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page 8 and Martin l.c. page 5. We have never seen it ourselves. It is said to be found in Iwashiro.
Nineth.—Red copper ore (cuivre oxydulé, Hauy) is also found in Japan in company with ochre (brown, ochry haematite) and copper green (mountain-green). We have seen several specimens from Hiuga, Satsuma, Nagato. The quantity in which it is found, seems, however, to be small, although it occurs in several mountain ranges. It constitutes the mineralogical guide for the Japanese miners, for they consider it as the chief criterion for good copper ores and learn from this mixture of coppergreen, iron-ochre and red copper where to construct mines. The Japanese call it Yaké. The experts of mines believe they can determine à priori the quality and quantity of the copper ore which will be found in the mountain, if they have examined the colour, the grain and other properties of yake. Thus the directions in which the mines are to be laid out, and the degree of declivity of the mine-roads, are chiefly determined by the occurrence of this mineral.
These are the Japanese copper-minerals known to us. We will now describe the metallurgy of copper, since the 16th century such a valuable branch of industry in this country. It will in future remain an industry of the highest interest for Japan. It is true, many of the very old mines, worked for several centuries, commence to be exhausted or at least give, by their long mine-roads, so much trouble in bringing the ore to light, that they do not pay the cost of working. But in a country like this where copper-ore, and, especially, copper-pyrites, is found in nearly every province, new mines can be opened after proper borings and mineralogical surveys. The exhaustion of a few very old mines does not by any means involve the exhaustion of the Japanese soil. Exaggerated as were many of the old accounts of the enormous wealth of Japan, the opinion that the sources of copper-ore are also exhausted is equally erroneous. The relatively large quantity of copper exported by the Dutch and Chinese from 1600 to 1858 is small when compared with the
