FIG. 107.—SHIPPING COPPER MATTE
The slag is dumped into a car and is carried outside, while the huge dish containing the copper and some slag is swung to the opposite side of the building, where its contents are cast into another furnace. A very strong blast of air is forced up through the molten mass in this furnace, and the remaining portion of slag is blown out at the top in a shower of glowing particles.
From the bottom of the furnace the liquid copper is drawn out and allowed to run into moulds where it finally cools. It is then known as copper matte. The copper still contains some impurities, and retains in addition whatever gold and silver may have been present in the ore. Most copper ores carry a small amount of these precious metals.
The heavy bars of copper matte are now ready for shipment to some manufacturing point, where they are refined still further and made into the various copper utensils, copper wire, etc. Copper is valuable for many purposes, as it does not rust easily, is highly malleable and ductile, and is a good conductor of electricity.
In the great copper-mines upon Lake Superior, copper is found in the native state mixed with the rock, and does not have to be smelted; but in most mines the ore must go through a process very like the one described before metallic copper can be obtained.
It does not matter how remote a region may be, how intense the heat or cold, or how desert-like the surrounding country, men will go to it if minerals of value are discovered; and there they will perhaps spend the whole of their lives, mining these substances which are of such importance to the industries of the world.
[COAL AND PETROLEUM]
People are beginning to ask where fuel will be obtained when the coal-beds are exhausted and the petroleum is all pumped out of the earth. The cold winters will not cease to come regularly, and we shall continue to need fires for many purposes. This is a question which need not trouble us. So long as the sun lasts in the sky and the oceans cover so much of the earth, and so long as there are mountains upon the land, there must be streams with rapids and waterfalls. The power of these streams, which has for ages gone to waste, is now being turned into electricity for purposes of light and heat. We may be sure that long before the mines cease to produce coal and the wells to supply petroleum, there will be something better ready to take their places.
But coal and petroleum are still such important commodities that everyone should know something about the way in which they were made. This earth of ours has had a very long history, much of which has been recorded in the rocks beneath our feet, and the record is more accurate than are many human histories which have been preserved in the printed books.