The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-25 00:00:00

GOLD MINING AS A BUSINESS.

Looking at it as a speculation, it is the fancy of
the press generally to have a fling at gold mining.
In every circle we hear men telling of successful
adventures in what they mis-name mining. If you
inquire closely you will find all losses by speculation
in Washoe stock are set down as losses in mining.
Money paid for claims supposed to cover good min-
ing ground, and money spent in finding out that
there was no such ore as represented, is called
mining. Money put into opening out ores that
assay well, but which, after putting up expensive
works, are found so full of base metal that our pre-
sent milling will not work them, is classed as losses
by mining. Tempted by under estimates, men go
into such companies and find they cannot pay the
assessments ; so they lose what they have paid by
forfeiture Soon after this a numerous crowd croak
against what it understands as " mining." Of all
the class of regular newspaper writers there is
scarcely one that does not take a fling at mining, and
scarce one really knows anything about actual min-
ing. Hearing much talk from the loungers about,
they get an idea that mining is all loss and no gain.
Seldom, if ever, these writers hear anything from
men really engaged in mining. Legitimate miners
are at their work, and are not encauntered in the sa-
loons nor in the clusters at our street corners. When
we consider that GO millions of dollars are produced
annually from our mines we cannot resist the
conclusion that mining is a steady and profitable
business, and that a great many persons are en-
gaged in it successfully; so many, indeed, that if
they would take the same pains to chronicle their
success and their monthly profits, as others do to
circulate their vague and unsubstantiated denuncia-
tions against what they understood as mining,
people would get a just conception of the wealth of
our Pacific States. They who best know the value
of good mines, well worked, are silently realising.
They do not talk nor write. Like the.. dog with a
rich bone, they do not even like people to be look-
ing inquiringly, and counting the income return.
Unfortunately, one min who has a loss to tell of,
like one whose head gets a crack in a crowd,
makes outcry more than one hundred men
whose heads have not been hurt. San Fran-
cisco owes everything to the gold mines of
California. People come here for gold. They are
kept here for gold. All other industries are an out-
growth from our gold mines. Take them away,
and the whole State as well as the city would retro-
grade. The production of the precious metal is the
talisman which started this coast into life, and will
stimulate its growth as year after year rolls round.
We are not of those who complain that capital
in San Francisco does not give aid to mining. It
has done its reasonable share, despite of the efforts
of the press to discourage it. What gold mining
asks, and it asks no more, is fair and honest repre-
sentation. There are gold-bearing quartz mines
enough to assure us that gold mining will endure
and be a permanent dependence of California.
Every business has its risks. Taking the actual
results of gold mining, pursued as a regular busi-
ness, we are confident that it will be found to have
less risks, in proportion to the profits, than any other
business, wherever it has been conducted with
equal prudence and economy. It is free from the
risks of close competition, over importations, dull
markets, dead seasons, changing fashions rem-
nants, bad debts, and the worry of a hundred de-
tail annoyances, repeated daily, from multitudi-
nous dealings. It is not one season you make and
another you lose. If you have a good mine in regu-
lar work, and keep your dead work a year ahead, it
is the most steadfast and trustworthy of all invest-
ments for revenue. No advertising, no higgling, no
white lies, no adulterations, no customers to please,
and all seems alike.

There may be exceptions to some of these rules ;
but they are more rare than in any other business.
Gold mining has some other admitted advantages
over all other industries that need to be considered.
When once under system it does not exact con-
tinuous personal presence, but gives you reivionable
recreation. Besides, the duller times, and the harder
the money panic in other pursuits, the more
eager is thu demand for the production of your
gold mine. If statistics speak truly, in all
mercantile business men fail in staggering propor-
tions. But the rarest thing ore hears is the failure
of a gold miner, whose mine is once opened and in
regular work. The chief risk is not in working a
gold mine, but in finding one that is workable, to
begin with. Here you need circumspection and good
judgment.

A mere mining claim has no value. Listen to no
large talk ; you must have proof of the fact that
the ore has been well and largely tested. As a
general rule you aresafest when you get on the well-
known mineral belts that have mines and mills
strewn along their well-known course. Then you
want to be convinced that the particular part of the
belt you examine has a sufficient proportion of pay
chutes. All quartz, on whatever mineral belt, is not
pay quartz. Every line of quartz consists of alter-
nations of pay and barren chutes, or sections. Take
no account of certified analyses of small pieces
of quartz. They should go for nothing. The vein
may furnish rich specimens, and yet be generally
not rich enough to pay. Prefer veins, as a gene-
ral rule, that supply an assured plenty of rock of
lower grade, so it be safe for satisfactory results,
to veins that are so small as to make supplies un-
certain, even when the yield of gold promises more
to the ton. Ten-dollar rock, and plenty of it, is
more desirable than twenty-dollar rock with scant,
uncertain supply. Rock that mills easily by pre-
sent mill process is greatly to be preferred. Though
other ores show more gold, and doubtless a time
come will when they will be more valued, they do
not answer your purpose at present. Of two places,
one accessible and another difficult of access and
shut out from the world, prefer the former, unless
there be much counterbalancing disadvantages. Be
sure that your capital is competent to your under-
taking. As a rule, three or four should unite to
make sure on this point. There is no paying mine
that cannot extend its workings in time so as to
satisfy tho increased capital parties desired to in-
vest.

For centuries the mines of Mexico, of Peru, and
Chili, have been worked to proverbial profit, under
difficulties that are not in California. In Europe
lean gold and silver ores, in very deep workings,
are still the most envied investments. So would
be our gold mines of California if their undoubted
superiority were understood abroad. But California,
with the best chances to offer, is perhaps the only
mineral country in the world where the press decries
its mines, and unwittingly sends abroad advice not
to come and invest in this our best and most attrac-
tive property.
Gentlemen of the press, we pray you to inform
yourselves, and we know you will alter your ver-
dict. Instead of listening to men about town,
speak among the veritable miners who are produc-
ing sixty millions of gold and silver annually, and
be assured that you will find quite a different pic-
ture to present to capital abroad and at home.
There is not a day that you may not chronicle a
mine that is paying what no other industry does.
llowever, in the time of our inexperience, some
may have been misguided (and let us freely alinit
it), gel I n,iui, g has now become a science, and a
safe industry to those who use ordinary discri:iii •
nation. Moreover, whatever our mints have paid,
it 1,;;; heen from only one-half of the gold which
fire assay prove to be in our ores. Now, by a new
process of fleet pulverisation, our miners are be-
ginning (as shown by ample proofs at Mariposa)
to add to their pro ts the greater part of the other half
of the gold hitherto lost, and at no appreciable ad-
ditional cost of reduction. We need not say that
this improved process is about to double the value
of our gold mines generally, and to bring into use
many mines not now available on account of the
impracticability of getting more of the contained
gold from the ore by present modes of reduction.—
Alta California.

LARGE PRODUCT OF SILVER.—Few persons in
this community, we believe, have anything like a
correct idea of the amount of bullion that is being
produced by one twenty-stamp mill alone. We
stepped into the Manhattan Mill yesterday, and
were shown the bullion product of the previous

day, which was exactly 3,400 ounces—fully equal
to $4,400. So far this month the amount has
reached 3,000 ounces daily. When it is considered
that the ore is crashed dry and then roasted,
making twelve tons a day fair average work for
the mill, its extraordinary quality will be under-
stood. Excepting some twenty tons of custom
ore, the present lively yield of bullion is from
the ore of the company's North Star Mine.
The ore produced now by that " razor-blade"
is wonderful both in quantity and quality.
For rich silver ore the mines of Lander Hill are
unequalled. If the Manhattan mill continues to
produce bullion in anything like the same ratio to
the close of the waning year— and apparently
nothing short of some serious accident will prevent
it—the amount for the last quarter will foot up the
snug sum of $250,000. Should this estimate be
realised it will be, under all the conditions, without
a precedent in the history of silver mining.
A PRODUCTIVE MINE.—From present appearances
the product this month of the famous Murphy mine
of the Twin River Company will exceed that of any
month since the mill was opened. Last evening
eight bars, valued at $2,000, arrived in the city,
making twenty-nine bars received so far this month.
The value of these bars is about $30,000. At the
expiration of the month we have not the least
doubt that the mine will have produced $BO,OOO
worth of silver.

BULLION FROM HOT CREEK.—Yesterday 3,6110 z.
of crude bullion arrived in the city from the mill of
the Old Dominion Company at Hot Creek.
FROM PALMETTO.—CoIoneI Catherwood has sent
to Aurora for more men to come to Palmetto Dis-
trict. He intends to work his mines the coming
winter, so as to be present to put up extensive
works early in the spring.
STOPPED WORK.—We have been informed by
persons who have arrived from Cortez that the mill
and mine of the Mount Tenabo Company have been
closed for the winter by order of the Board of En-
gineers in San Francisco. It may be novel and
agreeable, even droll, working mines located in the
centre of the State of Nevada, in San Francisco, but
it will hardly prove profitable- But that remains to
be seen.

VERY Rica ORE.—The extraordinary quality of
the ore which the Diana mine is producing excites
general surprise, as it had not hitherto obtained
distinction in that respect. We have before us the
result of the working of two batches of its first
class ore at the Mettacom mill : the first lot of three
and a half tons yielded at the rate of $842 per ton ;
the second lot of three tons at the rate of $844 per"
ton. Seven and a half tons of silver ore, producing
$5,579, could scarcely be' met elsewhere than on
Lander Hill. The second class-ore, of which the
Diana yields a larger quantity, is also of superior
quality, and will work upwards of $2OO per ton. It
must be classed among the richest mines of the
Reese River district.
NOTES OF REVEILLE DISTRICT.—We learned from
Mr. G. E. Clarke, who arrived in the city from the
Reveille District a few days ago, that a number of
mines were producing ore for transportation to Hot
Creek for reduction. The Atlantic and Mediter-
ranean ledges of the Reveille Company were yield-
ing a good quality of ore, which is estimated to give
$l5O per ton. The owners of a ledge called the
Davis are working it with much energy, and the
ore which they have taken out shows largely of horn
silver ; they expect heavy returns from the first
working in the mill. The Amazon Ledge is also
producing fine ore. Brobant and Co. are stirring
among their ledges on South Mountain, and are ex-
tracting ore for the mill at Hot Creek. The Bullion
Company is at present engaged altogether on its
Fisherman Ledge, which is opened by an incline
shaft 85 feet deep. The vein varies in thickness from
two to five feet. The ore produced by the mine is of
a remarkably high grade; for instance, three-quarters
of a ton, which were reduced at the Keystone
Mill near this city, yielded at the rate of $1,647 per
too ; and several lots of several tons each have been
worked here since, which yielded from $3OO to
$714 per ton. We have before us a certificate
from the superintendent of the Old Dominion Mill
at Ilot Creek, which gives the result of the working
of six tor.s of second-class ore at $17535c. per ton.
Thus far the Fisherman has yielded a large profit
over the expense of working ; and the fine quality
of its ore will be appreciated when it is stated that
nearly twenty tons of this first-class ore have been
transported to this city at the cost of $6O to $75 per
ton. It is the testimony of mill men who have
worked the ores from the Reveille District, that
they are of simple combinatio and free from base
metals, and very easy of reduction. Just now
the district needs an efficient mill under sensible and
liberal management.