|
DIAMOND MINES OF SOUTH AFRICA 237
climate somewhat trying. In the summer the thermometer would go to 1150
in the shade. In winter there was freezing weather. Shelter was of the
roughest. The houses were built of packing boxes and pieces of tin.
The pioneers carried with them small tents or " bug-walks" as they
called them. Getting there, especially by the ox-wagon route, was the
most tiresome part. Barnato said of his journey to Kim-berley, that he
paid a big price for the privilege of walking beside a wagon by day
and sleeping under it at night. But work at the diggings was more
dangerous. The hard work, poor shelter, almost entire lack of good
drinking water, for the African rivers are all muddy, and there was no
water at that time at the dry diggings, and the abundance of
troublesome insects, made a combination to which many succumbed.
Meantime
diggers were straggling among the kopjes to the South toward the Modder
river. About half way between the Vaal and the Modder rivers, one of
them discovered a number of small diamonds among a lot of stones the
children of a farmer played with. This was in December, 1870, on the
Vooruizigt farm. Diamonds had also been found among a lot of pebbles
picked up on the Bultfontein farm. Immediately, the diggers began to
swarm throughout that neighborhood, prospecting in every direction.
They found a number of diamonds sticking in the walls of Farmer Van
Wyk's dwelling, which he had plastered with mud from a neighboring pond
of his farm Du Toit's Pan. This led to the discovery of the mine so
named, which was the first of the four celebrated mines known later as
the De Beers Consolidated Mines. The excitement
|
||
|
|
||