to those of the Nilgiri district, and in it the principal gold tracts are situated.
The
principal rocks of the area are granites, gneisses, and other forms of
metamorphic rocks, which are traversed by numerous quartz reefs.
In
the tract to which Mr. Brough Smyth gave his particular attention, and
which covers about 500 square miles, 200 out-crops, not necessarily
distinct reefs, were counted; they are, in short, stated to be more
numerous, and proportionately wider and richer, than in almost any part
of Australia. Mr. King, first, and subsequently Mr. Brough Smyth,
pointed out that throughout the area there are no accumulations of
drifts or deep leads covered by volcanic formations such as
characterize the Australian fields. Operations, therefore, have been
hitherto, and must be in the future, confined to " surfacing" and
quartz mining, a regular hydraulic system of mining being inapplicable.
By
all the authorities it is considered that the native processes of
washing, as practised to-day by the Korumbas and Moplas, is of high
antiquity, dating so far back as 500 years B.C. There is evidence,
however, that operations were not limited to mere washing, but that
mining was carried on by one or more classes of people who have no
representatives at the present day. Mr. Brough Smyth enumerates the
traces of this higher skill under the following heads :—
1. Quarrying on the outcrops of the veins.
2. Vertical shafts.
3. Adits.
4. Vertical shafts with adits.
5. Shafts on underlie.
And remarks that they show different degrees of knowledge of the miner's art. h 2
