THE MINERAL RESOURCES OF DEVON AND CORNWALL. 489 
workings, and which were also found in considerable quantities in 
the neighbourhood scattered over the surface. Captain James 
Richards, who is still the chief captain, was superintending the 
operations. As soon as the shaft had been cleaned up, refitted, 
and sinking carried to seventeen fathoms in depth, the lode was 
cut in such a very rich deposit, that before the end of the first 
year dividends were declared from profits amounting to upwards of 
£73,000, equal to £71 per share ; and before the end of the second 
year 17,000 tons of ore had been raised and sold for over £120,000. 
Up to the present time the excavations underground amount to 
forty miles in linear extent. In the form of perpendicular shafts 
about two and a half miles, of winzes and rises six and a quarter 
miles, and drivages twenty-seven and a half miles. 
For several years the ores were carried by horse-power to 
Morwellham, over between five and six miles of ordinary road ; but 
since then, a good substantial railway has been erected, about four 
miles long, worked by locomotive and stationary engiue. 
There are now on the mine, eight large steam-engines, three 
locomotives, thirty-three water-wheels, a large foundry and fitting 
shop for building engines and machinery, saw-mills, changing and 
tool-houses and stores, extensive arsenic works for the extraction 
and refining of arsenic, large cooperage and carpenters' shops, and 
a school for the workmen's children, besides beautifully laid out 
precipitate works for obtaining from the drainage water the copper 
held in solution. This is done by causing the water to pass over 
old scrap iron, which is dissolved and carried off, copper being left 
in its place. When in full operation the working staff consisted 
of twenty captains, four hundred and fifty men and boys working 
underground as miners, and at surface two hundred and fifty-nine 
mechanics, such as engineers, fitters, blacksmiths, carpenters, 
masons, Ac., besides one hundred and thirty- six men, one hundred 
and sixty-eight boys, and two hundred and seventeen girls on the 
dressing floors, making in all a little industrial army of about 
one thousand three hundred souls. The monthly consumption of 
materials amounted to — coals, 200 tons; timber, 160 loads; gun- 
powder, 2,000 lbs. The payment of rates and taxes in the parish 
of Tavistock amounted to £1,200 per annum. The number of 
persons immediately dependent upon this mine was probably not 
less than four thousand, including the families of the employes. 
The fructifying influences of the lord's dues and of the dividends 
