CHAP. IV.

Of the Sale of Copper Ores; and of Black Tin at the SmeltingHouse, and after it is fmelted and coined in Blocks.

T

HOUGH the richness of our Copper works is not a late discovery; yet it is not a hundred years that the knowledge of working them to good effect hath been understood. The most obvious reason is, that it was the interest of the first difcoverers to keep the natives in profound ignorance. Mr. Carew, in the reign of Elizabeth, hints at the little profits made in Cornwall from Copper: "It is found," fays he, “in fundry places, but to what gain to the fearchers I have not "been curious to enquire, nor they hafty to reveal for of one "Mine, of which I took view, the Ore was shipped to be "refined in Wales, either to fave coft in the fuel, or to con"ceal the profit." Mr. Norden, one hundred and seventy years fince, feems to have had full information that the Cornish Copper Mines were rich, and, therefore, in his letter to king James the firft (fee his Surv. of Cornwall) like a faithful fervant, intimates the expediency of a better infpection into the state of thofe Mines, and furmifes the arts by which the value of them was concealed: "So rich are the works," fays he, "especially "fome lately found, as by the opinion of the fkilful in the

myftery, the like have not been elsewhere found, though the "worth hath been formerly extenuated by private pryers into "the secret, and covertly followed for their own gain." Notwithstanding these hints, we do not find any thing material going on here as to the improvement of the Copper Mines, till, about eighty years fince, fome gentlemen of Bristol made it their bufinefs to infpect our Mines more narrowly, and bought the Copper Ores for two pounds ten fhillings to four pounds & ton. The gains were answerable to their fagacity and diligence, and fo great, that they could not long be kept fecret, which encouraged other gentlemen of Briftol about fixty years fince to covenant with fome of the principal Miners in Cornwall to buy all their Copper Ores for a term of years at a stated low price, particularly with Mr. Beauchamp, the grandfather of the prefent John Beauchamp, Efq; to buy all the Copper Ore which should rife out of a Mine well ftocked, for twenty years, at five pounds

ton;

ton; and the Ore at Relistian in Gwinear was covenanted for at two pounds ten fhillings ton.

About fifty years back great quantities of Copper Ore were rifen from three principal Mines in this county; viz. HuelFortune in Ludgvan, Rofkear in Camborne, and Pool-Adit in Illugan; the produce of which Mines were fold to the few buyers at their own price. The four Copper Companies, viz. the Brass-Wire Company, the English Copper Company, Wayn and Company, and Chambers and Company, being then united and confederated, there can be no doubt of their beholding with a fingle eye their joint intereft and purfuit; till they were interrupted by a gentleman from Wales, who visited this county in order to improve his own branch of business in the fame way. Let his motives be ever so selfish, the gentlemen Miners at that time, if not their pofterity, were manifeftly benefited by his vifit; for juft then, fourteen hundred tons of Copper Ore, which had been lying unfold fome years at Roskear and HuelKitty, were offered to this gentleman, and for which the confederated buyers would give only four pounds five fhillings ton. But fo contracted were the principles of the Miners in those days of unremediable oppreffion, that they obliged this friend to their country to depofit a fum of money equivalent to the fuppofed amount of their Ores before they would confent to weigh them off at the advanced price they had agreed to take for their commodity. These confined notions will ever prevail where the trade of a country is subject to the domination of rapacious and dishoneft combinations. However, this gentleman bought the fourteen hundred tons of Ore at the advanced price of fix pounds five shillingston, which he paid for with ready money, and gained much above thirty cent. as the writer is well informed from the most indubitable authority! What must have been the profits of companies confederated to ferve their own interests without limitation or controul? This new comer bought nine hundred tons more at Rofkear at feven pounds ton; and in less than fix months before he left Cornwall he purchased three thousand tons, upon which he deservedly made, very little, if at all, fhort of forty cent. profit.

Soon after this, the buyers and fellers mutually agreed to ticket for all Copper Ores which should be ready for sale at stated times, and the highest bidder or ticket should be the purchaser. On the very onset of this compact, three hundred tons of Ore belonging to the fame Mine were to be ticketed for on a day

appointed

appointed, in Redruth, when the agent of the Mine having abfented himself fome time beyond the limited hour of fale, a certain gentleman of great addrefs, power, and fortune, declared himfelf the purchafer by private contract at eight pounds feventeen fhillingston, when one of the ticketers present produced his ticket before all the company, whofe offer was nine pounds feventeen fhillings & ton, to the fhame and confufion of all the adventurers.

It is to this nefarious tranfaction that we owe the present mode of ticketing for Copper Ores. The proprietors and adventurers in Mines of thofe times, found themfelves in a predicament fingularly ridiculous and diftrefling: they poffeffed a commodity whofe value they could not tell how to ascertain; and the buyers, who were acquainted with every requifite for their own advantage, had formed themselves into a confederacy the most pernicious and deftructive to the whole Copper Mine intereft of this county. It was impoffible that such a state of affairs fhould long continue. The fecret at length tranfpiring, other companies were gradually formed; and from an opposition and rivalship in trade, the adventurer received a better price for his Copper Ore, though far beneath its juft value.

In the beginning of my acquaintance with Mining affairs, about twenty-feven years paft, there were fix companies eftablifhed for buying of Copper Ores. At prefent I think there are thirteen companies, which attend by their agents, and throw in their tickets on the day of fale. It will be neceffary to premife that a day of fampling is fixed (fee book iv. chap. ii. p. 245) with a fortnight's interval between it and the ticketing day for trying the famples of Ore and receiving anfwers from their principals. On this ticketing day a dinner almoft equal to a city feast is provided at the expence of the Mines, in proportion to the quantities of Ores each Mine has to fell; and the adventurers, with the companies agents, affemble together. Soon after the cloth is removed, the tickets containing the different offers of the different companies are produced and registered by the agents of both buyers and fellers, the originals being delivered to the proprietors of the Mines; and the highest bidders are of course the buyers. In order to evidence the concise and easy method of ticketing for Copper Ores, I have jubjoined a duplicate of a ticketing paper, by which the reader may apprehend, at one glance, that ten thousand pounds worth of Ores may be fold and appropriated to the refpective buyers in half an hour's time.

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