GOLD, GOLD, GOLD.

Otago Witness, Issue 2631, 17 September 1902, Page 30

GOLD, GOLD, GOLD.

The Engineering Magazine contains an article on the Transvaal mine*, by Air John Hays Hammond, who, w-h&tever his Jamesonian record may be, is one (says the j Daily News) of the world's fh-st experts liv mining. Mr Hammond's figures arc 1 calculated to almost fctagger humanity. Think of a 10-mile strip of reef capable of yielding £500,000,000 worth of jzold ! Air Hammond does not say positively that it will, but only that geological investigations leave that estimate highly probable. And that 10-mile strip is only a fraction of the gold-bearing area of the Transvaal. At this rate gold should become some day as cheap as copper. Mr Hammond gives an account of the threo mining regions of the colony — the Witwatersn.n<l region of which Johannesburg is the capital, Lyaenburgh, and De Kaap. The first-named dwarfs the other two. The Witwatersrand gold was discovered in 1885, several years after gold was fovund in Lydenburg and De Kaap. In ' 1887 the Witwatersrand miners produced 2i.00(k>7.. In the nine months preceding the outbreak of war the output came to 4,008,3260z, worth about fourteen and ahalf million pounds. The Witwatersrand companies were, in other words, producing rather more than a quarter of the entire gold yield of the world. Mr Hammond believes that within the next three or four years the Rand may turn out 25 millions' worth. The advance will be owing partly to the increase of crushing machinery, " but more especially to the starting of many of the deep-level properties, which will then reach febe producing stage." Talking of deep levels, the engineers are prepared to work vertically in the Rand to a depth of ' 3000 ft. The cost would be great, but saya , Mr Hammond, the profit would be greater. "It is estimated that for every mile in length along the course of the reefs, down to a vertical depth of 1000 ft for the dip of these reefs, gold to the value of about £10,000,000 will be extracted." How long will the gold yield of the Rand last? Mr Hammond thinks that mining in the Rand will cease to be profitable within 25 years. Shortly before the war the Rand mines employed nearly 10,000 whites on an average monthly wage of £26, and 88,627 natives on an average of £2 9s 9d. Moßt of the white workmen aTe British, I?ut many of the imfcortaai member pi t»oUi}lg»l j<jg« «tt .

. I American. " The mine and mill foremen aro i I usually either Americans or British subjects', i 1 who have had mining experience ia 1 1 America." Mr Hammond pays nothing on the pomt — of course, he would not — Lirb I ' it is obvious that the Rand, with all this overwhelming \vealt!i. should bo mad^e to . p3y its liberal share of costs for the war, r end for the measures which must be taken , to restock and regenerate South Africa.