File:Africa (1878) (14589740028).jpg

Identifier: africa00johnrich (find matches)
Title: Africa
Year: 1878 (1870s)
Authors: Johnston, Alexander Keith, 1804-1871 Keane, A. H. (Augustus Henry), 1833-1912
Subjects: Africa -- Description and travel Africa -- Social life and customs
Publisher: London : Edward Stanford
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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become dearer, and the rate of yieldis not so great, the population has been reduced to about40,000, a large proportion being natives. The camps atfirst, owing to the scarcity of wood, and the frequentmigrations from one rush to another, were chieflycanvas tents; but in Kimberly, the capital, brick andstone have been used, though iron, wood, and canvas arestill the chief materials employed in house-building. Thepopulation of Kimberly varies from month to month, but,in addition to its mine, it has a fine market-place, banksand churches, assembly-rooms, clubs, and hotels. TheXew Bush Mine of Kimberly has now drawn the greaterpart of the diggers to it. It has the appearance of ahollow about three-quarters of a mile in circumference.Before it became a digging it had a slight elevation abovethe surrounding plain. It is now scooped out to a con-siderable depth, the lowest point reached being about220 feet.1 A good deal of the mining work is done by 1 Glanville, Guide to South Africa ; 1877.
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NATAL. 401 natives, who work with pick and spade loading bucketswhich are hauled up and let down by ropes. The stuffis carried off to sorting grounds where it is sieved out,and afterwards examined carefully with the aid of a knifeor piece of tin, on a table in the open air. The lots or claims in the earlier times of excitementwere sometimes sold for enormous prices; half a lot, 3 0feet by 16, and already worked down to a depth of 50,having actually realised £24,000. At present the rateof yield and the price of claims is by no means so great.Still every one lives in hope, and every unexpected findattracts fresh fortune-hunters to the spot. Nor are thesefinds at all rare. Thus an Irishman after a few hourssearch came upon a stone which he was able to pawn for£3000, while another discovered one of 115 carats on anabandoned claim ! One of the great diamonds which havebeen found here was named the Star of South Africa,and, before cutting, was sold for £11,200. 11. Natal—Maritzburg. Th

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