Mohave County miner., 1911-03-25
Mines Yield Marvellous Wealth.

udJlOuS are SO ldNOF6Q ln the mater Ol mineral wealth as Mexico. Humboldt once called this country the treasure house of the world. When one consid- CTS that untold millions have been taken out of its gold and silver mines, and that three fourths of all Mexican mining territory is as yet unexploited, Humbolt's p.oture does not seem to be overdrawn. Certainly they are but few of the metals used by modern civ ilization that are not found here in abund ant quantity. Besides it's metals Mexico has rich deposits of precious stones, its opal mines being famed throughout the world for the abund- ance and beauty of their product.
 Mexico today occupies first rank among the nations of the world in the production of silver. Its mines have been worked from times so remote that even tradition does not record them. Long before the Aztec Indians swarmed down from the north and took possession of the land of the Tol- tects, silver mines of seemingly in- exhaustible richness had been worked for uncounted years. When Cortez in- Vaded the land of the Montezumas he took from it more than 100000 worth of gold and silver. Silver is sometimes found in nuggets of vast proportions. One of these, discovered in the state of Sonora, near the Ameri- can frontier, weighed 2750 pounds The production of silver has ceased to be as profitable as it once was, owing to the decline in the market value of the refined metal.
 The annual output of silver amounts to approximately 100000 pesos. It was hoped by the Mexicans that the improvement of trade copditions in for eign markets would result in an in- creasing demand for silver in such countries as India and China, the principle users of the white metal It was thought that in connection with the gradually diminishing supply of bar silver it would bring about an i'm provement of prices. But just at the time that it seemed as if this hope was to be realized a new competitor ap- peared on the scene, and silver went still lower. The extention of a rail road in Canada was the means of discovering rich deposits of silver mix ed with cobalt and nickel. In 1910 the output of these mines amounted to one-sixth of the worlds total produc- ton of silver. The cost of mining and treatment is so small and the assay in many of the veins so great, in some cases averaging more that 5000 ounces per ton, that the effect of this discov cry has been to drive the price of sil- yer down and almost swamp the worlds markets. Mexico suffers most severely by this, owing to the fact that many of it's mines produce nothing but silver.
 But what Mexico is losing in silver iS being made up in the production of gold. Last year the output of the Mexican gold mines amounted to 55,- o 0,0O0S, an increase of 5000, ,OOOS over the year 1906 and 1907. This increase is partly due to the discovery of new mines, but mainly to the further ap- plication of the cyanide process to the treatment of gold-silver ores. The Real del Gro mine in Mexico is one of the largest gold mines in the world It has been worked for a period far an- tedating the Spanish occupation, and is still producing large quantities of the precious metal.
 There are upward of 1000 copper mines in the republic, some of them possessing deposits of remarkable rich ness. Those at Cananea are said to be the third largest in the entire world. The annual output of copper approxi- mates 10000, ,OOOS. The Territory of lower California boasted of the largest | output from single mine last year, even surpassing the record of the Can | anea mines. This was the Bolleo mine | with production of l2,0OO metric tons of copper. The United States is the principle consumer of Mexican copper. using nearly one-half of the entire out put.
 Nearly all of the other metals which are produced in the United States are | also found in Mexico. The production of petroleum promises to become one