Forced labour in the mines—Silver and bloodshed—History of discovery—Guanajuato—theveta Madre—Spanish methods—Durango—Zacatecas—Pachuca—Thepatioprocess—Quicksilver from Peru—Cornish miners' graves—Aztec mining—Spanish advent—Old mining methods—Romance of mining—The Cerro de Mercado—Guanajuato and Hidalgo—Real del Monte—Religion and mining—Silver and churches—Subterranean altars—Mining and the nobility—Spanish mining school—Modern conditions—The mineral-bearing zone—Distribution of minerals geographically—Silver—Thepatioprocess—Gold-mining and production—El Oro and other districts—Copper—Other minerals—General mineral production—Mining claims and laws.
"Grant me, oh! rock-ribbed matrix, here to knowThy minerall'd sanctuary;To none but me the sesame disclose,Un-oped since chaos fled!"
"Grant me, oh! rock-ribbed matrix, here to knowThy minerall'd sanctuary;To none but me the sesame disclose,Un-oped since chaos fled!"
There is much of interest and something of pathos and romance attending the old mines of Spanish-American countries—Mexico, Peru, and others. They are so interwoven with the history of these countries, so redolent of the past, and of the hope, despair, piety, greed of the old taskmasters who worked them, and of the generations of toiling Indian workers who spent their lives in wresting treasure from the bowels of the earth. Religion, superstition, cruelty have marked their exploitation in past ages, and as we explore their grim abandoned corridors, and pass half fearfully their yawning pits, our imagination might conjure up some phantoms of thosewho toiled amid these old scenes of man's sweat and avarice.
The cruelty innate in the Spanish race has been shown in their mining methods, and the native population of Mexico, and in a larger scale of Peru, suffered severely at their hands. Guanajuato, one of the most famous and richest of the mining centres of Mexico—in past times as to-day—bears in its archives the stories of oppression which marked the methods of the Spaniards, and may be taken as a concrete example. It was a system of slavery under which these mines were worked—an atrocious system of forced labour which took no heed of Indian life, save as it might most cheaply extract a given quantity of gold or silver ore from the pits and adits beneath the ground. Thousands ofpeoneswere impressed into this forced labour; armed soldiers were stationed at the entrances of these labyrinths to see that each wretched serf deposited his sack of rock, under the load of which he had toiled up fathoms of notched pole, or ladder, from the infernal regions below, panting, sweating, expiring, and presently driven down again by the brutal taskmasters, jealous lest he might enjoy too much of the light of day and so sacrifice some moments in the delving amid the rocks which furnished the wealth. In 1619, a law was promulgated in Guanajuato—it remains upon the archives to this day—prohibiting the branding of slaves upon the face!
But these inhuman methods brought about their own punishment. The great Valenciana mine, opened in 1760, which for fifty years was worked at a sacrifice of human life by these methods, producing more than 300 million dollars, became at last the scene of a terrible vengeance, for the serfs rose in rebellion and massacred every white man upon the place. Indeed, the brutalities practised by the Spanish mine-owners largely influenced the revolution and secession from the mother country.
For more than three centuries there flowed from the mines of Mexico and Peru, millions and millions of silver and gold, which went to fill the needy coffers ofSpain, to enrich a distant and callous or careless monarch, and to prop up a moribund nation. The appalling system of themitadand theencomenderos, by which silver and gold were extracted with indecent haste, form such pages as can never be erased from the history of metallurgy in the New World.
Yet there is another light in which to regard the picture of Mexican mining, and remembering that mining operations, whether in the sixteenth or the twentieth century, whether in Spanish-America or elsewhere, ever embody conditions of usury and oppression, we may turn to this more pleasing aspect. For unless under grave oppression, the native miner, be it on the plateau of Anahuac, or in the Andine Cordillera, has been a zealous worker. His picturesque surroundings, simple mode of life, and easy-going disposition, together with the pervading sentimental attributes which his religion lent, and the sunny skies under which he toiled, took from mining much of the material brutality and grey atmosphere which enshroud it in Anglo-Saxon communities.
Mining was a source of enrichment which appealed strongly to the Spanish nature, and it must not be forgotten that to the efforts of the men of Spain the science of mining owes much. And, indeed, these remote waste places of the earth owe the civilisation they possess to the early work of theseConquistadores. The Anglo-Saxon world prides itself on the great discoveries and exploitations which have marked epochs in its gold- and silver-getting history, Australia, California, Nevada, Africa; but we shall not forget that Mexico and Peru were yielding up stores of gold and silver centuries before Captain Cook sailed, or before those historic nuggets were found by accident in Sutter's mill-stream, in the Californian Sierra region. Scarcely six years after the Conquest the silver of Mexico was being eagerly sought, and easily found, with that remarkableolfatopossessed by the Spaniards. Shakespeare was at work, and Drake was voyaging under the Elizabethan ægis at the time whenthe great silver mines of the Mexican Sierra Madre were giving up their rich ores to treatment.
At Guanajuato, one of the most famous of the silver mining centres, prospecting was begun in 1525, only a few years after the Conquest, and the mining regions still further away to the north, as those of the famous Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi, had already been discovered. History relates that the silver deposits of Guanajuato were discovered as a result of a camp-fire, made by some muleteers, who found refined silver among the ashes, melted from the rock beneath! Shortly after the middle of the sixteenth century the greatVeta Madre, or "mother lode," of Guanajuato was pierced, with an ore-body 100 feet wide. This place, which to-day boasts a population of fifty thousand souls, had begun to grow and was granted a charter as aVilla Realat the beginning of the seventeenth century. This before the sailing of theMayflower! So, as we look back upon those strenuous times of Mexican mining, we shall see much of good arising from the metallurgical conquest. We have a vision of fair cities, established within mountain fastnesses, within fertile plains, long centuries before the advent of the locomotive, cities whose wealth came from the fabulous riches of the great silver mines, whose ore was quarried from its lodes and deposits, cities where fine cathedrals arose, built from the taxes levied upon the product of these mines, by which fortunate national trait some good at least was perpetuated for the inhabitants and toilers who produced it. Does the mining director and shareholder of to-day loosen his greedy and capacious pocket for such works? We might ask the toiling nigger—Kaffir, or Chinese, and his Jewish employer in the mines of Africa. The Spaniards did not suck out the wealth of Mexico's soil only to enrich a decadent monarch and his coffers, thousands of miles away, for which we have reproached them. Some of the wealth their enterprise produced formed beautiful cities and made the desert blossom where, before, savage tribes of Indians roamed; and stimulated great thoughts and actions inmen whose historic names remain upon the country's history.
It was a laborious journey from Spain to Mexico in those days, and mining was marked by difficulties due to the remoteness of the region from means of communication, and also from the hostile Indian tribes, who resented the advent of the white man into their territory. An example of the tenacity and courage of the invaders against these odds is shown in the founding of the fine city of Durango, 350 years ago. At that time this region was the home of savage tribes of Indians, who continually made raids upon the Spaniards. A marvellously rich mine, the Avino, worked as a huge open quarry, which exists to-day, was deeded by its owner to those white inhabitants there who would consent to build their houses together for mutual protection. Thus the beginning of the city of Durango was made.
Another famous mining centre in those early days, just as it is at present, was Zacatecas, and its name alone conveys the idea of silver and gold. In 1546 it was, that a lieutenant of Cortes, traversing the country, arrived there, observed its promise of mineral wealth, and formed a settlement. So rapidly did the place become renowned that, forty years afterwards, a Royal Charter was given to the city, and a coat of arms, with the title, "Noble and Loyal." The curious archives of the Alvarado Mines—they were worked by Fernando Cortes—which were kept, and which show the care in these matters exercised by the Spaniards, still exist; as is the case, indeed, with the records of many of the great mining centres of Mexico and Peru. Here it is shown that an enormous output of silver was made, the total from 1548 to 1867 amounting to nearly eight hundred million dollars.
The great lodes of the famous mining centre of Pachuca, which at the present day are the most productive, were discovered by the companions of Cortes soon after the Conquest. But knowledge of the great wealth in silver there was held by the Aztecs, who, in fact, showed the main veins to the Spaniards. It was here thatBartolomé de Medina discovered the famous method of treating silver ores by amalgamation with quicksilver, known as thepatioprocess, in 1557. An improvement on his invention came from Peru, in 1783, which was the use of mules instead of men in treading out the crushed ore. From far-away Peru other matters had come, as the quicksilver from the great Huancavelica mines, the mercury necessary for the process. And the beautiful Peruvian pepper trees, which were brought to ornament theplazaof Pachuca by one of the last of the Viceroys from Lima, form another reminiscence of the sister land of the Incas, in Mexico. There is at Pachuca a link with the world of Anglo-Saxon mining—the cemetery where to-day lie the bones of clever Cornish miners, who, in the time of the British revival of Mexican mining, taught the native their more useful methods. There lie these hardy sons of Cornwall, "each in his narrow cell," within the foreign soil whereon he had laboured.
What is the earliest time at which man began to dig for minerals in Mexico? It is not possible to determine this, as it is involved in the obscure history of the races of prehispanic days. But it has been affirmed that the method of recovering gold by amalgamation with quicksilver must have been known to the Maya civilisation which preceded the Aztec times. This is adduced from the discovery of a vessel containing quicksilver, during the excavations, in 1897, of the celebrated ruins of Palenque, in Chiapas. The native miners of Mexico have always won gold from the rocks, it is stated, by the method of crushing ore and treating it with quicksilver in amalgamation, and it is considered that the method has not been derived from the white man, but was handed down from the Mayas. Be this as it may, the early Mexicans carried on regular mining operations, extracting metals and metallic ores from the rocks by means of pits and galleries, and these, in some cases, furnished the Spaniards, after the Conquest, with the first indication of the existence of mineral-bearing veins. Gold was taken, however, among these prehistoric people,mainly from the stream-beds, orplacerdeposits, where it had been concentrated by nature. Gold was used more as a decorative or useful material than as a medium of currency, among the Aztecs, as among the Incas of Peru. However, in Mexico, transparent quills full of gold-dust were used as money. Gold ornaments figured largely in the military pomp and domestic decoration. The wonderful representations of animals and plants which they fashioned, and the remarkable presents of gold and silver which Montezuma made to Cortes, among them two great circular plates "as large as the wheel of a carriage," attest the relative abundance of the precious metal which the early Mexican possessed. How similar were these objects to those which figured in the dramatic scenes enacted in the Andes of Peru nearly three thousand miles away, a few years later, the student will recollect. Cortes told Montezuma that the Spaniards "suffered from a disease, which only gold could cure," and the Aztec monarch sent supplies of the yellow metal to alleviate this!
In addition to the mining and reduction of the ores of the three noble metals, gold, silver, and mercury, which these people understood and practised, were similar operations regarding lead, copper, and tin. Of the two latter they formed an alloy, and made tools of the bronze. Small T-shaped pieces of tin, moreover, were used as a medium of exchange or currency. As to iron, it appears to be the case that they were unacquainted with its use, notwithstanding that the ore of the metal is exceedingly plentiful. Nevertheless, it is stated that iron was mined and wrought into use at Tula, the Toltec centre, in the State of Jalisco, long before the advent of Cortes and the Spaniards.
Regarding the subject of the mining and metallurgy of the Aztecs and their predecessors in prehispanic days, it must be recollected that historical knowledge about it is exceedingly meagre, and the details of their operations in this field of industry are buried in much obscurity.
The Spanish advent wrought a marked change in thehistory of mining in the country. The Spaniards began to work mines as early as 1526, and continued their exploitation until 1810, the time of the War of Independence, at which period the value of the yearly output was 27,000,000 dollars. There was a general expulsion of the Spaniards in 1829. It was, however, in 1700 that the most marked period of Spanish mining began. The production of gold and silver from 1522 to 1879, according to the most reliable authorities, is given approximately as 3,725,000,000 dollars, of which gold formed 4 to 8 per cent. Indeed, the staple product of Mexico has ever been silver, in those remote times as it is to-day, and it has been calculated that possibly one-third of the existing quantity of silver in the world has come from the lodes of the Sierra Madre of Mexico.
The early Spaniards, whilst they did not despise the indication left or given by the Aztecs in the discovery of rich mines, struck out for themselves and found the great lodes which yielded fabulous fortunes in silver to their fortunate owners. These adventurous spirits spread over the whole of the country bordering upon the Sierra Madres, stimulated by the rich finds of silver mines successively made in one region or another. They have left old workings in almost every region where minerals exist, and they extracted greatbonanzaswith their crude, old-fashioned appliances. Ancient corkscrew-like workings, analogous more to the burrowings of animals than the excavations of man, honeycomb the crests of lodes and veins in every part of the country. After yielding fortunes to their workers these mines were abandoned, not because they were worked out, but for lack of appliances for drainage and hoisting, and in this condition, flooded or caved-in, remain innumerable of their old treasure-chambers to this day.
But not all the Spaniards' workings were of this nature. Magnificent tunnels were run by them into the bowels of hills, tunnels whose enormous dimensions excite the wonder of the mining engineer of to-day. In some instances thesesocavones, or great adits, are of such asize that a mounted horseman can enter with ease, or a locomotive might easily traverse them. Indeed, the engineer of to-day hesitates to attack the mountain sides with such bold adits as the Spaniard, with inferior materials, drove into them. Similar tunnels were driven by the Spaniards in some of the famous mines of Peru.[33]
33 See my book, "The Andes and the Amazon."
Ancient ore-reduction works,arrastres, canals, ditches, excavations, tunnels, pits, ruined buildings, and in some cases falling church walls, all of this bygone age, are encountered throughout the country, scattered far and wide. Those who lived and moved and had their being therein lie mingled with the dust these centuries past, and kind nature has often covered up the evidences of their handiwork with flower and foliage.
There was a steady flow of the two precious metals to the City of Mexico from the innumerable mines of the regions which produced them. To attempt to describe these mines, even those renowned for their richness, would fill a chapter alone. Fantastic displays of wealth are recorded by the owners of some of the great silver-producing mines—the bridal chambers of a palace, lined by the father of a bride with silver bars; the footpath from theplazato the church paved with great silver ingots, for the bridal party.
A famous hill of iron—standing on the plains of Durango, stands out also from the historical vista of metallurgical discovery of those early days. In 1552 Vasquez de Mercado, a Spaniard of wealth and family in Mexico, living in Guadalajara, heard from the Indians that a great mountain of pure silver existed on the boundless plateau far to the north. Arming an expedition he set forth with this vain illusion actuating him, and travelled on day after day expecting that every sunrise would gleam upon the burnished slopes of this silver mountain. Battles were fought with the savage Indians who inhabited the plains, but vanquishing these the deluded party pushed on. At last, on the horizon, the hill rose; they approached it: it was iron! Sleeping sore-hearted at itsbase that night, Mercado and his companions were attacked by Indians, various soldiers killed, and he himself wounded. Returning homeward towards Guadalajara, the unfortunate leader succumbed to his wounds, fatigue, and the ridicule of his companions, and he perished. But the great Cerro de Mercado, the hill of iron, still remains one of the wonders of Mexico.
The long years of the struggle for throwing off the dominions of Spain wrought a great change in Mexican mining, and even when independence was accomplished, the warring revolutionary factions of a country divided against itself destroyed all sense of security, alienated the labour, and so mining fell into disuse, and the mines into ruins. The history of the great Guanajuato silver mines is typical of the effect political conditions exercised upon this industry. The great output of silver from the Valenciana mine—300 million dollars during the last half of the eighteenth century—fell, after the first decade of the nineteenth, to insignificant proportions. The city was attacked in 1810, when in the zenith of her production, by the revolutionary army of the Republicans under Hidalgo, the famous instigator of independence. Sanguinary struggles took place in the city, which fell, and with it the mining industry. Work was stopped; the waters flooded the shafts and galleries, general lawlessness took the place of order, and bands of armed robbers helped themselves at will to the silver, and made forced loans upon the community. Indeed, at the great mining centres throughout the country, Mexican mine buildings resemble fortifications rather than the structures of a peaceable industry; those which were constructed during those turbulent times. Battlemented walls and loopholes give some of these places the appearance of the stronghold of robber barons of the Middle Ages, and remind the traveller, under the peacefulrégimeof to-day, how rapid has been the country's progress.
The troubled times of Iturbide followed, and mining operations practically ceased. The Indians at this period became unruly in some districts, due to the withdrawal ofthe Spanish soldiers who protected the mining communities; and in Sonora, one of the busiest of the mining states, a great uprising of the savage Apaches in 1825 caused the abandoning of towns and industries and the inauguration of a long period of ruin and bloodshed. In 1824 something of a revival had begun, by the operations of English capitalists in the great silver-producing centres of Real del Monte, at Pachuca, as already mentioned, and at Guanajuato. The history of this period at Real del Monte is a remarkable one, not yet forgotten, and the lavish outlay of funds made by the London company in Mexico and the extraordinary speculation upon the shares in London are still pointed to as an example of mining operations as conducted at that period. After spending twenty million dollars and extracting sixteen millions from its mines, the company was wound up in 1848. It was succeeded by a Mexican company, which operated to the present time, when sale has been made to American capitalists. The turbulent times of Maximilian and the struggles later for the Presidency of the Republic among its ambitious and unscrupulous military element in later years told against peaceful industry. Soldiers and bandits vied with each other in extortions and robberies, and the fortifications which it was necessary to construct around the mine buildings attest the state of lawlessness of that period.
Even towards the close of last century life and property were insecure, and men went armed in daylight in the streets of Pachuca even in 1890. At Guanajuato the English company which had acquired the great Valenciana and La Luz mines worked them successfully for years, but often under difficulties due to the raids of revolutionists—as in 1832. But a disastrous period followed, and during the last decade of the nineteenth century the end came. The regeneration of these historic groups of mines which is now taking place is due to American enterprise—the Britishrégimeis over. The Aztec, the Spaniard, the Mexican, the Briton, and the American—each have had their day in taking this treasure of the white metalfrom the mother lodes of Anahuac. Whatever their operations, good or evil, they have in succession done service to the world—putting into circulation added means of currency and commerce.
The extent into which religious matters and emblems entered into mining in these early days in the New World was remarkable. In many cases the entrances to the mines were through elaborate stone doorways, with pillar, capital, and pediment, carved figures of saints, and surmounted by a cross. Such are often encountered in Mexico and Peru, and they seem rather the portals to a temple than the entrance to a mine. There was some virtue in work which lavished its sentiment and artistic skill upon the surroundings of a purely industrial enterprise. Churches and chapels, in many instances, surmount the hills whose bowels are pierced by shaft and gallery, and upon the walls of these hang strange pictures, depicting, in some places, incidents of mining life and accidents, placed there perchance by some devout one who had escaped from danger. In some cases these churches were built by fortunate men who had become fabulously rich by the discovery of some greatbonanza, and in token of their gratitude to their patron saint who had guided them to so fortunate a destiny they raised the temple which bore his name.
The fine cathedral of Chihuahua, which cost more than half a million dollars, was built from a tax levied upon every pound of silver from the rich Santa Eulalia mine—discovered in 1704—of that region; and in the State of Guerrero, at Taxco, a splendid church was built which cost, it is stated, one and a half million dollars to construct, yielded by the famous mine there. A huge gallery, or tunnel, which was begun by Cortes, forms part of the extensive workings. Another example embodying this strange medley of silver and piety is that of the celebrated shrine, or church, of Guadalupe, near the capital, whose sacred vessels, altar rails, candelabra, and other accessories of a like nature, are formed of silver contributed by the pilgrims who, since the time of thevision which made the place famous, journeyed thither. The weight of the silver contained in these articles is calculated at fifty tons. In the plateau-city of Durango stands a fine cathedral, and this was built from the taxes imposed upon the great Avino mine, and stands as a lasting monument to the great natural wealth of silver which gave it being and which for 350 years has enriched the inhabitants of that favoured spot. In some of the rich mines it is recorded that the miners were permitted to carry out each day a large piece of rich ore, which they presented as an offering to the priest, who devoted the total to the building of a temple. At Catorce a splendid church was so constructed, at a cost of nearly two million dollars.
The great Valenciana mine at Guanajuato, of which mention has been made as the scene of ruthless oppression practised upon the natives by the Spaniards, which terminated in bloody vengeance, left a monument to the fabulous wealth extracted from it. This was built by a miner, one Obregon, who, the chronicles of the city state, became the "richest man in the world." With that almost fanatic and inexhaustible credence and energy which has often characterised the Spanish miner, he drove his adit year after year into the bowels of the great "mother lode"; penniless, ruined at last, without credit, and earning by his losses and persistence the name ofel tonto—"the fool." But—almost as if his patron saint had resolved to teach his detractors a lesson—the reward came. The richestbonanzathat the "mother lode" ever yielded he struck. From the results of this great treasure—a mere fraction of it—he caused the fine Valenciana church to be raised, whose handsome façade still draws the traveller's attention and marks the romantic episode of mining lore which gave it birth. The building of the temple was begun in 1765; its cost was a million dollars.
Ancient and, in many cases, ruined churches, especially in some of the northern states, lie scattered throughout the regions where great mining communities dwelt—nowdead and gone. But religion—or the barbaric custodian of religion, the Inquisition—claimed her victims among the workers of mines. At the beginning of the seventeenth century it was that a rich mine—the Monoloa, in the State of Jalisco—was being worked by one Treviño and his partner, who, having been denounced to the Holy Office by jealous neighbours, they were accused of invoking the aid of the devil in their work. The unfortunate mine-owner was brought to the capital in consequence in 1649 and burned alive!
The Mexican miner, like his brothers of Peru or Chile, not content with the churches and shrines above ground which his religion afforded, often formed chapels and set up images in the subterranean caverns to whose habitation his daily toil condemned him. Shrines and crosses are frequently encountered in the galleries and chambers of Mexican mines now, as ever. Often, candles are kept burning before them throughout the eternal night, which they illuminate, and in some cases the devout among the miners go through these underground labyrinths in their daily toil in the dark, saving their candles to light the shrine! As they pass this bright spot their accustomed hand comes up to make the sign of the cross, and wearied knees humble themselves in a genuflexion. In one of the mines at Guanajuato there is an elaborate underground shrine where as many as two hundred candles burn at times, shedding a radiance which contrasts weirdly with the gloomy depths of worked-out caverns which surround it.
Such vast wealth as was extracted from some of these mines brought not only material riches, but royal honours and State positions to their owners. Titles of nobility were given by the Spanish sovereigns to fortunate mine-owners, some of whom had afforded loans or rendered other services, and they received the high reward of being admitted into the ranks of the Spanish aristocracy. Thus the builder of the great church of Valenciana at Guanajuato, which has been described in this chapter, from plain Antonio Obregon became Count of Valenciana.And, again, another miner of that city, Sardañeta, who drew millions from the famous Rayas mine, from thebonanzawhich his persistent adit upon the "mother lode" laid bare, received the title of Marquis of Rayas. Still another—marquis and viscount—this wonderful city and its silver mountains afforded in Francisco Mathias, the owner and worker of mines upon this mighty ore deposit. To some of these men, as related, there have remained monuments in the great churches they built. The Marquis of Sardañeta raised up the massive and enduring structures which form the buildings of the Rayas mine at Guanajuato, whose striking architectural features of flying buttresses, massive walls, and sculptured portals arrest the traveller's attention. No sheds of props and corrugated roofs are there; but arches, pillars, and walls of solid stone, cut and carved, defying the centuries—and above their portal is the sculptured image of Michael the archangel.
Pachuca, the wonderful silver-producing city not far from the capital of Mexico, produced a Mexican noble. This was Pedro Romero de Terreros, who, in 1739, having discovered a greatbonanza, enriched himself by this characteristic stroke of fortune. He rendered some service to the King—presenting a battleship to the Imperial Navy—and was created a count—Conde de Regla.
It is not to be supposed that the Spanish Government did not recognise, in its demands for bullion from its colony of Mexico, any necessity for scientific advancement in mining. A petition sent to Carlos III. in 1744 by various prominent persons, and originated by one of the foremost miners of the country, secured the Royal assent to the creation of a "Mining Tribunal," and towards the close of the century this was established, with a school where the sons of poor miners received gratuitous education in mining, without distinction of caste or colour. Indeed, the sons of Indian chiefs of the Philippines were brought over and instructed here, and returned later to stimulate gold mining in their native land. A special tax on miners was then imposed for the purpose of raisingan adequate building, and this was completed in 1813, and it has been considered one of the best architectural features of the capital. It contained a special chapel, where services were held for the students up to the time of the Reform, after which it was turned into a library.
Important as mining has been in the past history of Mexico, it is, and must remain, the most important of the industries of the country—in the sense of wealth produced. This does not mean, of course, that it is the most beneficial to the interests of the country and its inhabitants at large, for agriculture is that by which the bulk of the native Mexicans earn their means of subsistence.
The mineral-bearing zone of the country is a very extensive one, and includes all that portion of the Republic traversed by the Sierra Madres and their offshoots. From the State of Sonora in the north, the boundary with the United States, to that of Chiapas in the south—bordering upon the neighbouring Republic of Guatemala—minerals are found. The region in which the most important mining districts exist, and in which the historic mines of Mexico lie, forms a great zone 1,600 miles long—between the States of Sonora in the north to Oaxaca in the south—and 250 miles wide. These more famous and largely-worked mines are chiefly upon the western slope of the Eastern Sierra, and their elevations above sea-level range from 3,000 feet to 9,000 feet, and more. The minerals which are found throughout this great region include almost all those known to commerce, and, more or less in relative order of their importance, are as follows:—
Silver, copper, gold, lead, quicksilver, iron, coal, zinc, salt, antimony, petroleum, sulphur, tin, bismuth, platinum; and others more rarely, as nickel, cobalt, &c. Onyx, marble, opals, emeralds, sapphires, topazes, rubies, are found, and other precious stones, whilst diamonds are said to exist in certain localities. Agates, cornelians, obsidian, are also among the products of this nature.
The following table shows the principal distribution of minerals in the various states:—
The geological formation of the country does not bear special relation to the deposits of metalliferous minerals, which are distributed in many parts of the great zone. In general terms it may be said that the abundance of the ores rather than their richness characterises the mines of Mexico and is the source of their wealth. Those which have most steadily produced bullion generally consisted of a main lode containing enormous quantities of low-grade ore of about 60 ounces per ton; and typical of these are the mines of Guanajuato, Pachuca, Querétaro, Zacatecas, and others. The ores, however, are not always low-grade, for greatbonanzasof exceedingly rich ore were encountered, making rapid fortunes for their discoverers.
Silver.—The main lodes in those places enumerated have ranged up to hundreds of feet in width, and form the most potent silver-ore deposits upon the globe. Their extensions in length and depth bear out their importance as metal-producing sources. Thus the Mellado vein, of Guanajuato, measures, in places, more than 300 feet in width; with workings ten miles in length, and extending to a present depth of nearly 2,000 feet. TheVeta Madre, or "mother lode," ranges from 30 feet to 165 feet in width; whilst others of the famous lodes reach 50 to 100 feet. As to the ore-values, Humboldt, who visited Guanajuato in the height of its production, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, assigned as his calculation a value equal to about 80 ounces of silver per tonfor the whole lode. For portions of the ore-bodies, and for many of the greatbonanzas, much higher values have obtained, silver up to 7,000 ounces per ton having been encountered; whilst ores of 1,100 ounces have been frequently exported to Great Britain.
The almost fabulous wealth obtained from the silver mines has been shown in the foregoing pages, and these mines are far from being exhausted at the present day. The importance of the Pachuca mines is shown by the statement that they produce six million ounces of silver and 30,000 ounces of gold yearly. Of the populationof the city, of forty thousand souls, seven thousand are employed underground.
All of the Mexican states are silver bearing, although those which contain the famous mines are the most important, as:—Sonora, Chihuahua, Sinaloa, Zacatecas, San Luis Potosi, Guanajuato, Querétaro, Hidalgo (Pachuca), Mexico. All these states contain numerous mining districts—cities, towns, camps—which it would take too much space here to enumerate. With the exception of the few modern installations most of the mines are worked by the primitive Mexican system of winding up the ore in raw-hide sacks, hauled by means of cables made frommagueyfibre, upon a mule-actuated windlass—themalacate. In some cases the miners carry huge pieces of ore on their backs, from 100 lbs. to 200 lbs. in weight, along the galleries to the shaft. Interior transport and haulage are primitive.
The principal ore of silver is the sulphate, although native silver is also freely encountered in some districts. The ores were very generally decomposed to a depth of about 300 feet. Argentiferous galena is plentiful, and silver is freely found in conjunction with copper ores. Thecaliches, a chalk-like substance, easily worked, is another rich form of occurrence of the metal, and there are others less important. Various different methods of separating silver from its ores are used; the prevailing ones being those of smelting, lixiviation, and thepatioprocess, which last has accounted for 90 per cent. of the production. Indeed, the recovery of silver by thepatioprocess has always been one of the most important industries of Spanish-American countries, especially in Mexico, Peru, and Chile. In Mexico it has been employed continuously since the year 1557, when it was invented by Medina at thehaciendaPurisima Grande. This was the first application of amalgamation to silver ores, and permitted the treatment of the vast quantities of low-grade ores, which did not pay to smelt. To-day great quantities of ore are still treated by this method. The process is too well known to require much description here. Its mainpoints of advantage are the simplicity—in practice, for its chemistry is complicated in theory—of its methods and appliances. The principal agents employed may be said to be mercury and horseflesh, or rather mule-flesh; the mercury forming an amalgam with the precious metals under the incorporation brought about by the trampling hoofs of the mules. The trampling and incorporation of thetorta, or charge of pounded ore, mercury, water, salt, copper sulphate, and other constituents, mixed into a paste, was originally performed by barefooted natives, but the practice of using mules for the purpose came from Peru, in 1783, as before mentioned. Thepatio, as its name implies, consists of a paved yard upon which the crushed mineral is treated. This is in some cases of very large capacity, one of the most important in the country, that of the Guadalupe works at Pachuca, which treats nearly a thousand tons of ore a week, being as large as theplazaof a city. Upon this thetortais spread, and bands of a dozen mules, or mules and horses, harnessed together, are driven up and down from morning till afternoon, through the slushy mass. The animals are then bathed to remove the chemicals, but notwithstanding this the work is deleterious, and they last but a few years—the old ones but a few months—as they become poisoned by the copper sulphate. At some of thehaciendasof Pachuca six hundred horses are employed in this work, and the total throughout the country is considerable. Constant efforts have been made for the use of mechanical appliances, to take the place of the equine mixer, but these have not been found to give the same efficiency. The process is typical of the country and the race—time, space, and material are plentiful, and labour is cheap, and horses—well, they were made for man's use! The innate tendency of the Spanish-Americans to do without mechanical appliances also is indulged.
The growth of the silver-producing industry of recent years is shown by the returns, giving approximately a value of seven million Mexican dollars for 1890 and fifty million for 1902, for export alone. The total value ofthe silver production for 1907 was eight million sterling, which was more than that of the United States, and so Mexico led the world in that year.
Gold.—The gold which was formerly produced in Mexico has come principally from the silver ores, with which it is generally associated, and has been obtained from the amalgamation of these. More recently gold-bearing quartz lodes are being worked, and are producing important quantities of gold. Among the foremost of these are the mines of the district of El Oro, in the State of Mexico, somewhat less than a hundred miles to the north-west of the capital. They produced in 1905 about ten million dollars in gold, or about 800,000 dollars per month. Whilst Mexico has not generally been looked upon as a gold-producing country, it is undoubtedly the case that it will, under the present rate of development, rank among the foremost of these. At present Mexico holds sixth place with a production for 1907 of 3¾ millions sterling. Gold-bearing lodes are being discovered and worked in most of the States, and thousands of such deposits are being prospected, or awaiting such, whilst numerous crushing plants are treating ores in those districts most accessible to the railways. The enterprise known as El Oro Mining and Railway Company may be looked upon as a well-managed and prosperous concern, controlled by British capital. It was first acquired by a British company in 1815, and it is stated that it yielded five or six million pounds sterling of gold. Later it was abandoned, taken up in 1870 by native capitalists, and at the end of last century purchased by an American company, to be again acquired by British interests in 1899. The enterprise controls a large area of ground of more than 500 acres, a short railway to the Mexican National Line, and some valuable forests which afford fuel. With its battery of 200 stamps and large cyaniding mills, it has a capacity for ore treatment of 20,000 tons per month. The yield per ton of ore is given for 1900 at slightly under £3 per ton, at a cost of about 25s., andfor 1907 35s. per ton, at a cost of slightly under 20s. The tonnage treated for these years were 53,500 tons and 263,000 tons respectively, and all the intervening years show the steady increase. The output for 1907 was more than a million tons of ore, due to the added capacity of the new stamp mill, whilst the monthly profits for that year and for 1908 fluctuated between £14,000 and £18,000.
Other successful enterprises of El Oro region are the Somera Gold Mining Company, affiliated with the foregoing, and the Mexico Mines of El Oro. The latter company's mill has a capacity of 250 tons of ore daily, and the recent monthly profits have been, it is stated, upwards of £15,000. These are also controlled by British capitalists, as is the "Esperanza" Mine of El Oro, it is stated, which has produced since 1895 a value of 4½ millions sterling, with a profit of nearly 2½ millions. The "Dos Estrellas" Mine is yet another example of this successful district. It is said to have made profits since 1902 of 2½ millions sterling, and to have ore for future work in large quantities. It is interesting to note that this excellent performance has been made on ground which had been condemned by mining experts![34]
34 These figures are from the Mexican Year Book, 1908.
Other prosperous mining concerns in different parts of the country, generally owned by native capital, include the "Real del Monte" Mines of Pachuca, elsewhere described: the "Maravellas and Anexas Mining Company," principally silver producing; the "Santa Gertrude Mines," a silver property; "La Blanca and Anexas," gold and silver—all of which are in the Pachuca district. The Parral mining district, in Chihuahua, is one which has recently received attention, although it is not new, having yielded silver from the middle of the sixteenth century. Some six millions sterling represent the investments in the district during the last fifteen years in these mines. The famous Peñoles Mine is among the most prosperous in thecountry. This is a lead-gold-silver-producing enterprise in Durango, at Mapimi, worked first in Colonial times. Now it owns large smelters, a line of railway, and an extensive property. In 1907 this enterprise produced 58,000 kilograms of silver, 504 kilograms of gold, and has an annual output of some 20,000 tons of lead.
In Sonora various gold-mining properties are at work. Among them is the Consolidated Goldfields of Mexico, Ltd., British capital: the Creston-Colorado Mines, worked by American capital, including the old British-worked Minas Prietas mines: there are other gold mining companies old and new under British enterprise, and the Bufa and the Trinidad Companies, producing gold, silver, and copper. In fact, the State of Sonora is a rich field for the working of the precious metals, and offers great possibilities.
In Chihuahua are some important gold and silver-producing enterprises, among them the Greene Gold-Silver Company, owned by Americans, and the Palmarejo Mines, a British enterprise. Indeed, with its numerous important mining centres, this State is held to be the foremost in Mexico, and a large output of the precious metals is being made.
Lower California contains a great deal of resource in gold-quartz lodes, and some importantplacerdeposits. This territory is one of the richest mineral regions of North America.
The principal gold-producing States are Chihuahua, Sonora, Zacatecas, Guerrero, Oaxaca, Mexico, Lower California, Hidalgo, Chiapas, Coahuila. No less than eighteen of the States of Mexico contain gold-bearing districts.
Hydraulic, orplacer, mining for gold has not been much considered as a source of supply, as there are no great alluvial deposits, so far known, such as exist in other parts of North and South America. Nevertheless, something has been done in this way, principally in the States of Chihuahua and Guerrero. Thegeological formation, however, does not point the probability of the existence of great alluvial deposits, and theplacerstake the form of river bars principally.
The rise of Mexico's gold-production has been rapid. The country now holds sixth place. In 1893 its value was less than 4 per cent. of that of the silver output, whilst in 1894 it jumped to 14 per cent., and in 1902, 20 per cent. The export of gold bullion in 1890 was only half a million Mexican dollars, whilst in 1903 it had risen to 11½ millions. The value of the total gold production for 1907 was 3¾ millions sterling.
Among other producing mines is the Providencia, of Guanajuato, yielding gold, silver, and iron. Yet another is the "San Rafael and Anexas," a regular dividend-payer, whose net profits for 1907 are given as three-quarters of a million dollars. The famous region of Tlalpujahua is once more receiving attention.
Copper.—The rise of Mexico as a copper-producing country has been remarkable. Less than fifteen years ago the Republic was unheard of as a source of the red metal, now it ranks second in the world's output, coming next to the United States with a production for the year 1907 of 56,600 tons. The following States are those which are most important as copper-bearing: Chihuahua, Sonora, Coahuila, Zacatecas, Jalisco, Michoacan, Puebla, Querétaro, Tamaulipas, Lower California, and Colima.
In Sonora the following mines are at work: The Bufa Mining and Smelting Company; the Trinidad Mining Company, upon which large sums of money have been spent; the Montezuma Mine, an important enterprise, formed with an outlay of millions of dollars upon its appliances and workings, and having a daily capacity of 250 tons of ore, belonging to American capitalists. The Cananea Consolidated Copper Company, a remarkable enterprise instituted by American capitalists. Cananea is considered to be one of the most important copper regions in the world, and a considerablepreliminary outlay made has been justified in the results; the works exporting several thousand tons of copper monthly. It forms one of the most complete installations of its nature. The Yaqui River Smelting and Railway Company is a custom smelter, and affords a market for much local copper ore. There are other copper-producing enterprises under development, and the State of Sonora is thus a most productive source of the red metal.
In Chihuahua active development upon copper mines is being carried on, and the production stimulated by the establishing of smelting works. There is also an important copper foundry at Monterrey, in the State of Nuevo Leon.
In Lower California are the large copper mines and smelting works of Boleo, owned by a French company. This is an important enterprise, supporting a population of 8,000 souls, and its eight smelters are of a capacity of 150 tons daily, giving an output of copper of 11,500 tons per annum. With its own railways, harbour, and town, the enterprise is a self-centred community of much prosperity.
The State of Guerrero affords some copper ore deposits probably of great extent, and among these are several mines which are being developed.
In the State of Zacatecas is the important British enterprise of the Mazapil Copper Company, with an extensive property, smelting furnaces, and railway line, with also a long overhead cable system of ore-carriage.
Iron.—Deposits of iron ores are found in several of the states. In Durango is the much describedCerro de Mercado, a hill of iron ore calculated as containing 460,000,000 tons of iron ore, assaying 70 to 75 percent. pure iron. This remarkable hill was discovered in 1552.
The city of Monterrey, in the State of Nuevo Leon, contains a large ironfoundry and steel-producing plant, and two iron and brassfoundries, establishments which are of much importance to the country. Guerrero has valuable deposits of iron ore near Chilpancingo.