162 



THE AURIFEROUS GRAVELS OF THE SIERRA NEVADA 



for opening them on an extensive scale. The same may be said of the 

 Cedar Creek Claim, near Dutch Flat, which according to Mr. Skidmore has 

 been opened by a bed-rock tunnel 3,000 feet long, and eight by eight feet in 

 dimensions, the property having been sold to an English company * 



Before passing on to a description of the You Bet and Red Dog gravel 



deposits next adjacent on the northwest to those just described, a few small 

 claims south of the line of the Central Pacific Railroad and at a considerably 

 higher elevation than those at Dutch Flat, may be described. 



About half a mile south of Blue Canon Station there is a cut of about 

 twenty-five feet in depth ; this is in a mass of gravel made up of rounded 

 pebbles and rocks of different sizes, up to a foot in diameter. These pebbles 

 were almost without exception of volcanic origin; and at first sight it seemed 

 as if they must have been transported from a considerable distance ; but a 

 second look showed that all of them, almost without exception, were weath- 

 ering from the outside and scaling off in such a way as to gradually assume 

 a more and more perfectly spherical form. Directly opposite Blue Canon 

 Station is also some of this cemented gravel, but with more angular pebbles. 

 It is said that "the color" can be obtained from the cuts south of the Station 



(elevation a little over 5,000 feet). 



The mining settlement of Lost Camp gives its name to Lost Camp Spur, 

 which is about a mile from Blue Canon Station in a nearly southerly course. 

 In this vicinity is the so-called Slumgullion Claim, at an elevation of 4,386 

 feet, and having its outlet into Texas Canon. The area of ground which had 

 been washed here in 1870 was of an irregular shape, about 500 feet long by 

 250 wide. The bed-rock is slate, with a dip of from 80° to 85° to the north- 

 east. Overlying the bed-rock is a coarse quartz gravel, none of the boulders 

 being much rounded; the thickness of the deposit is about sixteen feet. 

 Above the gravel is a stratum of pipe-clay, about fourteen feet thick, and con- 

 taining a few lenticular masses of gravel ; the altitude of the bed-rock here 



is 4,386 feet. 



Three eighths of a mile nearly due west of the Slumgullion is the Boston 

 Claim. The bed-rock in these two claims is of the same character, but its 

 surface is about 175 feet lower in the Boston than in the other. The height 

 of the bank varies from twenty to sixty feet, and there is an almost entire 



* The boulders too large to pass through the sluices are now got rid of, without the necessity of drilling 

 holes in them, by exploding giant powder on their surfaces, which breaks them up sufficiently, at slight 

 expense. The masses of pipe-clay, formerly a great annoyance in hydraulic mining, are now bored into by 

 an auger, and torn to pieces by the aid of a cartridge of giant powder. 





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