Amongst the important properties may be mentioned the San Antonio, Maria del Pilar and San Teodoro (situated at Agudo in the Almaden district) and the San Luis at Piedrabuena in the province of Ciudad-Real, and the silver-lead mines of Santa Maria, in the province of Badajoz. These latter mines, which have been proved to a depth of over 700 feet, and are now fully equipped with machinery, are the properties of the Santa Maria Mining Company.
There are extensive coal and cement stone mines at Almatret, in the province of Lerida. The coal or lignite, which is of good quality, is at present worked, and about eighty tons per day are being shipped. This will, it is anticipated, be shortly increased to 200 tons per day. The cement is suitable for constructive work; and experts who have reported upon the properties have expressed their belief that it will be found to approximate very closely to the composition required for true Portland cement. The quantity of cement stones is said to be practically inexhaustible.
One department of mining enterprise, which has remained unexploited from the time of the Romans until the last few years, is that of alluvial gold washing. The Romans washed for gold over a larger area, and on a much larger scale, than the chroniclers of the times were aware of. Even Jacob (1831) confessed himself unaware of the extent on which their operations were conducted, for modern investigation had disclosed that in the provinces of Lugo, and Orense, and Léon many of the rivers were washed by them on a scale of almost incomprehensible magnitude. So profitable must the operations have been that, in one case, the river Sil was diverged out of its course by means of a cutting made through a mountain spur in order that the river bed might be exposed for the precious metal. Considering the primitive means that the Romans possessed, this must be regarded as a gigantic engineering feat; and it has been estimated that if 10,000 men had been engaged on the work it would have taken many years to complete. Before 1100 B.C. the banks of the Guadalquivir were worked for alluvial gold, and sometime before 500 B.C. the auriferous
MAP SHOWING ALLUVIAL GOLD DISTRICT IN NORTH-WEST SPAIN.
Parts marked ^ and solid = Alluvial.
Parts marked by dots = Diluvial.
deposits of Spain were believed to be exhausted. But Pliny records that in 207 B.C., when the second Punic war ended in the Roman conquest of Spain, “the Asturias, Galicia and Lusitania furnished 2,000 lbs. weight of gold (4,427 lbs. English weight) annually; but Asturias supplies the most, nor in any other part of the world during so many ages has so great a quantity been obtained.”
