Some Controversial Notes on the Diamond. 
127 
have no recollection if I ever had knowledge, ])ut I cannot recall any 
case of success beyond securing a sale. 
"A case: W. found a 2| carat, pure, sharp, glassy. T. saw and 
coveted the same to send to his wife, but funked a slight cloud in one 
corner. Eventually it was agreed that W. should hold the stone for 
three months, and if it were still sound T. would give ^30 for it. The 
time passed, the stone was sound, and the sale was completed, and 
the proud T. put it with its pill-box full of cotton-wool in his pocket. 
I^ext morning I overtook T. on his road to work. His face was 
long, his brow was puckered. ' Look here,' quoth he, and produced 
the pill-box. ' This is the diamond I bought from W ; on going to bed 
I put the box on my dressing-table ; I awoke startled from my first 
sleep, lit a candle, opened the box, and look what I found.' I looked 
^ — cotton-wool and splinters ! This case about micl-1872. 
" Another case : I was buying diamonds in partnership with J. at this 
time. B. was in an office across the street. I happened to be alone when 
in came G. ' What will you give me for this ? ' ' This ' proved to 
be a rather kidney-shaped smoky lump of 14 carats. ' What do you 
want ? ' ' Fancy stone ! I want JtlO a carat.' ' Give you bort price, 
10s.' ' Kats ' (if not more so). Talk. At last I offered 20s. as a 
spec. — it might not burst. 'That your best? Then I'll go to B.' 
Stone in hand he started across, I carelessly watching. He stopped 
suddenly, looked hard at his hand and turned back : ' All right old man, 
I'll take your offer ; give the cheque.' ' Just let me look at the stone.' 
It was flawed through and through though still holding together. Th 
above was as near to seeing the catastrophe as ever I went, and would 
have been near enough to convince me had I doubted. This about 
1874." 
It will be observed that the writer of the above letter considers that only 
Kimberley Mine diamonds were liable to burst, which limitation would still 
leave us without an explanation why there are broken diamonds (brown, 
yellow and colourless) in otlier mines. Also that W. held the suspected 
diamond without mishap for three months before T. bought it. Now when 
one asks believers in the 40th Article why diamonds do not burst in the 
He Beers sorting office, the answer commonly given is that they burst before- 
hand in the mine as soon as their matrix is disturbed — a quite reasonable 
argument if it had any tangil^le basis. 
Another critic tells me that a diamond once broke (he does not say 
" burst ") to fragments in his mouth, and that he had a very bad time 
before all the sharp pieces could be got out — which is scarcely consistent 
with the belief that diamonds kept in a wet place will not burst. 
Heddle — writing from hearsay, of course, like the rest— about 1877, 
gives quite a different version of the story : " The cleavage of certain of the 
