360 



CHARLES DARWIN 



round his waist by a bright-coloured sash. His trousers are 

 very broad, and his small cap of scarlet cloth is made to fit 

 the head closely. We met a party of these miners in full 

 costume, carrying the body of one of their companions to be 

 buried. They marched at a very quick trot, four men sup- 

 porting the corpse. One set having run as hard as they 

 could for about two hundred yards, were relieved by four 

 others, who had previously dashed on ahead on horseback. 

 Thus they proceeded, encouraging each other by wild cries: 

 altogether the scene formed a most strange funeral. 



We continued travelling northward, in a zigzag line; 

 sometimes stopping a day to geologize. The country was so 

 thinly inhabited, and the track so obscure, that we often had 

 difficulty in finding our way. On the 12th I stayed at some 

 mines. The ore in this case was not considered particularly 

 good, but from being abundant it was supposed the mine 

 would sell for about thirty or forty thousand dollars (that is, 

 6000 or 8000 pounds sterling) ; yet it had been bought by 

 one of the English Associations for an ounce of gold (3Z. 

 8s.). The ore is yellow pyrites, which, as I have already re- 

 marked, before the arrival of the English, was not supposed 

 to contain a particle of copper. On a scale of profits nearly 

 as great as in the above instance, piles of cinders, abounding 

 with minute globules of metallic copper, were purchased; 

 yet with these advantages, the mining associations, as is well 

 known, contrived to lose immense sums of money. The folly 

 of the greater number of the commissioners and shareholders 

 amounted to infatuation; — a thousand pounds per annum 

 given in some cases to entertain the Chilian authorities; 

 libraries of well-bound geological books; miners brought out 

 for particular metals, as tin, which are not found in Chile; 

 contracts to supply the miners with milk, in parts where 

 there are no cows; machinery, where it could not possibly 

 be used; and a hundred similar arrangements, bore witness 

 to our absurdity, and to this day afford amusement to the 

 natives. Yet there can be no doubt, that the same capital 

 well employed in these mines would have yielded an im- 

 mense return, a confidential man of business, a practical 

 miner and assayer, would have been all that was required. 



Captain Head has described the wonderful load which 



