Greenbrier independent. [volume] (Lewisburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1980, 1896-03-05
The Causes OF the New Gold Flood.

The Causes OF the New Gold Flood.
: 1t seems that there is a mistake
made about the causes that have lee
to the immense increase in the yearl,
: supply of gold which is now beinG
poured into the worlds lap. Mr.
: Carl Snyder, in the current ReUieu
Of Rerie1rS, explains that it is not
as has been popularity supposed, be-
cause of the discovery of new gold
fields that over eight hundred mil.
lions Of gold have been mined
within the last five years, and that
much moro than that is certain to be
mined within the next five years.
He says there has been no wonder
full new "strikes anywhere, except
ing at Cripple Creek, which cuts no
great figure in the total annual yield
of the yellow metal.
The worldwide gold mining boom
is attributable, he says, alike in Aus
tralia, Africa, Colorado, British CO.
lumbia, Alaska, and Russia, to sim
gle and sufficing cause.-the cheaper
cost of mining by new mechanical
methods and the great reduction in
the cost of all mining supplies. The
chief source of the gold supply, I'M
til quite recently, was the rich gold
bearing alluvium, which bears the
same relation to gold deposits in gen.
eral as the top layer of cream does
to pot of milk. From 1S4S to 1875
nearly nine-tenths of the worlds
gold was taken out of this alluvium
iK,tn 4
from the hillsides at comparatively
slight expense. To-day, only about
one-third of tn annual production of
gold is obtained in this easy way.
Lode mining his taken the place of
placer mining.
The South African gold fields are
not correctly spoken of as newly
discovered. There was South'Afri-
can gold boom away back in 1891,
but it collapsed, because the cost of
working the mines had not then been
reduced to the present point. The
fall of prices generally has greatly
helped to cheaper all mining charges.
A Colorado price list shows that
smelling charges in that State aver
aged 500 per ton in 1870 and now av-
erage about $40. Stamp mill charges
have dropped from $35 to Sl6 per
ton. Lumber, which is a very inn
portant item of expense in under
ground mining, has fallen from $50
per thousand feet to .$1S. Giant
powder used to cost 81 per pound
twenty years ago, but now only costs
! t cents. Coal, which was hard to
get at any price in Colorado in 1870,
is now mined there and sold almost
as cheaply as in Pennsylvania. The
Colorado Mining Industry and Re
Uie,O estimates that in 1896, averaging
all mining supplies, S27 will buy as
much of them as 500 bought in 1870.
New machinery and high explo-
sives have done the rest. The com
pressed-air drill and the uses Of
heavy charges of dynamite and nj
tro-glycerine have reduced the cost
of driftihg," as it is called in our
Western States-the work of pierc-
ing and shattering the rock to get at
the ore-from about S15 per foot in
1870 to less than So now. The net
results is that mine can be opened
up now in weeks, often in few days,
which 1T formerly required months
to put in working order. a third
factor in the matter is the employ
ment of cyanide in extracting gold
from low-grade rock.
Vast quantities Of South African
gold was contained within rock that
was not worth crushing unless all
the gold there was in it could be got
out, to the last ounce. This was not
possible till the last process of treat
ing the crushed rock with cyanide of
potassium was discovered. This
chemical, applied to what used to be
simply refuse rock, takes up the last
grain of gold there Is i'm it dissolves
and absorbs it just as glass Of wa
ter absorbs lump of sugar. The
solution formed by soaking the pre-
viously valueless rock in cyanide is
now filtered through fine zinc shaw
ings and the result is to precipitate
gold in paying quantities. Mr.. Sny-
der says but for cyanide there would
have been no South African gold
boom of the present proportions and
no trouble in the Transvaal.
1t Is worth noting that while
South Africa has developed gold
mining on scale without parallel,
she owes it largely to American
brain and machinery, for it is noto-
rious that the best engineering talent
as we'll as the wonderful new ma
chinery and mechanical appliances
that have developed the marvellous
Rand mines, have gone out there
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