Gold in British Guiana. 281 
found to be depositing a siliceous veinstone contain- 
ing sulphides of iron, copper, oxide of manganese and 
metallic gold at the present day. At the celebrated 
Mount Morgan mine in Queensland, the auriferous deposit 
has probably been the result of a geyser, the gold being 
contained in a siliceous sinter. In some parts the matrix 
is aluminous, in others ironstone predominates. 
In this colony also we find mountains of iron-ore, one of 
the best known of which is composed of material similar to 
the auriferous ore of. Mount Morgan — quartz and limo- 
nite. Whether it contains gold enough to render its 
extraction profitable can only be determined by a proper 
assay, but gold undoubtedly exists, a placer having even 
been worked for some time in the alluvium at the base 
of the mountain. As interesting examples of what is 
believed to have been the deposition of gold from aqueous 
solution on the most extensive scale, may be cited the 
Witwatersrand gold-fields of the Transvaal, which in 
recent years have yielded such extraordinary quantities 
of gold. Some specimens which I have seen of the auri- 
ferous Banket or "almond rock," as the conglomerate 
in which the gold occurs is called, did not strike me as 
differing in appearance from many of the conglomerates 
of British Guiana which extend in an unbroken series 
across the whole breadth of the colony. I have tested 
these for gold on the Upper Massaruni, Potaro, Esse- 
quebo, Demerara and Berbice rivers, and never failed to 
find them more or less auriferous wherever examined. 
While considering the development and prospects of our 
gold industry, it may not be out of place to touch briefly 
upon the possibilities of other mineral industries, indi- 
cations of which are by no means few nor far between. 
