The first set of old workings which we visited was
only a few hundred yards from Mr. Fleming’s huts,
and consisted of rows of vertical shafts, now filled up
with rubbish, sunk along the edge of the auriferous
reef, and presumably, from instances we saw later,
communicating with one another by horizontal shafts
below. "We saw also several instances of sloping
and horizontal shafts, all pointing to considerable
engineering skill. It must have been ages since these
shafts were worked, for they are all filled nearly to
the surface with debris, and huge machabel-trees, the
largest in the vicinity, are growing out of them. We
then proceeded to visit some old workings about a
mile and a half off on the hill slopes. One vertical
shaft had been cleared out by Mr. Fleming s workmen,
and it was fifty-five feet deep. Down this we went
with considerable difficulty, and saw for ourselves the
ancient tool marks and the smaller horizontal shafts
which connected the various holes bored into the gold-
bearing quartz.
I am told that near Hartley Hills some of these
old workings go down even to a greater depth, and
that one has been cleared out to the depth of eighty
feet, proving incontestably that the ancient workers
of these mines were not content with mere surface
work, and followed the reef with the skill of a modern
miner.
All about here the ground is honeycombed with
old shafts of a similar nature, indicated now by small
round depressions in straight lines along the reef
where different shafts had been sunk f in fact, the
output of gold in centuries long gone by must have
been enormous.
Since the modern invasion of this gold-producing
district a considerable amount of prospecting has been
done, but of necessity time has not allowed of a
thorough investigation of the country. Wherever the
gold prospector has been, he finds instances of ancient
working, and these old shafts extend all up the country
wherever the gold-bearing quartz is to be found.
There are ruins similar to those at Zimbabwe and the
old workings in the Tati district. The old workings and
ruins extend for miles and miles up the Mazoe Valley.
Numerous old shafts are to be found at Hartley Hills,
and on the ’Mswezwe River. Near Fort Victoria and
in the immediate vicinity of Zimbabwe the prospectors'
have lately brought to light the same features;
everywhere, in short, where the pioneer prospectors
have as yet penetrated overwhelming proof of the
extent of the ancient industry is brought to light.
Mr. E. A. Maund thus speaks of the old workings in
the ’Mswezwe district: 1 | On all sides there was testimony
of the enormous amount of work that had
been done by the ancients for the production of gold.
Here, as on the Mazoe and at TJmtali, tens of
thousands of slaves must have been at work taking
out the softer parts of the casing of the reefs, and
millions of tons have been overturned in their search
for gold.’
In all these places, too, as in the Mazoe Valley,
especially down by the streams, are found crushing-
1 Lecture before the Colonial Institute, April 12,1892.