A GOLD MINE ON THE RAND.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 10869, 19 January 1901, Page 3

A GOLD MINE ON THE RAND.

(By Two Little New Zealand Grains.) Tyro thousand feet in ten minutes—the bottom seeming to fall out of everything. But we were quite safe in the iron "skip," as the miners call the cage, which', ran' smoothly down the rails laid-on the steep incline following the dip of the main reef. Wo readied the bottom of the shaft without a jerk, so justly was tho steel cable unwound by the machinery on the top. Wβ were then on the twelfth, level of one of the richest "outcrop" mines on the Rand. Long dark passages stretched away on every and further down the shaft went to where, water still drowned some of tihe workings. On our way up we climbed hundreds of steps through live or six levels till we re-entered the "skip" to land in daylight again. Perhaps we might succeed in giving a sort of general idea if we tried to explain in a few words what we have read in books that describe how ages and ages ago the very rich gold bsds were formed near what is now the great city of Johannesburg. It is said that the gold was laid down in layers that are remarkable for their regu« larity in the form of tino particles, among the pebbles on the floor and shores of a great inland sea, that disappeared in the violent changes* that tip-til tod these beds of pebbles so that tihey cropped out along the ridge that is called the Witwatersrand, or "the great divide," between the rivers that now flow north and south from the high land along which are laid off the streets of Johannesburg, nearly 6000 ft above sealevel. For several years after 1835, when the truo character of the "outcrop" was first discovered, people supposed that the gold reefs were at such a steep angle as to stand almost up and down. But in the course oi time borings on the slops of the ridge to the south proved that the angle of the reefa far down became natter, so that fresh mines were opened up, and came to be known as "the deep levels." Later on another row of mines whs laid off in the hollow where the racecourse is, to strike the reefs at a greater ebspth. These have come to be known as the "deep-deeps," and now the land, even where it rises again towards another ridge to the south,- has been pegged oil", so that we may see in a year or two the headgears of a third line of mines that might well be called the"deep-deep-deeps." The deepest shaft as yet on the Band, we have been told, is about 3250 feet, and engineers say that miners may be able to work as far down as 6000 feet, or nearly a mil? and a-quartsr underground. On tho "stopes," or faces, of the mine Vβ could plainly see the curious formation that is so like almond toffee, that it has come to be known as "banket," after the Dutch nani3 for that sweetmeat. The gold is mostly found in thin flakes around the smooth oval pebbles, that became embedded in the sand that has since become one solid mass of roc-k. The reefs are first drilled, and then blasted into fragments, that are hauled to the surface, aiicLHere sorted so as to send to the battery only what is likely to contain gold. We have tried to understand the treatment of the ore, and have asked a gentleman, who knows all about these things, to correct what we are writing, and he has kindly explained the process, leaving out a great many details, and using very few scientific; words: After the stone has been pounded by the iron stampers the dusb ie carried by stream! of water over tables with copper plates and quicksilver troughs, which retain most oi the gold. The pulp then flows into great vats outside, -where, by chemical process, more gold is secured 1 . The sUme that remains is drained into pits where othea* chemj. cals are used, and almost every trace of gold ia saved. Tlie mines are all idle, except to pump out the water that rose in them during the war, wlien all were shut down, except two or three that the Boer Government kept •working for their own purposes. In a few' months all will bo at work again, and soiffe people who should know say that the yearly, yield of gold fromjfcliia part of Africa, ivhioh the year before the' war was nearly as great as that of all tho rest of tho world) put together, will soon exceed anything before known. GLADYS AND ELLA HUTCHISON. Johannesburg, 26th November, 1900-, ,