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CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.
CONTENTS
THE TRANSVAAL GOLD-FIELDS.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
A PRACTICAL SCIENCE AND ART SCHOOL.
THE MINER’S PARTNER.
MISS MARRABLE’S ELOPEMENT.
A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE POLECAT.
AN OLD, OLD STORY.
No. 12.—Vol. I.
Price 1½d.
SATURDAY, MARCH 22, 1884.
THE TRANSVAAL GOLD-FIELDS.
BY ONE ON THE SPOT.
The gold-fields of the Transvaal, which have beenheard of by fits and starts during the last twelveyears, have of late begun to excite considerableattention both at home and in South Africa;and as the future of the Transvaal, and indeeda great portion of South-eastern Africa, dependsvery much on their proper development, a shortdescription of the gold-bearing region may proveinteresting to readers of this Journal.
Gold has been found scattered over a considerableextent of country here, and indeed is knownto extend up to the Zambesi; but the part mostfrequented by the gold-seeker is a belt of countryrunning almost north and south, commencing onthe Kaap River, a few miles east of the villageof Middleburg, in the Transvaal, and terminatingabout ten miles north of Pilgrim’s Rest, in theLydenburg district. The principal ‘farms’ onwhich gold has been found in the Lydenburgdistrict are Pilgrim’s Rest, Berlin, Lisbon,Graskop, Mac-Mac, Spitzkop, Elandsdrift, andHendriksdal—these so-called ‘farms’ being merelytracts of ground surveyed, but in scarcely anycase used for actual farming purposes. Thereare numerous other ‘farms’ on which gold hasbeen found; but the above-named have, up tothe present time, produced the largest quantity.From the Kaap River gold-fields, about fifty milesfrom Lydenburg, a considerable quantity of goldhas also been extracted, partly on unallottedgovernment ground, and partly from the ‘farms’of private owners; but this district has not beenso extensively worked of late, owing to its unhealthinessin the lower reaches of the river,and also to the difficulty of working in such abroken country.
At the present time, comparatively little workis being carried on in either of the above districts,from causes which will be explained presently;but that gold exists in considerable quantities,there is not the shadow of a doubt, as the returnsof banks and merchants for native gold purchasedcan show; and although no capitalists have untilrecently made their appearance on the gold-