5^2 



NA TURE 



[October 28, iQi^g 



In the far west, both in Yukon and in British 

 Columbia, fjold was the first attraction. The history 

 of Yukon mining is summarised since the first report 

 of gold there by Whymper in iS6g. There is refer- 

 ence to the Klondyke boom in 1897-8, and the sub- 

 sequent decline of the field. Lode mining there is 

 still unimportant. Five dredges are at present 

 mining the alluvial deposits, but they cannot work 

 economically in frozen ground, which has to be 

 thawed by the play of steam upon it. 



In British Columbia gold mining began with the 

 Fraser river rush of 185S, followed by twenty years 

 of placer mining. .Since 18S7 lode mining has made 

 steady progress ; the gold is generally associated 

 with copper, silver, or silver lead, and these ores 

 have usually to be smelted. The most famous mining 

 centre is Rossland, which includes some large copper 

 deposits in which the unoxidised ore rises to the 

 surface, and, according to Mr. Brock's account, some 

 -of these ores have been deposited parallel to the 

 present land surface. The ores at Rossland occur in 

 fissure veins in sheared and shattered belts, and as 

 irregular impregnations of the country rock. The 

 veins, such as that at Le Roi, the chief Rossland 

 mine, are usually well defined. The ores are low- 

 grade and their concentration is difficult, as the chal- 

 copyrite which contains so much of the gold readily 

 flows away in water. 



. Of the mines worked primarih- for copper, the 

 gold being obtained as a by-product, the most im- 

 portant in British Columbia is the Britannia Mine 

 on Howe Sound, which consists of a mineralised belt 

 of country up to 600 feet wide and two miles in 

 length. Most of this rock contains only o'5 per cent, 

 •of copper, and the ore of commercial value, contain- 

 ing an average of i\ per cent, of copper, occurs in 

 large patches scattered through the mineralised belt. 

 The iron ores of British Columbia have hitherto 

 "been little used, but the Puget Sound Mine on 

 Texada Island, a contact deposit between granite 

 and limestone, and replacing both rocks along their 

 junction, has been smelted with bog iron ores in 

 San Francisco. The Glen Iron .Mine, situated on the 

 ■Canadian Pacific Railway, is worked to supply flux 

 to the British Columbian smelters. 



The most sensational story in recent Canadian min- 

 ing history is that of cobalt, which was discovered by 

 accident in 1903, and is famous for its narrow, rich 

 veins of silver. They are found traversing ancient | 

 quartzites and conglomerates that have been in- 

 truded by diabase. 



The Sudbun,- field is of great commercial, his- 

 torical, and theoretical interest; it gives Canada the 

 control of the world's nickel market, and has been 

 the subject of a long controversy as to the origin of 

 its ores. They are claimed by some authorities such as 

 Prof. Coleman to be due to direct segregation from 

 a molten rock, a norite gabbro ; whereas other 

 authors, relying on the microscopic structure and 

 sequence of the minerals, claim that the ores were 

 deposited long after the consolidation of the adjacent 

 igneous rocks. 



XO. 20S7, VOL. Si] 



The volume contains a short account of Dr. 

 Haanel's fruitful experiments at Sault Sainte Marie 

 on the electric smelting of iron, and its maps give 

 impressive evidence of the vast extent of the coal- 

 fields of western Canada, as well as of the wide- 

 spread and varied mineral wealth of the Dominion. 



A MONUMENT TO LATIMER CLARK. 

 Catalogue of the Wheeler Gift of Books, Pamphlets, 

 and Periodicals in the Library of the American In- 

 stitute of Electrical Engineers. Edited by \V. D. 

 Weaver. With Introduction, Descriptive and 

 Critical Notes by Dr. Potomian. Vol. i., pp. viii 

 + 504; vol. ii., pp. 475. (New York: American In- 

 stitute of Electrical Engineers, 1909.) 

 ALL who knew Mr. Latimer Clark will feel the 

 most lively satisfaction that his cherished and( 

 invaluable library of books ancient and modern re- 

 lating to electricity should have found the resting- 

 place and custodian which kind fate and .\merican 

 generosity have provided. The position is best ex- 

 pressed by the following three quotations from the 

 book under review : — 



" It was Mr. Clark's wish that this valuable col- 

 lection of his should eventually be transferred to the 

 United .States, inasmuch as London was already in 

 permanent possession of the Library of Sir Francis 

 Ronalds. Failing an American purchaser, it was to 

 go to japan, ' a rising country which would greatly 

 value such a unique collection.' Thus wrote Mr. 

 Clark to Mr. P. F'leury Mottclay, of New York, on 

 February 21, 1898, eight months before his death." 



" My object in securing the collection was to 

 present the books to our Institute and make it the 

 custodian of the most complete electrical librarv in 

 the world, as well as to stirrulate such interest that 

 the Institute may in time own a permanent home in 

 New York." 



" This work is due to the generosity of Mr. Andrew 

 Carnegie, who donated a fund to house, catalogue, 

 and complete the celebrated Latimer Clark collection 

 of books, pamphlets, and periodicals presented to the 

 library of the .^mcrican Institute of Electrical En- 

 gineers by Dr. .Schuyler Skaats \\'heeler." 



Given an unrivalled collection and a free hand, it 

 is not every librarian or every professor of physics 

 who could, in preparing what is called a catalogue, 

 have produced what is in reality also a delightful 

 book, which will afford the book-lover some of the 

 inspiration and charm which the librarv itself alone 

 can provide in full. The books are numbered 

 in chronological order, the earliest being Vincentius 

 (1 190-1264). The system is to give a copy of the 

 material on rhe title-page, with some account of the 

 nature of the contents of the book. \\'here this is 

 of exceptional importance, a facsiinile of the frontis- 

 piece, title-page, or of some page or pages from the 

 text, and of some illustrations is given also. On 

 turning over the pages, the reader not altogether 

 devoid of historical interest cannot fail to be attracted 

 by these glimpses of the work of long ago, and to 

 be driven to seek in the library itself the continuation 

 of accounts of investigations to which the end of a 

 page sets a disappointing limit. .Among the facsimiles 



