In addition to asbestos, it is worthy of note that the whole of the Thetford district is rich in minerals. Among others some large and valuable deposits of chromic iron are found in the immediate neighbourhood, within but a short distance of the asbestos mines.
THE COLERAINE GROUP.
Four miles farther down the line of railway from Thetford we come to the Coleraine group of asbestos mines, situate at Black Lake.
The pioneer of these mines was a Mr. Noel, now resident at Richmond, near Sherbrooke, in the same province, who, in 1881, discovered and opened up a mine of a promising character here, which in 1882 he sold to Mr. Charles Lionais, who was until recently the resident manager of the mines owned by the Scottish Asbestos Company, at Black Lake and Broughton.
The mine first opened here was called by Mr. Lionais the "Eureka," and some time afterwards he opened another on the same estate which he named the "Emelie." The property on which these two mines are located subsequently came into the possession of the late Mr. Sénécal, and was by him transferred to the "Anglo-Canadian Asbestos Company, Limited," on the formation of that company in London, in the autumn of 1885.
The estate owned by the Anglo-Canadian Company comprises 325 acres, and has a frontage of 1,350 feet extending backwards over the hills as far as Lake Cariboo. Until recently this was the only place in the district where machinery was employed to get out the ore.
The peculiar characteristic of this property, as distinguished from the mines forming the Thetford group, is that much exceedingly heavy work, necessitating of course great expense and showing very poor results, must of necessity be done before the good veins, if any such exist, as it is believed they do, are reached. Much of this has already so far been done at the Emelie, that at length this portion of the property bids fair, in capable hands, of proving to be a moderately paying mine. Great results were prophesied from it at first, but so far it has by no means realised expectations.
The surface veins, not only at the "Emelie" but all over the property so far as yet proved, are not only thin, but are much discoloured by the infiltration of water which is so strongly impregnated with the oxide of iron as almost to destroy its value. It was thought, and as it would appear with some show of reason, that the output would greatly improve in value as a lower depth was reached; but although there has undoubtedly been a sensible improvement in quality, the general result is disappointing. Started as a No. 3 mine, as such in all probability it will continue. The output from this Company's mines for 1886 was 330 tons.
The No. 3 quality of asbestos, which has hitherto been the main produce of this mine, fetches so low a price in the market that alone it would not pay for working. This, as already explained, is mainly on account of its bad colour and general coarse quality. This latter having somewhat improved, a considerable proportion of the produce would cease to be classed as No. 3 if it were not for the bad colour. It therefore occurred to me that it might be possible to remove this defect without injuring the fibre, and in consequence I had some experiments made with this object in view, and ultimately succeeded beyond my expectations, in replacing the discoloured fibre by one sufficiently bright to enable it to take rank as No. 1. These experiments, it is true, were only conducted on a limited scale, but, so far as I am aware, there is no reason why it should not be done on a large scale, which would very materially increase the value of the article.
There is ample room for opening up in a more judicious way on other parts of this property on what seems likely to be good paying ground; and a mode of doing this without incurring any further expense might easily be devised, and, if this were done, other seams of better quality might be hit upon.