The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-04-24

good titles and permanent interests among
the people, than If it had given them millions
of dollars.
The other, and perhaps the main obstacles
to success in mining, are inherent in the pur-
suit itself and will be so long as mining
means Speculation" instead of 'business."
1t is difficult, at the start, to get a really good
claim. If the property has been opened and
proved, it is held at 'fancy price" If it is
undeveloped its Indications may befollowed
by thousand of dollars and years of labor, and
prove barren in the end. But look at the
numberless mines really rich in precious metal
that have come to naught. OF over $40, 900, 600
of silver extracted from Nevada mines not one
third returned to the capitalists whose money
had paid for the property, the machinery, and
the labor and sustained untold "assess-
ments." In California it has been the same.
When the placers began to be left for the
more enduring and steady quartz veins,
many small but exceedingly rich claims
were owned by combinations of two
of three partners only. Then the expenses
were directly and economically administered,
the chances and, indeed the motives for
peculation were wanting, and combination
of small capital and hard work brought a
legitimate return of steady, sure (and often
enormously profit. Then began the company
furor. The temporary productiveness of the
mines brought about huge interpretations
vast stock capitals, inflated prices, and ex-
travagant notions of prospective value. Single
"feet' in some few mines, originally costing
two or three dollars, paid monthly dividends
of from $500 to $780, and commanded prices
from $500 to $l5, 600. On the strength of these
results, over excitement set in, undue specu-
lation followed in new and untried mines,
wild extravaganza was the order OF the day
among the company officers; splendid offices,
costly furniture, expensive ''improved' ma
chinery, and all the long list of follies brought
their natural result We need not look all
the way to California for the effects. We are
here in the same plight, and there is many a
man who can testify to the truth of the fore
going picture.
A notable example of it is a well known
mine in Nevada, which, under the cautious
and economical management of its four origi-
nal owners, paid at the rate of $40, 600 pei
month. OF course it must be sold to a com.
pany. 1t was thus sold, and the company
managed i'll two years. time to spend $299, 00C
upon it, to take nothing out, and finally tC
so wind themselves up that the property
passed out Of their hands into the control o.
few practical men who were able to buy W
its bonds and get the whole thing into theil
own power. Within two months after the
second change, the sensible administration o
the few managers who were directly interested
produced yield of $67, 600 from the "played
out" mine.
The fault, generally, is not so much in the
mines, then as in the miners-or rather the
mine-owners, who subscribe vast sums o
money to be frittered away by incompetenc,
and extravaganza, or pocketed by downright
peculation. Combined capital is one of TIN
levers of the modern world, but it must b
applied to mining, just as to every other en-
terprise, in practical, economical, judicious
and business-like manner, or capitalists vii
find that their money has been worse thai
wasted, and their falsely named enterprise
will bring no return.