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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 72
Gold in Matabeleland
Gold in Matabeleland.
In sketching the progress made in Mashonaland since the occupation in 1890 I have given some account of the amount of gold-reef traced and the development accomplished in that territory. A few words may be said here on the subject of gold in Matabeleland, considered by all those who have travelled or lived in that country to be of great extent. The best known of the gold districts is the Tati gold-field, where mining has been carried on for some time, the reefs being rich and extensive. Insecurity and want of necessary capital have been the chief agents in delaying the development of this field, which is certain to become one of great importance; the difficulty of procuring labour, supplies, and bringing the requisite machinery to site, and the unhealthiness have also contributed to prevent much progress being made.
It is not until climbing out of the Limpopo basin, and surmounting the ridge, that you enter Matabeleland proper. Here outstretched before one is what will prove the largest and richest gold-field that the world has ever seen; extending from this great granite backbone in the south to within about sixty miles of the Zambesi in the north, and from the Sabi in the east to the Nata River in the west. The huge auriferous area ever improves and grows richer to the north, north-east, and east. The Matabele have never allowed any search for gold in the land actually inhabited by them; but the signs which greet the traveller's notice—the immense waves of promising quartz which seam the country, cutting through the soft soapy slate in a north-easterly direction; the numberless old workings to be found in every direction, and the inability of some of the reefs to hide their gold from the prying though cautious gaze of the observant white man—all tend to prove the wonderful mineral wealth here locked up.
Right through the Royal town of Buluwayo runs an immense reef earning visible gold. Close alongside Umvotcha (the country residence of Lo Bengula) is another great reef, also unable to hide the gold im- page 62
prisoned within its bosom. Two miles to the north-east of the old capita is yet another grand quartz reef with "visible." All these reefs have been traced for some miles. But to the north of Gangane lie what I believe will eventually prove to be the alluvial gold-fields of the world. The neighbourhood of the Amazoe River and its tributary streams is a veritable El Dorado. I have seen ignorant natives, with the rudest appliances and practically no knowledge of gold-working, wash large quantities of gold from the surface soil. Over an area of several hundred square miles gold is to be found in every stream.
