GOLD. 



157 



The following table gives the mniiber of miners employed in these regions during tlio 

 same period. 



In 1889 the workings of both systems of the Olekminsk region employed 2,340 horses 

 and 2,100 reindeer. The native Tungiiz and Yakuts transport the building timber and pit 

 props reguired at the mines, by reindeer. Passing now to a review of the gold deposits in the 

 vast river province of the Amour, it should be mentioned that the Nerchinsk mining region 

 is in the uppermost courses of this system, along the tributaries of the Shilka and Argouna. 

 The gold deposits of the Nerchinsk region are subdivided into four administrative regions: the 

 Chitinsk, Akshinsk, Nerchinsk and the Nerchinsk metallurgical regions, situated between 128 

 and 137" east longitude and 49 and 53° north latitude. Yeinons gold was discovered in the 

 Nerchinsk region so far back as 1777, but owing to the poorness of the ore it was not worked. 

 In 1838 promising alluvial deposits were discovered in the valley of the river Kara, the 

 left hand tributary of the Shilka. These workings which are exploited to the present tlay, 

 long remained the only ones of any consideration in the district. In 1853 the Shakhtalinsk 

 deposit was opened out, and in 1865 the deposits along the rivulet Chernaya Ougruma were 

 discovered; the latter remain the richest to the present time. Since 1865 when the Nerchinsk 

 region was opened to private enterprise, the production of gold has grudually increased. At 

 present, gold is extracted in the eastern portion of the Transbaikal province, in the 

 Akshinsk region along the systems of the rivers Onon, Ingoda and Nercha, and in the Ner- 

 chinsk region along the systems of the rivers Ougruma, Gazimoura, Ounda, Nercha and Shilka. 

 Yeinons gold is also worked in the Chitinsk and Akshinsk regions. The alluvial deposits of 

 the Amour and Littoral provinces are situated in the basins of the left tributaries 

 of the Amour, within an area lying approximately between 52 and 56° north latitude and 

 120 to 138" east longitude from Paris. 



From their geographical position the gold deposits of the Amour may be divided into 

 several groups, lying in the following order from west to east. The gold bearing district 

 of the first group is situated on the watershed between the Amour and Zea, in the 

 neighbourhood of Albazine at a distance of 100 versts from the Amour. The deposits of this 

 group were the first discovered in the Amour province, in 1866, by the well known raining 

 engineer Annsov, who during 12 years endured every privation in an untiring exploration 



