My own ledges at the head of Silver Bay, are 8 miles distant from those on Round Mountain, and have no connection with them.

After quitting work on Round Mountain, Doyle told me of ledges on a small creek emptying into Silver Bay, and Captain Olmstead, Lieutenant Rodgers, and myself formed a prospecting party. Three-quar ters of a mile up the creek I found a piece of white quartz of good grain, showing no sulphurets or gold, but resembling specimens shown me in Sitka. Following a small stream that entered from the northeast I found the ledge now known now as the Haley and Rodgers lode. The ore is very white and the surface of the ledge where it crosses the creek crops out for 6 feet, the balance covered with heavy timber and a red soil stained by the heavy flow of iron water running over it from one of the large trees. On stripping the grass and moss from a large bowlder that had broken away from the ledge, I found some yellow sulphurets of iron. The first discoverers of this ledge, Mahoney and Doyle, never worked on it at all, as they considered the quartz too white to have any mineral in it. In October, 1872, I went back with four men and after nine days' work, stripped the ledge. I put in a blast and to my great astonishment threw out with this blast $350 in nuggets of gold, and three gold-pans full of arsenical sulphurets. Some of the nuggets I had to chisel from the hard rock. I took my samples back to Sitka and reported the discoveries to Captain Olmstead and Lieutenant Rodgers. There was great excitement at the discovery. Soon after this, Captain Olmstead was ordered East and I was left to fight my own battle. The Haley and Rodgers lode is 93 feet wide at the depth of 48 feet, and a good foot and hanging wall, as in slate formation, runs east and west. These ledges are on a long range of mountains, running southeasterly before it reaches the ocean on the other side. All the claims that I represent run on this range of mountains in an east and west direction. They are struck by three distinct porphyry ledges, one of them about 60 feet wide, a mixture of quartz all through, assaying $6.50 per ton.

"Soon after the discovery of the Haley and Rodgers lode, I discovered another ledge, known as the Stewart Tunnel quartz lode. This leage cropped out from 1 to 3 feet wide, and the gold was visible to the naked eye on all sides of the quartz. It showed no blue streaks on the surface, and the quartz was so white that no one thought much of my prospects, although I assured them that blue quartz would be found on sinking. Assessment work was done, and 5 tons of ore sent to San Francisco to be reduced, to get an estimate of the value of our ore. The returns showed a value of $7.50 per ton in silver and no gold, although we could dig the gold out of the rock with our pocket knives before shipping it on the steamer. The ledge is 14 feet from wall to wall, and there is over 4 feet of blue-ribbon rock. The streak dips from the hanging-wall towards the center of the vein, with good tracings from where the blue streak ends to the foot-wall. There is all of 2 feet of good pay ore on this foot-wall, and in blasting fine specimens of free gold are found in the white body of ore. This payvein, or blue-ribbon rock, was increasing in width when the mine shut down. Major Stewart, Colonel Claywood, and I organized a company, now known as the Alaska Gold and Silver Mining Company, so that the Stewart mine has never really changed hands.

The sulphurets of my Lucky Chance mine go $1,840 per ton by my rough roasting process in the forge. I am just holding my claims, doing assessment work and crushing ore by hand mortar and working placers when I have sufficient water. I am now digging a ditch to bring in a larger stream of water to work the placers with. Each year I take out

enough gold to cover all outlay and expenses. The Lucky Chance rock shows enough free gold to satisfy me that it is rich enough without assaying, but I inclose you these results of assays of other ore specimens made by Williams, of Philadelphia:"

The Big Specimen, Wicked Fall, Lucky Chance, Haley and Rodgers, Banner Quartz lode, and Ribbon Rock mines in this group, owned by Nicholas Haley and Sons and M. Craigin, of Sitka, are rich mines and produced some gold during the year, although no definite statements of the amounts could be had.

During the summer prospecting parties from Sitka made trips into the interior and across Baranoff Island and found indications of gold in several places. They were convinced that a more thorough search would reveal mines equal to those worked by Haley and his sons on Silver Bay.

The Yukon district.-The Yukon River, and more particularly the territory about its headwaters, still tempt many prospectors from Juneau northward. The route over the Chilkat and Chilkoot Passes, opened by miners in 1879, have been traversed by parties each season, and varying reports are brought back of the richness of the country lying beyond the divide. Two military expeditions were sent out by General Miles, commanding the Department of the Columbia, ordered to explore the region lying between the Chilkat Pass and the Copper River. Both parties returned in the fall without having gone beyond the route of previous explorers and prospectors, or having ascertained anything more as to the mineral resources of the country. A new expedition, under more experienced leadership, was ordered by General Miles to leave Sitka in February, 1883, and, ascending Copper River on the ice, make progress towards its headwaters during the summer.

Prospectors and explorers after crossing the Chilkat and Chilkoot Passes are in British territory until they reach Fort Reliance, 300 miles distant. Mineral discoveries within that region are of interest, but are of no value to United States records, for as soon as camps or settlements are established British surveyors and gold commissioners will be sent to enforce their rigid laws. The boundary line is not located at any place along the route, but discoveries of any great importance will at once raise the question, and the United States prospectors will have expended their energies to no avail.

Prospecting at haphazard along the rivers and tributary streams they have found many rich deposits. On the Lewis, Stewart, and Pelly Rivers, which form the Yukon, bars were found that paid from $5 to $20 per day to the man. Over $1,000 in gold, just taken from these bars, was brought to Juneau last season and quite an excitement created. More prospectors will go out next spring, but as the season is so short in the interior and the difficulty of reaching the grounds so great they will probably be gone more than a year.

The prospectors that left Juneau in the spring of 1882 returned after an absence of two years and reported finding gold in all the streams emptying into Stewart River. They prospected the bars and tributaries of that river for 200 miles from the point where it joins the Yukon, finding gold in paying quantities. It was the intention of these men to make a second trip to the Yukon country, taking schooner to the mouth of the river and ascending by small boats to the rich gravel deposits instead of descending from the Chilkoot Pass.

One party of prospectors took out $700 in gold dust from a bar on the Pelly River, and found many quartz leads.

The fur traders reported finding placers near Fort Reliance, and ore from quartz leads near the same place was sent to San Francisco to be assayed.

The experience of the Schiefflin brothers, who went to the Yukon with a prospecting party of picked Arizona miners, well equipped and provisioned for a three-years' stay, led many ambitious prospectors to attempt to follow them. The Schiefflins sold their boats, tools, and supplies after eighteen months' stay and left. They found many good indications, especially in the region where a range of hills, known as the Ramparts, are aligned with the river's course. They were convinced that gold existed all through the Yukon country, but its remoteness from all base of supplies, and the long severe winters of the interior, left a mining season of four mouths too short to be profitable. A dozen miners are now reported as working the placers found by the Schief flins.

CHAPTER II.

ARIZONA.

The result of mining operations in Arizona during the year, measured by the output of the precious metals, has not been entirely satisfactory to those engaged in this industry, as it shows a decreased production of $650,000.

The decline in the yield was more marked in the Tombstone district, occasioned chiefly by the strike among the miuers for higher wages and the consequent shutting down of most of the large mines during a portion of the year. The shipments of bullion show, on the other hand, greater success in the newer camps and mining localities, and indicate a favorable development of new properties.

The mineral fields of Arizona have been very superficially prospected as yet, and its advantage over other mining regions in its equable climate, permitting work to be prosecuted throughout the entire year, has been more than counterbalanced by the high rate of freight and the want of reduction works.

The two railways now being constructed will traverse sections rich in mineral wealth, as well as in timber, farming, and grazing lands. They will open up Tonto Basin and the Mogollon forests, and connect Mineral Park, Flagstaff, Ashfork, Prescott, Tucson, and the other leading towns, making the people more homogeneous, and opening the resources of these sections to immigration.

The Arizona Canal, another important enterprise, is approaching completion. This canal has a channel 22 feet wide, banks 73 feet deep, and is to be 40 miles in length, and the purpose of its construction is to conduct the waters of Salt River, through the valley of Maricopa, into the Aqua Fria. This canal will furnish water to reclaim upwards of 100,000 acres of land, and will supply power for mills and smelters along its line.

Of the ten counties of the Territory, nine are producers of the precious metals.

Cochise County contains the most important mining camp, Tombstone, and the largest bullion producers, the Contention, Grand Central, and the Tombstone Mill and Mining Company. It is in this county that the large falling off has taken place.

Gila County is rich in copper mines.

Graham County has immense ledges of copper now producing, and large undeveloped gold-bearing gravel deposits.

Maricopa County contains the only distinctive gold mine, the Arizona Central (late the Vulture), which is producing nearly $30,000 per month.

Mohave County has been practically isolated by its mountains, and while some very rich prospects have been worked during the last ten years its mineral resources have scarcely been developed.

Pima, Pinal, and Yavapai Counties contain many valuable producing properties, while Yuma bids fair to become an important mining country,

and already contains one of the most successful silver mines in the Territory, viz, the Clip.

The Tucson Star estimates the production of the Territory during the calendar year 1884 to have been about $5,000,000, distributed as follows:

The copper output for the year was about 27,000,000 pounds, produced

Mr. Valentine, in the annual circular of Wells, Fargo & Co., credits the Territory with the following production for 1884:

Gold dust and bullion .....

Silver bullion....

Ore and base bullion by railroad.

Total....

The latter item consisted almost entirely of copper and lead.

$460, 791 3, 139, 625. 3,455,960

7,056, 379

In both

of the above estimates the value of the silver was calculated at its commercial value.