5 o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Africa and the countries of Wangara and Timbuctoo. The Moors of 

 Spain and Northern Africa obtained their precious metals from these 

 countries. The French of Senegal lately took possession of them. 

 They still found gold, but no longer in paying quantities, and the once 

 famous Gold Coast at present furnishes not half a million dollars per 

 year. The auriferous sand is washed by the negroes during leisure 

 hours, and they are content with a yield which would ruin a European 

 enterprise. 



The Egyptians obtained their gold from the upper Nile and Ethi- 

 opia, attested by inscriptions dating from the year 1600 before Christ. 

 Herodotus mentions a king of Ethiopia who was attacked by Cam- 

 byses, but not conquered, who shackled his prisoners with golden 

 chains, since gold was more common than bronze. According to 

 Edrisi, there was so much gold in Sofala that a copper trinket was 

 worth more than one of gold. The celebrated explorer Mauch, in 

 1867, found the remains of ancient gold-mines, but the gold of Africa 

 belongs to the past. The celebrated necklace of the Queen Aalie 

 Topeh, said to be three thousand six hundred years old, and still to be 

 seen in Boolak ; the gold chains worn by the Afghan prisoners at the 

 time of Cambyses ; the treasures brought by the Queen of Sheba to 

 Solomon's Temple ; the masses of gold with which the throne of the 

 King of Ghana was adorned all these, no matter whether they be 

 fables or not, indubitably point to the former immense gold wealth 

 of Africa, while to-day it produces barely a million dollars. Entire 

 Northern Africa, as far as the Sahara and the Falls of the Nile, con- 

 sists of sedimentary ground, which never can have furnished metals ; 

 but in the interior we find old rock granite, gneiss, and hornblende 

 and there the auriferous alluvial soil had been formed ; but it appears 

 that it has been thoroughly exhausted in antiquity and the middle 

 ages. According to Ab. Jevones, the natives have been the first to 

 discover auriferous sand. It is, therefore, possible that the interior 

 country still contains deposits, and even bonanzas, but large ones may 

 no longer be expected, since its gold would long ago have reached the 

 coast. 



Neither China nor Japan produces sufficient gold for home con- 

 sumption. 



The three chief sources are at present Siberia, the United States, 

 and Australia, while the last two are becoming exhausted. An im- 

 mense alluvial territory exists in Siberia, covering the entire space 

 from the Ural to the river Amoor, but the climate prevents washing 

 during the greater part of the year. Here, similar to California, gold 

 is found wherever granite fills the fissures. Although the yield of 

 the washings is gradually decreasing, it is really increased by daily 

 discoveries of new fields, and amounts at present to about $28,000,000 

 annually. The greatest quantity of gold has of late years been mined 

 in America, partly due to its natural wealth, partly to the energy 



