[XXXII-33] Gold placers in the dept. of Izabal were being worked on a large scale. Several silver mines promise large yields when they become exploited. The Indians of Zunil repeatedly offer for sale in Quezaltenango quicksilver obtained from a mine which they keep strictly secret. In the departments of Quiché, Alta, Vera Paz, and Huehuetenango are salt springs and deposits; in Chimaltenango peat and lignite; between Guastoya and Izabal, marble; and in several places on the Atlantic slope, coal. The government had a mineralogical survey of the country made. Guat., Mem. Sec. Hac., 1882, 28; 1883, 34, 72-4; Id., Mem. Sec. Fomento, 1884, 42; Wagner, Costa R., 36; Pan. Star and Herald, Jan. 17, 1883.
[XXXII-34] Among them must be mentioned zinc, iron, copper, lead, tin, antimony. The mines of lead, iron, and copper are believed to be inexhaustible. They are situated in a fertile, cool, healthy, and picturesque region, affording every other facility for working them. The whole northern frontier abounds in silver, a little of it being obtained by primitive processes. Quicksilver mines, though not rich, are common. The gold veins of Nic. come from Hond., running along the cordillera to the San Juan River, where they become somewhat ramified before crossing it, and reappear in Costa R. The chief one crosses the Machuca River. The gold is almost pure when washed from river-beds, and more or less mixed with silver when dug out of the earth. In the districts of Juigalpa and Libertad hundreds of mines have been entered. The Jícaro mines near Trinidad, and those of Santa Rosa, Achuapa, San Francisco, etc., have been famous. The Potosí and Corpus in colonial times yielded large quantities of gold. The whole upper region of the Coco River is rich. It may be asserted that the mines of Nic. are excellent, but the miners are generally incompetent. They use the crowbar, avoiding gunpowder as too expensive. Men are easily procured, who work steadily though slowly and by primitive methods, earning $8 to $10 per month, and their rations. The mills are mostly poor. Sixteen carat gold is worth at the mine $12 an ounce, but the average price paid by factors was $8 or $9. Considerable quantities of gold are taken by the Indians from river sands and bed, and washed in pans. Lévy, Nic., 160-6, 482-6; Squier's Cent. Am., 364, 392-400; Id., Nic., 653-6; Nic., Mem. Min. Fomento, 1871; Id., Mem. Min. Rel., 1875; U. S. Gov. Doc., H. Ex. Doc., 212-13, vol. x., Cong. 31, Sess. 1; Belly, Nic., i. 340-6; Nic., Gaceta, Nov. 11, 1865; May 26, 1866, suppl.; Sept. 7, 1867; Jan. 11, July 18, Aug. 8, 1868.
[XXXII-35] Nic., Gaceta, March 1, 1873; Rocha, Cód. Nic., i. 163-72; Nic., Correo Ist., Aug. 29, 1850.
[XXXII-36] It is said their yield was 47 to 2,537 oz. of silver to the ton. Dunlop has it that they yielded at one time $1,000,000 annually, though worked rudely and without machinery, and the chief one of them once produced $200,000 annually. Trav. in Cent. Am., 277. A French company undertook to work the Tabanco and Encuentros, invested a large capital, and sustained losses. The Loma Larga and Divisaderos, though represented as richer, probably fared not much better. Dunn's Guat., 225-6; Baily's Cent. Am., 92-3; Squier's Cent. Am., 291-4; Salv., Diario Ofic., Dec. 1, 2, 1875; Jan. 23, 1876; Jan. 28, 1879; Id., Gaceta Ofic., Oct. 24, 1875; Jan. 30, Aug. 15, Nov. 11, 1877.
[XXXII-37] Squier's Coal-mines of Riv. Lempa, 3-13.
[XXXII-38] It is believed that the Tisingal, which gave the country its name, lies near the Colombian frontier on the Atlantic. Molina, Bosq. Costa R., 33.
[XXXII-39] Squier's Cent. Am., 457; Lond. Geog. Soc., Jour., vi. 128; Thompson's Guat., 214-15; Dunlop's Cent. Am., 42; Costa R., Gaceta, July 15, 1854; Id., Inf. Sec. Hac., 1872; Laferrière, De Paris à Guatém., 36; Wheelright's Isth. Pan., 7.
[XXXII-40] Information for the years preceding 1800 may be gleaned from Juarros, Guat., 16-79, passim; Id., Stat. and Com. Hist. Guat., 21-105, passim; Montanus, Die Nieuwe Weereld, 275-7; Arevalo, Compend., 175; Russell's Hist. Am., 191, 391-2; Churchill's Coll., viii. 764-5; Dunn's Guat., 222-5; Squier's Trav., i. 39-40; Id., Guat., 586-7. To the end of the Spanish rule most of the precious metals from Hond. were smuggled out through Belize and Mosquito, probably one third only reaching the mint at Guat. The coinage in 1817-18, was $983,225; 1820-4, $1,319,106. Thompson's Guat., 217, 520. The superintend. of the old Guat. mint calculated the coinage in gold and silver for the 15 years anterior to 1810 at $2,193,832, and for the 15 years posterior at $3,810,382, adding that much of the production had been exported in its native state or manufactured. He estimated the actual products of the mines in those 30 years at ten times the amount coined; his estimate could probably bear some deduction. De Bow's Review, Jan. 1855, 77-8.
[XXXII-41] The Guat. mint has coined in the years 1879-83 $974,957, all in silver pieces from one dollar down to 3⅛ cents. Guat. Mem., Sec. Hac., 1880-4, in tables 6, 11, 14, 20, 18, respectively. The coinage of the Costa Rican mint from 1829 to 1880, both inclusive, was as follows: gold, $2,351,808; silver, $568,648; copper, $1,682; total, $2,922,138. Costa R., Mem. Min. Hac., 1883, table 11.
[XXXII-42] 'Hay oro en mucha cantidad; están descubiertos veinte rios, y treinta que tienen oro salen de una sierra que está fasta dos leguas de esta villa.' Carta, Eno 20, 1513, in Navarrete, Col. Viages, iii. 363.