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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



diamond merchants of Europe. The size of a parcel varies from 

 a few thousand to tens of thousands of carats ; in one instance, 

 two years ago, nearly a quarter of a million of carats were sold in 

 one lot to one buyer/' * 



The company sustain a considerable loss annually, estimated 

 now at from 10 to 15 per cent, by diamonds being stolen from the 

 mines. To check this loss, extraordinary precautions have been 

 resorted to. The natives are engaged for a period of three 

 months, during which time they are confined in a compound sur- 

 rounded by a high wall. On returning from their day's work, 

 they have to strip off all their clothes, which they hang on pegs 

 in a shed. Stark naked, they then proceed to the searching-room, 

 where their mouths, their hair, their toes, their armpits, and every 



Ix the Eight-Hundred-Feet Level of the De Beers Diamond Mine. 



portion of their bodies are subjected to an elaborate examina- 

 tion. White men would never submit to such a process, but the na- 

 tive sustains the indignity with cheerful equanimity, considering 

 only the high wages which he earns. After passing through the 

 searching-room, they pass, still in a state of nudity, to their apart- 

 ments in the compound, where they find blankets in which to 

 wrap themselves for the night. During the evening the clothes 

 which they have left behind them are carefully and minutely 

 searched, and are restored to their owners in the morning. The 

 precautions which are taken a few days before the natives leave 

 the compound, their engagement being terminated, to recover 

 diamonds which they may have swallowed, are more easily im- 

 agined than described. In addition to these arrangements, a law 

 of exceptional rigor punishes illicit diamond buying, known in 



* Report, 1890, General Manager, De Beers. 



