[R. M. Evans, Virginia City and Its Surroundings, Gazlay's Pacific Monthly Magazine, May 1865]

GAZLAY'S

PACIFIC MONTHLY.

================================================================================

VOL. L                                           MAY, 1865.                                          No. 5.

=================================================================================

VIRGINIA CITY AND ITS SURROUNDINGS.

            VIRGINIA CITY, of which we present our readers a faithful and correct illustration on the preceding page, lies directly in the heart of the great silver regions of the new and prosperous State of Nevada. The present site upon which the city is located, six years since was comparatively a barren waste, interspersed with mountains, hills, and valleys, and tenanted almost exclusively by a few prospecting adventurers after silver lodes, and by roving and predatory bands of savages. The latter were exceedingly warlike and troublesome at times, and were almost wholly instrumental in hindering the more rapid development of the country, and in delaying mining operations of the early settlers in their search after the precious metals. It was long after reports of the fabulous richness of the mother-veins of silver in Nevada were confirmed, and the Indians nearly exterminated, that the tide of emigration set across the bleak sierras from California and Oregon. It is only within the past five years, however, that Virginia City can really begin the date of its existence. Now it is the most prominent and thriving section in the whole State —the center of mining and commercial activity, and the principal artery that feeds and succors the various mining camps, towns, and settlements which diverge from it in every and all directions.

            When a stranger arrives in Virginia City, and observes a city containing a population of twenty-five thousand people of both sexes, long blocks and squares of brick and granite structures, with whole ranges of frame buildings, and ascertains further that immense sums are daily being paid for real estate, he naturally wonders whether growth in this ratio is likely to continue, and if so, whether the mines of Nevada will be sufficient ultimately to pay for it all. As he passes along the crowded foot-walks and notices the streets blocked up with teams laden with goods and merchandise from beyond the mountains, he comes to the conclusion that there must be some parties well supplied with money to pay for these; but whether the outlay will be repaid by returns from extracted ores is still in his mind an undecided question. But if he steps into the leading banking-houses in the city and takes a view of the silver " bricks " generally to be seen there, he begins to imagine there is something tangible in Washoe after all. And if he will next ascertain how many quartz-mills are running in the vicinity of Virginia City, Gold Hill and Silver City, and how much bullion each returns on an average weekly, he will unquestionably be led to the conclusion—which others have come to before him—that the rapid growth of Virginia City is only the outward evidence of a profitable development of the mines.

            The streets are macadamized, well lit with gas, water introduced through pipes, and it boasts of three theaters devoted to dramatic entertainments, an opera-house which seats in its auditorium some two thousand people, and where Italian and other operas of the best composers are produced by artists equal to any which appear before the audiences of much older communities. The

872      GAZLAY'S PACIFIC MONTHLY.

large amount of wealth which the earth so bountifully produces enables the population of the State to provide themselves with every comfort and luxury of civilized life. Stores of every character well supplied with merchandise of all descriptions, hotels, and fine market-houses filled with an abundance of game, meats, and vegetables, attract the eye on every side. The churches of various denominations, and schoolhouses attended daily by nearly a thousand children, will compare favorably with those in the Atlantic States. An excellent volunteer fire department, police force, and the working of a good municipal government, are no less attractive features of the new city which has so suddenly sprung into existence within the short space of five years. The country around is cut up with mines, mills, farms, and gardens, while in every section the topography is dotted with smiling villages, and even palatial private residences give unmistakable indications of the thrift and wonderful enterprise of its hardy and industrious population. There has been no difficulty as yet experienced in obtaining labor for mining operations. The supply is fully equal to the demand at any and all times. Good mining hands receive usually four dollars per diem, while the tariff of prices for ordinary laboring men is fixed at from three to three and a half dollars per day, payable in gold ; amalgamators and engineers of mills receive from five to eight dollars. Wood for milling and hoisting purposes is worth twelve dollars in summer, a cord, and fifteen in winter. Lumber for " timbering " and " shoring " up mines, and building purposes, may be obtained at from forty to fifty dollars per thousand feet, in any quantity that may be desired for all practical purposes. Fresh meats of the best quality can be had from twelve to eighteen cents a pound ; butter, milk, eggs, cheese, and fruits and vegetables of all kinds raised in the State, are as reasonable in price as the same may be procured in the city of New York on a specie-paying basis.

            The elevation of Virginia City, on the east slope of Mount Davidson, is about six thousand feet above the level of the sea. There are no extremes of heat or cold experienced at any season of the year; but for the reason that the air at this elevation becomes rarefied, many people at first find some difficulty in breathing as freely as they could in a lower atmosphere. Persons affected with asthmatic and lung complaints find great relief in inhaling the rarefied air of Mount Davidson. In the valleys, however, where the temperature of the atmosphere is more moderate, the objections raised by some to the former locality for a place of residence is entirely overcome. The best test of the general healthiness of the climate is to be found in the fact that there are few deaths in proportion to the population, and that the climate does not impair the energy of settlers is proved by the enterprise and activity which in Virginia City is evident on all sides, and in the rosy, blooming complexions of the people we meet on every hand. Since the discovery of silver in the Washoe country, initiating, about five years ago, the era of extended mining operations, there was spent in what may be considered a legitimate manner, such as the development of paying claims, the building of mills, and in the erection of other permanent and productive property, about $100,000,000 ; in return for which we have the mines with their improvements, worth at least $30,000,000, with bullion extracted from them, say $10,000,000, and at the lowest estimate $40,000,000 worth of improvements in the shape of towns, mills, smelting-works, roads, and other betterments, making up more than the money expended, and exhibiting Washoe as paying for itself; so far as legitimate outlays are involved, inside of five years. Had the enterprise of our people been restricted, then, to this class of mines and improvements, it is obvious, parties operating and investing there, instead of being losers, would, as a class, have come out ahead, while they made large accessions to the productive wealth of the country. The losses that have occurred in Nevada have chiefly grown out of reckless speculation or transactions in what are termed outside mines, being other than those in the immediate vicinity of Virginia and Gold Hill, upon the line of the Comstock lead.

VIRGINIA CITY AND ITS SURROUNDINGS.      373

            Go where you will about Virginia City during business hours, and nothing is talked about but silver. — silver. Every few days somebody comes in with a piece of favorable-looking rock, which was found by a private party, away off some where, and soon there is an excitement. Every old, half-starved horse is in great requisition, and a universal stampede is the result. It is reported that a certain party, whom night overtook in their search for a rich vein of silver, thinking they were in the neighborhood of the place, and being anxious to forestall all other claimants, commenced posting up notices upon every piece of rock they saw, claiming so many feet of this ledge, with all its dips, angles, and spars. Imagine the discomfiture of the party, when daylight dawned upon them and they found that they had stuck one of their notices upon the chimney of a miner's cabin !

            With regard to the permanency of the Washoe mines there can be but one opinion among those who have carefully surveyed the country and studied the peculiarities of its mineral-bearing veins—which is that they are inexhaustible. Go where you may, gold and silver bearing lodes abound ; and although a hundred times the amount of capital now invested were applied to the opening of these mines, still there would be room for more being profitably employed, directly and indirectly.

            Nothing is more gorgeous and beautiful than the cloud scenery which circles around the summit of the Sierra Nevadas. Daily, and with the utmost punctuality, the white, transparent mists begin their journey from the green, slumbering valleys below, toward the rugged landscapes of eternal snow. Slowly they march upward, one fold of brightness carelessly and lazily rolling over the upper edges of another, until a huge mountain of many-hued clouds is presented to the eye along the entire line of the Sierras, from the farthest north to the extremest southern horizon. They seldom produce rain, or assume those hues of darkness that distinguish the rain-cloud. Viewed from the high points of Virginia City, the contrast between these gay, fantastic air-castles, and the dark glens and somber forests beneath, is wonderful and striking.

            A few years hence, Nevada, as well as Idaho, Montana, and Utah are destined to be teeming with people and abounding in wealth beyond any thing we can now conceive. And there is nothing in its climate or its water to prevent the growth of a large population.

            In respect to the working of the mines of Nevada we must necessarily speak of their past yield in order to draw the comparison between their relative condition before the modern appliances of machinery were introduced and adopted. On their first discovery the rudest sort of Mexican arastas and hand-mortars were used for crushing the ore. By this process at least one-half of the metal was lost. Silver mining, to most Americans, was entirely a new business practically, though some had a theoretical knowledge of the subject. Still, mere theory in mining is a long way from practice. The mines almost lay unworked for over a year after they were discovered, for the perfection of the McCullough and other process by which they might be more profitably worked, and the heavy losses in tailings saved to the owners of the mines. Few could be found who would venture capital in an undertaking they knew nothing about. Notwithstanding only the richest ores were worked by the old method, and the poorer class thrown aside as scarcely being worth the labor expended in crushing, and the quicksilver used in amalgamating, the yield even then was a source of large revenue to the owners, gave good paying dividends, and left a surplus to develop further the mines by sinking shafts and running tunnels. Most of these tailings were afterward worked through what is known as the patio process, and yielded all the way from fifteen to forty per cent.

            In Nevada there are about three thousand five hundred stamps, ranging from five to eighty stamps to each mill, crushing quartz; or in all some one hundred and sixty mills in successful operation, running night and day, with others being rapidly constructed.