206 Kansas Academy of Science. 



deposits of Cape Nome, of the Rand and of innumerable placers 

 are the results of these actions of the waters in their grinding, car- 

 rying and sifting capacity. 



As already intimated, the gold found in quartz fissure veins may 

 have been deposited with the silica from the water. 



We may inquire, then, whether the seas, which cover a large part 

 of the earth's surface, still carry gold in solution. 



On authority of the English chemist, Liversidge, a ton of sea- 

 water contains on an average one grain of gold. If this be true, 

 we can calculate the amount of gold in the waters of the sea. 

 Chamberlain and Salisbury, in their recent text-book on geology, 

 estimate the quantity of sea-water at 1300 quadrillion tons. This, 

 then, is the number of grains of gold spread abroad in the sea. 

 The number of grains in a cubic foot of gold is, approximately, 

 8,312,500. The total number of grains, divided by this, gives 

 15,639,218,045, the number of cubic feet of gold dissolved in the 

 waters of the sea. This more than equals a cube of gold 2500 feet 

 on each edge. 



This universal distribution of gold in water is accompanied by 

 its almost equally general occurrence in mineral deposits, and per- 

 haps accounts for the latter fact. In studying the physical aspects 

 of the earth, we are apt to look upon it as a completed structure, 

 and we think of the great changes revealed to us in geology as 

 having no counterpart in the present time. A moment's reflection 

 will convince us that earth changes are yet going on by which the 

 structure may be altered as much as it has been in past eons. 



As to the possibility of gold veins and placers being even now 

 in the process of formation, we have some evidence to support such 

 a hypothesis. In the University of California Bulletin, vol. 4, No. 

 10, John A. Reid discusses the origin and genesis of the Comstock 

 lode. He treats of the geological formation and develojDment of 

 the Comstock lode mines, and comes to certain conclusions as to the 

 part water has played in the " bonanzas" of these rich veins. The 

 primitive vein of gold-bearing mineral has had the gold leached 

 out of it, as it were, to be redeposited in secondary veins, which be- 

 come thereby extremely rich in gold, and this investigator thinks 

 the process may be still going on in the deeper levels of the mine. 

 He finds by analysis of the vadose water of the mine a percentage 

 of gold greater than sea-water contains, and the deposit of the 

 metal in newly opened fissures is easily seen possible. 



What is going on in the Comstock mine may have its counter- 

 part in other veins, known or undiscovered, and suggests the 



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