Omaha daily bee., 1898-07-24
BOLIVIA'S MINERAL WEALTH
Vast Stores Of Precious Metals in the
Highlands of the Andes.
WHAT AMERICAN PROSECUTORS ARE DOING
Millions Already Produced and I'm
counted Millions in Prospect-
Facts About the Districts
and the Miners.

INblOAlltllNt W 4 ht bHisI $3.50"
are among the richest mineral regions of the
world. Bolivia has produced more thar
80. 900, 900, 900 worth of silver. She now stands
third among the silver-producing countries,
and II what American mining prospectors
here tell me is true, she bids fair to soon
come TO the front as a rich gold territory.
] went out yesterday to watch the weeks
cleanup of a little placer mine which be-
longs to a number of Bolivians of La Paz.
The diggings we're on the Chuguiaguillo
river, which runs by the city not two miles
from where l am writing. This river has
cut a gulley several hundred feet deep in
the side OF the plateau or basin in when
La paz is situated. and above the cut a high
wall of gravel extends to what is known as
the Alto. far above the city. 1t is in this
gravel that the gold is found. A score OF
Indians were at work digging down the hill,
carrying off the gravel in wheelbarrows and
dumping IL into troughs or sluice boxes
through which water from the river was
conducted. On the bottom of the troughs
were iron ladders or frames so laid that they
would catch the heavier parts OF the gravel
and gold as the water carried the dirt on
into the river. There was no quicksilver
used and the miners depended entirely upon
the weight of the gold to catch the particles
as they went through. Shortly after | ar
rived the water was turned partially off and
the gravel PANIED for gold. The panning
was done by three Indians, who sat with
their bare legs in the water on the sides OF
the sluices and dipped the gravel up into
wooden bowls Just about as big as those
which we use for making bread or chopping
hash. The bowls are the gold-washing pans
of the Indians. They are called bataes
and are to be found in all the
mining regions of Peru and Bolivia. The
miners dipped the bowls of gravel from
time to time into the water and, mixing
the gravel with their hands, caused the
dirt to flow off. Now and then they picked
up a handful Of the gravel, and after look
ing 1t over, cast it back into the sluice box.
AS they went on you could See little yellow
bits of metal among the dark stones.
After a while the gravel was all washed
out, and in each bowl there was a little pile
of gold pebbles or small nuggets. There
was no gold dust, the deposits ranging
from bits of pure gold the size Of the head
of a pin to nuggets as big as your little
finger nail. One of the nuggets which /
saw taken out weighed more than half an
ounce, and 1t was worth, 1 was told, at
least $40. The total amount cleaned up was
not large, but it was all of this coarse
gold.
inns 80 NV Siti Vi ~ 5N'' yum
in Bolivia. 1t lies in the earth not in
pockets, but distributed with great regu-
larity through the layers of gravel of some
parts of the country. Now and then large
nuggets are found. These sam gravel beds
have been burrowed into by the Indians
for more than 200 years, and out of almost
the spot upon which we stood there was
found, in the seventeenth century, a mass
of gold which sold for $11, 269. 1t was sen
TO the museum at Madrid, where it is saiC
one of the keepers had a dummy nugge
made to initiate it, and then stole the or.
iginal and melted it up and sold it. While
we were at the mine the skeleton of al
Indian was dug up. He had probably beer
mining here generations ago and the eartt
had caved in and buried him..
Bolivian Gold Fields.
I went out to this mine with Mr.. H.. II
Strater of Philadelphia and Prof. A.. A
Hard of Denver. Prof. Hard is a well know
mining engineer, and he has been brough
here by Mr.. Strater in connection with som
Philadelphia capitalists, who have taken u
a large claim on the Palka river, abou
thirty miles from La Paz, at the foot O
the great Illimani mountain. They hav
tested the property thoroughly, and 1t prom
ises to be one Of the great placer mine
of the world. The best hydraulic machiner
for its development has already been ordere,
from San Francisco, and within q fey
months they will begin active work. TIL
machinery is all made in sections, no piec
weighing more than $50 pounds. as it mus
go to the mines on the backs of mules
Prof. Hard has travelled extensively over thi
part of the Bolivian mining regions. II
tells me there Is no doubt but that there |
n great deal of gold here. Said he to m
today:
IL believe that the whole mountain rang
running from Mount Sorati, or Illampu, as
is here called, to Mount Illimani, a distanc
OF 100 miles, contains quantities of gold, an
/ shall not be surprised If there is her
within n few years a gold excitement equa
to the Klondike. This range forms a noun
tain wall containing some of the highes
peaks on the globe. The formation is a curl
GUS one. 1t has many alternate layers c
gravel and clay, and 1t seems to me tina
the whole country between here and LAX
Titicaca Is a sedimentary deposit which wa
during the ages under the sea with onl
the peaks of the mountains showing above /
Wherever prospecting has been done in tn
deposit very coarse gold has been founC
The gold everywhere runs in little nugget
like that you saw, and there is little of whi
We call gold dust. These nuggets are yer
scattered. Much panning results in nothinI
but almost every yard seems to contai
some gold. ! know of one instance whel
400 yards of gravel run through n sluice be
produced 4S3 ounces of gold, worth betwee
$1,000 and $4,000. Most of the gravel wi
only pay when worked with machinery an
on a large scale"
Where does this gold come from, NJ
Hard?' l asked. Are there quartz ledg,
in the mountains?"
Eyes, / am sure of it, replied the mi
ing expert. I'm all the gravel which
treated from near La PaZ to far up Moul
Illimani l found some gold, l saw hume
GUS quartz lodges on the Sorati mountain
when | crossed them the other day, al
j doubt not but that there will be exteI
siye quartz mines in Bolivia in the futur
So far the expense of bringing in machil
cry and the difficulties of development ha'
been so great that the people here ha'
not prospected for quartz lodges. In fac
there has been little systematic prospectiI
in Bolivia. The country has not be,
scratched and the examinations made ha'
been of the hit and miss order. The go
that could be gotten out without the aid
machinery has been pretty Wen worked
the Indians and Spaniards. The fact tn
no fine gold is found / consider an eviden