Back Aa

In the Land of Cave and Cliff Dwellers

<h2 style="margin-top: 3em;">CHAPTER IX.</h2> <big>SOUTHWESTERN CHIHUAHUA—DESCRIPTION OF ONE OF THE RICHEST SILVER REGIONS OF THE WORLD—MINERAL WEALTH OF THE SIERRA MADRES—THE BATOPILAS DISTRICT.</big> After leaving Cerro Colorado, with its undeveloped possibilities, the trail leads southwestward through the broken barrancas toward Batopilas. This portion of the trail has been so improved by the energetic mine owners, and was so broad and smooth, that our mules could often take up a trot, which seemed doubly fast after our laborious plodding through the rough, unbroken portion over which we had passed. This trail had been built[312] along some of the steepest cliffs and most rugged mountain sides, and must have been a work of great expense, for after every rainy season, lasting from June till September, these are badly washed out and require continuous repairs. The usual Mexican method is to abandon a badly washed trail and strike out in a new direction. Thus one finds all sorts of paths in the mountains, and it is necessary to have a good guide who knows the way thoroughly, or bring up suddenly on the washed-out ledge of an unused trail and then retrace your steps to its junction with another. Long before we reached Batopilas we came upon some of the massive work being constructed at that point, and were in a measure prepared for the energetic American activity, but not for the castle-like structure, the hacienda[313] of San Miguel and San Antonio, as the home of ex-Governor Shepherd, the part owner and superintendent of those famous mines is called. Entering through a massive stone archway, we passed by some of the principal offices within the inclosure, and then on to the residence portion of the great conglomeration of buildings. Here our welcome was of the heartiest description, and everything possible was done for our comfort and pleasure. The great buildings were lighted by electricity and furnished with all modern conveniences, including hot and cold water, steam baths, and, an unusual luxury, an immense swimming pool, formed by a slight deflection of a portion of the Batopilas River. The many comforts of this place made us loath to leave it for the mountain trail. [314] I shall try and give my readers some slight idea of the wealth of this portion of a country so famous in early Spanish conquest. In those great, broken barrancas, leading out to the westward from the heart of the Central Sierra Madres, I found myself in the richest mineral district of America, and probably the richest in the world. The fact that this is not generally known (and, to tell the truth, but very little has ever been published in the English language about so rich a district, and that little is very old) would make it easy to write a book on this region alone, and still leave a great deal unsaid. One of the late cyclopedias says of Mexican mines, "Almost one-half of the total yield [of silver] is derived from the three great mining districts in Guanajuato, Zacatecas, and Catorce."[315] Like most cyclopedias, this one was a little late in its information when printed, although it had an inkling of the truth in saying: "The State of Sinaloa is said to be literally covered with silver mines. Scientific explorers who visited the Sinaloa mines in 1872 reported that those on the Pacific slope would be the great source of the supply of silver for the next century." The fact is that the center of the greatest source of supply has moved even north of Sinaloa, to about the boundary line between the States of Chihuahua and Sonora, and about one-third of the way from its southern end. Taking either Batopilas or Urique as a base, and with a radius of 180 or 200 miles, that is, a diameter of 400 miles on them as a center, there is no doubt that the resulting circle will include the richest[316] mining district in America, and probably in the world, both in a present and prospective sense. From within that circle comes a little over one-fourth the bullion of the whole of Mexico, although this area is insignificant compared with all the territory of that celebrated republic. In 1864 a report of the mines of Mexico was expressly made for Napoleon III. by Dr. Roger Dubois, the French consul. He said as follows of those of Western Chihuahua: "Of all the States of the Mexican Republic, Chihuahua is, without contradiction, the richest in minerals, and we count no less than three thousand different leads, the greater part of which are silver." Probably three or four times that number could be added to Dr. Dubois' estimate of just a quarter of a century ago to bring it up to the present[317] date, all of the new mines being in the Sierra Madres, where not one in a hundred can be worked unless of fabulous richness. One of the new railways projected into this part of Mexico made a most thorough examination of this mining belt to see what could be depended on for freight, and their chief engineer told me that no less than two thousand mines of silver that do not pay now could be made to do so by the cheap transportation of a railway. If one will reflect that there are now in the whole of Mexico but 1247 mines being worked (gold, silver, copper, lead, tin, and cinnabar), it is easy to see that my statement of this being the richest mining district of Mexico, and therefore of America, will admit of no doubt, and especially in a prospective sense. Already, in anticipation[318] of a railway, many large companies are prospecting their concessions, while the individual miner is also to be found with pickax, pan, and shovel on his back, making for this El Dorado, so old in many ways, and yet so very new. Mr. H. H. Porter, the prospecting engineer of the Batopilas Mining Company, told me, and showed me the various specimens to verify his statement, that in one little area three hundred yards square, there were found twelve veins of silver running from three dollars to seventy-eight dollars to the ton. The reader unacquainted with mining may understand this by my saying that any silver mine of over twenty dollars to the ton is a fortune to its owner if on or near a railway. There are over five hundred veins in the Batopilas concession of sixty-four[319] square miles, and should any new railway running near by justify further research, it could probably be made five thousand without much trouble. The history of the big Batopilas Mining Company, about the center of the district I have spoken of, and which stands head and shoulders above all the surrounding mining companies, is a fair example of all in this part of the country where my travels were cast. Batopilas, or Real de San Pedro de Batopilas, as it was originally named, is said to have been discovered in October, 1632. Like Urique, its discovery is to be ascribed to the "adelantados" sent out shortly after the conquest to explore the country and enlarge the possessions of Spain. It is surmised that the rich mineral finds made near the capital, and[320] which subsequently extended far into the interior, led to the progress of the "adelantados" further north, and inspired the expedition into the Sierra Madres which gave rise to the discovery of Batopilas. Tradition has it that upon their descent to the river bottom the "adelantados" were struck by the luminous appearance of the rocks, which were covered in many parts by snowy flakes of native silver. Hence the name "Nevada," signifying "a fall of snow," which was applied to the first mine worked in the district. The news of the discovery spread far and wide, and, as the evidence of its great richness multiplied, it soon became one of the most famous mines of New Spain. The first miners of the new discovery made a magnificent present to the viceroy, composed entirely of large[321] pieces of native silver, the richness of the ore being unprecedented. I have now in my possession ore from Batopilas that runs from six thousand to eight thousand dollars to the ton, and that looks like a mass of solid silver ten-penny nails imperfectly fused together; so I can readily see how the present of solid native silver could have been made. In 1790 a royal decree ordered the collection of all data for a history of New Spain, and a special commission of scientists was ordered by the viceroy and Royal Tribunal of Mines to report upon the Batopilas district. There is but one copy of the report extant, which I traced to the city of Chihuahua. The commission states that the silver extracted from Batopilas in a few years amounted to fifty million dollars, not including that which[322] was surreptitiously taken out to escape the heavy imposts levied by the crown, and which must have been enormous. The most famous period of "bonanza" for the Batopilas district was during the last fifty years of the eighteenth and the first years of the present century. During this time the famous mines of Pastrana, El Carmen, Arbitrios, and San Antonio were discovered, and yielded the fabulous returns which have been variously estimated at from sixty million to eighty million dollars. From the outset of the Mexican Revolution in 1810 a period of decay set in, which reduced Batopilas greatly and almost caused its ruin. The many revolutions, together with the wonderful discoveries of very rich gold and silver mining districts adjoining this one, depopulated[323] it to such a degree that it counted but ten resident families in 1845. From this time the reaction which has made Batopilas the richest silver district in the world may be said to date. The old mines were again opened and new ones discovered. The measure of success did not compare with that attained in the time of the Spaniards, however, owing to the lesser energy displayed, but proved amply sufficient to repay the timid efforts of the native speculators. Not until the year 1862 did American enterprise direct its efforts in so promising a direction. A purchase was effected by an American company, composed principally of gentlemen interested in Wells, Fargo & Co., whereby the property embracing the famous veins of San Antonio and El Carmen passed into[324] their hands. They operated with great success in the face of many difficulties until the year 1879, when the property again changed hands, and was acquired by a stock company, which has held and worked it to the present day. The American companies in this, the richest mining district in the world, are: The Batopilas Mining Company, the Todos Santos Silver Mining Company, and the Santo Domingo Silver Mining Company. The Mexican mining companies are quite numerous, as may be supposed, but I shall not detail them, as it would require too much space. Many of them are very important, as the Urique and Cerro Colorado companies. Altogether there are over a hundred in a greater or less degree of active operation in this rich district, all contained within a radius of four[325] miles. Of these the Batopilas Mining Company owns and operates over sixty. It is without doubt one of the most important American mining ventures in Mexico. It is also a mining company that has had great difficulties to contend with. Its isolation in the establishment of a business of such magnitude in the heart of the Sierra Madres in so short a number of years is an accomplishment suggestive of great energy. This company owns nearly all the famous old mines in this district which, in the times of the Spaniards, yielded those fabulous bonanzas that caused the astonishment of the world. It has had to repair the follies which, from a scientific standpoint, were committed by several generations of inexpert and short-sighted Mexican mine owners. It has had to clear[326] the old mines of immense masses of rock and dirt which had accumulated during many decades of abandonment, "gutting and scalping," as the miners say. Recently over one hundred miles of openings have been made. The most important is the great Porfirio Diaz tunnel, to be 3½ miles in length when completed—one of the longest and most important mining tunnels in the world, cutting over sixty well-known veins at the river's level. No one can look at the great mills, the aqueduct of enormous masonry (eight or nine miles long, and that will take up all the water of the Batopilas river), or the town of Batopilas (a most active place of six thousand people) without respecting the energy that has accomplished all this. The history of[327] Batopilas is only the history of many other mining districts throughout this country, and the fortunes taken from these mines, and those still behind in them, seem unreal and bordering on romance. There is one mine near the city of Chihuahua, the Santa Eulalia, which in days gone by built the fine cathedral at that place at a cost of eight hundred thousand dollars. This was done by simply paying a tax of about twenty-five cents on every pound of silver mined, which was ample atonement for any or all sins that the owners could commit. From Batopilas, north or south, the mighty range of mountains lowers in height, while the big barrancas do not cut so deep into their flanks anywhere[328] else as here, giving the finest Alpine scenery to be found in this part of the continent. Some of the outside facts regarding the mines are really more interesting than the mines themselves. The miners work in the hot interiors bare to the skin, except their sandals and a breechcloth. Even these have to be examined when they emerge from the mine after the work is over. The sandals are taken off and beaten together, while the breechcloth is treated in the same manner if the examiner demands it. Of course the miners are usually known to the examiner, and his searches vary with the supposed honesty of the different workmen. In a mine where pure silver has been known to be cut out with cold chisels by the mule load, and sent direct to the retorts[329] for smelting, the temptation was very great to purloin a little with each departure from the mine; and accounts of the sly efforts of some of the thieves appear more like the yarns in detective stories than cold facts. Ventilating tubes, small as gas pipe and covered with wire gauze, have been used to transfer the metal from the interior to the exterior of the mine for quite long distances. Imitation kits of tools have been made of drills, hammers, etc., all of which were hollow and used for stuffing in stray bits of solid silver. Even candles and candle holders were made hollow and thus used for stealing. I could give a dozen other most singular means employed by these miners in their pilferings. The tunneling of the old Spaniards was very slow compared with that now[330] done by machinery. In some places there were evidences that they had heated the stones by fire and had then thrown water thereon, shivering the front by sudden chilling, a method yet employed in Honduras and Guatemala, according to an engineer at Batopilas who had recently arrived from those countries. One of the most singular things connected with prospecting in this particular portion of the mountains is the means by which large deposits of silver near a tunnel can be located. If an iridescent, smoke-like appearance spreads over the rocks at any point of a new tunnel or drift at the end of a week or two, the engineers always drift for it and generally strike silver. This stain is called by them "silver smoke," and is[331] said to be unknown in any other mines. I was given a half dozen theories in regard to it, mostly of a chemical character, but the mere fact that such a strange condition exists to help man pry into nature's secrets is more interesting than any explanation. From the garden of the hacienda, surrounded by banana and orange groves and all kinds of tropical plants and flowers, one can look up the steep sides of the mountains, which rise abruptly on both sides, to the oaks and pines beyond, and, while sitting on the veranda sipping ices or drinking cool and refreshing drinks, and vigorously using the fan, realize that only a mile above, on the cumbra or crest of the steep mountain, the ice water flows freely in the little mountain streams and the heaviest[332] flannels only would be comfortable. My stay at Batopilas was somewhat prolonged in waiting for a party that was soon to descend with bullion to Chihuahua. I had originally intended to continue my course toward the Pacific, but the hot weather, more severe in May and June than during July and August, owing to the rainy season tempering the latter, and the fact that I could find a more interesting trip through the Sierra Madres by another trail than that by which I had entered, determined me to turn my face eastward and keep on the high plateau with its grand equable climate. In leaving Batopilas the large pack train carrying the bullion was given two days' start, and we were to ride and join them after they had made the cumbra or crest of the mountains.[333] This trail took me well to the southward of the one traversed on entering the mountains, and gave me a new and interesting country. On the high mountain crest between Urique and Batopilas I had gained my furthest point west. The Sierra Madres break more abruptly on their westward slopes, and from the crest we could make out the great plains of Sinaloa and Sonora stretching far away toward the Gulf of California. The country to the west in Sonora and Northern Sinaloa is one of the most fertile in Mexico. The valleys of the Fuerte, the Mayo, and the Yaqui are as rich as any river valleys in North America, and perfectly susceptible of sustaining a dense population, or will be when all the Indian troubles of that region are definitely settled. Most of the[334] crops are of the kind, however, that need cheap transportation to compete with less favored districts in the markets of the world, and are now restricted in amount to what is necessary for a mere local consumption. Here wheat yields enormously to the acre, and the fields are so dense that it is next to impossible to wade through them. Cotton grows more luxuriantly than anywhere on the North American continent. Cotton is planted here oftentimes only once in many years, and large fields are seen four, five, and even seven years old, yielding two and three crops annually. In the same field can be seen plants in blossom, pods, and ripe cotton being picked. It will be one of the leading cotton districts of the world when a railway cuts through it so that the producer[335] can have some show to compete with other districts. Corn is very prolific, coffee produces well, tobacco is of fine flavor, and oranges, guavas, bananas, and plantains are plentiful and of rich flavor; but transportation on a pack mule for 100 or 200 miles is too uncertain as to condition of delivery, and too certain as to exorbitant price, to encourage their cultivation beyond local needs of a limited[336] amount. The Fuerte (in Spanish meaning "strong") is a strong-flowing river with enough water—as its name would indicate—to irrigate both sides of its course for nine or ten miles in width. The Mayo is but little inferior, and the Yaqui is even greater. <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG style="margin-top: 1em;" src="images/image40.jpg" width-obs="350" height-obs="289" alt="Indian Woman Grinding Corn." /></div> INDIAN WOMAN GRINDING CORN. The Pacific ports of this fertile belt are Mazatlan, Guaymas, and Topolobampo. At the latter point an American colony was founded some years ago, of which the reading public heard considerable, not very favorable to that country as a colonization district, and with a great deal of aspersion thrown at the colonizers. There was so much crimination and recrimination by the two sides that I do not believe anybody ever obtained a clear idea of how matters stood there. The fact is about this: A colony was put in[337] a part of an extremely rich country with the ultimate expectation that a railway would be completed from that point to the Rio Grande and to Eastern connections. Had the railway been finished, every colonist with enough gray matter in his brain to know his way home would have made a competence at least, and probably a fortune. This is just as sure as that fortunes have elsewhere been[338] made through the development by railways of new, rich countries. But with its failure there was no halfway ground to stand on, so that in this instance there arose such an amount of misty accusation and rejoinder that many people in an indefinite way laid all the blame on the country; a most erroneous conclusion. When a railway is completed through this country there will be the usual amount of money made that such circumstances justify, but only by those who have selected the right time for it. <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG style="margin-top: 1em;" src="images/image41.jpg" width-obs="375" height-obs="251" alt="A Civilized Tarahumari Cooking." /></div> A CIVILIZED TARAHUMARI COOKING. As I have already said, the main portion of the large pack train was started ahead to give it an opportunity to rest a little before attempting to climb the steep mountain trail, and, after reaching the cumbra, or crest, another breathing spell before starting on their long[339] journey. It was now nearing the rainy season, and even if we made haste we would only just escape this unpleasant and rather dangerous time in the high sierras, for there the floods pour down and often carry out large portions of the trail on the steep and narrow mountain passes. Our pack train consisted, all told, of about seventy or eighty mules, twenty to thirty of them loaded with silver bricks for Chihuahua, the rest of the train being the pack and riding mules of the various drivers and attendants of the "conductor," as the principal personage in charge of the bullion is called. This person was an immense quadroon, a person of unusual executive ability in that position, and thoroughly trusted by the superintendent, ex-Governor Alexander[340] Shepherd. He had under him a half dozen able assistants, all Mexicans, and was accompanied by three or four "valiantes," as they are called, men of renowned prowess, who have at least "killed their man," and who could be relied on to protect the train in case of attack by robbers. As this large cavalcade moved off up the narrow barranca or cañon it presented a motley and picturesque appearance from its gayly dressed and heavily armed attendants, well mounted on their sturdy mules, to the Indian drivers, with only a blanket apiece for covering and a stout stick to help them over the ground. Even the most civilized of these Indians think nothing of such a walk, two or three hundred miles, resting every night as they do when in attendance on a large[343] pack train and sharing in the good food supplied them by the owner. Indeed it is really a treat to them. Among the Indian drivers were two or three who had never seen a railway, nor had they ever visited a city as large as Chihuahua, and they were looking forward with feverish anxiety to this great event of their lives. They had heard of the wonderful Mexican Central Railway and the great trains of cars that moved so fast, but their minds seemed filled with unbelief until they could really take it in for themselves. The semi-civilized or civilized Tarahumari Indians are the best natured people imaginable, and there is nothing they are not willing or anxious to do for you if in your employ. They possess the same docile obedience and fondness that a dog exhibits for his[344] master, and are constantly anticipating little wants and looking for little favors they can do you, and this too without expecting any reward whatever. <hr class="chap" style="page-break-after: always;" /> <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG style="margin-top: 1em;" src="images/image42.jpg" width-obs="425" height-obs="594" alt="A Goatherd's Cache in the Mountains." /></div> A GOATHERD'S CACHE IN THE MOUNTAINS. <hr class="chap" style="page-break-after: always;" /> [345] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2

Update Required To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.