It is true they produce bullion, but they do not obtain such results as they ought to. This is partially caused by ignorance of the process of beneficiation by fire, partly by local circumstances. The actual product of the mines is nevertheless far in advance of the capital which has been invested in them. The cost of mining the ores is from $3 to $3 60 per ton, but they are carefully assorted by hand at present, making the total cost of production when ready for the furnace from $5 to $12 per ton. The character of most of the mines and their situations are such that the mining cost ought not to exceed $2 50 per ton, as nearly all of them can be worked to a depth of 200 to 500 and even 600 feet by tunnels, obviating the cost of hoisting. The ores, except in the immediate vicinity of the surface, are surrounded by hard compact rocks, and their dip is such that but very little timbering will be required. Labor at the mines ranges from $2 50 to $3 50 per day at present. These prices will probably maintain themselves for some time, but the cost of producing the ore will be greatly reduced as soon as the mines are opened in a systematic manner. Where two or three hands are needed now, a single miner will then be sufficient to perform the same work. A Most of the ores require blasting, and the final assorting ought to be carried on in the open air on the dump and not in the mines, as it is now done. The latter causes unnecessary expense and also loss in ore. good illustration of this is, that in 1866 the ores in the Chollar Potosi mine, Virginia, Nevada, were assorted in the mine at and above the Potosi tunnel level, and a loss in ore occurred thereby; that in 1868 and 1869 the same ground was reopened and produced 23,000 tons of ore, which were assorted overhead and yielded an aggregate of $600,000. B. Reduction.—At Cerro Gordo district three reduction works exist at present, none of which exceeds 10 tons working capacity. The one of Mr. Belshaw is the largest, and contains three furnaces. The other two are of 6 to 8 tons capacity. All of them work under great disadvantages from scarcity of water, which in winter has to be obtained by melting snow and ice to supply the steam-boilers, causing frequent stoppages. Besides these, several Mexicans own furnaces. They smelt their ores and refine their bullion on a small scale. In Lone Pine Valley exist three more establishments. The Cervantes Company reduction works of 20 tons capacity, driven by water power, is the best constructed. The Stevenson, of 10 tons, is situated at the east shore of Owen's Lake, and the works of a new company are being built of a capacity of 30 tons, on the lake, across which they will have a steamer crossing. Lone Pine Valley is certainly the place for smelting works, as sweet water and fuel are abundant, and ores from Cerro Gordo can be brought there at a cost of $7 50 per ton. It is only lately that the district has begun to yield regularly from $30,000 to $60,000 per month, except during one month when all the reduction works were producing, and $130,000 were shipped through to Los Angeles at 33 cents per pound. Cupelling is not practiced, and all the bullion varying from $270 to $540 in silver per ton is shipped by land to Los Angeles. The smelting done at Cerro Gordo and Lone Pine is carried out on the old Mexican method. The ores are assorted and freed from gangue matter as much as possible by hand at too high a cost at present. The galena ores are thrown into a "galemador," (a reverberatory furnace on an inclined plane,) where some of the sulphur and antimony is driven off and the greater portion of the ore is converted into a stiff slag highly impregnated with metallic lead. This is mixed with crude silver ores, the above-named copper ores, carrying copper and iron,) and smelted in à blast-furnace where the lead is reduced to its metallic state, carrying the greater portion of the precious metal with it. This is run into bars of 150 to 250 pounds. The Cervantes Company is the only one which has cupelling-furnaces. These "galemadores" are generally 10 feet long, 5 feet wide, have from 22 to 36 inches between the bed and arch, and can slag from 6 to 8 tous of galena ores in twenty-four hours. They are heated with wood, and work without blast, and consume 2 cords of wood per twenty-four hours. The "stack-furnaces" are of various shapes, round and square, from 10 to 15 feet high; their boshes vary from 18 to 25 inches in the clear. They are fed with wood, charcoal, and ore, in alternate layers, and require about 20 bushels of charcoal and cord of wood to reduce 1 ton of ore. They reduce, according to their size and blast and the character of the charges, from 5 to 10 tons of ore per day. The cost of wood is from $6 to $8 per cord, that of charcoal 35 cents per bushel, in Lone Pine Valley. The price of both is much lower at Cerro Gordo. The smelting of silver ores, when lead ores are plenty, as is the case in Cerro Gordo, is a very simple operation, and at least 90 per cent. of the fire assay of the precious metal ought to be got from the ores, but at present only 50 to 55 per cent. are obtained in Cerro Gordo. Many here adopt the principle to produce their lead with as high a percentage in silver as possible in the stack-furnace, which is not judicious, and the low yield in percentage of the assay is, in part, directly attributable to this. But the bad proportion of the blast, and the very shape of the furnaces, exert also considerable influence in this direction. Cerro Gordo is a new district, the actual merit of which has not been made apparent for want of capital and energetic explorations. There are a great many mines, among which is a comparatively large number of excellent ones, and little as they have been opened the developments already made promise a bright future. The character of their ores is such as to render the extraction of silver comparatively easy; moreover, Lone Pine offers every facility for profitable smelting, and there is no apparent reason why in time the district should not stand as high in rank as many others who had the advantage of capital. The product of this district during the last year does not fall short of $300,000, and there is every prospect that it will rapidly increase. Indeed, in August, 1870, the production of the Balshaw furnace alone was 2,774 bars, or 238,728 pounds of lead bullion; mining, especially tunneling, was going ahead rapidly, and the prospect was that a large amount of stoping-ground would be ready to be attacked in a short time. The Caso district, also situated in Inyo County, should be briefly mentioned here. This locality is fifty-five miles from Lone Pine. It was abandoned in 1866 on account of the Indians. In 1868 a party of Mexicans settled there, and have now twenty arrastras at work. The ledges are small, and mostly lie flat, but are very rich. The greatest abundance of ore is found in the Mina Grande, formerly the Josephine. The gold bullion produced is worth $15 per ounce, and the product between April and October is estimated at between $30,000 and $40,000. The Golconda Mine, two miles from Owen's River, was located twenty years ago, but little work was done. A thousand tons could easily be taken out in a short time, if a small amount of capital would be invested. As yet none has found its way to this district. The total population of the county, according to the late census, is 1,956; Chinese, 29. MONO, KERN, LOS ANGELES, AND TULARE COUNTIES. Of these counties a few brief notes only can be given, mainly from the reports to the Census Bureau. The ores of Mono County are eminently silver ores, but contain some gold. Five mines, employing twenty-two men, were reported working June 1, and the total yield for the preceding year was $95,000, of which $83,500 was silver. The wages paid were $83 per month. From Kern County three quartz mines were reported working. The Delphi Mining Company has a shaft 280 feet deep, and a tunnel 450 feet long, and employed eighteen men during one month, paying out $1,500 for wages. The product was 260 ounces of gold, worth $3,500. La Esperanza is worked by a tunnel 200 feet long. It was worked with fifteen men during seven months, at a cost of $8,400 for wages and $3,180 for materials. The product was 900 ounces, worth $12,600. The Kern River Mining Company works its mine by a shaft 170 feet deep, and a tunnel 260 feet long. During the entire year twenty-nine men were employed, and $27,000 was expended for wages, while the materials used amounted to $3,200. The total product of this company was $35,000. From Los Angeles County a single quartz mine is reported working during the entire year. This is the mine of the Eureka Mining Company, at Solidad. Thirty to forty men were employed at different times, and $48,000 expended for wages. At the mine is a shaft 125 feet deep and a tunnel 150 feet long. The total product was $50,000. All the figures in regard to product above introduced, as well as the following, refer to the year ending June 1, 1870. In Tulare County the 10-stamp mill of Birdseye & Co. on White River is reported to have been in operation during five months. Five men were employed at a cost of $1,500 in wages, and $700 were spent for materials. The product was 250 ounces of gold, worth $4,000. I am not informed in regard to the mine from which the ore crushed by the mill was taken. The total population of these counties is as follows: Mono Los Angeles.. Total. Chinese. The principal quartz-mining enterprise in this county continues to be that of the Mariposa Company, upon the grant of the same name. The history of this famous estate has been marked with many vicissitudes, brilliant successes having alternated in its management with disappointment and loss. The conditions now surrounding the enterprise are in many respects more favorable than ever before, as I can testify from personal observation at the time of my last visit, November, 1870. The rate of wages is more reasonable; Chinese miners are employed, even underground, to a considerable extent, with satisfactory results, and without violent opposition from their white colleagues. The machinery of reduction is complete and efficient. At the Ophir or Benton mills, where sixty-five stamps were running, and thirty more in process of erection,* there is an excellent water-power secured by a dam which The whole number running at these mills in March, 1871, was eighty. A new waterwheel will be required before the other fifteen are started. 29 may be trusted (in spite of sundry former catastrophes) not to wash away again; the mills themselves have been remodeled, raised, furnished with California high-mortar batteries, and arranged to work both cheaply and effectively. The Benton mills used to have the reputation of crushing more cheaply and losing more gold than any others in the State. In their present form the desirable characteristic appears to have been retained and the other removed. All the product of the Josephine and Linda (formerly Pine Tree) mines is worked at these mills with a profit, as the statement below, taken from the books, will show. The Another great improvement is visible in the general economy of administration, and in the absence of the turbulent and lawless class of inhabitants which once gave Mariposa an unenviable fame. "roughs" have shot one another, emigrated, or been hanged; and the departure of these worthies, coupled with the termination of legal conflicts, has greatly assisted the management of affairs with undisturbed attention to the permanent welfare of the estate. The three mills at the river, called as a whole the Ophir (formerly Benton) mills, have the following strength: Lily, (upper mill,) 16 stamps, at 650 pounds; Ada, (middle mill,) 25 stamps, at 550 pounds; Bessie, (lower mill,) 24 stamps, at 500 pounds. The Ada is considered the best mill. All the batteries are run at 65 to 70 drops per minute, and the total crushing capacity of the 65 stamps is about 60 tons daily. The ore is supplied from the Pine Tree and Josephine mines. The average of five semi-monthly cleanings-up on Pine Tree ore, during August, September, and October, 1870, was $10 50-or, leaving out the second clean-up of September, when a lot of poor ore was treated, the average was $11 35 per ton. No account is taken of tailings or sulA similar examination of the books as to phurets in this statement. Josephine ore showed an average yield of $8 06 per ton. The amount of rock crushed from May 1 to October 1, 1870, was as follows: Total Month. Bessic. Ada. Lily. Total. About one pound of quicksilver is employed to ten tons of rock, and 35 to 40 per cent. of the quicksilver is saved in amalgam, worth $8 per ounce. That the foregoing yield is sufficient to leave a small margin of profit appears from the following estimates of expense at the Josephine and Linda mines: Joseph Linda. ine. $2.75 75 2 25 $5.00 75 225 1.00 The greater cheapness of mining in the Josephine is due to its immense stopes, and the manner in which it is opened by drifts from the face of the mountain. The Linda, however, furnished during the months referred to a better grade of quartz, principally, I believe, from the socalled "Garden" shoot, which has been opened in that mine at greater depths with excellent results. The average thickness of the vein in the Linda being about 5 feet, and in the Josephine 10 feet, the work of opening new ground is but trifling, since every foot of drifting exposes for extraction a large amount of quartz. I measured the reserves of ore in these two mines, including only what could be extracted without deadwork in sinking or drifting, and found in the Josephine 15,810 tons, and in the Linda 14,016 tons. At the same time, the quality of ore in both mines was improving, and the yield at the mills in November was higher than the averages above reported. By the enlargement of milling facil ities, and the treatment of a greater amount of ore, the milling cost at the river could be reduced to $1 75, and the general expenses to 50 cents per ton of rock, thus securing $1 per ton of additional profit. The Mariposa mine contained, likewise, immense reserves of low-grade quartz. The mill at Mariposa has been reduced to 25 stamps, and the operations of these for August, September, and part of October, 1870, showed an average yield of $9 98 per ton. This scarcely paid expenses, as the mill is run by steam; and the mine has since been temporarily closed. When reopened, it will be worked by Chinese labor exclusively, as it has been, in part, the case for a long time past. The old Princeton mine, in which the population of Mariposa County still place much affectionate faith, produced from a single large body or chimney of ore between four and five million dollars. This chimney was worked to a depth of some 600 feet, and it was officially reported to be exhausted just before the first grand collapse of the Mariposa Company. A complete sectional map of the workings came into my possession several years ago, bearing valuable memoranda as to the yield of the quartz from each stope; and this, with other evidence, led me to doubt whether the old Princeton chimney was really exhausted, and to suspect that the company had been too easily discouraged. Subsequently to the first abandonment, however, a creditor took the mine and gutted it, filling up the deep shafts with refuse, to save hoisting, taking out pillars and timbers, and leaving the workings in such a condition that no one would like to undertake the job of reopening them. Whether that chimney is or is not exhausted will, therefore, not be soon discovered. Many explorations were made, without success, to find some equally promising body of ore on the continuation of the vein. It seems to part near the mine into two branches, in going eastward; and these are said to reunite toward Agua Fria, a mile away, inclosing between them a large area. On the northerly branch operations were unsuccessful, though this was generally supposed to be the main vein. The southerly vein makes a violent bend on the top of the first hill east of the mine, and trending northeast crosses a ravine, a smaller hill, and another ravine, beyond which the outcrop is hidden in the chapparal. On the top of the smaller hill are the two shafts of the New Princeton, the discovery of which was the most significant event of the year for the estate. The connection between these and the old mine is distinctly established by innumerable exposures of the vein outcrop. There is not much to be said of these shafts, but what there is is highly important. The western one is a prospecting shaft, 60 feet deep at the time of my visit; the other, 200 feet east, is a large working shaft, then about 30 feet deep, and showing a vein of 5 feet, the foot |