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This account is taken from Australia As It Is: Its Settlements, Farms. and Gold Fields, Vol. II, by F. Lancelott, Esq., published by Colburn and Co., London, 1852. It gives some practical advice on the methods employed by the diggers at the time.
pp. 28-45.
“THE alluvial deposits are worked by washing the soil collected either from the surface, from a deep pit, or tunnel, in the bank of a river, or water-hole, which has previously been drained by dams, or other artificial means. Crushing and stamping the rocks, and driving shafts, galleries, and levels on lodes of the ore, as in ordinary mining operations, have not yet been resorted to in Australia.
“The most simple, but the least lucrative method of washing consists in digging up the auriferous soil and washing it in a pan, or milk-dish. Pan-washing, as it is called, is only practised by those who, from poverty or eccentricity, work single-handed. An expert hand can gather and wash a pailful every ten minutes; and the place that does not yield about 10s. per day, is considered not worth working by that process.
 “But pan-washing is but little practised, as the diggers find it more lucrative to work in parties of from four to eight persons each, and to wash the soil in a cradle, a simple apparatus presently to be described. A collection of the following tools are indispensable to a cradling-party. Spades, crow-bars, pick-axes, with one end pointed and the other end square, shovels, iron wedges, falling-axe, tube, tin or iron buckets, tin dippers, tin or iron pans like milk dishes, cradle, gardeners’ trowels, maul, and cross-cut saw. It is also necessary to be provided with a good stock of bed-clothes, a roomy tent and the following cooking utensils: viz., a camp oven, an iron pot, and a kettle, several tin quart mugs, plates, and a few knives, forks, &v.
“All the above can be bought in the neighbourhood of the diggings, at a trifling advance on the London prices: therefore there is no necessity to take them from England, although, if your means are limited, it might be well to carry out with you a substantial tent, and a few thick blankets; the former will be pleasant by day, the latter most comfortable on cold nights, which, in Australia, are of frequent occurrence. Provisions can be purchased at stores at the diggings at an advance of from 50 to 100 per cent on Sydney prices.
“Most of the digging parties buy a horse and dray, or cart, to convey their tools, &c., from the metropolis to the diggings; but persons who have not the means to make such a purchase send their stores by a carrier, they themselves proceeding on foot in the wake of the vehicle.
“In choosing partners, great discrimination is requisite; in fact, the success or failure of each cradling party depends on the amount of active co-operation and unanimity of feeling existing between them. Do not take up with any fool who fancies he would find a hundred weight of gold at one haul; the men you want are stout, healthy, energetic, enduring fellows, who are determined to work, and work hard, for ounces. Have nothing to do with a peevish man, shun a gambler, and take no one whom you do not believe you could trust with untold gold without witnesses, for every partner must be so trusted. Also avoid shepherds and stock-keepers; and professional men, clerks, and shop-keepers; for the former, although used to roughing it, have an unconquerable antipathy to continuous labour, and the latter are both mentally and bodily unfitted for so hard and precarious a life. The best diggers are farm-labourers, excavators, sailors, brickmakers, and miners.
“Having chosen partners, and had a deed of partnership carefully drawn up and signed, you next get the tent fixed. Secure it firmly to stakes well rammed in the ground, as heavy squalls are of frequent occurrence. Place it neither in a low gully, nor the top of a high spur, but about half-way up a gentle slope, as you have the breeze by day and avoid the night mists. The beds should be raised a foot above the ground, so as to completely break the communication between the body and the earth. For this purpose, rough bedsteads cab easily be formed from either the bark or the branches of the eucalyptus trees. The other furniture of the tent should consist of simply a few boxes, which answer all the purposes of chairs, tables, wardrobes, &c. You should live well both as to eating and sleeping, and always mess with your partners, as slight dissensions are commonly talked away at meals. Avoid excitement; vehement exultation at good fortune, or extreme depression from want of success, wear men out faster than labour. Make up your mind to a certain result, and never mind single days, and still less single cradles.
“It is usual to appoint one trustworthy person to take charge of the gold. One person minds the tent, cooks, &c. One or more men dig; sometimes several hands are engaged carrying the auriferous soil from the digging to the washing-place, and one or more hands wash the gold from the soil in a cradle, which is so simple a contrivance that any ingenious person could make one. It is about 6 feet long, stands on rockers, and into the head is fitted a box, the bottom of which is a grating or sieve of coarse wire-work, or sheet-iron, pierced full of holes half of an inch in diameter. Three bars or ridges, about three eighths of an inch in height, extend across the inside of the bottom of the cradle, one beneath the centre of the sieve, one near the extreme end, and one midway between the two. An upright bar of wood is fastened to the middle of one of the sides of the cradle. By means of this bar, the rocker sets violently rocking rocking the cradle with one hand, and with the other pouring water on the soil, which has been thrown on the sieve, and as the gold and sand are separated from the stones and washed down, the current carries the bulk of the sand over the bars, while the gold mixed with a pasty soil, is intercepted, the lower bar arresting any that, by an awkward shake, gets over the upper ones. When in use, the cradle is placed in a slanting position, with the sieve end higher than the others. Twice, or oftener, in the day the paste is cleared out from the bottom of the cradle, and either dried in the sun and the sand blown away, or washed in a milk dish, the grains of gold, by their superior gravity, remaining at the bottom
“Some parties use a cradle about as large again as the one described. This, called a ‘Long Tom,’ employs one hand to feed it, one to pour on water, break the lumps, and pick out large stones, and another to keep it in motion.
“Mr. Rudder, formerly in California, but now in New South Wales, advises that the cradle should be about 4 feet in length, and 20 inches in width, with a slide of 2 feet in length under the hopper, so that the soil may be made to pass over an inclined plane, of at least 6 feet: thus, 2 feet from the slide, and 4 feet from the bottom of the rocker. No bars are requisite on a machine so constructed, except one at the extremity. The inclination of the rocker, when set to work, should not exceed half an inch in a foot; and the water, instead of being dashed into the riddle in large quantities, should be well distributed over the soil, and poured in with force enough only to cause it to flow freely, but gently, through the machine. By adopting this plan, the gold will traverse gradually over the first inclined plane (the slide), and drop on to the second (the rocker bottom), down which it will pass till impeded by the small stones and sand retained by the bar.
“The rocking motion, by aid of the water, throws the gold to the centre of the machine. When ten buckets have been washed through in this way (if the work be properly performed), on pouring water gently through the machine, keeping up an easy rocking motion for a very short time, and then discontinuing the operation, a cone will be found to be formed on the bottom, and the materials ranked in the following order, commencing at the lowest part of the inclination, which will form the base of the cone: 1st, small stones and sand; 2nd, emery; 3rd, gold; the apex of the cone being fine gold. The order observed by bodies when influenced by the attraction of gravitation being exactly reversed. The water first carrying the lightest particle before it to the extremity of the machine, and the heaviest being left the last and highest.
“It is also essential, before rejecting the washed material left on the inclined plane, that it be brought up to the top of the rocker, and water poured gently down the first inclined board (slide), and re-rocked, so as to obtain any portions of gold which, from their size or shape, have opposed a sufficient surface of water to enable that element to carry it too much below the apex of the cone. When the order described prevails, the machine and rocking may be said to be - the one accurately made, and the other performed. In this way the finest gold may be procured with very little, if any loss.
 “In the absence of more complicated contrivances, the following mode of separating the gold from the soil is at once simple and efficacious: Make a wooden gutter [sluice box], a foot in breadth, and 10 or more feet in length. Place it in a slightly inclined position, so that the water will easily run off. Reduce the soil to be washed to a thick pasty consistence, then place it in the upper end of the gutter. Pour on it a gentle stream of water, and if the operation is well managed, all will be washed away except the gold and heavy stones.
“Another equally good and simple method, is to place in the river a shallow tub, with its top a few inches below the water’s surface. Into this tub the auriferous soil should be dropped, and the whole kept stirring, when the running stream will carry away the lighter particles, and leave the gold and large stones behind.
“Besides the above, there are quicksilver [Mercury] machines of varied construction, to be bought in London, all the more or less excellent in their way, and doubtless well worthy of the notice of the wealthy emigrant. But as the man of limited means should go out unincumbered with heavy, or cumbrous articles, his wiser plan would be, if he requires it, to make his own quicksilver machine at the diggings, or on board the ship during the voyage. This with wood, nails, ordinary tools, and ingenuity, he can do in about a day. The following is a description of one by a Californian miner: ‘This machine is about 6 feet long, by about 18 inches broad, having a plate of iron the whole length, with three eighth inch holes bored or punched in it about 1 inch from each other. Below this is the rifle-box [Riffle], also the whole length, with 8 or 9 partitions of rifles [riffles], into each of which about a pound and a half or two pounds of quicksilver is placed. The earth, stones, &c., are thrown upon the iron plate, through which the earth passes with the gold into the rifles [riffles] below, while the stones go off at the lower end; when the machine is in motion the quicksilver traverses through the dirt and amalgamates with the gold, while the dirt and pebbles are washed out of the machine by the force of the water, leaving the silver [Mercury or Quicksilver] behind containing the gold.
“ ‘At night the whole of the amalgam is taken out, washed clear of the earth, emery, &c., and then strained through a leather bag, by which it is reduced to a thick paste, from which the quicksilver is separated by distillation in a retort, leaving the gold in one solid piece.
“ ‘The rocker must be worked regularly and steadily, not even stopping for an instant unless when cleaning the box; and when properly managed, it is very profitable. On the other hand, if it is not conducted properly, not only will there be no gold saved, but most likely a great portion of the silver [Mercury or Quicksilver] will be lost; as much as 50 lbs. having been lost by mismanagement in one week’s labour. To do it justice, eight men are required for one machine: two in the pit digging, two bringing the dirt in wheelbarrows, one man rocking, one pumping, one supplying the machine, and one taking away the stones as the they come out.’
“At the diggings, the gold-dust and nuggets are the chief circulating medium. The Commissioner, the store-keeper, the medical practitioner, the postman, the butcher, the blacksmith, the travelling pedlar, and the carrier, all have their weights and scales for weighing the virgin gold tendered in payment. Several cases of false weights and balances have been detected at the gold-fields; it is, therefore, proper that each party of diggers should have their for their own use and satisfaction, a set of well-made, and nicely adjusted gold scales and weights, which may be bought either in England or in Australia for a few shillings. It may be well to state that the colonists, following the example of the mother country, barter their gold only by troy weight.
“The very low price given by the tradespeople and others at the diggings (from L2 10s. to L3 per oz.), for the gold, which, being finer than standard, is in this country worth upwards of L3 17s. 10 1/2d per oz., prevents the more careful miners from disposing of the precious metal to persons at the diggings, except to provide themselves with ordinary necessaries. Indeed, in Australia, gold is so plentiful in the market, and its state of fineness so difficult to be obtained, that all who can, ship it to England on their own account; and the Sydney merchants are now realizing more by this than by any other investment. The miner, who is the great sufferer by this state of things, should, before disposing of his gold to the not too scrupulous colonial merchant, assay a portion of it, and ascertain its true value. This he could readily do, as assaying is so simple an art that any one after a little practice can perform the operation, which may be thus briefly detailed.
“The assay weights are made with the nicest regard to precision. They are technically termed carats, four grains going to a carat, and 24 carats to the pound troy; and as there are 12 grains troy to every 24 carats, or 1 grain troy to every two carats, an assay might readily be made with the troy weights only.
“Presuming then that the assayer is about performing the operation after the method employed in the public assay offices in England, he thus proceeds : - If, from the appearance of the gold, he judges it to be of 18 carats fineness, he then adds to 24 carats, or 12 actual grains of the gold, 36 carats, or 18 grains troy, of the finest silver, being exactly double the weight of the presumed fineness of the gold. The gold and silver, which together will weigh 30 grains troy, represented by 60 carats, is next wrapped up in a piece of thinly flatted lead, and the whole moulded into shape in an ordinary bullet-mould, and placed in a cupel, a small vessel made of burnt bone-ash, and which can be readily purchased in England. The cupel is then placed in a furnace, and there left for about twenty-five minutes (the exact time can only be determined by experience), when it is taken out, and if all has proceeded well, the lead will have descended into the cupel, carrying with it any of the lesser metals that were present, and leaving a button of pure gold and silver. This button is taken out of the cupel, and hammered or rolled out, until it is about as thin as writing paper, after which it is immersed in diluted nitric acid. In a short time the acid will have dissolved and precipitated the silver; and the gold, which from not being acted on by the acid, retains its solidity, can with a blow-pipe, be converted into a button of pure fine gold. To complete the process, the operator now weighs the button. If it weigh 22 carats, then the gold of which it forms a sample is said to be standard, or of 22 carat fineness. If, as is generally the case with Australian gold, it weighs more, then according to its increased weight it is so much above the standard fineness.
“In order to conduct the assay with efficacy, the operator must bear in mind that the use of the lead is to carry away whatever base metals are mixed with the gold; that silver always exists in more or less abundance in native gold, and that tin he operation in the cupel, only the baser metals are extracted. Consequently a large quantity of fine silver must be added, otherwise the gold which is not acted upon by the acid, would protect the silver from the acid’s influence too. But, be it remembered, that if too large a quantity of silver is used, then the gold is precipitated in a small black powder, which is difficult to collect. When the about [sic] proportions are used, and the operation is otherwise rightly conducted, the assayed gold is of a malleable texture, and of a rich brown colour, and quite pure. By carefully attending to the above simple explanations, every Australian miner, who possesses the necessary apparatus, may become his own assayer.
“There are other methods of assaying, but as they are less certain in their result than the method of cupellation here detailed, they must from want of space be passed over.”
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