San Andreas independent., 1857-01-24
Quartz Mining i'm Grass valley.
NEVADA. Jan. 9th. 1897

seen elsewhere for many a long day, an,
although the same quantity of gold is no
so easily accessible as heretofore to th,
hard-fsted. In view of worse times, or ;
depreciation of running about miners
are tolerably satisfied; no big licks ar,
taken out, but steady pay per days work
Quartz mining is steady, one or two miles
wanting some odds and ends or other, tt
set them on the usual routine.
| don't know what quartz miners cal
business here, Mr.. Editor, but several
times during as many days, whilst pokino
my nose into these works, have the
humping of stamps, the clinking of ANAL
gamators and the whirring of wheels, and
fizzing of steam engines, proclaimed to me
that If ever they do stop that knocking, it
is when nobody knows it. OF course
had the curiosity to examine the quartz,
but as general thing no gold is to be
seen IN it; nevertheless some of it is very
rich and in which it can be seen.
Shall | give an outline of the modus
operandi of one of the quartz mills here
1t may be interesting to your readers =
Well, first, steam engine Glow pressure
most economical, sets cams to rotate on the
main xle with four arms or cams thereon
to each revolution per stamp-stamps say
100 lbs. weight, (crushing Il tons per
day each)-three or four to battery
batteries double within same frame, stamps
shod with cast iron, with shaft either of
- inch square iron or oak, Z by 8 or there
abouts, lifting and falling a space of II
inches on the average A constant stream
of hot water runs in from behind-where
the batteries are fed with ore, being bro
ken by hand, after being deposited from
the mine. The ore as pulyerised is
splashed through fine seive on the other
side Of the stamps, runs down a series of
two or three sloped tables 20 inches wide,
2 inches deep, and each about 6 or feet
long to each battery, covered with blankets,
which are taken off every few hours,
washed in cistern adjacent for the pur-
pose, and renewed clean from the slopino
tables, (the slope of which may be regu-
lated at pleasure as in the old percussion
table, the stuff runs into shallow trough
of iron-say 20 by II and inches deep
containing quickilver, thence into a con
duct leading to as many German chests,
about Is inches wide and 9 or 10 feet
long, as there are batteries, the stuff run
ming down into the head of the same. drop
ping space of II or Is inches formed as
reservoir with quicksilver in it, thence
over the edge into another, and through
quicksilver rifle something like new
sluice rifle patented couple of years ago
thence running into the slope Of the
German chest proper, which may be 20
inches or two feet deep, and, as | said be-
fore, Is inches wide. And now, Mr..
Editor, commences the manipulations q
am now speaking Of the poorer ores).
After the stuff passes the quicksilver
rifle, the chest is supposed to be filed
near to the top, (its hight can be regula-
ted by hopper at the foot) Well, the
richest stuff therein collects near the head,
whence it is taken out to pass through
(according to quality either a small rota-
ry amalgamator within small trough of
quicksilver, thence by Hungarian rifle
with twenty OF thirty rifles containing
quicksilver; rifle box sloped, say eight
feet long, six inches wide and two deep,
into conduct or spout leading to an ANAL
gamator, like mortar mill, consisting of
two broad and heavy cylindrical wheels
revolving on an axle in shallow trough
thence out into dropping cistern-thence
into a slulce some two or three hundred
feet long, at pleasure, or it may pass from
the German chest into the mortar mill
at once, which is commonly
done with the stuff below the first best, or
the next after that at the head or the top
thereof, thence into dropping cistern and
away as before
This, sirs, | know is a very imperfect
description of the machinery, but it will,
at least, give you an idea of the operation
taking place In one of our best mills.
There are cisterns placed at convenient
places for separating the amalgain from
the dirt, &c, by means of bath or a
wash pan, and a new notion that [ hay mt
seen in operation for somethingof thesame
purpose, patented in New York in 1853.
1t may be needless to observe that the
quartz here is found within the plutonic
proper. The rocks are trapeau,
approaching a granite structure, varying
in detail from whinstone; charged with
pyrites, to greensboro, and from greenstone
to syenite, or granite Such in fact is the
geological character of this country for
many miles, and if my observations else
where be correct, it does not seem to me that
quartz mining Except occasionally in tai
cose slate) ever succeeds in any ether that
does not approach that character.
Witness the mining in Calayeras and
Amador. True, there are exceptions, as
at Angels, Sonora, Quartz Gulch, near the
Merced, or in Quartzburg, Mariposa, yet [
think, even in these, it will be found that
the plutonic rocks lay at no great distance
beneath the schists or states. (where occur