644 THE SAN JUAN MINES. 



be from one thousand to fourteen hundred tons, the yield of which -will 

 average between 150 and 175 ounces to the ton. Among these are the 

 " Wheel of Fortune," whose first class ore has run as high as 800 ounces, 

 the " Virginius" 230 ounces, and " Yankee Boy " 560 ounces. The greater 

 proportion of the ores in this district are galena, carrying gray copper, and 

 here the tetrahedrite is invariably highly argentiferous — in fact directly a 

 miner finds it in his lode he is, as they express it, " eternally heeled." 



Some few of the richest ores show proustite and stephanite in large 

 quantities, notably the " Wheel of Fortune" and " Yankee Boy." As a 

 class however, the ores are essentially smelting ores, but as yet we have no 

 smelter nearer than Lake City, 37 miles by trail, or 110 by road, or at Sil- 

 verton, 20 miles by trail, and it costs $45 per ton to pack to the former, and 

 $20 to the latter place. There is every facility for a smelter here in the 

 very centre of the mines, and a fortune to be made at it; splendid water 

 power, 500 acres of pine timber, and more if wanted. But the right man 

 has not come along yet. 



With the close of the season of 1877, miners see a notable change in the 

 San Juan region. It has grown solid. The day has passed when plucky, 

 shiftless men, braving hunger, heat and cold, could come in here, find a 

 claim, go out with a piece of the top-rock and sell the claim for a few hun- 

 dred dollars. The prospector's reign is nearly over; prospect holes no 

 longer find sale, and the only property men will look at is a developed mine. 

 This is as it ought to be, and the best sign of coming real prosperity. It 

 will clean out the horde of men calling themselves " miners," who have 

 found good lodes, and who as long as they can by any artifice get a " grub- 

 stake," sit at their cabin doors or round the bar-rooms of the nearest camp, 

 with their pockets full of sample rock, waiting for the everlasting capitalist 

 to come round the corner and buy them out at high figures. 



There are easy fortunes to be made here in 1878, by three classes of 

 men : First and foremost, by the smelter; and for the next ten years at least 

 a smelt mill managed properly will make a moderate fortune each year. — 

 There is no limit, you may say, to the possible output to ore in the San 

 Juan country, and as soon as there is a market for the ores, the mines will 

 be worked, of course. The smelter has, and will have for some time to 

 come, a monopoly here ; he gives the miner what he pleases for his ore and 

 grows fat meanwhile; but it is the same story as with the building of toll- 

 roads, the sure, safe and legitimate enterprise is thrown overboard for 

 speculation. The man who comes in to build a mill, which he perhaps does 

 understand, loses his head at the richness of the lodes and buys a mine 

 which he does not understand, and waits for some one else to come and 

 build the smelter to make it worth something. 



Second: — The man of means who is a miner by profession, or experi- 

 ence, who will come here and look about him: He can get any amount of 

 good silver lodes for a song, — and when I say " good silver lodes, " I don't 

 mean "prospect holes;" but mines that have been brought to a dividend 



