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There were models of machines used in gold-washing, quartz mills fifty years old, and almost identical with those of the present day; models of furnaces and zavods in various parts of Siberia, and full delineations of the principal silver mines of the Altai. There was a curious steam engine, said to have been made at Barnaool in 1764, and used for blowing the furnaces.
His power is almost despotic, and like the governors of departments throughout all Siberia, he can manage affairs pretty much in his own way. There are no convict laborers in his district, the workmen at the mines and zavods being peasants subject to the orders of government. Each man in the district may be called upon to work for the Emperor at fixed wages of money and rations.
In various parts of the Ural chain some of the zavods are of immense extent, and employ large numbers of workmen. At Nijne Tagilsk, for example, there is a population of twenty-five thousand, all engaged directly or indirectly in the production of iron. The sheet iron so popular in America for parlor stoves and stove pipe, comes from Ekaterineburg and its vicinity, and is made from magnetic ore.
Many zavods in the Urals were planned and constructed by Nikite and his descendants, and most of them are still in successful operation and have undergone no change. The iron works of the Urals are very extensive, and capable of supplying any reasonable demand of individual or imperial character.
About thirty thousand poods of copper are produced annually in this district, but none of the copper zavods are at Barnaool. All gold produced from the mines of Siberia, with the exception of that around Nerchinsk, is sent to Barnaool to be smelted. This work is performed, in a room about fifteen feet square, the furnaces being fixed in its centre like parlor stoves of unusual size.
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