SILVER, LEAD AND COPPER. 



167 



clearly proved the disadvantages of the great distances between the mines and the works. More- 

 over, the rise in the price of fuel, owing to the exhaustion of the forests in the neighbourhood 

 of the mines and the feeble development of the mechanical parts of the works, also influenced 

 the position of the metallurgical and mining industries of the Altai. And yet at the end of 

 the last and beginning of the present C(Mitury, the mechanical portion of the Altai works was 

 placed upon another footing. It is worthy of remark that su early as 1766 a mining engineer 

 Polzounov, erected the first steam acting blowing engine for blast furnaces at the Barnaoul 

 works. Polzounov may justly be called the forerunner of Watt. In the Altai also the first 

 experiment of laying down a tram line was made in 1817, for transporting the ore from the 

 Zmeinogorsk mine and the Zmeevsk works, along a distance of 2'/2 versts. 



Owing to the above mentioned causes, the production of silver at the Altai began to 

 decrease considerably, especially since 1868; so also the amount of copper smelted, whicii in 

 1872 amounted to nearly 40,0( ponds, subsequently gradually fell. The following table 

 gives the production of the Altai mining region durinif the last ten years. 



In reducing tlicir .sinelling of silver and lead, the Altai woiks aie adn]>liiiL; a wet 

 process for the extractimi of silver from the ores after a nietliod iiivenled tiy a Hungarian 

 engineei' Bittzansky fur treating the ores from the Zyrianovsk mine. 



In Eastern Siberia old workings of galena in crystalline limestone have been discovered 

 in the govei'nment of Yeniseisk in the Minousinsk district at the Irbinsk estate. A large 

 numl)ei- of Chad mines have been rouml dii llic eastern declivity of the Alatau inoinitains 

 and beyond in the valley of the Yenisei. These workings were lenewed in the middle tif the 

 seventeenth century and the Lougazhsk copper sundting wiuks wimc erected here at a distance 

 of 9 versts IVoni the Yenisei and 25 versts I'min the town of Minousinsk. These works not 

 only smelted ores linni the suniMiiidiiig mines, Imt also iVoui uioie distant localities; from 



