one of the most remarkable deposits anywhere known. It is contained
chiefly in clay slate, and crosses the southern slope of the hills
in a northwest and southeast direction, dipping with the slates (the
range which it follows) from forty-five to forty eight degrees toward
the southwest. The width averages a hundred and fifty feet, and the
depth is unknown. It has been traced about twelve miles, but its most
productive portion thus far, or rather, the portion operated, is only
about a tenth of that distance.
The mines of Zacatecas, opened in 1548, are also upon a single vein,
called the Veta Grande, averaging in thickness about thirty feet.
The formation is of green stone and clay slate, the former the most
productive. The veins of Catoree are in limestone, supposed to be of
carboniferous age.
[Sidenote: THE ORE IN THE MINES.]
The greatest proportion of silver in every mining district of
Mexico is obtained from the sulphuret of silver, an ore of gray
color, disseminated through the quartz matrix in minute particles,
and more or less combined with other metals. The other varieties
of argentiferous ores are numerous, but comparatively small in
quantity; they are the chloride of silver, ruby silver, native silver,
argentiferous pyrites, and argentiferous galena.
The comparative quantities of these, at the different mines, is very
variable, and few of the miners are able to determine them with
exactness. Notwithstanding the antiquity of the silver mining business
in Mexico, the processes which are employed are still far from
perfect, and greatly behind those of the Nevada and other mines. The
ore in Mexico is so rich that it has not been considered worth while
to practice any economy or to bring science to the miner’s aid.
Col. Albert S. Evans, who made a journey through Mexico, a few years
ago, gives a graphic account of a visit to the Serrano mine, in the
vicinity of Guanajuato. He was invited, with several others, to a
pyrotechnic display in the mine, and thus describes it:
[Sidenote: THE SERRANO MINE.]
“The mine is situated in the hill below the Buffa, at the upper end
of the city. Five hundred men, women, and children are employed at
this mine, getting out the ore, breaking it up, and sorting it. The
men generally work in small gangs, for a share of the sales of the
ore they take out. The amount of silver mined, weekly, is about five
thousand dollars, and the expenses one thousand dollars, leaving a net
profit of four thousand dollars. The great tiro is about nine hundred
and fifty feet in depth.
A horizontal tunnel penetrates the hill from a level with the
hacienda, cutting the tiro, or perpendicular shaft, at four hundred
feet from the surface. This tunnel may be about fifteen hundred feet
in length; a railroad track runs through it, and lying down in the
cars, we were carried in to the edge of the tiro.
This tiro is thirty feet in diameter, and six sided, laid up in
cement, like that at the Valenciano.
The necessity for this is seen in the fact that a rock, weighing many
tons, was displaced from a station near the bottom of the shaft, a
few days previous to our visit, and falling upon the miners beneath,
killed and maimed a large number of them.
Standing here, four hundred feet below the surface of the earth, and
six hundred feet above the bottom of the shaft, with a patch of pale
blue sky far above us, and inky darkness, almost palpable to the
touch, around us, and filling all the depths below, we witnessed the
most wonderful scene on which we gazed in Mexico.
Men were sent up to the top of the tiro at the surface of the ground,
and told to discharge rockets down it. This they did, and the hissing
and explosions of the fiery messengers caused the most deafening
echoes and re-echoes, while the sides of the shaft, dripping with ooze
and slime, were revealed with startling distinctness by the momentary
glare.
But this was nothing to what followed; balls of the fiber of the
maguey, or aloe plant, three feet in diameter, and steeped in pine
pitch or resin, were swung out over the mouth of the shaft, and
set on fire. When the first was in full blaze, it was detached, and
allowed to fall into the abyss. Like a great comet with body of molten
metal, and long tail of flame, rushing on a doomed planet, the monster
projectile came down from the dizzy height above us, and passing the
mouth of the tunnel in which we stood, with a roar more deafening than
the loudest thunder, went bounding and crashing into the depths below,
illuminating everything, for a moment, with the blinding, lurid glare,
followed by a darkness and silence more profound than before. As soon
as the tremendous echoes which were awakened by the first, had died
away, a second was sent down, and others followed in quick succession.
Most of our party were unable to control their nerves sufficiently
to enable them to approach the edge and look up and down the tiro,
holding by ropes to prevent them from becoming dizzy and falling
headlong into the depths, but those who could do so, beheld a scene,
the awful sublimity and grandeur of which beggars all the powers of
language.
[Sidenote: DOWN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE MINE.]
The remainder of the party now left, and I, in company with the
superintendent, clothing myself in a miner’s suit, to keep off the
water and mud, descended to the bottom of the mine, one thousand feet
and more from the surface.
We went down ladder after ladder, along gallery after gallery, through
chambers like great churches in size, and others in which we could
not stand erect, down steps cut in the rock, and so slippery with
dripping water and soft clay, as to compel us to use an iron-shod
staff to support ourselves, and through many a winding turning, until
we stood at the bottom of the tiro, wet through with perspiration, and
trembling with exhaustion.
At the bottom of the tiro is a great pond of water, the reservoir into
which all the drainings of the mine are gathered, and the buckets
on the great cables, worked by the _malacates_ at the top, were
constantly coming and going between it and the end of the tunnel six
hundred feet above. These buckets will hold three to four hogsheads of
water, and are made of rawhide, in the form of an ordinary Mexican
water jar. An iron ring distends the mouth of the bucket, and when
the vessel descends, the wet hide flattening down allows the water to
rush in, and as the lifting commences, it falls back into its original
form, filled to the brim with the dirty fluid. When the bucket reaches
the level of the tunnel, it is hauled into the opening, and as the
cable is slackened up, it flattens down again, and the water, escaping
over the rim, runs off down the side of the tunnel.
But there are still lower depths. We went down nearly two hundred feet
more, and at the bottom of the last level, found men at work taking
out ore. The dripping of the water at this point is very considerable,
and two plans are made use of to get rid of it. A part of the water
is carried up to the reservoir in pig skins on the backs of naked and
sweating Indians, and a part—the larger part—is pumped up to that
point by hand.
[Sidenote: PRIMITIVE APPLIANCES FOR MINING.]
The pumps are mere straight logs, thirty feet long, with a bore of
three inches, and a piston and bucket, pulled and pushed, back and
forth, by two stalwart Indians sitting on either side, working by main
strength, without even a lever purchase to help them along. There are
stations or reservoirs at the end of each pump, and all must be kept
continually working, night and day. The Indian pumpers sit down to
their work upon the wet rock, and are as naked as when born; the great
heat and want of ventilation at this depth, rendering clothing, if
they had it, a superfluity.
They get fifty cents each, per day, and work twelve hours at a shift.
In all my mining experience, I have never seen such a waste of power,
and such thoroughly primitive appliances for mining.
I went through many of the galleries and drifts, and examined the vein
carefully. The main vein is five to twelve feet wide, quite irregular,
and runs in a generally southwestern and northeastern direction,
dipping to the southwestward as it descends.
It carries metal in a very unequal degree in different portions, and
though presenting rich specimens, and bunches of almost pure silver in
spots, is not generally very rich.
In one chamber, I saw a number of mules and horses feeding, a thousand
feet below the surface. These poor creatures are let down in slings,
from the surface, through the tiro, and never go out again alive. They
turned their glazing eyes upon us with evident pain as we passed with
lighted torches, and appeared to regard us with mournful interest,
as in some way connected with the world above, of which they still
retained some dim recollection, but which they were never to look upon
again.
In another chamber, I saw women and children cooking food for their
husbands and parents. They appeared to live here, altogether, probably
returning to the light of day only at long intervals. Utterly worn
out, at last we climbed our way back to the tunnel, emerging into
daylight just as the sun was setting, swallowed a liberal allowance of
brandy, to protect ourselves against taking cold, mounted our horses,
and galloped back to the city.
[Sidenote: THE RESCATA.]
The weekly sale of ores at the several mines, is called the rescata.
One at the Serrano, I attended. The ore is placed on the ground,
each miner’s work in a separate lot, and the buyers sample it before
the sale. It is sold in the lump, by guess, not by weight, the buyer
taking his chances on the amount. The auctioneer stands silent, under
an umbrella, while the miners who have a small interest in the sales,
over and above their wages, volubly shout the praises of the lot in
turn. As each lot is put up, the buyers singly whisper their bids in
the ear of the auctioneer, and when all have bid, he announces who bid
the highest; the other bids are not named.
The chances for collusion seem, to me, to be very great. Some lots
brought as high as five hundred dollars, and the aggregate sales
exceeded six thousand five hundred dollars, at this rescata. This
ended our sight-seeing in Guanajuato.
The silver mines of Northern Mexico, near the boundary of the United
States, are supposed to be of great value, also, but their development
has been retarded by the hostility of the Apache and Comanche
Indians, who hold possession of portions of the territories.
Mining operations, however, have been undertaken, of late, upon the
Rio Grande, and also over the American line in Arizona territory, the
products of which are already reaching the United States. Central
America possesses no silver mines that are worked to much extent, but
rich ores are known to exist in Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.
[Sidenote: THE REAL DEL MONTE.]
A very rich mine in Mexico is the one known as the Pachuca, in the
group of the Real del Monte, and it has been worked almost from the
time of the conquest of the country by Cortes. The most successful
operator was Pedro Terreras, a muleteer, who found a shaft something
more than a hundred years ago. He made so much money from it that he
gave the King of Spain two ships of war, and promised him, if he would
visit the country, he should have the ground paved with silver, and
should not be required to put his royal foot on the plebeian earth.
The king did not come, but he made the enthusiastic Terreras a member
of the nobility under the name of Count of Regla. The mines yield
about four million dollars annually, and the Regla family is one of
the richest in Mexico. The ore yields about a hundred dollars a ton,
and the miners are carefully searched every time they come up from
their work. They wear only the lightest possible garments, which are
changed and shaken whenever the gangs are relieved.
An interesting feature of mining life in Mexico is the search for
sulphur in the craters of volcanoes. Popocatapetl and Orizaba are the
principal mountains where this substance is sought, and an extensive
business is carried on. The sulphur rises in the form of vapor, and
is condensed around the crater of the volcano. It requires several
years for an accumulation sufficiently thick to pay the expense of
collection, and sometimes the work is very dangerous. Men are let down
by ropes into the interior of the mountain, and sometimes they are
killed by the heat and noxious gases. The miners are a hardy race, and
seem to enjoy their venturesome occupation.
[Sidenote: ASCENT TO THE CRATERS.]
The ascent of these mountains is at all times difficult and fatiguing,
and very few persons, other than the miners, ever attempt it.
Sometimes an adventurous traveler happens along, and is not satisfied
till he has made the ascent of one or both of the mountains, but he
generally accumulates enough fatigue to last him several months.
Of this number is Mr. D. S. Richardson, United States Secretary of
Legation, who, in February, 1877, climbed the peak of Orizaba, or
Citlatepetl, as it is called by the Aztecs, the star mountain of the
Anahuac. He had previously climbed to the top of Popocatapetl, and
from its summit had gazed out over a sea of clouds to the frozen top
of its mighty rival, and now the position was reversed. Mr. Richardson
was accompanied by Mr. Eustace Morphy, who, with indomitable pluck,
held out to the last. The point from which the ascent of Orizaba is
generally undertaken is San Andres Chalchicomula, a pleasant little
town, which lies directly under the great volcano, at its southwestern
base. Here the sulphur-miners and the ice-cutters come down to sell
the products of their hazardous industry. The time selected, February
5th, was not at all favorable for the ascent. The miners and guides
had all come down, and reported the ascension impossible for several
days to come; there had been no such storm in fifty years, they said,
and to attempt to go up was simply madness.
Richardson and his companion yielded to their advice, and for a few
days engaged in a hunting expedition—which, however, was a failure in
so far as finding game was concerned. They saw one rabbit, and heard
wolves and coyotes howling; but that was all. They were high up the
mountain side, the weather was pleasant, and, as they had plenty of
provisions, and no thought of care, they enjoyed the interval with a
sense of absolute freedom. It was cold sometimes, and at night the
little stars would look down freezingly through the tops of the pines,
as if in derision of their foolishness; but these discomforts were as
nothing compared with subsequent ones.
At one o’clock on the 10th of February, they began their climb up the
mountain. For several hours their path wound up through the desolate
ravines which separate the Sierra Negra from the peak. Great masses
of volcanic rock were observed in fantastic shapes on every side,
and on the entire face of the country, half covered with snow, could
be read the signs of the savage convulsions which some day must have
shaken the mountains to their foundations. On the morning of the 11th,
the party resumed their march at two o’clock, and the ascent is thus
described by Secretary Richardson:
[Sidenote: THE ASCENT OF THE ORIZABA.]
“We were six, all told, four Indians, Morphy, and myself. No party
ever tried an ascent with better fellows for guides. They knew every
inch of the ground, were strong and good-natured, and took a lively
interest in the success of our enterprise. As we were the first to go
up after the heavy storms, we went prepared to have a tough climb.
The Indians said we would reach the top by ten o’clock, which was
giving us seven hours to do it in. Under ordinary circumstances, and
when the snow is in the best condition, the sulphur miners go up in
five or six hours from the cave, but on the present occasion they had
underestimated the difficulties. The snow was low down and very heavy,
and long before the sun peeped up over the murky horizon, we were
hopelessly launched upon the long, glistening slant, one end of which
seemed reaching out to touch the stars, and the other shot far below
us into a bank of clouds.
“Sunlight found us on the south side of the mountain, on a level about
equal to the height of the Sierra Negra. The ascent now began to be
very laborious, and, for the first time, we began cutting foot-steps
in the ice in order to proceed. When half way up the mountain, the
route usually taken is along a ledge of rocks which reaches up out
of the snow like the dorsal fin of a shark, and runs clear to the
top. In this respect, Orizaba differs very much from its kindred
peak, Popocatapetl. Sharp, jagged points of rock stick out all over
its surface like the spines of a porcupine, while the summit of
Popocatapetl is a clean, unbroken cone. These rocks on the slopes of
Orizaba are one of the principal sources of danger in the ascent, as
they often come tumbling down in great quantities; but at the time
of our adventure, they were all held fast by the unusually heavy fall
of snow. This was a point in our favor; but if we did not have to
dodge rocks, there was no lack of active operations in other respects.
The higher we went the more abrupt became the ascent, and the more
uncertain the foothold. Ten o’clock came around, and the summit was
still far above us.
“Every step now had to be cut out of the solid ice, and the fatigue
and light air were beginning to tell on our uninitiated muscles. At
eleven o’clock, we were at the foot of what is known as the rocks of
the _arrepentimiento_. This is the last grand pull, the home-stretch,
and it could not be more appropriately named. It is probably not over
three hundred yards to the top, but it is almost a perpendicular wall
of ice, and as it is reached when the adventurer is already fainting
and about ready to give up, it is a formidable obstacle. We were three
hours in getting over it, and then, almost fainting, and completely
exhausted, we threw ourselves down on a little shelf of sand at the
top of the peak.”
It was two o’clock in the afternoon when they reached the summit, just
eleven hours after their departure from the Cave of Santa Cruz, which
is itself no less than thirteen thousand feet above the sea. Two of
their Indians left the party, preferring to climb the mountain the
next morning, to spending the night on its top. Mr. Richardson says
that that was the most horrible night he ever hopes to pass. He says:
“Shortly after our arrival, a cold wind came up that struck us to
the very bone. There was no shelter to be obtained, as the descent
into the crater was impossible, and the excavations from which the
Indians take sulphur were covered deep with ice and snow. The bald,
naked peak presented but one point where it was possible to spend the
night. A little below the lip of the crater, on the southern side,
a little steam escapes through a bed of sand, and here the snow is
melted off a spot about a rod square. Into this sand we scratched a
hole, and, pulling our blankets over us, laid down. We had no eyes
for the magnificent panorama which was spread out before us, or the
sun, which was going down blood-red in the west; we were too utterly
miserable and cold.
“I do not think any of us slept a wink all night. Our blankets froze
stiff as boards, and all attempts to light a little spirit lamp and
make coffee were fruitless. We could not even drink our wine, for it
had turned to ice in the bottles. Thus hour after hour of the longest
night I ever spent dragged by, and at length signs of day began to
creep up slowly from the east. Almost too stupefied and stiff to
move, we were only induced to crawl out from our holes by the stern
realization of our desperate situation. The wind, too, now began to go
down somewhat, and after moving about a little we felt better. Making
our way up to the topmost pinnacle, we planted our flagstaff and
unfurled our blood-red banner to the breeze.
[Sidenote: THE CRATER OF THE ORIZABA.]
“The crater of Orizaba, which is much smaller than that of
Popocatapetl, is still an awful chasm, and is probably not far from
two miles in circumference. We could not take measurements of it, as
all the instruments were down the mountain with the other party. It
shows no signs of life, and with the exception of the heated sand
on which we passed the night, we failed to notice any evidences
of volcanic action still going on. But what a contrast this awful
stillness to the great convulsions of which this mountain has once
been the center. We had a magnificent view, for about an hour after
sunrise, and as far as the eye could reach, peak after peak of
lesser magnitude told the story of its volcanic birth. By a queer
coincidence, I had brought _The Last Days of Pompeii_ with me to read
in leisure moments, and as I looked out over the world at my feet, and
thought of Bulwer’s vivid description of the last days of that doomed
city, the thought suggested itself, ‘who knows how many Pompeiis are
buried beneath these hoary hills, and what tales might these rocks
repeat if they would?’”
XVI.
CORAL REEFS AND CAVES IN THE PACIFIC.
THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC—HOW THEY HAVE BEEN FORMED—WHAT THE
CORAL IS—THE WONDROUS ARCHITECTS OF THE SEA—WHAT A UNITED
STATES STEAMER SAW—HOW THE CORAL IS FISHED FOR—ROMANTIC STORY
OF A CAVERN—HOW IT WAS DISCOVERED—AN ELOPEMENT AND EXERCISE IN
DIVING—LOVE AND TURTLES—A BATTLE IN THE WATER—KILLED BY SHARKS—A
MAIDEN’S GRIEF—THE PERIL OF A LOVER—SURPRISING A FATHER-IN-LAW—END
OF A SUBMARINE COURTSHIP.
The waters of the Pacific ocean contain thousands of islands far
away from the coast. Their presence is recognized, long before they
become visible, by clouds directly above them in the otherwise clear
sky. The land absorbs the heat of the sun, and accumulates it faster
than the water; soon an ascending current of warm air is formed,
carrying up moisture into the colder regions of the atmosphere, where
it is condensed and forms clouds. A similar phenomenon is observed
in our western plains, where the sky is frequently clear enough in
the morning, but by ten or eleven o’clock, enough heat has been
accumulated to cause the formation of clouds.
[Sidenote: THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC.]
The islands of the Pacific are of two kinds, called the higher and
the lower. The lower rise but seven, ten, and rarely as high as one
hundred feet above the level of the sea; while the higher islands
reach an elevation of 10,000, 12,000, and even 15,000 feet. There
is no transition between them. The most remarkable are the lower
islands. Their appearance is very peculiar. In the first place, the
eye is arrested by a white beach; then comes a line of verdure, due
to tropical trees; then a lagoon of quiet water, of a whitish or a
yellowish color, then another line of verdure, and finally, beyond
all, the dark, blue waves of the ocean. Whitsuntide Island is a
remarkable model of the structure of these islands:
It is a ring rising seven or eight feet above the sea level, enclosing
a lagoon, and presenting the characteristics just described. The
lagoon inside is but a few fathoms deep; but on the outside of the
island, the water is fifteen thousand feet deep. Here, then, we
evidently have a tower-like structure reaching up from the bottom of
the sea, and having a depression in its summit. Some of these lower
islands are fifty miles across, but most of them are not so large. In
some the ring is broken at several points, and these are designated by
the Malay word _atoll_.
The island of Tahiti, the principal one of the Society Islands is a
good example of the second class or higher islands. It rises seven
thousand to eight thousand feet above the level of the sea, has no
lagoon in its center, but a crater, and the water around it is very
deep. It may, in fact, be considered as a mountain rising to a height
of some eighteen thousand feet from the bottom of the sea. Outside of
it is a double girdle of low islands, one near, which Darwin calls a
fringing reef, and one further out, to which he gives the name of a
barrier reef.
On examining these reefs, and the lower islands, their structure
will be found made up entirely of animal remains, generation after
generation having left their homes, consisting of limestone, to
accumulate there. On the top, we find these animals living and
growing, in all colors, shapes, and sizes. The highest islands, on
the contrary, except those near the continent, like Borneo, Sumatra,
etc., are entirely volcanic, and do not contain sandstone, granite, or
gneiss, like the mountains of the continent.
The limestone of the lower islands is not due to sedimental deposits
from the ocean, but is the work of the coral animal, the great
architect of the sea.
[Sidenote: WHAT THE CORAL IS.]