218 GEOLOGY OF PVRT OF CUBA. 
which has been collected by the simple process of pan washing, but no important works 
have been ever undertaken, on an efficient scale, for obtaining the precious metal. Cer- 
tain quartz Veins here, contain an amount of gold which would be thought very rich, and 
eagerly worked in Europe: but the attempt to work these expensive rock veins has, for 
the present been abandoned. ‘he late investigations into this matter have fully pointed 
out the sources whence the auriferous sands are derived. It is in the soft fragmentary 
beds, where the gangue consists of a deposite of miscellaneous rocky and ochreous matter, 
in a comminuted form, that the more recent researches have been applied. 
San Juan Bautista Gold Mine—Is situated in the Partido of Guago, Bals, five miles 
north-west of Holguin. At the surface this seam, or vein, for it appears to have regular 
walls, is four feet and a half wide; improving as it descends, and the ore resembles the 
Jacotinga of Gongo Soco, in Brazil. Like the mineral country nearer Gibara, its surface 
is undulating; diversified with patches of savanas and tracts of rich wood land; the mine 
being situated within the latter. The neighbourhood is intersected by numerous rivu- 
lets, capable of supplying the water for dressing the auriferous ores. We have received 
recent details of this undertaking, both from the proprietor and from one who devoted 
several days to its investigation. 
The auriferous vein bears north 55° west, dipping to north-east, at about an angle of 
45°. It is composed of a friable, brown and red ochreous earth ; intermixed with small 
quartzose fragments: between walls of magnesian rock, and decomposing schistose rock; 
in fact corresponding with the savana rocks noticed elsewhere. Very little gold can be 
detected by the unassisted eye. By an imperfect process more than four ounces of gold 
were obtained from a ton of this ore, worth therefore about seventy dollars per ton of ore. 
Large as this result certainly is, it is fully confirmed by assays made subsequently in 
Philadelphia, and by another made in London. 
Professor Booth found that the metallic matter resulting from the experiment consisted 
of at least two-thirds or three-fourths of gold, united with a white metal, probably iridium 
or osmium, which was insoluble in nitro-muriatic acid. 
Portions of ore analyzed in Cuba produced three to five ounces of gold per ton of ore. 
Three other assays in Philadelphia showed the presence of more than five ounces per 
ton. At present all operations are suspended, at the mine, 
CONCLUSION. 
It is time to bring this article toa close. The geological character of this region, and 
the value of its ores, have been detailed as minutely as our limits permit. The field is 
indeed a promising one; and there is small risk in predicting, that the mineral ores, of 
which we have made but brief mention, will, from the moment of putting the mines into 
operation, add immensely to the already abundant resources of this remarkable island. 
We think it will then appear that industry and skill will be as amply remunerated at 
Gibara as at Cobre; and judging from the past, it seems very probable that these under- 
takings are now only awaiting the resources, the capital and the enterprise of Englishmen 
and Americans, rather than of native adventurers. 
