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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It Is Also Natural That The Product Of
The Gold-Washings Should Diminish With Greater Rapidity Than That Of
The Subterraneous Working Of The Veins.
The metals not being renewed
in the clefts of the veins (by sublimation) now accumulate in alluvial
soil by the course of the rivers where the table-lands are higher than
the level of the surrounding running waters.
But in rocks with
metalliferous veins the miner does not at once know all he has to
work. He may chance to lengthen the labours, to go deep, and to cross
other accompanying veins. Alluvial soils are generally of small depth
where they are auriferous; they most frequently rest upon sterile
rocks. Their superficial position and uniformity of composition help
to the knowledge of their limits, and wherever workmen can be
collected, and where the waters for the washings abound, accelerate
the total working of the auriferous clay. These considerations,
suggested by the history of the Conquest, and by the science of
mining, may throw some light on the problem of the metallic wealth of
Hayti. In that island, as well as at Brazil, it would be more
profitable to attempt subterraneous workings (on veins) in primitive
and intermediary soils than to renew the gold-washings which were
abandoned in the ages of barbarism, rapine and carnage.); traces of
that sand are still found in the rivers Holguin and Escambray, known
in general in the vicinity of Villa-Clara, Santo Espiritu, Puerto del
Principe de Bayamo and the Bahia de Nipe.
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