The Scottish Naturalist. 353 



have been known. For he tells us that he disdains to "bye 

 gold and make show thereof as gotten in these workes " (' Re- 

 cords,' p. 108). 



Since the last of the present series of papers was written (for 

 the July No. of the * Scottish Naturalist '), an important meeting 

 has been held in London — important in so far as concerns our 

 present subject, the Crawford- Lindsay gold-field, and its auriferous 

 produce, actual and possible. I allude to the annual meeting of 

 the Directors and Shareholders of the " Leadhills Silver-Lead 

 Mining and Smelting Company " in June. The chairman stated : 

 *' With respect to the presence of gold in the property, it was 

 said that old workers, with their rude tools, had taken ;!^5oo,ooo 

 worth of gold out of the mine ; and surely a company, with im- 

 proved modern appliances, ought to develop this part of their 

 property." 1 This ^500,000 has a suspicious resemblance to the 

 valuation of the Crawford - Lindsay gold produce by Calvert, 

 which was ^£"51 5,000.^ 



Such a mining company as that above mentioned has it in its 

 power to determine two points of great interest, socially or eco- 

 nomically, as well as mineralogically or geologically, viz. : — 



1. Whether it will "pay" nowadays to conjoin the extraction 

 of alluvial gold from the soil, or of disseminated gold from aurif- 

 erous quartz, with the desilverisation of lead and the smelting of 

 the lead itself? 



2. Whether such disseminated gold and gold-quartz really 

 exist — that is, auriferous quartz in situ, and forming veins in the 

 lower Silurian rocks of the Wanlockhead district ? 



If the Leadhills Silver-Lead Company will undertake the solu- 

 tion of these problems by any kind of systematic operations on 

 a large scale, its directors will deserve well of their countrymen, 

 whatever be the result of the experiment.^ 



From the data set before the reader in the present and three 

 foregoing papers,* it would appear impossible to determine that 

 gold-quartz in situ was ever really found at Wanlockhead or 

 Leadhills ; or if it was so found, what was its mineralogical or 

 petrological character. Statements concerning stamping mills, 

 " vaines of gold," and gold-bearing rocks, stones, or minerals, are 

 flatly contradicted by other allegations of an entirely opposite 



1 ' North British Daily Mail,' June 7, 1878. 



2 * Vide his ' Gold Rocks,' p. 165, and the ' Scottish Naturalist,' p. 264. 



3 Vide 'Scottish Naturahst,' pp. 213, 214. 



4 In the January, April, and July Nos. of the ' Scottish Naturalist.' 



