104 COGGIN BROWN : MINES & MINERAL RESOURCES OF YUNNAN. 



Lan-ni.pe near A-mi An old abandoned prospect with a slag 



Chou. heap close to it. (La., p. 411 and D., p. 247). 



(Lat. 23° 41' : Long. 

 io:< 17'.)" 



At the contact of the baSaltd and the Urahan limestones of this 



region there are often little fractures con- 



jj^! 181 taming copper carbonate. They have been 



(Lat. 24° 6': Long worked on a small scale near Mo-pe-tchong 



l02 ° 48 -) an( | Qeai Lao-tchai and Sin-tchai to the 



north of Ilo-tien. They are of no economic importance. Near 



Che-mo to the east of Po-hsi there are a few abandoned pits of 



the same description. On the eastern shore of L%ke Ch eng-chiang, 



in the vicinity of Min-hin, there are a number of prospecting pits 



in the lavas and sandstones of Moscovian age. In all these 



localities copper carbonates are disseminated through certain bands 



of rock in small quantities but, as stated before, the deposits 



possess no economic importance. (D., p. 248). 



The mines in the neighbourhood of Lu-nan Chou have been 



abandoned for fifty or sixty years. They are 

 Lu-nan Chou. J ... „ , .. . J , 



(Lat. 24° 4(i' : Long, located around Lou-meie, Mao-chouei-tong and 



1030 lr> - Lan-nin-tsin. There are indications of sixteen 



old workings, which are either in the eruptive rock or at its 

 contact with the limestone. Lantenois estimates the slag heaps to 

 contain 10,000 or 20,000 metric tons corresponding to a production 

 of 2,000 to 4,000 metric tons. Deprat points out that the presence 

 of large quantities of slag is no ground to base the supposed impor- 

 tance of a former mine on. He writes, — " I have seen Chinese 

 treating minerals of an inconceivable poorness ; nothing discourages 

 them ; time is no object and labour is so cheap. These mines, 

 like all similar ones in Yunnan, can be considered as non-existent 

 for purposes of European exploitation. A Chinese will work poor 

 minerals because no great expenditure of capital is involved, and 

 will continue from day to day, without making large profits, often 

 simply supplying his daily wants and seeing the return of his 

 expenditure. In this way he will exploit the poorest deposit and 

 then search for another to be exhausted in the same way after- 

 wards." 



On the plateau of Devonian limestone between Lan-nin-tsin 

 and Ta-me-ti, there are similar prospects, holes in the limestone, 

 sometimes with a small heap of slag beside them. Lantenois has 

 shown that these deposits consist of small nests of ore in the lime- 



