Tin known from the most remote antiquity—Phoenician Traders—The Cassiterides—Diodorus Siculus—His Account of the Cornish Tin Trade—The Age of Bronze—Valuable Qualities of Tin—Tin Countries—Cornish Tin Lodes—Tin Streams—Wheal Vor—A Subterranean Blacksmith—Huel Wherry, a Tin Mine under the Sea—Carclaze Tin Mine—Dressing of Tin Ores—Smelting—The Cornish Miner.

Tin is one of the metals most anciently known to man. Its first discovery is hidden, like that of silver, gold, copper, and iron, in complete obscurity, for even the names of the nations which first made use of it are not known. Axes and lances, sickles and fishhooks of bronze—the well-known alloy of copper and tin—occur among the ruins of the ancient lacustrine habitations of Switzerland, and the tin of these bronze utensils could only be obtained by commerce from countries far remote, where it must, doubtless, have been known for many ages, before it found its way into the heart of Central Europe. Thus a few bronze implements picked up among other rubbish in the muddy bed of an Helvetian lake open a long vista into the obscure history of primitive man.

On turning from Europe to the East we find other proofs that tin has been known from the most remote antiquity. It is mentioned in the Book of Numbers (xxxi. 22) among the spoil which the children of Israel gained by their victory over the Midianites; and Ezekiel, in his prophetic warning to the Tyrians, enumerates tin as forming part of their riches.

It is frequently noticed by Homer as a substance used for architectural ornaments or for the embellishment of the armour of his heroes, and its Greek name ‘Kassiteros,’ which evidently represents the Sanscrit ‘Kastira,’ leaves no doubt as to the part of the world from which it was first obtained. The tin which, in times unrecorded by chronology, served for the consumption of Western Asia, Egypt, and Greece, was supplied by the mines of India to the Phoenician traders, who conveyed it, either by land to Babylon, or by water to the ports of the Red Sea. At a much later period that great merchant people extended their maritime expeditions to the West, and sailing along the Atlantic coast of Gaul, ultimately discovered Cornwall, which afforded them a new and inexhaustible supply of tin. With the jealous spirit of trade, they long made a profound secret of its position; but about 450 years before Christ, Herodotus speaks of the Cassiterides, or tin islands, which some have supposed to be Britain. Four centuries later Diodorus Siculus, who lived in the times of Julius CÆsar and Augustus, gives us an interesting account of the ancient tin trade of Britain. ‘The inhabitants of that extremity of Britain which is called Bolerion’ (probably Land’s End), says the historian whose narrative is the more deserving of attention as we are told that he visited all the places he mentions: ‘both excel in hospitality and also, by reason of their intercourse with foreign merchants, they are civilized in their mode of life. These prepare the tin, working very skilfully the earth which produces it. The ground is rocky, but it has in it earthy veins, the produce of which is brought down and melted and purified. Then, when they have cast it into the form of cubes, they carry it to a certain island adjoining to Britain and called Iktis (probably St. Michael’s Mount). During the recess of the tide the intervening space is left dry, and they carry over abundance of tin to this place on their carts; and it is something peculiar that happens to the islands in these parts lying between Europe and Britain, for at full tide, the intervening passage being overflowed, they appear islands, but when the sea returns a large space is left dry and they are seen as peninsulas. From hence, then, the traders purchase the tin of the natives and transport it into Gaul, and finally, travelling through Gaul on foot, in about thirty days they bring their burdens on horseback to the river Rhone.’ Thus we learn from an authentic source how the tin of Cornwall found its way to Italy in the times of the first Roman Emperors; but long before that period the wild inhabitants of Cornwall must have discovered the use of the metallic treasures of their barren soil and the way to barter them for the commodities of the rude tribes of their own island or of the neighbouring nations of Gaul.

When we consider the various and important uses to which tin may be applied, we cannot wonder at its importance in the commerce of the ancient world. The discovery of bronze marks one of the great epochs in the progress of human civilization, and the nations that could command its use became at once superior, in peace and war, to the tribes who had only flint spear-heads for their defence or flint hatchets for the construction of their huts. At a later period, when iron gradually supplanted the use of bronze for many purposes, tin still continued to be highly esteemed for its many excellent qualities. Possessing a lustre but little inferior to that of silver, it is not soon tarnished, and not only retains its metallic brilliancy a long time, but when lost easily recovers it. Under the hammer it is extended into leaves called tin-foil, which are about one-thousandth of an inch thick, and might easily be beaten into one-half that thickness if the purposes of trade required it. The application of tin to the coating of other metals has been carried to great perfection, and it forms the chief ingredient in various kinds of pewter and other white metallic alloys, such as Britannia metal, which are manufactured into domestic utensils by casting, stamping, and other ingenious processes. Tin is the substance which, coated with quicksilver, makes the reflecting surface of glass mirrors. It is also very important in dyeing processes, as its solutions in nitric, muriatic, and other acids gives a degree of permanency and brilliancy to several colours not to be obtained by the use of other mordants. A compound of tin with gold gives the fine crimson and purple colours to stained glass and artificial gems, and enamel is produced by the fusion of oxide of tin with the materials of plate glass.

There are only two ores of tin—the peroxide, or tinstone, and the pyrites, or stannine. The former alone occurs in sufficient abundance for metallurgic purposes, and has been found in few countries in a workable quantity. In Asia its richest deposits occur in Sumatra, the peninsula of Malacca, and some smaller islands, particularly Banca and Billiton. The stanniferous region in this part of Asia extends from 20° N. Lat. to 5° S. Lat., and in many places the ore is found in such quantities in the alluvial grounds as to be separated in the easiest manner, by washing or ‘streaming,’ from the gravel or sand with which it is mixed. The facility with which it is obtained renders its cost of extraction so small that large quantities find their way to the European markets. In 1866 the mines of Banca furnished 5,362 tons of tin, and those of the Sound 5,254 tons of the same metal. The port of London alone received 4,400 tons of tin from these two sources. In consequence of the constantly increasing importation from the Malay countries, the price of the metal has been constantly decreasing since 1856, so that the ton of ore, which at that time was worth 70l., now fetches no more than 48l. Unfortunately these low prices have materially injured the prosperity of our Cornish mines, which from year to year find it more difficult to compete with Banca and Billiton. Their production, however, still continues to be immense, for in 1866 they yielded 15,080 tons of ore, from which 9,990 tons of metal were extracted. This quantity is greater than that of any preceding year; and as many of the deep mines of Cornwall are changing from copper into tin ore, increased supplies will be obtained to meet any demand.

Compared with this vast production, that of Saxony (seventy-six tons), Bohemia (twenty-one tons), Spain, and France is so insignificant as to be hardly worth mentioning; but our Australian possessions have lately increased the small number of tin-producing countries, and give promise of future importance.

Both Cornwall and Devon possess tin mines, which, however, are most important in the county

The undulating surface of this arid peninsula, which, being remarkable neither for agricultural nor foreign commerce, has been celebrated since the remotest ages for the mineral riches concealed beneath its barren soil, consists almost exclusively of slaty transition rocks or killas, traversed or intersected by a central granitic range and by dykes of porphyry or elvan which cut the slate and granite, occasionally traversing both in one continuous body of rock, somewhat in the manner of trap-dykes, and evidently of a later formation. The lodes or mineral veins traverse the granite, the slate, and the elvan indiscriminately, but they occur more especially at the junction of granite and slate. They have commonly one prevailing direction, but they invariably throw off into the containing rock ‘shoots, strings, and branches,’ often in such abundance that, instead of one main lode, called a champion lode, the whole is an irregular network of veins. It is not at all certain that the same lode has ever been traced for more than a mile in length. Very often the lode first discovered dwindles to a mere line, whilst some of its offshoots swell out, enlarge, and rival, or even surpass, both in size and richness, the veins from which they have separated.

The metalliferous or valuable contents of a lode generally bear but a small proportion to its unprofitable parts. Instead of forming uniform lines of metal or pure ore, running throughout the whole extent of the vein, they generally occur in what the miners term bunches, or in patches of various sizes and shapes. These very rarely occupy the whole space between the walls or containing sides of the lode, but they are mixed up with a variety of other substances, the chief of which is quartz.

Sometimes a lode is filled with a compact and perfectly solid mass; at other times it abounds in cavities which may occur in any one of the ingredients and also of any size, from those of the hollows of a honeycomb to hollows of several fathoms in length and depth.

In many lodes tin is found associated with copper, and frequently above the latter, so that the upper part of many a copper lode has been worked as a tin lode.

The veins of Cornwall have no determinate size, being sometimes very narrow, and at others exceeding several fathoms in width; sometimes they extend to a great length and depth, at others they end after a short course. They vary so in breadth that in the same lode one part may consist of a mere line between the opposing walls, while another swells to a width of from thirty to forty feet. These great changes, however, seldom happen within several fathoms of each other. Lodes which yield both tin and copper in mixture are considerably larger than those which yield each metal singly. It is also a general fact that the lodes diminish in breadth in proportion to their depth. The richest tin ores are more commonly found between forty and sixty fathoms deep; but in some instances, as in Dolcoath mine, the depth of 200 fathoms has been attained without exhausting the supply, and Tresavean mine has been worked to great profit at more than 320 fathoms from the surface. Tin veins are considered to be good working when only three inches wide, provided the ore be good for its width.

Besides being contained in lodes, tin is also found in alluvial beds, probably resulting from the disintegration of the former during a long series of ages. This stream-tin, as it is called, is met with either in a pulverized sandy state in separate stones, called shodes, or in a continued course of stones, which are sometimes found together in large numbers, and occur at depths varying from one to fifty feet. This course is called a stream, and when rich in ore was formerly called Beauheyl, which is a Cornish word signifying a ‘living stream.’ In the same figurative style, when the stone was but lightly impregnated with tin, it was said to be ‘just alive,’ and dead when it contained no metal.

Tin streams of irregular breadth, though seldom less than a fathom, are often scattered in different quantities over the whole breadths of the moor bottoms or valleys in which they are found. As the confluence of rivers makes a flood, so the meeting of tin-streams makes what is called a rich ‘floor of tin.’ The ore, being thus disseminated both in the alluvium which covers the gentle slopes of the hills, and in that which fills the valleys winding round their base, is easily obtained by conveying over its bed a stream of water, which, by washing away the lighter matter, leaves the heavy ore to be picked up where the operation has been performed.

There can be no doubt that this was the oldest method of tin-getting, and the abundant traces of ancient stream-works which are to be seen from Dartmoor to the Land’s End give proof of the great accumulation which must have been formerly worked out by this method. In the course of ages most of these alluvial deposits have been exhausted, and where, thirty or forty centuries ago, large quantities of tin ore were superficially gathered with little ingenuity and labour, the miner is now obliged to descend many a fathom deep into the bowels of the earth and work his slow way through the hard rock.

Yet, after so many centuries of research and extraction, tin-streaming is still carried on in several places, as, for instance, at Carnon, north of Falmouth, where a long line of stream-works extends down the valley. The ore, mixed with rounded pieces of slate, granite, and quartz, lies buried about fifty feet from the surface, beneath the bottom of an estuary, where trees are discovered in their place of growth, together with human skulls and the remains of deer, amidst the vegetable accumulation which immediately covers the stanniferous beds. Thus ruins are here piled up above ruins.

In 1866 the number of tin mines in activity amounted to 139 in Cornwall and to 26 in Devonshire. In 1852 the most important works were Balleswidden, Great Polgarth, Pollberro, and Drake Wall; but, as nothing is more fluctuating than the fortunes of mines, others have probably taken the lead since that period.

Wheal Vor, in the parish of Breage, three miles from Helston, may be cited as a conspicuous example of the changes of fortune so frequent in the annals of Cornish mining. Twenty-five years ago it was considered the richest tin mine in Cornwall. More than 200,000l. profit had been divided among the shareholders. In 1843 there were fifteen engines at work on this extensive sett, which had the appearance of a town, and the machinery was valued at 100,000l. Here was put up the first steam-engine ever erected in Cornwall, between the years 1710 and 1714. The lode from which the chief part of the ore was raised was still productive in 1843, when the mine employed 1,200 persons, and the monthly cost of working had been, some years before 1843, about 12,000l. per month. The mine, however, became less profitable, and, wearing out by degrees, finally stopped.

There was formerly a blacksmith’s forge at the bottom of this mine, in full operation at 1,470 feet below the surface of the earth. All the miners’ tools were steeled, sharpened, and repaired, and bucket-rods cut and welded in this subterranean smithy, which was clear and free from dust, smoke, and sulphur, and did not in the least annoy the miners. Within the last few years the mine has been resuscitated with a capital of 200,000l.; but, as the shares have fallen from 40l. to 8l., the attempt seems to have been far from profitable.

The history of the rise and fall of Huel Wherry,^[54] a tin mine which was opened, more than a century ago, in the midst of the sea, near the town of Penzance, is too interesting to be passed over in silence. In this place a gravelly bottom was left bare at low water. Here a multitude of small veins of tin ore crossed each other in every direction through elvan rocks, and were worked whenever the sea, the tide, and the season would permit, until the depth became unmanageable. About the year 1778 Thomas Curtis, a poor miner, was bold enough to renew the attempt. The distance of the shoal from the neighbouring beach at high water is about 120 fathoms, and this distance, in consequence of the shallowness of the beach, is not materially lessened at low water. It is calculated that the surface of the rock is covered about ten months in the year, and that the depth of the water upon it at spring tide is nineteen feet. A very great surf is caused, even in the summer, by the prevailing winds, while in winter the sea bursts over the rock in such a manner as to render useless all attempts to carry on mining operations. Yet all these difficulties had to be overcome by a poor uneducated man. As the work could be prosecuted only during the short time the rock appeared above water—a time still further abridged by the necessity of previously emptying the excavation already made—three summers were spent in sinking the pump-shaft, which was a work of mere bodily labour. A frame of boards, made watertight by pitch and oakum, and carried up to a sufficient height above the spring tide, was then applied to the mouth of the shaft. To support this boarded turret—which was twenty feet high above the rock, and two feet one inch square—against the violence of the surge, eight stout bars were applied, in an inclined direction, to its sides, four of them below, and four, of an extraordinary length and thickness, above. A platform of boards was then lashed round the top of the turret, supported by four poles, which were firmly connected with these rods. Lastly, upon this platform was fixed a windlass for four men.

By such an erection it was expected that the miners would be enabled to pursue their operations at all times, even during the winter months, whenever the weather was not particularly unfavourable. But as soon as the excavation was carried, to some extent, in a lateral direction, the hope was disappointed, for the sea water penetrated through the fissures of the rock, and, in proportion as the workings became enlarged, the labour of raising the ore to the mouth of the shaft increased. To add to all this, it was found impossible to prevent the water from forcing its way through the shaft during the winter months, or, on account of the swell and surf, to remove the tin-stone from the rock to the beach opposite. Hence the whole winter was a period of inaction, and the regular working of the mine could not be resumed before April. Nevertheless, the short interval which was still allowed for labour below ground was sufficient to reward the bold and persevering projector.

The close of this wonderful mine, from which many thousand pounds worth of tin was raised, was as romantic as its commencement. An American vessel broke from its anchorage in Gwavus Lake, and, striking against the stage, demolished the machinery, and thus put an end to an adventure which, both in ingenuity and success, was in all probability unequalled in any country.

This wonderful mine was worked again a few years since; but, although a very large sum of money was expended, and it had all the advantage of improved machinery, yet it failed to be a profitable adventure, and was eventually abandoned.

The Carclaze tin-mine, near the town of St. Austell, though unimportant with regard to its produce, deserves to be noticed for its picturesque appearance and the manner in which it is worked. It consists of a large open excavation, of a mile in circuit and from twenty to thirty fathoms in depth, looking more like a vast natural crater thanthan a hollow made by human hands; and for hours the visitor might traverse the dreary and barren hilly common in which it is situated without suspecting that a mine is close at hand. No engine-house and chimney towering aloft announces it from afar; the whole business is confined to the interior of the punch-bowl hollow. Every detail of the works is here exposed to view, and it would seem as if a complete mine had been turned inside out for the benefit of timid travellers, who would wish to see the various operations of mining without the risk of a descent below the surface.

The walls of this vast hollow or crater are almost perpendicular, and the view from the ridge of the precipice, into which but few footpaths descend, is rendered interesting by the fantastic shape of the rocks, worn or hewn into a thousand grotesque forms by the action of the waters or the pickaxe of the miner; by the enormous number of holes and hollows resulting from ancient excavations; by the white colour of the granite, veined with the darker metalliferous streaks; by the water-wheels at the bottom, which, worked by streams from the neighbouring commons, propel the machinery for crushing the stones, loosened by the water as it flows down the sides of the cavity; and by the men, women, and children, scattered over the works. The ore is obtained without much difficulty, and is easily separated from the friable and decomposed granite, in which it is embedded, by repeated washings in the streams that are made to flow out at the bottom of the mine through a channel or tunnel, and which carry away the soft growan or granite by their rapid current, while the heavier metalliferous substances are precipitated.

As the ores are very poor, not even containing one per cent. of tin, Carclaze, which has been already worked for many centuries, would long since have been abandoned but for the abundance of the ores and the comparatively small expense of their extraction.

The dressing of the tin ores, or the process by which they are separated as far as possible from the earthy impurities which are mixed up with them, and are generally much lighter, begins with cleaning and sorting, and then goes on to washing and stamping, and finally to calcination in the burning-house and to smelting.

The tin ores of Cornwall and Devonshire are all reduced within the counties where they are mined, as the law prohibits their exportation—a most absurd and antiquated regulation, which, however, in this case is not injurious to private interests, as the vessels which bring the fuel from Wales for the smelting furnaces return to Swansea and Neath laden with copper ores. The smelting works, not exceeding seven or eight in number, belong generally not to the proprietors of the mines, but to other parties, who purchase the ore from the proprietors.

The smelting is effected by two different methods, which may be briefly described by stating that, by the first and most common, the ore, mixed with culm, is exposed to heat upon the hearth of a reverberating furnace, in which pit coal is used as fuel; while by the second method, which is applied merely to stream-tin, and which is followed in order to obtain tin of the finest quality, the ore is fused in a blast-furnace called a blowing-house, in which wood fuel or charcoal is used. The melted tin runs off from the furnace into an open basin, whence it flows into a large vessel, where it is allowed to settle. The scoriÆ are skimmed off, and the subsequent operations consist of refining by allowing the mass of the metal to rest, then submitting the upper and pure portion to the refining basin, and remelting the lower part. In order to convert the blocks into grain-tin, they are heated until they become brittle, and made to fall from a considerable height in a semi-fluid state, thus producing an agglomerated mass of elongated grains.

The number of persons that find occupation in and about the Cornish and Devonian tin mines may amount to about 20,000. The wages are, on an average, much inferior to those of the pitmen and pitlads in the northern coal-fields; but, on the other hand, the Cornish miner is exempt from many evils to which the northern miners are subject. He has not to fear the fatal fire-damp, and can sit at ease and hear or read of explosions that have destroyed hundreds in a few minutes.

His intellectual superiority to the agricultural labourer may be at once inferred from the nature of his pursuits. The latter plods on through life like a mere human machine, and, as he is never thrown on his own resources in the progress of his monotonous occupations, his stock of ideas remains scanty and confined. But the Cornish miner is the reverse of all this. He is engaged mostly in work requiring the exercise of the mind. He is constantly taking a new ‘pitch’^[55] in a new situation, where his judgment is called into action. His wages are not the stinted recompense of half-emancipated serfdom; but they arise from contract, and depend upon some degree of skill and knowledge. In fact the chances of the lode keep expectation constantly awake, and thus:—

If he is at all imaginative, golden dreams enliven the darkness of his underground labour. He is in fact a kind of subterranean stock-jobber, and ‘settling day’ is as anxious a time for the humble tributer at the Land’s End as for the bold speculator of the Stock Exchange.

When not exhausted after his hard day’s labour, the miner frequently cultivates a small patch of land. Many have tolerable gardens, and some are able to perform their own carpentry, while, if near the coast, others are expert fishermen.