[71] GOLD.--From a calculation recently made, it appears that the number of Chinese employed in the gold mines at Mentrada and other places on the western side of Borneo, amounts to not less than thirty-two thousand working men. When a mine affords no more than four _bengkals_ (weighing about two dollars each, or something less than a _tahil_) per man in the year, it is reckoned a losing concern, and abandoned accordingly. Valuing the _bengkal_ at eighteen Spanish dollars, which is a low rate of estimation, and supposing only four _bengkals_ produced in the year by the labour of each man, the total produce is 128,000 _bengkals_, worth 2,224,000 Spanish dollars, equal to 556,000_l._, at the rate of five shillings the dollar. But it is asserted, that upon the general run of the mines, seldom less than six _bengkals_ per head has been obtained, and in very rainy seasons seven. Taking the medium at six and a half _bengkals_, the 32,000 Chinese will procure 208,000 _bengkals_, which at eighteen Spanish dollars the _bengkal_ is 3,744,000 Spanish dollars, equal to 936,000_l._ Such is the result of a very moderate calculation of the produce of these mines. According to an estimate made in the year 1812, the annual produce of the mines on the west coast of Borneo was estimated at 4,744,000 Spanish dollars, being an excess of a million sterling. The quantity of gold procured on Sumatra, the supposed golden Chersonesus of the ancients, is according to Mr. Marsden about 30,800 ounces, which, at 4_l._ sterling the ounce, is worth 123,200_l._, equal to 492,800 Spanish dollars. With respect to the disposal of the gold from the mines of Borneo, it may be observed, that every native Chinese, whether employed in the mines, in agriculture, as merchant or artificer, manages every year to remit at least the value of one _tahil_, more or less, of gold to his relations in China. These remittances are generally made by the junks in gold, as it saves freight, is more easily smuggled on shore without the notice of the rapacious Mandarin, and remitted over-land to the residence of their families. Taking the Chinese male population who can thus remit at double the number employed in the mines, and supposing one half to be born in the country, most of whom may not remit to China, this remittance would amount to 34,000 _bengkals_ or _tahils_, which at eighteen Spanish dollars is 612,000 dollars, or 153,000_l._