Wisconsin and Missouri Lead Region. 41 



fire bricks for linings for the furnaces. It is an alluvial bed six 

 feet thick, at Winslow on the Peccatolica, where it crosses the 

 state line. 



Account of the lead biisiyiess of JViscoiisin.—The lead ore is 

 sought for by the miners at their own risk. Wherever they 

 think there is a prospect of discovering a "lead," there they com- 

 mence their operations ; two of them joining to sink experimental 

 shafts. Sometimes they spend a year in unsuccessful exploring, 

 but with the expectation of being repaid for it all by a happy 

 discovery. If they strike a " lead" they offer the ore to the 

 nearest smelters at the market price, and the owner of the land 

 comes in for his share of one fifth of the ore raised, but the origi- 

 nal discoverers are allowed by the custom of the country the 

 other four fifths. Should the discovery promise to be an impor- 

 tant one, other miners are attracted to it from the country around. 

 They come in companies proportioned to the reputation the new 

 diggings have acquired, and in a month's time a little village of 

 log cabins with a population of three or four hundred people has 

 sprung up in the midst of what was just before wild woods or 

 an uninhabited prairie. The new comers not having been in- 

 strumental in making the discovery, have an inferior claim to 

 their predecessors, who are not permitted by " the rules of the 

 mines" to monopolize more than a certain number of square rods 

 around their successful shafts. As each one comes, he selects 

 his own ground, and so many rods are staked out for his opera- 

 tions, but of the ore he raises, four fifths go to the p-f-oprietors of 

 the land, and he is allowed but one fifth. The proprietor may 

 persuade miners to come and work in this way, or he may hire 

 them on fixed v/ages, but the former is considered the preferable 

 plan, because the miner is induced by it to raise as much ore as 

 possible, and in the latter it is no object to him to take out any 

 at all, and it is therefore frequently the case that when working 

 on wages they will carefully conceal a rich lead, and work in 

 unprofitable rock until the proprietor abandons the diggings, and 

 years perhaps have passed, when they will come back and make 

 a new discovery there, and work it on shares. The miners 

 sometimes sell their " prospect," while it generally comes into 

 the hands of the proprietors, who then receive their greatest share 

 of four fifths, or it is bought by other miners, who are entitled to 

 the same privileges as the original workmen. All mineral raised 



Vol. XLiii, No. 1.— April-June, 1842. 6 



