The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-05-25
THE GENESIS OF GOLD.

San Francisco Chronicle: Through
the combined agenciesSof heat, pressure
and electricity diamonds, rubies and
other precious stones may be produced
in minute forms by science, and it is
not improbable that processes may yet
be devised for their creation equal in
bulk and purity TO the best yields Of
the laboratories of nature. a diamond
is but lustrious bit of carbon. but
gold is gold and nothing else, whether
considered as a salt or a solid. 1t COM
bines with otner metals and may De
separated from them. but no combi-
nation of other substances can produce
it, Since the days of Tubal Cam, VINO
probably worked in gold as we'll as
IRON, it has been the dream of the al
chemist that the baser metals might
be transmitted into gold, and in every
century except the nineteenth Rosi-
crurians and other reputed dealers in
the black arts have wasted their lives
in that hopeless undertaking.
Considering the origin of gold and the
methods of its deposition various theo-
ries have been advanced, and much
has been written. No one Of the eX-
plantations, however, is without its
contradictions and definite solution
pliShed achievement. Let it be said that
some fundamental facts in relation to
gold are generally accepted. II is adj
mitted that the waters of the seas con-
tain chloride of gold-enough in the
aggregate, perhaps, TO gid the surface
OF the earth-and that in its primal
condition it is probable that gold was
and is metallic salt in the form of a
chloride, Sulphide or silicate, or of all
= dora lo6 nv
Could it be ascertained through what
agencies this salt was originally
evolved gold might be produced by
initiating the processes of nature, as
in the manufacture of small diamonds
from carbon. but this is a sealed book
to science, and research will probably
never be rewarded with the secret.
Until recently the generally accepted
theory was that molten silica carrying
gold inmetallic or some other form was
forced uD into assures in the cooling
crust of the earth when the world was
new and that the gold now found in
gravel and other deposits was at the
same time or subsequently fused from
the quartz that held it and scattered
by glaciers and the action of the ele-
ments There are some weak spots in
this theory. AS the gold would be
by the intense heat of the
molten silica it is not shown by what
means it afterward uniformly per
meated the quartz in a. metallic form.
and as the clearly defined walls of
quartz veins were more readily fusible
than the quartz itself an explanation is
in order of the reason why the walls
should not have fused and mingled
with the molten silica. We do not say
that these apparent inconsistencies dis
prove what is known as the igneous
theory. but they certainly weaken it.
This theory has been attacked by |
learned biologists in both hemispheres. /
among whom are Professors Bischoff, |
lie Conte. Skey. Lobby, Newbery and
others, and more recently by ]. c. F.
Johnson, author of The Genesiology of |
Cold" To it they oppose what may be
called the infiltration theory. They adj |
nit that volcanic action had much TO
do, not only in the formation of mineral
veins but in characterizing their me-
tallic constituents: but that action, |
they assume, was largely hydrother-
mai. To this theory the original occur
renee of gold as metallic salt is a ne
cessity 1t is claimed that. when water
began to form in large bodies on the