THE BOOK OF DIAMONDS
a
little over 10,000,000 carats. Since the discovery of diamonds in
Africa, from 1870 to the present, it is doubtful if the entire
Brazilian diamond and carbon output much exceeded a yearly average of
100,000 carats.
Today,
after producing sixteen million carats, the Brazilian mines have
declined, being eclipsed by the great African fields and by natural
exhaustion. The production is about 20,000 carats per year. Nearly all
of these are carbonado, or black diamonds, most of which come from
Bahia. This state is the only spot in the world where black diamonds
are found.
The
most valuable diamond, "Southern Star", found in 1854, weighed 254
carats in the rough, and 124 carats after it was cut. The "Southern
Star" had impressions uoon its faces when it was found which appeared
to have been made by other diamonds so that the whole was probably a
group of diamond crystals. Massive diamonds have been found in Brazil
in the form of pebbles.
India
and Brazil are interesting only as historical fields. The capital of
the diamond empire is on the "dark continent". In the last sixty-five
years, the Union of South Africa has produced a hundred and eighty-five
million carats—three-quarters of all the diamonds owned by the human
race.
