lode ever opened in the state. The most profitable lodes are those
which have a large supply of rock, easily to be obtained, and all of it
yielding something above the cost of working. The common method of
ascertaining whether rock will pay, is to pulverize a little of it and
wash it in a horn spoon. In taking out the quartz rock in large lodes,
it is important to take out only that which will pay, and to determine
this, the superintendent of the quarry-men must occasionally test the
vein-stone. He takes several little pieces of it, average specimens,
places them on a hard, smooth, flat stone, about a foot square, on
which he crushes them with a stone muller four inches square, and then
by rubbing with the muller he reduces them to a fine powder. He has a
horn spoon, made of a large ox-horn, with a bowl about three inches
wide, and eight inches long, being merely one-half of the horn in its
natural shape. With this spoon he washes out the powder in water, and
if he does not find a speck of gold or a "color," as it is called, in a
pound of the rock, he infers that it will not pay. The three principal
quartz mines in the state are those of Fremont in Mariposa county, of
the Allison company in Nevada county, and of the Sierra Butte company
in Sierra county. The first has produced $75,000 in a month, the second
$60,000, and the third $20,000, but the average is probably thirty per
cent. less, and the expenses about thirty per cent. of the total
product. The average yield of the Fremont rock is fourteen dollars to
the ton, of the Sierra Butte rock eighteen dollars, and that of the
Allison company, according to report, has for more than a year at a
time been one hundred dollars per ton. The cost of working quartz rock,
including quarrying, crushing and amalgamating, is in the best mills
from five to ten dollars per ton. The width of the vein, the softness
of the rock, the amount of work done, and the skill and industry of the
workmen, all are items of great importance in estimating the cost of
quartz-mining. It is a business which the owner of the mill ought to
understand. The cost of quarrying common quartz rock is about two
dollars per ton, that is, for mill-owners that understand the business
and superintend the labor themselves. When given out by the job, it
usually cost more. When quartz is crushed in a custom mill, that is, a
mill built to crush for all applicants, the cost is rarely less than
five dollars per ton, and i