NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS ON THE GOLD FIELDS' OF QUEBEC AND NOVA BY ALFRED R, C. SELWYN. Chaudière, BEFORE Coming to Canada, in October, 1869, I had spent the greater part of sixteen years immediately preceeding in Australia, chiefly in Victoria, noted as being the richest gold-producing country in the world. During that period, as Director of the Geological Survey of the Province, a large portion of my time and attention was devoted to investigating the geological relations and the structure of the gold-bearing rocks. I had also previously, as a membor of the British Geological Survey, acquired an intimate knowledge of the gold-bearing Silurian and Cambrian rocks of North Wales; and as the gold-deposits of the Dominion have in the last few years attracted a good deal of notice, and a large amount of capital has been invested in their development, I considered it advisable to devote my first season in Canada to visiting some of the gold-producing districts, with a view of comparing them with those of the countries above referred to, and in the' hope of being thus enabled to offer practical suggestions for their further development. Other matters connected with the Geological Survey claiming my attention, I was not able to commence these examinations till towards the end of June, when I proceeded to the Chaudière, in the province of Quebec, from which river, and from its tributaries, nearly the whole of the gold which, up to the present time, has been produced in Canada proper has been obtained. None of it so far as I am aware, being the result of mining in the solid veinstone. On making enquiry to learn what was being done on this gold field, I found that with the exception of desultory and occasional washing operations carried on by resident habitans on the superficial gravels in the beds of some of the tributary streams, the only works then in progress were those of 1 the Canadian and Northwest Land and Mining Company, under the immediate superintendence of Mr. W. P. Lockwood, to whose great kindness and readiness to impart information, I am very largely indebted for whatever I was able to learn in the neighbourhood, respecting both present and past operations; as well as for facilities kindly afforded me in visiting all the most noted auriferous localities on the Chaudière and its tributaries, the Du Loup, the Famine, the Gilbert and the Des Plantes. After spending about a week in these examinations, I proceeded via River du Loup, Temiscouata Lake and the Saint John River, to New Brunswick. My observations in this province were confined entirely to the St. John River, which I descended in a canoe. The unusually low water afforded excellent opportunities for examining the rocks along the course of the river, and by making this traverse I have acquired a general knowledge of the aspect and the succession of the formations between the St. Lawrence River and the northern boundary, near Fredericton, of the great central Carboniferous area of New Brunswick. A considerable portion of this region in New Brunswick had recently New Brunswick, been explored and reported on by Mr. Robb, under instructions from Sir W. E. Logan, and previously also in 1864, by Prof. H. Youle Hind and by Prof. L. W. Bailey, on behalf of the Local Government. The little which has hitherto been done towards the discovery of gold in New Brunswick will be found stated in the reports of these explorers,* * and the hasty traverse I made does not enable me to add anything of importance on this subject to what has already been stated by them. The rocks certainly present all the external characteristics usually met with in auriferous regions, and there is therefore every reason to hope that intelligently conducted "prospecting," if persevered in, might lead to the discovery of really valuable auriferous deposits. It is, however, quite impossible to arrive at any reliable or conclusive opinion on this matter without much more extended and careful research and exploration than has hitherto been made, but which I hope to be able to carry out on some future occasion. From Fredericton I proceeded to St. John, and crossing the Bay of Nova Scotia. Fundy, arrived in Nova Scotia on the 5th August. I was then continuously engaged till the 13th September, visiting and examining various gold districts in the counties of Halifax, Hants, Colchester, and Guysborough; including Waverley, Oldham, Montague, Lawrencetown, Tangier, Mooseland, Musquodoboit, Mount Uniacke, Renfrew, Gay's River, Wine Harbor, Sherbrooke, and Isaac's Harbor. On the 7th of October I was again in Nova Scotia, and was occupied * Report of Mr. Charles Robb, 1869, on a part of New Brunswick, in Geological Survey of Canada, Reports for 1866-69, page 209. A Preliminary Report on the Geology of New Brunswick, &c., Fredericton, 1865, by H. Youle Hind, M. A., F. R G.S. Report on the Mines and Minerals of New Brunswick, by L. W. Bailey, A. M., Fredericton, 1864. Acknowledge. ments. Previous reports. Veinstones. till the 4th November, examining the southwestern portions of the Province, the route followed being from Digby, via Weymouth, to Yarmouth, Tuskett, Barrington, Shelburne, Liverpool. Lunenburg, and the Ovens, Gold River, and Chester. From Chester, vid New Ross, to Dalhousie Settlement, thence down the La Have River to Bridgewater, returning, vid Liverpool, to Annapolis. Thus, so far as observations over so large an extent of country made in but little more than two months can enable one to do so, I have endeavoured to gain a general knowledge of the leading features of the geology, and of those affecting the economics of the gold-fields of Nova Scotia, which will enable me to compare them with the gold-fields of other countries, and which will also be extremely useful in conducting a detailed geological survey, such as is essential for the right comprehension of the geological structure of the Province, and by which alone, geology can be made. to afford valuable assistance to the practical miner in developing its mineral resources. Before proceeding with the general and special remarks suggested by the facts to which my attention has been directed in the localities I have visited, I desire to tender my acknowledgements and thanks to the Hon. Robert Robertson, Commissioner of Mines, for his kindness in placing the resources of his department at my disposal. To Mr. John Rutherford, Inspector of Mines, and to Mr. John Kelly, Deputy Commissioner of Mines, my sincere thanks are due for much valuable and interesting local information, as likewise for the very cordial manner in which they gave effect to the instructions of the Commissioner. The valuable information, and the kind attention which I received from Mr. H. Y. Hind have been most useful; and I am also much indebted to the varions managers and agents of the mines which I visited, for the readiness with which they afforded me all the information and assistance in their power. The reports on the Waverley and Sherbrooke gold districts, in 1869, which have recently been published by Mr. Hind, under the authority of the Department of Mines; the report in connection with the Geological Survey of Canada, "On the Gold Region of Nova Scotia," by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt; the Acadian Geology, by Dr. Dawson; the "Mineralogy of Nova Scotia," by Prof. How; Mr. Heatherington's excellent "Guide to the Gold Fields of Nova Scotia," all published in 1868; together with the various reports by Messrs. Campbell, Silliman, Poole. and others, leave but little to be said either on the geology, or on the economics of the eastern gold-fields of the Dominion, which has not already been referred to, and ably discussed by one or other of these authors. In Canada, as in Britain, and in Australia, the known gold-bearing veinstone is confined to strata of eozoic, or palæozoic age; chiefly Silurian, but it is also occasionally found in crystalline rocks of later date, associated It consists commonly of with them in the form of dykes, veins, or masses. The paleozoic strata in the gold districts with which I am acquainted, are always more or less intimately associated with divers kinds of crystalline (igneous ?) rocks. In Victoria and Nova Scotia these are chiefly granitic and gneissic; while in the province of Quebec, and in Britain, serpentinic, dioritic and feldspathic forms are more prevalent. As above stated, they occur as beds, dykes, veins, or masses, sometimes parallel with, but often intersecting the stratification. I am not aware that any of these crystalline rocks have ever yielded gold either in Britain or in Nova Scotia; and the instances of their having done so in Australia are not numerous; the most noted and remarkable being that of the dioritic dykes with horizontal richly auriferous quartz veins intersecting them, numbers of which were found in the gold district of Wood's Point, Victoria, traversing slates and sandstones, probably of Upper Silurian age. An accurate sectional view of one of them is given in my Notes on the Geology and Physical Geography of Victoria, Plate IV. In this connection Dr. F. A. Genth, of Philadelphia states, [American Dr. Genth. Journal of Science, 2nd Series, vol. xxviii, page 253, 1859.] "Gold is frequently "found in diorite (in smaller quantities in syenite and granite) and although "it is only rarely observed in the massive rocks, I have seen specimens from Honduras, C. A., where it was imbedded in the diorite without any other "association. The result of the complete decomposition of the diorite is a "red clayish soil, and this has, in the gold region of North Carolina, etc., a "reputation for its richness in gold." 66 What influence the crystalline rocks, or the causes which produced them have had on the formation of the quartz veins with which the gold is generally associated, has not been in any case satisfactorily determined. It would appear however, apart from secondary causes in connection Geological age with the alluvions, that a general similarity in the geological conditions and of gold. associations under which the gold occurs exists in all auriferous regions, whether the veinstones are connected, as in Canada, Britain, and Australia, with eozoic and palæozoic strata; or as in California and Switzerland, with mesozoic formations; or as in Hungary and Transylvania with rocks of tertiary age; and thus the probability of the occurrence of veins bearing gold, or any Origin of mineral veins. Veins in depth other metal or metallic ore in any particular region, can never be determined by the geological age of the rocks alone, but rather by the physical conditions and influences connected with metamorphism, upheaving, fissuring, dislocation and invasion by crystalline rocks, to which they have ineach case been subjected since their original deposition. I have no wish to enter here on the intricate question of the age, origin, and mode of formation of metallic deposits, and mineral veins; and it is unnecessary to refer to the numberless theories which have been propounded to account for the varied phenomena which they present, except in so far as they are more immediately connected with the facts observed regarding the auriferous quartz veins of Nova Scotia, and other parts of the Dominion, or appear to have some practical reference to their probable extent and future development. It is now generally admitted that direct igneous agencies, in the sense of injection of fused matter, have played very little, if any, part in the production. of mineral veins, or in the distribution of the ores found in them, and also that auriferous quartz veins present no 'eatures which would serve to distinguish them from any other class of ore-lodes, either in their origin or in their mode of occurrence; and on these grounds I have long held the opinion that there was no à priori reason why such veins should not contain gold in sufficient quantity to be profitably extracted at any depth to which ordinary mining operations can be carried. * If most mineral veins and their ores are due, as I belieye them to be, † to infiltration and segregation of mineral matters, chiefly through the agency of subterranean mineral-charged gases and thermal waters, penetrating and percolating under favoring conditions into and through cracks and openings which have been formed in the crust of the earth, either by seismic, plutonic or volcanic action, or through dessiccation and cooling, causing contraction and corrugation; then there appears no reason physical, chemical or geological which should determine all or the greater part of the gold in auriferous veins, towards those particular parts which now constitute their surfaceoutcrops, but which at some remote earlier period were certainly many hundreds of feet beneath it. In some parts of Australia, and doubtless elsewhere also, veins have been traced from their outcrops on hills considerably elevated above adjoining valleys, across these valleys, and up the opposite slopes to equal or greater elevations; portions of the outcrops in the valleys being as rich as other parts of the same vein on the summits of the hills. In such cases the valleys represent at least a great part of the denudation which the strata have suffered since the veins were formed, and if the latter are followed vertically down * My opinion on this point are quoted in Murchison's Siluria, 3rd Edition, 1858, pages 495, 496, 497; and 4th Edition, 1867, chap. xix, pages 464, 465, 466. + See in this connection Dr. Hunt's remarks, Geology of Canada, 1863, page 735. |