220 



Visit to the Q^uiclcsilver Mines of Idria. 



mencing the descent. 



w 



church on its summit, from which a line of a dozen little chapels, 

 along the side of the eminence, showed the course of the Via do- 

 lorosa — sometimes an appendage to papal churches. A stream of 

 water about forty yards in width, dashing along the bottom of the 

 valley, and several of the excellent German roads, running zig-zag 

 up the steep ascents completed the view. At the entrance of the 

 village my pass-ports were examined, and the officer having ascer- 

 tained that I wished to examine the mines said he would send a per- 

 son to accompany me. Accordingly, a sergeant soon after called at 

 the public house where I lodged, to say that the mining operations 

 were carried on day and night, and that I could enter at any time : 

 I had noticed from the hills a dark crowd of men in front of a large 

 building, and those, he told me, were the evening gang about com- 



I appointed 6 o'clock in the morning, and on 

 waking^ found him waiting for me. At the building alluded to, 

 which is on one side of the village, and covers the entrance to the 

 mines, we changed our dresses, and the keeper unlocking an iron 

 gate we found ourselves in a horizontal gallery three or four hundred 

 yards in length, running directly into the hill at the foot of which 

 the edifice is erected. Here we came to a small chapel with a light 

 burning before the picture of the virgin, and turning short to the 

 left commenced the descent. It has nothing difficult, being effected 

 the whole way by means of stairs in pretty good order : indeed, the 

 mines have nothing corresponding to the ideas of terror which we 

 are apt to connect with such places, except the atmosphere, which, 

 throughout the mine, must be strongly impregnated with mercurial 

 vapor, and is constantly producing salivation among the workmen. 

 Having descended by seven hundred and twenty seven steps, reach- 

 ing to a depth of one hundred and twenty five fathoms, we aixived at 

 the region where chiefly the cinnabar is procured. The mining op- 

 erations are carried on principally in galleries, the friable nature o 

 the ground or rock seldom admitting of larger chanibers. The cin- 

 nabar is in strata of from two to six inches in thickness, and of a va- 

 riety of colors from dark to light red, the quicksilver sometimes be- 

 in the intervening strata of 

 earth or stone. Sometimes the cinnabar is of a brilliant red, ana 

 once 1 found it in small crystals, but such specimens are 

 generally it is of a dull red color, and the stone is so brittle that 

 nothing more than a pick-axe is required. The strata '^ " ^"'^ 



ing mixed with it^ sometimes occuring 



rare: 



afford 



\ 



