Ch. 2: The Traditional Ophir Land

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	CHAPTER II

	IN TRADITIONAL OPHIR LAND CHILD picking a shining pebble for a plaything from the gravel edging a river — was this sport of blind chance the revelation of the marvellous diamond fields of Africa ? In narrow fact, yes ; but in a wider, truer range of view, this discovery was the crown that sooner or later must reward the search of daring adventurers and the push of stubborn pioneers into the dark heart of the continent. There was no chance in the strain of pluck that braved strange perils to reach traditional Ophir and the pits of King Solomon's mines, that wandered far in quest of the golden cities of Monomotapa, that tore the wilderness from the clutch of the lion and vulture, and beat back the frantic impis of Tchaka, Dingaan, and Umsilikazi. The ardor and the toil and the courage and the blood of ten generations of explorers were spent before it was possible for a little child to play pitch and toss with the pebbles of the Orange River and clasp a rough diamond in his heedless hand. Two dominant motives were fused with the high-spirited zeal for exploration that so signally stamped the fifteenth century, — the opening of an all-sea route to the Indies, and the grasp of the riches of lands behind the veil. In the unknown there is space for any vault of fancy, and in that romantic age her soaring wings were rarely clipped. One may be moved to smile at the fantastic visions of the men who found the southern waterway to the Indies, and added a new world to the old; but there will be no sneer in the smile of any one who can measure his own debt to experience, and put himself back five centuries to stand 32

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