Near the Morelos is the _Jesus Maria_. Though on the western or Sonora slope of the mountain, it is only eight leagues from Chihuahua. This, like Morelos, is a modern discovery, and, of course, was not included in the number of those Sonora mines which produced such an intense excitement about a hundred years ago in Mexico, and even in Spain. Here, within the circuit of three leagues, two hundred metallic _lodes_ were registered in one year. The story of the mine of _El Refugio_, discovered by a fellow of the name of Pacheco, gave occasion for anecdotes like those of the Arancos which we have just recited. A dealer had an old cloak which took the fancy of Pacheco, and to purchase this thing he gave ore from which the dealer realized $8000. Three twenty-fourths (three bars) of the product of this mine netted, between the years 1811 and 1814, $337,000. On the Sonora side of the mountain is _Santa Eulalia_. The ores of this _real_ [district] are found in loose earth, filling immense caverns, or what are called "rotten ores" in California, and are easily separated by smelting. One shilling a mark ($8) was laid aside from the silver which one of these caverns produced, which shilling contribution constituted the fund out of which the magnificent Cathedral of Chihuahua was built. THE MINE OF ARAZUMA. Proceeding northward, we come to a spot the most famous in the world for its product of silver, the mine of _Arazuma_. For near a century, the accounts of the wealth of this mine were considered fabulous; but their literal truth is confirmed by the testimony of the English embassador. After examining the old records which I have quoted, I have no doubt that the facts surpassed the astonishing report; for in Mexico, the propensity has ever been to conceal rather than over-estimate the quantity of silver, on account of the king's fifth; yet it is the king's fifth, _actually paid_, on which all the estimates of the production of Sonora silver mines are based. Arazuma (which, in the report of the Mineria that I have translated for this volume, appears to be set down as Arizpa) was, a hundred years ago, the world's wonder, and so continued until the breaking out of the great Apache war a few years afterward. Men seemed to run mad at the sight of such immense masses of virgin silver, and for a time it seemed as if silver was about to lose its value. In the midst of the excitement, a royal ordinance appeared, declaring Arazuma a "creation of silver" (_creador de plata_), and appropriating it to the king's use. This put a stop to private enterprise; and, after the Indian war set in, Arazuma became almost a forgotten locality; and in a generation or two afterward, the accounts of its mineral riches began to be discredited.