surface
downward and in his opinion it would be at fifty miles. I asked him
what they would find there and he replied that in his opinion it would
be the same subtle and elastic essence that fills stellar space, but he
added: "God alone knows the secret of the universe in his keeping." We
visited the great smelting, refining and assaying works in the vicinity
and he introduced me to the general superintendent of all the mines on
the continental divide, who invited me to accompany him on a mine
inspection tour and he would show me the improved method they used in
prospecting for ore and extracting and milling it to the best
advantage. "When our mining experts discover a mineral belt containing
precious metals or copper, iron, lead, nickel, platinum, cobalt,
quicksilver, manganese or any other ore used in manufactures and the
arts, the first thing we do is to sink a shaft on the most likely ore
chimney and at every one hundred feet in depth we run levels to develop
it and if we continue to find ore as we go down and the ground requires
drainage, we survey for a drainage tunnel that will drain the mine at
the greatest depth, even if we have to run a tunnel ten miles. We sink
the shaft to within twenty feet of the tunnel level and then quit
sinking until the tunnel is completed. We use a tunneling machine,
boring a tunnel six feet in diameter at the rate of one hundred feet
per day. We run the tunnel directly under the shaft and then withdraw
all the men and machinery from the tunnel, put a six-inch drill into
the shaft that makes a hole into the tunnel, and quickly drains the
mine. Then we begin to stope out at the lowest level, filling in the
waste upward, and taking out only ore to be conveyed to the mill or
smelter. While the shaft is being sunk the ore taken out is sent to the
reduction works and carefully tested to find out the best way of
reducing it so that when the mine is in good condition to work we know
how to handle ore to the best advantage.

"We have only a few reduction works for refractory ore, but they are on
a grand scale, some of them handling one hundred thousand tons daily,
and as the government owns and operates all the railways the cost of
transporting ore is under two mills a ton per mile. We employ a corps
of metallurgists experimenting to discover better methods in reducing
and they have made great progress so that ores that were left in the
mine or on the dump are now worked with handsome profit