Evening star., 1896-09-19

of the west. For years some OF the most
expert miners in the United States have
worked in near it. 1t Is known as the
Mercur mining district, and 1t is on the site
where Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston had his
camp at the time of the Utah war. Be
tween 1870 and 1880 it was known as a sill
yer region, and in one mine a single pocket
of silver produced $4,000, some of the ore
averaging 5000 to the ton. At this time
the late Senator Hearst and Marcus Daily
were among the mine owners. The assay
ers told them that the district contained
gold, but they could find no color in the
rock and no paying means of getting out
the gold. Marcus Daily reduced the ore to
powder. and day after day panned and
washed 1t looking for gold. At last he
threw down his pan in disgust and said
that the assayer was fraud. He left
Utah and went to Montana, where he
bought the Alice mine. and from 1t devel-
oIed the biggest copper region of the world.
Americas johannesburg.
And still this district is now said to con-
tain more than enough gold to pay the ma
tional debt. / have gone through one miae
which has already produced more than a
million dollars worth of gold, ard which
has paid to It's stockholders a half million
dollars in dividends Other mines have
been opened which have gold ore in sight
of an estimated value of more than $1O,OOO,-
COO and within the past eighteen mort his
more than 2..s0 mining claims have been
taken up within it. 1t is noW producing
about 5000 worth of gold day, and 1 see
it is estimated that its product this year
may amount to SS.WOUO The camp, as
far as pay work is concerned. IS only abe ut
four years old, and ii has been made possi-
BILE only by the invention of the new cya-
nide processes for getting gold out of the
i - fc hain rAaI
less cost, in all probability, than in any
other mining district in the world Its ore
Is so much like that of the Rand mining
district of South Africa that the De ople
have named ii the Johannesburg of Ameri-
ca The ore can be mined and treated
however. at less than half the cost of the
cripple Creek gold The Charge for reducing
gold at Cripple Creek is $50 ton Here
the chemist of the great Mercur mine tells
me that the cost of mining and reducin;,
does not exceed s. per ton, while in the
Sunshine mine. about four miles away the
ore can be dug out and turHeI into gold
1or less than s. per ton. Th.re are already
fve cya- ide mills in operation in the dis
tr4ct, and there are others IN course of
construction
Three Golden Blankets
But let me give you some idea of this
last great gold discovery of the world
The story is 50 wonderful that 1 fear tc
write what believe to be the truth lest
be charged with exaggeration. Imagine
II you can. three great blankets of COLDER
rock, each from five to fifty feet thick ly.
ing one above the other with blankets OF
shale between them. Let these blankets
begin about four miles above the town OF
Mercur, at a distance of mile and hall
above the sea, and let them slope off ir
the shape of inclined plane croppins
out here and there through the mountain.
and valley Tor i distance of eight miles
Let the blankets be nearly a mile wide
and let the golden treasures within then
be worth all the way from IS to $1,000 pei
ton. and you have some idea of this won
derful camp The gold does not lie in little
veins between walls Of granite, as in othe1
mines. 1t is distributed with much regu
larity through these enormous blankets, 81