250
MINING IN THE
CHAP. X.
earth in search for gold, in most of the countriesof Europe ; but in no part of it to so great anextent as in the bishopric of Salzburg . Theinhabitants of that country seemed to thinkthemselves within the reach of the apple of theHesperides and of the golden fleece, and to findin their streams the Pactolus of antiquity. Be-tween the years 1538 and 1562 more than athousand leases of mines were taken. Thegreatest activity prevailed, and one or two largefortunes were made; but by the beginning ofthe next century, though large quantities of iron,copper, calamine, cobalt, and vitriol, with somegold and silver, had been extracted, partly fromdisappointment and partly on account of religiousdifferences, the district was deprived of thegreater portion of its inhabitants. In processof time, too, the lawines or glaciers extendedthemselves lower down on the mountain, andrendered the openings to the mines inaccessible;yet so late as 1796, efforts were directed by thethen archbishop to work the mines, which werefilled with snow and ice, but with very littlesuccess b
In the Tyrol, near to Brixen , between thetowns of Rattenburg and Schwatz, are silvermines, which during the excitement in the six-teenth century had obtained the name of El