Little or no gold comes into Europe from Asia, because its servile inhabitants place their fortune in treasure, and love to hoard up that precious metal.
Numerous gold mines occur on the two slopes of the chain of the Cailas mountains in the Oundès, a province of Little Thibet. The gold lies in quartz veins which traverse a very crumbling reddish granite.
Africa was, with Spain, the source of the greater portion of the gold possessed by the antients. The gold which Africa still brings into the market in abundance is always in dust, showing that the metal is obtained by washing the alluvial soils. None of it is collected in the north of that continent; three or four districts only are remarkable for the quantity of gold they produce.
The first mines are those of Kordofan, between Darfour and Abyssinia. The negroes transport the gold in quills of the ostrich or vulture. These mines seem to have been known to the antients, who considered Ethiopia to abound in gold. Herodotus relates that the king of that country exhibited to the ambassadors of Cambyses, all their prisoners bound with golden chains.
The second and chief exploitation of gold dust is to the south of the great desert of Zaara, in the western part of Africa, from the mouth of the Senegal to the Cape of Palms. The gold occurs in spangles, chiefly near the surface of the earth, in the bed of rivulets, and always in a ferruginous earth. In some places the negroes dig wells in the soil to a depth of about 40 feet, unsupported by any props. They do not follow any vein; nor do they construct a gallery. By repeated washings they separate the gold from the earthy matters.
The same district furnishes also the greater part of what is carried to Morocco, Fez, and Algiers, by the caravans which go from Timbuctoo on the Niger, across the great desert of Zaara. The gold which arrives by Sennaar at Cairo and Alexandria, comes from the same quarter. From Mungo Park’s description, it appears that the gold spangles are found usually in a ferruginous small gravel, buried under rolled pebbles.
The third spot in Africa where gold is collected, is on the south-east coast, between the twenty-fifth and the twenty-second degree of south latitude, opposite to Madagascar, in the country of Sofala. Some persons think that this was the kingdom of Ophir, whence Solomon obtained his gold.
In modern times, the richest gold mines are found in America, from which there is exported annually, 3700 or 4000 pounds avoirdupois of this metal. It occurs there principally in spangles among the alluvial earths, and in the beds of rivers; more rarely in veins.
There is little gold in the northern part of America. The United States have hitherto produced but a slight quantity of alluvial gold, collected in the gravel-pits of the creeks of Rockhole, district of Lebanon, in North Carolina. In 1810, a mass was found there, weighing 28 pounds. This district has furnished the mint of the United States with about 100 lbs. avoirdupois of gold.
South America, especially Brazil, Choco, and Chili, are the regions which furnish most gold.