Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1901-08-19
ABOUT GOLD.
No Eye is Inscnsible to the Charms of
That Metal

The only abundant metal in the
world that is yellow is the most prec
ious of them al!-gold. Brass is not =
true metal. but an alloy. q compound.
And the color which gold shares with
the sun has a great deal to do with it's
value. | do not think it would be pos
sible that we should ever have come 10
love and admire any metal so much. 10
choose 1t for our highest currency and
our ornaments, no matter how rare or
ductile it might be, if it were of a dark.
dull. gloomy color. The human eve
never gets too old to be pleased with
very much the same things which
pleased it in childhood; and no eye IS
inscnsiblc to the charm of that pee
ious yellow.
| like sometimes to think back to the
first man of all men that ever held that
rock of the sun in his savage hand
and TO imagine how he found it. and
how it made his sharp eyes twinkle:
and how he wondered at its weight
and pounded it with one smooth rock
upon another. and found that he could
fiatten il. All these things come by
accident: and gold was an accident
that befell when the world was very
young.
Proba bly, there had been great rain
that washed the comedy lump from its
| nest in some gravelly stream bank:
and the prehistoric man in his tunic Of
skins CHANGED that way and found it,
1t may be that the poor barbarian who
picked up the first yellow nugget sank
with it still grasped in his swarthy
fist.
We do not know even the name of
the man who first discovered gold, nor
where he lived. nor when. but il was
very, Very long ago. Before the time OF
Joseph and the coat of many colors
gold had already become not only a
discovered fact, bat used in the
worlds trade. The early Egyptians
got their gold from Nubia: so. very
likely, the discovery was first made in
Africa. At all events it dates back to
the very childhood of the race. and be-
fore men had invented the letters Of
| the alphabet mankind had achieved
the prettiest plaything it ever found.
All gold began in veins" in the
earth's rocky ribs. but Time. with his
| "a tient hammers of wind and rain an,.
| frost. has pounded vast areas of these
| rocks u sand. and the gold, broken
| from great bands to Jumps, has driftcC.
with the bones of the mountains into
| the later heaps of gravel.
The processes Of mining gold which
still remains in its original homo in
tn. rocks are much more complicated.
| There is Il vast amount of boring to be
| done into the flinty hearts Of the
| mountains with steel drills ana with
| blasting. ana then the rock which is
| dotted with the precious yellow flakes
| has To be crushed between the steel
| Jaws of great mills. Much Of the gold
| that is mined. too. is 50 chemically
| cha nEed that it does not look like
| gold at all. and requires special chcmi-
cal proc esSes to coax il out.
| In all gold mining. mercury is one 81
| the most important factors. 1t is the
mineral sheriff. swift To arrest any
| fugitive ilccll OF gold that may come in
| its way. The sluicc boxes in cxten-
| Sivc placer mines and the sheets in
| stamp mills are all charged with
| quicksilver. which saves Il vast amount
! of the finer gold dust that otherwise
would he swept away by the current Of
water. for water is equally essential in
| both kinds of mining.
| There is no such thing as pure
| gold" often as we hear the phrase.
| Natures purest, her virgin gold. is
| always alleged with silver. and the
| very finest is IS or 80 per cent. gold.
| California gold averages about the
| Gneness of our American coin-90 per
cent. of purity.
1t is an odd fact that the sea is fun
of gold No doubt at the bottom of
| that stupendous basin. which has re-
ccived for all time the washings of all
the world, there is an incalculable
wealth of gold in dust. but the strange
| ocean mine is not all SO deep down as
that The sea water itself carried gold