Am,  Jour.  Pharm. 
Feb.,  1887. 
The  History  of  Californian  Borax. 
83 
lake  yet  discovered  in  the  world.  I  was  met  by  John  and  Dennis 
Searle,  two  men  belonging  to  the  California  discovery  army  that 
sprang  into  existence  in  the  year  of  1849,  and  whose  members  are 
known  by  the  name  of  "Forty  Niner's."  These  men,  masters  of 
almost  every  kind  of  handicraft,  had  made  their  way  to  this  great 
lake  with  a  view  of  exploration.  Consequently,  though  I  can  claim 
to  be  the  first  Englishman  who  visited  the  borax  lake,  the  honor  of 
discovery  does  not  rest  with  me.  I  stayed  some  time  in  the  hut  of 
these  men,  and  together  we  examined  the  ground.  I  very  soon  dis- 
covered natural  borax  of  the  finest  quality  in  a  pure  state,  and  though 
Messrs.  John  and  Dennis  Searle  had  begun  prior  to  my  arrival  to 
develop  the  ground,  the  first  shipment  was  made  by  me  to  England 
The  borax  I  found  was  crystallized  borax,  in  the  same  form  as  the 
regular  borax  of  commerce,  and  is  the  only  known  deposit  of  natural 
borax  yet  discovered  in  the  world.  In  the  centre  of  the  lake  is  a  bed 
of  salt  about  five  miles  long ;  on  the  outside  of  this  salt  is  a  deposit 
of  carbonate  of  soda,  and  some  thousands  of  acres  of  land  covered 
with  crude  borax,  from  three  inches  to  two  feet  thick.  The  crude 
borax  is  collected  and  put  into  cowhide  baskets,  carried  to  a  large 
boiling-pan,  and  boiled  for  36  hours ;  the  solution  is  then  run  into 
vats  and  the  crystals  form  on  the  sides  of  the  vats.  After  drying  it 
is  put  into  bags,  about  70  lbs.  in  each  bag,  and  sent  to  San  Francisco, 
a  distance  of  about  420  miles,  and  conveyed  at  that  time  by  mule 
teams.  Before  leaving  California  I  arranged  to  buy  1280  acres  of 
this  borax  land;  I  returned  to  England  as  quickly  as  possible,  made 
arrangements  to  go  out  again,  formed  a  small  company  who  put  up 
works,  and  I  anticipated  making  about  a  million  by  it,  and  before 
long  we  began  to  ship  large  supplies  of  borax  to  Liverpool,  London, 
and  New  York.  The  price,  however,  suddenly  came  down  to  £26 
per  ton,  the  lowest  price  it  had  ever  been  sold  for,  while  the  carriage 
alone  from  the  lake  to  San  Francisco  at  this  time  was  about  £16  per 
ton  of  2000  lbs.  This  was  a  paralzying  condition  of  affairs  that  quite 
stunned  me.  I  had  made  a  very  large  contract  for  some  hundreds  of 
tons  to  a  large  firm  in  England,  but  before  the  arrival  of  the  ship 
with  the  first  parcel  the  firm  failed,  and  I  found  myself,  to  my  horrGr, 
with  some  hundreds  of  tons  of  borax  left  on  my  hands  that  I  could 
not  get  rid  of,  the  bankers  and  financial  houses  holding  the  docu- 
ments all  pressing  for  sales  to  be  made  !  My  golden  dream  of  mak- 
ing a  million  faded  away,  and  left  me  meditating  the  bitter  realities 
