The Firm of Girdlestone Chapter 17 - The Land of Diamonds

Arthur Conan Doyle (0:00)

Chapter 17 of Affirmed Girdle Stone by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain, read by Ashton Hoffman, The Land of Diamonds.

The anxious father had not very long to wait before he heard tidings of his son.

Upon the first of June, the great vessel weighed her anchor in the Southampton water, and steamed past the needles in the channel. On the 5th, she was reported from Madeira, and the merchant received telegrams both from the agent of the firm and from his son. Then there was a long interval of silence, for the telegraph did not extend to the Cape at that time. But at last, on the 8th of August, a letter announced Ezra's safe arrival. He wrote again from Wellington, which was the Railway Terminus.

And finally, there came a long episode from Kimberley, the capital of the mining district, in which the young man described his 800 miles drive up country and all the adventures which overtook him on the way. This place, Kimberley, he said in his letter, has grown into a fair-sized town, though a few years ago it was just a camp. Now there are churches, banks, and clubs in it. There are a sprinkling of well-dressed people on the streets, but the majority are grimy-looking chaps from the diggings, with slouched hats and collared shirts. Rough fellows to look at, though quite enough as a rule. Of course, there are blacks everywhere, of all shades, from pure jet up to the lightest yellow.

Some of these have money and are the devil. I was doing so.

I knocked the incident scoundrel down. He says that he will sue me, but I can't believe that the law is so civil as to bolster up a black man against a white one. Though Kimberley is the capital of the dry diggings, it is not there that all the actual mining is done.

It goes on briskly in a lot of little camps which are dotted along the Vowel River for 50 or 60 miles. These stones are generally brought by licensed agents immediately after they have been found, and are paid for by checks on banks in Kimberley. I have therefore transferred my money to this standard bank here, and have taken my license. I start tomorrow for Hebron Clibdriff, and other of the mining centers, to see for myself how business is done, and to make friends with the miners. So as to get myself known, and as soon as the news comes, I shall buy in all that offers. Keep your eyes on that fellow Dimmesdale, and let him know nothing of what is going on. He wrote again about a fortnight afterwards, his letter as it crossed the Atlantic past the Outward Mail, which bore the news of the wonderful diamond found by an English geologist among the Earl Mountains.

I am now on a tour among the camps, he said. I have worked right through from Hebron to Clibdriff, Penel, Corwoods, Hope, Welkerid's Plant, Nucleid, Hope, Windrush, and Blue Jacket. Tomorrow, I push on to Delpert's, Hope, and Lorcan's flat. I am well received wherever I go, except by the dealers who are mostly German Jews. They hear that I am a London capitalist, and fear that I may send up the prices. They little know I brought stones all the way along, but not very valuable ones, for we must husband all our resources. The processes of mining is very simple. The men dig pits in loose gravel, lying along the banks of the river, and it is in these pits that the diamonds are found. The black men, or boys, as they are called, do all the work and the buys, or masters, superintend everything that turns up belongs to the buys. But the boys had a fixed rate of wages, which never varies, whether the work is paying or not. I was standing at Hebron, watching one of these gangs working, when the white chap gave a shout, and dived his hand into a heap of stuff. He had just turned over a pile, out a dirty-looking little lump about the size of a marble. At his shout, all the other fellows from every clan within hearing gathered around, until there was quite a crowd. It's the fine stones of the man that turned it up. Fifty carats if it's one, cried another, weighing it in the palm of his hand. I had my scales with me, so I offered to weigh it.

It was sixty-four and a half carats. Then they washed it and examined it. There was a lot of whispering among them, and then the one who had found it came forward. You deal, don't you, Mr. Giddelstone? He said. Now and then, I answered, but I'm not very keen about it. I come out here more for pleasure than business.