Eureka daily sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1871-1887, 1879-06-25
MINING TERMS.
Their Misuse-Proper Definition OF
Certain Terms.


The right use of words, saws the Bodie
standard" is a matter of more Importance
than people generally stop to think. As a
rule, those who have been favored with a
technical education in any trade or pro-
fession, are not easily tripped up through
Inconsistencies of speech, or improper use
OF words and terms. OF all trades, pro-
fessions or callings, however, mining is
most afflicted with men entirely unfamiliar
with and utterly reckless OF the use of
those words and terms, etc, which would
enab'e them to express themselves intelli-
Sibiy. The trnth is, the mining people Of
this country are as yet a very much mixed
communlty-made up of all classes and
conditions. The field for operation is so
wide and inviting that every one is tempted
to pitch i'll and go it blind, so that the
verlest lllterate, inexperienced tyro of to.
day may become a foreman, s~uperintend-
ent, a bonanza king tomorrow; the bull
whacker or vaquero will be lifted into the
chair of superior mechanics and miners
will talk glibly of formations, ores, pro-
cesses of extraction, reduction, ETC., as an
astronomer would eXpatiate Upon the
planetary system, including fixed stars.
Charles Dickens hits off this sort of thing
in the case of the Irish emigrant, who met
an old acquaintance on the wharf at New
York, and exclaimed, 'Be Jasus, Jenny,
this Is the country for worruk, All yez
has got to do is jist to choose a trade and
be itl'
1t is safe to say that not one-half of
those engaged in mining, above or below
ground, in any district on the coast, cor
rectly employ the words drift and cross
cut when speaking of what is doing in the
works below. The qualification of the
country rock may strike north and south,
for instance, as clearly as the ore bodies
themselves, yet a crosscut through it will
be called a drift" just as much as an ex-
cavation on the line OF the ore body itself.
The average miner will apply the word
crosscut merely to a cut across the ore
body itself, from wall to wall-no more:
everything beyond that, however much it
may run crosswise of the country rock, is
designated a drift. Webster, as well as
the mining dictionaries of any thorough
ness, define the word drift, in substance,
Ito follow a vein." ITO drift with the
current is a natural expression outside of
mining, and an ore body is but another
word for CURRENT; its walls answering for
the banks of a stream. Crosscutting in
mining is but searching for another stream,
channel, branch, bayou, or whatnot; drift
ing in mining is but following the current
OF the stream when once found. "A shoot
OF ore Is entirely a different thing from
an lore chute" although these words
might be twisted into Il common siguitica-
ton by a roundabout way. A shoot of ore
is "a vein running in the same direction
AS the strata in which it occurs, a branch
of a tree is also a shoot. These Bodie
veins may be called branches and twiggs
from 4 great tree. Chute" is French for
IAN incline plane, either artificial or nat
ural, down which timber, coal. ETC., are
caused to Slide Webster, in another
place, is more definite, as follows: "a
framework or tube through which articles
are made to slide from a higher to a lower
level This seems clear enough, and
should enable all who talk or write about
mines to clearly express themselves.
There are many other suggestions of in
~terest, but these would seem to be almost
imperative.