The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-03-29
NICARAGUAN MINING.
The Rude and Primitive Methods
Even now in Use.
THE LOw-DOwN ADVENTURES.
TrOpics-The Lazy Wretches who Work
One Week in a Year.

GRANADA, NICARAGUA, March 3, 1889.
Especial Correspondence Of THE HER
AID. Immediately after the establishment
of peace in Nicaragua, numerous eXpe-
ditions were sent out from this city into
THE CELEBRATED GOLD REGION
called the Chontales. So encouraging were
the reports brought back by these adventur-
ers that the new government offered extra
ordinary inducements for the settlement of
that salubrious and beautiful portion of
Nicaragua by miners and agriculturists;
and from that day to this those far-famed
gold washings have been subject of deep
interest to individuals as well as to the
government.
At present the most important silver
mines in the Republic are those of Dipilta
in the northern mountains They have
been worked about forty years, but never
under advantageous circumstances, yet
have produced an average OF about 1900
marks of silver per annum. The yield of
Dipilta ores runs from something over one
and half per cent to two per cent of pure
metal.
An English writer named Byam. who
visited Nicaragua few years ago, for
mining purposes, states that the silver ores
which he observed were ''fine. broad but
irregular veins, the precious metal combined
largely with sulphur and lead, the ore hard,
but clean.n He also remarks that the cop
per ores are universally combined with sui
phur, or with some other substance which
requires calcining to get rid of: but that all
may pc smelted in common blast furnaces
with the aid of equal quantities of iron
stone, which is found in ineXhaustible
quantities on the surface of all the Near
aguan uplandS. They are what the Spanish
miners designate as ''metuL dc cOLOr,n being
red and blue oxides and green carbonates,
with now and then the brown or pigeon
breasted They cut smoothly and easily
with the bnife, and yield from twenty five
to sixty per cent. The copper veins are
generally vertical, all the larger ores run
ming east and west.
Speaking of the gold washings of the
country, Mr.. Byam says: "SOme adventur
ers, generally of the very lowest class,
BOTH IN MANNERS AND MORALS,
proceed to the auriferous streams that run
through the south part of the Honduras,
nearest to Granada, for two or three months
during the dryest part of the year, and
when the rains have entirely subsidized
Their baggage is very light and easily
carried on half starved mule. for each pro
vides only for himself and female com
panion, a small load of Indian corn barely
enough for the pair,) a initiate or stone to
grind 1t on, some tobacco, an earthern pot
or two, a Ratchet, and a small leathern bag
"a very small one will do-in which to put
the gold when found. They also take few
half-gOurds, dried, to wash the earth in, a
grass hammock for bed, their mechdte or
heavy brOad-swOrd, and some bows and
arrows.
That part of Nicaragua where the mines
are is almost uninhabited and on their ar
rival at the different streams, they generally
separate, and each pair choosing a spot,
often miles distant from the others, where
they commence operations. The first thing
is to build a rdmGdG or hut of branches:
but. with characteristic desire to save them
selves labor, they always select place
where two good sized trees are near enough
together to serve as the main posts to their
rude abode, and upon which to fasten their
hammock strings. Such a casa can easily
be builded in two or three hours, even by
the LATEST miner and his comprehensive
generally doing most of the actual work,
unless their honeymoon be very new.
The temporary home being thus estab-
lished, the entire care of the household is
left to the woman, who grindS the corn and
makes the tOrtillas, and gathers the brush
wood over which to cook them. These un-
leavened cakes are about their only article
of food, and are toasted on fiat stone
heated in the Goals. Their beverage is a
little cocOa-nut and corn ground together
and shaken up in gourd with a little water
and not bad drink either. as can testify
from experimental knowledge. Thus the
couple vegetate for quarter of year, up
held by hopes of affiuence during the re-
naming nine months.
Their
MINING OPERATIONS ARE As SIMPLE
as can well be imagined. The man digs a
few holes in the ground near the stream,
= 1nI of n
close to the water, washes it slowly in the
half gOurds, when. after repeated changes
of the water Of the spot chosen proves to
be a goood one,) a little fine gold -dust is Wis
IDLE in the gourd. 1t requires great deal
of nicely to balance the gOurd backwards
and forwards, up and down, to and fro, so
as to get rid of all the earth without losing
any of the gold; audit is still more difficult,
at the last washing, to manage to leave the
gold al together at the very end of the re-
naming deposit, which is generally of a
dark gray color. None but an expert can
do it without wasting most of the treasure.
The grains Of gold are sometimes large
enough to be picked out after one or two
washings, and often of a size to be dis
cerned while digging; so that a man in
reasonably good luck may find enough gold
in a week to keep him comfortably the re
mainder of the year-according to Nicar-
aguan ideas of comfort.
But money so easily Obtalned as easily
goes, and the fortunate twain on their re
turn to town quickly squander it in de-
baucherY and gambling. If he does not
wind up the annual spree by numbering his
cOmpInGrd she may consider herself mas
cote among her class and prepare for an
other seasons campaigning.
From various numbers of the principal
newspaper in the state, the NicdrdglteRese,
| have compiled most of the following facts
The modes of mining yet practided in Cen
tral America are so exceedingly rude that it
is surprising that any profitable result
should be obtained. The gold and silver
ores are crushed in a big adobe basin, in the
middle of which rises a vertical shaft, gen
orally driven by horizontal water-wheel
This shaft has two arms, to each of which
a large stone is suspended. These are the
"crushers." After the ore is reduced to
sufficient fineness, the metal is separated
by amalgam; long and expensive process
which is now beginning to be greatly cheap
ened by the introduction of the Germal
"barrel process"
THE MACHINES FOR CRUSHING THE ORES,
have, however, as yet undergone but slight
Improvement. Some of the mines in San
Salvador and Costa Rica have European
machinery, and are being worked to great
advantage, as compared to the no less rich
deposits in Nicaragua, but where modern
mining ideas have not yet been introduced.
Sulphur may be obtained from all the vol
canoes, crude and nearly pure; and nitre
is as easily procured; also sulphate of iron.
Not only are very valuable gold deposits
known to exist in this section, but import