DECEMBER, 1863.

District. Yield of Gold
                              per Ton of Quartz.

Stormont (Isaac’s Harbor) 2 oz. 10 dwt. 0 gr. 
Wine Harbor 10 " 6 "
Sherbrooke 1 " 7 " 0 "
Tangier 14 " 12 "
Montague 5 " 9 " 8 "
Waverley 9 " 11 "
Oldham 15 " 12 "
Renfrew 1 " 2 " 0 "
Ovens[P] 18 " 9 "

The difference in yield between the districts is here very considerable, as it happens,—­yet in the month of October the average yield at Oldham was 1 oz. 16 dwt, 20 gr., and at Renfrew 2 oz.; while for November it was at Stormont 3 oz. 2 dwt. 12 gr., at Tangier 1 oz. 10 dwt, at Waverley I oz. 3 dwt. 12 gr., and at Oldham 1 oz. 8 dwt.  The maximum yield per ton was 50 oz. at Wine Harbor, 12 oz. at Sherbrooke, 11 oz. 12 dwt. at Oldham, and 5 oz. 15 dwt. at Stormont, for the same period.

“The average yield,” says Professor Chace, “per ton of quartz, of the gold-fields of Nova Scotia will, it is believed, compare favorably with that of either Australia or California, while some of the maximum yields indicate ores of unsurpassed richness.”

In regard to the best and most effectual methods of dressing and amalgamating these rich ores, it seems to be conceded that the modes hitherto in use in Nova Scotia have been very defective.  Much larger returns of gold are to be expected from the introduction of the new processes, which scientific research is every day bringing to a greater degree of efficiency in Colorado and California.  The promoters of the Nova-Scotia mining-enterprises, thanks to the skill and pains of their scientific advisers, are fully awake to the importance of this vital point.  Pyrites—­the mineral mixture so universally found with the gold of this region—­is well known to escape, or rather to resist, the attraction of the mercury used in the amalgamating process, and it has hitherto been allowed to pass away with the “tailings”, or refuse from the mills.  When we state that it has been repeatedly shown to be from ten to twelve per cent. of the components of the ore, and that by test of the United-States Assay-Office its average yield is one hundred and twenty-eight dollars to the ton,—­and by the careful experiments of Professor Silliman, at the Sheffield Laboratory in New Haven, it has yielded even as high as two hundred and seventy-six dollars and forty-nine cents to the ton,—­the oversight and bad economy of its waste will be sufficiently apparent.  It may safely be estimated, therefore, that the process of Dr. Keith, or some other equally simple and efficacious method of extracting this hitherto wasted portion of the precious metal from the accompanying sulphurets, will produce an amount quite equal, at least, to the previous minimum yield.  The effect of such an increase in the returns will readily be appreciated by others besides the merely scientific reader.