The White Pine news. [volume] (Treasure City, Nev.) 1868-1906, 1900-06-21
MINERAL WEALTH OF
THE PHILIPPINES.
An Interesting Letter to the
"NewS.
SAN FRANCISCO, June sth, 1900.

SAN FRANCISCO, June sth, 1900.
EDITOR, WHITE PINE News:
aAlthough not native OF your
State by birth, | have married into
yonr county, my wife being the daugh-
ter of Mr.. l.. d. Pierce, of Cherry
Creek, and being practical mining eN-
pert aud having owned and edited sever
al mining newspapers, take the liberty
of giving you, herewith, brief write
up of the mineral conditions obtaining
in the Philippines whence | returned
two weeks ago for the purpose of or
ganizing a mi ming company to take up
claims in the islands. In this | have
been successful and probablywill return,
accompanied by my wife, within the
next thirty days, certainly after the
rainy season has passed.
"Thinking your readers might be in
terested in knowing what the mineral
resources of our new possessions really
are. from the pen of some one who has
Investigated their wealth and possibili-
ties have written briefly on the sub,
iect and assure you that | have never
within the past 20 years of practical
mining work seen anything to at all
compare with the immense deposits Of
high grade ore which | have seen nn-
covered on the island of Luzon.
after having spent number OF
months recently in Manila, in conuec-
ton with the Supreme Court and IN
framing the mining laws, based on the
old Spanish laws of the Philippine
Islands, as well a. in examining the
ores and mining outlook in general in
the islands, it can be safely said that no
fairer country exists under the sun than
these same islands for the mining men
of America. Gold in both placer aud
quartz exists in paying quantities on
the islands of Luzon. upon which
Manila is located) Mindanao and Cebu,
and its copper lodges are practically in
exhaustible.
1.-THE city of Dagupan lying about one
hundred miles north of Manila is the
northern terminus of the Manila q Dag
upan railroad. Leaving Dagupan by
horse or with Igorrote packers the trail
to the rich plaeers on the Agno river
lies eastward about so miles. The gold
deposits there are rich and extensive,
vast tracts of black sand or ''arena
negro lie along the whole course of the
Agno river from its source in the great
mountain range which divides the island
of Luzon from north to south, to its
mouth at Dagupan on the shores OF the
China Sea. BY actual tests this sand
has been found to run from S24 to S97
to the cubic yard bed rock varying
from to 20 feet in depth. The Agno
river is narrow and deep with an inn
oughly practicable, although as yet no
more extensive or modern methods
have been employed than those Of the
natives who wash the gold in wooden
calabashes or sluice it in bamboo split
troughs with small pebbles for rifles.
Even in this crude way the Iggorote
women are abe to save from SO to So per
day. The gold quartz is all free milling
no refractory ore having as yet been
discovered in the gold lodges, they be-
ing composed of white porphyretic
quartz mixed with iron oxide and filled
with wire gold from which assays have
been taken as high as $35, 900 to the ton
This gold Is taken out by the natives
by the use OF a sort Of a crooked crow
bar. the quartz crushed between rocks
by the native women and then washed
in the wooden calabashes. High grade
steel galena has also been discovered in
paying quantities and rich native cop
per lodges varying in width from 10 to
200 feet make the greatest copper show
ing ever discovered in the world.
''Nearly one hundred years ago the
Spanish government incurred the indy
ing hostility of the natives who prac-
tically control these provinces by a
wholesale massacre of over one hun
hired Iggorotes on account of the ma
tives refusing to submit to the Friar's
misrule and since that time the natives
have never allowed Spaniard to pen
citrate into or locate upon their land.
They are, however, extremely friendly
with American miners, feeling that their
cause has been espoused by the con-
querers of Spain, hence some 200 Amer
lean prospectors are now working plac-
ers and are bringing in vast returns in
the shape of nuggets and fine gold from
the provinces controlled by the Igor
otes. A mining company has been
formed in San Francisco and within the
next 30 days the company will send two
OF the best mining experts on the Pa
cific slope to Manila with instructions
to take up and locate as many of these
rich gold and copper claims as they can
handle. But as the land is practically
undeveloped there is room for ten thou
sand practical miners on Luzon alone
and as the insurrectos are practically
driven out of those provinces, and as
the climate is delightful and food album
dant no more promising field for fortune
winning by mining exists on the face
of the earth. Coal, iron and lead lodges
cross-cut the country in every direction
and once the rich mineral products of
the islands become known to the min
ing world, the gold fields of icy Klon-
dixie and malarious Nome will pale into
insigniiicance beside the latest OF Amer
iea's rich possessions, the fair isles OF
the Orient. WILL j. LEE.