William Hepworth Dixon, White Conquest: Volume 1

[156] in Nevada; though the mines are chiefly owned by San Franciscans. Some of these mines, such as the Ophir and the Mexican, have been worked for twenty years. The silver veins are long; four or five miles in length; but as no one has yet traced them out, their value is an unknown figure. From the stores of Virginia, built around the openings of these mines, the silver veins run up a gulch to Gold Hill, where they strike on beds of still more precious ore. Owned by rival companies, the mines are wrought on different plans. Much ore is found, and till a year ago owners of Ophir, Mexican, and Consolidated Virginia, had every reason to be satisfied with their gains. Of late, the yield of Mount Davidson has fallen off. The veins run deeper in the rock, needing more costly engines and more skilful labour. Prices have been depressed, and thrifty persons have been laying up their dollars in savings banks, instead of sinking them in Comstock mines.

Sharp as a shot has come a change.

“I'll tell you how it came about,” says a banker, sitting next to me at dinner. “Five or six of our worthy citizens, owning shares in Consolidated Virginia, met in a drinking-bar of Montgomery Street one ”