[Footnote 3:  It is merely a proof that the ore had been formerly very imperfectly managed, and still contained enough of silver to pay for extraction with profit, by more expert methods.—­E.]

[Footnote 4:  This proves only change of place, by solution, infiltration, and deposition not growth, increase, or new production.—­E.]

All these mines become the property of their first discoverer, who immediately presents a petition to the magistrates, desiring to have such a piece of ground for his own.  This is accordingly granted, and a spot of ground eighty Spanish yards in length by forty in breadth[5] is measured out and appropriated to the discoverer, who chuses what spot he pleases within these bounds, and does with it as he thinks fit.  The exact same quantity is then measured off as belonging to the king, and is sold to the best bidder, there being always many who are willing to purchase, what may turn out an inestimable treasure.  After this, if any person may incline to work a part of this mine on his own account, he bargains with the proprietor for a particular vein.  All that is dug out by any one is his own, subject however to payment of the royal duties; being one-twentieth part for gold, and a fifth for silver; and some proprietors find a good account in letting out their grounds and mills to others.

[Footnote 5:  In Harris this is said to be about 1200 feet in length, and 100 in breadth, which is obviously absurd; as the one measure gives the Spanish yard at 15 English feet, and the latter at 2-1/2 feet.  Both measures are probably erroneous; but there are no data for their correction.—­E.]

There are gold-mines just beyond the town of Copaipo, and in all the country around, which have attracted many purchasers and workmen to that district, to the great injury and oppression of the Indians; as the Spanish magistrates not only take away their lands for the purposes of mining, but their horses also, which they sell to the new adventurers, under pretence of serving the king and improving the settlements.  There is also abundance of magnet and lapiz lazuli, of which the Indians know not the value; and some leagues within the country, there is plenty of salt and salt-petre, which often lies an inch thick on the ground.  On the Cordelieras, about an hundred miles to the east, there is a vein of sulphur about two feet wide, so fine and pure that it needs no cleaning.  This part of the country is full of all sorts of mines, but so excessively barren, that the inhabitants have to fetch all their subsistence from the country about Coquimbo, over a desert of more than 300 miles extent, in which the earth abounds so much in salt and sulphur that the mules often perish by the way, for want of grass and fresh water.  In that long road there is only one river in the course of two hundred miles, which is named Ancalulae or the Hyporite, because it runs only from sun-rise to sun-set.  This is