In former times silver mines were worked in the Province of _Tucuman_. In Aconquija also we find mines of copper which must be a continuation of those of Catamarca.
The Provinces of _Córdoba_ and _San Luis_, besides ascertained veins of gold-bearing quartz, galena and copper, contain mines of manganese and wolfram, and well-known quarries of marble, and of onyx, both green and of other shades.
In the Territories of _Tierra del Fuego_ and _Santa Cruz_ the sands along the Atlantic coast contain, especially after storms, an abundance of gold in powder and small nuggets, whose extraction gives employment to numbers of workers.[87] There also are seams of lignite and of peat. Finally, in Santa Cruz there are several salt workings, the produce being sent to Buenos Ayres.
[Footnote 87: few years ago a company was formed with North American and Argentine capital to work the sands in this manner in Tierra del Fuego.]
The River _Chubut_, in the Territory of Chubut, brings down fine gold along its bed, as do its numerous small tributaries, which rise in the Andean slopes. The presence of gold more than 100 miles from the Cordillera tempted some colonists to organise an expedition; at the foot of the mountain they found gold in nuggets.
Another company exploits the salt pits of the Valdez Peninsula, and another the quarry of flat granite slabs, known as the Atlas Quarry.
For many years now large quantities of gold have been found in the rich “placers” of the Territory of Neuquen, where copper also has been discovered, silver-bearing galena, coal, and petroleum. The gold taken out of the washers of Villa Michicó and the neighbourhood is estimated at 330 lb. avoirdupois annually.
In the Territory of _Rio Negro_ there are abundant quarries of gypsum, limestone, and other building materials; in that of the _Pampa Central_ copper has been recently discovered and is being worked; in that of _Misionès_ there is native copper, iron, and manganese; in that of the _Andes_ (Puña de Atacama), there are immense deposits of borate of lime, as well as veins of quartz and “placers.”
Considering the vast extent of these territories, which have never been seriously explored except at a few points, we have every reason to believe that it will be many years before we have even an approximate knowledge of the mineral wealth they contain; but the data gathered up to the present time augur well for the future of the mining industry in the Argentine.