KMIGKANT DIAMONDS TN AMERICA. 801 



tioii ;i number of smaller stones. h:ivt> been I'eeently found in tlu^ elays 

 and gravels of this reo-ion. where their distribution was such as to 

 indicate with a degree of approximation the location of their distant 

 ancestral home. 



In order clearly to set forth the nature of this problem and the 

 method of its solution it will be necessary, first, to plot upon a map 

 of the lake region the locality at which each of the stones has been 

 found, and, further, to enter upon the same map the data which geolo- 

 gists have gleaned regarding the work of the great ice cap of the 

 Glacial period. During this period, not remote as geological time is 

 reckoned, an ice mantle covered the entire northeastern portion of our 

 continent, and on more than one occasion it invaded for considerable 

 distances the territory of the United States. Such a map as has been 

 described discloses an important fact which holds the clew for the 

 detection of the ancestral home of these diamonds. Each 3'ear is 

 bringing with it new evidence, and we may look forward hopefully to 

 a full solution of the problem. 



In 18S3 the "Eagle Stone"' (PI. II) was brought to Milwaukee and 

 sold for the nominal sum of 81. When it was submitted to competent 

 examination the public learned that it was a diamond of 16 carats 

 weight, and that it had been discovered seven j^ears earlier in earth 

 removed from a well opening. Two events which were calculated to 

 arouse local interest followed directly upon the discovery of the real 

 nature of this gem, after which it passed out of the public notice. 

 The woman who had parted with the gem for so inadequate a compen- 

 sation brought suit against the jeweler to whom she had sold it, in 

 order to recover its value. This curious litigation, which naturallv 

 aroused a great deal of interest, was final Iv carried to the supreme 

 court of the State of Wisconsin, from which a decision was handed 

 down in favor of the defendant, on the ground that he, no less than 

 the plaintiff, had been ignorant of the value of the gem at the time of 

 purchasing it. The other event was the "boom" of the town of 

 Eagle as a diamond center, which, after the finding of two other dia- 

 monds with unmistakable marks of African origin upon them, ended 

 as sudden!}' as it had begun, with the eti'ect of temporarily discredit- 

 ing, in the minds of geologists, the genuineness of the original 

 "find.*" 



Ten yojirs later a white diamond of a little less than 4 carats weight 

 caiuc to light in a collection of pebbles found in Oregon, Wis. (PI. II), 

 and brought to the writer for examination. The stones had V)een found 

 by a farmer"s lad while playing in a clay bank near his home. The 

 investigation of the subject which was thereupon made ))rought out 

 the fact that a third diamond, and this the largest of all, had l)een dis- 

 covered at Kohlsville. in the same State, in 1883, and was still in the 

 possession of the family on whose property it had bc(Mi found. 



