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8 DIAMOND FAMILY. particular places, and not so universally spread through the country. They were often found in washing the gold, before they were knowti to be diamonds, and were consequently thrown away with the sand and gravel se parated from it. And it is very well remembered, that numbers of very large stones, which would have made the fortunes of the possessors, have passed unre garded through the hands of those, who now with impa tience support the mortifying reflection. However, about twenty years since, a person acquainted with the appearance of rough diamonds, conceived that these peb bles, as they were then esteemed, were of the same kind: But it is said, that there was a considerable interval be tween the first starting this opinion, and the confirma tion of it by proper trials and examination, it proving difficult to persuade the inhabitants, that what they had been long accustomed to despise, could be of the import ance represented by this discovery ; and I have been in formed, that in this interval, the governor of one of these places procured a good number of these stones, which he pretended to make use of at cards, to mark with, instead of counters. But it was at last confirmed by skilful jew ellers in Europe, consulted on this occasion, that the stones thus found in Brazil were truly diamonds, many of which were not inferior, either in lustre or any other quality, to those of the East Indies But Serro Dofro is not the only district in Brazil where this gem is found ; it is also collected in the rivers Giquitignogna, lliacho Fundo, and Rio de l’eixe: and Dandrada informs us, that there are unopened diamond mines • Anson’s Voyage, Ito, p. 51.
