BUNDELCUND. 71 



case. The base of the hills themselves seem never to have been tried, 



yet there is no doubt, the cotemporaries of the diamond deposit are 



there ; whether the kakru itself ever reached so far remains to be seen. 



The question has some little importance for here, not as in southern 



India, the rock-diggings are the most valued. 



In respect of the origin of the diamond, I do not agree in calling even 



this regular seam its " native bed." I unfortuately 

 Origin. ... 



did not see any specimen in its matrix, but from 



what I could learn from the labourers, I should say the diamonds came as 

 pebbles, among the rest. The lists that have been given of these pebbles 

 are pretty full but the numerical relation has not been sufficiently particu- 

 larized ; pure quartz and also pebbles of its many opaque, earthy varie- 

 ties do occur in the rock matrix, but they are very subordinate ; the 

 error has probably arisen from confounding the different kinds of dig- 

 gings; the pebbles of chert, &c. are more common in the e lal-kakru' of the 

 diluvial deposits. The two prominent kinds of pebble are, the sub- 

 angular fragments of red and of white shale, and the pebbles of what 

 Franklin called green quartz : this latter is identical with a rock that I 

 have, near Tirhowan, described as glazed or as semi-vitrified sandstone ; 

 it is associated in a vague way with that peculiar calcareo-siliceous 

 bottom-rock, of the eastern district ; pieces of such a rock, quite of boulder 

 size, are got in the diamond conglomerate. If the statement of one of 

 the labourers to me was correct, my conjecture is not only confirmed but 

 we get a good clue to the real home of the gem ; he told me that the 

 presence of these pebbles was symptomatic of accompanying diamonds, 

 and that moreover they themselves contained diamonds and were broken 

 up as ore or rather as gangue. Whether this be correct or not the fact 

 of the association still remains. 



Rocks that would supply debris of both these descriptions may be 



Similar rocks seen at seen on Bi sramgunge ghftt, just north of the 

 Bisramgunge ghat. mineg . mj note of them .^ tQ geeing the 



