62 



thus to produce the beautiful flashing effect and play of colours 

 which can be obtained with no other stone, at least to nothing 

 like the same extent, owing to its great refractive power. Dia- 

 mond cutting and polishing were practised in India and China 

 long before its introduction into Europe, which is stated to 

 have been done by Louis de Berguem, an inhabitant of Bruges, 

 towards the latter part of the 15th century. At all events, he 

 appears to have been the first to employ a polishing wheel with 

 diamond dust, and, when suggested, a suitable arrangement of 

 facets for displaying in a high degree the reflecting and refract- 

 ing powers of the diamond. Berguem's pupils emigrated to 

 other European towns, and established workshops for cutting 

 the diamond ; and at the present day such workshops can be 

 found in London, Paris, New York, Boston, and especially 

 Amsterdam, which is the seat of the diamond cutting industry, 

 and in which the largest establishment for the purpose exists, 

 namely, that of Mr. Coster. The diamond is cut in several 

 different forms, but only two of these, the brilliant and the rose, 

 are common. The brilliant is derived from the octahedron, the 

 natural form of the diamond, by replacing the point of inter- 

 section of four of its edges by one or by several faces. The 

 brilliant complete has 66 faces. In the rose one surface is quite 

 flat ; the other is convex, and is divided into a variable number 

 of facets. The Holland Rose has 24 ; the semi-Holland, 18 to 

 20. 



The operations by which the rough diamond is fashioned 

 into the brilliant, rose, or other form are splitting, cutting, and 

 polishing. In splitting the diamond it is first embedded by 

 means of cement into a wooden handle, and the workman then 

 scratches a deep V-shaped notch on its surface at the place where 

 he wishes the fracture to occur. This he does by means of a 

 sharp-pointed diamond, which is fixed into- a handle. When 

 the notch is sufficiently deep, the handle embracing the diamond 

 is placed in a hole in a block of lead, and with one hand the 

 workman applies the edge of a small steel ruler to the notch, 

 whilst with the other he gives a tap to the ruler, and the stone 

 is split, A spectator says : " It is not without emotion that 



