Coal and Gold Deposits in Natal. 67 



Gold. 



I will now pass on to deal very briefly with the deposits of 

 gold in the Colony. Though up to the present that metal has not 

 been worked successfully on any large scale, it is very widely dis- 

 tributed, and I am sure that sooner or later profitable mines will be 

 established. It will be seen that the deposits are most abundant in 

 North-Western Zululand, that is, approximately, in the centre of the 

 Colony. 



I have had reliable information as to the occurrence of gold 

 in practically every geological formation in Natal, from the Gneiss 

 to the Stormberg beds, but the most important known deposits are 

 in either granite or gneiss, the Swaziland schists, the Witwatersrand 

 series, the Black Reef series, or the Table Mountain sandstones. 



Gold in Granite and Gn^eiss. — A belt of granite and gneiss 

 extends from near Port Shepstone through Botha's Hill, on the 

 railway, into the Eshowe district of Zululand, and through the 

 Unjoye Mountains to the sea coast. Another belt passes northward 

 from Zululand through the Babanango Division and under the 

 Vryheid coal measures to Luneberg, on the Transvaal border. It is 

 probable that the gneiss is the oldest formation in the Colony, 

 although the fact is obscured owing to the gneiss being locally altered 

 into granite, which is in places extruded into the Swaziland schists. 



Gold, in quartz reefs in the gneiss, is now receiving attention 

 near Umzinto, and near Mpapala, in the Eshowe district. At 

 Dumisa, near, Umzinto, several thin rich quartz leads occurring in 

 a sheared belt of hornblendic gneiss are being mined, and near 

 Mpapala large reefs cased in granite are being opened up. In con- 

 nection with the Dumisa reefs it may be noted that the quartz contains 

 a large proportion of marcasite, some at least rich in gold. 



A few miles from Dumisa, a gold-bearing quartz reef, known 

 as the Happy Thought, formerly worked by the Natal Gold Mimng 

 Companv, is interesting in view of the theory as to the connection of 

 some gold reefs with granitic extrusions, as the reef contains felspar 

 and mica. Pockets of clay rich in gold have been found overlying 

 the gneiss in several places, having no possible apparent connection 

 with any quartz reef. At Signal Hill, near Eshowe, the gold found 

 in the surface soil is in the form of wire gold. 



S\vaziland Schists. — The Swaziland schists do not appear in 

 Natal proper, except close to the Zululand border, but in Zululand 

 and in the Northern Territory they are found flanking the gneiss. 



Gold is very widely distributed in the schists, as, for instance, 

 in the Tugela Valley, the Lower Insuzi Valley, and the Vungwini 

 Valley, and near Melmoth, Nondweni and Paulpietersburg. 



The schists are mostly fine grained and chloritic, but sometimes, 

 especially near the gneiss, they are courser and hornblendic. The 

 variety in character of the gold-bearing reefs in schist is so great 

 that it is impracticable to do more than refer to a very few examples. 

 Household's Reef, near the junction of the Buffalo and Tugela 



