92
THE DISCOVERY OF GUIANA
they put to it a part of copper, otherwise they could not work it; and that they used a great earthen pot with holes round about it, and when they had mingled the gold and copper together, they fastened canes to the holes, and so with the breath of men they increased the fire till the the metal ran ; and then they cast it into moulds of stone and clay, and so make those plates and Images. I have sent your Honours, of two sorts such as I could by chance recover, more to shew the manner of them, than for the value: for I did not in any sort make my desire of gold known, because I had neither time, nor power to have a greater quantity. I gave among them many more pieces of Gold than I received, of the new money of twenty shillings with her Majesty’s picture to wear, with promise that they would become her servants thenceforth. I have also sent your Honors of the ore, whereof I know some is as rich as the earth yieldeth any, of which I know there is sufficient, if nothing else were to be hoped for. But besides that we were not able to tarry and search the hills, so we had neither pioneers, bars, sledges, nor wedges of iron, to break the ground, without which there is no working in mines : but we saw all the hills with stones of the colour of gold and silver, and we tried them to be no Marquesite, and therefore such as the Spaniards call El Madre del oro, which is an undoubted assurance of the general abundance; and myself saw the outside of many mines of the white spar, which I know to be the same that all covet in this world, and of those, more than I will speak of. Having learned what I could in Camuri and Aromaia, and received a faithful promise of the principalest of those provinces to become servants to her Majesty, and