272 KEMP'S ORE DEPOSITS. 



<lonia, in the South Pacific. The ores are garnierite and other 

 hydrated silicates of nickel and magnesium in serpentine. In 1890 

 they furnished 885,300 Ibs. Norway conies next, and in 1889 pro- 

 duced 149,872 Ibs. Sweden in the same year afforded 17,632 Ibs. 

 These latter are from sulphide ores. 1 



PLATINUM. 



2.15.12. Some hundreds of ounces of platinum are annually 

 gathered from placer washings in northern California, and two or 

 three times as much more from British Columbia. Much iridium 

 and osmium are associated with it. In October, 1889, F. L. Sperry, 

 the chemist of the Canadian Copper Company, of Sudbury, dis- 

 covered a heavy crystalline powder in the concentrates of a small 

 gold-quartz mine in the district of Algoma. He detected the 

 presence of platinum, and sent the material to Professors Wells 

 and Penfield of Yale, by whom it was analyzed, and crystallo- 

 graphically determined to be the arsenide of platinum, PtAs 2 , the 

 first compound of platinum, other than an alloy, detected in 

 nature. It has been appropriately named sperrylite by Wells, and 

 although not at present a source of platinum, it may merit atten- 

 tion, as the price of the metal has recently approximated that of 

 gold. The chief reliance of the world for platinum is Russia, 

 whose deposits are in the Urals. More or less comes also from 

 Colombia, South America, and from placer washings elsewhere. 

 Serpentine is very generally its mother-rock. 2 



gon," Jahrbuch d. k. k. geol. Reichsanstalt, Vienna, XLIL, 223, 1892. 

 Rec. A. D. Hodges, "Notes on the Occurrence of Nickel and Cobalt in 

 Nevada," M. E., X. 657. W. R. Ingalls, General paper, Engineering and 

 Mining Journal, Jan. 2, 1892, p. 40. Rec. Mineral Resources, 1887, p. 

 126. S. B. Newberry, "Nickel Ores from Nevada," Amer. Jour. Sci., iii., 

 II. 122. H. Wurtz, "On the Occurrence of Cobalt and Nickel in Oaston 

 County, North Carolina," Amer. Jour. Sci., ii., XXVII. 34. 



1 J. Heard, Jr., "Caledonia Nickel and Cobalt," Engineering and 

 Mining Journal, Aug. 11, 1888, p. 103. J. H. L. Vogt, "On Nickel Pro- 

 duction and Occurrence." Good paper in Swedish : Geologiska Forenin- 

 gens, i. Stockholm, Band, XIV., p. 433. 



2 California : Engineering and Mining Journal, June 29, 1889, 587. 

 B. Silliman, "Cherokee Gold Washings, California," Amer. Jour. Sci., 

 iii., VI. 132. Canada: F. W. Clarke and Ch. Catlett, " Platiniferous 

 Nickel Ore from Canada," Amer. Jour. Sci., iii., XXXVII. 372. H. L. 

 Wells and S. L. Penfield, "Sperrylite, a New Mineral," Amer. Jour. Sci., 

 iii., XXXVII. 67. Russia: A. Daubree, "On the Platiniferous Rocks of 

 the Urals," Trans. French Acad. Sci., March, 1875 ; Amer. Jour. Sci., iii., 

 IX. 470. General paper by C. Bullraan, The Mineral Industry for 1892, 



>. 373. Rec. 



