10 FOEEST LIFE IN ACADIE. 



pany established here has succeeded in obtaining large 

 profits, working the quartz veins by shafts sunk to a great 

 depth. Their crushing mill, when I visited it, contained 

 sixteen ponderous "stampers" moved by water power. 

 Every three or four weeks an ingot was forwarded by 

 them to Halifax, weighing four or five hundred ounces. 

 Some beautiful specimens of gold in quartz of the 

 purest white, from this locality, were exhibited by 

 the Commissioners at the last great International Exhi- 

 bition. 



Even at the present time it is impossible to form any 

 just estimation of the value of the Nova-Scotian gold- 

 fields. Scientific men have given it as their opinion that 

 the main seat of the treasure has not yet been touched, 

 and that the present workings are but surface pickings. 

 Then, again, we may refer to the immense extent of the 

 Lower Silurian rocks on the Atlantic coast. At one end 

 of the province, stretching back for some fifty miles, the 

 whole area of the formation has been stated to comprise 

 about 7000 square miles. The wide dispersion over this 

 tract of casual gold discoveries and of the centres of 

 actual operations naturally lea& to the belief that gold 

 mining is still in its infancy in Nova Scotia. 



The yield of gold from the quartz veins is exceedingly 

 variable : some will scarcely produce half an ounce, others 

 as much as eight ounces to the ton. I have seen a large 

 quartz pebble picked up on the road side between Hahfax 

 and the Waverley diggings, rather larger than a man^s 

 head, which was spangled and streaked with gold in every 

 direction, estimated in value at nearly one hundred 

 pounds. It is curious to reflect for how many years that 

 valuable stone had been unwittingly passed by by the 



