310 
Transactions of the Royal Society of South Africa. 
3. Diamond and Lead (p. 26). 
The idea that diamond could be attacked and subdued by lead appears 
to have originated in Greece, and to have been adopted afterwards by the 
whole world. Underlying the idea the author works out the hypothesis 
that diamond was wrapped in lead before being broken into engraving 
points, in order that none of the fragments should be lost. It may be 
added that diamond might have been put into a vice for the same reason. 
Mediaeval writers introduced into the story something allegorical. Thus 
Philip de Thaun, in his Anglo-Norman ' Bestiary, circa 1130 : 
" E 9es sacez vereiement que Ten I'adamas bruist en fent. 
Par le sane de buc e de plun, signefie grant raisun. 
Sbignurs, aez i entente, bucs est beste pulente ; 
Par le sane de bue entendum en nostre lai corruptiun ; 
Par plum entendum peehe par quel liom sunt enginne ; 
Ke li plums paise que fer, ki pechurs traite en emfer ; 
Corruptiun a pechet nus fent, "J encontre Deus nus ofent. 
E eel vertu ad en sei, le fer trait od sei ; 
Signefie que Christiens traient a la lur lei paens. 
Quant il laissent lur eresie, e creient el Fiz Sanetae Marie." 
[And this know truly that they break in pieces the diamond. 
With goat's blood and lead, it signifies a great matter. 
Lords, pay attention to it, a goat is a stinking beast ; 
By the blood of the goat we understand corruption in our law ; 
By lead we understand sin by which men are ensnared ; 
That the lead weights the iron which draws sinners to hell ; 
Corruption and sin splits us and makes us offend against God, 
And this virtue it has in it, it draws the iron with it ; 
It signifies that Christians draw Pagans to their law 
When they leave their heresy and believe in the Son of St. Mary.] 
4. The Diamond Point (p. 28). 
The only circumstance we shall notice under this head is the old and 
persistent idea of a mysterious association between diamond and iron. J 
This matter has been discussed in " Kimberley Diamonds, especially Cleavage 
Diamonds," § under the heading " Stewartite." Stewartite more than revives 
the idea of the same mysterious association, combining as it does the 
properties of diamond and loadstone. John Lyly, in ' Euphues and His 
England,' 1580, expresses the current conventional idea of his time concerning 
* Suggested, perhaps, by modern practice in the cutting factories. 
t Edited by Thomas Wright, 1841, p. 125. 
X Cf. L. Pearsall Smith in ' The English Language,' N.D., p. 160 : " Phoenix, the 
name of an imaginary bird, and adamant, used in literature to describe a half 
fabulous rock or crystal, combining the qualities of the diamond and the loadstone, 
were, with the earlier drake (dragon), the first of the names of the legendary animals 
and jewels to reach us from the East." 
§ Sutton, ' Trans. Eoy. Soc. S. Afr.,' 1918. 
