value
than all the gems of every kind which she produces. Until Mohammedan
invasions about the first part of the eleventh century, the native
princes of India held all the best of the yield of the diamond mines,
but from that time they were periodically plundered by foreign powers,
and a large part of the store of centuries was carried off, until the
invaders established dynasties within the country, when they began to
accumulate precious stones for themselves, as their despoiled
predecessors had done before them. Muhammed Ghori commenced to pillage
India in 1176. He founded the Mohammedan rule there, and it is said,
had accumulated about 400 lbs. of diamonds by the time he was
assassinated in 1206.
It
is a curious fact that all the great historic plunder-ings were made at
Delhi and Lahore, two cities outside the known diamond fields,
considerably north of the Punna mines, which, as far as we know, were
the most northerly of all the Indian diamond mines. There is an Indian
tradition that diamonds have been found in the Himalayas. In 1870 it
was reported that some diamonds were found after a great storm at Simla
on the lower ranges of the Himalayas. Either mines of great importance
existed in ancient times far north of those known now, or the princes
of that country made incursions far to the south to obtain them. This
was certainly done later, for while Shah Jehan reigned in Delhi, his
son Aurungzebe, at his command, made war upon his enemies at Allhabahad
and as far south as the Deccan. As he was successful in the battles
fought, and the Panna and Golconda mines lay in those territories, it
is not unreasonable to suppose that a large part of the stored prod-
