Rush on visits to the tents of the buyers, seated behind their little green baize tables, with scales all ready, and bags of gold and silver and piles of banknotes, to buy the little gems."
It may help to realise the enormous value of the Kimberley Mine if I say that two claims, measuring together 62 by 31 feet and worked to a depth of 150 feet, yielded 28,000 carats of diamonds.
The roadways across the mine soon, however, became unsafe. Claims were sunk 100 or 200 feet each side of a roadway, and the temptation to undermine roadways was not always resisted. Falls of road frequently took place, followed by complete collapse, burying mine and claims in ruin. At that time there were probably 12,000 or 15,000 men at work in the mine, and then came the difficulty how to continue working the host of separate claims without interference with each other. A system of rope haulage was adopted. 29
