Wisconsin and Missouri Lead Region. Al 
fire bricks for linings for the furnaces. It is.an alluvial bed six 
feet thick, at Winslow on the aha where it itatceod 
State line. 
- Account of. the lead diainess of Wisconsin. —The lead ore is 
sought for by the miners at their own: risk. Wherever they 
think there is a prospect of discovering a “lead,” there they com- 
mence their operations; two of them j joining to sink experimental 
_ Shafts: Sometimes they spend a year in unsuccessful exploring, 
but with the expectation of being repaid for it all by a happy 
discovery. If they strike a “ lead” ‘they offer the ore to the 
nearest smelters at the market price, and the owner of the lead 
comes in for his share of one fifth of the ore raised, but the origi- 
nal discoverers are allowed by the custom of the country the 
other four fifths. Should the discovery promise to be an impor- 
tant one, other miners are attracted to it from the country around. 
They come in companies proportioned to the reputation the new 
diggings have acquired, and in a month’s time a little village of 
log cabins with a population of three or four hundred people has 
sprung up in the, midst of what was just before wild woods or 
an uninhabited. prairie. The new comers not having been in- 
strumental.in making the discovery, have an inferior claim to 
their predecessors, who. are not permitted by “ the rules of the 
mines” to monopolize more than a certain number of square rods 
around their successful shafts. As each one comes, he selects 
his own ground, and so many rods are staked out for his opera- 
tions, but of the ore he-raises, four fifths go to the proprietors.of 
the land, and he is allowed but one fifth. . The proprietor may 
persuade miners ‘to come and work: in this way;or he may hire 
them on fixed wages, but preferable 
plan, because the: miner is induced by it:to raise as much ore. as 
possible, and in the latter it is no object.to him to take out any 
at all, and it is therefore frequently the case that when working © 
on wages they will carefully conceal a rich lead, and work in 
unprofitable rock until the proprietor abandons the diggings, and 
years perhaps have passed, when they will come back and make 
a new discovery there, and work it on shares. The min 
sometimes sell their “prospect,” while it generally comes into 
the hands of the proprietors, who then receive their greatest share 
of four fifths, Pee NOS who are entitled to } 
Alla 
ESO e 
