DIAMOND MINES OF SOUTH AFRICA 247
the
formation of companies, whose promoters often paid big prices for
claims which they could turn in at a large profit. Then came the end of
the open-cut working. They were all down about four hundred feet, the
Bultfontein four hundred and sixty feet in places. The reef began to
cave in to such an extent that further profitable working by that
method was impossible, and underground working conducted by different
interests on the same pipe was impractical. It had been tried on both
the De Beers and Kimberley, and was not a success. On the De Beers
Mine, the De Beers Company, the VicÂtoria, the Oriental, the Gem, and
others tried it, and as Barnato stated at the first annual meeting of
the De Beers Consolidated Mines Company, " one company worked against
another. If one company was on the 500 foot level and another on the
450 foot level, the opposing companies could eat into each other's
boundary walls and pillars to such a dangerous extent that the entire
mine was in a condition which threatened collapse at any moment." The
same thing happened on the KimÂberley mine, between the Central, the
French, and the Standard. Consolidation became an absolute necessity
for the salvation of the mines. It was doubted if the Dutoitspan and
Bultfontein could be made to pay even then by the underground system,
as their diamonds at that time were fetching only 6s. to 7s. per load,
and the cost of the underground work on the Kimberley and De Beers was
then 10s. per load. The policy of Rhodes, therefore, to force an
amalgamation of all the mines, and thereby reduce the cost of
production by united action, and by control of the diamond output of
the world practically, to be able to increase at will the price
