Aug. 1834. CHILIAN MINES. .SI? 



The Chilian government^ or rather the old Spanish laAv^ 

 encourages by every method the searching for mines. The 

 discoverer may work a mine on any ground^ by paying five 

 shillings; and before paying this he may try^ even in the 

 garden of another man^ for twenty days. 



It is now well known that the Chilian method of mining is 

 the cheapest. My host says the two principal improvements 

 introduced by foreigners have been, first, reducing by pre- 

 vious roasting the copper pyrites — which, being the com- 

 mon ore in Cornwall, the English miners were astounded 

 on their arrival to find thrown away as useless : secondly, 

 stamping and washing the scoriae from the furnaces — by 

 which process particles of metal are recovered in abundance. 

 I have actually seen mules carrying to the coast, for 

 transjDortation to England, a cargo of such cinders. But 

 the first case is much the most curious. The Chilian miners 

 were so convinced that copper pyrites contained not a par- 

 ticle of copper, that they laughed at the Englishmen for 

 their ignorance, who laughed in turn, and bought their richest 

 veins for a few dollars. It is very odd that, in a country 

 where mining had been extensively carried on for many 

 years, so simple a process as gently roasting the ore, to 

 expel the sulphur previous to smelting it, had never been 

 discovered. A few improvements have likewise been in- 

 troduced in some of the simple machinery ; but even to 

 the present day, water is removed from some mines by men 

 carrying it up the shaft in leathern bags ! 



The labouring men work very hard. They have little time 

 allowed for their meals, and during summer and winter they 

 begin when it is light, and leave olF at dark. They are paid 

 one pound sterling a month, and their food is given them : this 

 for breakfast consists of sixteen figs and two small loaves of 

 bread ; for dinner boiled beans ; for supper broken roasted 

 wheat grain. They scarcely ever taste meat; as, with the twelve 

 pounds per annum, they have to clothe themselves, and sup- 

 port their families. The miners who work in the mine itself, 

 have twenty-five shillings per month, and are allowed a little 



