Show VS MINES A quarter of a century ago when mining was comparatively in its infancy in this western country when business centers were few and far between when nearby camps of today were then isolated sections in a country of magnificent distances nothing appealed to the miner and prospector more strongly than a high grade proposition this however was not from choice but was owing to conditions then existing to the long distance from market to the lack of transportation facilities and the high prices paid for labor and supplies to say nothing of the inadequate milling and reduction methods then pertaining now however with almost every condition of that day and date reversed it is the big low grade 3 rade mine that appeals to the experienced experience ence d mining man and mill operator and asa as a general thing it is the great low grade proposition which pays the most in dividends and whose production continues continue for years after the exhaustion of the rich mine in I 1 n e we know that high grade I 1 ore appeals to the imagination and cupidity of the tenderfoot and to the public at large and that the inexperienced will go into raptures over a few inches of exceedingly rich mineral but in the long run the mine w with th vast bodies of millin milling ore in its workings will win out and maintain a paying basis long after the small vein of shipping ore has become exhausted it has been stated and correctly so that a foot of ore that yields from 60 to 80 a ton in the precious and baser metals is not to be compared in value and source of profit to the eight or ten foot body of 10 and 25 ore in the mining of the small vein but few nien men can be employed while a large amount of dead work must be performed in order to take out a small tonnage in a large zone of low grade or milling ore a small army of men may be employed in mining operations and but little dead work is required cross cuts upraises up raises arif drifts ts and dinzes can be driven on the ore and thousands of tons broken down and extracted aa ata 1 1 nominal cost and without the waste incident to the operation of a mine where nature has deposited her treasures in small but rich veins the investor seeking a producing and paying mine is t generally much more favorably impressed with a great low grade proposition than he is with a mine having rich ore but in small bodies nearly all of the great camps of the west are comparatively speaking low grade propositions the rich mines which have made fortunes for their owners being exceptions to the general rule furthermore the low grade mine is much better for a camp than is a high grade small vein producer as such a mine necessitates the employment of more men the erection of mills smelters shelters sm elters and reduction works while more money is in circulation as a result and the masses accordingly are more benefited than if the camp possessed mines with small veins but of high value |