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later crosscut after the ground was partly drained. It is stated that the
gold found did not pay for drifting. A shaft was sunk about 74 feet near the
end of the tunnel, but not to bedrock, and there is an air shaft for the tunnel
about 600 feet fromthe mouth. A number of borings were made near thejunc-
tion of Oregon creek with Chisholm creek, but not to bedrock, and were for
the purpose of determining the gold values in the surface gravels, and the
thickness of the gravel. Hydraulicking of the surface gravels of the creek
was carried on for two seasons during search for a buried channel, but the
work is said not to have paid. It is difficult to understand why these
borings did not definitely determine whether a side-hill rock channel or
bench existed and whether, if it existed, it carried sufficient gold to pay
for drifting. A marked feature of the valley is its thick content of glacial
deposits, largely boulder clay. This thick mass of clay which, in places,
extends down to bedrock, is not conducive to the occurrence of gold,
especially if the clay extended to, or nearly to, bedrock in the deep channel.
It appears to extend to bedrock only in places, for bedrock gravels, judging
by the old mine dump, were mined at the Snowdon and they are reported
to occur in the McPherson channel. The large amount of boulder clay
deposited by the ice in Chisholm Creek valley, and the very small amount
in the channel of Lightning creek above Stanley, may be explained by the
fact that Chisholm Creek valley is wide and deep, whereas the stream is
very short and small. Consequently during the disappearance of the ice
there was little opportunity for the deposition of stream (fluvioglacial)
gravels in the valley, but in Lightning Creek valley, which carried a large
volume of water from the melting ice, gravels would be deposited rather
than boulder clay. Boulder clay in the valley also precludes the probability
of underlying pre-Glacial gravels, for they could hardly have escaped erosion
by the ice in such a broad and deep valley.

Considerable prospecting work was done, by the Cariboo Chisholm
Creek Company and by J. F. Williams, high up on the east side of Chisholm
creek, and in a pass leading to the head of Perkins gulch, and running
parallel to Lightning creek. A number of shafts were sunk, several tunnels
run, and ground-sluicing carried on in the upper part of Dry gulch. Mr.
Williams states that some coarse, well-worn gold was found, but no definite
pay-streaks.

Perkins Creek

Perkins creek, the lower part of which is shown on Figure 26, is a
small stream flowing into Lightning creek from the southwest slope of
Burns mountain. Coarse, nuggety gold is reported to. have been found,
in the early days, in shallow ground in the upper part of the creek and con-
siderable drifting was done in the lower part of the creek. At the mouth
the rock channel is narrow, but just above the mouth it widens and on both
sides there are rock benches or old channels of the creek which were mined
by drifting and later to some extent by hydraulicking. High drift hills
line both sides of the creek near the mouth and the old driftings inside
the mouth extend beneath the hills parallel to Lightning creek. Hydraul-
icking has been done on the creek for a number of years by Messrs. Sparks
and Felker who have operated two plants, one about one-half mile up the

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