purington] PROSPECTING. 41 
COST OF PROSPECTING IN DIFFERENT LOCALITIES. 
In the Juneau district prospect shafts must be square set, and cost 
on an average $6 a foot, and in heavy landslide $20 a foot. In the Por- 
cupine district the cost of a cut 25 by 12 feet and 40 feet deep is $50 per 
foot, and that of an 8- by 8-foot shaft is $20 per foot. In the Sunrise 
and Chisna districts ground is prospected by open cuts. A cut 50 feet 
in length is reported to cost $2,000. 
At Atlin ground is prospected mostly by drifting. On McKee Creek 
tunnels, timbered and lagged, cost $3.50 per foot. On Spruce Creek 
the cost of posts and caps, 10 inches thick and 6 feet long, is 50 cents 
each; lagging, 10 cents each. On Gold Run thirty 6-inch holes are said 
to have been drilled to a depth of 32 feet by a churn drill (cost, $3,500, 
laid down),. at the rate of $1 a foot. 
In the Klondike drifts to prospect the bench gravels cost $7 to $8 
a foot, timbered, and shafts from $5 to $10 a foot. In timbering, three 
sets of posts, sill, cap, and lagging are put in for $6, and as one-half 
cord of wood is used to a set the whole cost is $7 per set. In frozen 
creek ground two men, working three shifts, sunk a pit 5 feet square, 
28 feet deep, using about 2-horsepower steam during thirty hours. 
On Fortymile Creek, thawing ten hours, two men take out on an 
average 4 feet a day, the shaft being 5 feet by Si feet in dimensions. 
On American Creek prospecting is very difficult, as running water is 
always encountered at bed rock, even in the coldest weather. 
In the Fortymile district shafts averaging 3i by 6 feet, untimbered, 
ost from $3 to $5 per foot. Seven shafts! by 8 feet and 23 feet deep 
iost $2,000. A shaft 7 by 3£ feet and 20 feet deep cost $5 per foot, 
;he thawing being effected by means of wood fires and steam. 
In the Birch Creek district shafts thawed down by wood fires to a 
iepth not exceeding 20 feet cost $5 per foot. On Mastodon Creek, in 
his district, 11 pits 3 by 6 feet and 20 feet deep cost $650. Twenty 
pits 3 by 6 by 13 feet cost $7 per foot. The differences in cost here 
ire due to the varying amount of permanent frost in the ground, pros- 
acting always being cheapest in solidly frozen ground. On Mammoth 
reek 100 pits 10 feet deep cost $5 per foot. Wood fires were used, 
I feet being sunk each day. No timbering was required, and labor 
pas paid $10 a day. 
In the Fairbanks district the prospect shafts cost from $7 to $10 per 
loot. Timbering is generally necessary, but very light poles are used 
||ther as lagging or cribbing. The best S3^stem is to put in 6-foot .sets 
f 3-inch poles, and outside of these to lag with 2-inch poles vertically, 
lling in solidly between the poles and the muck or gravel with moss. 
hafts cribbed with poles horizontally are more likely to get out of 
umb. Four shafts sunk on lower Fairbanks Creek cost $5 per foot, 
Hid were 32, 44, 53, and 54 feet deep. On Cleary Creek a shaft 4 by 
I I feet and 75 feet deep (hillside claim), cribbed with 3-inch poles, cost 
