94 Visit to the Salt Works of Zipaquera. 



quartillos, (9 cents.) The plan was tried, and the stores were soon 

 found filled with a superabundance of earthen ware. 



The gentlemen who have charge of the salt works are aware of 

 the very rude manner of conducting the processes, but the want of 

 artizans, the influence of ancient customs, and deficiency of scien- 

 tific and other practical information, induce them to adhere to the 

 old plan. Some of those however who have an interest in their 

 works, propose to establish, at some short distance, a forge and foun- 

 dery, ultimately to supply iron pots, with contrivances to allow the 

 escape of the loaves of salt after the processes of calcination. 



Although the impost of the government is so high upon the man- 

 ufacture of salt at the springs, that procured by evaporation on the 

 sea coast is not subject to any duty ; and foreign salt has been per- 

 mitted to enter almost free, until the last session of the congress at 

 Bogota, when a duty of eight rials (one dollar) for every hundred 

 lbs. was imposed. 



The state of the roads in New Granada, inaccessible for the most 

 part to wheel carriages ; with its rapid rivers, navigated almost solely 

 by canoes, makes transportation so expensive, that with the high 

 price created by the government monopoly, salt is much economized. 

 Strangers find themselves obliged to carry a lump of salt with their 

 baggage, to add to the very scanty seasoning of it usual in the 

 cooking. A salt cellar is by no means thought an indispensable part 

 of the table equipage, and in many instances it will be in vain called 

 for. A North American vessel was found at Buenaventura, on the 

 Pacific, with salt brought from the Sandwich Islands : this, inclosed 

 in hides, was conveyed up very rapid rivers into the interior, al- 

 though by nature so extensively and amply supplied with it. Some 

 of the medical gentlemen in the country are inclined to believe that 

 the deficient use of salt has a tendency to promote the goitre, a dis- 

 ease which prevails very extensively in some districts, and for which 

 iodine internally, and frictions with sea water and Aceyte de Sal,* 



* Dr. Cheyne, of Bogota, a highly esteemed English physician, gave me the fol- 

 Jowing analysis of the Aceyt6 de Sal, compared with that of sea water : 



Aceytd de Sal. Sea Water, 



Water, - - 0.7064 - - - 0.9691 



Hydrochlorateofsoda, 0.1527 - - - 0.0218 



" " magnesia, 0.0450 - - - 0.0049 



" " lime, - 0.0930 - - - 0.0008 



" " potash, - 0.0002 - - - traces. 



" " iron, 



Hydriodate of iron, 



Sulphate of soda, - - - - 0.0034 



1.0000 1.0000 



