Second in importance among the old mines of Guanajuato is Los Rayas. Its history presents a new feature in the mining system of Mexico, not before mentioned, but which is important to a right understanding of the operation of the mining code. The right of discovery gives title to two hundred varas along the mine, and to two hundred varas (about 500 feet) in depth. The consequence of this limitation is, that when a very rich claim is made, there immediately springs up a contest to get below it, and to cut off the lucky discoverer from the lower part of his expected fortune, and he has no means of avoiding such a result but by driving his shaft downward until he reaches a point below his first two hundred varas, which entitles him to claim another section downward.
This principle is strikingly illustrated in the case of the famous mine of the priest Flores at Cuatorce, which he blasphemously named "the Purse of God the Father," where there are marks of divers attempts being made to undermine him, though without success. But the case is a different one when the bonanza is upon a high ridge, and it can be undermined by drifting in from a lower level. Then commences a lively contest to determine who can dig the fastest, and make the most rapid progress in this contest of mining and countermining.
The Marquis de los Rayas owes his title and his princely fortune of $11,000,000 to a successful contest of this character. The Santa Amita was in bonanza, yielding an ore so pregnant with gold that the crude mass often sold for its weight in silver.
DEEP MINING.
Contests of this kind are very different from those which used to take place in California some years ago, when twenty feet square was marked off upon the top of a ridge, through which the claimant had to sink his shaft to the base rock on which the gold was supposed to be deposited. When the rock was reached, it was often found difficult to keep the lines