The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-27 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, MARCH 27, 1868,

EXPERIMENTS Arl SHOEBURY NESS.

Experiments were carried on at Shoeburyness
yesterday and the previous day by the Ordnance
Select Committee. The first series was with diaphragm
Shrapnel shells and fuzes, in continuation of the
trials recorded by us on the 15th of January last.
The objects were twofold—To ascertain the cause
of the premature bursting of shells as noted in late
experiments, and to test the accuracy of burning of
the 1-inch wood fuzes for diaphragm Shrapnel
shelli versus 9-seconds wood time fuzes, for muzzle-
loading gun. The guns used were the 8-inch 60
cwt., and 32-pounder of 58 cwt.
For the purpose of ascertaining whether the
premature bursting of the shell is traceable to some
action of the bursting charge, 20 rounds were fired
from each gun, the shells being loaded with powder
and plugged ; charges, IQlb. common large-grained
powder ; elevation, 5 degrees. Result :--None of
the shells burst. Nineteen of each nature were re-
covered and carefully examined ; none of the load-
ing or fuze-hole plugs were found to have become
loosened.

To ascertain whether the premature bursting of
the shells is traceable to any action of the fuze, 20
rounds were fired from a 32-pounder gun, the shells
being loaded and fuzed with 1-inch wood diaphragm
Shrapnel fuzes, all bored to 2-10ths. Elevation of
gun, 1 degree. Result :—Five blind, 2 burst in
the gun, 13 burst at various distances. The times
of flight to burst varied from 9-10ths of a second
to 1.7 seconds, so that is at a distance from about
360 yards the minimum, to 750 yards the maximum.
Twenty rounds were then fired with similar
shells, charges and elevation, but with the 9-seconds
wood time fuzes for muzzle-loading guns bored to
2-10ths. Result :-1 blind, nine burst in gun, 19
burst at various distances. The time of flight to
burst, noted by instruments, varied from 6-10ths
to 1.4 seconds, that is, at a distance of from 275 yards
minimum to 700 yards maximum.
Twenty rounds were fired from an 8-inch 60-cwt.
gun, with 10lb. charges, the shells, charges, and
fuzes being as in the first series with 32-pounder.
Result :-1 blind, 1 burst in gun, 18 burst at
various distances—the times of flight to burst being
from 7-10ths second to 2.4 seconds, that is, at dis-
tances from 360 yards minimum to 750 yards maxi-

mum.

Twenty rounds followed, shells and charges simi
lar to the third series above, the fuzes as in the
second series. Result :—None blind, none burst
in gun, 20 burst at various distances ; the times of
flight to burst being from 6-10ths to 1.3 second,that
is at a distance from about 255 yards minimum to
470 yards maximum. The time of flight was taken
throughout by an officer with a clock at the bat-
tery, and the estimated distance of burst ascertained
also by observers placed at right angles to the
picketed line of fire.
The second experiment of the programme was to
test case-shot, designed for use with 32-pounder
breech-loading guns, for defence of flanks and
caponnieres. The cases were of common tin, with
iron ends ; weight, 491 b. ; length, 10.94 in. ; diame-
ter, 6.14 in. Contents, a segmento iron lining and
80 eight-ounce sand shot. Ten rounds were fired,
with 31b. charges of L. G. R. powder—gun at about
three-quarters of a degree elevation. Results : all
broke up, some near and some 50 yards from the
muzzle. The time occupied in firing the last four
rounds (the gun being loaded for the first round)
was noted as 53 seconds. The gun used in this ex-
periment is a service cast-iron smooth-bore 32-
pounder of 46 cwt., converted to a breech-loader on
Krupp's plan, and was mounted on a wrought-iron
carriage and platform so arranged that the gun
should not recoil. The weight of the carriage and
platform being 22 cwt. 3 qrs. 111 b.
The third experiment was to test a trough de-
signed at Shoeburyness from which to fire rockets
of Hale's pattern. Five 24 pounder rockets were
fired at nine degrees of elevation. They were placed
at various distances in the trough, and grazed some
at about 150 yards, others at 400 and 600 yards'
distance. It was ascertained that the rockets made
one whole turn in 5i feet, as shown on the trough
by the gas marks from the vents.
The experiments were conducted by the com-
mandant, Colonel Eardley-Wilmot, R.A., assisted
Rdnbp yer a;
n, ptcct.A. T: Captain
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ecoi
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eFoeLrlrravueslioeanirngi
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RA.,
ColoneldoAt l Lieutenant
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Fu committeelt.i
Mayne
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B.el
(un-
attached), were
nt
attached), Colonel Shaw, R.A., Colonel Heyman,
R.A., Secretary, and Quartermaster Behenna,
It.A., Commissary of Stores.

THE SILVER MINES OF NEVADA.

(From a Correspondent of the New York Times.)

The Comstock Lode, on which the Silver Mines
of Virginia City and Gold Hill are situated, is pro-
bably the most productive mineral vein in the
world. It is only a strip of land three miles long
by 600 yards wide, yet it yields $12,000,000 an-
nually. Five thousand men are employed on it
during the year, and the produce for each work-
man is about $2,000 per annum—an average of
production probably equalled on no other mineral
vein in the world. In 1865 there were 46 com-
panies working it, who owned 22,258 feet, and had
excavated about 28 miles of tunnels and drifts, and
54 miles of shafts, wings, and inclines, with some
33 miles more of chimneys, &c. The longest tun-
nel made is the Latrobe —3,200 feet ; the greatest
depth penetrated is by the Gould and Curry, 821
feet. These companies have 44 hoisting and pump-
ing engines, aggregating more than 1,500 horse
power; 76 mills are employee in reducing the ore,
with an aggregate capacity for crushing 1,800 tons
daily. They consume annually about 22,265 cords
of wood, at a cost of about $l6 per cord. Their
wood and timber together are estimated to cost
annually about $1,000,000.
Mount Davidson, in which this famous vein
occurs, is a barren mountain (in Story County,
Nevada), mainly of granite, though serpentine,
quartz, syenite, gneiss and talcose, and calcareous
rocks enter into its composition. Its summit is
7,827 feet above the sea level; while the vein itself
and Virginia City are about 6,200 feet. The lode
is a regular fissure vein, and subject to the usual
displacements and faults of mineral veins, which
show such an uncertainty over all mining opera-
tions. At one place it may be entirely interrupted
by trap-dykes or other rocks, or the wall rock may
be imbedded in it or other matter destitute of ore.
The ore, too, is often deposited in " chimneys,"
which run lengthways with the vein, and thus carry
the rich deposits out of one property into another ;
so that the unfortunate company which had been
gathering their hundreds of thousands one month
may be entirely without income the next ; and yet
after penetrating deeper they again strike on even
a richer deposit, or they may labour for years with-
out
meeting with any.
I visited, during my stay in Virginia City, the
Savage mine, as being one of the safest and best
conducted, and also went over the works of the
Gould and Curry, Hale and Norcross, and Empire.
In the Savage we were placed on a platform in a
shaft, and with a warning from my conductor we
disappeared as if by magic from the cheerful sur-
face of the world, and descended with frightful
rapidity some 600 feet into the bowels of the moun-
tain, getting wild glimpses as we passed of what
seemed dark caverns, with lights gleaming and
mysterious-looking forms wielding the pick-axe—
which were the various levels with their workmen
—until we landed quickly near the bottom.
• These steam-worked shafts and platforms, how-
ever, seem very dangerous things, and I hear of
constant horrible accidents in them. It was re-
markable how dry and commodious the various
wings and levels and galleries were in this mine.
My guide took fragments from each rock as we
groped around the mine, and gave estimates of its
value with perfect confidence. " This will pay $lO
a ton, this $l5, this $BO, this $5OO, and this $2,000!"
while all I could discern was a more or less dark
shade of the sulphurets. He says (what I hear
everywhere) that the companies now are careful
not to commit the error of the Gould and Curry,
and bring all their best ores at once to the mill;
but they mix them and so average their product.
AThey all are working with far greater economy

than they used to ; and when a branch of the Pacific
Road touches Virginia City they hope to be able to
bring down their expense for fuel (now $l5 a cord)
and for lumber (now $45 per thousand) at least one-
half. My guide—a very intelligent leaseman who
has risen from the workmen—says that the miners
are constantly investing their savings in one, two,
or three of the shares of these companies, and know-
ing the precise condition of their own mines they
often make large sums.

The cost of reducing the ore in the Savage was
about $l6 per ton, and the yield averages about
$44.
In 1866 this mine alone, produced 30,653 tons of
ore, and reduced 20,535—valued at $1,303,852.
During the 26 months after they began their works
(April, 1863) they produced bullion valued at
$3,600,709, and paid out in dividends over $BOO,OOO.
During the first six months of 1867 the mine pro-
duced $1,815,000 of bullion against $711,553 in
1866, and divided $750 per share in the same
period, or $600,000 against no dividend in 1866.
Its shares were worth this summer about $1,700
per foot.
The general opinion in the other mines seemed
to be that this company had ore enough in sight to
pay large dividends till August, 1868. Yet, that
no sane mortal on the eastern coast should think
of investing in this or any other Californian
or Nevada line on the strength of such statement.
Indeed, the more I see of mines and mining opera-
tors on this coast the more I wonder that Eastern
capital can be directed to them with any confidence
or reasonable hope. When a given mining stock
is presented to investors in New York or New Eng-
land no one can possibly say how much real value
it represents. It may all exist in imagination, or it
may represent a bona fide mining claim ; but what
its value will be a month or a year hence no mortal
can predict. It may be even the best existing
silver mining stock on the Pacific Coast, and
yet in three months not be worth one half its pre-
sent price. The superintendent to whom I spoke
in the Comstock mines said to me that he could not
possibly predict what their product would be after
a twelvemonth ; it might be tenfold their present ;
it might be nothing. The business is the most un-
certain imaginable. It is said that the hills about
Virginia City could be covered with the silver dol-
lars uselessly wasted by Eastern investors and specu-
lators in these mines.

Then mining stocks on this coast have fallen to a
large degree into the hands of the most unscrupu-

lous gamblers. No such sharpers exist in the worn
as deal in mining stock speculations in California
and Nevada. Beside them Wall-street itself is rural
and moral. Many of them have now large indivi-
dual and banking capital to back them. They can

falsely reduce values, and purposely diminish pro-
duction, till they can lay assessments and " freeze
out" the unhappy stockholders, and then buy in
themselves ; or they can produce extravagantly
a short time and " corral" a stock till it rises

to fabulous prices and then sell out, leaving
the unfortunate public the owner of a worthless
property. The general rumour in California ac-
cuses the Bank of California, or its managers, of

furnishing these unprincipled speculations. But
while even the occasional prizes of silver mining
remain as they do on this coast there will al-
ways be investors and speculators. Thus, take
such fortune as this :—The Empire Mining Com-
pany was organized in Virginia City on March 7,
1863. On November 30, 1864, they had crushed
about 25,000 tons of ore, and had received from it
in bullion $1,043,720. No capital stock was ever
paid in, though it was valued (in 1864) at a million ;
no assessment had ever been laid, 'and the mine has
paid all expenses, beside paying the owners
$308,000 above all costs and charges. Its divi-
dends in 1865 amounted to $120,000. The pro-
perty, which had cost its owners nothing, was at one
time worth $lO,OOO a foot. In 1866 it had fallen
to $l,OOO ; it is now $lBO a share, or $l,BOO a foot.
The fluctuations in some of these mining stocks
have been marvellous; thus Gould and Curry was
worth in 1859 $3 a foot ; in eight months it ros e
to $6OO ; in less than two years it rose to $5,000,
and reached once, we think, $7,000. It is now
worth about $7OO. This company alone has taken
out $14,000,000 worth of bullion, and has paid
over $4,000,000 in dividends. There seemed to be
very little doing in its works during my visit. The
mine may, however, yet strike some deposit, and
its value rise again. Hale and Norcross again has
risen in a single year (1865-66) from $l5O to
$1,275 per foot; it is now $3,250. This mine
worked four years without discovering any ore
of value, and expended $350,000 without ap-
parent result. In 1866 it struck pay-ore, and
produced $736,394 in bullion in eight months.
During the first six months of 1867 it divided
$290,000 to its stockholders, and is now one of the
most profitable mines on the Comstock Lode.
There was a great increase in the product of many
of these Comstock mines during 1867. Thus twelve
of the most important produced, in the first half of
1866, an aggregate value of bullion of $1,926,707 ;
in 1867, in a similar period, their product was
$7,013,343. Their market value has increased also
in a striking manner. The stocks of fifteen leading
companies were worth, on July 1, 1866, $6,739,780 ;
on July 1, 1867, they were worth $13,683,640.
This increase of value is partly due to good luck,
but partly to greater economy of working. It is
said that nearly one-fourth of all the bullion received
from Nevada during the past six months has been
collected from the mills. The entire canyon through
which the tailings and waste from the mills about
Virginia City and Gold Hill flow to Carson River
has been fiumed for several miles. The bottom of
the flume is covered with blankets, which are changed
every four or eight hours to collect the material
collected on them. This refuse and waste is said to
be worked at a higherprofit than some of the original
ores. The whole yield of the mines on the Comstock
Lode from 1859 to 1867 is estimated at $66,000,000,
or about $44 to the ton of ore. The whole yield
for Nevada for 1867 is estimated at $19,000,000,
or say $17,500,000 for these mines. The ores of
the Comstock mines are generally black and grey
sulphurets of silver ; occasionally native silver is
found. Combined with the ore are sulphurets in
small quantities of iron, lead, antimony, copper,
&c. The silver has gold also associated with it.
The ores are treated by simple crushing and
amalgamating. The great instrument for amalga-
mating is the pan, of which there are several kinds
in use. It is generally a cast iron vessel two feet
deep and from two to seven feet in diameter. A
shaft rises through it, turned by steam or water,
and to it are fastened pieces of iron, which are made
to run over the movable iron•bottom and grind the
pulp. Some have chambers at the bottom for
steam, to keep the pulp at a temperature of 200
degrees. Into the pan is put a quantity of ore with
salt, iron pyrites, quicksilver, and enough water to
make mud. Thc--great object of the " muller," or
grinder, is to grind thoroughly the material and to
bring all the particles in contact with the quicksilver.
The pan is worked about three hours and a half, and
then water is run into the pulp to render it liquid
enough to flow off through a valve in the bottom,
into the " agitator" or "separator ;" as it flows off
or runs over, it forms a genuine silver mud, in
which the traveller has the satisfaction of wading for
the first time in his life. In the separator pulp is
mixed with a large quantity of water, and by an
arrangement of discharging openings is gradually
strained and relieved of its earthly particles, until
nothing but pyrites and liquid amalgam are left.
The amalgam is drawn off from the bottom, and
is washed in clear water and dried with flannel. It
is finally strained through thick conical bags of
canvas, which are beaten with sticks to drain them
thoroughly. The hard dry amalgam is finally carried
to the assay office, where the mercury is separated by
exposing it to red heat in a cast iron cylindrical re-
tort. The mercury is vaporized, and then con-
densed by a stream of cold water in a " Liebig
Condenser." The silver remaining is broken up
and melted in plumbago crucibles, and cast into
" bricks" or ingots of silver, which are assayed,
valued, and marked accordingly. C. L. B.

The prices of Horniman's Teas are greatly reduced ; their
well-known superiority has attracted a host of spurious
imitations; therefore notice all Genuine Packets are signed,
Horniinan cf Co," London. 300 Confectioners are Agents
in 1491494 4144 2,200 Ghtquitito the GiatutrY.,

COURT OF CaIILIIO.V COUNCIL.

A special meeting of the Court of Commom.
Council was held at the Guildhall yesterday, -Oat.
LORD MAYOR (Mr. W. F. Allen) presiding.

TIIE SHERIFFS' COURT.
Mr. C. ROBINSON brought up a report from the
Officers and Clerks' Committee in reference to thr,
seal of the Sheriffs' Court, stating that Mr. Justice
Willes had rescinded the order of Mr. Commissioner
Kerr, requiring the substitution of the royal amii
for those of the City. The learned judge, however,
was of opinion that the words " Sheriffs' Court"
should be altered to " City of London Court," in
order to make the style of the court conformable to
the act of last session of Parliament. The Reg;..s-
trar pro ten?. had accordingly laid before the co•n-
mittee a new seal containing this alteration, :and
the committee now recommended it to the approval
of the Court of Common Council.
The report was adopted unanimously.