CHAPTER LXII.

THE WEALTH OF THE WORLD.

Silver was known to the ancients as far back in the dim and distant ages of the past as any record extends. It was undoubtedly one of the first metals mined by mankind. In writings, both sacred and profane, mention is made of silver in the earliest ages of the world.

Gold being a metal that is found native, and silver being very frequently found in the native state, these were doubtless among the first metals with which the primitive races of mankind became acquainted. Native silver being found mingled with various ores of silver, it was probably not long after the metal became known and valued that men conceived the idea of smelting these ores and thus obtaining a larger supply of the metal than was yielded in the native form. In the Bible frequent mention is made of silver, from the very beginning. Silver was more highly prized than gold by all the primitive peoples of the earth. Even the sacred writers speak of it with gusto. To this day we find that savages and semi-civilized nations prefer silver to gold. It is the case with the negro tribes of Africa, the Indians of the American Continent, and with the nations of China and Japan. The human animal must be educated up to a just appreciation of gold, but silver by its brilliant white lustre and flash in the light of the sun recommends itself to him as soon as its sheen strikes his eye.

All metals were no doubt first extracted from their ores by smelting, yet it appears that the process of extracting silver from its ores, and gold from its matrix, by means of quicksilver was not unknown to the ancients. Pliny and Vitruvius speak of quicksilver being used for this purpose. In ancient times, if Pliny is to be believed, the art of mining was well understood, as he speaks of silver-mines being worked to the depth of a mile and a half. If this be true, our modern mines have little to boast of. To have done such mining the ancients must have possessed hoisting and pumping machinery, or their equivalents, with appliances for ventilation equal to if not surpassing any known to the mining engineers of the present age. There is every evidence that silver-mines were worked in many countries in the Old World at a very early day, and not a few are still being worked, in regard to the date of the discovery and opening of which there is no record. All that is known is that they seem to have always been worked.

Fuller, in his treatise on silver-mines, says:

“Wherever in any part of the world silver-mines have been worked they are worked now, unless for some unexplainable cause, such as the lack of machinery, the existence of war, the invasion of Indians, etc. We know of no silver-mining regions in the world that have given out. Mexican mines, worked by the Aztecs before the conquest, are still worked as profitably as ever; the old Spanish mines opened long before Hannibal’s time, are still worked with enormous profits; the South American mines have constantly yielded their wealth for more than three hundred years, and are as productive as ever; mines in Hungary, that were worked by the Romans before the Saviour’s time, still yield abundance of ore; the silver-mines of Freiburg, opened in the eleventh century and worked continually ever since, yield their steady increase. So in Norway, Sweden, and Russia, and indeed, wherever silver-mines have been opened, we believe without exception, they continue to be worked at the present day, and generally are more productive than at any time in their past history. For permanent and rich returns, silver-mining has no parallel in any other business.”

In regard to the yield of the silver-mines in Spain in ancient times little can now be ascertained. By many persons the Spanish peninsula is regarded as the Tarshish of old, and through such traditions as have come down to us it is quite certain that Solomon drew much of his wealth from the Spanish mines at the time it is said, “it was nothing accounted of, for the King made silver to be as stones in Jerusalem.”

Among the fabulous stories of the ancients in regard to the silver-mines of Spain is that of Diodorous, who relates that the shepherds of the Pyrenees set fire to the forests in the neighborhood of their camps, when by the burning of the fallen timber the minerals of the earth were fused and the molten silver ran upon the ground as water in a brook. Among the modern silver-mines of Spain are those of Sierra de Almagrera, which were discovered and opened in 1839, and which in 1845 gave employment to eight thousand miners. The most important silver-mines in Spain at the present time are those of Hiendelaencia, which were discovered about thirty years ago and which have been productive ever since—their average annual yield for twenty years was 31,577 pounds troy. The whole silver yield of Spain is at present about one hundred thousand pounds troy per annum.

In Germany, the silver-mines discovered in the Hartz mountains and at Frieberg, Saxony, in the tenth century are still being worked as vigorously as ever. Much of the silver-ore worked in Germany is of no better quality than is thrown away on the Comstock as “waste rock.” In Norway and Sweden silver-mines known before the discovery of America, are being worked. The mines of Sala, Westmania, which are yet being worked were known and worked over 500 years ago. The Cero de Pasco mines, Peru, discovered in 1630, from which no less than five million pounds of silver were taken out in forty-three years, are still productive. The famous mines of Potosi (Cerro de Potosi), Bolivia, formerly included in the territory of Peru, discovered in 1544, are said to have yielded $1,200,000,000. The total annual yield of Bolivia at present is about 450,000 pounds.

The Zacatecas mines, in Mexico, were opened in 1548, and the mines of Guanajuata in 1558. The principal mines of Mexico are those of Guanajuata, Catorce, Zacatecas, and Real del Monte. The yield of the Mexican mines since the conquest of the country by the Spaniards, up to 1860, amounted to $2,039,100,000. The following is the yield of some of the older silver-mines of Mexico and South America: Sierra Madre mines, $800,000,000, Veta Madre, $235,934,636; Rio Grande, $650,000,000; Royas, $85,421,015; Valencia, $31,813,486; Santa Anna, $21,347,210; Biscania, $16,341,000. These are, in most instances, not single veins, but mining districts in which there are numerous veins of various sizes and degrees of richness. They are groups of parallel veins. The Veta Madre, of Mexico, is however, situated much the same as the Comstock lode of Nevada. It fills a similar fissure and is in a similar formation. Although other mines in Mexico contain much richer ores, the Veta Madre (Mother Vein), has been more extensively worked than any other mine in that country. It has been steadily worked for over three hundred years, yet during the three centuries there has been taken from it but little more silver than has been taken from the Comstock during sixteen years.

Humboldt says the silver sent to Europe from Mexico and South America, from the discovery of the New World by Columbus to 1809, would make a solid ball eighty-three and seven-tenths Paris feet in diameter; at the present rate of production the Comstock lode alone should roll up a tolerably large ball, as in sixteen years it is estimated the yield of the vein has been $220,000,000, or an average annual yield of $13,750,000. This is a good showing when we consider that our people did not know what the silver-ore was when they found it, and that during the first two or three years after they began working the ores much time was spent in trying experiments with all kinds of processes, and with machinery of an inferior character.

In 1874 the yield of the Comstock mines was $21,940,123,96; in 1874, it was $22,242,274,95; and for 1875 it will be much greater.

According to recent estimates the total silver product of the world from 1850 to 1875 was $1,025,000,000 and the Comstock mines are now yielding one-tenth of the entire amount produced in the world. The latest estimates of German and American authorities give the total product of all the gold and silver-mines in the world, from the year 1500 to 1874, as follows: Pounds of silver—364,000,000, valued at $8,175,000,000. Pounds of gold—17,000,000, valued at $6,450,000,000. Total pounds of gold and silver—381,600,000; valued at $14,625,000,000. These figures are probably not very exact. It is a hard matter to get the exact yield of even such mines as are worked by regularly organized companies, and almost impossible to get figures at all where gold is being mined from placers.

It would not be of general interest to trace the progress of mining events on the Comstock year by year from the discovery of silver up to the present writing. It is sufficient to say that in 1862-3, up to which time operations on the lode have been pretty fully described, there began to be an abundance of tolerably efficient mills, and hoisting-works that were sufficiently powerful to do the work at the depth to which the shafts of the principal companies had then been sunk. Even as late as 1866 the greatest depth which had been attained in any mine on the Comstock lode was 923 feet. This was in the Chollor-Potosi mine. The Gould & Curry were then working at a depth of 900 feet, Belcher, 850; Bullion, 800; Hale & Norcross, 783; Savage, 614; Ophir, 547, and other leading companies at a depth of from 500 to 600 feet. Ever since the setting up of the first steam-hoisting and pumping machinery on the lode, and ever since the starting of the first mills for the reduction of the ores extracted, improvements have been made and still continue to be made. The mills and hoisting-works at present in operation would astound the miner and millman of 1862-3, though he doubtless flattered himself that the mills and hoisting-works of that day had attained a degree of perfection beyond which there was little room for improvement.

During these years there were numerous changes in the fortunes of the companies along the lode. Some that had rich ore upon the surface had worked down to the bottom of their deposit and had found themselves in clay or barren porphyry, while others who had started in with no ore on the surface, as the Hale & Norcross and some others, found themselves in “bonanza” at the depth of six or seven hundred feet; and when ore began to grow thin with these last the first companies, by drafting east from the point where their pay pinched out in clay and porphyry, had again found ore and in larger and richer bodies than at first. Thus the bonanza and luck shift, and will probably so continue to shift as long as the mines are worked. It never but once happened—which was in 1865—that so many mines were at once in barren as to depress business and cause a feeling of distress in regard to the permanence of the mines.

No sooner had some of the more timid taken their departure, however, and raised the cry that the country was “played out,” than longer and richer bodies of ore began to be found than ever before. Those who had run away then came back, bitterly regretting the want of faith which had caused them to leave just at a time when a fortune might have been had for a mere song. In 1862, the Reese River mines, 150 or 200 miles east of Virginia City, were discovered, a rush to these occurred, and the town of Austin was built up; then came the White Pine excitement, and the towns of Hamilton and Treasure City were built; afterwards Eureka and Pioche were built by the discovery of rich mines in their neighborhood. The camps named still flourish, though they have their “ups and downs”—are sometimes in “bonanza” and sometimes in “borrasca.”

It may be well just here to explain these words. Both are Spanish. “Bonanza” signifies prosperity, success—that all is well. At sea it is used by sailors when the weather is fair and they are sailing with a fair wind—when all is well with them. Among miners it means that they are working in a body of ore, that they are in luck, and all with them is prosperous. “Borrasca” means just the opposite of “bonanza.” At sea it means tempestuous and dangerous weather, bad fortune—all going wrong; among miners it means that they are in barren rock, that they are in a bad streak, out of luck. Among miners, borrasca is suggestive of long faces, sad hearts, and empty pockets, while bonanza shows us faces wreathed in smiles, hearts that are merry, and purses that are plethoric. Along the Comstock the mining companies are sometimes in bonanza and sometimes in borrasca. So long as they are in the great fissure, however, and have a good width of “vein-matter” they are not utterly cast down even though they may be drifting in barren rock—they are liable to run into ore at any time and often do so when such good fortune is least expected. Some have compared the vein-matter of the lode to a great pudding into which has been stirred raisins, currants, and plums; sometimes you find a currant, sometimes a raisin, and sometimes a plum, while again you are blessed with nothing better than the matter of which the mass of the pudding is composed.

To multiply examples would be tedious, but an example or two will probably not be out of place. Although there is ore in the Crown Point mine, Gold Hill, at the depth of 900 feet, their first great bonanza was not found until they had attained a depth of 1300 feet. This was a magnificent body of ore, and yielded many millions of dollars. The very rich ore was confined to a space about two hundred feet in length lying just north of the line of the Belcher mine, but the vein contained a considerable amount of low-grade ore for a distance of about 350 feet further north. Finally, in 1873, they had worked down through this rich deposit to the 1400-foot level and there started a cross-cut east in search of ore. When this cross-cut had passed through the west clay wall of the vein a deposit of very rich ore was found some feet in width. Passing through the cross-cut next encountered, a streak of white and almost barren quartz about two feet in width, and beyond this reached ore worth from $45 to $75 per ton. This body of ore proved to be twenty-four feet in width. The cross-cut being continued east across this suddenly struck a solid wall of porphyry. The whole face of the cross-cut was in this barren rock, and it was at first thought that the east wall of the ledge had been reached, but after passing through a few feet of porphyry a very large body of ore assaying from $250 to $600 per ton was reached. As the mine continued to be worked this search for ore was repeated at intervals, and thus far the search has never been in vain. In 1875 ore was being extracted everywhere from the 900 down to the 1500-feet level, though much of that obtained in the upper-levels was of low-grade, yet too rich to be left behind.

In May, 1873, in the Belcher mine, adjoining the Crown Point on the south, was found the continuation of the same rich deposit worked on the 1300-foot level of the last mine named. Afterwards, other bodies were found at a still greater depth, and to the eastward, and so the work of sinking and searching for new bonanza still goes on, while at the same time ore is being extracted from those already found. In the Savage, Gould & Curry, Hale & Norcross, Chollar-Potosi, Yellow-Jacket, Imperial, Empire, Overman, and a score of other mines this is the work which is constantly going on.

Some persons will no doubt think that if there is a deposit of ore in a mine it should be found in a short time and with but little trouble, but miners can see no further into the ground than persons who have their homes and business on the surface. Place a man in the bottom of a shaft one thousand feet in depth; then tell him to drift off and find a body of ore, and he is much the same as a man groping about in a dark cellar. He knows which way to go to reach the vein, but when once he is in the vein he may almost touch that of which he is in search without finding it.

If mining men knew the exact spot in which the rich deposits are located, it would be an easy matter to sink a shaft or run a drift to tap them. Thus it happened that it was fourteen years after the discovery of silver, and the Comstock lode before what is now known as the “Big Bonanza,”—the chief of all the bonanzas—was found. For fourteen years men daily and hourly walked over the ground under which lay the greatest mass of wealth that the world has ever seen in the shape of silver ore, yet nobody suspected its presence. The ground on the surface presented the same appearance as the soil in other places in the same neighborhood, and roads were dug in it, houses were built upon it, and all kinds of things were done on, in, and about it without anybody thinking any more of, or about it, than of any other ground in the town.