We have remarked elsewhere on the abundant mineral wealth of the country. The great silver deposits of Guanajuato were discovered as a result of a camp-fire made on the rocks by some muleteers, who found refined silver among the ashes, which the heat had smelted from them. The great "mother lode" here yielded up enormous wealth. The pleasing city of Zacatecas to-day grew from another discovery of silver ores, which produced a value, up to the middle of last century, of nearly eight hundred million dollars. The curious archives of these mines, which still exist, show how carefully the Spaniards worked them. The Pachuca mines, which to-day are still worked, yielded similar wealth, and it was here that the well-known _patio_ or amalgamation process was discovered, with quicksilver from Peru.
There are other centres, scarcely less important, well known to the mineralogist. The mineral-bearing zone of Mexico is sixteen hundred miles long, and yields nearly all the metals known to commerce. Coal, however, is not a frequent product. The country has been described as a paradise for the prospector. The mines are innumerable: almost every hill is pierced or perforated by shafts and galleries, ancient or modern; some are enormous tunnels, or _socavones_.
[Illustration: CORDOVA AND THE PEAK OF ORIZABA. STATE OF VERA CRUZ.
The Mexican native miner is, in his way, expert and active, and with rude appliances performs marvels in the work of ore extraction. Halt a moment by yonder pit in the rocky slope. Look down: a notched pole descends, upon which you would hesitate to venture, giving access to the workings beneath. Yet, in a moment, perhaps, a peon, bearing on his back an enormous load of rock in a hide or sack, will ascend from the bowels of the earth, panting and groaning--we shall hear the noise of his breathing before we see him. He will cast his load at our feet, and from it will roll the gleaming quartz and pyrites, with perhaps the red of the _rosicler_, or rich oxide ore of silver, or the yellow ochres of the decomposed gold-bearing sulphides, more readily prepared by Nature for treatment and winning of the yellow metal. Or he may bear it to the stream-bed, there to treat it in some primitive stone mill.