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THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE OF MINING AND M ETALLURGY-1933

Gold Tellurides are Soluble in Cyanide

BY W. E. JonNSTON*
(An nual Gen eral Meeting, Toronto, Ont., April, 1933)

A T last year's Annual Meeting a paper by Haultain and Johnston was

presented entitled Is the Gold in Tellttrides Soluble in Cyanide? Since then
the writer has continued the study of various phases of this problem. Samples
and specimens of ore from some of the Kirkland Lake mines have been studied
and non gold-bearing tellurides have been found in these that are not soluble
in ordinary mill solutions. Samples of tailings, both old and recent, from
this district have been examined wit)l apparatus and methods that have
prQved very successful in detecting the presence of extremely minute quantities of tel.lurides. Tellurides, both base-metal and gold-bearing, h ave been
discovered in these tailings, but only in such minute quantities that their
presence would not affect the ordinary assay results . More free gold particles
have been found in the tailings than gold-bearing tellurides.
Much experimental work has been done on tellurides, concentrated from
high-grade material and from ordinary run-of-mine ore. The gold-bearing
tellurides behave very much as"does gold itself. Finely divided particles are
dissolved fairly rapidly, coarser particles more slowly. All the tellurides
are soft and brittle .and also have a high specific gravity, with :he result that
they are extremely finely divided in ordinary mill practice.
The ordinary high-lime solution of Kirkl and Lake practice is suitable
for the dissolving 'o f the gold tellurides. Oxygen is necessary, but apparently
not more so than in dissolving gold.
Some particles have been found that appear under the microscope to be
ordinary metallic gold particles, but on heating they show a small telluride
content. These appear to dissolve more slowly than gold.
There is considerable variation in the ratio of tellurides to gold frtJm
different points in the mines . So far the writer has failed to find any connection between this ratio and the richness of the ore. Generally speaking, the
base-metal tell~rides predomi~ate .. Some of these.contain gol d but this m~y
be due to a mixture of tellundes m the one particle.

Attention is. drawn to the following statement appearing in an article by

Swainson and Tucker, describing Lake Shore mill practice, in the Engineering

fi

*Research Assistant, Dept. of Mining Engineering, University of Toronto.

TELLURIDES ARE SOLUBLE IN CYANIDE-DISCUSSION

225

and Mining Journal of December, 1932: "In spite of the fact that this concentrate contains a high percentage of gold tellurides, the extraction is
about 98 per cent." The writer is very curious to know if anybody has any
evidence of the prc;sence of an appreciable percentage of gold-bearing
tellurides in concentrates recoverable from Kirkland Lake tailings.
The work is being continued on samples from Colorado and from West
Austratia. Further details will be presented at a later time. The writer,
howeve~, is satisfied that the tellurides in themselves are no't responsible for
any of the difficulties in the way of high recovery of gold from the Kirkland
Lake ores.

' ' '

DISCUSSION
I

PROFESSOR H. E.T. HAULTAIN: This paper is by way of being a challenge.

It is a direct contradiction of the generally expressed opinion of the metaliurgists, during the past thirty years, of the great gold camps of West Australia, Colorado, and Kirkland La)ce. Or.tario.