THE RICHEST SPOT IN THE WORLD.
As by this time the general reader will have heard as much as he will
care to know about excitements in stocks, crashes, the tricks of the
manipulators, and the troubles of the manipulated, I shall now turn to
the Big Bonanza itself.
A description of a trip down a deep shaft being given elsewhere, I shall
with the reader’s permission, drop at once to the bottom of the shaft of
the Consolidated Virginia mine, landing among the miners at a station
1,500 feet below the surface of the earth, on what is known as the
“1500-foot level.”
Although many bodies of ore that have yielded millions of dollars have
been found on the great lode, here has at last been discovered what
appears to be the heart of the Comstock. At the point where the big
bonanza was found the fissure in which is formed the Comstock lode is of
unusual width. Measuring, from the country-rock (syenite) on the west to
the east country rock (propylite), the distance is from one thousand to
one thousand two hundred feet. This space between the two country-rocks
represents the width of the fissure, and is filled with a “vein-matter”
or gangue composed of quartz, clay, and porphyry. In this gangue has
been formed the ore. As the vein-matter or gangue appears to be the
“matter” of the ore, in order to produce so great a deposit as is seen
in the Consolidated Virginia and California mines, an immense mass of it
was required. In a place where the fissure is narrow and the vein-matter
is pinched, no great breadth of ore may be looked for—it will be in
proportion to the vein-matter.
As we have seen, the Consolidated Virginia folks reached the crest of
the subterranean silver-mountain in 1873, at the depth of 1,167 feet,
but it was not until in the fall of 1874 that they began to open out on
the 1500-foot level, running cross-cuts into the mass of ore that
produced an unprecedented sensation among the mining men of both Europe
and America.
Leaving the station into which we dropped with the cage from the
hoisting-works, standing 1500 feet above, we advance a few steps
eastward along a broad gallery, the sides and roof of which are composed
of a mass of heavy timbers and thick planks, when we reach the main
north-and-south drift, which is the great highway of the mine. It is a
grand gallery, nine feet in width by about the same in height, and over
one thousand feet in length. It extends through the whole length of the
California (600 feet) to the Ophir mine. From the Ophir to the north
line of the Consolidated Virginia it was made of double height in order
to carry a great volume of air; as the air, fresh and pure from the
surface, is drawn down the Ophir shaft and passing through that mine
enters the great main drift which it follows through the California and
the Consolidated Virginia to the shaft of the mine last named, where it
ascends and again mingles with the atmosphere of the upper-world. In
passing from shaft to shaft, however, this air has been turned from its
direct course in various places (by means of doors closing drifts and
cross-cuts) and carried to where it has refreshed and given life to many
miners digging down the ore in the breasts of the several heated stopes.
Crossing this thoroughfare of the 1500-foot level and advancing a few
steps further to the eastward, we reach the vast deposit of ore known as
the “Big Bonanza.” Cross-cuts pass through the ore, east and west, and
cross-drifts from north to south, cutting it into blocks from fifty to
one hundred feet square, as the streets run through and divide a town
into blocks. It is indeed a sort of subterranean town, and is more
populous than many towns on the surface, as it numbers from 800 to 1,000
souls, and nearly all are voters.
Passing to the south end of the bonanza, to the place where it was first
crossed by a drift, we find it to be one hundred and forty-eight feet in
width—all a solid mass of ore of the richest description. Here a large
stope is opened, and we see the miners at work in the vein, blasting and
digging down the ore. They are working upward from the floor of the
level, and as they progress they build up square sets of supporting
timbers in the cavities or chambers cut out in extracting the ore from
the bonanza. Even here, well toward its south end—as far as explored—the
ore-body is by no means small, being over nine and one half rods in
width! This is not a mixture of ore and worthless rock, but is a solid
mass of rich silver-ore which is sent to the mills just as it is dug or
blasted down—ore that will pay from $100 to $300 per ton. As thirteen
cubic feet make a ton of ore, we have here for every block of ore three
feet square from $200 to $600 in pure silver and gold.
We may take our stand here, where the miners are digging out the ore,
and for a distance of seventy-five feet on each side of us all is ore,
while we may gaze upward to nearly that height to where the twinkling
light of candles shows us miners delving up into the same great mass of
wealth. On all sides of the pyramidal scaffold of timbers to its very
apex, where the candles twinkle like stars in the heavens, we see the
miners cutting their way into the precious ore—battering it with
sledge-hammers and cutting it to pieces with their picks as though it
were but common sandstone. Silver-ore is not—as many may suppose—a
bright and glittering mass. In color the ore runs from a blueish-grey to
a deep black. The sulphuret ore (silver glance) is quite black and has
but a slight metallic lustre, while what is called chloride ore is a
kind of steel-grey, with, in places, a pale green tinge—the green
showing the presence of chloride of silver. Throughout the mass of the
ore in very many places, however, the walls of the silver-caverns
glitter as though studded with diamonds. But it is not silver that
glitters. It is the iron and copper pyrites that are everywhere mingled
with the ore, and which, in many places, are found in the form of
regular and beautiful crystals that send out from their facets flashes
of light that almost rival the fire and splendor of precious stones.
There are also often found in the mass of the ore great nests of
transparent and beautiful quartz crystals that are almost as brilliant
as diamonds. Many of these crystals are three or four inches in length.
Some of the nests of crystals are of a light blue color, and then they
may be classed among the precious stones, as they are amethysts. Some of
these are almost as handsome as the precious amethyst. The miners always
like to find these nests of crystals, as they indicate life and strength
in the vein.
On the 1500-foot level the bonanza extends into the Consolidated
Virginia ground over three hundred feet. How much further it may extend
in that direction on the levels below remains to be ascertained. The
“chimneys” of ore, or bonanzas, everywhere on the Comstock have had a
southward inclination, in addition to dipping eastward with the vein.
The dip of the vein is to the east, at an angle of from 30 to 45
degrees, while the inclination of the chimneys of ore to the southward
is at an angle of from 60 to 75 degrees. This southern dip or
inclination will, as many suppose, carry the southern part of the
bonanza into the Best & Belcher ground at a certain depth. To reach the
Best & Belcher the ore must pass entirely through the lower-levels of
the Consolidated Virginia mine. At the depth of 1700 feet a drift has
been run southward into the Best & Belcher ground from the Gould &
Curry, and the work of cross-cutting commenced. Even at this depth it is
not unlikely that they will tap the bonanza.
Two hundred feet north of the bonanza we have been examining (the stope
at cross-cut No. 3), another stope has been raised (on cross-cut No. 1)
toward the 1400-foot level, and here large quantities of rich ore are
being extracted. Cross-cut No. 2, about half way between the two stopes
mentioned, shows the bonanza to be three hundred feet in width, all of
this great distance being a mass of rich ore, and ore that can be sent
to the mills without assorting. Think of a mass of silver-ore over
eighteen rods in width! In many places a vein of ore three feet in
thickness is considered large, and in California veins of gold-bearing
quartz that are only from one to six inches in thickness are profitably
worked. Compared with such deposits the bonanza is not a vein at all but
a field, a district of ore!
No such breadth of silver-ore has ever before been found in any mine in
the world. The silver-bearing veins of Europe are but a few feet in
width, and to speak to a German miner of a mine in which the breadth of
ore was measured by rods would cause him to suppose that he was talking
with a crazy man. Even in the richest mines of Mexico and South America
they have never had any such astounding width of bonanza. Then they have
always been able to keep up their ground with single timbers—posts and
caps—which they could not have done with bodies of ore more than a few
feet in width. On the Comstock hardly one bonanza has been found that
could have been worked by timbering with posts and caps. In order to
work the ore-bodies of the Comstock it became necessary to invent a new
and special system of timbering.
In this broadest part of the bonanza we find at work a great number of
miners, but they are so distributed that we see but a few in any one
spot. They work on separate floors, and floor above floor they are
digging down the ore. The pyramids of timbers rise to the height of
fifty or seventy-five feet, and, as all the heated air of the level
ascends to the highest point, it is very hot where the upper gangs of
men are at work. In addition to the natural heat of the mine, coming
from the heated rock and hot water, the flame of the hundreds of candles
and lamps does much to heat the limited atmosphere of the level;
besides, the air is vitiated by the breathing of so many men. Candles
and lungs rapidly consume the oxygen contained in a given amount of air.
In order that the miners in the upper part of the stope may work in
something approaching to comfort, there are here small blowers which
send up to them through tin tubes a supply of fresh air. Without fresh
air from the surface men can no more work in a mine than they could work
under the sea in a diving-bell, were no air sent them. These blowers are
all driven by small engines run by compressed air, there being in
constant operation on the surface two powerful air-compressors that
force air down through mains, under a great pressure, for the supplying
of the Burleigh drills and the engines in various places on the several
levels of the mine.
Besides the air-engines that run the blowers in this part of the mine
there are other engines, driven by compressed air, that hoist all of the
timbers to the men working in the upper part of the stopes. Nothing is
done by hand that can be done by machinery. As the miners always work
upwards in extracting ore, there is little heavy handling of the ore
itself after it is dug out of the breasts. It is sent down to the floor
of the level in chutes, which land it in bins, from which it is drawn
out through gates into the cars which convey it to the main shaft, up
which it is hoisted to the surface.
In the centre of this part of the bonanza we have on each side of us a
width of over nine rods of silver-ore that will mill from $100 to $250,
and in many parts of which ore is found that assays five or six hundred
dollars. Not only have we this mass of ore on all sides of us, but it
also extends to a great height above. On the 1,400, 1,300, 1,200, and
the 1,167-foot levels men are at work as we see them here. From the
level last named, when the ore was first found, in 1873, they have
followed it up to the 1000-foot level and even above. Fifty feet below
the level on which we stand, or on the 1550-foot level, a long drift has
been run through rich ore toward the Ophir mine, and from this drift a
number of cross-cuts have been run into the bonanza. On this 1550-foot
level a winze has been sunk to the depth of over two hundred feet, all
the way in excellent ore. This shows the bonanza to extend, at least, to
a depth of over 1,750 feet. Near the stope on cross-cut No. 1, about the
California line, is seen some of the richest ore found in the great
bonanza. At this point comes in what is called a “horse,” which is a
huge mass of propylite (generally spoken of as porphyry in the mines),
which tumbled into the vein from the upper or hanging wall at the time
of the formation of the fissure. This “horse” crowds the ore into a
smaller space, and the ore-body is here only about twelve rods in width,
but the greater part of it is immensely rich—such as will yield from
$300 to $600 per ton.
Here are frequently found deposits of stephanite, or silver in the form
of crystals. This is almost pure silver. In the places where the
stephanite occurs there are frequently found nests of pure, malleable
silver in the shape of flattened wires that look as though they had been
pulled in two, and in springing back after breaking had coiled up
against the pieces of ore on which they are found. Some of these wires
have the lustre of metallic silver, but the greater part are blackened
as though by the fumes of sulphur. Some of the smaller and finer wires
on being unrolled and straightened out are found to be a foot or more in
length, and often have several branches, when they somewhat resemble
sea-moss, or some similar vegetable production. The old Mexican mine was
particularly rich in specimens of this kind. In that mine they were
found in a kind of yellow clay in the crevices occurring in the mass of
the ore.
Free gold, in glittering spangles, is also very frequently found in the
places where the rich deposits of black sulphuret of silver, and native
silver occur. A large percentage of the value of the ores of all the
mines on the Comstock is in gold. In many instances the bullion
extracted is fifty per cent. gold. In that part of the bonanza through
which passes the line between the California and the Consolidated
Virginia Companies, it is an easy matter to find ore that assays from
$1,000 to $5,000 or $10,000 per ton, but this is, of course, only in
places where the strength of the vein appears to have concentrated.
At the time that the first cross-cut (No. 1) was run through this part
of the bonanza, at a point about fourteen feet south of the California
line, a chamber about ten feet square was opened (at a point marked
“winze down to 1550” on the map) the walls of which were a solid mass of
black sulphuret ore flecked with native silver, while the roof was
filled with stephanite, or silver in the form of crystals. This was one
of the richest spots found in that part of the bonanza, and the masses
of ore taken out were almost pure silver. Many magnificent specimens for
cabinets were taken from this chamber and parts of the mine adjoining,
some of them little else but stephanite and wires of native silver. The
whole cross-cut through this part of the mine showed an average assay of
$600 per ton. Bottom, top, sides were all the same. Look where you might
you saw but a solid mass of black sulphuret ore mingled with the pale
green ore containing chloride of silver.
Two mining superintendents were one day discussing the bonanza, when one
of them said to his brother silver-hunter: “Supposing the Almighty to
have given you full power and authority to make such a body of ore as
you pleased, could you have made a better than this?”
“I don’t know that I could,” said the other, “but I should have made it
still bigger.”
“Well,” said the first speaker, “you have more cheek than any man I ever
saw!”
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