ing copper?

[Copper-working a pre-Spanish art.] The locality of these rich
quarries was still unknown to the Governor, although the copper
implements brought thence had, according to an official statement
of his in 1833, been in use in Manila over two centuries. It is
now known that the copper-smiths are not Negritos but Igorots; and
there can be no question that they practiced this art, and the still
more difficult one of obtaining copper from flint, for a long period
perhaps previous to the arrival of the Spaniards. They may possibly
have learnt them from the Chinese or Japanese. The chief engineer,
Santos [134], and many others with him, are of opinion that this
race is descended from the Chinese or Japanese, from whom he insists
that it acquired not only its features (several travellers mention
the obliquely placed eyes of the Igorots), its idols, and some of
its customs, but also the art of working in copper. At all events,
the fact that a wild people, living isolated in the mountains,
should have made such progress in the science of smelting, is of
so great interest that a description of their procedure by Santos
(essentially only a repetition of an earlier account by Hernandez,
in the Revista Minera, i. 112) will certainly be acceptable.

[The Igorots' Method.] The present mining district acquired by the
society mentioned, the Sociedad Minero-metalurgica Cantabrofilipina
de Mancayan, was divided amongst the Igorots into larger or smaller
parcels strictly according to the number of the population of the
adjacent villages, whose boundaries were jealously watched; and
the possessions of each separate village were again divided between
certain families; whence it is that those mountain districts exhibit,
at the present day, the appearance of a honeycomb. To obtain the ore,
they made cavities, in which they lighted fires in suitable spots,
for the purpose of breaking the rock into pieces by means of the
elasticity of the heated water contained in the crevices, with the
additional assistance of iron implements. The first breaking-up of
the ore was done in the stream-work itself, and the dead heaps lay
piled up on the ground, so that, in subsequent fires, the flame of
the pieces of wood always reached the summit; and by reason of the
quality of the rock, and the imperfection of the mode of procedure,
very considerable down-falls frequently occurred. The ores were divided
into rich and quartziferous; the former not be