I may further relate, in order to show the harm which legalized lotteries do to the moral tone of a community, that at the spring meeting, 1885, of the Griqualand West Turf Club, a thousand pound lottery was so rapidly subscribed that a second was started and filled almost at once, the club receiving 10 per cent. of the winner’s money. At the Capetown autumn meeting in 1886 a somewhat similar lottery was started, when a well-known Kimberley gentleman chanced to draw the favorite, and the news of his luck soon spread. Judge of his surprise on receiving a telegram from the horse’s owner, a supposed honorable man, to the following effect: “My horse sure of a place, will you give a third of prize? Otherwise I shall scratch him.” The Kimberley gentleman did not see his way to accede to this modest request, and preferred, much to the disgust of the too astute owner, to publish his telegram in both the Kimberley and Capetown newspapers. This course of action caused the question of the legality of these race lotteries to be raised in parliament, but the premier’s reply at the time was considered to be vague, and was severely commented upon by the press of the colony. [Illustration] CHAPTER IX. O’REILLY’S ACCOUNT OF NIEKERK.—DR. ATHERSTONE AND THE FIRST DIAMOND.—THE RIVER DIGGINGS.—INFLUX OF POPULATION.—THE DRY DIGGINGS.—DISCOVERY OF THE KIMBERLEY MINE.—EARLY DISCOMFORTS OF THE DIGGERS.— PRESENT CONDITION OF KIMBERLEY. It is already a matter of history how in 1867 the first diamond was discovered in South Africa—not in the bed of a river or in the bowels of the earth, but among the playthings of a Boer’s child in a farm-house near the Orange River in the Hopetown district. It is curious to note how—to slightly alter Pope—“great events from trivial causes spring.” In the same manner that the discovery of diamonds in Brazil and the opening up of the mines in that country virtually closed the Indian mines, so the diamond mines of Griqualand West have almost put a stop to the Brazilian trade. There is a certain spice of romance about the story of the finding of the first diamond in South Africa, as told to me by a former patient of mine, Mr. John O’Reilly, who was the principal agent interested in the discovery, and who thus achieved for himself a historic name in connection with the development of South Africa. I took down from his own lips the following graphic account of the finding of this gem, which differs in some particulars from the version that has been frequently given: [Illustration: KIMBERLEY MINE—PRESENT STAGE, 1886. ]