THE MINERALS OF AFRICA.
For many years the knowledge of Africa was so indefinite that it was
difficult to determine how rich the continent might be in minerals.
Gold and silver had been found, but the former was believed to be more
abundant than the latter, judging from the amounts brought down in the
sands of the great rivers which flow through the central portions of the
continent. Gold had also been found upon the coast of Guinea and in
Southeast Africa.
Precious stones have been found in most of the tropical countries of the
globe; but in Africa they were of rare occurrence until the discovery of
diamonds in the vicinity of the Cape awakened much interest. The
attention of the whole world was then called to the possible resources
of the country.
Just as the discovery of gold in California drew to the gold mines many
men who were anxious to acquire wealth, so the Kimberley diamond mines
attracted hundreds, who, in the pursuit of fortune, forgot fatigue and
hardship, lured on by visions of the future.
The largest diamond in the world, the "Excelsior," was found June, 1894,
in the mines of Jagersfontein in Cape Colony, by the inspector of the
mine.
Experts have pronounced it a gem of the purest water, and its worth to
be about a million sterling.
The greatest precautions were taken to have it conveyed from the mine to
the coast. A squadron of the Sixteenth Lancers guarded the carriage to
Cape Town; from there it was conveyed to London in the gunboat
_Antelope_, and was deposited for safe keeping in one of the vaults of
the Bank of England.
The stone is described as fully three inches in height and nearly three
inches in breadth. Its weight is estimated at nine hundred and
seventy-one carats, or about seven ounces Troy. Its color is white, with
a very slightly bluish tint, and its luster is matchless. In the center
of the stone is a very small black spot, but experts consider that it
can easily be removed in the cutting.
It has been reported that the British Government has offered half a
million pounds sterling for this diamond. The owners, however, have
refused this offer. It has also been reported that the German Emperor
will be the probable purchaser of the gem.
The great sources of the world's supply of gold have been the United
States, Russia, Australia, and South Africa, together with that portion
of West Africa, known as Ashantee, bordering on the Gold Coast of
Guinea.
There is a curious belief among the natives of the entire Gold Coast,
and Ashantee as well. The Great Spirit, it is believed, created three
each of white men and women, and as many black, and placed before them a
large calabash and a sealed paper. To the black men he gave the first
choice. They chose the calabash. This contained gold, iron, and the
choicest products of the earth; but the black race remained ignorant of
their use and value. The white man became possessor of the paper, which
instructed him in all things, made him the favorite of the Great Spirit,
and gave him superior advantages over the black man.
The great bend in the coast of Africa, which makes room for the Gulf of
Guinea, is one of the singular land formations that strikes the eye and
excites the fancy.
The glowing pictures of the beautiful Gold Coast and the wonders of land
and sea under the equator serve to create a taste for travel and a
desire to enjoy the strange and wonderful sights to be met.
An English explorer, Alvan Millson, has recently written much to give an
added interest to this coast section and to call attention to one of the
many freaks of nature.
A little description will be of interest. For a distance of about five
hundred miles along the Bight of Benin there is an intricate chain of
waterways, which lies just at the edge of the sea.
"In many places these narrow and brimming channels are separated from
the onslaught of the Atlantic rollers by no more than five or six level
yards of shifting sand. The spray from the ocean drifts over them, and
the roar of the surf is heard by the native as he glides over their calm
surface in his fragile canoe.
"There are hundreds of miles of similar lagoons bordering the Gulf of
Guinea farther to the west. Many rapid rivers pour into them from
uplands behind, bringing down vast quantities of sand and mud.
"At the same time, the 'Guinea Current,' which resembles our Gulf
Stream, brings another endless supply of sand, worn from the headlands
toward the west, and this sand, heaped up at the ocean's edge, arrests
the rivers just where they are about to empty into the sea, and spreads
them out into a great system of deltas.
"The resistless strength of the narrow sand barriers is attributed
principally to the vast quantities of papyrus and water grass brought
down in huge floating islands by the rivers, which take root and
flourish in the sand. Only at rare intervals can a passageway be found
through the sand. And so, on this singular coast, the ocean and the
rivers unite to build up and perpetuate a barrier between them."
No doubt in the Gold Coast section of the Gulf of Guinea there is this
same constant carrying down of sand by the rivers. Whenever these rivers
pass through gold-bearing regions, the sand carries with it vast
quantities of gold grains, or scales, which have to be panned, or
separated from it by washing.
We have in our reading gained some little idea of the struggles of the
Dutch to obtain possession of the soil of such sections as Natal, Cape
Colony, and what has been known until within a few years as the
Transvaal Republic.
The Witwatersrand may be considered the great gold-mining district of
Africa. It is rapidly pushing its way to the front in the list of
sources for the supply of the precious metal. This region, locally
called the Rand, gives Africa the fourth place in the list of the
sources of the earth's supply.
The Rand is situated in what has been known as the Transvaal Republic.
It is the home of the Dutch settlers, or Boers, but is under the rule of
the British power to a great extent.
The great metropolis of the republic and of the Rand is Johannesburg. It
is a regular mining center, or what is known by the miners as a "boom"
town. From a small settlement it has, in the course of a few years,
grown to a city of nearly twenty thousand inhabitants, while around it
clusters a mining camp of thirty thousand more.
The Boers are naturally a contented people, caring little for display,
but fond of comfort and plenty.
They have had little ambition to dig for such treasures as the earth
might hold in its depths, but have been content to till the soil and to
gather the harvest or fruits of their labor, or to engage in sheep
farming for the purpose of raising wool for exportation.
No doubt, too, they deemed it better policy not to attract strangers to
"prospect" for treasure beneath a soil which they preferred to call
their own, rather than to see it laid out in "claims" by those eager to
mine for its stores.
Now that the miners have rushed into the Rand in such numbers, the Boers
must feel that their own claim to the land is but a name, particularly
as the largest and most profitable mines are owned by London companies.
At the close of the year 1893, the mines in the Rand were producing at
the average rate of two million five hundred thousand dollars value of
bullion each month.
In 1892, the output of the Rand was about twenty-one million two hundred
and fifty thousand dollars in value; in 1893, it rose to nearly
twenty-six million.
Naturally the question arises how long the deposits will last. The best
authorities, however, see no signs of early exhaustion.
There is a strong belief that gold in vast quantities exists in
Matabele-land. Should this prove true, South Africa is likely to become
even more important than it is to-day, as one of the great sources of
the world's supply of gold.