104 



QUICKSILVER. 



like frost. They are frequently swept ; I did not think to ask to whom 

 these sweepings belong, but I imagine to the farmers of the "callana." 

 The bars are marked with the number of the bar for the year, the num- 

 ber of marks it contains, the initials of the owner, and the invariable 

 11.22, which designates its "ley" or quality. 



Remittances of bars are made to Lima every week. Last week the 

 remittance amounted to seven thousand five hundred marks — a large 

 yield. Since my return, I cut from a Lima paper a letter from Cerro 

 Pasco, of April, 1851, (a few months before the date of my visit,) in 

 which the writer states the remittances for the week at eighteen bars, or 

 four thousand five hundred marks. He says, "The drainage by steam is 

 progressing rapidly. Another vein of ore has been discovered in the 

 mine of Peiia Blanca, but I believe not very rich. The advices from 

 Lima are constant that the quicksilver mines of California will yield a 

 sufficient supply for Peru, at a price not exceeding fifty or sixty dollars 

 the ' quintal] (or hundred pounds.) Should this be the case, there will 

 be no need of suspending the working of the cascajos, as ore of six 

 marks to the caxon, with quicksilver at seventy dollars the quintal, and 

 piiia at eight dollars the mark, will. leave fifty dollars of profit in the 

 circo. The price of quicksilver at present is from one hundred to one 

 hundred and seven dollars the quintal ; that of piiia, eight dollars and 

 forty-three and three-fourth cents." 



The yield of these mines is about two millions a year, which is nearly 

 equal to the yield of all the rest of the mines of Peru together. 



M. Castelnau makes a calculation from all the data within his reach, 

 by which it appears that the yield of the mines of Cerro Pasco, since 

 the date of their discovery in 1630 to the year 1849, amounts to about 

 the sum of four hundred and seventy-five millions of dollars, which 

 would give a yearly mean of about two millions one hundred and 

 seventy thousand. 



About two hundred miles to the southward and eastward of Cerro 

 Pasco are situated the celebrated quicksilver mines of Huancavelica. 

 The viceroys of the regal and the presidents of the republican gov- 

 ernment have made many efforts to keep up the working of these 

 mines, but of late years entirely without success. M. Castelnau 

 states that their produce since the opening in 1751 to the year 

 1789, inclusive, (since which time they have yielded nothing of 

 importance,) has been one million forty thousand four hundred and 

 fifty-two quintals, which, at a mean price of sixty-five dollars the 

 quintal, will give the sum of sixty-seven million six hundred and 

 twenty-nine thousand three hundred and eighty dollars. In the same 



