102 The American Geologist. Ausust,i896 
the essentially genetic relationship of the niinoral combina- 
tion, gold, quartz and pyrite. 
Since it is only in rare instances that we lind gold enclosed 
in ('riii)tivo rocks,* and even then serious doubts are enter- 
tained as to its being an original constituent, we must exam- 
ine into the natural solutions from which the metal may 
crystallize or be precipitated. 
One solvent which universally contains gold is sea water. 
The gold content, which Sonnstadt detecteel by various means 
is, however, only found (lualitatively and in such niinute 
quantity that solution in sea water cannot serve as a general 
explanation of the deposition of gold. We should also, in the 
light of the theory, expect to find gold as an original constit- 
uent of marine sediments, contrary to the actual facts. Nev- 
ertheless, it is quite conclusively demonstrated that gold may 
be separated from solutions in which it apparently occurs as 
a chlorid. 
K. Johansson demonstrated in a paper "Om Ryssland malm- 
tyllgangar och dess Berghantering," that the gold of the 
Uralitic veins at Beresowsk may be secondarily crystallized 
out of solution. He writes: "With quartz we find pyrite„ 
which by oxidation becomes limonite; and as subordinate 
minerals we have copper sulphid, galenite, cerussite. pyromor- 
phite, etc. The gold seems to be principally contained in the 
pyrite and limonite and amounts to as much as 200g per ton. 
The gold content becomes less as depth increases, a circum- 
stance which indicates that it may be of secondary origin. 
The presence of chlorine-bearing pyromorphite among the 
gang minerals is also an evidence of secondary deposition. It 
is supposed that the gold was introduced into the vein in the 
form of chlorid, a supposition that is warranted by the high 
ijontent of pyrite, since this mineral precipitates metallic gold 
from its chlorine solution, as may be readily shown by exper- 
iment. 
In his experiments Johansson used a funnel whose stem was 
filled with quartz fragments whicii wei'e covered over with 
*The only instance of the kind with which I am familiar is described 
by Moricke. But he also mentions the association of the gold with py- 
rite and thinks that the former was originally native in liparite and 
later became attached to the pvrite. Zeit. f. praArf. GeoL, 1893, pp. 
143, 144. 
