188 THE DIAMOND MINES OF SOUTH AFRICA
towns
were two hundred miles nearer the Diamond Fields. This was proudly
noted as an advance of rapid transit, which promised greater
developments, and was one of the many stirring impulses of the diamond
discoveries. But as only one stagecoach started weekly from
Wellington, the chief contribution of the new line to South Africa lay
in its promise rather than its performance.1 It was the
first push of the enterprise which has followed its hoof tracks through
the African desert with the tireless race of the iron horse.
While
this swarm was gathering from India, Australia, Europe, and America,
and pressing toward the diamond mines through the southern Colonial
ports, another swarm was entering the fields from inland Africa. To
the native tribesmen the opening of the diamond mines was a certain
Golconda. For the shovelling of gravel under a burning sun, for the
heaving of boulders, for the shaking of cradles in the midst of
whirling dust, for the quarrying in pits and the scraping on sorting
tables,— the wiry sinews, pliant muscles, nimble fingers, and sharp
eyes of Africans, inured to the scorch of the sun, the pelt of the
rain, and the blast of the sand, were greatly serviceable. So there was
a cordial greeting of the influx of natives, ready to work for the
barest pittance of pay while their masters lolled in the shade.
First
came the neighboring Griquas, Koranas, and Batlapins, with Basutos from
their southern reservation, followed by a stream of Zulus, Mahowas,
Malakakas, and Hottentots, and Kafirs of one hundred tribes, ranging
east to the Indian Ocean and far northwest into Namaqua and Bechuana
lands and northeast into Matabeleland and the regions lying beyond the
Limpopo and the Zambesi.2 There was every shade of dusky
color in this throng, from livid and tawny yellow to jet black. Some
stalked proudly over the veld in the full plumage of the Zulu veteran,
with flowing ox-tail girdles, armlets, and anklets, decked with
1 "Among the Diamonds," 1870-1871.
2
"The Diamond Diggings of South Africa," Payton, 1872. "South African
Diamond Fields and Journey to Mines," William James Morton, M.D., New
York, 1877.
