SOUTH AFRICAN DIAMOND FIELDS.

Kumara Times, Issue 1149, 4 June 1880, Page 2

SOUTH AFRICAN DIAMOND FIELDS.

The following is from the Natal Mercury :—“ From the Diamond Fields we regret to hear that three waggons Lave been washed down, the Vaal river at Barkly. The Moddetf river had been very high, and quantities of fiSn had been caught in .the mud by th& flow. The mine at Dutoitspktthaaoßea sold for £6500, the highest priceyefc realised. The mine at 'Kimberley ia now worked to the depth of 291 feet. The administrator is taking. steps to the mine tfith nsttfvb labour. The mine at Kimberley does not probably cover more than fifty or sixty acres of superficial area, and yet that

'small plot is assessed at a value of £1,650,000. The estimate is of course more or Jess conjectural, as no one can Bay hp^ - deep in the bowels of the earth £ the ‘ d'iatUondiferous’ deposit may. sink. So far there is bo evidence of failing • finds. Th'e fact that a claim has sold for £6506 is sufficient proof of that, and this, although the mine has all but touched a depth of 300 ft. Diamond digging, as far as Kimberley is concerned, is a phrase of the past, the process being in every sense of the term a mining operation. Next to diamonds, potatoes seem Vo be the dearest thing on the Fields, £6,1 Os having been given for a hag. It might b 6 Worth while to cultivate that sort of precious commodity along the fertile banks of the Vaal.”