90 



Gogga Brown 



" Now that the name of diamonds is as familiar 

 to the people of South Africa as * household 

 words/ and reports have gone forth, not only 

 throughout the length of the Colony, but into 

 the uttermost parts of the earth, of untold wealth 

 and immense treasure scattered profusely on the 

 surface of the ground, a few thoughts upon the 

 subject may not be uninteresting to the readers 

 of the first Christmas Annual published in 

 Aliwal North. 



For Africa is already noted for its unique and 

 protean forms in the Animal and Vegetable 

 Kingdom. Africa — the mysterious, the unknown, 

 replete with wonders and prodigies of nature, the 

 survivor of the wreck of continents, the first born 

 of the present distribution of land and water ; 

 the land of immense antiquity, which has for 

 ages been raised far beyond the power of the 

 ocean s mighty waves ; the land whose evidences 

 of great duration are impressed on the degraded 

 and worn-out mountains ; the land whose rivers 

 are cut deep into the earth, and whose channels 

 bear evidence of bygone impetuous streams ; the 

 land of desiccated lakes, wherein once disported 

 fishes and reptiles of wondrous form, whose banks 

 were fringed by noble trees, since turned to stone 

 and transfixed to the spot in which they flourished. 



