Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-08-09

NOT suitable for amalgamation. which has been
and stiii Is the only system of treating them.
Inc people have no knowledge or conception
OF operating with purifying furnaces and other
MODERN inventions. Thus great quantities Of
ores. from 30 to 300 ounces Of silver per ton,
entirely worthless today, can be bought at .
low price, for this kind Of metal does not yield
any proht II sent to Europe, freightage to the
coast being too costly. Now that American
enterprise has started . home market for all
TINS that was formerly wasted, mining industry
ought 70 receive new impetus.
PRIMITIVE MuLs
The mills Of Potosi in which ores are crushed
are fair samples Of the primitive methods en-
ployed in the richest mines here. The best of
them are rude affairs, beside which tho most
oid-fashioned homemade cider mill you might
nnd In the United States would look like a
dainty piece OF cabinet work. Bolivian aras-
ira, as the crushing mill 10 called. has great
stone wheels attached to the ends Of horizon
tai bar moved by an upright shaft propelled
by an OK, mule or a couple of bare-legged In
dams. Thus the stone wheels revolve in a sort
OF rude trough, into which the broken ore has
Deen tumbled, moving slowly around. crushing
perhaps half a ton of ore in a day. while the
mills OF California and Nevada would crush
twenty times as much in as many hours and
with little more expense
FROM the beginning of the work to the end
the very simplest and slowest methods are en-
ployed, and even by those processes the labor
ers are few and inefficient. In early days the
Indians were compelled, sorely against their
WILL to work in the mines for tho benefit of
their conquerors, and we're rewarded with the
most cruel treatment When the enforced
labor could no longer be controlled the mines
fell into comparative decay and the Indians Of
today doubtless retain a memory through ira
dition Of wrongs and sufferings Of their ances-
tors and cannot be induced to work with any
degree of energy or industry.
HOW THE ORE Is HANDLED.
Powder or other blasting material is rarely
used in Bolivian mines, the ore being broken
out OF the veins by man power. Then the
or ore carriers, put it into rawhide
sacks, string it on their backs and carry it out
OF the depths, climbing patiently upward by
perpendicular logs that have been notched to
give holding places for the hands and feet
Then 1t is dumped on the ground, where
Indians sitting down, pound the Jumps into
pieces suitable for the crushing mill where
the stone wheels finally reduce it to mud by
the slow process above described. Afterward
1t Is roasted or treated with quicksilver and
at last a little pure silver is obtained and run
into bars for transportation. By this process
a great part of the silver is lost. together with
much OF the quicksilver used in the work of
When the primitive process
yields profit of say $40 ton, the methods of
the United States miner would make it Weld
five times as much. lie would hoist the ore by
instead OF by man power, and would
use machinery for reducing it to powder, thus
allowing none to be wasted, and getting out a
much larger quantity in a given time. After
the reduction he would extract the silver from
the rock in such o way that not grain of it
would be lost. and all the quicksilver used
would be carefully preserved to be employed
for the same purpose over and over again.