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PRINCIPAL SOUTH AFRICAN MINES 297
various
interests. The New Jagersfontein Company, as it is known since the Boer
war, is capitalized at £1,-000,000, divided into 500,000 each of
ordinary and deferred shares. The shape of the mine is a rough oval,
and the size of it about 1,500 by 2,000 feet, and it contains 1,124
claims. It has been skillfully and methodically worked as an open mine
to depths, which in all the others entailed most disastrous
consequences. It is worked down in concentric terraces. The three
lowest are carried down 360, 410 and 450 feet, with a small area
below, 480 feet deep, and late reports claim that a depth of 700 feet
in the open has been reached. So well has this been done that the
system serves as a model to mines discovered later, in their open
working.
At
the beginning of the Boer war, this mine had been producing about
250,000 carats yearly. In 1898, 232,-433 carats; in 1899, 288,937
carats. In 1900 the production fell to 183,399 carats, and in 1901,
while the war was on, to 18,002 carats. Work was then abandoned until
July, 1902, when the English company again took possession of the mine.
Some months were occupied in getting the water out of the mine,
repairing and replacing machinery, etc.; after which, work was resumed
and 29,302 carats won for the year ending March 31, 1903. For the year
ending March 31, 1904, the yield was 167,597% carats. In 1905 the
output was back to the old figures, being 266,225 carats. The year 1906
gave 255,841 carats and 1907, 219,275 carats.
The
yield of .diamonds to the load in this mine is very small. Before the
war it was 0.112 of a carat to the load. In 1904 it was only 0.0968.
The management attributed the decline to reef and mixed material having
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