The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-04-03
COLD FROM THE OCEAN.

l 10 bullu dOubes or lAe leiiuW nhVt"A
 Effect it Would Have on the World.
 From the St. Louis Globe-Democrat.l
 Forty y-four years ago Malaguti and
 Durocher startled the world by amour.
 cling that the ocean contained silver, but in such small proportions that it
 would hardly prove profitable to at
 tempt to gather 1t. The more impor- tant and far reaching discovery has
 now been made that the waters of the
 vast oceans contain gold in solution in
 such quantities that the annual output
 could be more than trebled if science finds way of extracting the precious
 metal. In 1872 Sonstadt first demon- strated that there were traces of gold | in the ocean, held in solution, but he | never pursued his inquiries far enough l to show that 1t was in any large quan- | tity. It remained for later investiga- tors encouraged by the high prices for gold, to determine the approximate | quantity held in solution.
 There is every reason to believe that | in the future more gold will be extract ed from the salt waters of the ocean
 than from the mines now worked in the richest part of the worlds gold regions
 The vast size of the oceans makes the field practically inexhaustible. and while the mines of the land are yielding their thousands of tons, the seas will produce their millions. Even though
 the gold is found in small quantities, | the aggregate yield would be enormous.
 Extracting the gold from the ocean
 will also be attended with less risk and
 exposure to danger and the work will
 not be very much different from that
 required to obtain refined salt from the
 ocean. Professor Ramsey, one of the
 best gold experts and mineralogists in this country, has given considerable at tention to the subject, and In speaking about 1t he gave some interesting facts,
 Tt seems almost like revlving the dreams of the alchemists in predicting that gold will soon be produced abun- dantly by ocean miners" he said.
 Nevertheless, there is sufficient scien- tific data to warrant one in this specu- lation. It is no new thing to discover either gold or silver in salt water, but recent researches have directed more interest toward the subject by proving that the quantity is large enough to be of practical use. The exact quantity that ton of ocean water contains de- bends upon local conditions, and varies all the way from one-twelfth to one- quarter of grain. Even much higher in portions of the ocean not yet investi- gated. The temperature of the water greatly affects the amount of gold held in solution.
 Taking the low figures given for the waters in warm climates-one-thir teenth of grain of gold to one ton of ater-and what probable yield of gold would one find? Why, 1t would be an enormous quantity-one that would completely eclipse our present product on the land. The average depth of the ocean has been scientifically estimated at 2,500 fathoms with 400,000,000 cubic miles of space. In this vast area about 1 ,S37, ,O30, 1000 million tons of water are deposited-an amount that is hard ly conceivable when expressed in fig ures. We'll, if each ton yielded the low est quantity of gold obtained the whole yield of the ocean would be about 10,250 million tons of gold.
 Just stop and think of that for a minutel Gold would be so plentiful with this amount on tap that we would make furniture of the precious metal, and even build houses with it.. A solid gold ring could be had for a few cents. Silver would be worth sixty times as much as gold. Instead of trying to put the currency of the world on a gold basis f1nanciers would tumble over each f,, +haf, aff1 1rfe tn cyat ri5 of a gold money. We would think no more of the precious metal than we now do of iron or copper, and 1t would be no more desirable. Compare the amount | of gold in the ocean to the total quanti- ty that has been taken from the gold | mines of the world during the last four | centuries. The total output of the | whole world since 149A tn 1894 approx1- | mated about 5,O20 tons, and the present | output Is about two hundred ! tons. What an insignificant quantity! | And the reports are that the gold mines | of the world are showing decided signs of exhaustion.
 This gold in the ocean is held in so- Iution by the iodine which is obtained | from the iodate of calcium. If you mix gold with solutions of iodine 1t can be very readily reduced to. soluble state, and in this condition it can be prevent ed from dropping through the water to the bottom. Possibly the lower strata of water contain considerable quanti- ties of precipitated gold that has nev- er yet been reached by deep soundfngs. We know that it is frequently released md dropped by the iodine, for this lat .er is absorbed by the seaweeds and plant growths of the ocean, Along the coasts of Great Britain, France and Sweden, the ''kelp," or seaweed is gath cred and burned and then from the ash IS iodine is extracted. This iodine in ts simple form in the water before be- ng absorbed by the plants holds the gold of the ocean in solution.
 Formerly the iodine was i'll much yreater quantities than to-day, and in past geological ages it abounded in ev- ny body of salt water. Occasionally have obtainsd traces of odine from rain water along the bord- ITS of the oceans, showing that it had ,een taken up by the wind and sun. Every time this iodine liberates the cold it probably drops to the bottom of he ocean to form beds of gold for flu ure generations. Should the ocean yer recede from the Sargasso sea great ,eins of precipitated gold may be found