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Ch. 5: Camps on the Vaal

Ch. 5: Camps on the Vaal Page of 449 Ch. 5: Camps on the Vaal Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
THE CAMPS ON THE VAAL                    147
cradles and water-troughs at the bottom of the Klip-drift bank, and the ridged and gullied slope for hundreds of yards inland was pitted with holes from ten to thirty feet square, and ranging in depth from four to twenty-five feet. If the river shore in line with the parallel claim was too thick set with cradles to admit a new washing machine, or if the claim was high up on the bank, water for washing was sometimes carried up from the river in carts to the working ground. Alluvial soil covered the face of the basin, more or less thickly, for a stretch of half a mile from the river, lying even on the tops of the kopjes, except
where rugged boulders and blocks of basalt and trap protruded stiffly above the coating of gravel.
The choice of location was largely determined by fancy, rather than any solid reason. Some preferred light colored patches of gravel to dark, but would have been puzzled by any call to justify their choice. Others sought for tops of kopjes, with a supposition that the rains had washed the light gravel downhill and left the heavier deposit with the diamonds on the crown of the hillocks and ridges.1 It was generally observed, however, that diamond crystals were most plentiful in spots
1 "The Diamond Diggings of South Africa," Charles Alfred Payton, London, 1872.
Ch. 5: Camps on the Vaal Page of 449 Ch. 5: Camps on the Vaal
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