422 KE. T. Cox—Ovxide of Antimony at Sonora, Mexico. 
reduction and add to the cost of purifying the metal. These 
sulphides are also found in such sparse quantities, that the 
iaotal usually commands from three to four times the price of 
lead, and fully as much as that of tin or copper. At present 
the supply of sulphides of antimony for the English smelters 
is obtained from Algeria, Spain and Ceylon. Small quantities 
of oxide of antimony ores have been found in portions of 
Europe and in Ceylon, but at no time in such capageia as to 
elicit special attention. When, therefore, about a year ago, I 
called the attention of English metallurgists and Fp to 
the occurrence of vast lodes of almost pure oxide of antimony 
in the district of Altar, Sonora, Mexico, thirty miles from the 
Gulf of California, it seemed too marvelous for their belief. 
A company of gentlemen of Boston, Mass., now have con- 
trol of these psuinony mines, and the ore will soon be in the 
hands of smelter, 
The ees features of the country where A ore 
abounds are similar to those of Southern Arizona. The m 
tains are in short, narrow ranges, having for the most Se a 
northerly and southerly trend. Their crests are either rugged 
or well-rounded cones, mela to the nature of the rocks 
tw) 
forming their mass. Between these ranges, we have what is 
called mesa or table land ; Ae latter is formed of the aeore of 
the mountains. This material is of so loose and us a 
nature, that the small amount of rain which falls sinks fronek 
obliterate all traces of fossils. Presi ahr these and 
forming the mountain peaks, we have porphyry, quartzites, 
basalt, diorites and trachytes. 
e country rock in the immediate vicinity of the setae 
mines is quartzite and limestone. The lodes are from 
to twenty feet wide, and iseplovtation work, carried to a depth 
of thirty feet, shows that the fissures are filled from wall to 
wall with the oxide of antimony, almost pure and remarkably 
uniform in character. The course of the lodes is nearly north 
and south; the pitch is high to the east. The area over which 
the ore is found may be roughly stated to be five or six miles 
long and half a mile or more w 
The Boston Company controls nine mines, each of which is a 
full Mexican claim, 800 meters (2624’ 8”) long and 200 meters 
(656’ 2”) wide. On three of the mines, the crop, which is solid 
oxide of iatishoity, stands up boldly above the general surface 
and may be traced along the claims for many hundred feet. As 
stated above, the ore, so far as explorations have exposed it, is 
