(Published in the Glasgow Herald from the Boston Post)
Although the papers contain occasional notices of the great mineral region of Lake Superior, recently opened to the enterprise of our citizens, there is an unaccountable scarcity of facts and results in the communications thus far made to the public.
There is disputation among the knowing ones in this business to monopolise the most valuable of these lands ; and this design can be best accomplished by permitting Congress and men of capital generally to remain in ignorance until the choicest locations are secured. We think it important to a judicious administration of this property by the government, and to a prompt and profitable development of its resources, that whatever can be known in relation to it should be made public.
Having had access to some authentic sources of information on this subject, we shall communicate what we have learned.
The copper region commences at Chocolate River, a little east of Copper Harbour, in Lake Superior, and extends along the southern shores of that lake some 350 miles to the British line, pursuing a north-westerly direction. The width is from 1 to 25 miles, according to the course of the ranges of trap rock, the uniform concomitant of the ore. This region abounds in evidence of ancient volcanic action, particularly in the frequent appearance among the ore of bodies of native copper. The ore appears in veins on the surface of the earth, and in rocks and hill sides. These veins vary in width from 6 inches to 16 feet. Some fo them descend into the earth perpendicularly, others at various degrees of inclination, and some of them, after perfoming a curvature under the earth, reappear or “crop out” again. The ores yield, on average, about 25 per cent. of pure copper, the purest in the world. The mines of Cornmwall, in England, yield only from 8 to 9 per cent ; thowse of Bohemia about 15. The only mines in the world – except those of Cuba and Jamaica, of which we are ignorant – that rival in riches the mines of Lake Superior, are those of Russia. The latter also are the only ores which are worked with equal facility, being like the Superior mines, near the surface, and yielding, from the very commencement of operation, ample supplies of metal. The mines of Cornwall and Hungary are worked to a depth of 2500 feet, and in some cases the first 500 feet have been excavated at an expense of 300,000 dollars to 500,000 dollars before anything was realised. No shaft on Lake Superior has yet been sunk to a depth greater than 100 feet. It is remarkable that the copper vein never fails unless it crops out otherwise. Interruptions, faults may occur, but continued digging with strike ore again.
(To be continued…)
