◎ Rowland Croucher

An African farmer had heard tales about other farmers who had made millions of dollars by discovering diamond mines. These tales so excited the farmer that he could hardly wait to sell his farm and go prospecting for diamonds himself.

So he sold the farm and spent the rest of his life wandering the African continent, searching unsuccessfully for the gleaming gems that brought such high prices on the markets of the world.

Finally, broke, worn out, and in a fit of despondency, he threw himself into a river and drowned.

Meanwhile, back at the farm, the man who had bought his farm happened to be crossing a small stream on the property one day when he saw something gleaming at the bottom of the stream. He picked it up. It was a sparkling stone—a good size stone—and, admiring it, he later put it on his fireplace mantel as an interesting curiosity.

Several weeks later, a visitor admired the stone, looked closely at it, hefted it in his hand and nearly fainted. He asked the farmer if he knew what he’d found. When the farmer said no, that he thought it was just a piece of crystal, the visitor told him that he had found one of the largest diamonds ever discovered.

The farmer was astonished. He told the man that his creek was full of these brilliant stones, and his farmland was covered with them. Not all were as large, perhaps, as the one on his mantel, but they were sprinkled generously throughout his property.

Needless to say, the farm the first farmer had sold, so that he could search for a diamond mine, turned out to be the most productive diamonds mine on the entire African continent.

The first farmer had owned, free and clear, acres of diamonds, but had sold them for practically nothing in order to look for them elsewhere.

The moral is clear: If the first farmer had only taken the time to study and prepare himself—to learn what diamonds looked like in their rough state—and, since he had already owned a piece of land, to thoroughly explore the property he had before looking elsewhere, his wildest dreams would have come true.

一个非洲农民听说过很多关于其他农民因为发现钻矿而一夜暴富的故事。这些故事让这位农民如此心潮澎湃，他迫不及待地要卖掉他的农场，踏上寻宝之路。

于是他卖掉了农场，整个余生都游荡在非洲大陆，寻找着那在世界市场上价格始终高居不下的闪闪发光的宝石。

最后，他破产了，筋疲力尽了，一时绝望之下，他投河自尽。

与此同时，在原来那个农场，那个买下农场的人有一天碰巧跨过农场里的一条小溪，他看见溪底有什么东西在闪闪发光。他把它捡了起来，是一块发光的石头——很大一块——他欣赏着它，并把它当做一个有趣的珍藏放在壁炉架上。

几个星期后，一位游客来欣赏那块石头，他仔细观赏着，放在手上掂量着，然后几乎昏厥过去。他问农民是否知道自己发现的是什么。当农民说不知道，还以为只是一块水晶时，访问者告诉他，他捡到的是迄今为止人类发现的最大的钻石。

那个农民震惊极了。他告诉那位客人，他的小溪里到处都是这种闪闪发光的石头，他的农田也被这种石头覆盖着。也许不是所有的都像壁炉架上的那块一样大，但是它们遍布农场的每一个角落。

不用说，第一个农民为了搜寻钻矿而卖掉的农场，结果却是整个非洲大陆上最多产的钻矿。

第一个农民本来名正言顺地拥有几亩的钻石，但他却为了去其他地方找钻石而把它们卖了，卖得一文不值。

这个故事的寓意很清晰：如果第一个农民花一点时间去学习和准备——认真学习未经打磨的钻石长什么样——并在探索其他地方之前，先在自己拥有的那块土地上彻底探索一番，他的美梦就可以成真。