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Show INTER-MOUNTAI- MINING REVIEW. N and the adsilver coinage vocates believe that falling values have locked up all the money. But, regardless of the cause, there must be an end to present conditions, and the Presidential election is likely to be the vir roted to the Minins and Smelting Interests of West. the beginning of the end. The. country will not submit to an indefinite suspension Room H C. T. by ARTE, Weekly published of all business, and just as soon as the 223 Atlas Block. financial policy of the next four years is determined, capital will be unlocked, TERMS: business will revive and the lead in(Payable in Advance.) 82.00 Year On. 1.00 dustry will recover from Its present yix Months 50 paralysis. This revival can only be de..... Three Months To foreign countries except Mexico and Canada, layed by one possible contingency, and 83 per year, postage prepaid. that Is a determination on the part of I Intered at the Salt Lake City Postoffice as the money power, in the event of the ammil-clas- s matter. election of a silver Congress and President, to bring about such a financial San Francisco Office : 61 and 65 Merchants panic and such industrial distress as Exchange, where this paper is kept on file- Ad wtising contracts can be made with E. C. will intimidate the from Pfike, Agent. performing their duty. Chicago Office: 761 Monadnock Building. INTER-MOUNTA- IN MINING REVIEW. Inter-Mounta- in - law-make- Salt Lake City, Sept. Under the head line Whats Up, the Vernal Express publishes the following: Thu recent drop of 3 cents In the price of silver and 50 cents in the price of lead has exerted a depressing influ- upon the low-gra- de silver-lea- d properties, some of which find themselves unable to operate at present The present situation, quotations. however, is not so discouraging as to justify the pessimistic views enterd tained by a number of operators. Some hardship and distress will be produced among the miners who have been employed upon these properties, but, as we view it, prices faint-hearte- remain at the present low point but a few weeks, and a marked improvement will certainly set in before the close of the year. The slight fall in silver was due largely to the liquidation of holdings which speculators were unable to carry, coupled with a lighter demand from India than had been anticipated. At the worst, it is but a temporary condition, and it is noteworthy that the slump has not carried prices below the January quotations. The present year's demand has been fully equal to the supply, thus preventing the accumulation of a large surplus stock, a condition that will tend to strengthen the market. The present price of lead is the result of conditions that afflict almost every industry In the land. The producers simply cannot sell at any price, because there is absolutely no consumption. It Is true that the Lead Trust is able to influence the course of the market, under ordinary conditions, but the present situation is one wholly beyond the control of the Trust. For months the manufacturers have been pursuing a policy, living only for immediate wants, and thosy wants have been few. They refuse to purchase raw material because tli people will not buy their manufacturer! products, and the people will rirt buy because they have no money. Opinions differ as to why the people UlVtno money. The goldbugs say It is because the silver agitation has all the money into hiding places; McKinleyites are certain It the present tariff law that j i:'s impoverished the people, will hand-to-mou- th - Grabbing Asphaltum Lands. 3, 1896, Silver and Lead. ence rs claims on the asphaltum beds on the Uncompahgre reservation were filed for record with the Clerk and Recorder of this county yesterday. The claims embrace a strip from the Colorado State line, near where It crosses While river, into the eastern border of Wasatch county, Utah, and wholly on the reservation. Thomas Loyd of Salt Lake City is acting as agent for the locators. Is the reservation opened, or are these locators a favored few who are allowed upon the reservation to locate preparatory to its being opened by telegram, with a view to gobbling up all of the asphaltum lands before the public has an opportunity to know that anything has been done in regard to the matter? This is the question we would like to be enlightened upon, as heretofore ' all sooners have been kept off from the reservation and no one allowed to stake claims thereon, and these filings monuments all describe and boundaries. For the past year there have existed grounds for the suspicion that a certain ring, including some high Federal officials, were preparing to take possession of the whole asphaltum field, but they were not expected to show their hand until the reservation was thrown open. Of course the locations mentioned above are invalid, but a deep game is being played, and developments will be watched with interest. The syndicate that is able to acquire possession of these asphaltum fields will realize fabulous profits, but before such a consummation comes to pass the general public will be heard from. Fifty-fiv- e well-defin- ed McNally of this city, a recently-converte- d goldbug, if he is correctly reported by the press, is spreading throughout the East the falsehood that rs reduced the the Utah wages of their employees when the law went into effect The eight-hors did nothing of the Utah sort. With very few exceptions they are now paying the same wages for eight hours that they formerly paid for ten. J. C. mine-owne- ur mine-owne- 3 Gold in Granite and Plutonic Rocks. BY WII.LIAM P. DRAKE, TUCSON, ARIZONA. A recent paper by Prof. George P. Merrill, Curator of the Department of Geology of the United States National museum, Washington, upon An Occurrence of Free Gold in Granite, describes an Interesting instance of the dissemination of this noble metal In the substance of granite of normal composition believed to be from So- nora, Mexico. He found the gold in small scales, rarely exceeding a millimeter in diameter, distributed through the scales of mica and apparently enclosed in both the feldspar and quartz granules. A number of thin sections of the rock submitted to examination with the aid of the microscope gave confirmatory evidence. Sulphides were not detected, nor any Indication of a secondary impregnation, though the granite had undergone some alteration, apparently by weathering. Mr. Merrill concludes that there Is apparently no way of accounting for the gold other than by considering It an original constituent of the rock, a product of cooling and crystallization from the original magma. We thus have another link In the chain of evidence showing that gold is a constituent of granite and of plutonlc rocks, and that such crystalline rocks may be the primal source of the gold which Is concentrated In veins. We do not, however, overlook the fact that the oceans may have contributed a portion of their dissolved gold to the sedimentary rocks, such as the slates, magnesian or otherwise, of different geological epochs; such slates being generally known to us as the country of most of the auriferous or wall-rocquartz veins, especially of the central gold region of California. As Investigation progresses, and our ks knowledge Is Increased, it becomes more and more evident that such pyri-tou- s sediments derived their metallic contents from the waters of the ocean at the time of their sedimentation, through the reducing agency of organic matters or the exhalation of sulphuretted or carburetted gases, as for example, from the petroleum shales. We encounter here the difficulty that gold is not uniformly present in pyrl-tou- s deposits, as we might expect considering the universality of the oceanic source, and the general distribution of gold in this menstruum. But before we can generalize satisfactorily we require much more evidence regarding the dissemination of gold in the mass of the various kinds of rocks, independently of veins. Examples of the nature cited by Prof. Merrill are thus of great importance, not only In themselves, as bearing upon the question of the origin and distribution of gold, but as tending to stimulate observation, inquiry and discussion. Prof. Merrill refers to the description by J. B. Jaquet of an occurrence of free gold in miero-clin- e in a rock consisting essentially of microcline and quartz impregnated with hematite, and, also, to the occurrence and crystalof free gold in glass-lik- e line varieties, of a quartz trachyte, in Transactions Am. Inst, of Min. Eng. |