Show THROUGH THE NORTH the and prospects la wood river country Count rj fl Sec lal cor to tha taking theila geto challis Cb allis a ride of ligh y two miles brings us to abreo areo where we change stages and strikeout strike out for the west again chal lit is about due northwest of abreo areo while bellevue a due west and the route of travel requires the trip I made in coming here FROM ARGO TO is seventy six milea and the distance from here to blackfoot by the present aronte is one hundred and thirty two mile th blackfoot Elack foot and bonanza atigo company operate all the line running from blackfoot to the mineral regions of challis bonanza and wood kiver and they have been improving and shortening ening the routes and soon will make other improvements that will materially cut down the distance here in for mer letter I have described the country traveled over and there is much of interest to mention which I shall leave for future letters and to day confine myself to this particular OP WOOD that is so full ot interest as a mining district in which richer developments are sure to be made belles vue was first laid out early lai t spring and became a town by the influx of strangers the greeni population will number rubout four hundred persons who occupy ahe houses now built chib thirty more louses are in process of erection and every day teems to add more to the population the location of the town is upon A PRETTY a few feet above the river wood river drains large extent of country and at this place is a stream much larger than the weber at ogden the nearest mines are located in what is called the boy ie district which has been lately formed by the discovery of some good mines in which some gold is found in combination with silver the most prominent mine in the boyle dis brict is called the ohio having a seven foot vein of rich milling ore and the mine is owned by boyle hought c edgington the latter being sn coplen gentleman five miles north of boyle sand at a point eight miles from bellevue Uell evue is located what is called BULLION after a mine owned by a salt lake company of which col merrelt is president and mr IT bidman surer in the work done on the mine consists of a sixty aix fool shaft which has been tapped at the bottom by a tunnel run in from the outside and then continued alone the lode until it hundred and seventeen feet long portion of which is in vein matter the ore when it has been cross cut shows a good fissure vein of over six feet running from up to 1500 ounces of silver per ton with a goud per cent of lead this mine was discovered iest may and the amount of development shows energy upon the part of its owners shipments of ore were made over one month ago and when I visited the mines a report of value had not came in on the same lode and to the north we find THE MAY which was the original discovery of the lode and in fact the first discovery in this district and it was made by mr T J edgington of ogden after the discovery and the location of it and also the jay gould a northern extension by edgington and associates the may flower was bonded to salt lake parties who went to work sinking a shift on the original discovery the incidents and facts in reference 10 this bond ing have been a fruitful source of talk and discussion through all the mining districts of idaho and at times it seemed as if the success of this particular district of wood river depended upon tho results of the developments develop menis at the may flower and when the panics decided not to come up and comply with THE TERMS or THE BOND and take the mine we heard from every point the expression very common such as wood aliver has petered out tho bottom has fell out the may flower i a failure and many other tuch upon my arrival here I met mr J S lewis of Ogden and mr edgington Edgin glon who kindly showed me around and gave me many incidents connected with the bonding and subsequent operations but a visit to the mine and an inspection spec tion of the chaff was more satisfactory than a mere explanation beginning at the surface tho lode dips a few degrees to the west for few feet when it curvan and dips to iho east eo that in sinking the shaft perpendicular it cut in two the two sections leaving the ore of the vein where the or change of course is still hanging on the west wall of the shaft and in the farther desell the shaft is all the while getting away rpm the lode so that at tho bottom it is probably twelve or fifteen feel away when the parties holding the bond talked ef having KNOCKED BOTTOM OUT of several minea here it aroused suspicion that all was not fair and the talk general that an effort was bring to secure a valuable property by ft false showing at nominal rates mr lewis wa here to advise with his sow mr edgington and look alter the interests of his other two sons geo edgington Edging too and II 11 J lewis and he promptly prom ply told the parties thai they must either pay the money or give up the mines and they did the latter wile the may flower has been thua treated the developments on the bullion go to show that th former must be t good mine from the net that the and tunnel oa abe bullion i fully feel lower in the earth than the may flower shaft and alist as they go down the bullion increases a size of ledge and quality of ore such must be the case also in the may flower an outside party has brought i AGAINST LEWIS and his associate iu several for an interest in each in such wanner 09 to cuso the suspicion that the suits are only a part of the plans of the parties formerly holding the bonds to secure tho property at low figures the jay gould Is axlen sion to may flower located by george edgington and upon which but lidle work has been done about one half mile southeast of the bull son is TH last juno by ogden and now owned by him and judge turner of boie idaho ot all the mines I have seen thia strikes me as the best one for he aae of developing the ore A good natural wagon ro td aea up the to W palt discovery and tho mine lies through tho bill which is go near level that teann can drive almost anywhere dedred de ired the ground was stripped off to tho depth one to two feel where the lode is reached and ahey aro noff running in a cuton the vein which is sixteen feet wide with booi gooi honing A LEDGE thus situated there seems to bo no limit to the amount of ore that can be taken out and as the ore ranges from two hundred ounces up to two thousand h silver it cannot help but pay well mr lewis and his asio chatea aro certainly fortunate in BO curing ao many good claims mr lewis has been here about one month and has worked at mining every day since he came and u in fine pints and health the iris is an eastern extension to the idahoan CITY so called consists of good restaurant and some and houses aed by men engaged in mining and a good road connects with Bell eruc eight miles dist antAs we go up towards ketchum eighteen miles distant the bill which are almost bare of trec her become clothed with timberland tim berand grow higher so that the country seems more rugged h similarly built to bellevue but the population is not o large one hundred and fifty person reside there and two good stores one brewery several saloons and two assay ollices are in operations no mines arc nearer than from six to ten miles yet this place beems to bo the center of all the mines in a district reaching out for twenty miles in all directions ore in sacks awaits shipment and other signs of pros penty aro seen As I did not visit tho mines I can only speak from satisfactory information and say that many are showing well and prospects are good for rich developments in the coming season if not sooner while there Wm Cook formerly ot Ogden came in GALENA twenty five miles farther up the river and reported that camp a being about similar in iz to arl chum and as prospering the maix there he reports as bowing up wili in estimating the value the Wooi biver country that this is really the first season of fin real and earnest developments ind then calculate the encountered by the sevaro sierras and great depth of snow of idt winter and that it was impracticable to enter here before lato in may and then when we look around end see how much has been done we wonder at its proportions no belter incentive to prospecting is found than in the fact of so many strike and the rich quality of the ores two assay era in Kolc lium estimate tho average of six hundred tests to bs near ay iy ONE AND per ton and ono assayer in bellevue estimates two bundled and fifty ounces as the average on three hundred essays assays made by him during the past two months many of these essays assays wre upon almost worthless rock and float while others ran up in the thousands in value the great need of this district is od smelling smelting sm elting works and mills to reduce the ores instead of having to send so far away for reduction those will como ere long and even now parties are talking ol 01 investments tho bellevue market is supplied with fruits from byias which compares well walli timily utah varieties and a sold hero at about ten rents pound after being hauled by teams for hiie hundred idaho sept 19 COTTON crop of tin united states for the year ending apt is estimated at bales tic largest probably ever raised und worth for 1878 79 the crop was bales crop not yet picked is expected to bo still larger than that of 80 those figures how that the south is rapidly recovering from the of the war and that fee labor is more profitable than slavo the crop i now fully three limea larger than that of ca which reached but bales and still republican organs persist in the old song of tho ruination and decad ence of the south |