The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1926, Page 12

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

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12 THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

II.

Having touched on the missionary work of the
Kolar Gold Fields, let us now turn to the mining
work; for to the visitor it presents many: ihteresting

‘features. When you arrive at either one of the
stations in the Kolar Gold Fields, several things
at once attract your attention — huge piles of rock,
piles of cyanide, many steel and wooden frames
marking the various shafts, and the long rows
_ of huts.

To take the last-named first, it may be said that
over the whole field are long rows of these little
huts, hundreds upon hundreds of them; and a most
monotonous sight they are to the eye. Here the
miners live. The huts are about 6X8 feet, with
zinc sheets for a roof and mats woven from bamboo
for sides. The number of people that “live, sleep,
and exist” in each one of these huts baffles the
imagination.

Day by day these people — sometimes one alone,
at times the whole family — go to work in some
part of the big plant. The underground force, and
those directly in connection:with the working of
the rock, labor in three- to eight-hour shifts, every
day of the year, without a break. The mines never
stop operating.

Inasmuch as there are certain dangers connected
with entering the mines, I have never desired to
make the trip, though from the time the rocks come
to the surface until gold is extracted I have seen
the process. Each mine has many shafts and is a
unit of its own. In iron buckets the workers are
let down the shafts from six to eight thousand feet
underground. All the mine8 are connected in the
deep. Here the rock is cut out and sent to the sur-
face. Some gold is said to be so prominent in the
rock that occasionally a miner will go off into a
secluded corner and pick out bits of gold, put his
gathering in a small cloth and, swallowing it, come
to the surface to disgorge it. The work under-
ground becomes quite dangerous due to certain con-
ditions, until recently called “air-blasts,” but now
designated as “rock-blasts.” There is a fortune in
store for the’man who finds what this is and can
give a remedy. As it was thought tobe due to air,

the first name was given. Some think it is due to

the pressure of the thousands of tons of rock over-
head: In the mine huge pieces of rock shift, and
the small pieces flying about wound many. Yearly
thousands are hurt this way; but there is never
a shortage of people who want to work in these
mines. On the surface the effect of the “blast” is
much like an earthquake shaking the house, so that

bits of plaster fall. Occasionally there are several
“blasts” in a day; then again a month will pass
without your hearing one. This is the daily risk
the miner must take.

After the rock has come to the surface, an elec-
tric railway connecting all the shafts conveys it to
a central point. Here the rock is assorted. The
good rock, or “quartz,” as, I believe, it is termed,
is loaded on little cars and is transmitted to the
crushing-mill by means of an endless cable. Huge
pounders are used to crush the rock into powder,
which is washed by water over a table of copper
and mercury plates. These plates attract the larger
particles of gold, but much still remains in the
powdered mass.

Years ago this powder was run out into great
piles. ‘These piles are of a bluish green color, and
on investigation it was found that, literally speak-
ing, they are piles of “gold dust,” since not much
more than half of the gold has been removed. Now
these piles of dust are reworked with the material
from the crushing-mill. Describing this process in
a general way, I might say: The powder is soaked
with water. By a filtering process the gold-laden
dust is separated from the other stuff and then run
into a mill consisting of long, revolving tubes re-
sembling great boilers. Also the poor grade of rock
is run into these tubes. As the tubes revolve, the
large rocks grind the dust so fine that the naked
eye cannot detect the single particles. The water
which runs through the tubes filters over felt pads.
The gold settles into the pads, which are “washed
out” every hour. Since the gold is not yet entirely
removed, the dust-mush is again passed through the
sand and another series of, copper and mercury
plates until the maximum amount is extracted. In
this manner over 95 per cent. of the gold is obtained.

All the gold is now gathered together, formed
into good “gold bricks,” and sent to the mint in
Bombay. ‘Twice every month the gold from the
whole field is shipped, and: the semimonthly ship-
ment for the last half of; March was the equivalent
of nearly $400,000. Tr!

So much is to be said concerning the gold itself.
There are, however, many,more things which help
to make up the settlements. Inasmuch as each
camp is a complete unit, every mine -has its own
superintendent, office force, a complete machine-
shop, foundry, smith-shop and’ lumber-yard.

The company also operates! one of the best hos-
pitals in South India. ([herejare always from two
to four European doctors itt the service. Every
morning as I pass the hospitil I find it filled with