The morning journal-courier., 1908-01-02
THE TOURMALINE
How This Beautiful Mineral Is Got in the Mines of
 Burma.
SOME OF THE RICH FINDS
It Is Matter of Pure Specula. ton Where to Dig
 for It.

Tourmaline is beautiful mineral known according to its color by a va riety of names. The red is rubellite, the pale blue or bluish black is indi- collite, the Berlin blue is called by jewellers Brazibian emerald, and so on.
 'Tourmaline is found in separate crystals in the interstices of hard granite looking rock. As conse- quence men with no means find it oc- casionally profitable when they have leisure to dig down eight or ten feet on the off chance of finding some not very valuable bits" says c. S. George, deputy commissioner, Ruby Mines Dis trict, Burma. This system is called Kathe talk or Kathe system, after. the idea of the original ruby dlggings at Kathe. The next method is the or dinary Twinlon method of sinking a vertical shaft about four or five feet square. By custom the owner of the shaft is entitled to extend his work ings underground anywhere to a radi- us of five fathoms from the center of the shaft.
 The vein is formed by vein of white, hard granite rock, in the inter stices of which the tourmaline is found at times adhering loosely to the rock, at others lying separate in the loose yellowish earth that is found with the granite. When vein Is once found 1t is followed up as far as pos sible, subject to the five fathom limit alluded to above. What, however, makes the mining so exciting and at the same time keeps the industry nuctuating is that the tourmaline cry stalls are only found internationally in 1 the vein.
 "One may get several in the length of one yard, and then they will unac- countably cease. Directly one man strikes vein yielding crystals every one who can commences digging along the line of the vein, but 1t is all loss up as to whether, when the vein Is reached, there will be tourmaline therein. Adjoining Twinlons give ab- solutely different results, and it is cal culated that at least two-thirds of the shafts sunk yield nothing at all, while only an occasional one is at all rich"
 Of the si&ty-two Twinlons at the time of Mir. Georges visit only three were yielding, and of these only one had traces of the best quality stone. The veins" are fairly deep down. none having ever been reached at q lesser depth than nine fathoms, while an ordinary depth is forty or fifty cubits; when the vein" takes a down ward direction it is followed as far as possible, but that is rarely over about sixty cubits, for at that depth the foul ness of the air puts the lamps out.
 The vein Is said rarely, if ever, to show an outcrop, and it is a matter of pure speculation where to dig" says MT. George. As the whole place Is covered with jungle, prospecting anyway would be laborious. There have been three finds, each causing a rush. The first was seven years ago at Hnal Bdlng tMllauHBgoHt, dDoul d mile to the south of the present place and near where the Chinese had worked formerly. The next was a year or two later at Htaukat betwe n Milaunggon and Sanka.
 Then there were three or four lean years, and then, early in 1905, one Konhkan struck vein, near Sanka village, which has attracted the pres ent growth of population to Maingnin, but. as explained above, though the area within 100 yards of Konhkan's original shaft is honeycombed with pits, only three are yielding, and Konhkan's twin has ceased to yield. All the material dug out from the in- side Twnlon is pulled up to the sur face in small buckets, all worked by enormously long pivoted bamboos worked with a counterpoise, and the tourmalne is sorted out of hand, the granite fragments being piled in a wall around the mouth of the shaft.