r a mining
venture. Directors are invariably incapable of deciding whether a
so-called improvement in machinery or process is really so or not, and
the reasonable course is to follow established precedents.

"(2) The risk of selecting an incompetent manager should be reduced to
minimum by taking a man with a successful record in the particular work
to be done. The manager selected should be prohibited, as much as the
directors, from experimenting with new methods or machinery. A really
experienced man will require no check in this direction, as he will not
risk ruining his reputation.

"(3) The only time for a company to experiment is when the mine is
paying well by the usual methods, and the treasury is in a condition to
speculate a little in possible improvements without jeopardising regular
returns."

Probably this is the best place to insert another word of warning to
directors who are not mining specialists, and also to investors in gold
mining shares. Assays of auriferous lode material are almost invariably
worthless as a guide in the real value of the stone in quantity. The one
way to decide this is by battery treatment in bulk, and then only after
many tons have been put through. The reason is obvious. First, the
prospector or company promoter, if he knows it, is not in the least
likely to pick the worst piece of stone in the heap for assay; and,
secondly, even should the sample be selected with the sole object of
getting a fair result, no living man can judge the value of a gold lode
by the result of treatment of an ounce of stone. So when you see it
stated that Messrs. Oro and Gildenstein, the celebrated assayers, have
found that a sample of rock from the Golden Mint Mine, Golconda, assays
at the rate of 2,546 oz. 13 dwt. and 21 gr. to the ton, and that there
are thousands of tons of similar stone in sight, the statement should
be received with due caution. The assay is doubtless correct, but the
deductions therefrom are most misleading.

A few words of advice also to directors of mine-purchasing companies and
syndicates, of which there are now so many in existence, may probably be
found of value. It is not good policy as a general rule to buy entirely
undeveloped properties, unless such have been inspected by your own man,
who is both competent and trustworthy, and who should have indeed an
interest in the profits. Large areas, although so popular in England,
do not compensate for large bodies of payable