DIAMOND MINES OF SOUTH AFRICA 271
potency
of conditions in the United States, than the effect of the panic here
in November, 1907, upon the diamond mines of South Africa. The De
Beers closed down a large part of their works in 1908; reduced their
expenses £100,000 per month; to avoid the British income tax, turned
their London headquarters into an office for the transfer of shares
only, transferring their headquarters to Kimberley, and borrowed a
million pounds on the security of their investments. It paid the Cape
Colony £302,174 as a tax on its profits for 1907, and estimated the tax
for 1908, including the British income tax to April 1, at £110,683
only. The Jagersfontein reported sales to March 31, 1908, at 53s. id.
as against 71s. formerly. Premier goods dropped from 18s. per carat to
14s., and the big Transvaal mine cut down its production some thirty
thousand loads monthly. The Diamond Syndicate did not renew its
arrangement with the Premier to market the diamonds of that mine, nor
did it exercise its option with the Consolidated Mines on December 21,
1907, thereby terminating its contract, and it is claimed on good
authority, that contrary to the policy steadily maintained heretofore,
of holding the market price of diamonds, it made sales during 1908 at a
cut on 1907 prices. According to the Frankfurter Zeitung, the De Beers Consolidated made sales to the Syndicate early in the fall of 1908 at a 25 per cent, reduction.
Among
the valuable items of information gathered by experience in the mines
is one relating to timber. It has been found that California redwood
outlasts any other wood used. Redwood sleepers after being ten years in
the ground proved to be as sound as when
