Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Mines Of Gold
And Silver Were Worked At The Beginning Of The Conquest At Buria, Near
Barquesimeto, In The Province
Of Los Mariches, at Baruta, on the south
of Caracas, and at Real de Santa Barbara near the Villa de
Cura.
Grains of gold are found in the whole mountainous territory between
Rio Yaracuy, the Villa de San Felipe and Nirgua, as well as between
Guigue and Los Moros de San Juan. M. Bonpland and myself, during our
long journey, saw nothing in the gneiss granite of Spanish Guiana to
confirm the old faith in the metallic wealth of that district; yet it
seems certain from several historical notices that there exist two
groups of auriferous alluvial land; one between the sources of the Rio
Negro, the Uaupes and the Iquiare; the other between the sources of
the Essequibo, the Caroni and the Rupunuri. Hitherto only one working
is found in Venezuela, that of Aroa: it furnished, in 1800, near 1500
quintals of copper of excellent quality. The green-stone rocks of the
transition mountains of Tucutunemo (between Villa de Cura and
Parapara) contain veins of malachite and copper pyrites. The
indications of both ochreous and magnetic iron in the coast-chain, the
native alum of Chuparipari, the salt of Araya, the kaolin of the
Silla, the jade of the Upper Orinoco, the petroleum of Buen-Pastor and
the sulphur of the eastern part of New Andalusia equally merit the
attention of the government.
It is easy to ascertain the existence of some mineral substances which
afford hopes of profitable working but it requires great
circumspection to decide whether the mineral be sufficiently abundant
and accessible to cover the expense.* (* In 1800 a day-labourer (peon)
employed in working the ground gained in the province of Caracas 15
sous, exclusive of his food. A man who hewed building timber in the
forests on the coast of Paria was paid at Cumana 45 to 50 sous a day,
without his food. A carpenter gained daily from 3 to 6 francs in New
Andalusia. Three cakes of cassava (the bread of the country), 21
inches in diameter, 1 1/2 lines thick, and 2 1/2 pounds weight, cost
at Caracas one half-real, or 6 1/2 sous. A man eats daily not less
than 2 sous' worth of cassava, that food being constantly mixed with
bananas, dried meat (tasajo) and panelon, or unrefined sugar.) Even in
the eastern part of South America gold and silver are found dispersed
in a manner that surprises the European geologist; but that
dispersion, together with the divided and entangled state of the veins
and the appearance of some metals only in masses, render the working
extremely expensive. The example of Mexico sufficiently proves that
the interest attached to the labours of the mines is not prejudicial
to agricultural pursuits, and that those two branches of industry may
simultaneously promote each other. The failure of the attempts made
under the intendant, Don Jose Avalo, must be attributed solely to the
ignorance of the persons employed by the Spanish government who
mistook mica and hornblende for metallic substances.
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