104	THE DIAMOND
	permanent Under-Secretary of the Colonial Office, pre­sented the diamond to the King at Sandringham. They were attended by Inspectors Drew and Gough, and from the time they took the diamond from the vaults of the London and Westminster Bank until it was returned to its place of security, the party was in charge of Scot­land Yard and surrounded by detectives. Arrived at Wolferton, the two knights entered a royal carriage awaiting them and preceded by an outrider, drove to Sandringham. Upon reaching the royal abode they were conducted to the drawing-room, where they were shortly joined by the King and Queen, the Queens of Spain and Norway, the Princess of Wales, the Princess Victoria, the Princess Henry of Battenberg and others. Sir Richard Solomon at once presented the diamond to the King. He examined it with interest, and expressing his admiration, handed it to the Queen, who in turn with the other ladies present, inspected it. At the invitation of the King, Sir Richard Solomon and Sir Francis Hop-wood lunched with members of the royal family and returned to London by the 2 155 v. m. train, taking the diamond with them. Now came the important matter of cutting the great diamond. After much deliberation, it was decided to entrust the work to the firm of J. Asscher & Co. of Amsterdam. A replica in clay was made and experi­mented upon. The crystal was studied in every aspect to find how the flaws could be lost in the cutting; into what shapes and sizes of cut gems the crystal could be transformed with the minimum loss of weight, and to that end, where and how it should be cleaved. A de­cision was finally reached, to make one large cleavage