OPERATIONS OF THE RAILWAYS OF MASSACHUSETTS (CONTINUED.)

gravel carried in the cars.... Number of tons of merchandise and

Number of passengers hauled one

Number of passengers carried in the

JOURNAL OF MINING AND MANUFACTURES.

THE GOLD PRODUCT OF AUSTRALIA AND CALIFORNIA COMPARED.

From a series of elaborate statistical tables prepared by Mr. Khull-for the last four years a bullion broker in Melbourne--and published with editorial indorsement in the latest copy of the Melbourne Herald received, the San Fran cisco Herald gives the total yield of the Victoria gold mines for the year 1855. An analysis of these tables shows :——

The quantity of gold dust brought to Melbourne and Geelong by escort

PRODUCTS OF The gold fields, AS SHOWN BY ESCORT RECEIPTS.

Besides the amount above specified, Mr. Khull estimates that there were taken, by private hand, to Adelaide, 7,500 ounces; to Sydney, 35,900 ounces; to Tasmania, 3,278 ounces. These tables show :

The amount actually exported from Victoria in 1855, as per customs returns, was 2,674,677 ounces. The average price in Melbourne was 80 shillings, or $19 36 per ounce.

This would give a total value to the exports of.
Exported in 1855 from California.....

Difference in favor of Australia ..

$51,791,749

45,192,600

$6,599,149

It must be borne in mind that the Australian records employed above include only the shipments from the colony of Victoria. Those from New South Wales (Sydney) are not accessible. They are, however, comparatively small.

The following table shows the comparative exports of gold from Victoria and California during the last four years :—

The shipments from Sydney (New South Wales) during the same years, not included in the above, would about equal this difference, making the total exports of gold from the whole of Australia during the past four years about the same as from California. In round numbers, $200,000,000 has been exported from each of the rival gold countries in four years making an addition of $400,000,000 in that time to the circulating medium in the Atlantic States and Europe.

In estimating the total value of the gold produced by Australia, the ounce is fixed at 80 shillings, or $19 36, while the California gold is estimated at only $17 50 per ounce. It would seem from this, that the number of ounces of gold exported from our State has been very much larger than the number from Australia, although the value is nearly the same.

Mr. Khull gives also the following statistics of the arrivals and departures during the year 1855 :-

Arrivals overland from Sydney and Adelaide, and estimated in-
crease from births...

10,000

Total increase of population.......

50,124

The weekly arrival of emigrants in 1855 amounts to 1,200, against 1,500 in 1854; while the departures from the colony show that 500 weekly have emigrated, against 600 in 1854.

In commenting upon these statistics, the Melbourne Herald says :

"It has been argued that the yield of gold, as compared with the number of persons now in the colony, showed a less remunerative rate per head than in previous years; whereas Mr. Khull, by careful investigation, establishes the fact that while the increase to our population for the past year has been at the rate of 20 per cent over the year 1854, the increase in the gold produce during the same period has been at the rate of 35 per cent. Again, from the multiplicity of experiments reported in quartz crushing, speculations have been indulged in that the old-fashioned mode of obtaining the gold was rapidly declining, and that it was to quartz-crushing operations that we are indebted for sustaining our auriferous produce. Yet Mr. Khull vouches for the fact, as based upon diligent inquiries, that quartz crushing during the past year has only added about 20,000 ounces, or scarcely one hundred and fiftieth part of the gross yield, to the whole amount of gold raised in the colony. This is not a very gratifying result to the successful crushers; but with the evidence that exists of the highly remunerative character of our quartz reefs, under a more perfect and economical system, it is a circumstance for great rejoicing to the colonists, as showing that this branch of their auriferous wealth is hitherto scarcely touched, and remains to be added to the alluvial gold produce; while it also shows that the latter is vastly increasing in amount, instead of becoming small by degrees and beautifully less.'"

GUTTA PERCHA AND INDIA RUBBER.

These two articles, which were scarcely known when the Merchants' Magazine was established in 1839, now occupy a large space in the commerce and industry of the world. Very many persons, says our cotemporary, the Southern Argus, when they first arise in the morning, take a bath in a gutta percha tub, comb their hair with a gutta percha comb, and shave with a gutta percha handled razor, sharpened on a gutta percha razor strop, before a mirror with a gutta percha frame; eat their breakfast on a gutta percha table cover, and over a gutta percha crumb-cloth, and after they have finished, take their gutta percha walking-stick and sally forth to their business; and if it is raining, don themselves from head to foot in gutta percha garments. And yet many of these intelligent people are totally ignorant of the article which they use so extensively, and many imagine that it is a preparation of the old fashioned India rubber.

Mr. E. L. Simpson, of New York, a gentleman of eminence in the scientific world, sheds some light on this subject, and furnishes a succinct and most interesting account of the discovery and properties of this article.

Perhaps no material was ever discovered which was so soon extensively shipped as an article of commerce-taken up so eagerly, and manufactured at once so extensively, as has been the article of gutta percha.

The first that was known of this wonderful production by the Europeans, was in the year 1845, when Doctor Montgomerie, an English gentleman, residing at Singapore, observed in the hands of a Malayan wood chopper, a strange material used for a handle to his axe. On learning from him that it was made from the sap of a tree, which soon solidified on being exposed to the air; also, that by the use of hot water it could not only be made plastic, but made to take (and when cool retain) any desired form, he immediately obtained samples of the material, which were forwarded to the London Society of Arts and Sciences, with the best description he could obtain regarding them.

These samples arrived in England about the time the importance of the discovery for vulcanizing India ruber was made known, and the vast monopolies created by the issue of rubber patents. The London Society, equally impressed with the singular properties of these strange samples, lost no time in having them examined and reported upon, which report was of such a character as to create a great excitement, and to induce large orders for its importation, which continued so to increase, that in 1848, its importation amounted to 21,598 piculs, valued at $275.190.

This article is produced from a juice or sap, taken from the Isonandra or Gutta tree, which is indigenous to all the islands of the Indian Archipelago, and especially to the Malayan Peninsular, Borneo, Ceylon, and their neighborhoods, in which are found immense forests of it-all yielding this product in great abundance. Its fruit contains a concrete edible oil, which is used by the natives with their food.

In its crude state, gutta percha has no resemblance whatever to India rubber, nor are its chemical or mechanical properties the same, nor does the tree from which it is taken belong to the same family of trees, or grow in the same soil; yet, from the fact that it can be dissolved, and wrought into water-proof wares, many, not informed on the subject, have inclined to the belief that the two materials are identically, or very nearly the same. But nothing could be more erroneous, as may be seen by the following comparisons, which prove that India rubber and gutta percha are chemically and mechanically, as well as commercially, very dif ferent :

India rubber, or caoutchouc, is produced from a milk-white sap, taken chiefly from the Sephonca Cahuca tree, afterwards coagulated, and the whey pressed out or dried off by heat-the residue is the India rubber of commerce.

Gutta percha is produced from the Isonandra or Gutta tree; is of a brownish color, and when exposed to air, soon solidifies, and forms the gutta percha of com

merce.

India rubber of commerce is of a gummy nature, not very tenacious, and astonishingly elastic.

Gutta percha of commerce is a fibrous material, much resembling the inner coating of white oak bark, is extremely tenacious, and without elasticity, or much flexibility.

India rubber when once reduced to a liquid state by heat, appears like tar, and is unfit for further manufacture.

Gutta percha may be melted and cooled any number of times, without injury for future manufacture.

India rubber, by coming in contact with oil or other fatty substances, is soon decomposed, or ruined for future use.

Gulta percha is not injured by coming in contact with oil or other fatty substances in fact, one good use of it is, for oil cans.

India rubber is soon ruined for future use, if brought in contact with sulphuric, muriatic, and other acids.

Gutta percha resists the action of sulphuric, muriatic, and nearly all other acids -in fact, one great use of it is, for acid vats, &c., and other vessels for holding acids.

India rubber is a conductor of heat, cold, and electricity.

Gutta percha is a Lon-conductor of electricity, as well as of heat and cold. India rubber, in its crude state, when exposed to the action of boiling water, increases in bulk, does not lose its elastic properties and cannot be molded.

Gutta percha, in its crude state, when exposed to the action of boiling water, contracts, and becomes soft like dough or paste, and may then be molded to any shape which it will retain when cool.

India rubber is not a perfect repellent of water, but is more or less absorbent, according to quality.

Gutta percha has an exceedingly fine grain, and its oily property makes it a perfect repellent of liquids.