useful but more plebeian brethren of the mineral kingdom, has yet been
deposited under similar conditions from mineral salts held in solution.

The first mode of obtaining this much desired metal was doubtless by
washing the sand of rivers which flowed through auriferous strata. Some
of these, such as the Lydian stream, Pactolus, were supposed to renew
their golden stores miraculously each year. What really happened was
that the winter floods detached portions of auriferous drift from the
banks, which, being disintegrated by the rush and flow of the water,
would naturally deposit in the still reaches and eddies any gold that
might be contained therein.

The mode of washing was exactly that carried on by the natives in
some districts of Africa to-day. A wooden bowl was partly filled with
auriferous sand and mud, and, standing knee-deep in the stream, the
operator added a little water, and caused the contents of the bowl to
take a circular motion, somewhat as the modern digger does with his tin
dish, with this difference, that his ancient prototype allowed the water
and lighter particles to escape over the rim as he swirled the stuff
round and round. I presume, in finishing the operation, he collected
the golden grains by gently lapping the water over the reduced material,
much as we do now.

I have already spoken of the mode in which auriferous lode-stuff was
treated in early times--i.e., by grinding between stones. This is also
practised in Africa to-day, and we have seen that the Koreans, with
Mongolian acuteness, have gone a step farther, and pulverise the quartz
by rocking one stone on another. In South America the arrastra is still
used, which is simply the application of horse or mule power to the
stone-grinding process, with use of mercury.