SALT INDUSTRY. 233 



Buffalo Salt Works are situated, is one vast stretch of yellowish mud, with- 

 out vegetation, impassable except during the dry season, and locally known 

 as the "mud lakes." The salt obtained from the wells of the salt works 

 and the sulphate of soda, and other minerals found on the surface near at 

 hand, are all derived from the salts impregnating the Lahontan Lake beds. 

 The brine from the wells has been analyzed by Mr. F. W. Taylor, of 

 the National Museum, with the following result: 



Specific gravity, 1. 1330. 



Silica in solution trace 



Calcium sulphate 0. 1467 



Magnesium sulphate . 8833 



Potassium sulphate . 3111 



Sodium sulphate ..5306 



Sodium chloride 14.8383 



Water 83.2900 



100. 0000 



eagIjE salt works. 



Another locality fovorable for the study of the desiccation products of 

 Lake Lahontan is at the Eagle Salt Works, situated near the Central Pacific 

 Railroad, about 1 8 miles east of Wadsworth. The long valley in which 

 they lie was a strait during the higher stage of Lake Lahontan. When the 

 water fell about 1( feet the region where the salt is now found became a 

 bay, connected with the Carson division of the lake through the Ragtown 

 Pass. The country about the works is a desert mud plain, much of which 

 is covered during the summer by a white saline efflorescence. The method 

 here employed for obtaining the salt is to dissolve the crust that is formed 

 on the surface of the desert and allow the saturated water to gather in shal- 

 low vats and evaporate. The water from springs on the eastern edge of the 

 plain is conducted over the surface of the lake-beds, and made to flood 

 small areas inclosed by low dams or ridges of clay. From the flooded areas 

 it soaks through the clay ridges and enters shallow vats dug in the lake- 

 beds on either side, where it evaporates and deposits its salts. The areas 

 inclosed by clay ridges and flooded by the fresh water are called "reservoirs" 

 by the woikmen, and the long troughs between them, where the brine evap- 



