The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1880-09-03

The diamond has many histories. II
has n chemical and commercial,
mineralogic8l and mystical history.
1t has what might be called personal
history, comprising the varied adven-
lures OF Individual stones; there is a
history OF diamond cutting and counters
feiting, of diamond discoveries and dia-
mond robberies, and there promises
soon to be r history of diamond manu-
facture. The earliest known home of
the gem was in India. From India it
made its way westward to the Greeks,
who, among its many remarkable quail.
ties, singled out its pre- eminent hard
ness as that by which it was thencefor-
ward to be distinguished when known,
and detected when doubtful. They
named IT. adamas, the indomitable, and
invented fables in illustration of this
character, which passed current and un-
questioned for many hundreds OF years.
Such was the obduracy of the genuine
diamond. they maintained, that the at
Tempt to break il between hammer and
anvil resulted, not in the fracture oi the
stone, but the rending of the metal;
and numerous gems OF the purest water
were inundated, generntion after gen.
Grafton, 10 the lind tradition of this
perilous ordeal by iron. There was. IN
deed, it was added. one method by which
this otherwise invincible resistance
could be overcome. Immersion for
certain time in warm goats blood rem
dered the crystal amcnable to the blows
of the hammer, although even then, like
the Calydonian hero at the siege OF
Thebes, it contrived to involve its
sturdy adversary in its own destruc-
ton.
Now the truth is that the diamond,
although the hardest of known sub
stances, is also one of the most brittle,
since it possesses natural cleavage
along which it splits with the utmost
facility. When the Koh.i-noor was be-
ing recut in 1859, the jeweler to whose
care it was intrusted during the opera
ton. submitted it to the inspection OF
one of his most valued customers. who
heedlessly let it slip through his fingers.
The jeweler, seeing it fall, all but lost
his senses with terror, and called forth
a similar access of retrospective dismay
in his distinguished visitor by explain
ing that ii the jewel had touched the
ground at q certain angle it would al
most infallibly have separated into frag-
ments.
The extreme difficulty of polishing
the diamond caused it, in early times, to
be sought after as an amulet rather than
as an ornament. The belief in its efficacy
both as poison and as an antidote to
poison is of high antiquity, and as re-
CARDS the healing branch is even yet not
wholly extinct. Benvenuto Cellini re-
lates that he owed his lie to the avarice
of an apothecary in substituting pow
dered beryl tor the diamond dust which
he had been bribed to mis-: with his
salad; and the same pseudo-d deadly sub
.A tot 30
| Overbury in the Tower. On the other
hand, the Romans regarded it as a sure
remedy, not only against poison, but
against various other perils, and the
conviction of its mystical virtues con-
tinued to prevail throughout the middle
ages. 1t was said to confer valor, to
insure victory, to repel witchcraft and
madness, to give success in lawsuits.
Pliny is careful to tell us that if worn
on the left arm, touching the skin, it
dispels nocturnal panic; and Sir John
Vaudeville adds that it should be given
freely, not bought or sold.
Diamond superstitions, in our days,
seem to have taken refuge in the East.
The Shah of Persia is said to possess one
set, in a cimeter, which has the power
OF rendering the wearer invisible, and
the great diamond of the Rajah of Mat
tan, in Borneo, weighing 367 carats, and
supposed to be the largest in existence
is credited with the virtue, not Uf tails
man alone. but of panacea as well,
The natives of the island believe that
water in which it has been immersed
cures every disorder; and the vast price
offered for it by the Governor of Ba-
tav'a, of $3.50, 900, two ships of war fully
equipped, together with sundry arms
and munitions. was refused, not because
OF the intrinsic value of the jewel, but
because the fortunes of the dynasty
were traditionally affirmed to depend
upon its possession.
1t appears to be commonly lost sight
OF that these gems have commercial |
value entirely Independent of their de-
corative purpose. A peculiar modiii-
cation OF diamond. known rs "carbon-
ado" which is as unsightly as cast iron,
Is sold for use in rock-boring machines,
at an average price of four and halt to
five dollars the carat. Fifteen years ago
an unlimited supply of this substance
was Offered TO a London merchant at
the ridiculously low price of three
pence n carat; the Amsterdam cut
ters, however, reported unfavorably as
TO its employment in their trade, and the
proposal was declined. 1t was never
renewed; tor shortly afterward the SER
viceableness of the stone (Which is as
hard as diamond itseli), both for rock
drilling and gem-engraving, was dis
covered, and from drug in the market
it became an object oil energetic CON-
petition. Carbonate " resembles in
appearance certain meteorIc stones of
a blackish- brown hue and crystalline
texture. 1t is composed OF the same
material rs diamond, and is in fact SUD.
posed to be diamond which has some
how got spoiled in the making. 1t is
found in masseJ of from one to two
pounds weight. and only in the neigh
borhood of Bahia, for the Jumps of
"carbon" occasionally met with in
South Africa are deficient IN hardness,
and thus seem TO have been arrested at
still earlier Stage of their progress to-
ward mineral perfection. Bort" {"
which is another deficient member of
the diamond family, but is nevertheless
also highly priced in the arts, consists
in an aggregation OF tiny crystals. mixed,
like the black diamonds of Borneo, with
a certain proportion OF amorphous car
bon. We see in it u failure or freak
of nature; and just as the ring OF as
teroids in the solar system is supposed
TO represent a single majestic planet, so
the forces thus scattered in separate
centers disqualification would presum-
| ably. under normal conditions have