be done is to hope that the investors will some day get their money back.  Without any doubt, there is a large amount of copper there, and more in other parts of Oriente.  So is there copper in Camaguey, Santa Clara, and Matanzas provinces.  There are holes in the ground near the city of Camaguey that indicate profitable operations in earlier years.  The metal is spread over a wide area in Pinar del Rio, and venturous spirits have spent many good Spanish pesos and still better American dollars in efforts to locate deposits big enough to pay for its excavation.  Some of that class are at it even now, and one concern is reported as doing a profitable business.

The bitumens are represented in the island by asphalt, a low-grade coal, and seepages of petroleum.  At least, several writers tell of coal in the vicinity of Havana, but the substance is probably only a particularly hard asphaltum.  The only real coal property of which I have any knowledge is a quite recent discovery.  The story was told me by the man whose money was sought to develop it.  It was, by the way, an anthracite property.  In response to an urgent invitation from a presumably reliable acquaintance, my friend took his car and journeyed westward into Pinar del Rio, through a charming country that he and I have many times enjoyed together.  He picked up his coal-discovering friend in the city of Pinar del Rio, and proceeded into the country to inspect the coal-vein.  At a number of points immediately alongside the highway, his companion alighted to scrape away a little of the surface of the earth and to return with a little lump of really high-grade anthracite.  Such a substance had no proper business there, did not belong there geologically or otherwise.  The explanation soon dawned upon my friend.  They were following the line of an abandoned narrow-gauge railway, abandoned twenty years ago, along which had been dumped, at intervals, little piles of perfectly good anthracite, imported from Pennsylvania, for use by the portable engine used in the construction of the road.  My friend declares that he is entirely ready at any time to swear that there are deposits of anthracite in Cuba.  A very good quality of asphalt is obtained in different parts of the island, and considerable quantities have been shipped to the United States.  Signs of petroleum deposits have been strong enough to induce investigation and expenditure.  An American company is now at work drilling in Matanzas Province.  The most extensive and promising mineral industry is iron, especially in eastern Cuba.  Millions of tons of ore have been taken from the mountains along the shore between Santiago and Guantanamo, and the supply appears to be inexhaustible.  The product is shipped to the United States, to a value of several millions of dollars yearly.  A few years ago, other and apparently more extensive deposits were discovered in the northern section of Oriente, The field bought by the Pennsylvania Steel Company is estimated to contain 600,000,000 tons of ore.  The Bethlehem Steel Company is the owner of another vast tract.  The quality of these ores is excellent.  In Oriente Province also are deposits of manganese of which considerable shipments have been made.