Impressions of Spain

by Albert Frederick Calvert

and general excellence of the Spanish miner, I would advise you not to ventilate your opinion of the subject in the presence of the manager of the Escurial Mines, or of Señor Bárris, the Company’s local director. Nor indeed can one be long among these men without recognising their sterling good qualities. They work well, and they lighten their labours with an enthusiasm which I have not remarked in any miners outside Spain. Every man and boy has a personal interest in the mine and its development; his talk is about its progress and prospects: his joy is a rich strike or a satisfactory return; his sorrow is a blank day. And with the characteristic independence of the Spaniard, each man keeps to his own drive, or shaft, or gallery, which he is convinced is the best, and richest, and most promising portion of the whole property.

ENGINE HOUSE AND BLACKSMITH’S SHOP, ESCURIAL.

It will be seen from a glance at the accompanying plan that the northernmost claim, the Ramon, is situated at a little distance from the rest of the group, and it is here that the principal buildings and concentration works are located. Two lodes have been proved on this property. No development work had been done on the Ramon at the time of my last visit, nearly the whole of the labour having been concentrated on the Antigua Pilar concession, which carries eight proved reefs, and is undoubtedly the most valuable claim of the entire group. The developments on this, and on the adjoining Jaime lease, have demonstrated that both these claims are of very great value, and the manager declares in his report that with proper management “they will yield incalculable profit.”

The Antigua Pilar claim has been exploited in a masterly manner, and the results reflect the greatest credit upon the management. All the work proceeds under the unremitting personal supervision of the manager, and his very full and luminous reports reveal his intimate knowledge of every detail. “It is a pleasure,” he said to me, “to work such a mine. Every week brings its work, and the work brings its recompense in the consistently and thoroughly satisfactory nature of the progress made. The property has never, as mothers say of good children, given me an uneasy moment, and I am only too delighted to show visitors over it.” As we proceed, he explains to me his theory of the property and of its prospects. The Antigua Pilar he believes to be the centre of a network of reefs, and the eight lodes he has already proved are only a few that he expects to discover as the work progresses. “It is a large property,” he says, “and it must be developed by degrees. I have proved to my entire satisfaction that the lodes in the Ramon and the Jaime leases will pay handsomely when we get to work on them. I have also traced two of the Antigua Pilar reefs into the Gloria lease, and six others are also making in that direction. This naturally led me to make a special study of the lodes in Antigua Pilar, and I am convinced that in formation and structure the reefs are the same in all. Everything pointed to satisfactory results, and, indeed, the results have exceeded our expectations.”

A CUTTING, ESCURIAL.

In the manager’s office I was permitted to examine the figures and measurements on which he had based his estimates of the value of the mine, and they are calculated on so moderate a scale that he is convinced the net profits will be much greater. To give an idea of the value and sizes of the lodes on the property, I may mention that by cubing the lodes of Nos. 2, 3, and 4 on Antigua Pilar alone, and calculating the yield of copper at the very low return of 5 per cent. per ton, he estimates the value of the ore at £155,532. By the present methods of exploitation, the daily output of ore will shortly be twenty tons per day; and this ore, with proper plant for concentration, could be brought up to 33 per cent. of copper, worth £16 10s. per ton. The carbonates of copper which the ore carries could, by proper treatment, be made to yield from sixty per cent. to eighty per cent. of copper suitable for smelting. But there is an alternative scheme for the complete exploitation of the property, by which 100 tons of copper ore, of a value of £550, could be raised and treated per diem. This plan would, of course, involve a larger outlay, but it has been forwarded to London for the consideration of the directors. Such figures and prospects justify the manager in his high opinion of the mine, which is shared by the miners and the local shareholders.

SNAPSHOT SHOWING CUTTING, ESCURIAL.