But all the other mining operations of the Phoenicians were insignificant compared with those of which the theatre was Spain.  Spain was the Peru of the ancient world, and surpassed its modern rival, in that it produced not only gold and silver, but also copper, iron, tin, and lead.  Of these metals gold was the least abundant.  It was found, however, as gold dust in the bed of the Tagus;[1016] and there were mines of it in Gallicia,[1017] in the Asturias, and elsewhere.  There was always some silver mixed with it, but in one of the Gallician mines the proportion was less than three per cent.  Elsewhere the proportion reached to ten or even twelve and a half per cent.; and, as there was no known mode of clearing the gold from it, the produce of the Gallician mine was in high esteem and greatly preferred to that of any other.  Silver was yielded in very large quantities.  “Spain,” says Diodorus Siculus,[1018] “has the best and most plentiful silver from mines of all the world.”  “The Spanish silver,” says Pliny,[1019] “is the best.”  When the Phoenicians first visited Spain, they found the metal held in no esteem at all by the natives.  It was the common material of the cheapest drinking vessels, and was readily parted with for almost anything that the merchants chose to offer.  Much of it was superficial, but the veins were found to run to a great depth; and the discovery of one vein was a sure index of the near vicinity of more.[1020] The out-put of the Spanish silver mines during the Phoenician, Carthaginian, and Roman periods was enormous, and cannot be calculated; nor has the supply even yet failed altogether.  The iron and copper of Spain are also said to have been exceedingly abundant in ancient times,[1021] though, owing to the inferior value of the metals, and to their wider distribution, but little is recorded with regard to them.  Its tin and lead, on the other hand, as being metals found in comparatively few localities, receive not infrequent mention.  The Spanish tin, according to Posidonius, did not crop out upon the surface,[1022] but had to be obtained by mining.  It was produced in some considerable quantity in the country of the Artabri, to the north of Lusitania,[1023] as well as in Lusitania itself, and in Gallicia;[1024] but was found chiefly in small particles intermixed with a dark sandy earth.  Lead was yielded in greater abundance; it was found in Cantabria, in Baetica, and many other places.[1025] Much of it was mixed with silver, and was obtained in the course of the operations by means of which silver was smelted and refined.[1026] The mixed metal was called galena.[1027] Lead, however, was also found, either absolutely pure,[1028] or so nearly so that the alloy was inappreciable, and was exported in large quantities, both by the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians, and also by the Romans.  It was believed that the metal had a power of growth and reproduction, so that if a mine was deserted for a while and then re-opened, it was sure to be found more productive than it was previously.[1029] The fact seems to be simply that the supply is inexhaustible, since even now Spain furnishes more than half the lead that is consumed by the rest of Europe.  Besides the ordinary metals, Spain was capable of yielding an abundance of quicksilver;[1030] but this metal seems not to have attracted the attention of the Phoenicians, who had no use for it.