64 Wisconsin and Missouri Lead Region. 



any other ore than that which runs in horizontal strata through 

 the clay or through the rock near the surface. In one instance, 

 however, the limestone rock itself contains so much galena scat- 

 tered through it, as to render it an object to be quarried, beaten 

 up, washed and smelted. Notwithstanding this rude way of 

 mining — the same hands taking the lead ore through all the dif- 

 ferent operations of raising, washing, and smelting — they still 

 find the business so prosperous that two hundred men employ 

 themselves on the tract. In their progress they occasionally meet 

 with vertical fissures filled with clay, and more or less ore scat- 

 tered through them ; one miner, more enterprising than the rest, 

 followed one of these fissures down about seventy feet, and then 

 abandoned it, the water coming in. 



Some of the lead ores here have been considered argentife- 

 rous, but on examining the most promising, a fine steel-grained 

 crystalline galena, by cupelling, I can find no silver ; indeed it is 

 only among the lead ores found in the primary rocks that one is 

 led to look for this metal. 



There are now nine blast furnaces on this tract, and will be 

 five more in a few months ; besides these there are two cupolas 

 and one, air or reverberatory furnace. The blast furnaces are 

 driven by four steam engines and one water wheel. The steam 

 engines are of fifteen horse-power each ; these are now owned 

 by different individuals, but in six or seven years from this time 

 will belong to the land. Much of the land is suitable for farm- 

 ing, the soil being good and surface gently rolling, but no in- 

 ducements have been held out to any persons to cultivate it, and 

 with one exception, all the houses on the tract are of the most 

 miserable kind of log cabins plastered with mud. No wells are 

 dug, and little attention paid by any of the people to supply them- 

 selves with the common comforts of life. 



A certificate published by an agent of the company in 1837, 

 states that for the four preceding years the annual amount of lead 

 manufactured may be estimated at 1,035,820 pounds, of which 

 one tenth came to the proprietors as rent, and that the number of 

 persons employed may be estimated as one hundred and fifty, 

 each of whom receives therefore 69,005 pounds ; and the follow- 

 ing remarks of the proprietors accompany the certificate. 



" Supposing the lead to be worth five cents the pound, we have 

 the sum of $345 for each hand. When we take into considera- 



