As early as 1866, Mr. C. W. King expected that quantities of diamonds from Australia would reach the world’s markets, and there is no doubt that this expectation will be realized when those parts of the vast Commonwealth from which many diamonds have already come, have been thoroughly tested and proved. In 1885 several companies were working at Bingera, a township in New South Wales, 350 miles from Sydney, and many small but pure hard stones were found. The writer has handled some few specimens of fine blue white from Bingera, ranging from a quarter to half a carat after cutting. The hardness of the Australian gem—which may well add another point to Mohs’s scale—has counted against it, but modern cutters will not consider this a bar especially if sufficient quantities be submitted for treatment. Gold has also been found at Bingera and, as Mr. King writes: “The observation made of old by Pliny that the diamond always accompanies gold has been fully borne out by the experience of succeeding ages.” The first Australian diamonds were found in New South Wales, at Reedy Creek, near Bathurst, in 1851. In 1869 during a gold rush near Mudgee some fair diamonds were found by the miners. Professor Liversidge of Sydney describes the occurrence of diamonds at Bingera “as being situated in a sort of basin about four miles long and four miles wide, hemmed in by hills on all sides, save on the North. An old river-drift, probably an ancient bed of the river Horton, rests upon rocks of Devonian or Carboniferous age, and is associated with basalt by which it appears to be overlain. In some places the materials of the drift are compacted together into a conglomerate, so that the mode of occurrence of the diamond at Bingera strikingly resembles that at Mudgee. The minerals composing the gravels are also generally similar in the two cases, though points of difference are not wanting. Some of the diamonds are clear and colourless, others have a pale straw tint. Thousands have been found in this district, as well as in many other localities of New South Wales.” The gravels enclosed agate, sapphire, ruby, zircon, jasper, rock crystal, garnets, grey corundum, ilmenite, tourmaline, gold and tin. Mr. A. R. Pike who, with his partner, Mr. John O’Donnell, has had much experience with Australian diamonds at Inverell, New South Wales, writes interestingly concerning them. “With slates and diorites from the bed-rock, gold is found in the wash, in addition to its diamond output. Rich yields of alluvial gold have been won from the Gulgong district. The wash deposit of this field also carries diamonds and a special class of semi-precious gems. They embrace sapphires in large numbers and various tints; cornflower, blue, green, dark blue, straw, yellow, and blood-red are plentiful. The red sapphires in many cases are true rubies of the desired pigeon-blood colour. Unfortunately all the sapphires represent small flat fragments and are too small for cutting purposes.” A few