It may be well just here to explain these words. Both are Spanish. “Bonanza” signifies prosperity, success—that all is well. At sea it is used by sailors when the weather is fair and they are sailing with a fair wind—when all is well with them. Among miners it means that they are working in a body of ore, that they are in luck, and all with them is prosperous. “Borrasca” means just the opposite of “bonanza.” At sea it means tempestuous and dangerous weather, bad fortune—all going wrong; among miners it means that they are in barren rock, that they are in a bad streak, out of luck. Among miners, borrasca is suggestive of long faces, sad hearts, and empty pockets, while bonanza shows us faces wreathed in smiles, hearts that are merry, and purses that are plethoric. Along the Comstock the mining companies are sometimes in bonanza and sometimes in borrasca. So long as they are in the great fissure[fissure], however, and have a good width of “vein-matter” they are not utterly cast down even though they may be drifting in barren rock—they are liable to run into ore at any time and often do so when such good fortune is least expected. Some have compared the vein-matter of the lode to a great pudding into which has been stirred raisins, currants, and plums; sometimes you find a currant, sometimes a raisin, and sometimes a plum, while again you are blessed with nothing better than the matter of which the mass of the pudding is composed.
To multiply examples would be tedious, but an example or two will probably not be out of place. Although there is ore in the Crown Point mine, Gold Hill, at the depth of 900 feet, their first great bonanza was not found until they had attained a depth of 1300 feet. This was a magnificent body of ore, and yielded many millions of dollars. The very rich ore was confined to a space about two hundred feet in length lying just north of the line of the Belcher mine, but the vein contained a considerable amount of low-grade ore for a distance of about 350 feet further north. Finally, in 1873, they had worked down through this rich deposit to the 1400-foot level and there started a cross-cut east in search of ore. When this cross-cut had passed through the west clay wall of the vein a deposit of very rich ore was found some feet in width. Passing through the cross-cut next encountered, a streak of white and almost barren quartz about two feet in width, and beyond this reached ore worth from $45 to $75 per ton. This body of ore proved to be twenty-four feet in width. The cross-cut being continued east across this suddenly struck a solid wall of porphyry. The whole face of the cross-cut was in this barren rock, and it was at first thought that the east wall of the ledge had been reached, but after passing through a few feet of porphyry a very large body of ore assaying from $250 to $600 per ton was reached. As the mine continued to be worked this search for ore was repeated at intervals, and thus far the search has never been in vain. In 1875 ore was being extracted everywhere from the 900 down to the 1500-feet level, though much of that obtained in the upper-levels was of low-grade, yet too rich to be left behind.
In May, 1873, in the Belcher mine, adjoining the Crown Point on the south, was found the continuation of the same rich deposit worked on the 1300-foot level of the last mine named. Afterwards, other bodies were found at a still greater depth, and to the eastward, and so the work of sinking and searching for new bonanza still goes on, while at the same time ore is being extracted from those already found. In the Savage, Gould & Curry, Hale & Norcross, Chollar-Potosi, Yellow-Jacket, Imperial, Empire, Overman, and a score of other mines this is the work which is constantly going on.
Some persons will no doubt think that if there is a deposit of ore in a mine it should be found in a short time and with but little trouble, but miners can see no further into the ground than persons who have their homes and business on the surface. Place a man in the bottom of a shaft one thousand feet in depth; then tell him to drift off and find a body of ore, and he is much the same as a man groping about in a dark cellar. He knows which way to go to reach the vein, but when once he is in the vein he may almost touch that of which he is in search without finding it.
If mining men knew the exact spot in which the rich deposits are located, it would be an easy matter to sink a shaft or run a drift to tap them. Thus it happened that it was fourteen years after the discovery of silver, and the Comstock lode before what is now known as the “Big Bonanza,”—the chief of all the bonanzas—was found. For fourteen years men daily and hourly walked over the ground under which lay the greatest mass of wealth that the world has ever seen in the shape of silver ore, yet nobody suspected its presence. The ground on the surface presented the same appearance as the soil in other places in the same neighborhood, and roads were dug in it, houses were built upon it, and all kinds of things were done on, in, and about it without anybody thinking any more of, or about it, than of any other ground in the town.
CHAPTER LXIII.
FLUCTUATIONS OF FORTUNE.
What are now known as the “bonanza mines” are in great part made up of small mines that were located to the southward of the Ophir soon after the discovery of silver. The big bonanza lies in the Consolidated Virginia and California mines, and its northern extremity extends into the Ophir, as is supposed; it is also thought that it will be found to extend into the Best and Belcher, which is the first mine south of the Consolidated Virginia.
The north end of the vein is divided into claims at this point, as is shown in the accompanying diagram.
The California mine contains 600 feet on the length of the ledge, and is of whatever width the vein shall prove to be, as the owners have a right to follow it, wherever it may go. It consists of the original California of 300 feet to which has been added by purchase the Central mine No. 1, containing 150 feet; the Central No. 2, 100 feet, and the Kinney ground 50 feet. There are 900 shares to the foot, or 540,000 shares in the whole mine.
The Consolidated Virginia mine contains 710 feet of ground along the lode, and is made up of the Dick Sides ground, 500 feet, and the White & Murphy ground, 210 feet. There are 108,000 shares in the mine. The Ophir, which lies next north of the California mine, contains 675 feet and is divided into 100,800 shares. In 1874, 600 feet were taken off the north end of the Ophir and incorporated as a separate mine, which was called the Mexican. The Mexican contains 108,000 shares.