EMIGRANT DIAMONDS IN AMERICA. 



79 



gan has been found the Dowagiac stone, of about eleven carats' 

 weight, and only very recently a diamond weighing six carats and 

 of exceptionally fine " water " has come to light at Milford, near 

 Cincinnati. This augmentation of the number of localities, and 

 the nearness of all to the " kettle moraines," leaves little room for 

 doubt that the diamonds were conveyed by the ice at the time of 

 its later invasion of the country. 



Having, then, arrived at a satisfactory conclusion regarding not 

 only the agent which conveyed the stones, but also respecting the 

 period during which they were transported, it is pertinent to in- 

 quire by what paths they were brought to their adopted homes, 

 and whether, if these may be definitely charted, it may not be pos- 

 sible to follow them in a direction the reverse of that taken by the 

 diamonds themselves until we arrive at the point from which each 

 diamond started upon its journey. If we succeed in this we shall 

 learn whether they have a common home, or whether they were 

 formed in regions more or less widely separated. From the great 

 rarity of diamonds in Mature it would seem that the hypothesis of 

 a common home is the more probable, and this view finds confirma- 

 tion in the fact that certain marks of " consanguinity " have been 

 observed upon the stones already found. 



Not only did the ice mantle register its advance in the great 

 ridge of morainic material which we know as the " kettle moraine," 

 but it has engraved upon the ledges of rock over which it has rid- 

 den, in a simple language of lines and grooves, the direction of its 



Four Views of the Burlington Diamond (a little over two carats) ; enlarged about three 

 diameters. (Owned by Bunde and Upmeyer, Milwaukee.) 



movement, after first having planed away the disintegrated por- 

 tions of the rock to secure a smooth and lasting surface. As the 

 same ledges have been overridden more than once, and at inter- 

 vals widely separated, they are often found, palimpsestlike, with 

 recent characters superimposed upon earlier, partly effaced, and 

 nearly illegible ones. Many of the scattered leaves of this record 

 have, however, been copied by geologists, and the autobiography 

 of the ice is now read from maps which give the direction of its 

 flow, and allow the motion of the ice as a whole, as well as that 



