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PRINCIPAL SOUTH AFRICAN MINES 311
between
grantee and grantor that would placate the general public and enable
the exploiters to carry the country's natural treasures away. Whereas
the Premier pays the Transvaal government sixty per cent, of its
profits, the De Beers Company, a few miles off in the Cape Colony, is
taxed only ten per cent. This unrighteous condition, established in
the Cape Colony by the powerful influence of capital upon legislation
at a time when the people of the colony did not understand the
situation, which permits millions of the natural wealth of the colony
to be carried annually to the mother country without adequate
compensation, would place the industry in the Orange River Colony and
the Transvaal outside the possibility of competition, were it not for
the smaller cost at which the new mines can be operated. The area of
the Premier is so great that it can be operated as an open working for
years. It is estimated that the claim area to a depth of 70 feet
contains 20,000,000 loads. It is being opened in a similar way to a
quarry, after which manner open working has been carried on in the
Jagersfontein mine in the Orange River Colony, it is said, to a depth
of 700 feet.
Roberts-Victor Mine.
For
several reasons the Roberts-Victor mine is one of the most important of
the new mines of South Africa. Its initial capital is £160,000, divided
in one pound shares. With one exception, the diamonds from this mine
have brought the highest price per carat of any. In 1906 the average
price of the Dutoitspan diamonds was 80s. 11.52d., whereas the
Roberts-Victor brought only 75s., but in the value of the yield per
load it far
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