20 Oeogtapbical Botes on flDejico, 



Our production of gold has so far been comparatively small, be- 

 cause the mining and reduction of gold are more difficult and expensive 

 than the same operations in silver, and our gold production has really 

 been the amount of gold which has been found in our silver. For 

 many years, when the amount was small, it was not separated, and for 

 that reason old Mexican dollars have in China greater value than newly 

 coined ones; but recent improvements have made it easy and cheap to 

 make the separation of the two metals. Now that gold has risen so 

 much in value, its mining is beginning to be developed in Mexico on a 

 comparatively large scale, and I have no doubt that before long 

 Mexico will be one of the largest gold producers of the world. 



Mexico is an undeveloped country, in fact there are parts of 

 Mexico as unknown as was Central Africa a few years back. From 

 the Sonora gold district, south, on the west side of the Sierra Madre, 

 to the State of Oaxaca, there is a gold belt as rich as California, Alaska, 

 and South Africa combined. It is known that in the State of Sinaloa 

 there are gold placers and gold washings, and that they are also found 

 in every State from there south on the line of this belt. 1 



The gold output of Sonora, now beginning to attract attention, is 

 only the first contribution of Mexico to the world's stock of the yellow 

 metal. The west side of the Sierra Madre has a belt rich in gold, and 

 when the world discovers this fact capital will flock to Mexico to dig 

 it out, and Mexico will become one of the first gold producers of the 

 world, as she has been in silver. 



Specimens of " float " rich in gold have been brought from the State 

 of Guerrero. These indications of gold have not been followed up, 

 because no one has been progressive enough to advance the means 

 necessary to prospect this belt. To prospect in a country where often 

 water fit to drink must be carried, where food for man and beast must 

 be carried, and where in many places roads must be cut with machete 

 and axe, cannot be done without the spending of money in outfit and 

 expenses. 



The principal gold-producing States will be Sonora, Sinaloa, Guer- 

 rero, and Oaxaca, but in all of them gold-mining is yet in its 

 beginning. 



1 I take from a report of Mr. Cramer, a mining engineer sent to Mexico by the 

 Geological Society of Washington, D. C M as Commissioner to explore the gold fields of 

 that Republic, the following, which refers to only one of the many new gold fields that 

 are being found there : 



" There exists an extensive ' gold placer ' situated about thirty miles from Durango 

 in the mountain devoid of vegetation ; the rock that is found in greater quantities is 

 porphyry. I estimate that one ton of ore will yield at least $50 of gold. 



" Gold is found all over the mountain, though in such imperceptible filaments 

 that it is hard to recognize it with the naked eye ; however, every piece of stone con- 

 tains the same proportion of gold." 



