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THE DE BEERS SAGA
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There
is no need to recruit labour at great cost for the Kimberley Mines. An
agent in the principal centres of the Territories to see to the
entraining of the boys for Kimberley is all that is needed. It is rare
for the mines in Kimberley to be short of labour. The natives realize
that they are assured of fair treatment and receive many benefits by
way of good food and housing, free medical and hospital services and
entertainments. In addition, they receive compensation for injuries
sustained at work, and their families are compensated in case of death
by accident. In either event, the amount awarded is far and away above
what is provided by the Law. Liberal rewards are paid for diamonds
found in the course of work. The provision of these amenities free of
cost to the natives may be looked upon as a refund to them of such
profits as may be made in the compound stores.
Now,
all this digging and wandering about and warfaring and rebelling and
thieving was dramatic, but it had no particular effect upon the
efficiency of diamond production. Americans, of course, are accused of
being too much interested in mass production, in efficiency of
production. But with such a glamorous, idealistic, expensive product as
the diamond, it is interesting to discover that there rarely has been
shown so much efficiency, so much mass productiveness at low cost as
the English developed in South Africa. And again this comes back to the
genius of Rhodes—Cecil John Rhodes.
While
the career of Cecil Rhodes is inevitably linked with De Beers and
diamonds, this story is concerned less with him than with them, just as
it is concerned less with De Beers than with diamonds. He did not
discover diamonds: he exploited them. That he created a great
diamond-producing corporation was incidental to his dreams of empire. ,
He
was born in 1853, the son of an Oxford clergyman. And of course he went
to Oxford. He was tall and well built, with blue eyes and curly blond
hair, a fine figure of
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