74 8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Nevertheless, viewed as a whole, the Comstock was immense- 

 ly profitable. In twenty-one years from the summer of 1859, 

 according to Government reports, the mines levied in assess- 

 ments $62,000,000. The dividends paid during the same period 

 aggregated $118,000,000. Striking a cash balance, the Comstock 

 ledger shows an actual profit of $56,000,000. The total bullion 

 yield for the same period was $306,000,000. Subtracting divi- 

 dends and adding assessments, we find that the cost of purchasing, 

 maintaining, defending, and developing the great lode for twenty- 

 one years was $250,000,000. Three fourths of this sum came from 

 the mines themselves, the other fourth was gathered from direct 

 assessments. The prospectors and original locators had received 

 less than $100,000. The various owners paid less than a million 

 dollars out of their own pockets, as working capital, before as- 

 sessments and the stock-gambling period began. Since 1880 

 the yield of the Comstock has been decreasing, and many of 

 the mines have been shut down. The ledger account of the Com- 

 stock with the public remains practically unchanged. 



The most dramatic events in the story of the Comstock clus- 

 ter about a series of struggles for its control during the ebb and 

 flow of alternate borrasca and bonanza. Nothing was lacking to 

 make the period impressive. The financial leaders of the Pacific 

 coast were conquering Nevada, while another group of men were 

 winning victories that shortly led to the culminating treasure of 

 the lode, and while the indomitable Sutro was toiling in his great 

 tunnel. So vast and ruthless was the battle that its far-reaching 

 results still influence politics and social life of California and 

 Nevada ; men still divide upon issues which began in the depths 

 of the Comstock a quarter of a century ago. 



In 1864 the ore deposits were worked out, and rayless gloom 

 settled over the Comstock. The Bank of California, through its 

 resident agent, William Sharon, had been making advances on 

 mills and allowing the mine owners to overdraw their accounts. 

 The security in both cases was only undiscovered ore, and if the 

 lode were really exhausted the whole camp was ruined. Ralston, 

 the head of the bank, visited Virginia City in 1865, and agreed 

 with Sharon that the time had arrived to gain control of the dis- 

 trict. Loans, instead of being lessened, were increased, to what 

 extent is not known, but it was afterward said by Sharon that at 

 one time before 1870 $3,000,000 of the $5,000,000 capital of the 

 bank was on the Comstock. In June, 1867, the famous mill and 

 mining company was formed by W. C. Ralston, William Sharon, 

 Alvinza Hayward, D. O. Mills, Thomas Bell, Charles Bonner, 

 William E. Barron, and Thomas Sunderland. It was the strongest 

 possible combination of capitalists and mining men ; its business 

 was to manage the mills and mines that had now fallen into the 



