The age-herald., 1900-10-24

that 1t is practically impossible for the average mind to form any idea of what 1t really means.
 Kimberley has monopolized a great deal Of attention during the present South Af- rican war, and with its fortunes one name is inseparably connected-that of Cecil Rhodes. It was Rhodes, aided by one of the most astute financiers of the century, Alfred Belt, who welded together the whole diamond industry of the Kimberley dis trict in the De Beers Mining Company, and formed a corporation whose grip of Kim berley and it's gems is more absolute than any other commercial trust in the whole world.
 What the actual wealth of Kimberley may be no one can accurately guess Mill lions upon millions may be stored away In the offices of the De Beers Company. No body knows. No secret has ever been bet ter kept What Is known is that the busi- ness of the De Beers Company is to keep the price of diamonds up. Once let the sup ply increase to any extent, and prices would drop. Therefore, only a limited number of diamonds find their way into the market each year-the remainder never leave Kimberley.
 Like many another great-~Source of wealth, the discovery of the diamond mines Of Kimberley was tue to an accident. In, the late sixties a Boer, with the distinctly Hiberr.sin name of O'Reilly, happened to t-she Snelter one nlBnl III u hdlHr hrddi. Some of the native children were playing with particularly bright stone, and this attracting O'Reilly's notice, he offered to exchange a few beads and other trif1es for 1t.
 He knew little of the real value of dia- monds, but when he reached home he was able to dispose of the gem for substantial sum of money. He told his friends, too, that the Kaffirs had told him there were plenty more similar stones in the district, and soon there was quite an influx of pros- pectors to the neighborhood of the Vaal river.
 The surrounding country was secured by fortune-seekers, and at Hopetown, Bulfon- tein, small discoveries of diamonds were made. But it was on the spot where the town of Kimberley now stands in all its prosperity that the greatest finds were made, and the very first mine to be opened there was on farm owned by Boer, one De Beers. It Is this mine which still holds sway as the monarch of all diamond pro ducers, and which gives its name to the .ast corporation of which Alfred Belt and cecil Rhodes are the leading spirits, whose wealth is so fabulous and whose power lo SO tar-reaching.
 mother vast mine is the Kimberley This and the De Beers have the honor of being the largest holes ever dug by man in the surface of the earth. When one imagines that the nfouth of the Kimberley mine is nineteen acres in area, and that the latter has an opening covering thirty-fve acres, while the depth of each is something like 300 feet, one can gain some conception or the magnitude of these great pits Lat terly, however, It has become necessary to adopt other methods of securing the dia- monds than that of digging great open pits such as these.
 When the necessity arose for descending to very great depths, and to use violent explosives, such as dynamite, for blasting rd hl1a ground in which the costly gems are embedded, 1t was found that the destruction of life and property through the constant collapsing of the walls of earth was too serious and alarming to De allowed to continue; so other methods had to be devised. At some distance from the great open pit shafts were sunk, and from these ran horizontal galleries, penetrating the blue clay.
 The lowest of these galleries is 1200 feet in the De Beers mine, and 1500 feet in the Kimberley. In inaugurating this newer system of diamond mining. an enormous outlay was necessary in eXcayating appli- ances and it is estimated that these cost millions of dollars. The wheel used TOT mining purposes Is the largest in the world, and was cast by the De Beers Company at Kimberley.
 In the various mines vast army of la borers Is kept in constant employment when everything is in running order. over twelve thousand colored men are at work' with stan or nearly SVUO "hiee hieh eii- gagged as overSeers, engineers ana traues- men. Day and night, week days and Sun days, the work proceeds. There Is never stop. Eight hours at a stretch each gang works. While one gang Is below, the re- mainder live on the surface, and while they wait their turn they are kept In huge square or compound, surrounded on the inside by sheds, where the colored toll CTS live and sleep.
 They are entirely cut off from the outer world for three months at time, and then if anyone wishes to leave his work he IS kent in A room by himself for seven days. All his clothing is taken from him, and he Is not suffered to depart until every risk of having secreted diamond on his per son Is eliminated.
 That such stringent measures are needed to check robbery Is shown by the fact that not long ago one fellow had sore leg, and had 1t well bandaged just as he was leav-