THE TECHNOLOGIST. [Slit. 1, 1865 
68 NATURAL CAPABILITIES OF 
diggings. Even flour lias for years past cost on an average 4s. a pound. 
Twenty shillings have been given for a pound of common nails, and 
half as much again for a mess of fresh vegetables. This high tariff of 
provisions and material created a correspondingly high scale of pay for 
labour. The ordinary navvy received from 30s. to 40s. for his day's 
work, while the mechanic might earn from two to three guineas ; and, 
in the experience of the writer, a hair-cutter at Lightening Creek 
charged at the rate of about 7d a minute for his services. 
While exacting heavy tribute from the richest and most successful 
diggers, these enormous prices, together with the limited and frequently 
overstocked condition of the labour-market, fell upon the needy and un- 
successful with an effect that was absolutely ruinous. Men of slender 
means, and others who had quickly sacrificed their capital in fruitless 
mining-operations, unable to get employment, or to support themselves 
in a country, where it cost from 15s. to 20s. a day to procure the bare 
necessaries of life — hurried away almost as soon as they came, without 
pausing any longer to " prospect " in so expensive a locality. In this 
manner anything like a deliberate examination of the country has been 
completely prevented. Moreover, by reason of the extravagant cost of 
every commodity, continuous mining operations have hitherto- been 
practically limited to the very richest spots in the district ; and, even 
then, to the most productive strata of auriferous gravel. In localities 
where hired labour cost 40s. a day, it became obvious that it would 
never pay to work diggings which would not yield at least that amount 
to the individual labourer, over and abjve all contingent expenses. On 
this account, the operations of working claims have been confined to the 
gravel lying immediately upon the bed-rocks, where the richest deposits 
are found ; and the upper strata, containing amounts of gold, which, but 
for the enormous price of labour, would have well repaid the cost of 
working them, have been left altogether untouched. In like manner, 
surface diggings — capable under more favourable circumstances of sup- 
porting a large mining population — remain as yet undisturbed. 
It is no wonder, then, if in the face of all these impediments the 
actual profits of Cariboo mining have, in the majority of instances, been 
far from considerable. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt, upon a 
consideration of the history of the region up to the present time, that it 
teems with productive gold-mines, practically boundless in extent, and 
promising lucrative employment to thousands so soon as an improved 
system of communication and commerce shall admit of ther fuller de- 
velopment, and of the introduction of the many economical appliances 
of civilisation. 
Cariboo, however, is by no means the only auriferous district in 
British Columbia. The bars of Fraser River, throughout the greater 
part of its course, are not nearly stripped, as yet, of their accumulations 
of " fine " gold. Moreover, the accuracy of a theory long ago advanced 
by the present distinguished President of the Royal Geographical Society, 
