUTH OF BOETIUS’S BELIEF AND NEWTON’S DEDUCTIONS: BOYLE’S EXPERIMENTS AT HIGH TEMPERATURE: AVERANI PROVES THE FORCE OF THE SUN’S RAYS ON A DIAMOND: EASILY BURNED BUT UNAFFECTED BY ACIDS: THE GNOMES OF THE ROSICRUCIANS: GNOME LEGENDS: SIR JOHN MANDEVILLE ON THE DIAMOND: RABBI BENONI, BOETIUS DE BOODT AND THE HINDU WRITERS: ES-SINDIBAD OF THE SEA AND THE VALLEY OF DIAMONDS: SIMILAR STORIES: EL-KAZWEENEE: MARCO POLO: MR. MARSDEN’S OBSERVATIONS: GOLCONDA: LITTLE PRINCESS MARY’S DIAMOND MARRIAGE RING: LORD LISLE’S DEATH DIAMOND: THE DIAMOND HEART RING OF MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS: QUEEN ELIZABETH AND SIR WALTER RALEIGH: DIAMOND SAVES THE LIFE OF QUEEN ISABELLA OF SPAIN: EX-PRESIDENT KRUGER’S UNLUCKY DIAMOND: KING ARTHUR AND THE DIAMOND JOUSTS: THE AFFAIR OF THE DIAMOND NECKLACE: INDIAN DIAMOND CUTTERS: LOUIS VAN BERGHEM: CHARLESMAGNE’S DIAMOND CLASP: HERMAN THE LAPIDARY: PERUZZI: CLEMENT BIRAGO AND JACOPO DA TREZZO ENTER THE SERVICE OF PHILIP II: POPE HILDEBRAND SENDS A DIAMOND RING TO WILLIAM OF NORMANDY: THE DIAMOND SWORD IN THE TALE OF THE YELLOW DWARF: THE ZODIACAL SIGNS OF THE DIAMOND: THE DIAMOND IN LOVE AND MARRIAGE: BORT.

DIAMOND

The diamond derives its name from the Greek ADAMAS, ADAMANTOS, adamant. It has been written at various times as dyamawnte, dyamamaunt, dyamant, diamant, diamownde, dyamonde, dyamount, diamonde, diamont, dimond, dymauntz, and adamant stone. It is but pure crystallized carbon, and Arnott (Physics, 1830), writes: “The diamond has nearly the greatest light-bending power of any known substances, and hence comes in part its brilliancy as a jewel.” It is remarkable also for its extreme hardness and for its variety of colours—steel, white, blue, yellow, orange, red, green, pink and black. This “prince of gems” in days of old was considered the royal stone which only a prince was privileged to wear. The highly electrical properties ascribed by the ancients to the diamond were proved in the 17th and 18th centuries by the chemists Boyle and Du Fay, and Dr. Kunz has demonstrated today that all diamonds “phosphoresce when exposed to the rays of radium, polonium, or actinum, even when glass is interposed.” In a paper read to the Royal Society, London, November 5th, 1914, the late Sir William Crooks said: “Many substances become coloured by direct exposure to radium, the colour depending on the substance. Diamond takes a full sage-green, the depth of tint depending on the time of exposure to the radium. In addition to the change of colour the diamond also becomes radio-active, continuously giving off a, , ? rays. The acquired colour and activity withstand the action of powerful chemical agents and continue for years with apparently undiminished activity. Removing the surface by mechanical means removes both colour and radio-activity. The appearance of an auto-radiograph made by placing an active diamond crystal on a sensitive photographic plate and the visual examination of its scintillating luminosity suggest that there is a special discharge of energy from the corners and points of the crystal.”

The several experiments for the production of diamonds by artificial means have since 1880 been conducted by some eminent scientists, notably Professor Marden, Professor Henri Moissan and Sir William Crooks. For many years Sir Charles Parsons has been working closely at the problem, and the main conclusions arrived at by this scholar were communicated to the Royal Society, London, in 1918. They were as follows:

That graphite cannot be converted into diamond by heat and pressure alone within the limits reached in the experiments;

That there is no distinct evidence that any of the chemical reactions under pressure have yielded diamond;

That the only undoubted source of diamond is from iron previously heated to high temperature and then cooled.

That diamond is not produced by bulk pressure as previously supposed, but by the action of gases occluded in the metal and condensed into the centre on quick cooling.

In connection with these experiments it will be found interesting to read Balzac’s “Search for the Absolute,” in which it is told how after many ruinous attempts to produce a diamond by artificial means one, self-formed, is found in the old chemist’s laboratory after his death. The worth and romance of the old mines of Brazil and India are dwelt on by many of the writers of the past, and although diamonds were discovered in South Africa in the 18th Century, yet no important discoveries were made until 1867, when a large stone was found by children of a Dutch farmer, Mr. Jacobs, not far from their farm near Hopetown on the Orange River. Not knowing what the stone really was and attaching no value to it, Mrs. Jacobs gave it to Mr. Schalk van Niekerk, a neighbour, who entrusted it to Mr. O’Reilly, a hunter and trader, asking him to submit it to some mineralogist for an opinion. Mr. O’Reilly took the stone to Colesberg and showed it to Mr. Boyes, the acting commissioner for that district, at whose suggestion it was submitted to Dr. W. G. Atherstone of Graham’s Town. Thanks to his mineralogical knowledge, Dr. Atherstone proved the stone to be a diamond. It was exhibited in Paris in March, 1867, as “The First African Diamond Discovered,” and was purchased by the Cape Governor, Sir Philip Wodehouse, for £500. Sir Philip sold it to Garrards and it has changed hands several times since then. The weight of this stone was 21 carats. The famous Du Toit’s Pan was found through a Boer farmer actually discovering diamonds in the mud bricks of which his house was built.

As early as 1866, Mr. C. W. King expected that quantities of diamonds from Australia would reach the world’s markets, and there is no doubt that this expectation will be realized when those parts of the vast Commonwealth from which many diamonds have already come, have been thoroughly tested and proved. In 1885 several companies were working at Bingera, a township in New South Wales, 350 miles from Sydney, and many small but pure hard stones were found. The writer has handled some few specimens of fine blue white from Bingera, ranging from a quarter to half a carat after cutting. The hardness of the Australian gem—which may well add another point to Mohs’s scale—has counted against it, but modern cutters will not consider this a bar especially if sufficient quantities be submitted for treatment. Gold has also been found at Bingera and, as Mr. King writes: “The observation made of old by Pliny that the diamond always accompanies gold has been fully borne out by the experience of succeeding ages.” The first Australian diamonds were found in New South Wales, at Reedy Creek, near Bathurst, in 1851. In 1869 during a gold rush near Mudgee some fair diamonds were found by the miners. Professor Liversidge of Sydney describes the occurrence of diamonds at Bingera “as being situated in a sort of basin about four miles long and four miles wide, hemmed in by hills on all sides, save on the North. An old river-drift, probably an ancient bed of the river Horton, rests upon rocks of Devonian or Carboniferous age, and is associated with basalt by which it appears to be overlain. In some places the materials of the drift are compacted together into a conglomerate, so that the mode of occurrence of the diamond at Bingera strikingly resembles that at Mudgee. The minerals composing the gravels are also generally similar in the two cases, though points of difference are not wanting. Some of the diamonds are clear and colourless, others have a pale straw tint. Thousands have been found in this district, as well as in many other localities of New South Wales.” The gravels enclosed agate, sapphire, ruby, zircon, jasper, rock crystal, garnets, grey corundum, ilmenite, tourmaline, gold and tin. Mr. A. R. Pike who, with his partner, Mr. John O’Donnell, has had much experience with Australian diamonds at Inverell, New South Wales, writes interestingly concerning them. “With slates and diorites from the bed-rock, gold is found in the wash, in addition to its diamond output. Rich yields of alluvial gold have been won from the Gulgong district. The wash deposit of this field also carries diamonds and a special class of semi-precious gems. They embrace sapphires in large numbers and various tints; cornflower, blue, green, dark blue, straw, yellow, and blood-red are plentiful. The red sapphires in many cases are true rubies of the desired pigeon-blood colour. Unfortunately all the sapphires represent small flat fragments and are too small for cutting purposes.” A few months ago the writer picked out about a dozen fair but small diamonds for a “fossicker” from a little bag of different stones that he had found in Spring Creek, Beechworth, Victoria.

It is recorded that diamonds were first brought to Europe from the first known of the mines of Golconda, the mine of Sumbulpour, in 1584. The mines of Brazil were discovered in 1728. Boetius de Boodt asserted in the year 1609, his belief in the inflammability of the diamond, and in 1694 the Florentine academicians demonstrated the truth of Boetius’ belief and Newton’s deductions—Sir Isaac Newton having based his similar conclusions on the refracting power of the diamond in 1675. Boyle discovered in 1673 that when the diamond was submitted to high temperature it ejected a pungent vapour in which a part of it was consumed. In 1695 Averani experimenting with the concentrated rays of the sun on the diamond demonstrated that “it was exhaled in vapour and entirely disappeared while other precious stones only grew softer.” That the diamond can be burned is easy of proof, as is also the fact that acids have no effect upon it.

The gnomes figure in the elemental system of Rosicrucian philosophy, being described as small people who guard the mines and treasures of the earth, the precious stones and the metals. They are robust little fellows of a brown colour, and their sympathy extends to philosophic minds amongst both miners and scholars. They hate frivolity, for they are serious little fairies. Comte de Gabalis details an argument with their Prince who came to the upper earth in respect to the will of the Irish sage Macnamara. Macnamara has sympathy for the gnomes whom he calls “the unhappy guardians of treasures,” in the mystical chapters on “The Irreconcilable.” There are numerous legends of the Gnomes, the meanings of which are not difficult to interpret if the mind of the student is filled with the desire to know. It is said that these little fairies suffer much, and that when they grieve for those they have loved and lost their tears change into diamonds, which remain as the jewel emblems of pure and unselfish grief. That great old English traveller of the 14th Century, Sir John Mandeville—a copy of whose MS., said to date from the time of the author, is in the Cottonian Library—wrote that the diamond should always be worn on the left or heart side of the body, and that it is possible for a diamond to lose its occult virtue after being handled by evil people: for in the human body there is more potency for good or ill than is generally understood. There are many stories of misfortune and discord following the possessors of stolen diamonds. Ample evidence exists that substances handled by diseased persons are quite capable of conveying their symptoms to others. The Diamond, ever a symbol of purity, was regarded as a charm against all evil, but—said the philosophers—it must not be touched by evil, by lemures, incubi, succubi or by the formed or formless devils of the material and super-material spheres. In this philosophy it is advised that a woman about to give birth to a child should refrain from wearing diamonds. Rabbi Benoni wrote in the 14th Century that the diamond was capable of producing somnambulism and spiritual ecstasy, a suggestion which was acted on in the last century by experimenters at Nancy. According to Boetius de Boodt, diamonds were of different sexes, and some Hindu writers classified them as masculine, feminine or neuter.

In the Mani Mali it is stated that:

However, the three, four and five cornered diamond would not be reckoned evil in a flawless stone of good colour. It is asserted by some of the Hindu masters that diamonds, according to their colours and qualities, appealed to the taste as sweet, sour and salty. Marbodus calls the diamond a potent magical charm for protecting the sleeper from evil dreams and the child from the dreaded goblin. The fifth Arabian Heaven, the Garden of Delights, Jannat al-Naim, is said to be composed of the purest diamonds.

In the second voyage of Es-Sindibad of the Sea (commonly known as Sinbad the Sailor) in the “Thousand and One Nights,” E. W. Lane’s translation, the hero finds himself in the Valley of the Serpents: “Then I arose and emboldened myself and walked in that valley: and I beheld its ground to be composed of diamonds, with which they perforate minerals and jewels, and with which also they perforate porcelain and the onyx: and it is a stone so hard that neither iron nor rock have any effect upon it, nor can anyone cut off aught from it or break it, unless by means of the lead stone.... I then walked along the Valley, and while I was thus occupied, lo, a great slaughtered animal fell before me, and I found no one. So I wondered thereat extremely: and I remembered a story that I had heard long before ... that in the mountains of the diamonds are experienced great terrors, and that no one can gain access to the diamonds, but that the merchants who import them know a stratagem by means of which to obtain them: that they take a sheep and slaughter it, and skin it, and cut up its flesh which they throw down from the mountain to the bottom of the Valley: so descending, fresh and moist, some of these stones stick to it. Then the merchants leave it until midday, and birds of the large kind of vulture and the aquiline vulture descend to that meat, and, taking it in their talons, fly up to the top of the mountain: whereupon the merchants come to them and cry out at them and they fly away from the meat. The merchants then advance to that meat, and take from it the stones sticking to it: after which they leave the meat for the birds and the wild beasts and carry the stones to their countries. And no one can procure the stones but by means of this stratagem.” In his notes and comments on this passage, Mr. Lane says: "Though I believe that there is no known substance with which the diamond can be cut or ground except its own substance, I think it not improbable that the Eastern lapidaries may be acquainted with some ore, really—or supposed by them to be—an ore of lead, by which it may be broken, and that this is what is here called “the lead stone” or “the stone of lead.” It is well known that those diamonds unfit for any other purpose than that of cutting or grinding others, are broken in a steel “mortar.” In further notes on “The Valley of Diamonds,” Mr. Lane added the following: “El-Kaz-weenee after describing the diamond, saying ‘It breaketh all other stones except that of lead (el-usrub, a bad kind of lead): for if it be struck with this the diamond breaketh,’”—relates as follows: “To the place in which the diamond is found no one can gain access. It is a valley in the land of India, the bottom of which the sight reacheth not: and in it are venomous serpents which no one seeth but he dieth: and they have a summer abode for six months, and a winter abode (where they hide themselves) for the like period. El-Iskender (either Alexander the Great or the first Zu-l-Karneyn) commanded his men to take some mirrors and to throw them into the Valley that the serpents might see in them their forms and die in consequence. It is said also that he watched for the time of their absenting themselves (or retiring into their winter quarters) and threw down pieces of meat, and diamonds stuck to these: then the birds came from the sky and took pieces of that meat, and brought them up out of the valley whereupon El-Iskender ordered his companions to follow the birds and to pick up what they easily could of the meat.” The valley or valleys of diamonds we also find described by other writers, among them Marco Polo, in his account of the Kingdom of Murphili or Monsul. Mr. Marsden observes: “This is no other than Muchli-patan or, as it is more commonly named, Masuli-patam: the name of a principal town by a mistake not unusual, being substituted for that of the country.... It belongs to what was at one period termed the Kingdom of Golconda, more anciently named Teligana. Golconda, of which Masulipatam is the principal seaport, is celebrated for the production of diamonds.” In the astronomical observations of Mr. Topping, printed in Dalrymple’s Oriental Repertory, mention is made of the famous diamond mines of Golconda at a place named Malvellee, not far from Ellore. Caesar Fredericke who was at Bijanagar in 1567 mentions that the diamond mines were six days’ journey from that city. Es-Sindibad’s adventure in the Valley of Diamonds has been amply illustrated by the learned writer from whom the above remarks are borrowed, and by Hole. The following is an extract from Marco Polo’s Travels: “In the mountains of this Kingdom (Murphila) it is that diamonds are found. During the rainy season the water descends in violent torrents amongst the rocks and caverns, and when these have subsided the people go to search for diamonds in the beds of the rivers, where they find many. In the summer, when the heat is excessive and there is no rain, they ascend the mountains with great fatigue as well as with considerable danger from the number of snakes with which they are infested. Near the summit, it is said, there are deep valleys full of caverns and surrounded by precipices amongst which the diamonds are found, and here many eagles and white storks, attracted by the snakes on which they feed, are accustomed to make their nests. The persons who are in quest of the diamonds take their stand near the mouths of the caverns and from thence cast down several pieces of flesh which the eagles and storks pursue into the valleys and carry off with them to the tops of the rocks. Thither the men immediately ascend, drive the birds away, and recovering the pieces of meat frequently find diamonds sticking to them.” Mr. Marsden transcribes from Hole’s ingenious work part of a quotation from Epiphanius, upon which he remarks: “Thus it appears incontrovertibly that, so early as the fourth century of our era, the tale of the valley of diamonds and the mode of procuring the precious stones from it was current, divested, it is true, of the extraordinary incident of the adventurous sailor’s escape, but in conformity with what was related to Marco Polo—with the exception of the scene being laid in Scythia or Western Tartary where, in fact, diamonds are not found. The question of locality,” he adds, “is however determined by another Oriental navigator Nicoli di Conti, who visited the coast of the peninsula in the 15th Century....” Hole observes that a story somewhat resembling this of the Valley of Diamonds is recorded in the travels of Benjamin of Tudela and that the translator supposes it to have been borrowed from “The Thousand and One Nights.” “However,” he adds with better judgment, “I rather suspect that the account of Benjamin of Tudela and of Es-Sindibad were derived from some common origin.”

Perhaps the smallest diamond ring mentioned was placed by Cardinal Wolsey on the tiny finger of the little Princess Mary, aged just two years, daughter of Henry VIII, on October 5th, 1518, on the occasion of her marriage with the baby Dauphin of France, son of Francis I. The baby bride’s dress was of cloth of gold and her black velvet cap sparkled with jewels. Another historical diamond ring was that sent to the imprisoned Lord Lisle, giving freedom and forgiveness—an act so unexpected that it caused the unfortunate man to die of joy. The ring sent by Mary, Queen of Scots, to Queen Elizabeth, is described by Mr. William Jones, quoting from Aubrey, as “a delicate piece of mechanism consisting of several joints which, when united, formed the quaint device of two right hands supporting a heart between them. This heart was composed of two separate diamonds held together by a central spring which, when opened, would allow either of the hearts to be detached. Queen Elizabeth kept one moietie and sent the other as a token of her constant friendship to Mary, Queen of Scots, but she cut off her head for all that.” Another story of Elizabeth, quoted by Fairholt, is that Sir Walter Raleigh wrote on a window with his pointed diamond ring: “Fain would I rise, but that I fear to fall,” the Queen writing beneath with her ring: “If thy heart fail thee, do not rise at all.” Very different was the experience of Queen Isabella who was saved from death by a diamond. Ex-President Kruger’s diamond had a bad history that did not change with its different holders. In allusion to the Diamond Jousts instituted by King Arthur, Dr. Brewer says: “He named them by that name since a diamond was the prize. Ere he was King he came by accident to a glen in Lyonnesse, where two brothers had met in combat. Each was slain, but one had worn a crown of diamonds which Arthur picked up, and when he became King offered the nine diamonds as the prize of nine several jousts—‘one every year, a joust for one.’ Lancelot had won eight and intended to present them all to the Queen when all were won. When the knight laid them before the Queen, Guinevere in a fit of jealousy flung them out of the palace window into the river which ran below.”

The affair of the Diamond Necklace is familiar to readers of history and romance. It attracted the perceptive mind of Dumas who moulded it into an interesting story, but of its reality no doubt has ever been entertained. The Prince Cardinal de Rohan, having entertained a secret affection for Queen Marie Antoinette, the Countess de Lamotte to forward her own nefarious designs persuaded him that the Queen reciprocated his passion. By thus working on the Cardinal’s feelings, Madame de Lamotte managed to relieve him of some sums of money, and succeeding so well in this way, she and her husband resolved on a more imposing venture. Louis XV had had made a wonderful diamond necklace which he intended as a present for his favorite Madame Du Barry. Before it was finished Louis had passed away, and his favourite had been driven from court. The necklace which was made by Boehmer consisted of 500 magnificent diamonds, the whole when completed being valued at 1,800,000 livres. Madame de Lamotte represented to the Cardinal the Queen’s desire for this handsome necklace, asking him as Her Majesty was at the time unable to pay the amount of the purchase money, which she said amounted to £700,000 sterling, to become security for her for this amount. This he gladly consented to do, and added his name to the forged signature of the Queen. On February 1st, 1786, the Cardinal carried the precious jewel to Versailles, whence by arrangement a messenger from the Queen was to take it. The next day, as arranged by Madame de Lamotte’s husband, an accomplice dressed in the uniform of a court official entered the Cardinal’s apartments at Versailles and muttering several times “De par la Reine” (in the Queen’s name) relieved the trusting Cardinal of the necklace. It was afterwards broken up and disposed of by these three conspirators, in England it is believed. Some time afterwards Boehmer, not receiving his payment, applied to Marie Antoinette for his money. She denied all knowledge of the affair. Boehmer thereupon brought the case before the Parlement de Paris in 1785, and in May, 1786, after a trial of 9 months, the Cardinal, Monsieur de Lamotte and his accomplice were acquitted, but Madame de Lamotte was sent to prison for life, each shoulder being branded with the letter V (Voleuse, thief).

The Indians were the first to polish a diamond with its own dust, but their cutting only consisted in burnishing the original facets or concealing defects by a number of new and smaller ones. Louis van Berghem is credited with being the first to cut and polish diamonds with their own dust in 1456, but both Emanuel and King refer to four large diamonds which adorned the clasp of the Emperor Charlemagne 1373, and to numerous cut specimens of older date set in church monuments. Emanuel mentions the skillful Herman who worked in the year 1407. Towards the end of the 16th Century, Peruzzi invented the double cutting known as “Brillants recoupes,” and of late years the modern cutters have reached a high degree of artistic excellence, producing the most beautifully cut specimens the world has seen. Clement Birago and Jacopo da Trezzo were the first to engrave upon the diamond, and both “enriched in the service of Philip II.” In giving the Papal Sacred Banner and Blessing to William of Normandy when about to invade England after the excommunication of Harold, Pope Hildebrand sent a diamond ring, said to enclose a hair from the head of Peter the Apostle. In the Comtesse d’Anois’ pretty fairy story, “The Yellow Dwarf,” the mermaid gives the captive King an all-conquering sword made from a single diamond, which rendered invincible anyone who carried it.

The diamond is astrologically under the sign of the Sun Leo, and has power especially in Aries and Libra. To dream of diamonds was considered symbolical of success, wealth, happiness and victory, and its reputed power of binding man and woman together in happy wedlock has made it a favourite stone for engagement rings, and in some countries for wedding rings.

BORT or BOART is the name applied to imperfect greyish or blackish specimens which are powdered and used for cutting and polishing diamonds and hard gems, among other purposes.