STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 323 



the richest veins stand nearly perpendicular, while others lie almost flat. 

 In length they are equally and even more variable, being traceable some- 

 times for miles, while again the}' can be found only for a few hundred 

 feet, or perhaps less. The position of the quartz belt of California is 

 longitudinally through the centre of the State, embracing the foothills 

 of the Sierra ISTevada Mountains. It has an altitude varying from one 

 to five thousand feet above the level of the sea, reaching at a few points 

 to a greater height, but not often found below the line of elevation first 

 mentioned. Towards its southern limit this belt trends to the east, and 

 crossing the Sierra Nevada chain has its extremity in the Owens Valley 

 country; while in the opposite direction, following the straggling spurs 

 of this same range, it sweeps to the northwest, and terminates on the 

 shores of the Pacific, a portion continuing on into Soutliern Oregon. 



At one time it was thought there was no quartz in the more elevated 

 portions of the Sierra Nevada, but this has since been found to be a mis- 

 taken opinion. More recent explorations have brought to light exten- 

 sive districts containing lodes of this rock highly impregnated with both 

 gold and silver. The Kearsarge District, in Tulare County, and the 

 Excelsior, in Nevada County, with several of less importance situate 

 between them, but all Ij'ing high up the sides, and several quite on the 

 summit of the Sierra, disprove this theory, and go far toward warrant- 

 ing the belief that these mountains may yet become the theatre of large 

 and profitable mining operations. The theory has been entertained by 

 some that there was but a single large vein, or rather narrow belt car- 

 rying numerous small veins, running along the western declivity of these 

 mountains, and stretching north and south several hundred miles, within 

 the limits of which the principal claims of value are situated; a view 

 that can bardl}^ be accepted as strictly true, though there are many facts 

 and circumstances tending to lend it plausibility. The mines of Clear 

 Creek, and Mariposa, the Soulsby Claim near Sonora, the rich deposits 

 found at Carson Hill, and, finally, the still more afliuent and thoroughly 

 developed ledges at Grass Vallej^, all maintaining the same position rela- 

 tively to the Sierra Nevada, against which they rest, and the plains at 

 their base, and marked by other geological resemblances and surround- 

 ings, while they give a strong coloring to this vicAV, fail to establish it 

 as a positive fact. During the 'earlier history of quartz mining in this 

 State it was a common impression that these veins, though paying well 

 in their upper portions, would gradually give out when they came to be 

 explored to greater depths, a belief founded upon the narrow and insuffi- 

 cient experience of those who, without adequate means or a knowledge 

 of the business, had first undertaken it in a small way. The heavy 

 operations at Grass Valley, where the most extensive and long continued 

 work yet performed in the prosecution of this business has been done, 

 and where the deepest excavations in the State, with one or two excep- 

 tions, have been made, demonstrate that as a common rule the reverse of 

 this is true, the rock brought from the lowest points reached — being 

 several hundred feet beneath the surface — giving as good, and ordinarily 

 better, average results than that obtained nearer the surface. It is noAV 

 even a question with many if the numerous failures that attended the 

 pioneer efforts at quartz mining in California may- not, to some extent, 

 justly be ascribed to the fact that they were generally confined so near 

 the surface. However this may be, there is now no longer any doubt 

 as to the fact that our quartz lodes will, as a common thing, continue to 

 pay indefinitel}^ downwards, the only difference being that the greater 

 the depth attained the smaller the margin of profits, on account of the 



