251 



thick. There are three mines, which are all 

 wrought by slaves. The largest mine, the Bis- 

 cayna, has but thirty miners, and the total 

 number of slaves employed in the extraction of 

 the ore, and in smelting it, amounts only to sixty 

 or seventy. As the draining gallery is but thirty 

 toises deep, the waters prevent working the 

 richest parts of the mass, which is deeper than 

 the gallery ; and no one has hitherto thought of 

 erecting hydraulic wheels. The total produce 

 of metallic copper is twelve or fifteen hundred 

 quintals a year. This copper, known at Cadiz 

 by the name of Caraccas copper, is of an excel- 

 lent quality. It is even preferred to that of 

 Sweden, and of Coquimbo in Chili*. Part of 

 the copper of Aroa is employed in casting bells 

 on the spot. Some ores of silver have been re- 

 cently discovered between Aroa and Nirgua, 

 near Guanita, in the mountain of San Pablo. 

 Grains of gold are found in all the mountainous 

 lands between the Rio Yaracuy, the town of 

 San Felipe, Nirgua, and Barquesimeto ; parti- 

 cularly in the Rio de Santa Cruz, in which the 

 Indian gold-gatherers have sometimes found 

 lumps of the value of four or five piastres. Do 

 the neighbouring rocks of mica-slate and gneiss 



* The exportation of Aroa copper from L<a Guayra, in 

 1794, was only 11,525 pounds entered at the custom house ; in 

 1796, 31,142 pounds ; and in 1797, 2,400 pounds. At that 

 time the hundred weight fetched twelve piastres. 



