These remained until February, 1884, under the detective department, the expenditure falling upon the different mines, the half per cent. registration fee on exported diamonds and the proceeds of those captured defraying a portion. The searching officers when under the detective department were excessive in number and extravagantly paid. The number and expense was ridiculous, eighty (80) searchers were employed in the four mines, and the expense was nearly two thousand pounds per month, for which they were supposed to examine all persons, white or black, leaving the mines, but this was done so hurriedly that the inspection became a mere farce. In January, 1886, the chief of the detective department reporting on this department gave it as his decided opinion that it had no effect on the theft of diamonds, and advised its discontinuance. Since this was written, however, great improvement in this department has taken place under Major Maxwell. I am able to give my readers some statistics comprising the searching and detective expense of the four mines which are interesting, showing the cost of the detective department for the first twenty-seven months after the promulgation of the act, and that of the searching department for twenty-two months after its inauguration: September, 1882, to November, 1884. 1 Registration Fees £38,145 14s. 2d. 3 Detectives’ Salaries 24,906 19s. 6d. 2 Captured Diamonds (sold) 30,671 12s. 3d. 4 Cost of Trap Stones (net) 4,011 8s. 7d. 5 Bonuses to traps 2,130 9s. 0d. March, 1883, to November, 1884. 1 Searching Department £39,578 14s. 6d. I have good authority for stating that the value of the diamonds seized in searching amounted to less than £200. It will, however, be argued that “prevention is better than cure,” and that the searching was to prevent the abstraction of diamonds from the mines. This, however, it failed to do, it only altered the channel by which they passed from the elevated to the underground railway, or in other words, from the pockets of the Kafirs to their stomachs.[45] In February, 1885, the various mining boards took the searching arrangements under their own supervision, and retrenchment is now the order of the day.