Reviews — Dr. Pages " Chips and Chajjters.'^ 363 



Merionethsliire, the most productive in Wales, yielded £20,000 worth, 

 of gold in 1862, when a rich pocket of disseminated gold was 

 struck. The total yield of the North Wales district up to April, 

 1866, has been 12,800 ounces. Mr. Blake concludes this chapter 

 with an interesting table giving the relative amounts of metal raised 

 in the chief gold-producing countries of the globe in the year 1867, 

 which shows that the United States contributed 43 per cent., Aus- 

 tralia 24, Eussia 11, New Zealand 4-6, Central America 4-0, Borneo 

 and East India 3 "8, China and Japan 3*8, and so forth. 



Entering on the history of silver mining, Mr. Blake provides us 

 with an interesting chapter on the workings in the State of Nevada. 

 Here we read of the Great Comstock Lode, which, though discovered 

 scarcely ten years since, had already at the end of 1867 contributed 

 80 millions of dollars in value to the bullion of the world, that is to 

 say, 28 millions in gold and 53 in silver. Lists of the several claims, 

 with the number of their hoisting and pumping engines and batteries, 

 detailed statements of the cost of the workings from year to year, 

 in fact, a host of statistics highly valuable to the mining engineer, 

 are tabulated. Such names as Segregated Belcher, Yankee Blade, 

 Fenian Star, and Gouge-eye, for mines, are suggestive of the mode 

 of life and manner of men in Nevada. Colorado will soon become 

 celebrated, as well for silver as for gold, large veins, not only of 

 argentiferous galena, but of true silver ores such as sulphides, anti- 

 monides, and of rich chloride having been struck. The chapter on 

 the silver regions of Mexico, Central and South America, contains 

 little new matter. Of the European mines those of Norway seem to 

 have been the best represented at Paris ; among the specimens from 

 Kongsberg being a cube of silver three quarters of an inch in 

 diameter, with small and perfect octahedral planes. 



The remainder of Mr. Blake's report is devoted to a detailed con- 

 sideration of the aggregate production, consumption, and movement 

 of the precious metals, and of the unification of gold and silver 

 coinage, subjects which address themselves more especially to the 

 student of political economy. 



IL — Chips and Chapters ; a Book for Amateur and Young 

 Geologists. By D. Page, LL.D., etc. 8vo. pp. 303. Edin- 

 burgh : W. Blackwood and Sons. 1869. 



DE. PAGE has selected from his unpublished addresses and papers, 

 two dozen, which form a readable and entertaining volume 

 deserving to be consulted by the practical geologist as well as by 

 those to whom the author in his title page specially addresses it. 

 The essays are on very different subjects, and of different merits. 

 In accordance with the spirit and object of our journal we neces- 

 sarily give the first place to those recording observations and dis- 

 coveries made in the field, or giving the history of any portion of 

 our science. The paper on Dura Den may illustrate both of these 

 classes. Without the wonderful word-paintings of Hugh Miller, 



