The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1924-12-21
Metals Speak In Mysteri'
Gus Tones Through
Strange Device

LOS. ANGELES Dec. 20.-Edgar AL
len Poe electrified the faicies of peren-
NAL generations of readers by his
weird tale of the "Gold Bug which
uncovered buried hoard of pirate treas
ure. What shall be said then of an
electrified Gold Bug''-no mere fig
ment of a creative artists grotesque
fancy, but a tested and proven inven-
tion-which men of ample means and
sober judgment plan to use in system
attic search for the worlds treasure
trove of lost or hidden gold, silver and
other metallic valuables!
Just such piece of apparatus, in
vented by W. S. Clayton, British
subject, is at present hidden away here
in a West Side apartment house. 1t
has not been and probably never will
be manufactured for sale or lease on
royalty basis. 1t has never been
patented, so precious is its secret held
to be by those who control it.
Seek Lost Treasure
With the aid of the ,contrivance they
expect to retrieve from the oceans bed
the contents of the strong room of
countless sunken ships, and disinter
from the dank soil of lonely tropical
islands the iron strong boxes overflow
ing with gold and jewels which were
buried there by buccaneers and pirates.
They hope, too to restore to Europe
millions upon millions of vanished but
imperishable wealth, which, during the
centuries has been sequestered and for
gotten in the crypts of abbeys and ca
thedrals, buried in ground which was
later overrun by war, or tucked away
inside the thick walls of old castles.
Soon now all this mute wealth may
be calling aloud for some one to take
and use it. That, to a lay observer, is
the most marvellous and the most eerie
thing about Mr.. Clayton's strange de-
vice. The metalphone he calls it, be-
cause it announces it's discoveries aloud
and in voice of many intonations. If
he sends it gold hunting and it finds
the metal, it makes the fact known with
a thick-volumed, strong, clear and
wholly musical tone. For silver, it
speaks in quite another accent and in
still other tones for copper, the other
metals and also their alloys.
This has been done already while
undergoing tests into which many diff
ficulties were purposely interspersed.
The most spectacular of them were
conducted somewhat more than a year
ago off the coast of British Columbia.
During these experiments the uncanny
contrivance was on the surface, separa-
ted by 81 feet of solid rock from cav
ern where iron bars, length of anchor
chain and other metallic objects were
placed successfully. Without hesita-
ton or error the metalophone announced
the presence of each object and the
material of which it was composed.
Mr.. Clayton, who is president of the
Clayton Electric Company, No. 1903
Main street, Vancouver, 3. c., de-
scribes his apparatus as one designed
ito locate mineralized ore and metals
under ground or water" This descrip-
ton, though scientifically accurate,
omits all the fireworks. For the de-
vice is really nothing less than an IMAM
innate but articulate treasure hunter,
made for no other purpose and indie
pendent of the paraphranalia of charts
and cryptograms so dear to the fancy
of Stevenson, Poe, and all the other TO-
mancers about pirate gold.
A Secret Trip
Already he has made one Journey to
distant Cocos island lost in the blue
trOpic seas southwest of Costa Rica and
not far from the equator, where, ac-
cOrding to documents preserved in the
British museum, millions of pounds in
treasure-gold bars, silver ingots, bull
lion, plate and jewels-were buried by
the British buccaneers, who ravaged the
Spanish Main in the days when CASTLE
was the worlds dominant sea power
and the constant victim of fOrays
against the stately galleans which were