192 OX GOLD IN WESTERN AFRICA. 



tated with ground-down pebbles. In smelting gold, the smith uses an 

 alkaline salt, obtained from a ley of burnt corn stalks. He is capable, 

 as even the wildest African tribes are, of drawing fine wire. When 

 rings — the favourite forms in which the precious metal is carried coast - 

 ward — are to be made, the gold is run without any flux in a crucible of 

 sun-dried red clay, which is covered over with charcoal or braize. The 

 smith pours the fluid into a furrow traced in the ground, by way of 

 mould. When it has cooled, he reheats it, and hammers it into a little 

 square ingot or bar of the size required. After a third exposure to fire, 

 he twists with his pincers the bar into a screw shape, lengthens out the 

 ends, and turns them up to form the circle. 



It must now be abundantly evident to the reader that the great 

 centre of West African gold, the source which supplies Mauding to the 

 North, and Ashantee to the South, is the equatorial range called the 

 Kong. What the mineral wealth must be there, it is impossible to esti- 

 mate, when nearly three millions aud a half of pounds sterling have 

 annually been drawn from a small parallelogram between its southern 

 slopes and the ocean, whilst the other three-quarters of the land — 

 without alluding to the equally rich declivities of the northern versant 

 — have remained as yet unexplored. Even in northern Liberia colonists 

 have occasionally come upon a pocket of 50 dols., and the natives bring 

 gold in from the banks of streams. 



Mr. Wilson ('Western Africa,' chap, x.) remarks upon this subject, 

 " It is best for whites and blacks that these mines should be worked just 

 as they are. The world is not suffering for the want of gold, and the 

 comparative small quantities that are brought to the sea-coast keep the 

 people in continual intercourse with civilised men, and ultimately, no 

 doubt, will be the means of introducing civilisation and Christianity 

 among them." 



