Page:Mexico in 1827 Vol 2.djvu/401

Rh Angangeo. For upwards of a league, the ravine which leads to the town is full of Arrastres, (mills for grinding ore,) worked by horizontal waterwheels, and little Patios, (open sheds,) wretchedly constructed, it is true, in which the process of amalgamation is carried on.

The German Company is the only Foreign establishment in the Real; but there are several Mexicans who work mines in a small way, with capitals, (if they may be called so,) of from five hundred to two or three thousand dollars each, with which, by constant personal inspection, they manage to earn a sufficiency to support themselves and their families.

Angangeo contains four principal veins, running nearly parallel to each other, and separated by valleys or ravines, in one of which the town is situated. The direction of the veins is from North to South. Two only of the four have names,—the Veta del Carmen, and the Veta Descubridora, (so called from the principal mines upon each,) which vary in breadth from two to five, and even nine varas.

On these veins there is a multitude of mines, worked, as I have already observed, by small Mexican proprietors, who contrive to earn by them a scanty subsistence.

Few exceed one hundred, or one hundred and twenty varas in depth, the oldest mine in the place not having been worked above sixty years.