the
name of Barbot is said to have employed for the last ten years a
process which he keeps secret, but which, it is said, enables him to
remove the opaque crust which covers the diamond in its rough state, so
as to show the colour it will have when cut; if true, this might render
the work of the lapidary more easy, but the fact is much to be doubted.
At
the great fire in Hamburg, many diamonds were sold for trifling sums
which had remained in the burning buildings, and, to an unexperienced
eye, appeared totally valueless, but when repolished they regained
their pristine brilliancy, though with a slight loss in weight.
The
diamond can be cloven with facility in a direction parallel with the
planes of the octahedron or dodecahedron, or, to use the lapidaries'
expression, "splits easily with the grain." This quality much assists
the otherwise tedious operation of cutting or grinding the diamond,
particularly where it is desirable to get rid of flaws. In spite of its
hardness, it is capable of being reduced to powder, and the mistaken
idea which used to prevail, and even now exists, that the best test of
the reality was to put it on an anvil and strike it with a hammer,
when, if genuine, it either broke the hammer or buried itself in the
anvil, has been the cause of the loss of many fine gems, which were
either crushed or thrown away as valueless.
The
diamond is found in Hindostan, Brazil, Sumatra, Borneo, the Ural
Mountains, and occasionally in North America; in some instances, in
Australia; gene-
