no good, the charge not cracking off but blowing out of the hole. The matter taken out, and containing the gold is piled up until spring, when the torrents come down, and is panned and cradled by these. It is certainly very hard labor."

Another quotation may be given as a practical example of this process:

"The gold so far as has been taken from Bonanza and Eldorado, both well named, for the richness of the placers are truly marvelous. Eldorado, thirty miles long, is staked the whole length and as far as worked has paid.

"One of our passengers, who is taking home $100,000 with him, has worked one hundred feet of his ground and refused $200,000 for the remainder, and confidently expects to clean up $400,000 and more. He has in a bottle $212 from one pan of dirt. His pay dirt while being washed averaged $250 an hour to each man shoveling in. Two others of our miners who worked their own claim cleaned up $6,000 from one day's washing.

"There is about fifteen feet of dirt above bed rock, the pay streak averaging from four to six feet, which is tunnelled out while the ground is frozen. Of course, the ground taken out is thawed by building fires, and when the thaw comes and water rushes in they set their sluices and wash the dirt. Two of

our fellows thought a small bird in the hand worth a large one in the bush, and sold their claims for $45,000, getting $4,500 down, and the remainder to be paid in monthly installments of $10,000 each. The purchasers had no more than $5,000 paid. They were twenty days thawing and getting out dirt. Then there was no water to sluice with, but one fellow made a rocker, and in ten days took out the $10,000 for the first installment. So, tunnelling and rocking, they took out $40,000 before there was water to sluice with."

LEGAL ASPECT OF ALASKA.

Commissioner Hermann, of the General Land Office, has announced that the following laws of the United States extend over Alaska, where the general land laws do not apply:

First-The mineral land laws of the United States. Second-Town-site laws, which provide for the incorporation of town-sites and acquirement of title thereto from the United States Government by the town-site trustees.

Third-The laws providing for trade and manufactures, giving each qualified person 160 acres of land in a square and compact form.

The coal land regulations are distinct from the mineral regulations or laws, and as in the case of the general land laws Alaska is expressly exempt from this jurisdiction.

On the part of Canada, however, the provisions of the Real Property act of the Northwest Territories will be extended to the Yukon country by an order in council, a register will be appointed, and a land title office will be established.

The act approved May 17, 1884, providing a civil government for Alaska, has this language as to mines and mining privileges:

"The laws of the United States relating to mining claims and rights incidental thereto shall, on and after the passage of this act, be in full force and effect in said district of Alaska, subject to such regulations as may be made by the Secretary of the Interior and approved by the President," and "parties who have located mines or mining privileges therein, under the United States laws applicable to the public domain, or have occupied or improved or exercised acts of ownership over such claims, shall not be disturbed therein, but shall be allowed to perfect title by payment so provided for."

There is still more general authority. Without the special authority, the act of July 4, 1866, says: "All valuable mineral deposits in lands belonging to the United States, both surveyed and unsurveyed, are hereby declared to be free and open to exploration and purchase, and lands in which these are found to occupation and purchase by citizens of the United States and by those who have declared an intention to become such, under the rules prescribed by law and according to local customs or rules of miners in the several mining districts, so far as the same are applicable and not inconsistent with the laws of the United States."

The patenting of mineral lands in Alaska is not a new thing, for that work has been going on, as the cases have come in from time to time, since 1884.

One of the difficulties that local capitalists find in their negotiations for purchase of mining properties on the Yukon is the lack of authenticated records of owners of claims. Different practices prevail on the two sides of the line and cause more or less confusion. The practice has been at most of the new camps to call a miners' meeting at which one of the parties was elected recorder, and he proceeded to enter the bearings of stakes and natural marks to define claims. Sometimes the recorder would give