The silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1909-1925, 1910-09-22
PERENNIAL SLANDER
AGAINST MINING INDUSTRY

81 notice that perennial SANDER
against the mining industry to the eff
feet that more gold has been put into
the ground than has ever been taken
out of it has again appeared in
PRINT said a former western news
paper man last night in the reading
room at the New York Press club, as
he laid aside the paper he had been
perusing, relit his cigar and fitted lis
body into the accommodating lux
uriousness of a leather covered loung-
ing chair.
Gas a matter of fact,' he continu-
ed, "no more flagrant untruth has ever
become maxim, and that is a pretty
strong statement, for experience has
convinced me that most so-called
maxims are untrue and as little worthy
of credence as our present-day bro
mides However, we must not go off
the question altogether, to paraphase
Harry Lauder, and so / will content
myself by asserting there has not been
as 'much gold put into the ground as
has been taken out of it and will of
fer YOU my proofs in substantlation of
that statement.
"Thousands of well-meaning people
and newspapers have repeated the
ridiculous old saw / have quoted and
4 have accepted it as gospel without
question: yet the fact is that the Com
stock mines alone, with an aggregate
production of approximately $600,OO0,-
000 have yielded more of the previous
metals than was contained in all the
dollars which have been expended in
/ all of the gold and silver producing
districts on this continent.
"There has been hoisted through
/ the Consolidated Virginia shaft, which
pierced the argentiferous heart of the
! famous Comstock lode, in excess of
! Sl40,000,000 worth of gold-silver ores.
The dividends paid by the Consolidated
Virginia Mining company amounted to
the stupendous sum of nearly 1884,
10000.
"The fortunes dug from the depths
of the Con. Virginia have been instru
mental in the rearing of many cities
that front the Pacific coast; have done
yoeman service in the stretching OF
cables across the Atlantic and Pacific
oceans; have played an important part
in the connecting of the two oceans by
rail; have bolstered the credit of q
nation in time of war and financial EN-
Ibarrassment. All these things have
they done in the past, and yet today
they participate as actively IN the car
rving on of the world s affairs as they
did several decades ago, when the
splendor of Nevada's silver star wa'
frst seen in the constellation of the
states.
"That the element of financial risl
enters into the business on mining
will grant you, although l will no
eoncede, numerous ignorant or In
spred writer's to the contrary not
withsanding, that the percentage o.
risk is any greater than attaches t.
any other investment. / refer, o
course, to persons who exercise rea
sonable modicum of intelligence il
! their financial ventures. Those VIII
do not are quite as often taken in b.
+ the speeiously- advertisement
Q of some corporation like that i'm
mortalzed by Charles Dickens unde
+ the caption, sUnited Metropolitan In
+ proved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Bak
ino and Punctual Delivery Company
! as they are by the glttering general
n ties of the prospectus Of a wildca
mining company. People of that II
Z have been gulled from the day whe
tNe SERPENT worked his confidence gam
! in the Garden of Eden until the pres
ent time. Stringent laws may In tn
future, perhaps, more fully proteC
them from their own folly, but thei
complete emancipation from the pre-
J motion hawk will only come with the
q self education in matters financial
Mining Financial News.