MINING NEWS.

Bruce Herald, Volume VI, Issue 401, 10 January 1872, Page 3

MINING NEWS.

We think 'the following 'portion of ah. official report by Mr Skey, as to 'the treatmerit of ' ; tailings "'from ' crushing- machines at the Thames, and the. results thereof are worthy of study by thbse'interested in quartz mining : — iS TO TREATMENT OF TAIIiIN'GS. Mr Skey narrates the^ precautions he used in sampling the tailings, which, with two or three exceptions, was done under his'immediate personal superintendence. " Only two or three "samples were takeh from the settling-pits, as failings "so deposited wbiild be more than usually concentrated, 'and so vitiate the results of their analysis. ; ,The rest of the tailings were collected, 'either from the large heaps which had ■accumulated in the yards round variovis'b.'itteries, or else directly from the shoots discharging : the ; se, while the batteries were at work." The heaps were each sampled from twenty or thirty different places, on all exposed sides five 6r six inches below the surface., "All samples were well mixed, and dried before examination. The results given, therefore, refer to the respective samples .when airdried. 5 ' .Of the two plans of saihpling, Mr Skey prefers that from the shoot, although more tedious, as the analyst " can allow with more certainty for the proportion of fine substances carried away by tile Vater." Having stated these preliminaries, Mr Skey proceeds to detail the mode of deter ihining the yield of gold afforded, by re-amalgama-tion of 'failings. He used a hand Ber San, similar in shape. 'to the ordinary ones, and fixed iit about the usual inclinatib 1. N-;> chemical agent was used in amalgamation by "the Berdau. The whole of the quicksilver was retorted, off from the several amalgams obtained, and lib leather was used, as the leather <l must have seriously affected the correctness of th« returns." The results of careful and lionest manipulation, of "tailings" -will _. be seeh from a perusal of the following returns, which appear in the report above referred to :— _ Results of the A,ii a 'ysis of certain of tire Gold Alloys referred to in the list, Bhbfamg^the proporeion 6f G-old to Silver bfid other Metals.

Mr Skey'cotitintes:— Restricted, as 1 necessarily way, iii tlie quantity of alloy for analysis, I was imable to determine the per-cei'tage of any other metal possibly present iildn:* with the gold and silrerj but with reference to the quantity of those* I believe it td be uniformly small. A« a general rule, the employment of cyanide of potassium in the amildar mation, raised the proportion of silver to thit of gold in the resulting amalgam.

It is rarely that men who ran for luck catch it. Luck isn't got by the run 'of chance; bat tip the slow and steady step of work alike of the' head arid hand: Luck is foresight pushed into the best practical and most productive place. —Beople in doubt should try it on. - ■....;...

Per-"centa<'e of Gold. Per-cetltage 6 ; i Silver, &c. 43-2 534 '56-8 46-6 454 537 .546 %63 481 564 529 43-6 49-6 57-1 534 42-d •49-7 57-3 50-3 42-7 50-2 60-fi 49-8 394