DIAMOND: OCCURRENCE IN LAPLAND S3l 



diagonal (Eig. 31 c). The largest weighed 2^|- carats, the five coming next in order of size 

 weighed respectively 1^, 1^, IJ^, IJ^, and 1 carat, while the remainder were small, the 

 smallest weighing only \ carat; the twenty-eight stones first found had an aggregate 

 weight of \1^ carats. A recent discovery of five stones at this locality led to the institu- 

 tion of a systematic search, which, however, has been unattended with any marked 

 success. 



The occurrence of diamonds in the Urals is not confined to the Adolphskoi washings, for 

 in 1831 two small diamonds, one weighing | carat, were found in the Medsher gold- washings, 

 fourteen versts (nine miles) east of Ekaterinburg. Again in 1838, a small stone weighing 

 xV carat was found in the Kushaisk mine, which lies in the sands of the Goroblagodatsk 

 mining district, twenty-five versts (seventeen miles) from the smelting furnaces of Kushvinsk 

 and east of Bissersk. In the next year a crystal weighing | carat was found in the Uspenskoi 

 mine in the sands of the district of Verchne-Uralsk in the government of Orenburg. 

 Solitary stones have been found also at other places, for example, recently in the Charitono- 

 Companeiski sands on the Serebrianaya river in the district of Kungur, government of 

 Perm ; among these was a twin-crystal showing several hexakis-tetrahedra in combination, 

 and having a thickness of 5 millimetres. Among these finds were a small colourless stone 

 from the Kamenka mine, in the Troitzk district, government of Orenburg, and also the first 

 diamond discovered in the southern Urals ; this latter is a perfectly transparent, yellow 

 hexakis-octahedron of |^ carat, and was found in 1893 in the gold-washings of Katshkar. 

 This latter discovery is of interest, for it shows that the diamond is more widely distributed 

 in the Urals than was formerly thought to be the case ; moreover, the minerals with which 

 it is associated in the southern Urals are the same as in Brazil, from which we may 

 conclude that the diamond originated in a similar manner in the two countries. 



The occurrencn of diamonds in the Urals is so rare and the stones themselves arc so 

 small that there are persons who doubt the genuineness of the occurrence, and express the 

 opinion that the stones which have been met with found their way to this locality in order 

 to fulfil Humboldt''s prophecy. No definite proof of fraud has, however, been brought 

 forward, and Russian mineralogists, who have closely studied the questioti, are satisfied that 

 the occurrence is genuine, their opinion being supported by I'ecent discoveries of stones 

 having been made. A number of rough diamonds acquired from other countries, have been 

 distributed by the Russian Government among the managers of mines, in order that the 

 miners shall become familiar with the appearance of rough stones, and the possibility of 

 diamonds being overlooked avoided. 



9. LAPLAND. 



In a far western corner of the Russian empire, namely, in Russian Lapland, a few small 

 diamonds have been recently found. At the time of the expedition of C. Rabot in the 

 second half of the eighties, a few stones were found in the valley of the Pasevig river which 

 flows into the Varanger Fjord, an ai'm of the Arctic Ocean, and forms the Russo-Norwegian 

 frontier in longitude 30° E of Greenwich. This river flows over gneiss which is penetrated 

 by numerous veins of granite and pegmatite, by the weathering of which the diamond- 

 bearing sand has originated. 



According to the investigations of C. Velain, these sands contain the following minerals, 

 named in the order of their frequency of occurrence : Garnet (almandine) in rose-red 

 rounded grains, forming half ihe lotal bulk of the sand, zircon, brown and green hornblende, 

 glaucophane, kyanite, green augite, quartz, corundum, rutile, magnetite, staurolite, andaln- 



