Low-grade meaning

The output is to-day relatively small in comparison with that of many other fields, but there are one or two permanent gold mines of great value working low-grade ore.

In small works the cupellation is finished in one furnace, and the resulting low-grade silver fined in a plumbago crucible, either by overheating in the presence of air, or by the addition of silver sulphate to the melted silver, when air or sulphur trioxide and oxygen oxidize the impurities.

In the case of the cheaper and more abundant minerals, such as coal and iron ore, and of large deposits of low-grade ores, the extent and character of the deposit can generally be determined by surface examinations at comparatively small expense.

The Alaska gold was derived almost wholly from the large low-grade quartz mines of Douglas Island prior to 1899, but in that year an important district was discovered at Cape Nome, on the north-western coast.

Large deposits of phosphate occur in Russia, and those in the neighbourhood of Kertch have attracted some attention; it is said that the Cretaceous rocks between the rivers Dniester and Volga contain very large supplies of phosphate, though probably of low grade.