month (November) and for several months this year, as indicated by the records of deliveries from refineries, have been record breaking, the price of copper delivered remained about thirteen and one-eighth cents a pound the middle of December. This is a price at which most California copper mines find little inducement to operate unless their ores carry sufficient gold and silver to help out.

Afterthought Copper Company's properties were sold under foreclosure late in the year to Forest P. Tralles of St. Louis, assignee of the executors of the will of J. F. Milliken of St. Louis, who, it is said, had loaned the company over a million dollars. A compromise between the Milliken interests and the bondholders is reported to have been arranged whereby the bondholders will receive a few cents on the dollar, leaving the stockholders out.

Mountain Copper Company's smelter at Martinez was fired July 26 after an idleness of four years and the first copper was turned out August 15. In September 125 men were employed at the Iron Mountain Mine and the oil flotation plant at Minnesota had also been put in operation. However, in November the Iron Mountain Mine had been shut down and the future operations were uncertain.

All the holdings of the Trinity Copper Company in Shasta County were attached in August by the Federal National Bank of Boston. The best known of the claims of this company is the Shasta King, nearby the Balaklala, and seven miles west of Kennett. The property had been idle a number of years.

United States Smelting, Refining and Mining Company put a crew of over a hundred men at work at the Mammoth smelter in August to prepare for reopening the smelter. At the same time, 65 men were put at work at the Mammoth Mine and about half as many at the Keystone and Balaklala Mines. Late in November one furnace was reported in operation, but there have been no opportunities for field trips to the district the past month, so it is not known whether work will be continued or not.

BARITE.

Loftus Barite Mine was being prospected the past summer by H. C. Austin who is planning to buy the property. It lies about 2 miles in an air line east of Castle Rock. Austin has been considering the installation of a tramway, as the claims lie in rough country. The surface extent of the barite outcrops is said to be very large and a depth of about 50 feet has been reached in prospecting. The color of the rock varies from white to gray.

COAL.

An adit was being driven in October on a coal prospect on the Lon Luce property in section 20, T. 33 N., R. 1 W.; a little over a mile from Oak Run postoffice. A. Stevens of Oak Run was in charge.

At the time of visit the adit had been driven 43 feet and showed at the face a width of five feet of coal, of which several layers appeared more lustrous and harder than the rest, but nearly the entire width was coal, the seams of clay being narrow. The quality of the material had improved rapidly after leaving the surface. It is jet black in color

and looks like a better fuel than the ordinary run of California lignite, approaching sub-bituminous and not checking and slacking as fast as the brown lignite, though it soon shows the effect of exposure to the air. The coal bed dips east and north about seven degrees, has a sandstone and shale roof and a shale floor. The tunnel was being run a little south of east, and water was beginning to show a little at the face. On account of the direction the work was taking, it was becoming a flat incline in which it would no doubt be necessary to soon arrange for handling the water. There was no time to make an examination of the enclosing strata for fossils that might show the age of the coal, but although there is some uncertainty, the coal may be Cretaceous.

Surface outcrops of coal have been noted in a belt some ten miles long, according to local people, but for the most part these outcrops have not been prospected, although the U. S. Geological Survey comments on some coal prospects in the Ingot region, in the Ione formation. The region appears worthy of closer investigation on account of this coal and it is hoped that there will be an opportunity for field work there by the Bureau next spring.

The greatest handicap to development of the prospects is the long haul to the railroad, the nearest railroad point now being Palo Cedro, 17 miles away. It would be necessary to develop a good sized field of merchantable coal to justify a railroad, unless some lumber company should decide to exploit timber lands in that section.

Sierra County.

The Alleghany district, and particularly the Sixteen to One Mine, has produced most of the gold mined in this county during the past year. Due to the fact that some of the other large producers of the state will show a decrease in yield this year from various accidental causes, it seems probable that the Sixteen to One Mine will rank among the three largest gold quartz producers for 1923. This record is all the more notable because it is being made with a normal working crew of 30 to 40 men. Relatively small production has also been made by the Plumbago, Tightner, Rainbow, Kate Hardy and Irelan Mines during the year, so far as reports late in the year indicate, but these figures are apt to be changed at any time by discoveries of rich bunches.

All the mines and prospects that were accessible at the time were described in the October chapter of our 1922 report. Some changes since are noted below.

Work at the Brush Creek Mine was suspended after two explosions of gas had resulted from workmen penetrating the old workings.

A mill has been put up at the Contact Mines during the past summer, and underground work has continued.

Some prospecting of the Edwards claims at Chips Flat was contemplated.

Gold Canyon and Rainbow Extension claims were taken under one management and work continued during the latter part of the year.

A new hoist was being put in at the Irelan Mine late in the fall.

Kate Hardy Mining Company has been running the mill on their mine just below Forest and report that the proceeds have been contributing toward the cost of prospecting.

The lease and option on the Oriental and Dead River Groups of claims was abandoned by Tonopah Mining Company after considerable unproductive work. Very soon afterward, Bert Austin and associates took the lease and option and began work.

Prospecting work has been going on at the North Fork claims near Forest.

The Plumbago Mine, which was being reopened at the time of the last report, has since been taken under option by Alleghany Mining Company. Some rich specimen rock was reported to have been found by the former operators just before the transfer was made.

The Rainbow Mine produced a bunch of rich ore during the year, but not sufficient to repay the outlay for prospecting, according to the company's engineer.

The Sixteen to One completed many surface improvements and additions to the mill during the year, and as noted above remained the principal producer of the county.

In the Downieville district there was not much mining activity aside from the seasonal work in the many small drift mines, where parties of two or more men are employed each summer. There have not been any important developments, however, in this branch of mining in the district recently.

Bessler Bros. make an occasional small crushing of ore in the mill on their mine just outside the town of Downieville.

City of Six Mine comprises seven claims, unpatented, lying at the head of Slug Canyon two miles west of south of Downieville by trail. It is being developed under lease and option by A. E. Hodgkinson, 801 Lane Mortgage Building, Los Angeles.

Development work on the quartz claims to October of this year consisted of two adits. No. 2 or upper adit was run as a crosscut 100 feet then on the vein formation and the serpentine contact southward for 800 feet. The lower adit, which is 360 feet lower than No. 2 and 960 feet north of it, has been run about 1200 feet on or near the serpentine contact. The vein varies in width from a foot or less up to 4 feet, and in general is parallel to the contact of serpentine and Calaveras formation. From the two adits a few raises and crosscuts were run and there are two possible ore zones indicated, both raking south at a steep angle. These two shoots have produced some high grade ore similar to that from the Alleghany mines, and the property is similar geologically to the mines there. The greatest depth reached by the lower adit is about 485 feet.

Dan McGonigal, J. T. Lane and H. G. Smith were cleaning out and reclaiming the old workings of the Finney (or York) Mine just outside of Downieville during the past fall. The four claims and millsite of this property lie on both sides of the river. There is an old shaft 150 feet deep, with some drifting and stoping at a depth of 100 feet, and also an adit 350 feet long in which they were clearing a caved section. The mine has a record of some past production of high grade.

Gold Bluff Mine a mile from Downieville was taken under bond and option in the fall.

Tuolumne County.

QUARTZ MINES.

Many prospecting projects that were under way during the year in this county have been suspended; numerous new ones have taken their places, but in point of size of operations and number of men employed, the county has suffered a loss. The fixed price of gold relative to the cost of other commodities, which have been maintaining a high general price level, has especially affected the quartz mines on the Mother Lode in this county, as the ores that have been mined on that lode in this county have been as a rule low grade, taken as a whole. Before the war many properties kept running on rock that averaged $3 to $5 a ton and a recent perusal of old reports showed there were about 400 stamps in operation in the county in 1913 and 1914. In November, 1923, there was only one mill, containing 12 stamps, in operation on the Mother Lode in the county.

Alabama Mine. Work on this property, which had been carried on by the Tonopah Mining Co. during the year 1922, was suspended last spring. The claim was prospected through the Crystalline shaft, six hundred feet deep. Drifting was carried under the old Alabama shaft on the 600 level to prospect for the downward extension of ore.

Belmont Shawmut Mine closed down early in November, 1923. This was the last large mill operated on the Mother Lode. The owners returned to do some work after the Belmont Mining Company quit.

Crystalline Mine. Work was suspended in this property near Jamestown in the summer.

Casa Madera Gold Mines Syndicate, a Nevada corporation, has under lease and option a number of claims in the Basin Slope district, 20 miles by road and steep trail from Sonora via Confidence, three miles being by steep trail, or 8 miles from Tuolumne over a steep road. J. H. Sharpe, president of the company, Hearst Bldg., San Francisco. The claims are owned by John Nash and Rooker and adjoin the old Lewis Mine, once productive. They are near the contact of a gabbro intrusive and the extremely hard slaty quartzites and micaceous schists of the Calaveras formation. The intrusive is exposed on the mountainside just north of the workings and shows a sheeted zone the plane of which strikes northwest and dips 45° west.

The upper or No. 1 adit has been run east about 300 feet on a tight seam without quartz or gouge although the operators claim some assays. This is about 800 feet below the summit of the hill. A short way inside the portal of this adit, a crosscut has been run on a joint fissure striking about south, to follow a small bunch of sulphide ore that formed around the junction of the two joint seams. On the hillside about 100 yards south of the mouth of this adit and about on the line of the crosscut if produced, a small shallow prospect hole shows hard· quartz carrying galena and other sulphides. There are no definite walls or gouge here, but there appear to be two systems of joint planes in the schist, one striking southeast and dipping vertically, and the other striking west of north and dipping 40° west. No. 2 or lower adit, 100 feet vertically below No. 1 was 60 ft. long on Nov. 3 and

showed the formation at the face similar to No. 1 adit, but the rock carries considerable sulphide.

A milling plant was being installed just below No. 2 adit when visited. It is to contain a ball mill of 40 tons capacity and 2 Plat-O concentrators, and 35 h.p. motor to run the mill. All this machinery was on the ground, as well as a 10 x 10 in. air compressor run by 50 h.p. motor at the lower adit and a 20 h.p. gas engine and 1-drill compressor at No. 1, with a tramway for supplies from the top of the ridge to the mill. Electric power was brought three miles from Confidence during the summer. The company has broached the idea of getting a water supply by running the upper adit ahead to tap the old mine workings nearby. This would be an uncertain and expensive method. If ore has been found on the surface of the claim as reported, it appears that erosion must have lain bare one of the west-dipping joint planes, which coincides with the present surface of the hillside in places. If this has occurred, the almost inevitable result would be an overestimate of the amount of ore available. The amount of work done had not yet justified a mill. Twelve men were employed in November, of whom three were working underground.

Clio Mine. Clio Vindicator Mines Co. A new surface plant is under construction at this mine, mile south of Jacksonville on Tuolumne River. A new headframe is up and hoisting is to be done directly to the surface dispensing with the old adit. A new 10-stamp. mill is being prepared for to replace one lost by fire.

Cherokee Mines, Consolidated, of Modesto has been doing some work at the Donella Mine at Arastraville and have also reopened the old adit on the Cherokee Gravel Mine, a mile and a half north of Tuolumne and are reported to have hauled some cemented gravel for a test run at the Columbus mill.

Erin-go-bragh Claim. During 1923 J. L. Bryson and associates have sunk a shaft 92 feet deep on this claim at Stent. Early in November the claim was idle, but it was stated that a few rounds of crosscut had been run and that work had stopped only a few weeks before. The crosscut was required on account of the shaft being flatter than the vein, but it could not be learned if the vein had been picked up.

Experimental Mine. Conlin Bros., Columbia, owners. Lately this mine has been taken under a ten-year lease with option to purchase by L. L. Coffer and F. L. Mitchell, who formed a stock company. Wolfley and Schank have taken an option on the majority of stock and work had begun in November with shaft repairs. The geology and workings of the mine are briefly described in Preliminary Report 8. This mine. was being profitably worked in 1854, when a mill of 8 square stamps with wooden stems was put up and used to crush rich ore from near the surface.

Harriman Mine has lately been taken under lease and option, which were later transferred to A. G. Fraser and J. Hibbard of Los Angeles.

Heslep Mine. This old Mother Lode mine at Quartz has lately been leased to J. A. Keyes and associate, their lease embracing, however, only the section from the surface to 300 feet in depth. Keyes was