SURVEY OF COLOEADO AND NEW MEXICO. 127 



small particles, must render the separation of the clust from the com- 

 panion rock as easy as that of the nuggets. But experience shows that, 

 regulate the supply of water as nicely as he may, the miner always 

 loses a comi^aratively large percentage of this finely divided gold hy its 

 floating off on the surface. This will be referred to again when the 

 effect of the sux)ply of water on the loss of gold from the tailings is 

 spoken of. 



Where the topography of the country has been snch as to cause an 

 elbow in the stream carrying the debris, or where, from any cause, an 

 eddy has been formed, and the diminished velocity of the water being 

 insufficient to keep the larger rocks in motion and the coarser particles 

 in suspension, there have been deposited at certain points little 

 islands, as it were, of irregular but generally more or less oval shape, 

 the gulch miner finds his richest harvest. The discovery of such depos- 

 its has often led to the erroneous belief tliat any part of the bed of the 

 creek will produce equal treasure if the water be but diverted from its 

 channel, and the construction of flumes or artificial channels in places 

 where circumstances were not favorable to a deposition of the precious 

 metals has, in several instances, involved the misguided projectors in 

 useless expenditure and great waste of time and labor. 



The creeks springing from that part of the range opposite and nearest 

 to this first settlement were the first to be prospected, and, in the main, 

 more than fulfilled the expectations which had been formed of them. 

 The statistics in regard to gulch mining are necessarily harder to obtain 

 than those of lode mining, for in the first place the operations are con- 

 ducted by one or two men at innumerable points in various creeks 

 and streams remote from the miners' settlements, and secondly the 

 independent conductors of this system of mining have a natural reluc- 

 tance to stating the true amount of their earnings, from the fear that 

 other parties may be led to their vicinity and thus reduce their gains. 



Statistics of that kind of placer mining which is carried on away from 

 the beds of the streams and upon the more or less decomposed outcrop 

 of a lode, by means of water flumed from some higher level of the creek, 

 are easier to get at and appear to be better known. I append a few facts 

 drawn from Mr. HoUister's book, page 6Q. 



Zeigler, Spain & Co. ran a slnice three weeks on the Gregory, and cleaned np three 

 thousand pennyweights, their highest day's work being .f495, and their lowest $21. 

 Sopris, Henderson & Co. took out $507 in four days. Spears & Co., two days, $853, all 

 taken from within three feet of tlie surface. John H. Gregory, five days, $942 ; Casto, 

 Kendall & Co., one day, |22.5; Defrees & Co., twelve days, one sluice, $2,080; Leper, 

 Gridley & Co., one day, three sluices, $1,009. 



At the present time there are perhaps twenty points on Clear Creek, 

 between Idaho and Golden City, where the wheels and sluices of the 

 gulch miners are standing, but scarcely more than one-half of them are 

 really in operation. A few such works are to be found in all the creeks 

 issuing from the range, but their share in the annual production of gold 

 in the Territory is but insignificant, and their value has diminished, as 

 is always the case AAith this kind of mining. While " no one has ever 

 yet seen the lower edge of a vein," a little labor will bring one to the bot- 

 tom of a placer mine, which is formed by the w^ash of a few fragments 

 carried from the out-crops of the veins by the rains. 



It has already been stated that the valuable ores are found in a broad 

 belt running along the range north and south. Gold, silver, copper, 

 lead, and zinc are found abundantly in the granitic and metamorphic 

 rocks, which form the true back-bone of the Cordilleras, and coal in the 

 outlying and more recent foot-hills. 



