PiUlT 4 .] 
Foote: Auriferous Rucks of the Damlal Hills. 
137 
and elsewhere; but none was met with here. All the reefs observed lie above the surface 
of the surrounding country, and have hence been far more exposed to weathering influences, 
which might account partially for the absence of sulphides in the reefs, but which will not 
account for the absence of the characteristic cavities they should have left behind. 
Prom the great paucity of sulphides a proportionate paucity of gold is to be reasonably 
inferred in the reefs of the Kappatgodc area. I must have broken off several hundred pieces 
of quartz while prospecting, but not one contained any visible gold; while that found loose 
at the PIuttee-Kuttee reef contains but a very small quantity—a mere speck. A number 
of carefully selected samples was brought away from the most promising looking reefs, to 
ascertain whether they contain gold in so finely divided a state as to bo invisible to the naked 
eye, which is frequently the case in Australian and Californian reefs. These were assayed at 
the Calcutta Mint through the kindness of Colonel Hyde, and in the Survey laboratory by 
Mr. Tween, but noue of them yielded any gold. 
Even if the reefs were moderately auriferous, the pioneers in mining operations would 
have many serious difficulties to contend against; the distance from the coast, and at present 
from any railway, would make the setting up of machinery very expensive. No timber or 
fuel of any kind is obtainable except at very great distances, and water would be very scarce 
except through the rainy season. 
Alluvial Gold. 
The washing for gold in the sands borne by the various streams flowing through the 
„ T , auriferous tract is carried out by a class of men called 
Jalgars, and they are now very few iu number compared to 
what is reported about them in former years. I could only hear of three, two of whom 
were at Soortoor, and the third lived at Seerhuttee, in the Sangli Jaghir. I obtained 
the services of the two former, and made them wash for me in the Dhoni, Soortoor, 
Jilgerree, and other nullahs on the west flank of the Kappatgodc. Of these nullahs, 
the Soortoor nullah was by them stated to bo the richest, and this statement was fully 
borne out by the results obtained when washing there in my presence. Next in pro¬ 
ductiveness came the Dhoni stream, but the yield was greatly smaller, and hardly enough 
to remunerate them for their labour. In the Jilgerree nullah they got a yet smaller 
return; and in the other nullahs, including that at foot of the Kappat Iswara ravine, only 
a very few exceedingly minute spangles were obtained, just sufficient to show that gold was 
not entirely absent from the detrital matter. 
The plan pursued by the J algars when I lot them follow their own devices, was to take 
Process of selecting wash-dirt. “ P the loWOT part ° f the latest fl °° d dep0sit fr0m tLe rocky 
or clayey bottom of the nullahs, not from the deepest part 
of the bed, but from the point at which a strong length of current slacked off, owing to a 
change in the direction of the stream. Another favorite sort of place from which to collect 
‘wash-dirt,’ was the small alluvial terrace between the water at low flood level and the present 
high flood level. From this they collected the rain-washed surface, and in the case of the 
washings in the Soortoor and Jilgerree nullah, obtained much bettor results than from washing 
the material obtained in favorable positions from pockets in the beds of either nullah. In 
another washing in the Soortoor nullah, the wash-dirt selected was the kuukur crust depo¬ 
sited on the decomposing surface of a band of chloritic schist. This was altogether the 
richest washing made in my presence. Unfortunately the proceeds of this washing were, by 
inadvertence, mixed up with those of another, going on at the same time a little further down 
the nullah. Tho united results Were said by the Jalgars to be a very good day’s work. The 
second washing was made from a stuff collected at the base of the old alluvium bank, which 
