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Show AMERICAN TO STUDY RICHEST OF MINES Mexican Wealth Producer Over 400 Years Old. Washington. The mines which gave their wealth of gold and silver to the Toltecs of Mexico when the Spanish Span-ish coiiquistadores discovered them 4ix) years ago, and which have produced pro-duced unceasingly since, will be Included In-cluded in a mineralogieal survey on "which a Smithsonian geologist left Washington recently. Lr. W. l- Foshag, assistant curator of mineralogy and petrology In the National museum under the Smithsonian, Smithso-nian, will make the survey under the auspices of the institution and of the mineralogieal department of Harvard university. He will go to Chihuahua, Durango and Coahuila and other Important Im-portant mining regions of northern Mexico, as time permits. In .spite of the great age of and great wealth produced by Mexico's mines, no one has ever described the mineralogy or geology of the region. Even collections collec-tions are rare. Doctor Foshng will help to remedy this lack. Richest in World. The richest silver mines In the world are at Guanajuato, 12 hours by rail from Mexico City. In historical histor-ical times it has produced nearly a billion dollars' worth of metal. The Comstock lode in Nevada, which was the richest deposit in the United Slates, produced $310,000,000 in the 30 years of operation. The great main shaft upon (he Yeta Madre vein at Guanajuato is one of the mining wonders of the world. It is 30 feet in diameter and 1,700 feet deep. To the depth of 300 feet it is lined with masonry, but for the remainder re-mainder of the distance the rocks are firm and do not require timbering timber-ing or masonry. The reason for the great width is to permit eight or more windlasses to be worked at once. Until comparatively recent years these grout mines had no machinery. Even the water was baled out of the shafts in cattle skins to be dumped. Production has therefore been stow, which accounts for the long centuries of operation. Discovered by Convicts. Two escaped convicts discovered the Santa Eulalla mines in the mountains moun-tains south of Chihuahua, where Doctor Doc-tor Foshag will go first, in 1703. Not daring to .return to civilization, they sent Indian carriers to a priest with the request that he intercede with the government in their behalf. They promised that if allowed to go unmolested unmo-lested they would build the "finest cathedral in the western hemisphere." The bargain was struck and Chihuahua Chihua-hua cathedral is the result admittedly admit-tedly one of the finest specimens of Spanish-American architecture in existence. ex-istence. Doctor Foshag lias an invitation from the governor of Durango to make his survey of that state and has been promised aid in getting collections and information. He will inspect particularly par-ticularly the large gold, silver, copper and iron mines, and possibly the opal and tin mines, studying modes of occurrence oc-currence of the ores, minerals in the ores, and, if possible, how they were formed. |