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Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. irrata to pelure, n A n 32X 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 / GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES OF NORTH AMERICA A POPULAR DESCRIPTION OF THEIR OCCURRENCE, VALUE, HISTORY, ARCHiBOLOGY, AND OF THF COLLECTIONS IN WHICH THEY EXIST, ALSO A CHAPTER ON PEARLS AND ON REMARKABLE FOREIGN GEMS OWNED IN THE UNITED STATES . . ILLUSTRATED WITH BIOHT COLORED PLATES AND NUMBROUS MINOR ENORiVINOa BY GEORGE FREDERICK KUNZ GBM EXPERT WITH MESSES. TIFPANV k CO., SPECIAL AGENT or THE UNITED STATES GEOIXKIICAL SUEVEV AND OF THE ELEVENTH UNITED STATES CENSUS, MEM- BER or THE MINERALOGICAL SOCIBTV Or GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, THE IMPERIAL MINERALOGICAL SOCIETY or ST. PETERSBURG, THE SOC|At< PRANCAISE DE MINBRALOGIB, ETC NEW YORK THE SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING COMPANY MDCCCXC 167310 COPYRIGHT, 1890 BV THE SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING COMPANY MOTHSn A TUIWUIIE ! WUT 14TH tTllUT, Pk V. CONTENTS PAGE Introduction, . . . . . . . . . 7 Chapter I. Diamonds, 13 Chapter II. Corundum, Sapphire, Ruby, Oriental Topaz, Orien- tal Emerald, Diaspore, and Spinel, . -39 Chapter III. Turquoise 54 Chapter IV. Topaz and Tourmaline (Rubellite, Indicolite, and Achroite) 66 Chapter V. Garnet Group: — Essonite, Spessartite, Almandite, Pyrope, Ouvarovite, Schorlomite, ... 78 Chapter VI. Beryl (Emerald Aquamarine), Chrysoberyl, Phena- cite, Euclase, Peridot, Zircon, . . . .87 4 CONTENTS Chapter VII. page The Quartz Group: — Rock Crystal, Transparent Quartz, Amethyst, Smoky Quartz, Cairngorm Stone, Gold Quartz, Rose Quartz, Novaculite, Slliciiied Coral, Quartzite, Quartz Inclusions, Thetis Hairstone, Agate, Jasper, Silicified Wood, Opal, Hydrophane, .... io6 Chapter VIII. Spodumene (Hiddenite), Smaragdite, Diopside, Rhodonite, Enstatite and Bronzite, Wollastonite, Crocidolite, Willemite, Vesuvianite, AUanite, Gadolinite, Epidote, Zoisite, Axinite, Danburite, lolite, Lepidolite, Scapolite, Cancrinite, Sodalite, Elseolite, Lapis Lazuli, . . . . 147 Chapter IX. The Feldspar Group: — Lennilite, Cassinite, Elseolite, Moonstone, Albite, Ol'joclase, Sun- stone, Labradorite, Amazonstone, Perthite, Peris- terite, Leoparite, Obsidian, Pitchstone. Also Chrondrodite, Andalusite, . . . ' . 162 Chapter X. Chiastolite, Cyanite, Datolite, Staurolite, Isopyre, Pectolite, Dioptase, Prehnite, Zonochlorite, Chlor- astrolite, Thomsonite, Lintonite, Natrolite, Fluorite, 175 Chapter XI. Serpentine, Bowenite, Williamsite, Microlite, Meer- schaum, Apatite, Beryllonite, Lazulite, Cassiterite, Hematite, Lodestone, Rutile, Octahedrite, Brook- ite, Arkansite, Titanic Iron, Titanite, Malachite, Chrysocolla, Azurite, Arragonite, Fossil Coral, Pyrite, Amber, Jet, Anthracite, Cat's-Eye Miner- als, Catlinite 185 rTriT1PiWi.ll'nr|llwi>IJ(llMM'ii|iii'l'""*'i'i'«n''i'"iii CONTENTS Chapter XII. Pearls, Chapter XIII. In the Dominion of Canada, Chapter XIV. In Mexico and Central America, .... Chapter XV. Aboriginal Lapidarian Work in North America, Chapter XVI. Definitions, Imports, and Production, Values, Cutting of Diamonds and other Stones, Watch Jewels, Collections of Gems, Minerals, and Jade, Uses of Precious and Ornamental Stones for the Ornamentation of Silver, and Furniture and for Interior Decoration, Trilobite Ornaments, , page 211 258 275 303 310 •^ INTRODUCTION NEARLY all the known varieties of precious stones are found in the United States, but there is very little sys- tematic exploration for them, as the indications seldom justify the investment of much capital in such search. The daily yield from the coal and iron mines, or from the South African diamond mines, or a week's yield of the granite quarries, would exceed in value the entire output of precious stones found in the United States during a year. Systematic search for gems and precious stones has been carried on in only two States — Maine and North Carolina. Otherwise, the gems are found accidentally, in connection with other substances that are being mined, or in small veins which are only occasionally met with, as the turquoise in Mexico. They are often gathered on the surface, as is the case with garnet or olivine from Arizona and New Mexico ; or in sluicing for gold, as the sapphires from Montana ; or in connection with mica mining, as the beryl from Connecticut and North Carolina ; or from the beds of streams and decomposing rocks, as the moss-agate from Wyoming ; or on the beaches, as the agate, chlorastrolite, and thomsonite from the shores of Lake Superior. Nearly all the gems found in these various ways are sent to the large cities in small parcels, or sold in the neighborhood to tourists, or sent to other places to be disposed of as having been found in their vicinity. Many of them are only known locally, some to mineralogists, while others, mentioned in the following 8 INTRODUCTION pages, are accepted by the few gem collectors of the United States, whose only object is to find something possessing the qualities of a gem or precious stone, wherewith to enrich their cabinets. A list of such gem stones will be of interest to many who have not known of their existence in this country, and to others this knowledge may have a commercial value, should some of these minerals be met with in sufficient quantities and of good quality ; and, in directing attention to valuable de- posits where a small amount has already been realized, it may stimulate the interest in and search for gems, and aid in develop- ing what may become an important industry. It is known that the Indians worked the turquoise mines of New Mexico more than two centuries ago ; that they made arrow and spear points of rock crystal, smoky quartz, agatized and opalized woods, agates, jaspers, and obsidian, and buried crystals of quartz with their dead ; that the richly colored fluorite t f Hardin County, 111., was worked by them into ornaments. Some of the most beautiful of their arrow-points are now used for decoration by the white man, paralleling the prover- bial conversion of swords into plowshares. Mention will be made of a few localities where gem specimens have been found which are remarkable as such, and which have a special claim on the collector ; some notes will also be given concerning specimens that have been of value to the finder, such, for example, as the Pike's Peak amazonstone, or the spinels found at Monroe, N. Y., which have little or no gem value. Many of these stones are as beautiful, in their native form, as they are after having un- dergone the grinding process. The cutting of such material, therefore, for its money value, is really vandalism and should be discouraged by all scientists, although we may not all be willing to accept more broadly Ruskin's opinion that "gems should not be cut, but worn in the natural state." In 1882 the writer was invited to prepare a paper on precious stones of the United States for the first annual report of the Division of Mining Statistics, and since then has prepared similar annual reports. From that beginning the pres- ent work has grown, and it contains much additional information obtained from studying the collections of the United States as INTRODUCTION well as from a personal examination of many of the localities where gems are found. Its object is to present, in convenient form, as many of the facts as possible regarding the precious stones peculiar to the United States, Canada, and Mexico, so that they may be available, not only to the mineralogist, the miner, the mineral and gem collector, the archaeologist and the jeweler, but also to the public, the conditions under which they occur, the methods by which the mining and seaich for them are con- ducted, the value and production of different stones, and also an account of the collections in these countries. A brief general description of each important gem will be found at the beginning of the article and a series of analyses indicating the composition of each precious stone, from the latest or most reliable authority, and for comparison a typical analysis is generally included. Full reference to the literature of the subject is given in the foot-notes. The chapter on Canadian precious stones is based on a re- port prepared for " The Mining and Mineral Statistics of Canada" for 1887, and its use is permitted through the courtesy of the authorities of the Canadian Geological Survey. One chapter is devoted to pearls, with a full account of their mention by the early explorers, their occurrence in mounds, Indian graves, and similar remains ; another devoted to the imports and values, and to the cutting of gem stones, with mention of some remarkable gems owned in the United States, and a brief description of the best known collections in this country. A number of minerals are enumerated that are not only below 7 in the scale of hardness, but that are even lelow 6, and apparently too soft for cut gems ; yet cups, vases, and other objects may be made of these stones, such as serpentine and catlinite, which could be successfully used where transparent apatite could not, because they are opaque, do not show scratches, and always present an even, good color. During recent years a number of items have appeared in the newspapers relative to the finding of alleged valuable gems, which have proved on investigation to be without foundation. As newspaper statements are sometimes copied into special literature, it may be well to refer briefly to them. I1' li lO INTRODUCTION The " Blue Ridge sapphire," or " Georgia marvel," as it was called in the reports, was found in 1883 in a brook in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Georgia. It was estimated to be worth about $50,000 by the owner, he having been assured of its genuine- ness as a sapphire by two Southern jewelers, who had arrived at its valuation by computing its weight. Anything scratched by a file is sure to be pronounced glass, whether it is glass, topaz, or some other equally hard stone ; while, on the other hand, the common fallacy prevails that anything that a file cannot scratch is a genuine stone, even though it may be only glass. In this in- stance the gem proved to be a piece of rolled blue bottle-glass, of which fact its owner could be convinced only when he saw a platinum wire coated with a melted fragment. Another wonder was a stone weighing 9 ounces, plowed up near Gibsonville, Guilford County, N. C, which was pro- nounced a genuine emerald by some local expert, who tested it, and with the microscope showed that it contained various small diamonds. Its value was estimated up in the thousands, and $1,000 was reported to have been refused for it by its owner, who, as it was believed to be the largest known emerald, expecte i that it would bring him a fortune. Being, therefore, too valuable to be entrusted to an express company, he put himself to the ex- ' pense of a trip to New York, where his prize proved on examina- tion to be a greenish quartz crystal, filled with long hair-like crys- tals of green byssolite or actinolite, on which were series and strings of small liquid cavities that, glistening in the sun, had led to the included diamond theory. The best offer that he received for the stone was $5. The "Wetumpka Ruby," from Elmore County, Ala., was supposed to be a raby of six ounces weight, " after cutting away all the rouganess." Owing to its assumed value, it was deposited in the Wetumpka bank vault, and on no consideration would be sent to any one on approbation. A small fragment sent to New York City proved the stone to be only a garnet and from its quality, of no gem value, even if a ruby. Another is a crystal found near Danbury, N. C, which was examined and pronounced to be a genuine diamond by the local jewelers, and valued at $7,000. INTRODUCTION H A number of the supposed diamond discoveries will be found at the end of the iirst chapter. It is not intended to make this volume either a complete treatise on precious stones or on the science of mineralogy, but to confine it more particularly to the occurrence of precious stones in North America, and for comparison, occasional reference is made to foreign sources and authorities. The beautiful colored plates contained in this volume are the work of the eminent art lithographers, Messrs. L. Prang & Co., of Boston, Mass., and are unquestionably the finest work of the kind ever published. The writer's thanks are extended to Messrs. TifTany & Co. for the facilities afforded by their corps of artists in the preparation of the original designs used in the pror^uction of these plates. During the preparation of this work, much valuable assist- ance has been received from the following gentlemen, to whom the author begs to tender his most sincere thanks. Maj. John W. Powell, William H. Holmes, Prof. Frank W. Clarke, Joseph S. Diller, and Dr. David T. Day, of the United States Geological Survey ; Lester F. Ward, Frank H. Knowlton, William H. Dall, Georgt H. Merrill, Dr. Thomas Wilson and Dr. Robert E. C. Stearns, of the United States National Mu- seum ; Prof. Edward S. Dana, Dr. Samuel L. Penfield and Mr. O. H. Drake, of Yale University ; Dr. Augustus C. Hamlin, Bangor, Me. ; Dr. Robert Lilley, Dr. Marcus Benjamin, Prof. Daniel S. Martin, Mr. James D. Yerrington, Prof. Oliver P. Hubbard and Mr. C. J. Cottier, of New York City, also Dr. E. Hamy, of Paris, France. mult MP ■iHM iir I CHAPTER I. Diamonds. THE diamond crystallizes in the isometric system, and is usually found as an octahedron or as some modifica- tion of that form. It is lo in the scale of hardness and the hardest of all known substances. Its composition is pure carbon. It has a greater refractive and dispersive power on light than any other gem, and is the only one that is combus- tible. Its specific gravity is about 3"525. In color its range is extensive, and it is found in almost all the shades of the spectrum, more commonly, however, white, yellow, brown ; rarely rose-red, red, blue, and green. Ninety-five per cent, of the diamonds at present obtained are from the Kimberley Mines, Griqua Land West, South Africa. The remainder come from Brazil, India, and Borneo. A few have been found recently in New South Wales, and they are known to exist in the Ural Mountains. Since the discovery of South African mines in 1867, and the opening a short time afterward of 3,143 claims that are now consolidated into a small number of large companies, all within a radius of a mile and a half, more diamonds have been found than during the two preceding centuries throughout the whole world. Over 9 tons (4o,cxx>,ooo carats) of diamonds, valued in the rough at $250,000,000, and after cutting at over $500,000,000, have been taken from these mines. Diamonds are sold by the carat. The >3 i i H GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE I t ! y I i I ii International carat weighs 205 grams, equivalent to 3*168 grains troy. The proportions according to quality of the entire South African yield are as follows : First quality, eight per cent., second quality, twenty-five per cent., third quality, twenty per cent., and the balance bort, which is used for slitting gems, polishing diamonds, more recently for saws, and ground into powder for use in the arts. An impression seems to prevail that a diamond will not break if struck with a hammer on an anvil, and several that were supposed to be good specimens were broken in this way. While the diamond is hard, it is also veiy brittle, and can be easily broken, and although every substance from the hardness of feldspar up, including a cleavage or cut dia- mond, will scratch glass, nothing but the natural edge of a diamond crystal will cut it. To determine whether a given specimen is a diamond, the best test is to try if it \A\\ scratch corundum. If no mark is produced, and if the specimen cannot be scratched by a diamond, it is safe to assume that it is a diamond. It is well to make the trial on a smooth or polished surface, other- wise thfe scratch will not be perceptible. The occurrence of diamonds in the United States is chiefly confined to two regions, geographically very remote and geo- logically quite dissimilar. The first is a belt of country ly- ing along the eastern base of the southern Alleghanies, from Virginia to Georgia, while the other extends along the west- ern base of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade ranges in northern California and southern Oregon. In both cases the mode of occurrence has several marked resemblances. The dia- monds are found in loose material, among deposits of gravel and earth, and are associated with garnets, zircons, iron sands, mona- zite, anatase, and particularly with gold, in the search for which they have usually been discovered. This resemblance is due al- together to the fact that these loose deposits, in both regions, are merely the debris of the crystalline rocks of the adjacent moun- tains, and therefore present a general similarity, while the ages of the rocks themselves are widely different. In the case of the South Atlantic States, the rocks of the Blue Ridge and eastern Alleghanies are of ancient Archaen and Cambrian ages, while in the western belt, the Sierra Nevada was not elevated and meta- UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 15 morphosed until the middle or later Mesozoic. From the general resemblance of conditions above referred to, the details of discov- ery in the two regions are remarkably similar, and in both occas- ional diamond crystals are found, accidentally picked up on the surface, or more frequently encountered in the search for gold, sometimes in placer-mining and sometimes in the flumes and sluices of hydraulic workings. They have sometimes been over- looked, unrecognized, or destroyed by rude and ignorant meth- ods of testing, and at other times have been made the basis of fabulous estimates and exaggerated tales, but they have not as yet been found in sufficient quantities to justify an attempt at diamond-mining, nor have the specimens obtained been of more than local interest and moderate value. With regard to the finding of diamonds in other parts of the country, there have been various reports, but little or no positive evidence. The supposed diamond field of central Kentucky has been the subject of much interesting study and discussion on ac- count of the striking resemblance of the rock to that of the diam- antiferous region of South Africa ; but the conditions are found, upon closer examination, to present important differences, and the diamonds are yet to be discovered. The formations in the eastern portions of the United States where diamonds have been found are entirely different from those of South Africa. They resemble more nearly those of the diamond fields of Brazil and of parts of India. The diamonds found in the United States are much older than those of South Africa, and if they have ever occurred in rock similar to that in Kimberley, there is nothing to indicate it now, since the rocks in American diamond-bearing localities are mainly granitic. It may be said that, while diamonds are found to some extent within the limits of the United States, there is no reason as yet to believe that they will ever be numbered among our important mineral products. Their local and scientific inter- est is of course very great ; and this fact will justify the some- what detailed account of their occurrence given in this volume as an important part of a work on precious stones in the United States. Prof. H. Carvill Lewis paid much attention to this subject, visiting many of the localities where diamonds had been found in the eastern part of the United States, and personally in- fir i6 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE 1 I I vestigating the history of such stones as he could trace. His con- clusions are to be published in a final memoir on the " Genesis of the Diamond," the completion and editing of which has been undertaken, since his death, by his friend and associate, Prof. George H. Williams, of the Johns Hopkins University. A moderate number of well-authenticated diamonds have been found in Georgia and in North Carolina, a very few are reported from South Carolina, and one or two are known from southern Vir- ginia. These are all apparently derived from the detritus of the crystalline metamorphic rocks that extend through these States as the eastern ranges of the Appalachian system. Of these, the great continuous Blue Ridge is, of course, the leading member ; eastward of it lies the so-called Atlantic or Tidewater gneiss, by many regarded of later age ; and another belt, perhaps distinct, extends from Richmond, Va., to the vicinity of Raleigh, N. C. It is much to be regretted that the geology of these crystalline belts is thus far so little known. At some points they appear to be well distinguished, while at others they merge into one another and have not been clearly defined. The names Laurentian, Hur- onian, Montalban, and Cambrian are variously applied to differ- ent portions of them by different geologists. The Blue Ridge proper is generally admitted to be chiefly true Laurentian ; and it is certain that Cambrian beds appear at some points in the area. The remarkable itacolumite rock, popularly associated with the occurrence of diamonds, is found at many points on the flanks of the Blue Ridge, but its geological age is not yet clearly estab- lished. Beginning with the account of the one well-known Virginia diamond, we shall pass on southward, taking up the States in or- der. The Dewey diamond (see Colored Plate No. i), was found at Manchester, Va., in 1855, and Jofin H. Tyler, Sr., of Richmond, Va., who was the first to see it, says : " This diamond was found just opposite Richmond, by a laborer engaged in grading one of the streets. It was brought to me to ascertain its character and value. I pronounced it at once a valuable diamond, and recom- mended the finder to keep it carefully and to see me about it again. I did not know his name, and have not seen him since, but after- wards learned that he sold it." The first record that we have of i I PLATE I. A D Cut sapphire. El Dorado Bar, near Helena, Montana. B Dewey diamond found in 1855. near Manchester, Vii^ia. C Natural crystal of sapphire, El Dorado Bar, Montana. E Section of a sapphire crystal, banded biue and yellow, Jenks Mine, Macon go.. North Carolina. [A lerican Museum of Natural History, New York City.] Asteriated sapphire, Jackson County, North Carolina. Ruby, Jenks Mine, Macon County, North Carolina. First sapphire found at Corundum Hill, Macon County, North Carolina. Restored to matrix after being cut. [American Museum of Natural History, New York City.] ■frH'* mtt ' i chi!-: •' to be i . ' FJiamoncl," the < e r'sntTibi^r ■ • '"th Ca' lies th c, fiuL K, titty. A been fouiKJ, .'orted from &f^!)H stActam .^^^ fr|.;hfir)(>i hnonv ■■ (l ?! • ,a:/ ,,,.>.■;.!. ',.•.,,•,, ./^ 1 ;.;;il;j-;i:;'"> sihun .hr.' *l LM Plate No. 1 CopSrteHtilSOil.y Ik. Scimiai^ p ,K ,';, s , UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 17 it is from the "New York Evening Post" of April 28, 1855, where it says : " We were shown yesterday, on board the steam- ship ' Jamestown,' what is said to be the largest diamond ever discovered in North America. It was found several months ago by a laboring man at Manchester, Va., in some earth which he was digging up. It was put into a furnace for melting iron, at Richmond, where it remained at red heat for two hours and twenty minutes. It was then taken out and found to be uninjured and brighter than ever. It was valued in Richmond at $4,000." This stone next passed into the possession of Samuel W. Dewey, of Jackson, now of Philadelphia, and by him was named the Oninoor, or " Sun of Light," though it has more generally been known as the Dewey diamond. It was for a time on exhibition in New York, at the store of Ball, Black & Co., and was cut at an expense of $1,500 by Henry t). Morse, of Boston. Having passed out of Mr. Dewey's hands, through his failure to redeem it on a loan, it was then sold to J. Anglist, who received from John A. Morrissey a loan of $6,000 on it, and as he failed to redeem it, it became part of the Morrissey estate and was known as the Morrissey diamond. It had a large flaw on one side (see Colored Plate No. i), and was an octahedron with slightly rounded faces. Its original weight was 23 1 carats, and after cutting it weighed i iH carats. As it is off-color and imperfect, it is to-day worth not more than from $300 to $400. Exact copies of it in glass, as well as copper electrotypes of it as it was found, and as cut, were deposited by Mr. Dewey in the United States Mint at Philadelphia, and also at the Peabody Museum in New Haven and in a number of cabinets. North Carolina, so rich and varied in mineral resources, has long been known to yield a certain amount of gold ; and in the same region have been found some diamonds, either loose in the soil, or taken from the washings of auriferous gravel. The por- tion of the State which has yielded these valuable substances is that known as the Piedmont region, — a belt of country lying, as its name indicates, at the foot of the mountains, along the eastern base of the Blue Ridge. The rocks here are metamorphic and crystalline, with some Camb'ian beds a little farther west. There runs throughout much of this region a belt or belts of itacolumite, I :*rT i8 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE the so-called " flexible sandstone," which is sometimes found in Brazil and in the Ural Mountains, and is generally supposed to be the matrix of diamond crystals. The presence of this peculiar rock and the occasional discovery of diamonds in adjacent dis- tricts have led to the idea that the itacolumite belt of North Caro- lina might prove to be a valuable diamantiferous region ; but as yet no diamonds have actually been discovered there, and but few have been found in the loose debris of the crystalline beds. Prof. Frederick A. Genth, of the University of Pennsylvania, describes * the occurrence of the two crystalline varieties of car- bon in that State, — the graphite in beds interstratified with mica schist or gneiss ; the diamond in the debris of such rocks, asso- ciated with gold, zircon, garnet, monazite, and other minerals, and after speaking of this occurrence in connection with rocks of identical age, as a very interesting circumstance, he says : " The diamond has not been observed in North Carolina in any more recent strata, and in the itacolumite regions no diamonds have ever been found, as in Brazil ; from which it appears that the itacolumite of Brazil is either simply a quartzose mica slate of similar age with the North Carolina gneissoid rocks, or, if it be contemporary with the North Carolina itacolumite, the diamonds were not produced in the same but came from the older rocks, and were redeposited with the sands resulting from the reduction to powder of these and are now found imbedded .^i the same, their hardness having prevented their destruction. Seven or eight diamonds have thus far been found. They occur distributed over a wide area of surface in the counties of Burke, Rutherford, Lincoln, Mecklenburg, and Franklin, and I have no doubt if a regular search were to be made for them, they would be more frequently found." To the counties named by Professor Genth, must now be added McDowell, and these all form, with the excep- tion of Franklin, a group lying together in the line of the general drainage of the country, southeast of the Blue Ridge. Franklin County is far to the northeast of the others ; and any diamonds occurring there must be derived from the disintegration of another belt of crystalline rocks, that traverses the eastern portion of the State, near Weldon, in Halifax County, or else have been > Mineral Resources of North Carolina, p. 38, Philadelphia, 1871. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 19 transported to a great distance by rivers. The same is doubtless true of the diamond found at Manchester, Chesterfield County, Va. Historically the North Carolina diamonds are reported as fol- lows : The first specimen was picked up at the ford of Brindletown Creek, Burke County, in 1843, byDr^ F- M. Stephenson. It was an octahedral crystal, and was estimated to be worth $100. Another was found in the same neighborhood by Prof. George W. Featherstonhaugh ; but there seems to be no account of its characters. The third found, but the first to attract much atten- tion, was obtained in 1845, f^^o"^ t^^ gold-washings of D. J. Twitty's mine, in Rutherford County. It was owned by Gen. Thomas L. Clingman, of Asheville, and was described by Prof. Charles U. Shepard.^ It was a curved and remarkably distorted octahedron, clear, almost flawless, and faintly tinged with yellow. The weight was about li carats (4*1 2 grains). Professor Shepard had announced the existence of itacolumite in the gold-bearing region of North Carolina, at the meeting of the American Asso- ciation of Geologists and Naturalists in 1845, and under the im- pression that the itacolumite is their matrix, had predicted the further discovery of diamonds in that region, as in Brazil. For this reason, diamonds, when found, were naturally submitted to him. C. Leventhorpe, of Patterson, Caldwell County, N. C, reports a small and poor specimen found in a placer-mine on his property in Rutherford County, and states that he presented it to Professor Shepard, who retained it in his cabinei:. The fourth important specimen was found in gold-washings in 1852, by Dr. C. L. Hunter, near Cottage Home, Lincoln County. It is said to have been an elongated octahedron of a delicate greenish tint, transparent, and about half a carat in weight. Another, said to be a very handsome white crystal of i carat, was obtained in the summer of the same year, at Todd's Branch, Mecklenburg County ; and a beautiful black stone " as large as a chinquapin," was afterwards found by some gold-washers in the same locality. This specimen, unfortunately, was crushed with a hammer, sharing the fate of several Ameri- can diamonds when submitted to the mistaken test which con- « Am. J. Sci. II, Vol. 3, p. as3, Sept. 1846. mmmm 20 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE founds hardness with strength. The fragments of the black diamond scratched corundum with ease, thereby proving its genuineness. The next discovery reported is that mentioned by Professor Genth, — two diamonds, one a beautiful octahedron, from the Portis Mine in Franklin County. These specimens, as before remarked, came from localities remote from all the others, and must have been either transported a long distance by river action, or else derived from the belt of gneissic rocks that extends from Richmond to Raleigh. McDowell County has yielded two specimens, one a small crystal found some years ago on the head waters of Muddy Creek, and a much larger one, picked up on the surface in 1886, at Dysortville. This is a somewhat distorted and twined hex-octahedron of 4^ carats' weight, 10 millimeters in height and 7 millimeters in diameter, transparent, but with a gray- ish-green tinge of color, and is valued, for gem purposes alone, at from $100 to $150. The circumstances of its discovery are thus related : Willie Chrystie, the twelve-year-old son of Grayson Chrystie, was sent for a pail of water to a spring on the Alfred Bright farm, in Dysortville. While sitting at the spring, he saw a glistening object among the gravel, and picking it up as a " pretty trick," brought it home. It lay on a shelf almost un- noticed for a fortnight, and was then shown at the store of the vil- lage grocer. Here it became an object of general curiosity, and elicited various opinions, until the idea grew that it was probably a diamond. It was sent to Tiffany & Co., of New York, and its real character at once determined. A year later the present writer visited the spot, and fully authenticated all the facts of the discovery. The sediment in the bed of the spring was taken out and examined, and also the small hollows on the adjacent hillside. None of the ordinary associations of the dia- mond were observed, and hence it is probable that the crystal was washed down with decomposing rock-soil from higher ground, perhaps during some freshet ; or possibly it may have been carried to the spring by miners, and left unobserved or un- recognized among the " wash-up " of the gold-bearing sand from some neighboring placer. There are gold mines in McDowell County, worked chiefly by hydraulic sluicing, but as a rule the stones that remain in the sluices are carefully examined, as the l^^ — 1 9 Mmtmmn^mim UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 21 miners know that gems are sometimes thus found. The value of the Dysortville diamond as a jewel will hardly represent the in- terest that attaches to it as a local specimen of large size and fine appearance. The foregoing list includes all the authentic diamonds thus far discovered in North Carolina. A number of small stones, exhibited as diamonds, have been found at Brackettstown. They are similar to supposed diamonds found by J. C. Mills at his mine at Brindletown, but these were transparent zircon or smoky-colored quartz, the former of which has a lustre readily mistaken by an inexperienced person for that of a diamond. A number of piecf-s of iough diamond, exhibited as from the same section, have been decided to be of South African, not Carolinian, origin. It is to be hoped that the few legitimate discoveries actually made in this locality will not lead to decep- tions, which would greatly retard any natural development of interest. It is quite possible that diamonds may be found widely distributed throughout the auriferous belt of the Carolinas and northern Georgia ; and that, in the often rude and hurried methods of gold-washing employed, they may have been over- looked in the past, and now lie buried in the piles of sand that stretch for miles along the water-courses. It would naturally be expected that in the extension of the Piedmont region through the extreme northwestern part of South Carolina, the same possibilities of diamond discoveries would exist. The reports are few and uncertain. Mr. Leven- thorpe, already referred to, has stated, in writing to the " New York Sun," that in 1883 D. }. Twitty, of Spartanburg, had a fine diamond valued at some $400, that was obtained from a place in South Carolina. He had it cut and mounted as a stud ; but it was unfortunately stolen from him while riding in a car in New York City. The loss of so interesting a specimen is much more than that of an ordinary diamond of the same gem value. On passing into Georgia the same metamorphlc belt, with its localities for gold, itacolumite, and to some extent diamonds, ex- tends across the State to the Alabama line. The counties in which diamonds are claimed to have been found are Habersham, White, Banks, Lumpkin, Hall, Forsyth, Gwinnett, Cobb, Clay- wcmmsmmif^amtmBsmK^^mmmmmmmBmmmmmimmmimmmiii^ mmmmmm 32 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ton, Bartow, Carroll, and Haralson. Dawson, Cherokee, Milton, and Paulding, lying in the same line, and very possibly other coun- ties adjacent to the metamorphic belt, should perhaps be in- cluded in the list. The mode of occurrence is similar to that of North Carolina, as previously described, a few real diamonds, and many supposed ones, having been found in connection with min- ing for gold, in the detritus of the crystalline rocks spread along streams and placers. From time to time glowing accounts have been published, in which Georgia is announced as the future dia- mond-field of the continent ; but up to the present the specimens actually obtained have been few and small, and it has not been considered worth while to mine for them. Of these diamonds interesting stories are told. An Atlanta lady wears in a ring one of the best specimens ever found in Georgia. Another Georgia lady would not marry until her prospective husband gave her a ring witV a Georgia diamond for an engagement ring. Sev- eral stones have been lost, and it has been found that they were destroyed by ignorant people who attempted to test them. The earliest discoveries reported were by gold-washers in Hall County over forty years ago and later in White County. Most of the specimens were found near Gainesville, in the troughs and sluices of the Hall County placers. Two small crystals, less than i carat each, are in the cabinet of Samuel R. Carter, of Paris, Me. They are opaque and without definite form. Th^y were found in 1866, in the Racoochee Valley, White County, at the Horshaw placer gold-mine. One was discovered by Dr. Augustus C. Hamlin, of Bangor, Me., and the other by H. Ashbury. An- other specimen from the same region is thus described by C. Leventhorpe, of Patterson, Caldwell County, N. C, in a letter to the "New York Sun," in August, 1883. He says : " Numerous diamonds have been discovered in Georgia. After the war, dur- ing the prevalence of a mining fever, a company was formed, I believe, for exploring and diamond washings. I heard nothing further of this enterprise, and if dividends were declared the an- nouncement escaped my notice." There is in the writer's posses- sion, a rough diamond taken from a "Long Tom" in White County, Ga. It is of very perfect water and crystallization, and weighs almost a carat. The " Long Tom " is a narrow I i I UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 23 plank trough set with a steep pitch. An iron grating at its lower end closes it so as to form an obtuse angle. The detritus from the gold-bearing streams is shovelled into this box, and a second operator stirs it with a shovel under a small stream of water. The coarser gravel is thrown out, and the gold, and such small gravel as may possess a superior gravity, do not pass off with the cur- rent. It was thus that this diamond was detained. In April, 1887, Lewis M. Parker, a tenant of Daniel Light, found a dia- mond on his farm, situated three-quarters of a mile northeast of Morrow's Station, Clayton County. The stone afterwards came into the possession of W. W. Scott, of Atlanta, who sent it to me for examination. It proved to be an octahedral crys- tal weighing 4i^ carats (12*672 grains), | of an inch long and i of an inch wide (9 x lox 7 millimeters), is slightly yellow and has one small black inclusion. It would afford a stone from ij[ to 2 carats in weight. Its spccihc gravity is 3*527. Its surface is curiously marked with long, shallow pittings. L. O. Stevens, of Atlanta, Ga., has communicated to the writer that a negro called on him during the past year with a 2-carat diamond, defective and of very poor color, which he had found in his garden a few miles from Atlanta. He showed no desire to sell the stone or loan it for examination. A book by Dr. M. F. Stephenson * records some of the exag- gerated accounts of Georgia diamonds that have been given in good faith, but upon mere hearsay evidence, and often after years have passed. Although diamonds have been found in Geor- gia, and the smaller ones mentioned are doubtless genuine, yet it is certain that in some instances Dr. Stephenson was unable to discriminate between a paste imitation and a genuine stone, and his enthusiasm may have overreached his judgment in other cases. The large specimens described were evidently quartz crystals and not diamonds. This is almost certain as to the one mentioned which was used for a marker in a game of marbles and bore con- siderable concussion, as a diamond could not withstand this con- cussion without cleaving, whereas a rolled quartz pebble would bear a good deal of such treatment. It is possible that quartz crystals without any prismatic faces, like those found in Arizona (heX?ig- > Geology and Mineralogy of Georgia, Atlanta, 1871. f nT 24 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE onal dodecahedrons), may have misled the Georgia pros- pectors. Many notices have from time to time appeared, both in local newspapers and in scientific journals, of the occurrence of dia- monds in California. After making due allowance for errors and unfounded rumors, the fact of such occurrence in certain localities is well established ; but the number and size of the diamonds found have not been such as to render the search for them profit- able. The fact of their discovery is highly interesting, and some of the specimens possess both elegance and value ; but as a rule they are small and rare. The mode of their occurrence seems to be in all cases that they are imbedded in the auriferous gravels, and thence washed out in the search for gold. These gold-bear- ing gravels of California present two types of distribution : first, as loose material in the valleys and bars of the modern streams, and, second, as great accumulations of gravel occupying the valleys of much larger ancient streams, and now covered with masses of lava or compact volcanic tufa. The sides of the Sierra Nevada are trenched with cross-valleys running down into the great, trough- like valley of California, which lies between the Sierras on the east and the Coast Range on the west. Along this great depres- sion, the drainage from the mountains on both sides finds its way to the sea through the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, the former flowing from the north and the latter from the south into the Bay of San Francisco, where a break in the Coast Range, at Golden Gate, allows a passage between the ocean and the bay. In the northern part of the State, where the streams from the Sierras run down to the Sacramento, this remarkable system of "buried river gravels" is found. In and before the tertiary period of geology these streams had worn valleys on the slopes of the Sierras, and made extensive deposits of gravel, by the ero- sion of the mountain-sides. Then came a period, or a succession of volcanic disturbances and outflows, which made the great " lava-beds" of northern California and Oregon. In many cases the lavas flowed down and filled up the river-beds from side to side, covering the gravel deposits, and in some instances hard- ening and compacting them. The rivers have since then worn down a new series of channels between these hard lava-streams. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 25 and the old river gravels, with their protecting caps of volcanic rock, are now seen running out as spurs from the Sierras and forming the divides between the modern streams. The latter have formed their own more recent gravels, from the wear, partly of the old deposits and partly of the mountain sides, as at first. The surface-diggings and placers of the early prospecting days of California were, of course, in these modem gravels and bars. The older gravels, equally rich, are worked either by the hydraulic process, or when compacted into what are called " cement-beds," by stamp-mills. It is in these deposits that the diamonds have been found, picked from the sluices and flumes. In the case of the cement-beds, only fragments are obtained, as the diamond- crystals have been crushed under the stamps. There is much in the mode of their occurrence that recalls, at first sight, the diamond mines of Brazil and South Africa. In Brazil the matrix is also a gravel, and is frequently cemented into a conglomerate (" cascalho ") by oxide of iron. In Africa the diamond gravels contain associated minerals similar to those found in some of the California placers, notably in those of Butte County, where zir- cons, garnets, and rutile are met with. But these are not impor- tant relations, and afford no ground for assuming either a similar richness of yield or an identity of geological origin. The first recognition of diamonds in the State goes back to the early gold-seeking days of 1850. In that year, Mr. Lyman, a clergyman from New England, was shown a crystal about the size of a small pea, with convex faces, and of a straw-colored tint. He saw it for a moment only, yet its general aspect was enough to identify it as a true diamond, and the interesting fact was pub- lished.^ The first diamond from the Cherokee district, Butte County, was obtained in 1853. This has since proved one of the principal localities in the State. In 1854 Melville Attwood called attention, in a newspaper article, to the general similarity of the California deposits to the diamantiferous gravel and con- glomerate of Brazil, with which he had become familiar by a res- idence there of some years. He advised that search be made and care exercised, lest diamonds should pass unheeded in the gold-washings. Since then diamonds have been reported from ' Am. J. Sci., II, Vol. 8, p. 294. Sept. 1849. 26 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE a number of points, and at present, according to Henry G. Hanks, the State Mineralogist, five counties, Amador, Butte, El Dorado, Nevada, and Trinity, are known to have yielded them. Other localities and larger numbers are yet, in his judgment, to be discovered. The hydraulic mining is in some respects a wasteful and unfortunate process, as the force of the current sweeps away the greater part of any material that does not amalgamate with the mercury ; and thus many valuable sub- stances are probably lost, such as iridosmine, platinum, and dia- monds. Moreover, whatever diamonds occur in the hard cement are crushed into fragments by the stamps, and such frag- ments and particles are not infrequent in the tailings and sluices. The following is a brief summary of the principal diamond discoveries in California up to the ] resent time, arranged by local- ities. At Indian Gulch, near Fiddletown, and Jackass Gulch, near Volcano, Amador County, numerous diamonds have been found. In 1867, the younger Silliman of Yale College ex- hibited several specimens before the California Academy of Sci- ences:* one of these, a little over i carat in weight (3*6 grains) was from near Fiddletown ; and four others from the same region were at that time known. These stones occurred in a compact volcanic ash or tufa, forming a gray " cement-gravel." At Volcano the rock is similar, and some sixty or seventy dia- monds have been reported thus far. This is one of the places where the cement-rock is worked by stamping, and the tailings show pulverized diamonds. The crushed gravel pays well in gold ; and it has not been thought desirable to change the pres- ent method and break up the rock in other ways more costly and troublesome, in order to save the diamonds that it may contain. In August, 1887, Mr. Hanks exhibited before the San Francisco Microscopical Society, a beautiful stone of i "5 7 carat weight (4*97 grains), found at Volcano in 1882, and belonging to J. Z. Davis, a member of the society. It is a modified octahedron, about T^ inch in diameter, transparent and nearly colorless, though slightly flawed. The curvature of the faces gives the crystal a subspherical form, but the edges of the pyramids are channels in- stead of planes. Closer examination shows that the channeled > See Proc. Cal. Acad. Sd., Vol. 3, p, 354. ■i.n» » ■i»^^'*"«^' ♦* *• UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 27 edges, the convex faces, and the solid angles are caused by an apparently secondary building I'p of the faces of a perfect octahedron, and for the same reason the girdle is not a perfect square, but has a somewhat circular form. These observations were well shown by enlarged drawings. The faces seem to be composed of thin plates overlying each other, each slightly smal- ler than the last. These plates are triangular, but the lines form- ing the triangles are curved, and the edges of the plates are beveled. Mr. Hanks remarked that it could be seen by the en- larged crystals shown under the microscope, and by drawings ex- hibited, that each triangular plate was composed of three smaller triangles and that all the lines were slightly curved. The build- ing up of plate upon plate caused the channeled edges and the somewhat globular form of this exquisite crystal. A close examination of the crystal revsftled tetrahedral impressions, as if the corners of the minute cubes had been imprinted on the surface of the crystal while in a plastic state. These are the re- sult of the law of crystallography, as was shown by the faint lines forming a lace-work of tiny triangles on the faces when the stone was placed in a proper light. Mr. Hanks concluded with the remark that it would be an act of vandalism to cut this beau- tiful crystal, which is doubly a gem, and he protested against its being defiled by contact with the lapidary's wheel. The Cherokee district, in Butte County, has been, from as early as 1853, one of the most prolific diamond localities in the State. Cherokee is near the North Fork of Feather River, and the geological relations of the diamonds and gold are essentially the same as those in Amador County, a hundred miles to the northwest, both districts lying among the western foot-hills of the Sierras, as previously described. Mr. Hanks calls attention to included leaf-impressions in the volcanic beds, as proving them to be tufas and not lavas. In number, the Cherokee diamonds obtained are about equal to those from Volcano. One was shown by Professor Silliman, on the occasion already mentioned, in 1867 ; and others were then known to be from that locality. William Bradreth obtained a crystal in the same year which he afterward had cut into a fine white stone of i^ carats. In 1873, several were obtained from the ground of the Spring Val- r 28 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE i ■ ley and Cherokee Mining Company, in cleaning up the sluices. One of these was described as large and straw-colored, while others were smaller, but very pure. Various stones, white, yellow and pink, have from time to time been reported, and some have been cut and set. A fine crystal was presented to the State Museum by Mr. Williams, Superintendent of the Spring Valley Mining Company. Two others, found at the same place in the summer of 1 881, by Lucinda Voght, were shown by the present writer before the New York Academy of Sciences in 1886. Professor Silliman made the concentrations from the sluices of these Cherokee mines the subject of a minute investigation, the results of which were published in two papers.* In the first he describes his treatment of the material both chemical and me- chanical ; and in the second he gives additional particulars, with results. He finds here the following association of interesting minerals; light-colored zircons, crystals of topaz, fragments of quartz, rutile, epidote, pyrite, and limonite, with some platinum, iridium, iridosmine, and gold, and a large quantity of black grains, which are proved by the magnet to consist about equally of chro- mite and titanite. At first he could find but little of the platinum and iridosmine, but this was due, as above stated, to the force of the hydraulic streams, which sweep away all small particles that do not amalgamate. Mr. Hanks adds that platinum minerals have been found rather abundantly in Butte County. At St. Clair Flat, near Pentz, they were found in quantity in the early days of placer-mining. They are found, also, at the Corbier Mine, near Ma- galia (Dogtown). In 1861, a diamond was found one and a half miles northwest of Yankee Hill, Butte County, in cleaning up a placer-mine. The stone was taken from the sluice with the gold, and sold to M. H. Wells, to whom I am indebted for this in- formation. Mr. Wells presented the gem to John Bidwell of Chico, who had it cut in Boston. It weighed li carats (475 grains). Mr. Bidwell gave the diamond to his wife, who now wears it in a ring. This was the only diamond found in this locality. In all the northern counties of California, drained by the Trinity River, in the vicinity of Coos Bay, in Oregon, and on the banks ■ See Mineralogical Notes on Utah, California, and Nevada, in The Ejig. and Min. J., Vol. 17, p. 148, March ii, 1873, and the Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 6, p. 127, Aug., 1873. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 29 of Smith River, Del Norte County, diamonds are very likely to be found in the flumes and sluices. Diamonds have been found at a few points in El Dorado County. In 1867, Professor Silliman, at the meeting of the California Academy of Sciences, before men- tioned, showed a crystal of li carats (475 grains), of good color, though a little defective, from Forest Hill. It was found at great depth, in a tunnel run into the auriferous gravel. W. P. Carpenter, of Placerville, gives the following account of it in a letter to Mr. Hanks, in 1882: "In 1871, W. A. Goodyear, Assistant State Geologist, while examining the deposits of auriferous gravels in the ancient river bed, about three miles east of Placerville, found several specimens of itacolumite, and expressed the opinion that diamonds should be found in the gravels. I assisted him in searching for them, and we found several in the hands of the miners. Mr. Goodyear bought one of them as a geological spec- imen. None of the parties who had them knew what they were, but kept them as curiosities. The gravel in the channel is cap- ped with lava from 50 to 450 feet in depth. Of late years the gravel is worked by stamp gravel mills, and I know of instances where fragments of broken diamonds have been found in panning out the batteries." He goes on to give the particulars of about fifteen diamonds obtained at different times in the neighborhood, some yellow and some white. One of these was a nearly spherical crystal, over i of an inch in diameter, that was sold in San Francisco for $300, and another was sent to England to be cut. Professor Silliman also showed to the California Academy of Sciences a very clear and symmetrical crystal from French Corral, Nevada County. It was thrown out of the cement-rock of deep gold washings, as usual, and weighed i| carats (5* 11 grains). The color was slightly yellowish ; but this was perhaps due to its having been exposed to a red heat, as a test of its authen- ticity. Prof. Josiah D. Whitney of Harvard College stated, at the same meeting, that diamonds had been found in some fifteen or twenty localities in the State, and that the largest that he had seen was from French Corral, and weighed y{ carats. Some small ones are reported from Trinity County ; and their mode of occurrence, similar to that of the diamonds of Cher- ' I 30 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE okee County and of Oregon, is described in a letter to Dr. Charles F. Chandler, of the Columbia College School of Mines.* Prof. Fredrich Wdhler, of Gftttingen, mentions having observed in the native platinum sands of the Trinity River, Oregon, transparent zircons associated with laurite, sulphide of ruthenium and osmium, iridosmine, chromic iron, etc., and microscopic rounded crystals which he supposed were diamonds. In a subsequent communication, dated Gdttingen, August 8, 1869, Professor Wfthler continues: "On examination under the microscope the mineral powder which had been freed from platinum, gold, chromic iron (in part), silica, iron and tin, and from which the ruthenium, etc., had been removed by aqua regia, besides many grains of chromic iron and beautiful hyacinth crystals, colorless and transparent grains resembling quartz were observed ; but besides these, grains resembling rounded diamond crystals were detected." He then describes in full his methods of testing these grains, and expresses his conviction that they were true diamonds. A few small diamonds have been found in the placer diggiiigs of Idaho, of about the same quality and occurring under the same conditions as those in California. In neither region have they been made the object of special search, those found having been picked up by miners while washing the gravel for gold. Fragments of diamonds have been noticed in the tailings from the quartz mills, being the remains of stones broken under the stamp. About twenty years ago, quite an excitement prevailed for a time over Idaho diamonds. Local and mining papers, during the latter part of 1865 and the spring of 1866, had many references to the reported or anticipated diamond-yield of that territory. Small crystals, answering to all the usual tests, were said to be abundant in a tract of country some forty miles square, between Boise City and Owyhee. After a few months the excitement subsided, and the ordinary quartz-crushing industry resumed its sway over the attention of the people and the press. In the latter part of 1883, an octahedral diamond is said to have been taken from a placer claim called Nelson Hill, near > Chemical News, Am. Ed., Nov., 1869, and Am. J. Sd., n., Vol. 48, p. 44, Nov., 1869. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 31 Blackfoot, Deer Lodge County, Mont. It was panned out by a Chinaman, who handed it to Edward Mason, one of the owners of the claim. The latter did not regard it as of any particular value and left it lying about his cabin. Afterward, while on a visit to Helena, he showed the stone to a jeweler, who examined it and made several offers to purchase it. These Mr. Mason declined, suspecting that the stone was of greater value than he had imagined. He subsequently came to New York, and submitted it to a diamond-broker, who pronounced it a true diamond. According to a recent article in the Butte " Inter-Mountain," the stone is retained in its natural state by Mr. Mason. A few years ago reports were started of the finding of dia- monds in central Kentucky. Prof. Edward Orton, the State Geologist of Ohio, made a visit to that district, and found that it presented certain resemblances to the diamond-bearing region of South Africa. He found dykes of trap-rock (peridotite) break- ing through fissures in shale, and spreading to some extent over the adjacent country. Garnets and other associated minerals derived from the decomposition of the peridotite were found, suggesting the possibility of a diamond yield, from the similarity of the conditions to those of Africa. Similar investigations and results were reported by A. R. Crandall.' It had been previ- ously suggested by E. J. Dunn, E. Cohen, H. Huddleston, and Rupert Jones that the South African diamonds were formed in a sort of volcanic mud. Mr Huddleston thought that the ac- tion was hydrothermal rather than igneous, the diamonds result- ing from the action of steam in contact with magnesian mud, under pressure, upon carbonaceous shales, and compared the rock to boiled plum-pudding. At a meeting of the Manchester Literary and Philosophic Society, held in October, 1884, Sir Henry E. Roscoe presented a paper on the diamond-bearing rocks of South Africa, in which he said that he had noticed a peculiar odor, somewhat like that of camphor, which was evolved on treating the soft " blue " diamond earth with hot water. He powdered a quantity of this earth and digested it with ether ; and after filtering and evaporating, he ob- > Note on the Peridotite of EUiott County, Ky., Am. J. Sd. HI., Vol. 33, p. 121, Aug. 1886. /' 32 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE lit 'I tained a small quantity of strongly aromatic crystalline body, volatile, burning easily with a smoky flame, and .nelting at about Sd'C. Unfortunately the quantity obtained was too small to admit of a full investigation of its composition and properties. He suggested that perhaps the diamond was formed from hydro- carbon simultaneously with this aromatic body. Prof. H. Carvill Lewis, at lue meeting of the British Association at Birmingham, in September, 1886, in a paper " On the Genesis of the Dia- mond," stated that from the De Beers* Mine, in South Africa, at a depth of 600 feet, there had been sent him specimens of unal- tered rock which proved to be peridotite containing carbonaceous shale. He added that information received from New South Wales, Borneo, and Brazil led him to believe all diamonds to be the result of the intrusion of a peridotite through carbon- aceous rocks and coal seams. The similarity of the South African peridotite to that described by Joseph S. Diller in Kentucky * led Professor Lewis to suggest interesting possibilities as to the occurrence of diamonds there ; and on the invitation of Prof. John R. Proctor, State Geologist of Kentucky, in the summer of 1887, Mr. Diller and the writer were sent, by Major John W. Powell, the Director of the United States Geological Survey, to make an investigation. The locality is easily reached by way of the East Kentucky Railroad, which ends in Carter County, at Willard, where conveyances may be obtained of the farmers for the remaining ten miles. The best exposures of the peridotite occur along Ison's Creek, in Elliott County. The peridotite alters and disintegrates readily, but because the declivity of the surface here is considerable, the transportation of material almost keeps pace with disintegration, and there is no great accumulation of residuary deposits upon the narrow divides and hillsides. The specific gravity and durability of the gems found in connection with peridotite are generally greater than of serpentine and other products of its alteration. On this account they accumulate upon the surface, and in favorable positions along adjacent lines of drainage. The plan followed was to search by sifting and care- fully panning the beds, receiving the drainage directly from the surface of the peridotite, and to enlist the services of the people > Am. T. Sd. III., Vol. 32, p. 121, Aug., 1886. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 33 of are- the ople in the neighborhood to examine the steep slopes where gems that had weathered out of the peridotite might be exposed. Par- ticular attention was directed also to the study of the solid rock and residuary deposits which so closely resemble the diaman- tiferous material of South Africa. Till this time the actual con- tact of the peridotite and shale had not been observed. It is exposed in the bed -rf a branch of Ison's Creek, within ;oo yards of Charles Ison's house. The intrusion of the peridotite has displaced and gteakiy fractured the shale, besides locally indurating it and enveloping a multitude of its fragments. The latter are dark-colored, like the peridotite, and are strongly contrasted with the light-colored dolomite nodules of secondary origin. Besides pyrope garnets, a few of which are suitable for cutting, several fairly good specimens of pyroxene were found here, resembling the same transparent mineral from Ari- zona. The South African mineral is a little more opaque, but of a richer green color. When suitably prepared, they will make worthy additions to the gem collection of the United States National Museum. An altered biotite also occurs, identical with the South African vaalite. During a careful search over a small area for nearly two days, no diamonds were found, but this by .lO means demonstrates that they are not there. The similarity between the peridotite here and that of the Kimberley and other diamond mines of South Africa is very striking ; and when this fact alone is considered, the probability of finding diamonds in Kentucky seems correspondingly great ; but when it is noted that the carbonaceous shale, and not the peridotite itself, is the source of the carbon from which the diamond is formed, and that the shale in Kentucky is much poorer in carbon than that of South Africa, the probability is proportionally diminished. Recent excavations have shown that large quantities of this shale surround the South Afri- can mines, and that they are so highly carbonaceous as to be combustible, smouldering during long periods of time when accidentally fired. In the chemical laboratory of the United States Geological Survey, J. Edward Whitfield found 37-52 per cent, of carbon in the shale from near the Kimberley Mine, while in the blackest shale adjoining the peridotite of Ken- fK # 1^; T;! # i » ■ H I ' Liir 34 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE tucky, he found only '68 per cent, of carbon. The peridotite at the time of its intrusion must have been forced up through a number of coal beds, and at a greater depth it penetrated the Devonian black shale, which is considerably richer in carbon than the shale now exposed at the surface. It is quite possible, if the theory of the origin of diamonds proposed by Profes- sor Roscoe and independently advanced by Professor Lewis be true, that a number of diamonds may have been formed in the Kentucky peridotite ; but the general paucity of carbon in the adjacent rock is certainly discouraging to the pros- pector. The best time to search for gems in that locality is immediately after a heavy rain, when they are most likely to be exposed upon the surface. It is proposed to continue the search economically, by furnishing to responsible persons living in the vicinity a number of rough diamonds mounted in rings, for comparison, that they may know what to look for under the most favorable circumstances. The "Jewelers* Review" for June, i888, gave an account of a diamond from Russell County. It Is described as a small octahedron, with curved faces, lustrous and nearly white, though with a yellow tinge, and weighing ^ of a carat. It was found in a gravelly field on the top of a hill some 300 feet above Cabin Fork Creek. The country rock is said to be composed of granite dykes, slates, and some floating rocks, such as quartz, feldspar, magnetic iron ore, I'Jint, garnet, etc., mingled in clayey hills. The rocks near Montpelier, Adair County, Ky., belong either to Keokuk or to the St. Louis group, probably to the former. From the absence of any direct geological informa- tion concerning the two counties, they have been referred to these groups by Professor Proctor. Various reports of the discovery of diamonds in different parts of the country are from time to time published by local papers ; but they generally prove to have been written without exact information as to the character of the stone, or for specu- lative purposes. A few of these reported diamonds will be referred to, of which only the tbllowing are known to be gen- uine. Two diamonds have been on exhibition for several years at the store of Frederick N. Herron, Indianapolis, and >MMiw -wu m mi' » iM tfi m i t# f aiMiiliJi li n wilii UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 35 'erent local rithout spec- nil be ; gen- ,everal s, and are reported by him to have been found at some locality in Indiana. They are perfect elongated hexoctahedrons of 2 carats each. The stones are genuine diamonds, but the particu- lars of their occurrence and discovery have not been obtained, and therefore nothing definite can be stated regarding them. J. D. Yerrington of New York city has had a brown diamond weighing i carat, that will yield, when cut, a gem weighing i carat, which was found near Philadelphos, Ariz. Two pieces of blue bottle-glass that had been rolled so as to lose all form, were naturally supposed by the finder to be sapphires, being in the same locality with the diamond. It is stated that three diamond crystals were obtained many years ago on Koko Creek, at the headwaters of the Tellico River, in East Tennessee, on the " bench lands " of the Smoky or Onaka Mountains. If this statement be correct, it probably points to a western extension of the diamond-belt of North Carolina, or to the transportation of the stones thence by streams. In 1884, quite an excitement was aroused in Wisconsin by a reported diamond-discovery at Waukesha, in that State. A Mil- waukee jeweler purchased for $1 from a lady, a stone which he stated was a topaz. It was said to have been found at a consider- able depth, in digging a well on the property of the lady's hus- band, at Waukesha, some years before. Subsequently it was thought to be a diamond, and as the first ever found in Wisconsin was valued at a high price and made the basis of much local ex- citement and speculation. The land where it was found was pur- chased at an increased price and two other small diamonds were produced as from the same locality. The gravel in which they were claimed to occur was simply the ordinary glacial drift of the whole region, and the diamonds have the aspect of being African stones. In 1888, it was announced that a fine and large dia- mond of over 80 carats had been found by a laborer while attending a bowlder-crushing machine in Cincinnati. The theory was advanced that it might be the stone lost in 1806, at Blen- nerhassett Island, by Mrs. Clark, and described by Aaron Burr in a letter to his daughter. The story lacks foundation. Another instance is that of a stone, supposed to be a dia- mond, found in working for coal a few years since at Ponca, ' i> 1 -/ 1 ■•^ i % (i! P^ i, ' 36 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Neb. Great excitement was aroused, but the stone proved not to be a diamond. The well-known " Arizona diamond swindle " was a clever one, and its locality could hardly have been better selected ; but it should not have received so much credence, since gem minerals are so readily recognized through their local characteristics by all collecting mineralogists. A few words in regard to this cele- brated swindle may not be amiss. Twenty years ago fabulous stories were circulated about the richness of New Mexico and Arizona. Companies with high-sounding titles were organized to collect not only the diamonds, but the rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and other gems, which were said to abound there. In 1870, a large scheme for this purpose was originated. It was represented in San Francisco that Philip Arnold and John B. Slack had found diamonds and other precious stones in great quantities in a cer- tain Territory of the United States. Among some of the ob- jects shown in confirmation were 80,000 carats of so-called rubies and a large number of diamonds, one of 108 carats weight. These gems were all displayed for the inspection of those inter- ested in the scheme, and were deposited with the Bank of Cali- fornia for safe-keeping. Subsequently the same parties again visited the fields, which were reported to lie somewhere in New Mexico, and returned with another lot of stones, not so large as the former ones, however. It was remarked at the time that one could scarcely expect to pick them up by the bushel. Heavy cap- italists on both coasts soon became deeply interested, and on May 10, 1872, a bill was passed by Congress in the interests of the dia- mond-miner. Finally, a party composed of representatives of both the East and the West, with a mining expert, a graduate of the Royal School of Mines, Freiberg, Saxony, chosen by the in- vestors, started out prospecting, equipped for a sixty days' expe- dition. They left Rawlins, Wyo., May 28th, first taking a south- western course, then a northwestern course, until som- of the party thought that they had missed their way, and began to doubt the truth of the discovery. But when the mountain was reached, the promised Golconda, every one picked up gems, and hope rose correspondingly. In a week i ,000 carats of diamonds and 6,000 to 7,000 carats of rubies were gathered, and the party returned, well UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 37 pleased with their success. Another expedition, setting out late in the season, failed to reach the fields, and was abandoned. On hearing of the failure of the third party, Clarence King, Director of the United States Geological Survey, started on his famous expedition, which proved that the whole affair was a humbug and that the mine had been " salted." The " rubies " were shown to be ordinary garnets, and the io8-carat diamonr« proved to be a piece of quartz. It was ascertained that an American had purchased a large quantity of rough diamonds in London, regardless of their value, and so plentiful was the salting that some years afterward diamond crystals were still found there. A number gathered by a shoemaker are still in the cabinet of Prof. Joseph Leidy, of the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia. So carefully was the swindle planned that an eastern expert was only shown a paper of cube diamonds, a form quite rare, and peculiar to Bra- zil. About $750,000, taken principally from capitalists on the California coast, was realized by the promoters of this gigantic fraud. Had the company employed a competent gem-expert or a gem-collecting mineralogist, no such swindle could have oc- curred. The expert retained by the investors was himself de- ceived, and this fact, of course, greatly facilitated the fraud. To insure the finding of diamonds in a new district, one of the best methods is to familiarize the searchers with their lustre. This can readily be accomplished, and was once partly carried out by Dwight Whiting, of Boston. He has suggested selling to the miners small, imperfect diamond crystals (bort), mounted in a very inexpensive manner, so that the entire ring or charm could be sold at from $5 to $10. Several thousand searchers thus pre- pared would soon ascertain whether diamonds really existed, and the crystal would also serve for testing the hardness as well as the lustre of the stone. A geologist of North Carolina conceived the happy idea of interesting the children of his vicinity in the search for minerals. A trifling reward was sufficient to awaken a keen interest, so that healthful exercise certainly, and often valuable specimens, were the result of his plan. Some of the series of modified quartz crystals described by Prof. Gerhard von Rath, as well as the beautiful rutiles, emeralds, and other minerals that we are now €1 38 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES familar with, we owe to the industry and sharp sight of these children. It would aid much in the development of new min- eralogical fields if this plan of Mr. Stephenson's could be widely introduced. One of the minerals most likely to be mistaken for the diamond is a form of small quartz crystal found principally at Santa F^ and Gallup, N. M. ; Fort Defiance, Ariz. ; Deadwood, Dak. ; and Shell Creek, Nev. These crystals range in size from i to 5 millimeters and the prism is nearly or entirely obliterated. In addition to this, as a rule, the surface is slightly roughened, and by an inexperienced person such a crystal is easily mistaken for an octahedron, which is almost universally considered to be the only diamond shape. r : I CHAPTER II. Corundum, Sapphire, Ruby, Oriental Topaz, Oriental Emerald, Diaspore, and SpineL CORUNDUM is nearly pure alumina (Al, Og), and is found in almost all colors of the rainbow. The trans- parent varieties rank among the most valuable of gems. The names, ruby, sapphire, oriental amethyst, oriental emerald, and oriental topaz are given to the transparent red, blue, purple, green, and yellow varieties of the mineral. These colors are due to the addition of minute quantities of metallic oxides to the alumina. Its specific gravity varies from 3*97 to 4*05, and its hardness is 9 ; that of the ruby is generally about 8*8. The finest pigeon's-blood-colored rubies are found at Man- dalay in Burmah, where mines have recently been leased by a London syndicate. Fine rubies, which are generally small, sometimes of a pink color, and often with a currant-wine or pur- plish tint, are found at Ratnapoora in Ceylon ; likewise in Siam, where, however, the color is most commonly a dark red, almost that of a garnet, often with a tinge of brown. The finest sap- phires are found in Burmah or Ceylon. Some of the finest corn- flower blue varieties are from Ceylon. Many of the rich velvety blue, as well as the lighter-colored stones, are from the Simla Pass in the Himalayas. Fine sapphires have recently been found in Siam and in Australia, the latter generally of an opaque, milky-blue color. 1^ AO GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Corundum is a mineral of great importance, though not of frequent occurrence ; in combination, however, especially with silica, alumina enters into a vast number of mineral species and varieties. Its great hardness gives it value as a polishing mate- rial, and as such it has no substitute. It is found in the United States, chiefly in the crystalline rocks along the Appalachian Mountains, from Chester, Mass., to northern Georgia, and also in Montana. At Chester, where the deposits have long been known and worked, the mineral consists chiefly of emery, which is corundum mixed with magnetite, and somewhat softer than corundum alone. No gems have been found here. At Pelham, Mass., corundum in small quantities has been recognized, and Prof. Charles U. Shepard ^ found asteriated crystals in nodules of cyanite at Litchfield, Conn., also at Norwich, Conn., where he found small blue crystals enclosed in fibrolite. It is likewise found in the metamorphic rocks of the Highlands of New York and northern New Jersey. At Vernon, N. J., forty years ago, crystals of sapphire and ruby corundum were found, but always opaque, so that, while many specimens were obtained from this locality, some of which have been cut, it is probable that none of them has furnished a transparent gem. It is of interest to know that rubies from Mandalay, Burmah, occur in similar association with limestone ; hence they are generally found detached and separated from their original matrix. Some handsome cabinet specimens, showing asterism, have been obtained from Delaware, Chester, and Lancaster Counties, Pa. ; few, however, were suitable for cutting. Crystals have been found in Virginia, in Louisa County, and near Staun- ton, Augusta County. The great corundum region is in the crystalline rocks of North Carolina, where in Madison, Buncombe, Haywood, Jack- son, Macon, and Clay Counties, numerous localities are known. A second and a third line of localities are recognized, but they are of slight importance. According to Thomas M. Chatard,*' of the United States Geological Survey, the corundum region extends from the Virginia line through the western part of » Rqjort on the Geological Survey of Connecticut, p. 64, New Haven, 1837. 'Mineral Resources of the United States, p. 714, 1883-1884. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 41 South Carolina, and across Georgia as far as Dudleyville, Ala. Its greatest width is estimated to be about one hundred miles. This belt is frequently referred to as the chrysolite or chromifer- ous series, owing to the presence of chrysolite and chromium, from which corundum is believed, by certain authorities, to have been derived by alteration.* In this decomposed and altered chrysolite, throughout the Southern States, corundum is found in place. Dr. J. Lawrence Smith says that " outside of serpen- tine it has not been found," while Professor Shepard says that it occurs " only in a single formation, which may be designated as chrysolite rock, though from its color and some other peculi- arities it has often been confounded with serpentine." Chailes W. Jenks gives the following account of the Culsagee locality, which is typical of most Southern deposits. He says : " The aspect of the ridge is somewhat barren, like that of all the corundum and emery localities with which I am acquainted in any part of the world. The granite rocks which make up the principal masses of the mountains have been fissured with a large dyke of chrysolite and serpentine, in which the corundum-carry- ing veins are found. These veins traverse the dyke, and are mainly composed of chlorite and chloritic minerals, carrying with them corundum in massive and crystal forms. The veins are five in number, dip to the northwest at an angle of 45°, and contain the mineral, in size from microscopic crystals to those of from I to 500 pounds. The two varieties of chlorite known as ripido- lite and jefferisite form the usual vein-gangue or matrix of the mineral. Some gem masses were in their native matrix of ripidolite between hanging walls and foot walls of serpentine ; others, from the size of a hen's egg to a fifty-pound shot, were found locked up in geodes of chlorite ; others still in pockets of partially changed or decaying schists of mica or talc."* It is believed by some that corundum is derived from the breaking up of alumina compounds, especially hydrates, like the minerals diaspore and bauxite. Professor Genth, in his monograph on corundum, refers to a locality near Friendship, in Guilford ' See, Corundum : Its Alterations and Associated Minerals, by Frederick A. Genth, in Contributions from the Laboratory of the University of Pennsylvania, No. I. Philadelphia, 1873. » Conmdum and Its Gems. A Lecture before the Society of Arts, Boston, 1876. I ^m Hi .1 lit f I II u M' 42 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE County, where corundum is found associated with titaniferous iron ore. In other localities, in Gaston and Rutherford Coun- ties, the corundum was found in a series of slates, and was regarded by Prof. Ebenezer Emmons, Chief of the North Carolina Geological Survey, as belonging to the Taconic system. At these places it is found associated with pyro- phyllite, rutile, damourite and lazulite. Professor Genth says : "There are reasons to believe that the pyrophyllite beds in Orange, Chatham, Moore and Montgomery Counties are analogous to the corundiferous strata of Gaston County, and the same appears to be true for those at Graves' Mountain, Lincoln County, Ga." At this locality there is also to be found lazulite with rutile as well as at Crowder's Mountain in Gaston County, N. C, The earliest reference to corundum in this country is found in Silliman's Journal for 1 819,* in an article on the mineralogy and geology of parts of South and North Carolina, by John Dickson, who sent a number of specimens to illustrate the paper. Among these was one nearly an inch in length and very like the East Indian specimens, which Prof. Benjamin Silliman, Sr., of Yale College, recognized as a very perfect hexagonal crystal of blue corundum. The locality from which it came was subsequently found to be near Andersonville, Laurens District, S. C, and it has lately yielded a large amount of corundum mingled with zircon. The Massachusetts emery deposits near Chester were first described by Dr. Charles T. Jackson' and later by Professor Shepard* and Dr. Smith.* The Connecticut localities were described by Pro- fessor Shepard, and that at Pelham, Mass., by J. H. Adams, a few years later ; meanwhile the Pennsylvania corundum, and that of Vernon, N. J,, and Orange County, N. Y., had been found. Dr. Smith writes' that this mineral was first discovered in North Car- olina in 1846, but does not specify where or by whom. Professor Shepard, in 1872, states' that he had received an hexagonal prism > Am. J. Sd. I., Vol. 3, p. 4, 1819. • Am. J. Sd. II., Vol. 39, p. 88, Feb., 1865, and theFroc. Boston .Soc. Nat. His. for 1864. •Am. J. Sd. II., Vol. 40, p. 112, Aug., 1865; Vol. 42, p. 42, Nov., 1866; Vol. 64, p. 256, Oct., 1868. ♦Am. J. Sd. II., Vol. 42, p. 83, Aug., 1866. 'Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 6, p. 180, Sept., 1873. •Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 4, p. 17s, Sept., 1872. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 43 of ruby-red color, " upwards of twenty years ago," from a gentle- man of Macon, Ga., who said that it came from a gold mine in Habersham County of that State. The specimen was apparently a loose crystal that had been washed down to the placers east of the Blue Ridge. About the same time Gen. Thomas L. Cling- man sent him several pounds of a coarse blue sapphire broken from a large crystal " picked up at the base of a mountain on the French Broad River in Madison County, N. C." This is probably the same discovery as that in 1846 or 1847, for at that time Madison County was part of Buncombe County. Dr. C. L. Hunter discovered the Gaston County corundum, and Professor Emmons refers to it in his report on the midland coun- ties of North Carolina in 1853.* The civil war began soon after, putting a stop to further research, and it was not until its close that investigations were resumed. Rev. C. D. Smith, of Franklin, N. C, who had served as an assistant to Professor Emmons on the State Geological Survey, discovered most of the important localities in North Carolina. In 1865 a specimen was brought to him from a point west of the Blue Ridge which he recognized as corundum ; he visited the lo- cality, found the mineral, collected specimens, and announced the occurrence. This was the origin of the mining industry now so valuable. These discoveries led to further exploration, and many localities were found in the same region which have since been more or less developed. The principal deposits that are now worked are the Jenks, Lucas, or Culsagee Mine ; Corundum Hill Mine, near Franklin, Macon County, N. C. ; the Buck Creek or Cullakenee Mine in Clay County, also at Laurel Creek in Rabun County, Ga., and near Gainesville, Hall County, Ga. The Jenks Mine is on the Culsagee or Sugartown fork of the Ten- nessee River. Its two names are derived from the locality and from the name of its first operator, Charles W. Jenks, of Boston, Mass. Prof. Washington C. Kerr, State Geologist of North Carolina, placed the mica-bearing rocks in the upper part of the Laurentian series, identifying them provisionally with those called by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, Montalban. Thomas M. Chatard, of the United States Geological Survey, bar described quite fully the occur- > Am. J. Sci. n., Vol. 15, p. 373, May, 1853. -I*l 44 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE rence of corundum ' at the Culsagee and Laurel Creek localities, both of which are now operated by the Hampden Emery Com- pany, of Chester, Mass. The Culsagee outcrop, covering some thirty acres, consists of chrysolite (dunite) mingled with horn- blende. The corundum is enclosed among various hydromic ceous minerals, commonly grouped, under the term chlorite, b». tween the gneiss and the dunite, from the alteration of which they have evidently been formed. It occurs chiefly in crystalline masses, often of considerable size, and sometimes suitable for gems. At other parts of the mine it is found in small crystals and grains mingled with scales of chlorite, forming what is called the " sand vein." This is so loose and incoherent that it is worked by the hydraulic process ; and the small size of such corundum is the saving of much labor in the next process of pulverizing. The Laurel Creek Mine is similar in character. At Buck Creek the chrysolite rocks cover an area of over 300 acres, and from that point southward the hornblende rocks assume greater proportions, be- ing associated with albite instead of the ordinary feldspar and for ing an albitic cyanite rock. There is also found here the beaut green smaragdite, called by Professor Shepard chrome arfveo- sonite, which, with red or pink corundum, forms a beautiful and peculiar rock curiously resembling the eclogite or omphacite of Hoff, in Bavaria, Germany. At Shorting Creek in Clay County and in Towns County, Ga., there are also corundum localities. The resemblance in the occurrence of the North Car- olina corundums to that of Mramorsk in the Ural Mountains, as described by Prof. Gustav Rose of the University of Berlin, has been shown by Professor Genth.' There the associated species are serpentine and chlorite schist, sometimes with emery, dia- spore, and zoisite, very similar to the chrome serpentine corundum belt of the Southern States. The emery deposits of Asia Minor and the Grecian Archipelago, according to Dr. J. Lawrence Smith,* yield that substance in marble or limestone, overlying gneissic rocks; while with it are associated many of the same hydromicaceous and chloritic species that accompany both the New England emery and the Southern corundum. • Mineral Resources of the Unittd SUtes, p. 714, 1883-1884. ■ Cmtributions to the Laboratory of the University of Pennsylvania, No. I, 1873. • Am. J. Sd. II., Vol. 10, p. 355, Nov., 1850; and Vol. la, p. 53, Jan., 1851. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 45 With more particular reference now to the actual gems yielded at these various localities, we may note that they occur in two distinct forms : first, as crystals, of which the usual forms for sapphire are doubly terminated hexagonal pyramids, often bar- rel-shaped by the occurrence of a number of pyramidal planes of successively greater angle ; and second, as nodules of purer and clearer material, in the midst of larger masses of ordinary cleav- able corundum. The latter, when broken or falling out, are some- times taken for rolled pebbles, which they resemble. In 1886, a London periodical made the statement that any one who found the sapphire or the ruby in its original matrix would be called the " King of Rubies," and that his fortune would be assured. This recalls the fact that Charles W. Jenks, of Bos- ton, was the original finder of the true corundum or sapphire gems in place in the Jenks Mine at Franklin, N. C, and that he obtained from this locality nearly all the fine crystals of the best American collections. One of the most interesting of these is a piece of blue crystal with a white band running across it and a place in the center where a nodule had dropped out. This piece was cut and put back in it place, and the white band can be seen running across both gem a i rock. (See Colored Plate No. i). Nearly all the fine gems froiu Franklin, N. C, were brought to light by Mr. Jenks' mining; but although found here in their original matrix, they were of such rare occurrence that it was found unprofitable to mine for them alone. The work was sus- pended for some time in consequence of the financial crisis of 1873, but has lately been resumed by the Hampden Emery Company, as mentioned, who now own the mines, and are operating them for corundum under the direction of Dr. S. F. Lucas, whose name has been given to the mine at Culsagee, formerly called after Mr. Jenks. What success in gem-discovery is at present attained, it is not easy to learn. Certainly but few gems have appeared in the market of late from that locality. The largest crystal ever found, which is five times larger than any other known crystal, is one early discovered by Mr. Jenks and described by Professor Shepard. It is now in the cabinet at Amherst College ; but much injured by the disastrous fire of 1882, which destroyed so many fine specimens of the Shepard Collec- 46 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE tion there. This crystal weighs 312 pounds, is perfectly termin- ated, partly red and partly blue in color, but opaque. (See Illus- triiiion). Another large crystal, also obtained by Mr. Jenks and purchased by Professor Shepard, weighed iif pounds. These two specimens are more fully described as follows : \ he largest is red at the surface, but of a bluish-gray color within. The gene- ral figure is pyramidal, showing, however, more than a single six- sided pyramid, whose summit is terminated by a rather uneven and somewhat undefined hexagonal plane. The smaller crystal is a regular hexagonal prism, well terminated at one of its extremi- ties, the other being drusy and incomplete. The general color is a grayish-blue, though there are spots, particularly near the angles, of a pale sapphire tint. Its greatest breadth is 6 inches and its length over 5. Some of the lateral planes are coated in patches with a white, pearly margarite. Only the smaller crystals found at Franklin furnish material suitable for use in jewelry. They are frequently transparent near their extremities, so that small gems can be cut from them; but scarcely any of those thus far obtained are worth $100 and not 100 have been found in all. In variety of color the North Carolina corundum excels ; it is gray, green, rose, ruby-red, emerald-green, sapphire-blue, dark- blue, violet, brown, yellow of all intervening shades and colorless. Many specimens have been cut and mounted, especially of the blue and red shades, and make good gems, though not of the choicest quality. The two finest rubies are in the collection of Clarence S. Bement, of Philadelphia, in a suite of the choicest crys- tals found at the Culsagee Mine. Among these is probably the fin- est known specimen of emerald-green sapphire (oriental emerald). It is the transparent part of a crystal of corundum, 4x2x1^ inches, from which could be cut several pieces that would together furnish from 80 to 100 carats of very fine, almost emerald-green gems (not too dark, as in the Siamese), the largest possibly 20 carats or more in weight. As its color is one of the rarest known, it makes this specimen a very valuable one. There is in this col- lection a beautiful crystal of yellow and blue in consecutive bands (see Colored Plate No. i), from which it is estimated that at least $i,cxx> worth of gems could be cut. A dark-blue stone of GRKAT CRVSTAL OK SAlTlll Ki: IN Tllli SIIEI'AKU COI.LKCTION, AM HEKsr CDU-KGE igyjii. ' t ! I il I >-B !:c-i UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 47 I carat weight is in the United States National Museum at Wash- ington, and a series of fine red and blue crystals have been deposited there by S. F. Lucas. In the collection disposed of by Prof. Joseph Leidy, of Philadelphia, a few years ago, were sev- eral gems from the same mine, including a wine-yellow sapphire of 3J carats (660 milligrams) ; a violet-blue stone of a little over I carat (215 milligrams) ; and three dark-blue ones weighing re- spectively about li (320 milligrams), ij (250 milligrams) and i (145 milligrams) carats each. In Professo; Genth's suite of co- rundums are some from North Carolina z^nd Pennsylvania that would afford opalescent stones with fixed stars and other inter- esting forms. Many fine examples of corundum from Pennsylvania are in the cabinets of W. W. Jefferis, now of Philadelphia, Lewis W. Palmer, of Media, and Dr. Cardesa, of Claymont Specimens from Pennsylvania and North Carolina are also to be found in the cabinets of Joseph Wilcox and Dr. Isaac Lea, and in the William S. Vaux cabinet at the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. Near the Franklin, N. C, locality there has been obtained a con- siderable amount of a brown variety of corundum,* which shows distinct asterism, both by artificial light and in the sunlight, when the stone is cut en cabochon. A similar variety, though of darker brown, with a bronze-like reflection, has also been found, some twelve miles from Franklin, by Mr. Chatard. These all show a slight bronze play of light on the dome of the cabochon in ordinary light, and under artificial light they show well-defined stars, being really asterias or star-sapphires, and not cat's-eyes, as might seem at first sight to be the case. Similar light-brown corundums, showing asteriation and cleavage faces of the crystals, are found in Delaware County, Pa. A fine opalescent variety of deep indigo color is reported by E. A. Hutchins, as obtained by him from near Franklin and elsewhere in Macon County. Red and pink corun- dum is found at the Cullakenee Mine, in Buck County, and also at Penland's, on Shooting Creek, in Clay County. From the for- mer locality there is a fine ruby-colored specimen in the cabinet of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, and in the Vaux Collection a remarkable black crystal, the locality given for which is Buncombe County. > Transactions New York Academy of Sciences, p. 53, Jan., 1884. 48 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ! I ( Among other varieties found at various points in North Car- olina, the following may be noted : Two miles northeast of Pigeon River, near the crossing of the Asheville road, in Haywood County, and two miles north of this, on the west fork of Pigeon River, at Presley Mine, are found some of the finest colored spec- imens of blue and grayish-blue corundum. Twenty miles north- east of this, at the Carter Mine, fine white and pink corundum occurs in crystals and in a laminated form. Blue, bluish-white and reddish varieties occur at Swannanoa Gap, Buncombe County. J. A. D. Stephenson found fine hexagonal prisms of a pale brown- ish corundum at Belt's Ridge and more recently some very fine, fair colors from several new localities near Statesville. Fine crys- tals have also been found in the Hogback Mine, Jackson County. The chief locality for gem-sapphires in the United States is near Helena, Mont., where they occur as loose crystals, usually small, but often transparent and of good colors. They are found on bars in the Upper Missouri River, more or less rolled among gravel, and in the riffles and sluices of the gold- washers, with the gold, garnets and other heavy minerals of the placer mines. Dr. J. Lawrence Smith was the first to describe these Montana sapphires, as follows : " These pebbles are found on the Missouri River near its source, about sixty-one miles above Benton ; they are obtained from bars on the river, of which there are some four or five within a few miles of each other. In the mining region of this territory considerable gold is found on these bars, it having been brought down the river and lodged there, and the bars are now being worked for gold. The corundum is scattered through the gravel (which is about 5 feet deep) upon the rock bed. Occasionally it is found in the gravel and upon the rock bed in the gulches, from 40 to 50 feet below the surface, but it is very rare in such localities." * It is most abundant upon the Eldorado bar, situated on the Missouri River about 20 miles from Helena, where, at one time, a man could collect from i to 2 pounds a day. Some of these have been cut, and one very perfect stone of 3^ carats and of good green color, almost equal to the best oriental emerald, has > Am. J. Sd. in., Vol. 6, p. i8Si Sept., 1873. '!■! UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 49 been obtained. The Montana specimens rarely exceed i inch to i inch in length. (See Colored Plate No. i.) They are brilliant but usually of pale tints. Two gems are in the Amherst College Collection, which weigh about i carat each. One is a true ruby-red, and the other a sapphire-blue, colors rarely met with here. The gems are usually of a light-green, greenish-blue, light-blue, bluish-red, light-red and red, and the intermediate shades. They are usually dichroitic, and often blue in one direction and red in another, or when viewed through the length of the crystal, and frequently all the colors mentioned will assume a red or reddish tinge by artificial light. A fine one of 9 carats was found of a rich steel-blue. A very beautiful piece of jewelry, in the form of a crescent, was made of these stones by Tiffany & Co., in 1883 ; at one end the stones were red, shaded to bluish-red in the center, and blue at the other end ; by artificial light the color of all turned red. Perfect gems of from 4 to 6 carats each are frequently met with. Occasionally crystals are found which would afford ruby and sapphire asterias of a poor quality. The value of the gems cut from material found in this district amounted at one time to fully $2,000 a year. Many are found that are never cut, for it requires greater skill, involving much higher cost, to cut sapphire, than gems which are less hard. In the latter part of 1889 specimens were shown to the writer of a trachyte rock, imbedded in which were well-defined crystals of sapphire, similar to those found on the Eldorado bar, from a dyke on the Missouri River near and above that locality. The sapphire on Eldorado bar evidently came from this rock, and, on its disintegration, was washed down the river. CORUNDUM Silica 3-38 Alumina 85-75 Ferric Oxide 4*26 Titanic Oxide a'74 Magnesia trace Lime i'99 Water i'37 Color red to gray Locality Shimerville, Pa. Analyst Edgar K. Smith ■ Sapphires are obtained to a limited extent in Colorado. William B. Smith states, in the " Proceedings of the Colorado Scientific Society," that near Calumet, about twelve or fourteen miles from Salida, corundum is found in v. hat has proved to be a corundum schist. The crystals are in fiat hexagonal plates, ' Am. Chem. J., Vol. 5, p. 272. so GEMS A>ID PRECIOUS STONES IN THE have a bluish tinge, in some cases quite deep, and are from i to 5 millimeters ('039 to '196 inch) in thickness. Hoflfman men- tions corundum occurring in fragments near Silver Peak, Nev.' Rubies and sapphires have been erroneously reported to be found in the surface sands and gravels of Arizona and New Mexico, associated with the pyrope garnet. SPINEL crystallizes in the isometric system, and is generally found in the form of octahedrons. Its hardness is 8 and its specific gravity about 3*65. Following the ore! or of the rainbow, it exists in all shades of red, orange, green, blue, and indigo, as well as white and black. The crimson and flame-red colored varieties are ex- ceedingly beautiful. The red is called ruby spinel, and fine stones command high prices. Spinel is found associated with ruby in Burmah, Ceylon, and Siam. Its composition consists of one mol- ecule each of alumina and magnesia, equivalent to 72 per cent, of alumina and 28 of magnesia. Spinel fine enough to cut into gems has been only occasion- ally met with in the United States. The Rev. Alfred Free of Toms River, N. J., had in his possession at one time cut gems of a smoky blue or velvety green and a dark-tinted claret color, from the locality near Hamburgh, Sussex County, N. J. They were all good specimens, weighing about 2 carats each. Some half dozen from San Luis Obispo, Cal., of very good quality and weighing about 2 carats each, were brought to the notice of the writer by James W. Beath, of Philadelphia, Pa. Silas C. Young, who, for over twenty years has collected minerals in Orange County, N. Y., writes that in his extensive working for minerals he has found small ruby spinels, also others of a smoky and purple tint, sufficiently clear to cut. The locality at Ham- burgh, N. J., was discovered by his father over fifty years ago. The region of granular limestone and serpentine in which spinels abound extends from Amity, N. Y., to Andover, N. J., a distance of thirty miles. Monroe, Norwich, and Cornwall, N. Y., are well-known localities. The finest crystals from the locality known as Monroe, N. Y., are in the Vaux and Bement Collec- ■ Mineralogy of Nevada. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 51 Uh ity lec- tions, Philadelphia, and in the Amherst College Collection. The place that furnished the monster spinel crystals so well- known to collectors of twenty years ago, is probably somewhere between Monroe and Southfield. Its exact situation was known only to the two collectors, Silas Horton and John Jenkins, both now deceased, who secretly worked the locality some years by moonlight, and from it took crystals that realized for them over $6,c>cx), although many fine crystals were ruined in blasting and breaking out Since the death of these workers the location has been lost. The gahnite green spinel from the Deak Mine, Mitchell County, N. C, is of a very dark-green color, translucent on the edges, and appears to be compact enough for cutting. The lo- calities of Franklin and Sterling, N. J., have afforded some of the finest known crystals of this mineral, some of which would cut into mineralogical gems. At the lead mine at Canton, Ga., some fine crystals were found implanted on galenite Professor Genth mentions in his " Contributions to Mineralogy " large, rough crys- tals, 3 J inches (9 centimeters) long, from the Cotopaxi Mine, Chaffee County, Col. In a specimen of gahnite sent the writer from a lead mine in New Mexico the crystals were bright, polished octahedrons, from i to | inch across, translucent on the edges, imbedded in galenite. This most interesting and curious association was accompanied with massive garnet. The locality may rightfully be regarded as one of the most interesting for this variety, and it is to be regretted that more exact information cannot be obtained regarding it. Gahnite is found in the pyrite mines, associated with iron pyrite quartz, at Rowe, Mass.,' the larger crystals having a diameter of f inch. DIASPORE This is an aluminium hydrate, with a hardness of about 7 and a specific gravity of 3*4. Probably the finest known diaspores are those which were found with corundum near Unionville, Chester County, Pa. There crystals have been obtained from i to li inches in length, and i inch in thickness, the color varying from white to a fawn > Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 39, p. 455, June, 1885. 52 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ■ ii ••ppiO ••Pl»0 ■»pi»o ••pi»o 3|VOJ1|3 •»PI»0 'tttimn^ ■S: & mood w>0 0o •SrSiS; : II usjnoou HH (d H I— I < 'inu -pj«H 'itsan •»Pi«o •»PI'0 •no •»pi»o •»pi«o •Wins •^ Ifc < th H • ; ::::::: I *0 M V) : N M o o o m*N m'o • 1« S jK « Q Q M • . 8 • w *« I b 6 b Vo C c *M I ','0 t *M P 9 ■■'?,■ iiffS :.8,:S.S!8.R?.?..f;? mi*. 10 10 VI vt m 10 to ^^ m m v) m tft ! M « •« b b b : b « •o 46 .o Eng. and Min. J., Vol. 31, p. 169, Sept. 10, 1881. hi ': aioi IIRIJUOISK CHARMS, HKADS AM) URNAMIiNTS MAIIK IIV NAVAJi) INDIANS i l- ! Ii; if .( ^ !?^ UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 57 consists in building large fires against the base of the rock which becomes heated, whereupon water is thrown over it. The sud- den change of temperature cracks off large pieces, and much of the turquoise is ruined in the process. After cracking off the rock, the turquoise is picked out of the exposed seams with pieces of pointed iron, such as old harrow-teeth, or any other sharp- pointed instrument. Only occasionally is there a blast put in. The turquoise is sold in Santa F6, or along the line of the rail- road in the vicinity of the mines, by the Indians of the San Domingo pueblo, N. M. The specimens are ground into round or heart-shaped ornaments, which are pierced with a crude form of bow-drill, called by them " malakates." The drilling point is either quartz or agate, and the wheel to give velocity was in one instance made of the bottom of a cup. The selling price of the ornaments is now very low, the Indians disposing of their speci- mens at the rate of twenty-five cents for the contents of a mouth, where they us'ally carry them. A string made up of many hun- dreds of stones, they value at the price of a pony. Comparatively little of the American turquoise finds sale except as cabinet specimens, or as mementos of travel. Still, for ornamental or in- laying work, were it properly introduced, it might have a large sale, as the green and blue-green tints would contrast favorably with many stones or with dark wood. It is possible that deeper workings will develop finer stones, perhaps of such material as will maintain a more permanent color. Concerning the origin of the turquoise veining rock, both Prof. John S. Newberry and Prof. Benjamin Silliman, Jr., regard it as eruptive. According to Prof. Frank W. Clarke, the very small size of the veins and their limited distribution show that the turquoise is of local origin, and he em- phasizes the idea that it has resulted from the alteration of some other mineral. In addition to the facts tending to show its deriva- tion from apatite, there is also the fact that epidote containing lime is present as a secondary product. The existence of the pyrite in the gold-bearing veins may have had something to do with initiating the process of alteration, and the alumina of the turquoise was probably derived from decomposing feldspar. Dur- ing the summer of 1885 a very full suite of specimens was col- lected by Maj. John W. Powell, and placed for analysis in the ^1 a. II 58 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE hands of Professor Clarke, chief chemist of the United States Geological Survey, and are now deposited in the United States National Museum Collection. This mineral varies in color from a fine sky-blue through many shades of bluish-green and apple-green to dark-green, showing no blue whatever. The dark-green nodules pass to white at the center, sometimes resembling in structure certain varieties of malachite. Many of the specimens obtained by Major Powell, which are seai».ed or streaked by limonite, Professor Clarke suggests have been derived from the accom- panying pyrite ; and the latter mineral is occasionally found, bright and unaltered, enclosed completely in masses of clear blue turquoise. Three samples, selected as representing as nearly as possible the most definite types of the mineral, may be briefly described as, A. Bright blue, faintly translucent in thin splinters. B. Pale blue with a slight greenish cast, opaque and earthy in lustre, and having a specific gravity of 2"8o5. C. Dark green in color and opaque. These were analyzed, with the fol- lowing results : A' B c Alumina ) 3688 37-88 Ferric Oxide j ^^ ^^ 240 4-07 Phosphorus Pcntoxide.. 3»"96 3286 28-63 Copper Monoxide 630 7* 51 656 Lime "13 -38 Silica ris •16 4*20 Water iq'So I9'6o i8"49 98-87 9979 99-83 In Professor Silliman's paper there is reported 3 'Si of copper, which corresponds to 478 of copper monoxide. On account of the value of this gem, attempts have been made to color it by artificial means. The discovery of this deception was made by the writer, who saw numerous parcels of turquoise sent to New York from New T xico, and among them several small lots with an exceptionally fine color for American specimens. This color did not appear to be natural, although the stones ' Analysis A was not completed, as material enough could not be obtained without the destruction of two valuable specimens. The silica in it was due to traces of admixed rock from which the material could not be perfectly freed. C, however, was free from rock, and the silica in it must be otherwise accounted for. m UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 59 were found to have the same specific gravity as others from New Mexico, and when tried with a knife cut with the characteristic soapy, ivory feel. It was only after the back had been scraped off to some depth that the fact was revealed that they were artificially stained. The coloring matter used was the same as that employed in Germany to make the breccia agate that resembles lapis-lazuli, and is often sold as such to tourists. In this case, however, the Prussian blue is only a superficial stain, and the intensity of the blue is modified by the green. It can readily be removed, without injury to the stone, by scraping the back with a knife. Prussian blue dissolves readily in ammonium hydroxide, so that the simplest test is to wash the stone in alcohol, and after wiping it, to remove any grease, and lay it in the ammonia solution for a moment, when the blue color will partially or wholly disappear, and the gem resume its natural greenish hue. If it is desired to examine the stone without destroying the color, the face should be covered with wax, which should be allowed to project above the back, and a little strong ammonium hydroxide poured into this groove. If artificial, the difference of the shades of the two sides will be apparent at once. If stones thus stained are worn in rings, their color is soon affected by the water used in washing the hands. Ammonia does not afifect the color of true Persian turquoises, although washing the hands with them on usually does. By artificial light the color of this stained turquoise is rather gray-blue, and appears duller instead of lighter, as is the case with the genuine turquoise. A stone costing $ioo to $200, if found to be stained, would depreciate to only a hundredth part of its original cost. The deception is to be regretted, since it will cast suspicion on any fine turquoise that may be found in this country hereafter ; but the test is so simple that any one can satisfy himself as to the genuineness of the specimen. A few stones cut from New Mexico turquoise, which had at the time of cutting a very good color, changed to the characteristic green within a few days. William P. Blake ' also describes a second locality in Cochise County, Ariz., about twenty miles from Tombstone and not far ' New Locality of the Green Turquoise known as Chdlchihuitl. By William P. Blake. Am. J. Sd. II„ Vol. 25, p. 227, March, 1858. i-rfrr^, ^Rf ^^Htt ^ 1 if ^ 1 ' 1 ! J N » h H Hi 6o GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE from the stronghold of the Apache chief, Cochise. This locality, likewise worked by the ancients, is now known as Turquoise Mountain, and as there are several deposits of silver ores in the vicinity, a mining district has been formed known as the Turquoise District. At the place itself, there are two or more ancient excavations upon the south face of the mountain, and large piles of waste or debris thrown out are overgrown with vegetation. The place has been worked only for a short time, and probably never by the Apaches. The excavations are not so extensive as those at Los Cerrillos, and the mineral is iiiore difficult to find ; but, though it is less abundant here, its identity with the New Mexican chalchihuitl has been satisfactorily estab- lished. The rock is all similar, and the turquoise occurs in seams and veinlets rarely more than i or i inch in thickness. In color it is light apple-green or pea-green, rather than blue. The specific gravity of two different fragments gave 2710 and 2 "828, of which the first was slightly porous and earthy and the seccind dense, hard, and homogeneous. In 1883 the author saw a series of finely colored specimens, which had been obtained at Mineral Park, Ariz., and brought to New York city. They had been taken from three veins, varying in thickness from i to 4 inches, about 100 yards apart, running almost parallel, and traceable for nearly half a mile. This de- posit showed evidences of having been mined by the Spaniards, and a large number of stone hammers was found, indicating that it had also been worked by the Indians. Hoffmann, in the "Min- eralogy of Nevada," states that turquoise is also found in a local- ity situated in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, five miles north of Columbus. This locality was visited by J. E. Clayton, who re- ports that, on a sharp ridge, about half a, mile southwest of the Northern Bell Mine, in the Columbus District of southern Ne- vada, he found turquoise in seams and bunches in a metamorphi" sandstone of a brownish color, not vitreous enough to be classed as a quartzite. The best specimens were in small, roundish peb- bles in clusters, imbedded in the brown sandstone, in size from that of a duckshot up to a third of an inch in diameter. Some fine ones have been obtained, equal in color and hardness to the best standard. Those which occurred in seams were higher PLATE 2. A Holy toad of the Zuni Indians, clam shell incrustcd w.th B Turquoise in rock. Los Cerillos. New Mexico. C Turquoise in rock, Humboldt, Nevada. D Cyanite, Seven Mile Ridge, Mitchel' County. North Carolina E Shell rmg inlaid with turquoise and shell. [Hemenwav Expedition Collection.] L"cmenway 4: I i. r-i liirge Htciim;".!^. .at«*»iJc i oundisJ) p< 1- Plate No. 2 11 # UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 6i colored and softer. The principal sale is in San Francisco, where the sandstone is cut with the turquoise in it, making a rich mottled stone for jewelry. Although the nodules are small, this is the finest turquoise for color and quality found on the conti- nent. At Taylor's Ranch, Chowchillas River, Fresno County, Cal., several hexagonal crystals of bluish-green turquoise have been found, each about i inch in length. They were identified as turquoise by Dr. Gideon E. Moore, and are of great interest as to the origin of turquoise. The crystalline characterti were such that V. von Zepharovich believed them to be pseudomorph after crystals of apatite.' (See Fig. i.) That the ancient Mexicans held the turquoise in high esteem is well known, and that the Los Cerrillos Mines were exten- sively worked prior to the discovery of America, is proved by fragments of Aztec pottery — vases; drinking, eating, and cooking utensils ; stone ham- mers, wedges, mauls, and idols — discovered in the debris found everywhere. While Major Hyde was exploring this neighborhood, in 1880, he was visited by several Pueblo Indians from San Domingo, who stated that the turquoise he was taking from the old mine was sacred, and must not go into the hands of those whose saviour was not Montezuma, ofTering, at the same time, to purchase all that might come from the mine in the future. In the Mystery Cave, there was found a stone hammer weighing 131:^ pounds, with its handle attached. Additional evidence of the antiquity of the turquoise workings of New Mexico and Arizona has been gathered by the Hemenway Expedition, sent out by Mrs. Hemenway, under the direction of Lieut. Frank H. Cushing. There was found a prairie dog cut out of white marble, with turquoises for eyes (see Illustration) ; also, about ten miles from Tempe, Ariz., enclosed in asbestos, in a decorated Zuni jar, a sea shell coated with black pitch, in which were incrusted turquoises and garnets in the form of a toad, the sacred emblem of the Zuni. (See Colored Plate No. 2.) The Christy Collection in London contains two human skulls which FIG. I. PSEUDOMORPH OF TURQUOISE AFTER APATITE. Itfi • Kallait pseudomorph niich Apatit aus Califomien, Zeitschrift fur Krystallographie, Vol. lo, p. 240, 1885. 63 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE are inlaid with turquoise and have eyes made of iron pyrites (see Illustration), and a finger-ring made of the central whorl of a cone-like shell (see Colored Plate No. 2), in which triangular- shaped pieces of turquoise and red spondylus shell were inlaid. Pieces of dark wood were also inlaid with turquoise. Bernal Diaz, who came over with Cortez, mentions that on the landing of the explorers at San Juan de Ulloa, the ambassa- dor from Montezuma brought various rich presents, including four chalchihuitls, each of which the ambassador claimed was worth more than a load of gold. Diaz states that the chalchi- huitls were green stones of uncommon value, and held in higher estimation among the Indians than the smaragdus or emerald was among the Spaniards. Torquemada, who regarded chal- chihuitl as a species of emerald, states that the Mexicans gave the name " Chalchihuitl " to Cortez, intending thus to show their respect for him as a captain of great valor, " for chalchi- huitl is of the color of the emerald, and emeralds were held in great esteem." Offerings of this stone were made by the Indians in the temple of the goddess Matlalcueye, and it was their custom to place a fragment in the mouths of distinguished chiefs when buried. Torquemada, in recording this fact, says that these stones were emeralds, but that they were called chalchi- huitl by the Indians. When Alvarada and Montezuma played together at games of chance, Alvarada paid, if he lost, in chal- chihuitl stones, but received gold if he won. The Indians claimed that the art of cutting and polishing chalchihuitl was taught them by the god Quetzalcohvatl. Ber- nardino de Sahagun considered chalchihuitl to be a jasper of a very green color, or a common smaragdus. He states that they are green and opaque, and are much worn by the chiefs strung on a thread around their wrists, being regarded as a badge of distinction. (See Illustration.) Friar Marco de Nica in 1539 made a journey among the Indians of New Mexico, and in his narrative frequently mentions green and bluish stones, which were worn as ornaments by them, pendant from the ears and nose. He also mentions seeing many " turqueses," which there is little doubt he considered the green stones to be. These turquoises were worn, not only in the ears and nose, but as neck- f i SKUI.I. INCRUSTEU WITH TURyUOISK AXU WITH KVES OF IRON I'VRITES KKOM THE CHRISTY COLLECTION ! 'if' WHITE MARBLE PRAIRIE DOG WITH EVES OF TURQUOISE \ 1 .* 11 Ml UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 63 laces and girdles. They were called Cacona by the Indians, and were obtained from the kingdom. On arriving at this place De Nica observes that "the people have emeralds and other jewels, although they esteem none so much as turquoises, where- with they adorn the walls of v'he porches of their houses and apparel and vessels, «? nd they use them instead of money through all the CO intry." Coronado, who visited Civola in 1540, denies De Nica's statement respecting the turquoises upon the porches of the houses, but he obtained turquoise ear-rings and tablets set with the stones. The turquoise has always been the favorite jewel of the western tribes of Indians and was extensively in use at the time of the Conquest by Coronado, in 1541. Fra Saverio Claverigo,' alluding to the minor kingdom states tributary to the main kingdom, says : " Among articles of tribute annually required from these natives, mention is made of ten small measures of fine turquoises and one carga of ordinary tur- quoises," and elsewhere the first present from Montezuma to Charles V. of Spain, through Cortez, is thus referred to : " The present of the Catholic 'cing consisted of various works of gold, ten bales of most curious rolls of feathers and fair gems, so highly valued by the Mexicans that, as Tehuitlile himself, the ambassador of Montezuma to Cortez, affirmed, each gem was worth a load of gold." According to the Mexican system of weights, 240 pounds constituted a load of gold. Esti- mating gold at $20 an ounce, the value of these gems was over $57,000. It is a well authenticated fact that these gems referred to were turquoises, and it is believed that they are now among the crown jewels of Spain. In the memoir on ancient turquoise mosaics, recently published by Luigi Pigoni, director of the Ethnographic Museum in Rome," it is stated that the objects of this kind known as Mexican are distributed as follows : five in the Museum in Rome ; seven in the Christy Collection in London ; one in a private collection in England ; two in the Ethnographic Museum in Berlin ; and one in Gotha. Those in the Christy Collection have been described by E. B. ' History of Mexico, Cesena, 1 780-1881. < Gli Anticlii Oggette Messicani Incrostati di Mosaico Isistenti Nd Miueu Preiatorico* Etnografico di Roma. Roma, 1885. ■"^ — 1»- 1 -^■i^u«=a^ffec^"^wi 11 i" I 64 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Tyler in his " Anahuac ; or, Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern," p. 337 ; also in the " British Museum Guide to the Christy Collection " (1868), p. 20; and by Brasseur de Bourbourg in his " Recherches sur les ruines de Palenque et sur les origines de la civilization du Mexique " with drawings by M. de Waldeck (Paris, 1866). The specimens in the Copenhagen Museum have been described in " Congr^s International d'anthropologie pr6- historique, Compte Rendu de la 4me Session" (Copenhagen, 1869), p. 462, and by Steinhauer in "Das konigliche Ethno- graphische Museum zu Copenhagen" (1881), p. 19. The three in Berlin have been described in a lecture before the Anthro- pological Society of Berlin. Adolph Bastian claimed that one had originally been the property of Alexander von Humboldt, TURQUOISE Chemical Composition AND Properties. Theoretical Composition Locality Los Cerrillos, New Mexico. Analyst, F. W. Clarlte.' Locality Los Cerrillos, New Mexico. Analyst, F. W. Clarke.' Locality Los Cerrillos, New Mexico. Analyst, F. W. Clarke." Locality Taylor's Ranch, Colorado. Analyst, G. E. Moore.* Color 32-60 46-90 20-50 Bricht Blue. 31-96 [ 39*53 j 6-30 0-13 IIS 19-80 Pale Blue. 3286 36-88 2-40 038 0-16 19-60 2-805 Dark Green. 28-63 37-88 4-07 6-56 4-20 18-49 Blue Green. Phorphoric Acid. . . Alumina 33-21 35-98 2-99 7-80 Ferric Oxide Copper Oxide Lime Silica Water 19-98 2-806 Specific Gravity.... », •, • F. W. Clarke, Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 33, p. an, Sept., 1886. * Gideon E. Moors, Zeit. fur Krj'st. u, Min. 10, 34a while the other two were from the Ducal Museum of Brunswick. See " Verhandlungen der Berliner Gesellschaft filr Anthropol- ogie" (1885), p. 201. The exact ownership of the one in Gotha does not appear to be known. Illustrations of these objects are to be found in the works of E. B. Tylor and Brasseur de Bourbourg, and notices of them appear in various books of the seventeenth century, among which are " Pyranarcha sive de fulminum natura" by Liceti (Padua, 1643), p. 143, and " Musaeum Metallicum," by Aldrovandi (Bologna, 1647), p. 550; " Museo Cospiano," by Legati (Bologna, 1677), p. 477; and in Clavigero " Storia antica del Messico" (Vol. II., Book 7, Chap. 52). These mosaics are made with pieces of broken .kA ■Ml OBI UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 65 shells. The art is still practised in Guatemala. Pigoni's pamphlet is specially devoted to a description of the masks of the Museum in Rome. Of these, three are mentioned in the books of the seventeenth century, the first having been the property of Aldrovandi, while the other two are from the Museo Cospiano. The mask, shown in the plate of the pamphlet as No. 4 is the one mentioned by Aldrovandi in his " Musaeum Metallicum." It is made of wood, one side of which is left natural and carved out so as to fit the human face, while parts of the front side are painted, and t! se are incrusted in mosaic. Among the materials composing the mcrustations are turquoise, white, pearly, red, and black sea shells, also small garnets, with several minute square pieces of metal. This mask was in the Archaeological Museum of Bologna until 1878, and its history is well known, as it originally belonged to the AlcVovandi Collec- tion. The mask designated on the plate as No. 5 is well pre- served, and was acquired in 1880 from Florence. The mosaic is formed of red shell and turquoise. In the ethnographic collection of the College of the Propaganda in Rome, there are also two masks, differing from the others in not being in- crusted with mosaic, but tinted red, and engraved with lines that are filled in with white material. These have been described and illustrated by Dr. Guiseppe A. Colini in the " Bulletino della Societa geografica Italiana," Vol. 19, p. 324, 325. CHAPTER IV. Topaz and Tourmaline (Rubellite, Indicolite, and Achroite). TOPAZ crystallizes in the orthorhombic system, and oc- curs in prisms with one end regularly terminated, and has a very perfect cleavage transverse to the prism. Its hardness is 8, and specific gravity 3"53. It is a silicate of alumina containing fluorine. A blue crystal weighing 20 pounds is in the Imperial Mining School at St. Petersburg, Russia. Fine blue and sheny colored crystals have been found in Siberia, blue ones in Scotland and Ireland, yellow in Minas Geraes, Brazil ; white in Villa Rica, Brazil ; and blue and white in Ceylon and Australia. Brazilian or true mineralogical topaz is often confounded with two other minerals, namely, citrine and Spanish or Saxon topaz, the color of which is made by heating and so decolorizing smoky quartz to various .shades of yellow or brown. Yellow sapphire is called Oriental topaz. The specific gravities of the three varieties are given for comparison. SrSCIPIC CKAVITY, HAKDNBSS, COMPOSITION. Oriental Topaz 4-01 9 Alumina. True or Brazilian Topaz ySS 8 j of' Alumint False or Saxon Topaz 265 7 Silica. True yellow topaz, if heated for a time, becomes pink, and continued heating renders it colorless. «« PLATE 3. A Natural garnet pebble found near Fort Defiance. Arizona. " Garnet found near Gallup, New Mexico. ^ Peridot, Fort Defiance, Arizona F Spessartite garnet, Amelia Court House. Virginia r Ameri can Museum of Natural History, New Scity^ G H I J Arrow points of chalcedony, carneiian. obsidian and jasper, Columbia River. Oregon. K Crystal of topaz. Cheyenne^ .untain. Colorado rAmeri can Museum of Natural History. New York City^ "^ ^"" A?irka^""' '^^''^'' ^°" ^^-^«'- ■'^'-^een River. M Chlorastrolite. Isle Roya.. Lake Superior. [Lynde Coilec- N Topaz. Cheyenne Mountain. Colorado. i'l 'A M^l^. m '^f^S^: .•4^;«w«-» A C!!(0_ LJ- ffi/fi mi: -' '*o.MB.34i«es3nin.iied, and J¥;n-Ijds it^'mil massi-itH'g^^fji-jy./ '^r^JHi .-.C^^J^K^j^^j ;,i,^,, \';h 5 [■>■ ,./«i^^ -ii^f ; ci.a, ;.);<..■ (1 filngf}oWHfe:J5giftf:^. ,,, ivU U'^.4!,iuii S.Jil.i'. i .. (_>_.,.'- ■■K-i. )nuis \>ml I'LATE N--' 3 A p^^^ GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES 67 The gem topaz has been found in Huntington and Middle- town, Conn. ; Stoneham, Me. ; North Chatham, N. H. ; Sevier Lake, Utah; at Nathrop, Chalk Mountain, Crystal Park, Floris- sant and Devil's Head Mountain, Col. ; and at Ruby Mountain, Nev. The first discovery of topaz in the United States was that of Trumbull, Conn. Specimens of it, found there in a vein of fluorite, associated with a chlorophane variety of fluorite, were sent to Prof. Benjamin Silliman, who determined it to be topaz. Six different determinations of its specific gravity gave results varying from 3*42 to 3*47, with a mean of 3*45. In their modi- fication and color, the crystals afforded by this locality very strik- ingly resemble those from Saxony, but are generally of larger dimensions, and scarcely any of them would afiford a gem, since they are nearly all opaque. This same authority, in 1838, in a " Notice of a Second Locality of Topaz in Connecticut," says : ' " Among specimens which I obtained at China Stone Quarry, in Middletown, two years ago, I find one that contains above fifty crystals of topaz. They measure from ^ to J of an inch in length, are very slender and perfectly transparent, being attached by a lateral plane to crystals of albite." Probably the most beautiful and brilliant crystals of topaz known in the United States are those found forty miles north of Sevier Lake, Utah, and the same distance north of the town of Deseret on ihe Sevier River. This locality, known as Thomas Mountain, is an isolated and arid elevation about six miles long, and is described by Henry Engel- man, geologist of the expedition that, under Capt. James Simp- son, crossed Utah in 1859. ^^ found crystals loose on the sur- face. James E. Clayton, of Salt Lake City, visited the place in June, 1884, and obtained a large number of beautiful crystals, larger than those from Nathrop, Col., and equally as brilliant as those from San Luis Potosi, Mexico, which they closely resemble. Mr. Clayton states that still larger crystals are found, and he says : " They are evidently not secondary products, like zeolites, but primary, and produced by sublimation or crystallization from presumably heated solutions, contemporaneous, or nearly so, with the final consolidation of the rocks.'" Prof. J. Alden Smith refers ' Am. J. Sci. I., Vol. 34, p. 329, Oct., 1838. ' Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 31, p. 432, June, 1886. 68 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE to beautiful topazes occurring in the lithophyses of rhyolite, which is thp first noted occurrence of this gem in an eruptive rock.' This .ock was, however, first identified by Whitman Cross, and its exact locality is directly opposite Nathrop, Col., on a ridge a quarter of a mile in length and about 200 feet in ueight. Here the topaz is found in more or less rounded cavities, partially filled by its curved walls, which by concentric arrangement and an over- lapping often produce a roselike form. These cavities are often lined with minute, glassy quartz crystals, and on them are found the topazes, which are prismatic in form, and, being attached to TOPAZ Iff • i Chemical Comfositiom AND PlOFBKTIBS, Silica.... Alumina Fluorine Potassa Soda Water Color Hardness Specific Gravity. Mh6 31-92 57-38 1699 015 '•33 0-20 8-00 3'5i V fa a I 32-03 57-18 1883 o U a o 21-37 51-26 29-21 33- >S 57-01 16-04 Clear Green. 32-38 55-32 16-12 3-514 fog 15 29-74 47-46 12-02 Yellow. 3-45 • F. W. CUrke, U. S. Geol. Sur. Bull. No. 37. • F. A. Gcnth, Proc. Am. Phil. Soc, Oct. 1885. • C. M. Bradbury, Chem. News, Sept. 7, 1883. < W. F. Hillebrand, and Whitman Cross, U. S. Geol. Sur. Bull. No, 30. • Rammelsberg, ). fur pr. Ch. 96, 7. " SilUroan and Hitchcock, Am. J. Sct.(i)xi, xi3. the sides of the cavities in all positions, are often found doubly terminated. The crystals are from } to (rarely) i inch in length and i to i inch across the prism. In color they are generally transparent and flawless, and are either colorless, pale-blue, or distinctly sherry-colored. A similar occurrence is noted by Mr. Cross, in the nevadite of Chalk Mountain, but the crystals are somewhat smaller. Chalk Mountain is situated at the junc- ture of Lake Eagle and Summit Counties in Colorado.' Many fine large topaz crystals have been found at Crystal Park, near Pike's Peak, El Paso County, Col. Three crystals from this lo- ■ Rqxirt on the Development of the Resources of Colorado, p. 36, 1881-1882, • Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 27, p. 94, Feb., 1884. " ■<*!3S^iA ^ jit"«»^ri'r^ CRYSTAL OF TOPAZ FROM STONEHAM, ME. 1 ' MA.MMOI'. IfERYI. FROM CRAFTdN, N. II, '>. ^ ^ %l IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) i: // V V ^ w A % f/. t 1.0 I.I 11.25 t m 2.0 8 U ill j,6 p> ^^ -^ ^J^J" ^^'^/ Photographic Sciences Corporatioii 23 WIST MAIN STRECT WIBSTfR.N.Y. U580 (7i6)eya-4s * liMMIIirM <6 ^ T UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 69 cality, all of which are remarkable for their size and clearness, were very fully described by Whitman Cross and William F. Hillebrand, under title of "Minerals from the Neighborhood of Pike's Peak, Col.'" One of these, a fragment of a crystal, was found near Florissant with amazon-stone ; it is remarkable on account of the probable size of the original crystal, which when complete must have been nearly a foot in diameter. It was clear in parts and had a decided greenish tinge. The specific gravity of a fragment was 3*578 and its chemical composition was entirely normal. Another locality of importance in the vicinity is Devil's Head Mountain in the Colorado range, some thirty miles north of Pike's Peak. The pocket in which the topaz was found at this place is of irregular shape, being about 50 feet long, from 2 to 1 5 feet wide, and averaging 4 feet in depth. Owing to the dis- integration of the rock at the surface, many of the crystals had been carried in the debris to a considerable distance down the mountain side, and were badly worn and broken. The topaz is found here in isolated and usually loose crystals, surrounded by distorted quartz crystals of smoky reddish shades, frequently the exact color of the topaz. The principal color of the latter was reddish, although wine-yellow, milky-blue, and colorless crystals were found.' These Colorado localities have proved quite valu- able. Within a year after their discovery it was estimated that over 100 crystals had been sold for nearly $1,000, at prices varying from 50 cents to $100 each.' A topaz crystal weigh- ing i8i ounces (587 grams) was found at Cheyenne Mountains, Col., during 1886; but, although very perfect, it had little gem value. There is in the United States National Museum in Washington a cinnamon-tinted cut stone from Pike's Peak weigh- ing 15 carats, that is superior in beauty to the brilliant white topazes from Brazil. Several of the sherry-colored Colorado crystals have been cut in stones, two of the larger ones weighing 125 to 193 carats each. (See Colored Plate No. 3.) During 1882, crystals from Haindon Hill, in the vicinity of Stoneham, Me., were determined by the writer to be topazes, and further research • Am. J. Sd. III., Vol, 24, p. 282. * Contributions to the Mineralogy of the Rockjr Mountains, p. 70, et acq., Bulletin No. 30 of the United States Geological Survey, Washington, 1885. » Mineral Resources of the United States, 1886, p. 596. /O GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE resulted in the finding of large quantities of fragments. This locality furnished good, clear, and distinct crystals of topaz and has yielded the best crystals found in the East. The specimens are either colorless or faintly tinted with green or blue. The finest crystals were from f inch to 2^ inches (lo to 65 millimeters) across, perfect, and in part transparent. Several perfect gems have been cut from some of the fragments. They had the characteristic fluid cavities, and in hardness were the same as the Brazilian.' Some white opaque crystals, a foot in diameter, were blasted out by the writer. The finest crystal found at this locality is in the cabinet of Clarence S. Bement. (See illustration.) During 1888 nearly 100 crystals associated with phenacite were found on Bald Mountain, North Chatham, N. H., which is only a few miles from the Stoneham locality, both places being near the State line.' They were colorless, light-green, or cherry- colored on the outer sides and colorless in the center. The largest crystal measured ij inches in height and the same in thickness. Almost all the crystals contained irregular hollow spaces from xfff to I'ff inch (i to 10 millimeters) across. In habit the crystals close- ly resemble those from Cheyenne Mountain, Col. Some of these crystals are equal in point of quality to any found in Colorado, although they are not as large. At Stoneham, Me., green and red damourite, altered from topaz, has been cut into dilferent odd forms and charms by the local collectors.' TOURMALINE belongs to the rhombohedral system, and occurs in prisms, the sides of which are generally striated and channeled. The hardness of the transparent variety is 7*5, and its specific gravity ranges from 3*0 to 3*25. Its composition is very complex, as is shown in the table of analysis. The question of color is an interesting one, particularly when the varying colors of the lithia tourmaline ate concerned. The color of the iron and magnesian varieties depends on the amount of iron present, and passes from the colorless specimens ' See Topaz and Associated Minerals from Stoneham, Oxford County, Me. Am. J. Sd. III.. Vol, 3$, p. 161, Feb., 1883 ; and Vol. 27, p. 212, March, 1884. » Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 36, p. 222, Sqjt., 1888. •Am. J. Sd. III., Vd. 39, p. 378, May, 1885. , J UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO from DeKalb through all the shades of brown to the black variety found in Pierrepont. On the other hand, the lithia tourmaline, containing more or less manganese, gives us the red, green, blue, and colorless varieties. The shades of color do not appear to depend on the absolute amount of manganese present, but rather on the ratios existing between that element and iron. When the ratio of manganese is to iron as one is to one, there is produced the colorless, pink, or very pale green tourmaline. An excess of manganese produces the red varieties, while if the iron be in excess, the result is various shades of green and blue. The finest green and red specimens are found in the province of Minas Geraes, Brazil, tho dean red rubellite in Siberia, the yellow and brown in Ceylon, and Carinthia, Austria, and pink on the island of Elba. The hardness of the flawless variety is about 7*5, and the specific gravity varies from 3*0 to 3'25. It is very electric. The colorless variety is called achroite, the red, rubel- lite, the blue, indicolite, the green, Brazilian emerald, and the black, schorl. Tourmaline is one of the most dichroitic of all gems. When a crystal is viewed through the side, it is transparent green, but when viewed through the end of the prism ^ it is either opaque or yellow-green. For instance, in tourmaline from Paris, Me., if two gems are taken from a green crystal, one with the top cut from the side of the prism and the other from the pyramid side, one will be bright green and the other yellow-green. It has frequently happened with specimens from Brazil that one would be green and the other opaque. Specimens that rival any found in the world have been obtained in Maine. The localities that have furnished fine ones are Mount Mica, near Paris, /Vuburn, Hebron, Norway, Mount Black, in Andover, Rumford, and Stan- dish. In the two latter places, however, they do not count as gems. The famous tourmaline locality at Paris, Me., is situated on Mount Mica, a spur of Streaked Mountain, about one mile east of Paris Court House. It was discovered in 1820 by Elijah L. Hamlin and Ezekiel Holmes, while they were on a mineralogical and geological trip. Mr. Hamlin found a fragment of a transparent crystal lying loose upon some earth which still clung to the foot of a fallen tr§e, and procured about thirty beautiful crystals. ,1. •72 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE J' i I ^ These were entrusted to Governor Lincoln of Maine to take to New Haven, and all but one were, at this time, lost It is believed that these tourmalines are at present in the Imperial Mineralogical Cabinet at Vienna, since there were some fine specimens of tourmalines purchased with the collection of the well-known antiquarian, Vandervull, in 1830. These were recog- nized as being from Paris, Me., by Baron Lederer, the Austrian Consul in New York City, who was familiar with the crystals, having made collections in that locality. In 1825, Prof. Charles U. Shepard visited the locality, and after considerable work obtained some of the best crystals ever found, which are now in the Shepard Collection at Amherst College, having escaped the disastrous fire of 1882. Prof. John W. Webster, of Harvard College, found a large red crystal and some beautiful grass-green ones. In 1865 the locality was supposed to be exhausted, but excavations which have been made there since, from time to time, through the perseverance of Dr. Augustus C. Hamlin, have brought to light many fine crystals. In 1881 the Mount Mica Tin and Mica Company began operations, with Doctor Hamlin as president, and work has been carried on at intervals since. Some hundreds of tourmalines are the result of this mining, among them a blue indicolite crystal 9 inches long, somewhat shattered by blasting. (See Colored Plate No. 4.) It is light- blue at one end, shading gradually into dark-blue and deep blue- black. This would have been the finest crystal known, and would have furnished several hundred carats of fine stones, had it not been so broken. It is now in the State Museum at Albany, N. Y. The next summer's work brought to light material that cut into two of the finest gems, of a grass-green hue, weighing about 30 carats, which surpass in beauty anything hitherto found. (See Colored Plate No. 4.) The gems and crystals obtamed by this company have been valued at over $5,000, and the value of all that have been taken from this locality, and sold at the highest rate asked for them as native gems, probably amounts to $50,000. The crystals of green tourmaline, inclosing red crystals of rubellite, found at Mount Mica, when properly cut across the prism form objects of great beauty. The centers have often furnished magnificent ■■■ PLATE 4. ' ""^i5::trs.srs;S;/-"' ^^-- --• --• C White tourmaline, [achroite], Mount Mica. Paris. Maine D Red tourmaline [rubeliite]. Mount Mica. Paris. Maine E Green tourmaline. Mount Mi-a. Paris. Maine ' '^'^"irnT""^'^^""'^ f"-«" G Section of a crystal of tourmaline from Mount Mica Paris fxrL"'''^^'"^^-^-^-^'--erwS,'rn H Section of a crystal of tourmaline from Mount Mica Paris Ma.ne^.^showingdark blue and pink center with 'S 1 'I' «ta<~ . M d U» Plate No. 4 .- --.«.«, «»>fW*trt-S**l-«Ui.^,*|^U^,^(i^^^^^; t'Vyri^ht JflJHlhv ihr.S. i,.ntifi.-n,f, I ■„ ii> '^ I !|ii m UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 73 transparent gems, scarcely distinguishable by the eye from the true ruby It would be difficult to find a more wonderful mineral than that composing these crystals from Paris, which are white at the termination, then almost emerald-green, light green, pink, then colorless as water, and when broken are dark blue or red in the center, this center in turn being coated white, pink, and green. The gree.. tourmaline, which has been called Brazilian emerald, is used by the Brazilian clergy as their emblem. Fine tourmalines have a greater brilliancy than the emerald when seen by artificial light, but have not the rich deep light of the latter. Some of the finest cut rubellites and green tourmalines are in the possession of members of the family of Professor Shepard. One of the finest known, which is i inch long, f incL broad, and i inch thick, was described by Professor Shepard as of a chrysolite green, with a blue tinge, but less yellow and more green than chrysolite. This, on comparison, he found to be finer than any of the gems in the Hope Collec- tion, that was sold at auction in 1881. It now belongs to his daughter, Mrs. James, wife of Judge James, of Washington. (See Plate No. 4.) Ore fine achroite two-thirds this size, and one remarkable rubelliic, the size of the largest tourmaline, are in the possession of L. E. DeForest of New Haven, Conn. (See Colored Plate No. 4.) The Hamlin cabinet,' the first crystal of which was found in 1820, contains many fine rubellites (red tourmalines), indicolites (blue tourmalines), and achroites (white tourmalines), as well as good examples of pink, yellow, green, and other colors, all from Paris, Me. This is the best tourmaline collection in the world, and would furnish full suites for a dozen cabinets. The crystals used by Dr. Hamlin to illustrate his treatise on the tourmaline are in this cabinet, as well as many other fine stones of nearly every known shade of the gem, in- cluding a wonderful dark gem of 28 carats (see Colored Plate No. 4), I inch in diameter, and an achroite of 23 carats. One, the finest tourmaline of this collection, is shown as it now is. (See Colored Plate No. 4.) In the Peabody Museum at New Haven are some crystals collected by Dr. Sanborn Tenney, of Williams ■ See The Tourmaline, by Dr. Aimustus C. Hamlin, Boston, 1873. : ,.|: !• T 74 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE II' f 1 \ College. A light-green crystal, about 2 inches long, has at one end a transparent, kernel-like nodule that would afford a gem of over 10 carats' weight. The center of a section of green and red tourmaline would cut one of the finest magenta-colored rubellites ever seen. The next important tourmaline locality in Maine is Mount Apatite, in Auburn, Androscoggin County. It was first worked in 1882, and since then fully 1,500 crystals have been found. They were colorless, light-pink, light-blue, bluish-pink, and light-golden, the sections showing the character- istic variety of color, such as blue and pink, green and pink, etc., when viewed through the end of the crystal. Some of the faintly-colored crystals afforded gems that were considerably darker after the cutting, but no gems over 6 or 8 carats were obtained here. Further working in 1883 o"" ^884 brought darker material to light, especially the green colors, some of which equal those found at Mount Mica Rude black crystals 8 inches in diameter and 1 2 feet long (at times enclosing quartz- ite) were observed here. This, like the Mount Mica locality, gives promise of fine gems for some time to come. The collec- tion in the United States National Museum contains a i-carat blue indicolite, two lavender-colored stones of 1 carat each, a light emerald-green stone of | carat, as handsome as an emerald viewed by artificial light, and also a suite of several dozen loose crystals of various colors. The tourmaline locality of Rumford is situated in the northeast part of the town, in Oxford County, Me., on the northwest slope of Mount Black, and is about 1,500 feet above sea-level. The vein, which has been covered for a lei:gth of about 250 feet, has been found to be quite irregular, varying from 30 to 100 feet in width, and dips northeast and southwest at an angle of about 60°. The rock is a coarse granite with mica schist overlying. The Mount Mica Company did some work here, and since they stopped E. M. Bailey has worked the solid ledge to a depth of from 3 to 10 feet. No gems have been found, though some interesting mineralogical specimens have been secured, among them specimens of lepidolite, which is found here of finer grain than that from any other Maine locality. One form is in scales not over jfTr inch (i millimeter) across, quite compact, and in large masses of a beautiful lilac color, closely UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 75 resembling the mineral from Altenberg, Saxony. A character- istic form is of a light lavender color, very compact, so that it could be used for ornamental purposes, and in this the scales are not more than Tfir to i inch (i to 25 millimetere) in width. The mass is penetrated in every direction by crystals or rubel- lites, which are of the light or dark shade of red. This associa- tion is similar to that from Rozena in Moravia. Rubellite, indicolite, and the green tourmzilines are the common varieties at this locality. All exhibit a tendency to radiate, assuming this form when they occur side by side in one radiation. Crystals of green, red, and blue tourmaline have been found at Standish, which, although very good as crystals, are not of gem quality. Little work has been done in this locality, which may improve by development. The specimens at Bates College, Lewiston, Me., labelled " Baldwin," are supposed to have been found here. Bluish and brownish-green tourmaline is found in fine crystals, penetrating damourite and diaspore, in Newlin Township, but none of them transparent enoiigh for gem purposes. A small, well-terminated, transparent green tourmaline was found by J. C. Mills, on Silver Creek, Burke County, N. C, also a black crystal 4 inches long, inclosed in a green beryl crystal. William Irelan, Jr., State Mineralogist, reports that fine crystals of translucent rubellite, but not of gem value, are found in California. Fine crystals of indicolite and green tourmaline are found with the cleavelandite feldspar at Chesterfield, Mass., but none transparent enough to furnish gems. They are inter- esting from the fact that the green crystals often inclose crystals of rubellite, and sometimes both red and white tourmaline. These afford very interesting specimens when cut in sections across the prism. St. Lawrence County, N. Y., has given to mineral cabinets the greatest number and the finest examples of doubly terminated crystals of black and brown tourmaline, both kinds occurring in a granular limestone, from which they can readily be broken out, or the limestone removed by acid. The result is that many thousands of specimens from Pierrepont, of the most highly polished black, doubly terminated crystals, although without value as gems, grace the mineral cabinets of the world. Nor have the products of any locality ever excelled in nil 76 < !=> O H GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE -Xt|A«JO if I 8 8 8 8 S K -- a- s = ^5 : a =3: ;?:8 : • J?' "8 : : :? : ?S SSf^aSffS-S 8 , ^ . . . ;« . p p 9 p ►> ." r " P ." 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One of the finest is in the Root Collection, at Hamilton College; many fine ones are in the Peabody Museum, New Haven, Conn. ; but the best series of both varieties is in the cabinet of Clarence S. Bement, in Philadelphia. At Richville, near De Kalb, N. Y., achroites (white tourmalines) have been found in fine crystals. The choicest of these, in the cabinet of Mr. Bement, is over i inch in length, and would cut into a gem weighing over lo carats. Crystals of brown tourmaline were obtained by Charles E. Beecher, at Newcomb, Essex County, N. Y. Portions of these crystals were very free from flaws, and material enough was found to cut hundreds of gems weighing from i to lo carats. In the eupyrchroite locality, near Crawford, N. Y., William P. Blake obtained beautiful transparent brown and light-brown tourmaline in crystals large enough to cut gems of several carats' weight. A large number of green tourmalines, some quite thick and several inches in length, have been obtained at FranKlin Furnace, Essex County, N. J., but, although they are an important addition to our mineralogical collections, and the outer parts of some of the crystals are of a rich, almost chrome green, not a single crystal has been found that would cut a transparent gem of even i carat. Professor Genth men- tions beautiful light-yellow, brownish-yellow, and at times white crystals of tourmaline, at Bailey's limestone quarry, East Marl- borough, Pa. ; yellow crystals at Logan's limestone quarry. West Marlborough ; brown and light-yellow, which are at times transparent, at John Niven's limestone quarry. New Garden Township ; and green touruidine in talc near Rock Spring, Centre County. Specimens of black tourmaline as fine as are ever obtained, are found near Leiperville, Delaware County, in well terminated crystals, 5 inches in length and \\ inches ihick ; also at Marple Township, terminated with two low rhombohedra. ,.M3ts.-»Ji^^mmdi<« •■.■lUiillJii HJ«1.'W mumammmm 1 CHAPTER V. Garnet Group — Essonite, Spessartite, Almandite, Pyrope, Ouvarovite, Schorlomite. i; :*■ THE garnet represents a group of minerals which, al- though chemically quite different, crystallize in the isometric system. The following are the varieties that have been used as gems. Essonite, which has been confused with zircon, the only true hyacinth, is still called hyacinth by the jeweler. It has a hardness of 7 and its specific gravity is 3*68. Grossularite is the pale-green or yellowish variety of essonite. Almandine garnets vary in color from violet or purple through brownish-red to deep red. The scarlet and the crimson varieties, when cut en cabochon, are called carbuncles. The finest alman- dines are from Siriam, India. Their hardness is 7*5 and specific gravity, 4-1 to 4-3. Pyrope, or blood-red garnet, is commonly known from its use in cheap Bohemian jewelry and is found extensively at a number of places in Bohemia, and also of fine quality at the Kimberley Mines in South Africa. Its hardness is 7*5 and its specific gravity 37 to 3*8. Ouvarovite is of a brilliant emerald-green color and is found at Bissersk, in Siberia, but is rarely large enough to furnish gem stones. Its hardness is nearly 8 and specific gravity 3 "45. Demantoid is a variety of green garnet called Bobrowsaka garnet or Uralian emerald, and is found near Poldnewaja, district 71 B( i innwaMiMlPw GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES 79 of Syssersk, in the Ural Mountains, in nodules varying from tV to i an inch across. The color ranges from yellowish-green or brownish-green to almost yellow emerald-green. The refractive power of the garnet on light is so great that it shows a remark- able amount of " fire " by artificial light. Its hardness is only about 5 and specific gravity is 3*85. It has not been found in the United States. Essonite, cinnamon garnet, cinnamon-stone, or the hyacinth of the jeweler, has been found of good quality in Oxford County, Me. Very fine essonites, red and yellow, were formerly found at Phippsburgh, Me., and at Warren, N. H. Beautiful essonite crystals, i inch in diameter, entirely transparent and quite flat, have been found between plates of mica at Avondale Quarry, Pa., and near Bakersville, N. C. Some of these would cut into fine gems over a carat in weight. In 1882 grossularite was found in perfect, yellow-green, opaque crystals, nearly i inch across, in the GilaCaflon, Ariz. The finest in the United States are the rich, dark, oily-green dodecahedral crystals, i inch in diameter, from the Tilly Foster Mine, Brewster, N. Y. William P. Blake mentions a green grossularite found in copper ore near Petaluma, Sonoma County, Cal. In the cabinet of Dr. Isaac Lea are transparent crystals of a dark oily-green grossularite, from I to 5 millimeters long, that were found at the Good Hope Mine, California. Some fair crystals of a rich, green color, from I to 5 millimeters in diameter, were found at Hebron and West Minot, Me. At none of these localities, however, was the min- eral of gem value. At Amelia Court House, Va., a large quantity of spessartite garnet, which is a variety of essonite in which part of the alumina is replaced by manganous oxide, has been found in masses several inches across, and of a dark brown, dark red, or honey-yellow color. These are the finest specimens of this variety of garnet ever found, and have been cut into gems from I carat to 100 carats in weight, almost rivaling the essonites from Ceylon. Some of the most beautiful natural gems are the microscopic yellow garnets, evidently spessartite, found in clean« ing out a small cavity at this place. The beautiful little red spessartites found in the rhyolite cavities with topaz, at Chalk Mountain, Nathrop, Chaffee County, Col., and in Ruby Valley, n 8o GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE n J. Ift' 'I Elko County, Nev., are perfect gems, so splendent are they, but they are generally too small or too dark in color for jewelry. The finest pyrope garnets in the United States are found in New Mexico, Arizona, and southern Colorado, where they are often called rubies. In New Mexico they are to be found, it is believed, only on the Navajo Reservation, where the Indians col- lect them in large quantities from ant-hills and scorpion-hills, in the sand, and also, it is believed, pound them out of the rock. They are found associated with olivine and chrome pyroxene, and in northeastern Arizona they are found in loose sand, having prob- ably been brought by the action of water from a point fifty miles to the north, where they are supposed to occur in a peridotite rock, from which it is said the Indians pound them out with stones. In the western part of Arizona, on the same parallel with Fort Defi- ance, on both sides of the Colorado River, garnets have been observed associated with grains of peridot, a chrome pyroxene, and a hyaline chalcedony. They are also found on the ant-hills and near the excavations made by scorpions, having been taken therefrom by the busy occupants as obstructions to the erection of their galleries and chambers. They are collected by soldiers and Indians, and sold to the Indian traders, who send them to the large cities in lots of irom an ounce upward. The garnets have never been found in place by any of the geologists or any surveyor of the United States Geological Survey, and it is suggested that they are derived from some lower cretaceous sandstone ; but it is very evident, from the associated minerals, that they have weathered out of a peridotitic rock. They are from i to i inch in diame- ter, rarely over \, and but a few have been seen that measure ^^ inch across. In form they are generally quite round and pitted, often, however, with fractured edges, as if they had been rolled. They average well for quality ; one-half are worth cutting, and one-quarter will furnish good stones, but fine ones are quite rare. An interesting fact in connection with these garnets is that a large proportion of them contain a network of fine acicular crystals, evidently rutile from their arrangement, as has been suggested by Babinet and Dr. Isaac Lea.' Occasionally these grains or pebbles of garnet break in two with a conchoidal fracture, reveal- ' Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., Phil., Vol. 21, p. M9, May, 1869. !■)! I ■ iiiM I II «■«« ■ ■■« ^na^vaa^dpi^ -D— -- III —^i^ UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 8i ing in the center a small grain or kernel of transparent quartz. These garnets are found in a large variety of tints of red, claret, almandine, and even yellow essonite-colored stones. They are often believed by the finders to be spinels or rubies, and have been sold as Arizona or Colorado rubies. Although the garnets found in washing and mining dia- monds at the Cape of Good Hope, the so-called " Cape Rubies," are of larger size than those found in Arizona and New Mexico, and perhaps equal to them in color by daylight, the latter are much superior by artificial light, only the clear, blood-red hue be- ing visible, while in the " Cape Rubies " the dark color remains unchanged. They are extensively used as gems, the annual sales amounting to about $5,000 worth of cut stones. A few remark- ably fine ones have brought $50 each, though stones equally good have frequently sold for much less. Fine stones of i carat sell at from $1 to $3 each, the exceptional ones rarely for $5. They seldom exceed 3 carats in size. Pyrope garnet of good color, that has furnished gems, has been found in the sands of the gold-washings of Burke, McDowell, and Alexander Counties, N. C. In the peridote rock of Elliott County, Ky., are found deep ruby-red grains of pyrope garnet, locally regarded as rubies, having a specific gravity of 3 '6 73, and varying in size from tV to i inch in diameter. They are especially abundant along the line of the peridote trap-dykes in the soil resulting from the disintegration of the rock, and would cut into gems almost as beautiful as those from Arizona. Garnets are found in many localities in California ; at Roger's Mine, in the eastern part of El Dorado County, they are associated with specular iron, calcite, and iron and copper pyrites ; in the Coosa district, Inyo County, they are found in large, semi-crystalline masses, of a light-yellow color, some specimens of which were taken to San Francisco under the impression that they contained tin. Three miles from Pilot Hill, El Dorado County, garnet rock is found in blocks several feet thick. They also occur in Plumas, Mono, Fresno, Los Angeles, and San Diego Counties, Cal. In Burke, Caldwell, and Catawba Counties, N. C, are found large dode- cahedral and trapezohedral almandite garnets, coated externally with a brown crust of limonite, the result of superficial altera- m 82 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE pi I it. I tion, but usually showing a bright and very compact interior when broken. They are sometimes as fine in color as the Bohemian garnets, and should find a ready use for watch jewels and other like purposes. Some of the crystals which have been found, weighing 20 pounds each, although not fine enough for gems, might be cut into dishes or cups measuring from 3 to 6 inches across. A very large quantity of these garnets has been found about eight miles southeast of Morgantown, and also near Warlick, in Burke County, N. C, and in Rabun County, Ga. Many of them are transparent, varying in color from the purple almandine to pyrope red. Tons of these have been crushed to make " emery " and the sand-paper called garnet paper. The peculiar play of color observed in the North Carolina garnets is often due to the inclusions. In those secured in Rabun County, Ga., at times nearly one-quarter of the entire specimen is taken up by fluid cavities containing acicular crystals of rutile. Quanti- ties of fine purple almandine garnets, which are found in the gravel of the placer mines near Lewiston, Idaho, in rolled and pitted grains from ^ to i inch across, would cut into good gems or jewels for watches. Hoffmann mentions good small crystals from Black Caflon, Colorado River, Nev. Fine small almandine garnets are also found in the trachyte of White Pine County, Nev. At Acworth, Grafton, and Hanover, N. H., garnets of gem value have often been found. In Essex County, N. Y., many tons of common garnets are mined annually to be ground into abrasive materials. Many small pieces would furnish clear garnets, and occasionally of fine color. The feldspar quarry at Avondale, Pa., has furnished some of the finest known crystals of common garnet ; one of them, perhaps the finest specin:\en of this mineral in crystal form, measuring 2^ inches across, imbedded in a mass of quartzite, is of a rich purplish-red color, with high natural polish and remarkably sharp angles. It is in the cabinet of Mr. Bement. At Ruby Mountain, three miles from, Salida, Chaffee County, Col., is a remarkable deposit of alman- dite-garnet crystals in a bed of green chlorite. These crystals vary in weight from i ounce to 3 or 4 pounds each, and occasionally 10 or 12 pounds. Two very perfect crystals, weigh- ing respectively 14 and 14! pounds, were obtained from i AI.MANDINE UARNKT CRYSTAL FOUND IN NEW VORK tlTV, WKICllING yS I'UtNUS ■■^ ii UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 83 this locality. They were simple dodecahedrons in form, and were altered to chlorite superficially to the depth of -^ of an inch. Inside they are very compact, and often show two or three distinct zones of color, but are not transparent, hence not of gem value. From the fact that they occur in so soft a matrix, the crystals literally fall out of it when it is broken, and hence are generally perfect At least 5 tons of these cr>'stals have been sold to collectors and tourists for cabinets, for use as paper-weights and ornaments. They ar. "tompact enough to make them valuable for watch jewelry or f( r ornamental dishes. At Russell, Mass., a vein of garnet, very dark in color, and called there black garnet (not melonite), was opened about 1885, and many fine crystals were obtained and exchanged for minerals, or sold as specimens, to the value of over $1,000. The colophonite from Millsborough, N. Y., although of a beautifully rich, iridescent color, has never been utilized, except as a substi- tute for emery, owing to the small size of the grains and the friability of the large masses. At Franklin, Sussex County, N. J., immense crystals of the different varieties, melonite, polyadelphite, colophonite, etc., have been found, but rarely in crystals transparent enough to afford a gem. The iron-alumina garnet is found in Concord Township, at Deshong's Quarry, Shaw & Ezra's Quarry, and at Upland, near Chester ; also in Darby, Acton, Low Providence, Haverford, and Radnor Town- ships, Pa. A dark-red variety, similar to pyrope in color, is found in the bed of Darby Creek, near the Lazaretto, in Delaware County. Some peculiar garnets of a deep blood-red color have been mistaken for pyrope. Many garnets from both Chester and Delaware Counties have been cut, and some of them have proved of fine quality and rich color. The Alaska garnets, which are so well known for their remarkably perfect crystals, forming such a beautiful contrast to their dark-g^y matrix, occur in great quantities near the mouth of the Stikeen River, in the vicinity of Fort Wrangel, Alaska. They are found about one mile from the river in a bed of mica schist, and after being quarried out, are transported on the backs of men to the river, and thence by boat to Fort Wrangel. As groups of crystals, they are the finest that have been found anywhere, and 84 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 85 P u o IS a »-) b] Q O b] H I— < ;? IS H o o o u (d H 2 Q ■XllAWO ilii . 1^ •timdiM •»pi»o ouiuiuvii :8"9. ,0 05(8 p^ M . . SRSft^!? • o ;u : u 13 • ■ a ■■•3 I 2 s : :2 • 'A : :» :> O < > o •'•»»M •J .' ■) ; a : o ■•inalilf ■•pi«o J3f? ■>p»o i^8 'vafinniv 3,^ il •o ••o 1 = ft H < I— ( s • •»pi»o if? •tBimniv "8.8 « M ••pi«o '|MI|X •wins M il 35 I w 86 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES many thousands of specimens have been brought from Alaska in the past ten years. Some time ago the United States man-of- war " Corwin " visited the place, and brought away specimens, which are now in the United States National Museum. The beautiful and rare species, known as ouvarovite or chrome garnet, was first described as occurring in the United States by Prof. Charles U. Shepard, who found it in minute, nearly transparent, emerald-green crystals, tV inch in diameter, at Wood's chrome mine, Lancaster County, Pa. Ouvarovite is found in large quantities at Orford, Canada, adjoining Newport, Vt, on Lake Memphremagog, sometimes in masses measuring over I foot across. The crystals, however, are very small, rarely over tV inch in diameter, though usually of good color. The white garnet of that locality, described by Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, although not in crystals, is identical with the fine crystals found at Wakefield, Canada, and has been cut into gems. The Wakefield ouvarovite is much finer than the Orford variety. It has been described by Waldemar Lindgren as occurring in small crystals associated with a chromiferous chlorite related to kotscheubeite, from Green Valley on the American River in Cali- fornia. The crystals are of very fine color, but not transparent enough for gems.' Schorlomite, which has recently been referred to the garnet group, is really a titaniferous garnet, and occurs at Magnet Cove, Ark. It is generally penetrated by white crystals of apatite, but at times it is free from all foreign matters, and very compact, breaking with a bright conchoidal fracture. On cutting it yields a dead black stone, having a lustre not quite as metallic as that of rutile, but rather between it and black onyx. As it occurs in sufficient quantity, it is suggested as a mineral that will afford a new and fine mourning gem. Stones can be cut of any size up to perhaps about 20 carats, as the mineral is found of sufficient size. The first stone cut was over 6 carats in weight Prof. George A. Koenig, of the University of Pennsyl vania, describes a titaniferous garnet from southwestern Colorado, and also gives an analysis of so-called schorlomite from Magnet Cove, Ark., which he finds to be titaniferous garnet. * > See Proc. Cal. Acad. Sd. H., Vol. i, Dec., 1887. »Proc. Acad. Nat. Sd., Ph.il., 1886, p. 355. ■ ■i-"— ***^*''i^it:ui.i CHAPTER VI. Beryl (Emerald Aquamarine), Chrysoberyl. Phenacite, and Euclase. THE emerald and aquamarine are mineralogically in- cluded in the species of beryl. Their difference in color is due to slight traces of other compounds. They crystallize in the rhombohedral system, almost always in six-sided prisms. The specific gravity of the transparent beryl is very nearly 27, the hardness of the aquamarine being 8 and the emerald variety about 7*8. The emeralds from Muso are less hard than the aquamarine from Stberia. They are also found in Takowaja, Siberia, and at Zabara, near the Red Sea, in upper Egypt, and in Habachthal, Tyrol. This latter locality evidently furnished some of the material used in ancient Rome. The finest emeralds are found in isolated crystals and in geodes with calcite quartz, iron pyrites, and parisite, and in a clay slate rock contain- ing fossiliferous limestone concretions, at the Muso Mine, near Santa F^ de Bogota, New Grenada. Fine blue and green beryls are found in Brazil, Hindoostan, Ceylon, and in the mica schist of the right bank of the Takowaja River, Ekatharinenburg, Siberia. The emerald variety of beryl is among the most remarkable of American gem minerals. In Alexander County, N. C, emeralds, or beryls suggesting them, have been found at five different points, with quartz, rutile (some of the finest ever found), dolomite, mus- covite, garnet, apatite, pyrite, etc., all in fine crystals. One of these localities, Stony Point, is about thirty-five miles southeast 88 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and sixteen miles northeast of Statesville, N. C. The surface of the country is rolling, the alti- tude being about i,ooo feet above sea level. The soil, which is not very productive, is generally a red, gravelly clay, restilting from the decomposition of the gneissoid rock, and un ler these circumstances it is easy to find the sources of minerals discovered on the surface. Prof. Washington C. Kerr's theory of the "frost-drift" is strongly confirmed by the conditions that prevail throughout this region. The unaltered rock was found at Stony Point at a depth of 26 feet and is unusually hard, especially the walls cf the gem-bearing pockets. A corporation called the Emerald and Hiddenite Mining Company was organized to work the property at Stony Point, and has prosecuted the search for gems irregularly, for periods varying from one week to eight months of each year. The entire output, including specimens and gems, has amounted to about $15,000. The history of the discovery of the deposit and its subsequent development is best told in the words of William E. Hidden, the Superintendent. Recounting the discovery of the mine, he says:' "Sixteen years ago the site of the mine now being worked was covered with a dense primitive forest. Less than ten years ago (1871), this county was mineralogically a blank; nothing was known to exist here having any special value or interest. Whatever we know of it to-day is due directly or indirectly to the earnest field work done aere in the past seven years by J. A. D. Stephenson, a native of the county, now a well-to-do and respected merchant of Statesville, N. C. Under a promise of reward for success, he engaged the farmers for miles around to search carefully over the soil for minerals, Indian relics, etc., and for several years he enjoyed surprising success in thus gathering specimens. . . . The amount and vari- ety of the material gathered in this way was simply astonishing, and his sanguine expectations were more than realized. To be brief and to the point I will state that from a few localities in the County Mr. Stephenson would occasionally procure crystals of beryl of the ordinary kind, but now and then a semi-transparent prism of beryl, having a decided grass-green tint, would be brought ' The Disrovery of Erneralds in North Carolina, by W. E. Hidden. Privately printed, 8vo, 4 p., 1881, and also Trans. N. Y. Acad. Sci., 1882, p. 101-105. fi I Mil unwjanPMpipak^Hn PLATE 5. D A Lithia emerald. Stony Point, Alexander County, North Carolina. B Golden colored beryl, Litchfield County, Connecticut. C Crystal of aquamarine. Mount Antero, Chaffee County, Colorado. Azuriteand Malachite in concentric bands, Morenci. Arizona. [American Museum of Natural History, New York City.] Crystal of emerald, Stony Point, Alexander County, North Carolina. [Dement Collection.] Amazon stone [microcline]. Pike's Peak, Colorado. One-fifth natural size. [New York State Cabinet.] Cut aquamarine, Stoneham, Oxford County, Maine. [Dexter Collection.] H Crystal of emerald. Stony Point, Alexander County, North Carolina. [Bement Collection.] ^ 1/ ^' J'RECi' ue Kidge Mount;i Statesvjlle, N. C, The ■^oui i,o6o fe«5 not very productive, is gt- from the decomposition of on th' •-ilcs noitlbeai^ o,{ rolling, th*' aki- soil, wi: nay, resiih,-. ck, and under tht^se •"inerals discovered thecjiv of the nditions that was foand (;Orp!.)S r- :iTA.n wa^ (iiiyaii);'f;(! to \vork tiu.' p!opt.;rty a! Sl^'^'jiniloiBO out — r.dudinj^ speeinitfis and gems, has ajBttHAftfiPd' to abuui, iiBVi,vf^,,)«ipjteii;J«wif^ijoifl[.(t4,(»]/Vv twite E. nnlll6'} aSilr^ ,i)rtilD01'>i«l] onhln rid :. /m.'. ,' ' ■ ■ -iJBjfi ^-tOY •'/■»'/<1 .asis iRllJJKft I .ftoiJ-joirnD SUCCCtv ,^;-; \! ■ Plate No 5 <«f <«V"'frf»' WHt\ hv tlw S. i«iliiii- l\i Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 33, p. 505, June, 1887. '."^•••aBBpfe'*''!.*-***'**" .I wii it ii iHtH aopk- UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 91 allow the cutting of even a small gem. The beryls from Monroe, Conn., often present interrupted curvatures as shown in Fig. 2. During the last twenty years many beryls, approaching those from New Hampshire in magnitude, have been found in other localites, chiefly in Oxford County, Me., in North Carolina, and in Amelia County, Va., all of which have furnished crystals from 2 to 4 feet in length and i foot or more in diameter. Only occasionally small spaces are clear enough to afford gems. Mr. Stephenson called the attention of the writer to a crystal of dark-green beryl, weighing 25 "4 ounces, part of which would furnish gems of some size, that was found in January, 1888, near Russell Gap Road, Alexander County, N. C, by a farmer plowing. This locality is about ten miles from the Alexander County Emerald Mine, and is the largest beryl deposit affording gems that has been found in North Carolina. It is noteworthy that the highly modified beryls of this region occur rarely, and only when associated with spodumene or albite, and also that the white or pale-greenish beryls are found with the deepest green spodumene. It has before been noted that the quartz and beryl of Alexander County are more highly modified when implanted on the feldspathic layers of the walls of the pockets. Two emerald beryls, which were found in 188 1, at a depth of 34 feet, were in a little pocket, the walls of which were almost covered with crystals of albite twinned parallel to the base. Only four emeralds were found, averaging about i centimeter in the three dimensions. The pocket was free from all decomposition what- ever. The crystals were of good color, transparent, and had their commoner planes well polished, but they differed to some extent in habit' Blue beryl in fine crystals that afforded fair gems was reported by William E. Hidden from Mitchell County, near the Yancey County line, N. C. In the State cabinet in Albany, N. Y., is a curious beryl found by S. C. Hatch at Auburn, Me. It is of imperfect structure and broken diagonally across, showing the structure to advantage. (See Fig. 2.) It is 8i inches, 30 centimeters high, 8| inches, 22 ■ Am. J. Sd. in., Vol. 33, p. 505, June, 1887. no. t. BBKVL. ' H II 92 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE iti centimeters wide, and has fifty different layers, twenty-five of beryl, the remaining twenty-five of albite, quartz, and mus- covite. All the corners of the hexagonal prism are carried out in full, giving the beryl an asteriated appearance, and making it a striking and interesting specimen. Prof. Parker Cleaveland mentions' having seen several emeralds from Topsham, Me., of a lively green color, scarcely, if at all, inferior to the finest Peru- vian emeralds; also two beautiful rose-colored beryls, over I inch across, have been found at Goshen, Mass., and are in the Gibbs Cabinet at Yale University. An emerald from Haddam, Conn., deep green in color, an inch in diameter and several inches in length, is mentioned in Bruce's "Mineralogical Journal"* as belonging to Col. George Gibbs' cabinet ; but as no true emeralds from Haddam and Topsham are in existence, this may really be a dark-green beryl, as the species beryl is in that locality called emerald. In the United States National Museum, at Washington, are three beryls, one 6 carats in weight, of a light-green color, another I carat, light-blue, from Royalston, Mass., and a third and per- haps the finest specimen ever found at the Portland, Conn., quar- ries, is 15 carats in weight, and of a rich sea-blue color, almost deep enough to rival in splendor the superb 3-carat Brazilian blue- stone that is in the same case. The writer obtained at Stoneham, Oxford County, Me., two beryls, exceptional for the United States. These were found in 1881, several miles apart, and sev- eral miles from the topaz region, by farmers who were traversing pastures in the township. The first was found in two pieces, as if it had been roughly used, and broken, and discarded as worth- less, or else broken in taking from the rock and then rejected, its value not being known. This crystal measured 4! inches (120 millimeters) long, and 2-^ inches (54 millimeters) wide, and was originally about 5 inches (130 millimeters) long, and 3 inches (75 millimeters) wide. The color was rich sea-green viewed in the di- rection of the longer axis of the prism, and sea-blue of a very deep tint through the side of the crystal. In color and material, this is the finest specimen that has been found at any North I Mineralogy and Geology, by Parker Cleaveland, p. 341, Boston, 1822. ' Vol. s, p. 9, 1813. ly^mmmisti. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 93 American locality, and the crystals, unbroken, would equal the finest foreign crystals known. It furnished the finest aquamarine ever found in the United States, measuring if inches (35 milli- meters) by if inches (35 millimeters), by J inch (20 millimeters). It was cut as a brilliant and weighs 133} carats. The color is bluish-green, and, with the exception of a few hairlike internal striations, is perfect. (See Colored Plate No. 5.) In addition to this remarkable gem, the same crystal furnished over 300 carats of fine stones. The other crystal is doubly terminated, being if inches ^41 millimeters) long", and f inch (15 millimeters) in diameter. Half of it is transparent, with a faint green color, the remainder is of a milky green and only translucent Where the two colors meet, the crystal, like the Haddam beryls, has the appearance of a solution in which a flocculent precipitate has almost completely settled, leaving the upper portion nearly clear. Beryl, resembling the Siberian, is found in greenish-yellow and deep-green crystals, in the South Mountains, nine miles southwest of Morganton, Burke County ; in the Sugar Mountains at Shoup's Ford, Dietz's, Huffman's, and Hildebrand's ; and in smaller crystals in Jackson County, N. C. One fine blue-green crystal in quartz was found at Mill's Gold Mine, Burke County, and one fine transparent green crystal from that vicinity is now in the cabinet of M. T. Lynde, of Brooklyn, N. Y. Fine blue-green aquamarine occurs at Ray's Mine on Hurricane Mountain, Yancey County, N. C. Clear green beryls have been found at Balsam Gap, Buncombe County ; Carter's Mine, Madison County ; Thorn Mountain, Macon County, and at Wells, Gaston County. Some crystals 2 feet long and 7 feet in diam- eter, small pieces of which would cut into gems with small, clear spots, occur four miles south of Bakersville Creek, and still larger crystals, not of gem value, at Grassey Creek, N. C. Beautiful transparent beryls have been found at Streaked Moun- tains, Norway, Lovell, Bethell, and Franklin Plantation, Me., and very good ones also at Mount Mica and Grafton, Me. At Albany, Me., have been found beautiful transparent golden- yellow beryls that would cut into perfect gems of over 2 carats each. A fine sea-green aquamarine beryl, weighing 94 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ,f ' n ■1? about 7 carats, was found near Sumner, Me. Some very clear white stones are obtained at Pearl Hill, Fitchburg, Mass., and are there sold by the local dealers. A very fine golden- yellow beryl of 4 carats, from this locality, is in the collec- tion of Doctor Hamlin. Fine crystals of beryl, of almost emerald-green color, also beautiful yellowish-green and bluish beryls, are found in Deshong's Quarry, near Leiperville, Pa. At Shaw & Ezra's Quarry, near Chester, in Upper Providence, and in Middletown, Concord, and Marple Townships, fine specimens have been found. Fine beryls also have been found at White Horse, three or four miles below Darby, Pa. Bluish-green and blue beryls occur in the vicinity of Unionville, NewHn Township, and on Brandywine battlefield, in Birmingham Township. One crystal, of a dark tourmaline green tint, over i inch long, in the cabinet of Michael Bradley, of Chester, Pa., is from Middletown, Delaware County, and would afford a fine gem. Some of the stones here have much the appearance of bluish emeralds. The finest golden-yellow beryls are found at the Avondale Quarries, Delaware County, Pa. A 20-carat gem is in the cabinet of Mrs. M. J. Chase, of Philadelphia, and the material for another is in the cabinet of Clarence S. Bement. In 1882 B. B. Chamberlin found in Manhattan ville, New York City, six fine yellow beryls that cut into stones of i to 2 carats each. At a mica mine in Litchfield County, Conn., between Litchfield and New Milford, were found during the past four years a quantity of deep-yellow, light-yellow, yellow-green, light-green, and white beryls, which were cut into gems and extensively sold as jewelry, the former under the name of golden beryl. Several thousand dollars' worth of beryls from this locality were annually sold. These beryls were at first placed on the New York market as an entirely new stone, said to be very nearly as hard as the sap- phire, and to be from some South American locality. Prof. Eugene A. Smith, State Geologist of Alabama, obtained from Coosa County, Ala., some light, golden-yellow beryls of sufficient transparency to furnish small gems. Large masses weighing many pounds, of translucent, light sea-green beryl, were obtained at Branchville, Conn., in connection with other minerals described by Prof. George J. Brush and Prof. Edward ! H UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 95 S. Dana. These were handsome enough to furnish ornamental objects, small balls i or 2 inches in diameter, charms, etc. Aquamarine has been found in a number of localities in the United States, the principal among them being Royalston, Mass. ; Acworth, N. H. ; Grafton, Vt. ; Burke County ; Stony Point, N. C. ; Paris, Me. ; Fitchburg, Mass. ; and Avondale, Pa. The richest colored gems from any known locality have been found at Royalston, Mass. Although small, they are almost as blue as sapphire. Large, clear gems of light-blue and sea-green tint have been found at Acworth, Grafton, and Stony Point ; at the latter locality shading into beryl-emerald. The crystals of beryl found associated with phenacite on Mount Antero, Chaffee County, Col., are obtained at an altitude of from 12,000 to 14,000 feet, and vary in size from i to 4 inches in length and from tV to I inch in diameter. As crystals, they are re- markable for the fact that portions of them have been entirely dissolved or eaten away, which gives them a peculiar etched appear- ance. In a number of instances not only have the ends of the crystals entirely disap- peared, occasionally leaving long, needle-like projections, but holes have been eaten through the crystal. In color they vary from a very light-blue to quite a dark sky-blue, almost as rich as some of the finest Brazilian crystals. They would furnish gems up to 10 carats in weight, the largest one cut weighing 5 carats. A variety of blue beryl, called goshenite, occurs at Goshen, Mass., in pieces transparent enough to afford gems. Chryso- beryl occurs in orthorhombic prisms, and frequently more or less modified as shown in Fig. 3. Its hardness is 8*5, next to that of sapphire, and its specific gravity is from 3*65 to 3 "85. In color it varies from yellow or golden-yellow through brown and green, including a large series of sage-green and leaf-green, as well as rich brown. Alexandrite is the variety of chrysoberyl that is colored by chromium. It is, by natural light, of a deep leaf or olive-green color, but by candle-light appears a rasp- berry or columbine-red shade. The true cat's-eye is a variety of chrysoberyl that owes its chatoyancy to minute internal striations FIG. 3. CHRYSOBERYL. ■^WPW^ "vpPiilippiilliPiipiilll 96 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE VJJL .J (4 i 1 'i(l)AUO *isn)oj ■tiMia I:,: R P. . r* »». K P. . . Y, . « '« •*«*««'«■* 00 K m T mjo ,0^1 O n n n m Vi *« Vt ; , rvvi , m r, : '0 o :::::;: ; ; , M IN. M CI Q . . . , : ; *M '0 b b 2 : ; : .GO « M '^m H , , . , . w 00 Ct tri t%. rs , . . ; N M b b b : : : ■ •«mii»a •»pi»o •api«0 ino ■nvSntM •9PISO ; : : : : c : : : : ; : : : ^5 5" : : : : : : ; ; ; n M b : : ; ; ; : '^ ro n o V* m «i m m V ♦ w :8 r^'S'S^^ : ff : ? : ; b b b b ; b : « n : ; : t : ; b : : : : : ■ •fi • •t^.MV .u , . . n . . ro . (4 Q .J . ! :'« : :o :oS -.g : Svo »o « J- lo m 10 iftoo V'b 6> ;t3g ■ "0 .35 S o -'§* ■3 S- 111 "y * id « « ft" , y ". * ft. '\ S III h at J UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 97 of the composite crystals of which the latter is made up, or the twinning of the crystal ; or when certain minerals have been de- posited between the layers during crystallization, the stone, being cut en cabochon across these lines, exhibits the phenomenon. The stellate effect frequently produced by the twinning of chryso- beryl is shown in Fig. 4. Alexandrite was named after Alex- ander I., Czar of Russia, on whose birthday it was discovered. Large crystals that occasionally furnish gems are found in Takowaja, Siberia. Fine gems, up to 67 carats each, have been found during the last ten years in the kingdom of Kandy, Ceylon, associated with the true cat's-eye, and the yellow, brown, and green chrysoberyl. This is also found in the alexandrite variety, but it is extremely rare. Beautiful light-golden chrysoberyls (the chrysolite of the jeweler, valued at nearly as high a rate as the pia. 4. ■TKLLATH BPFF' es FRKQUEHTLV Pr.ODUCBD BY THB TWINNING OP THB CHBYSOBSRVL. diamond in the time of Louis XIV.) have been found in Brazil, also fine light-yellow cat's-eyes. Chrysoberyl, of sufficient transparency to be of gem value, is not found in North America. It has been found at Stoneham, also at Canton, Peru, Norway, and Stow, Me., but thus far not in fine specimens. Some of the small yellow crystals occurring in the fibrolite at Stoneham are, however, quite perfect in form. Small crystals occur at Canton and Stow, Me., together with large, coarse crystals. At Stow ' it has been found in masses weighing about 5 pounds each. A single distorted crystal 3 by 5 by I inches, opaque, and of a dull yellow-gray color, has also been found, which may in part furnish very poor chryso- beryl cat's-eye. Nathaniel H. Perry found one small, very perfect crystal at Tubb's Ledge, Me., and it has also been observed at < Trans. N. Y. Acad. Sci., Vol. 2, p. 64, Jan. aa, 1883. '•'"'i — mnfif" •"" 98 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ■'t'. f If il ii' ■•m II' t( Speckled Mountain, Norway, Me., by Prof. Addison E. Verrill. A crystal 3J inches long by i inch wide, from Topsham, Me., and one li inches long by i inch wide, from Buckfield, Me., are in the collection of Prof. George J. Brush, of New Haven, Conn. Rev. Frederick Merrick stated that he had collected, fifty years ago, some crystals that he believed would furnish gems, but perhaps not of the finest quality, at Haddam, Conn., the old and well-known locality now exhausted. At Greenfield, one mile north of Saratoga Springs, N. Y., now also exhausted, were found many beautiful crystals ; also in New Hampshire in gran- ite, at the deep cut of the Northern Railroad, at Orange Summit. None of these localities, however, has furnished a fine gem. The most promising localities are those in Maine, and gems, if found at all, will be likely to occur there. Haddam, Conn., has furnished CHRYSOBF.RYL Chemical Composition AN15 FsorsiiTiKS. Theoretical Composition Locality Haddam, Conn. Analyst, Damour.' Locality North America. Analyst, Thomson.* Locality Haddam, Conn. Analyst, Damour.' Locality Haldam, Conn. Analyst, Damour.< Ferrous Oxide Alumina 80-20 19-20 18-88 4'3 4-49 76-75 17-79 0-48 76-02 18-41 451 75-43 1793 4-00 Beryllia Ferric Oxide Titanic Oxide Loss on Ignition . . . 1 Typical Analysis, Rammelsberg's Mineral Chemie, p. laS. ' I'hillip's Mineralog)', i8sa, p. 368. 'f * Damour, Ann. Chim. Phys. III., 7, 173. many fine twin crystals. Among some rolled quartz pebbles sent from North Carolina for examinati jn, a transparent yellow chrysoberyl was observed, which would afford a i-carat stone. The alexandrite variety of chrysoberyl has not been observed. Phenacite crystallizes in the rhombchedral system. Its hard- ness is about 8 and its specific gravity about 3"o. It is a silicate of glucinum. The colorless, transparent variety is one of the most brilliant stones known, occasionally showing prismatic colors (or fire), by candle or artificial light. The finest large specimens known are found at Takowaja, fifty-six miles east of Ekaterinburg, in Siberia. Phenacite was first identified in the United States in 1882, when it was discovered in the Pike's Peak Region, Col.,' and more recently on Bald Mountain, North I Am. J. Sd. UL, Vol. 34, p. 383, Oct., 1883. N-Mfc, mmmsm mgnmmtr. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 99 Chatham, N. H. Both localities have furnished crystals of sufficient size and quality to be cut into fair gems. The first occurrence of this mineral in the United States was mentioned by Whitman Cross and W. F. Hillebrand,' who published a short description and figure of a crystal occurring with mica and amazon- stone in El Paso County, Pike's Peak Range, Col., where some of the largest crystals in the United States have been found. The largest and finest phenacite crystal ever found in the United States is the one in the possession of Clarence S. Bement. It is from Crystal Park, Col., and weighs 59 penny- weights and 6 grains, and measures nearly 2 inches (46*5 milli- meters) in length, and il inches (32 millimeters) in thickness. Occasional transparent spots are noticeable in it. A second locality is at Topaz Butte, near Florissant, about sixteen miles 4 riG. 5, CRYSTAL OF PHP.HACITB FROM COLORADO. from Pike's Peak. The crystals here are usually implanted on amazonstone and topaz. Many hundreds of them were found, varying in size from ^ inch to | inch (i millimeter to 20 millimeters) in diameter, of which quite a number were transparent. They are often readily detached, or occur in a brown mass believed to be fayalite. The other Colorado locality is Mount Antero, where the crystals are found at an altitude ' Am. J. Scl., III., Vol. 34', p. 383, Oct., 1882. Sec also full description of phenadtes fixiin Crystal Park and Florissant, Col., by Whitman Cross and W. F. Hillebrand in Bulletin No. 20, of the United States Geological Survey, Washington, 1 885. Phenacite from the Florissant locality was described later by William E. Hidden, Am. J. Sci , III., Vol. 29, p. 349, March, 1885. The crystals at Florissant were first found by J. G. Heistand, of Manitou, Col. See Samuel L. Penfield, Am. J. Sci., HI., Vol. 36, p. 320, Nov. 1888. I (i I; ■ *■! I 11 111 ICX5 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE of about 14,000 feet, in a region of almost perpetual snow, which is accessible for only a short period during the summer. Hun- dreds of crystals have been found attached to and implanted on quartz crystals, transparent beryl, and Baveno twin crystals of orthoclase feldspar. The largest crystal found measured over I inch across and was nearly i inch long. The crystals are nearly all quartzoids or simple rhombohedrons. (See Fig. 5.) Some have a faint wine-color and others a smoky, bluish tinge. Some smoky quartz crystals, with crystals of phenacite in the center, were observed. In May, 1888, E. A. Andrews, of Stow, Me., discovered some crystals of phenacite on Bald Mountain, North Chatham, N. H., near the State line between Maine and New Hampshire, and in the neighborhood of Stoneham, Me. They were found in a vein of coarse albitic granite,' associated with crystals of smoky quartz, topaz, and muscovite, some im- planted on smoky quartz, a few attached so loosely to the matrix by one of the rhombohedral faces that they could be re- moved without being broken. They were about fifty in number, lenticular in shape, and measured from ^ inch to ^ inch (3 milli- meters to 12 millimeters) across, and from uV inch to i inch (i millimeter to 3 millimeters) in thickness. They were all white or colorless, with polished faces, and for the most part very sim- ple inform. The series from Pike's Peak, Col., has been described by Prof. Samuel L. Penfield." Few of the phenacites found in the United States have been cut into gems, but several thousand dollars' worth have been sold as mineralogical specimens, and now adorn the cabinets of the world. Mention is made of euclase in the United States as follows : Several crystals were reported as having been found at Mills' :* Spring, Polk County, N. C, by Gen. Thomas L. Clingman, in washing the gold sand at this locality, but Prof. Frederick A. Genth says' that they were not euclase. It was also mentioned as having been found in connection with topaz at Trumbull, Conn., but this report proved incorrect.* With the full series of glucinum found in this country, it is not unlikely that euclase I Am. J. Sci. in., Vol. 27, p. 312, March, 1884. » Am. J. Sd. III., Vol. 33, p. 131, Feb., 1887. ' MineraU and Mineral Localities of North Carolina, p. 54, 1881. > * Am. J. Sd. I., Vol. 43, p. 366, July, 184a. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO lOI will soon be reported. It has been found in magnificent crys- tals at Villa Rica, Brazil, S. A., but it is of extremely rare occur- rence, is highly cleavable, and is scarcely known except to mineralogists. The peridot of the jeweler, which is the chrysolite or olivine of the mineralogist, is found in abundance and of a good quality, in the form of small, olive-green, pitted grains or pebbles associ- ated with garnet, in the sands of Arizona and New Mexico. Locally they are called Job's tears on account of their pitted ap- pearance. This material affords smaller gems than those coming from the Levant, and as the demand seems to be for the large peridots of the richer olive-green color, which is not possessed by those from the United States, only a small number of the peri- PHENACITE Chbmicai. Composition and Proprrtibs. Silica Beryllia Soda Lithia Water Color Specific Gravity. Theoretical Composition, 54-25 4575 Locality. Topaz Butte, Floduant, Col. Analyst, Speny.' 54-46 45-57 0'2t Trace 0*26 Clear— Colorless. 2"966-2-9S7 LOCALITV. Topai Butte, Florissant, CoL Analyst, Penfield.* 54-42 45-60 Clear— Colorless. 2-966-2-957 >, > S. L. Penfield and E. S. Sperry, Am. J. Set, Nov., 1888, p. 3aa dots found in the West have been cut into gems. Many of the so-called " emeralds " in European church treasuries, notably those of the " Three Magi " in the Cathedral of Cologne, are peridots and not emeralds, but the locality whence they were taken is now unknown. All the peridots that are sold in modern times are taken out of jewelry which is often two centuries old. The chrysolite of the French jewelers is chrysoberyl. From the meteoric iron that was found on Glorietta Mountain, Santa F^ County, N. M., in 1885, the writer' obtained some peridots of I carat in weight, that were transparent and yellowish-green in color. The meteorite that was found on Glorietta Mountain, Santa F^ County, N. M., and the one found at Eagle Station, Carroll County, Ky., is believed to be identical with the piece, « Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 3a, p. 311, Oct., 1886. •^ssmiSS^:s3i'S[T:s ^ sifu mu.'-. SB Ik >M r'w i I'l ■'! 1 H VU 111 In - 102 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE H t— I o > oi ■XllAUO •iWA •»P1«0 Diuwix *«)S3UXlW •auin •»P|iO sno -u«2u«w •»P1"0 •3^30 .a |o ^5 :8 iidu h I ^ : :« : : :S• : : : o «85 1 99>^% 7 "8 o 8 :J~2 b ; o " 8 8 n rt g Mi •»pi«o •»P!«0 •»P!«0 . - ■ .* a o : o C it u • • 8! C & : : o •'PIXO 3MJtm U?.:^ :■». & poo OC ^ %%^% ^ 9 o 3aB ": s u u V S V .. I i> 2 a c "3 o I I li " a. "i ""a Hi 1. «l riji ii^ 1-^s ^'^. i ojAui -;k w UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 103 now in the meteorite collection at Harvard University, that was found on the altar of one of the Altar Mounds in the Little Miami Valley, Ohio, by Prof. Frederick W. Putnam. Both of these meteorites contained clear crystals of olivine that would cut into gems of over i carat each, so that these may be truly called " ce- lestial precious stones." The gem stone called zircon is sometimes known as jargon or jargoon, jacinth or the true hyacinth. Its hardness is about 7*5, and its specific gravity is generally 47, although it is vari- able, ranging from 4'i to 4"g. It is a silicate of zirconium, con- taining zirconium oxide sixty-seven parts, and silica thirty-three parts. It has a large range of color owing to its high dispersive power, and exhibits more " fire " than any other known gem ex- cept the diamond. The finest gem stones come from Ceylon, Mud- gee, and New South Wales. Those from Expailly in Auvergne, France, are exceedingly small and are of true hyacinth color. Zircon has not often been found in the United States in pieces sufficiently clear to warrant cutting. Some very small crystals of good color have been found in Burke County, N. C, and the terminations of the zircons from St. Lawrence County, N. Y., might be cut into very small gems of i carat or less in weight. Near the Pike's Peak toll-road, almost due west from the Cheyenne Mountains, following a vein-like mass of white quartz in granite, is found a very interesting form of zircon. The crystals are either in the quartz or in a soft yellow material, and are generally a deep reddish-brown, pink, or pale honey-yel- low, and T. Whitman Cross mentions a few small crystals of deep emerald-green color. The crystals are all pyramidal, having very little or no prism. The largest observed were about i inch, but generally they are not more than iV to ^ inch in length, and would only cut into minute gems. As crystals, however, these are perhaps the most beautiful known, owing to their transparency, brilliancy, and perfection.' Some white and color- less crystals sent from this locality were found to be the result of heating, which destroyed the natural color. Ceylon zircons treated in this way were formerly used for incrusting watches, which were then sold as diamond-incrusted, so greatly did this > Am. J. Sci. III., Vol. 24, p. 285, Oct., 1882. 'I I '. i r MWWWM .^.^ijL,,-jnjg; '!' 1 i i I 1 ■ 1 ill ■ 104 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE variety resemble the diamond. An opaque variety of zircon is found in several localities in the Pike's Peak District, in one instance associated with amazonstone, and in another with astrophyllite, also with flesh-colored microline. No mate- rial that would cut into gems has been found at any of these localities. In North Carolina zircon is abundant in the gold sands of Polk, Burke, McDowell, Rutherford, and Caldwell Counties, in nearly all the colors peculiar to Ceylon — yellowish- brown, brownish-white, amethystine, pink, and blue. The crys- tals are beautifully modified, but too minute to be of any value. Brown and brownish-yellow crystals, very perfect in form, occur abundantly in Henderson County, N. C, and in equal abun- dance in Anderson County, S. C. The latter are readily dis- tinguished from the North Carolina crystals, as they are generally larger, often an inch across, and the prism is almost always very small, the crystal frequently being made up of the two pyramids only. Fine crystals of zircon have been found in Lower Saucon Township, Northampton County, Pa., three-fourths of a mile north of Bethlehem. The gravels of the Delaware and Schuyl- kill Rivers contain considerable quantities of very minute, nearly colorless, crystals of zircon. Some fine ones, over an inch in length, have been found at Litchfield, Me., and all through the cancrinite and sodalite rocks near that place. In the Canfield Cabinet at Dover, N. J., there are some of the finest known black zircon crystals, over an inch long, that were found near Frank- lin, N. J. Opaque green zircons in crystals an inch long and a half-inch across have been found by C. D. Nimms in the town of Fine, St. Lawrence County, N. Y. They were remark- able mineralogical specimens, but of no gem value. One found by Dr. Samuel L. Penfield, now in the United States National Museum, is nearly 4 inches long and doubly terminated. Dur- ing 1886, the demand for minerals containing the rare earths, zirconia, thoria, glucina, etc., greatly increased, as they were then wanted to furnish the mantles or hoods of incandescent gas- burners. This demand led at once to active search by collect- ors and mineral-dealers in England, Germany, France, Russia, Norway, and Brazil, and especially in the United States. So thorough and successful has this search been that many minerals UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO los which were then considered rare are now so plentiful that they are quoted at one-tenth to one-hundredth of their former prices. The best zircon locality in North Carolina is on the old Mere- dith Freeman Estate, Green River, Henderson County. It was leased for twenty-five years by Gen. Thomas L. Clingman of that State, who, as early as 1869, mined i,0(X) pounds of zircon, and during that whole period never lost faith in the incandescent properties of zirconia ; but when these were proved and acknowl- edged, through some legal difficulties General Clingman had for- feited his leases, and hence failed to reap his reward. The Henderson County, N. C, and Anderson County, S. C, zircon ZIRCON Chemical Composition AND Propertiks. .Theoretical Composition Locality, Litchfield, Me. Analyst, W. G!bbs.« Locality, Reading, Pa. Analyst, C. M. WethereU.« LOCALITV, Buncombe Co., N. C. Analyst, C. F. Chandler.* Locality, ElPasoCo., CoL A nalyat, G. A. KbenW.* Silica Zirconia Ferric Oxide Magnesia 2300 6700 35-29 6333 , 079 34-07 6350 2-02 • ■ 0-50 Chocolate. 4-595 3370 65-30 067 041 4-607 2970 60-98 9-20 0-30 Iron Black. 4-538 Water Color Specitic Gravity... ' W. Gibbs, Ann. der Phys. Pogg., 71, 559. • C. M. Wetherill, Trans. Am. Phil. Soc. 10, 346. Am. J. Sci. 11., 15, 443. " C. F. Chandler, Am. J. Sci. II., ai, 131. * G. A, Koenig, Trans. Am. Phil. Soc. 16, 518, 1877. is found in large quantities, loose in the soil, as the result of the decomposition of a feldspathic rock. The crystals are generally remarkable for their perfection, are distinct in each locality, and weigh occasionally several ounces. The recent demand has also brought to light the existence of enormous quantities of zircon in the Ural Mountains and in Norway. Though very large crystals, some weighing 1 5 pounds, have been found in Canada (Renfrew and the adjoining counties), they are so isolated that it would be impossible to obtain a supply there. The new demand has brought together more than 25 tons of zircon ; and this min- eral may prove of considerable value, for the earth it contains can be used as a refractory material for crucibles and furnaces. As new processes have cheapened and made available aluminum and magnesium, so zirconium may yet be called into use. TTriwi .«! CHAPTER VII. m) I'' The Quartz Group: — Rock Crystal, Transparent Quartz, Amethyst, Smoky Quartz, Cairngorm Stone, Gold Quartz, Rose Quartz, Novaculite, Silicified Coral, Quartzite, Quartz Inclusions, Thetis Hairstone, Agate, Jasper, Silicified Wood, Opal, Hydrophane, etc. TH E quartz group consists of a large series of substances, which to the eye are very unlike each other, and pass under a great variety of names, but they are all chemically of one substance, namely, silica. The vari- ous colors are evidently due to the presence of metallic oxides, principally manganese or iron. Quartz may be divided into two groups, crystalline and cryptocrystalline. The former crystallizes in the rhombohedral system, generally as six-sided prisms, with a hardness of 7 and a specific gravity for the colorless of 2*65, the specific gravity of cairngorm and the amethyst being slightly higher. Following is a list of the crystalline varieties : Amethyst. — Deep purple, bluish violet fading almost into pink. AsTERiATED Star-Quartz. — Containing between layers of the crystals a deposition of substances, so that when cut en cabo- chon across the prism it exhibits asterism. AvENTURiNE. — Transparent to opaque, either red or yellow, with iridescent spangles of mica distributed through it. Cairngorm. — Transparent, smoky gray, yellow, yellowish brown, and brown. 106 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES 107 Cat's-eye. — Translucent, gray or greenish, chatoyant when cut en cabochon, an effect due to fibres of asbestus or actin- olite. Hyaline. — Opalescent white, due to admixture of chalce- dony. Milk Quartz. — Opalescent, milky white, sometimes yellow by transmitted light Morion. — Deep black, almost opaque. Prase. — Translucent, leek-green, deep green. Rock Crystal. — Transparent and colorless. Rose Quartz. — Rose red or pink, sometimes opalescent. Sapphirine Quartz or Siderite. — Translucent and grayish blue, indigo, and Berlin blue color. Sagenite. — Penetrated with acicular crystals of other mine- rals, generally rutile, tourmaline, gdthite, stibnite, asbestus, acti- nolite, hornblende, epidote, etc. Smoky Quartz. — Transparent, and various shades of gray and brown. False Topaz, Scotch, Saxon, or Spanish Topaz. — Trans- parent yellow or light brown, generally the result of decoloriza- tion by heat. The cryptocrystalline varieties are : Agate Chalcedony. — Jasper or rock crystal, mottled or in layers ; when irregular, called fortification agate ; when banded, banded agate. Agate Jasper. — A variety of agate containing jasper. Basanite, Lydian Stone, or Touchstone. — A velvet-black siliceous stone, or flinty jasper, used by the jewelers for trying the purity of precious metals. Beekite. — Silicified corals, shells, or limestones, resembling chalcedony. Bloodstone. — Jasper, translucent to opaque, green with red spots. Chalcedony. — Clouded or translucent, white, yellow, brown, or blue. Chrysoprase. — Translucent, pale bluish-green or yellow- green. Carnelian. — Translucent like horn, yellow, brown, or red. -mmmam ^ io8 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ! f ill fil Egyptian Jasper. — Opaque, concentric, with other layers of brown, yellow, or black. Heliotrope. — With base of chalcedony colored with green delessite, red spots of iron oxide. Jasper. — Impure, opaque-colored quartz, red, yellow, brown, or gray-blue, called ribbon jasper when striped. Onyx. — Like agate, but consisting of distinct, even layers, so that it can be used in cutting cameos. Plasma. — Bright green, leaf-green, and almost emerald-green, very translucent. Porcelain Jasper. — Different from true jasper in being vis- ible gray, white, and pink. Sard. — Translucent, red, brownish red, crimson, blue-red and blackish red, golden and amber. Sard Onyx. — Like onyx, but having a stratum or several strata of sard. A remarkable mass of rock crystal, weighing 51 pounds, was sent, in 1886, to Tiffany & Co., New York. It pur- ported to be from Cave City, Va., but as it subsequently proved was found in the mountainous part of Ash County, N. C The original crystal, which must have weighed 300 pounds, was unfortunately broken in pieces by the ignorant mountain girl who found it, but the fragment sent to New York was sufficiently large to admit of being cut into slabs 8 inches square and from half an inch to an inch thick. The original crystal, if it had not been broken, would have fur- nished an almost perfect ball 4J or 5 inches in diameter. A visit to the locality by the author showed that this specimen had been found near Long Shoal Creek, on a spur of Phoenix Mountain in Chestnut Hill Township. There have also been found at two places, 600 feet apart (about one mile from the for- mer locality), two crystals, one weighing 285 pounds, that was 29 inches long, 18 inches wide, 13 inches thi.k, showing one pyra- midal termination entirely perfect and the other partly so ; also another specimen that weighed 188 pounds. These crystals were all found in decomposed crystalline rocks consisting of a ' Proc. Am. Ass'n Adv. Sd., Vol. 35, p. 329, 1886. •i UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 109 coarse feldspathic granite, and were obtained either by digging where one crystal had been found, or by driving a plough through the soil. Altogether, there have been found in this vicinity several dozen crystals, weighing from 20 to 300 pounds each, and future working will undoubtedly bring more to light. These large crystals are often very irreg^ular and pitted, like many of the crystals of quartz from St. Gothard. Of those found, the most irregular was 20J pounds in weight, with the entire surface rough and opaque like ground glass, and almost spherical in form but perfectly transparent. In a few instances, they had a coating of rich, green-colored chlorite that penetrated to the depth of an inch. This was left on the quartz, and it gave the cut object, after polishing, the eficct of a pool of water with green moss growing on the bottom. A large piece weighing 1 1 pounds, brought from Alaska in 1884, originally formed a part of a mass that must have weighed 44 pounds. It afforded clear crystal slabs for hand-glasses, 3 by 5 inches. The superiority of this mineral over glass lies in the fact that it does not, like glass, detract from the rosiness of the complexion, as is well shown in the fine mirror of this substance in the green vaults at Dresden, Saxony. Transpart it crystallized quartz is found in many places in the United Statt At Lake George, in Herkimer County, and throughout the a acent re^nons in New York State, the cal- ciferous sandstone com. ins single crystals, and at times large cavities are found filled with doubly terminated crystals often of remarkable perfection and brilliancy. These are collected in numbers, and both natural and uncut specimens are mounted in jewelry and sold to tourists under the name of " Lake George Diamonds." Those sold in large cities under this name are, in nearly every instance, the so-called "paste," a lead glass which has more brilliancy and fire but does not have the same dur- ability as the quartz. Of the Herkimer crystals, possibly $1,000 worth are sold yearly. On account of their remarkable brilliancy and perfect crystallization, rivaling even those found in the cav- ities of the Carrara marble, many collections of them have been made, notably one by Rev. Bogert Walker, formerly of Herki- mer, N. Y. There are collections at Middleville, Little Falls, and Canajoharie, and very fine ones in the State Museum at ■•"•■■■■■"iHlMVNmHIMHi ;■ ! ( ► ;J . 1 '■ 4 ' i' * no GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Iff I Albany, and Smith College at Northampton, Mass. These nat- ural crystals are extensively sold along the railway, a two-ounce vial containing about 500 usually costing from fifty cents to $2. A specimen with a drop enclosed often commands from fifty cents to $30, and a single fine limpid crystal from ten cents to $25. Many of these crystals are whiter than any diamond and fre- quently as brilliant and transparent. They are often so small that in an ounce will be contained over 7,500 crystals, all perfect and doubly terminated. Curious groupings or inclusions, of great beauty, such as bitumen, pearl spar, and other substances, are eagerly sought for by cr Hectors. Many fine specimens were obtained at Middleville, Newport, and Little Falls, N. Y., when the West Shore Railroad was opened. The old diggings at Lit- tle F'alls have been worked so extensively from time to time that the roadway has been encroached upon, and to such a degree that further search has been rendered almost impossible. The mode of procedure was to tap the rock until a hollow sound indi- cated a cavity, and within these cavities the crystals were found, sometimes few in number, sometimes as many as a bushel. At Diamond Point and Diamond Island, Lake George, N. Y., crys- tals occur similar to those found in Herkimer County, and they have been extensively sold during the last forty years. At Crys- tal Mountain, Ark., and in the region around Hot Springs for about forty miles, large veins of quartz are frequently met with in a red sandstone. The exact geological horizon of the Arkan- sas quartz ha" not yet been accurately defined. The crystals are common in the millstone grit and in the underlying rock, occa- sionally the lower strata and also the millstone grit coming through the beds anywhere between the layer of carboniferous and the Cambrian. In some cases, detached crystals are found in beds of sandstone or quartzite, and again in quartz veins that traverse both the layers of the carboniferous and the underlying beds. They are often found in cavern-like openings, in one of which, a cavity 30 feet long and 6 feet high, were found several tons of crystals, the sides of the cavity being completely cov- ered with them. (See Illustration.) Wagon-loads of these crystals are taken to Hot Springs and Little Rock by the farmers, who often do considerable blasting to secure them, and TRANSPARENT QUARTZ KRCIM (KVS1AI. MllUNTAIN, <;/iKl.ANl) ( 111 NTV, ARK. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO III who search for them when their crops do not need attention. They are sold by the local dealers, principally as mementoes. Probably a hundred wagon-loads have been bought by visitors at these and other resorts. Usually only half of the crystal is clear, and a clear space over two inches square is quite uncommon. The sale of uncut crystals from this region amounts to fully $10,000 per annum. At Hot Springs, Ark., clear rolled pebbles, that are found on the banks of the Washita River, are often sold and are more highly prized than the crystals, because of tbj mistaken belief that they will cut into clearer gems. The great demand for these pebbles, which are scarce, has so excited the cupidity of some of the in- habitants of the vicinity that they have learned to produce rolled pebbles by putting numbers of the crystals in a box, which is kept revolving for a few days by water-power. Any expert, how- ever, can discern the difference, since the artificial ones are a lit- tle whiter on the surface. Many localities in Colorado yield fine specimens of quartz, and all along the Atlantic coast at Long Branch, Atlantic City, Cape May, and other places, transparent pebbles are found in the sand, and are much sought after by visi- tors, who often have them cut as souvenirs. At Narragansett Pier, R. I., some of the local lapidaries have been known to sub- stitute for pebbles found on the beach, foreign cut quartz, cairn- gorm, topaz, crocidolite, moonstone from Ceylon, and even glass. At all of these resorts large quantities of the quartz pebbles are cut in gems and seals, and all manner of ornaments are sold as having been found in the vicinity. Sometimes even the stones that have been found by the visitors, and intrusted to lapidaries to be cut, are exchanged for cut stones, brought to this country from Bohemia, Oldenburg, and the Jura, where cutting is done on such a large scale and by labor so poorly paid that the cut stones can be delivered in this country at one-tenth of the price of cut- ting here, as the rock crystal in the articles themselves has but little value. The annual proceeds of the sale of cut stones and the money expended in cutting them at these different localities may amount to $20,000 or more a year, and the sale of specimens to as much more. The clear crystal used in the United States for optical purposes is almost entirely Brazilian, not on account of any defici- --TOTi-trTJ 112 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE r h : ency in the quality of that found in this country, but because of the cheapness of the Brazilian crystal. Cut spectacle-glasses can be imported for less than the cutting costs here. Some of the most magnificent groups of quartz ever found were formerly ob- tained at the Ellenville Lead Mines^ Ulster County, N Y., and some of the finest of these, by gift of Jackson Steward, are now in the Museum of Natural History, New York City. Few, if any, were cut into gems or used in the arts, although man} were sold in the vicinity as souvenirs. The Sterling Mine at Antwerp, N. Y., furnishes ^mall, fine, doubly terminated dodecahedral crystals, and the same forms, with some slight differences, are found in the specular iron at Fowler, Hermon, and Edwards, St. Lawrence County. Diamond Hill, Lansingburgh, N. Y., is an old but poor locality, and Diamond Island, Portland Harbor, Me., is well known for the small but bright crystals found there. The highly modified crystals from Diamond Hill and Cumberland Hill, R. L, also the fine ones from White Plains, in Surrey County, N. C, and Stony Point, Alexander County, and from Catawba and Burke Counties, N. C, are worthy of mention as having formed the subject of the crystallographic memoirs by Dr. Gerhard von Rath." Prof. Frederick A. Genth mentions the finding of fine specimens in Delaware and Chester Counties, Pa., especially in East Bradford anu Pocopson Townships. Rock crystal seems to have been valued by the Indians of the American continent. Dr. Daniel G. Britton, in a paper on the folk lore of Yucatan, quoting Garcia, says that the natives prac- tised witchcraft and sorcery, their wise men divining by means of a rock crystal, which was believed to exert great influence over the crops. The presence of crystals with abraded edges in the mounds of Arkansas, North Carolina, and elsewhere, would lead to the inference that they were not only collected to bury with the dead, but were worn as charms and talismans, and having been used for such purposes, were probably interred with the dead as their property. Personal observation in Garland and Montgomery Counties, Ark., forty miles from the Crystal Moun- tain locality, showed that these quartz crystals were found in mounds, with a quantity of some of the smallest, finely-chipped ' See Naturwissenschaftliclien Verein, Westphalia. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO "3 arrow-points of chalcedony, yet not a single object made of chipped crystal was found. In a number of the mounds leveled by the farmers in cultivating, and not examined systematically, single crystals of quartz were revealed, which may, however, have been kept for their beauty and symmetry by the Indians. The report of the finding at Bakersville, N. C., of transparent crystals of quartz, weighing 642 pounds and 340 pounds respec- tively, was premature, what was found proving to be, not crys- tals, but veins of translucent quartzite, with the crystalline mark- ings of a group rather than of a single crystal. The clear spaces, which were to be observed only on these crystalline sides, would hardly afford material for a crystal ball an inch in diameter, and with this exception thej' were almost an opaque white, with flaws. Specimens of rutilated quartz and of rock crystal, one mass of which weighed over 10 pounds, and was quite clear, though frac- tured by frosts, were found near Stuart, Va. Near Trinidad, Col., there have been found large quantities of crystalline quartz, with small, doubly terminated crystals, resembling those from Herkimer County, N. Y. Some of these crystals afford larger masses of clear rock crystal than have ever before been found in the United States, and suggest its use for art objects, such as the crystal balls, clock-cases, mirrors, etc., which are now to be seen in the Austrian Treasury at Vienna. In Alexan- der and Burke Counties, N. C, crystals of white as well as of smoky quartz have been found, in which were spaces that would cut into clear crystal balls of from 2 to 2i inches. One of these from Alexander County, measuring 2^ inches, is in the State Museum of Natural History at Albany, N. Y. A very inter- esting bead made of rock crystal, fluted and drilled from both ends, is in the collection of A. E. Douglas, in New York City. It is evidently native work, as it is improbable that foreign traders would use white rock crystal beads, when glass would answer the purpose as well. Amethyst is found on Deer Hill, at Stow, Me., where there is a vein of amethystine quartz which has been traced fully one- quarter of a mile, and has furnished many thousands of crystals during the last twenty years, scarcely any of them, however, being of any gem value ; but among some amethysts found dur- 114 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE i\ I ing 1885 was one remarkable mass that yielded a gem weighing 25 carats, of the deep purple color of the Siberian amethyst. (See Colored Plate No. 6.) Some fine amethysts have been found at Mount Crawford, Surry, Waterville, and Westmore- land, N H. At Burrillville, and at Bristol, on Mount Hope Bay, R. I., fine amethysts were found, and used as ornaments, over sixty years ago. J. Adams says' that some were taken from a quartz vein in a coarse granite, and others were found in the sand at the foot of the hill at low tide. An amethyst nearly equal in color to the finest Siberian, and that would afford a gem nearly i inch across, was found a mile and a half from Roaring Brook, near Cheshire, Conn. When the West Shore Railroad tunnel at Weehawken, N. J., was being blasted out, there were found a few very fair specimens of amethyst on the trap rock. The finest one of these is in the State Museum at Albany, N. Y. Professor Genth " mentions magnificent specimens from Delaware and Chester Counties, Pa. Some of the principal localities are the townships of East Bradford, Pocopson, Birmingham, Charles- town (where about a quart of loose crystals was obtained), and Newlin (where about 100 pounds have been found, but none of it of gem value). W. W. Jefferies' announced that amethysts of a rich purple color had been found in the northern part of New- lin Township. Crystals, of fine quality, though not affording gem material, one weighing 7 pounds, have been found in Upper Providence. Amethysts of large size, and with very perfect single crystals, well adapted for cutting, were found here in a vein of oxide of manganese and solid walls of sand- stone, quartz, and quartzite, often extending to a depth of over 25 feet. The finest, perhaps, of the crystals of this locality, was found in November, 1887. (See Colored Plate No. 6.) In these gems the purple coloring is unevenly distributed in the crystals, as in the case of the Siberian amethysts, both of which, when properly cut, disseminate the color in an unevenly tinted ame- thyst, making a rich royal purple tint equal to that of any known gem. As a precious stone the large crystal has little value, but > Am. J. Sci. I., Vol. 8, p. 199, Aug., 1824. ' Preliminary Report on the Mineralogy of Pennsylvania, p. 37- ' Proc. Acad, of Nat Sd., Phil., Mineralogical Section, p. 44. PLATE 6. A B Cut amethyst. Deer Hill. Stow. Maine. C Group of amethyst crystals. Upper Providence ToM-nship Delaware County, Pennsylvania. [American Museum of Natural History, New York City.] I atm i ! elded a gtai weigliing ing: iSSs was ofte remark r»^^ ;■ 5 carats, of the deep j . (See Colored Plate Ne. 6 found at Motmt Crawi larui, N. H. At Uurr< liny, R, f., fuui Amcthyj. i>vf;r -.ixtr ^ ' lys a^jo. from Jf ^'cia ifl a ; tJte santt at ihe foot of t' equal in color to the (in- nearly f inch across, \i.vs touifU Brook, nt;rir Choshiro, C'- ' \V ;•..,., , . tunnel at Wechav,'ken, . , , was bemg I . . found a few very fair fipecimetr^ of amefhy'^r The finest one of r.hese is ig %*t^^'f/f; M-. 'Professor Genth * nsentsona magnih and C hv^u^ r Count ic's, 1(%W .-.M^.^M vnuv. vtow'<«-|i«i^ ;t A.Jitifs are di* to'v.!ua¥(w«^i>T ^wli)V{«H,.T*tp,jjvU^«^33 sw^iJiamiite ^|m^ju3\ Charles- i^horc a^u^' '.^ir^ -t'-^.^-^^Hi ...».^jo , . ^^^ ^^^^^^^^ ^^ ^ niiVi iii '-ifTii port fff Nt*w-i tie Siljerian amethyst amethyst.'j have been iviiJe, afttl Westmor.. I on Motint Hope V as (Amaments, i«e w^jre taken ■- 'r->-f- fM^.nid m ■irly were >elHWare - 'i us in Use - properiy > i ' thysi, niakiii. gear. A a a j- A>ji • found t> vt-iuit waii.s of sand- ■^g t^» a depth of over , > : r,,,,ilb of this locality, was { m-ed Plate No. 6,) in these i'* v,ni:'-'i::n\y distributed in the cryst;ds. i ihv '-^\hii.,\n dinelhysts. both oi which, when ■.^■'U\'.\.t-(i tho folor jn an untvenly tinu-d ame- ). ir%;d purp(f. tint f'i]u;il to thai of any knov-'cs '-.■ ^1 'HO thf lar^re cryUul has little vain*;. IhA- -Ha- •^ior'hM H'ri'iiiT-.'rifTi Krjx'il i:>n (tic Shwn-il'-njj oi V'^.insylv.TL'.i, p, j;. Vt A'i'i;- n-, p. ire .nd of '!;(: UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO "5 as a crystal it is quite unique. Amethysts have also been found in Astor, Concord, Marple, and Middletown Townships. In Birmingham, in one locality, they are found in clusters; in another, in fine isolated crystals. At Chester and Thornbury, Delaware County, Pa., also, many fine gems have been found by collectors. Perhaps the most unique gem of the collection of the United States National Museum at Washing^ton is a piece of an amethyst found at Webster, N. C, and deposited by Dr. H. S. Lucas. The present form is just such as would be made by a lapidary in roughly shaping a stone, preliminary to cutting and polishing it. It was turtle-shaped when found, which shape was unfortunately destroyed by chipping, and was said to have borne marks of the handiwork of prehistoric man. It now measures 3f inches (7 centimetres) in length, af inches (6 centimetres) in width, li inches (4 centimetres) in thickness, and weighs 4} ounces (135*5 grams). It is perfectly transparent, slightly smoky, and pale at one end, and also has a smoky streak in the center. This coloring is peculiar to the amethyst, however. In Haywood County, N. C, were found quite a number of crystals of ame- thyst which were cut into very fine gems. Amethysts of a light purple and sometimes of a pink color are found in abundance, in crystals 3 inches long and over, at Clayton, Rabun County, Ga. At times these have large liquid cavities containing movable bubbles of gas. They are of little gem value, although fine as specimens. At the Lake Superior watering-places there are sold many fine groups of amethyst from Prince Arthur's Landing, Lake Superior. These groups are generally composed of crys- tals from i inch to 5 inches in size, the groups ranging from a few inches to several feet. Lake Superior crystals have one pe- culiarity : they are spotted with the red, moss-like markings so well known, giving the moss amethyst effect if cut, though as a rule the coating is so even as to cover the entire surface, noth- ing but a brick-red color being visible unless the crystals are broken. Notwithstanding its abundance, but few gems could be cut from the mineral in this locality. Hoffmann mentions the finding of amethyst on the mesa near the mouth of the Rio Vir- gin, Nev. In Llano and Burnet Counties, Tex., some very fair amethysts have been found ; and also at Grand Rapids, Wood rCT ■;^S5!BS ■Jf'" ii6 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE County, Wis., in the amygdaloid on the Lake Superior shore, and in trap rock at Keweenaw Point and elsewhere in the upper peninsula. At Amethyst Mountain, in the Yellow- stone National Park, and at Holbrook, Ariz., amethyst varying in color from light pink to dark purple lines the hollow trunks of agatized trees, and forms a beautiful contrast with the pale chalcedony and banded agate sides of the tree-trunks. It is also found in small crystals at Nevada and neighboring localities on Bear Creek, and on the summit of the range east of the Animas, Col. Smoky quartz, also known as smoky topaz or cairngorm, and citrine are found in large quantities at and near Pike's Peak, Col. ; also, to some extent, at Mount Anteros Summit, Col., Magnet Cove, Ark., Burke and Alexander Counties, N. C, and at other points. At Pike's Peak, Col., it occurs in pockets in a coarse, plegmatic granite, often associated with beautiful crystals of amazonstonc and flesh-colored and other feldspars. The larg- est crystal that has as yet been found, measuring over 4 feet in length, is in the cabinet of the Marquis of Ailsa. A doubly ter- minated crystal 13 inches long and over 5 inches in diameter, which would furnish a 5-inch ball, is in the Kunz Collection in the State Museum at Albany, N. Y. The Pike's Peak material is sent abroad in large quantities to be cut, and the larger part is returned to be sold in tourists' jewelry, principally at Denver and Colorado Springs, Col., Hot Springs, Ark., and in other Western cities and summer resorts. The sum realized from the cut mate- rial amounts to about $7,500 annually, and that from the crystals sold to $2,500 more. Most of the cut articles of smoky quartz sold at the tourist resorts are of foreign material, or of material found in the United States and cut abroad. Smoky quartz peb- bles are occasionally found along the coast of Long Branch, Cape May, and cut as souvenirs. Crystals of smoky quartz, a foot • length, are frequently found at Sterling, Mont. Of these, markably fine specimen was presented by J. E. Davi inet of the California State Mining Bureau, in Sai ancist The quartz of Herkimer County, N. Y., and Diamond Island and Diamond Point, Lake George, are occasionally found i a variety of beautiful smoky tints which are exceptionally trans- ms* UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 117 parent. Fine smoky quartz has been found at Goshen, Mass. In 1884, a fine, clear mass, weighing over 6 pounds, with clear spaces several inches across, was found on Blueberry Hill, Stoneham, Me., and a broken crystal that weighed over 100 pounds and a crystal over 4 inches long and 2 across, very clear in parts, were found near Mount Pleasant, Oxford County, Me., and a fine crystal at Minot, Me. Professor Genth' mentioned the occurrence of smoky quartz near Philadelphia; on the Schuylkill, near Reading, Berks County; near Hummelstown, Dauphin County; in Upper Darby, near Garret's road toll-gate, and near the Kellyville school- house, all in Delaware County ; at the tunnel near Phoenixville, in East Nottingham and Birmingham Townships, Chester County. In certain parts of Delaware and Chester Counties the amethyst and smoky quartz gradually shade into each other, a character- istic peculiar also to many specimens from North Carolina. Some fine crystals have been found at Iron Mountain, Mo., and Mag- net Cove, Ark. Citrine is mentioned by Hoflfmann* as occur- ring at Tuscarora, Gold Mountain, and in Palmetto Cafion, Nev. At Taylorsville and Stony Point, N. C, a number of clear pieces of this material were found that cut fair stones weighing over an ounce each. In Alexander, Burke, Catawba, and adja- cent counties, N. C, smoky quartz crystals which would afford fine gems are frequently met with. They are generally from i to 5 inches in diameter, and often of a citron or light yellow color. When clear, compact, white quartz contains veins, or streaks, or spots of fine gold, it is worked into jewelry and souvenirs on a considerable scale in San Francisco, and to a less extent in many of the large towns in the mining regions. Some of the mines in California, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana have furnished very fine specimens, especially when the quartz is clear and the gold penetrates in compact stringers. Gold miners, however, often have a prejudice against what are known as " specimen mines," that is, mines furnishing ore of this kind. The gold found in Calitornia quartz is worth about $16.50 an ounce, but jewelers willingly give from $20 to $30 for each ounce of gold contained in material that they can use. The price of specimens ' Preliminary Rqiort on the Mineralogy of Pennsylvania, p. 58. ' Mineralogy of Nevada. u •*rr-~T>tl ti u u8 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE is governed by their beauty, varying from $3 to $40 per ounce of quartz. The specific gravity of the mineral is first taken, after which the gold value of the quartz is ascertained by Price's table. The amount of this material sold in the rough for jewelers' purposes is variously estimated at from $40,000 to $50,000 a year, $1,000 to $2,000 worth being often purchased at one time. One lapidary at Oakland, Cal., where most of the cutting of this material is done, bought nearly $10,000 worth within a year, and a large jewelry firm in San Francisco, during the same time, pur- chased nearly $15,000 worth. In the selection of the quartz, great care is necessary. The stone used must be large enough to bear the rough treatment of the diamond-saw and the lap- wheel of the polisher. All of the rock quartz is friable, and some of it crumbles to pieces while undergoing these processes. The saw, catching in the gold in the slitting, prevents the cut- ting of large pieces, as the wafer-like slabs are apt to be broken by this resistance while being detached from the mass. For this reason, all the pieces set in cabinet work are small. Pieces 4 by 2 inches are quite rare, although fine pieces 4 inches square are at times seen. Rarely more than half of the rough material pur- chased finds its way into the market, owing to breakage while being trimmed into shape. The white gold quartz of California is mainly supplied from the counties of Butte, Calaveras, El Dorado, Mariposa, Nevada, Placer, Sierra, Tuolumne, and Yuba. The black gold quartz, a quite recent novelty, is found at the Sheep Ranch Mine, Calaveras County, and at Sutter Creek, Amador County. The so-called rose gold quartz is made by backing a translucent quartz with the desired shade of carmine paste, and forms an effective contrast to the opaque white and black gold quartz with which it is usually mounted. Single specimens for scarf-pins, rings, and sets of pins and ear-rings sell from $2 to $10 each. Exceptionally fine or curious pieces bring higher prices. It is within a few years that gold quartz has been utilized to any great extent in jewelry. At first the designs were usually simple and the mountings modest, but the demand has created a supplv of elaborate designs, and at present the quartz is used in every conceivable form of jewelry, and in articles of personal adornment and decoration of almost unlimited n. i 124 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE result has apparently justified the large expenditure of time and money necessary to prepare the stone for market. The quartz inclusions in some varieties of minerals are of great beauty, and constitute an important part of the gem min- erals of the United States. Some of the most interesting of these, and some that are quite rare and little known, are given here. Sagenite, "rutile in quartz," "flfeche d' amour" (love's ar- row) or " Venus's hair stone," as it is variously termed, is found in many places in the United States, and is often cut into oval seals and charms for use as jewelry. The stone gives a very pleasing effect in either sunlight or gaslight. As much as $500 worth has been sold for gems and specimens in one year. The most magnificent specimens were found in boulders, from the vicinity of Hanover, N. H., during the years 1830 to 1850. None, however, were traced to their original locality. Three of these were remarkable specimens, equal in beauty and interest to anything known. One belonged to Dr. James R. Chilton of New York, and passed into the hands of William S. Vaux, of Philadelphia, and is now in the possession of his nephew, George Vaux. The rutile crystals in this specimen are of a rich red color, and are transparent by transmitted light, varying from the fmeness of a needle to i of an inch in diameter. In one part of the mass is a series of rutile crystals united into a single form i of an inch wide and 5 inches long. The finest specimen found belongs' to Prof. Oliver P. Hubbard, of Dartmouth College. It is 6 inches long and 3 inches square, and of irregular shape. (See Colored Plate No. 7.) Both these pieces are evidently frag- ments of larger masses. The quartz itself is slightly smoky, almost clove-brown, and transparent, while slices cut from it are almost colorless, so that it is questionable whether the color is not due partly to the reflection from the rutile crystals, or per- haps to the presence of titanic acid in the quartz. The crystals of rutile in all these specimens vary in size from the fineness of a hair up to i inch in diameter, are uniformly distributed through the quartz, cross and intersect each other in all direc- tions, and are of a reddish-brown color with the lustre of polished copper. Of equal interest are the remarkable inclusions of ver- ' Proc. Am. Ass'n Adv. Sd., Vol. 4, p. 35, Washington, 1850. ■v % m PLATE 7. R c , *^'*J'^'"3"der County, Nonh Carolina Nw Yort City.] °' ''""'"I "»">')'. n I i.'^Mj; .u,i> ,!-Kf;n' • ■ '^f ;< ;v:\ht-re of timeat beauty, and consUtui^ ^it^ '^r;;s-.':>n,'>;.v p^r^ ^,i «;,. .,..,„ ,j,jj^.. a^dsoi ih.U;nH-4 Stales, ivrfi..:.-::;,?..- , .■^^■., ,,;.,, ^Mh^goi U^'^e. aud Home tlui? .h;- <|(j;tc r;:.K: .^.-, ■- ■..;;,;:>.■ ;v/^.c^-V'^ ^,::-i- ::Atv*:ii hc^ve. rov,) or ' ■ - ;■.-'-. ^m!• Vii.o;w., " - ■- ^:^ " in man)' nLvce-v in li^;- tjnit-,^; ,:^;,.,„.. ,-, -:. ^^ ^^^■orrli has le%-u i;r;l'Iiar c;f:?n'> arui ..;=f':^ ;•:;.' -• . •'■/-', , ' >v..' . . ■ i-t'O fi'fiiV ''■■■«/', - ;, ' <<'.:> iriKikivB: .iticui-'.V .bniin^.^i \n-/f .,., ..,,,,1 :•, ::,;■:,, H J :iy \-- .uii ■V !■ I ""WWlWaiBPIP^W" 1 Hi! i!*^i UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 125 micular chlorite which they contain. Another piece, which was cut from this specimen, is in the Silliman Collection at Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y. Beautiful pieces of quartz 3 by 4 inches, and fine crystals penetrated by clove-brown and black ru- tile, were formerly found at Middlesex, Vt, and in 1848, when the cut for the Central Vermont Railroad was made through a perpendicular mass of talcose slate, at Waterbury, Vt, a vein or pocket of quartz was found containing many fine crystals of ru- tilated quartz.' Rutilated quartz of unexcelled beauty, the rutile usually brown, red, golden, and black, has been found in many places in Randolph, Catawba, Burke, Iredell, and Alexander Counties, N. C, and in 1888, crystals of quartz, 5 inches in length, and filled with rutile the thickness of a pin, were found at Stony Point. Beautiful series of these are in the collections of J. W. Wilcox and Clarence S. Bement, both of Philadelphia. Fine pieces of quartz, 4 inches square, containing acicular rutile of a rich red color, have been found near Amelia Court House, Va. Some fine acicular crystals of rutile in limpid quartz, now in the possession of Joseph Wharton, of Philadelphia, were found near Kinger's, Lancaster County, Pa. At Calumet Hill Quarry, Cumberland, R. I., beautiful specimens of limpid milky quartz from 2 to 6 inches square, and also quartz crystals, at times i inch to 2 inches long, are found penetrated by crystals of black hornblende varying in thickness from a needle's diameter to about tV inch, and these are at times 6 inches long, in- terlaced and penetrating the quartz in every direction, making a very beautiful gem and ornamental stone. Specimens of this character are preserved by the quarrymen to sell to collectors. Several hundred pounds of this material were sent abroad about 1883 to be cut into jewelry at Idar and Oberstein, but as work has been suspended at Calumet Hill, the mineral is likely to become somewhat scarce. Cut specimens command prices rang- ing from twenty-five cents to $5 each. The specimens found here are quite equal to the variety found in Japan, and are even better adapted for use in jewelry than the remarkable trans- parent masses, over a foot across, procured from Madagascar, in which the crystals of hornblende are too large. ' Am. J. Sd. I., Vol. 10, p. 14, July, 1850. I 126 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Thetis' hair stone, found by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, near Sneatch Pond, Cumberland, R. I., is occasionally met with in fair pieces and is used to a very limited extent in jewelry. It is transparent quartz, so completely filled with acicular crystals of green actinolite as to make it quite opaque. Probably $100 worth was at one time sold annually to be cut into seals and charms. Acicular crystals of indicolite, somewhat re- sembling rutile in quartz, filling the quartz so completely as almost to render it opaque, were found in pieces over an inch square at the famous tourmaline locality, near Paris, Me. The mining operations at Stony Point, N. C, brought to light a number of crystals 4 by 3 inches, and masses of quartz 6 by 3 inches, some of the former fillcxl with what appears to be asbes- tus or byssolite, forming interesting and pretty specimens sus- ceptible of being cut into charms and other objects. The inclos- ures of what is seemingly gOthite in red, fan-shaped crystals from North Carolina is also a beautiful and interesting gem stone. A fine limpid crystal of quartz, i inch long and f inch in diameter, penetrated to the depth of half a millimeter by fine green crystals of actinolite, is reported from Virginia. The so-called Gibsonville emerald was a similar crystal of quartz, the crystals being 3 by 2 inches. It was plowed up in a field at Gibsonville, N. C, and when first found was believed to be an emerald. Some crystals of limpid quartz, containing particles of native gold, have been found in California. One of these was said to have been i inch long, and enclosed in the center was a scale of gold about the size of the lunula of a finger-nail. Two similar inclusions, though not so large, are in the possession of Rev. Horace C. Hovey, of Bridgeport, Conn. In Nevada County, Cal., in the Grass Valley Mines, quartz is occasionally found supporting gold between the crystals. Pellucid crystals of quartz, some i inch long and | inch across, filled with a very brilliant stibnite projecting in all directions, and some of them curiously bent, were found at the Little Dora Mine, Ani- mas Forks, San Juan, Col. This material is capable of being made into very beautiful gems. A fine crystal 2 inches long and I inch in diameter is in the Tiffany Collection. The crys- tals of quartz from the Herkimer, N. Y., North Carolina, and UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 137 Arkansas localities, containing fluid cavities with moving bubbles, are sometimes cut into ornaments which are not only interesting but pretty. One of these pure limpid crystals with a crescent- shaped cavity, from Little Falls, N. Y., was mounted in a pair of gold ice-tongs to represent a cake of ice. Such crystals are val- ued at from $i to $25 each. The fine amethyst from Rabun County, Ga., often contains fluid cavities nearly an inch long, and could be cut into interest- ing objects like those from Stow, Me. From a region twenty miles west of Hot Springs and extending westward for about sixty miles, the quartz crystals are generally all doubly terminated and detached, and are found loose in the sand between the breaks or veins in the sandstone, which in appearance strikingly resembles the calciferous sandstones of Herkimer, N. Y. At that part of the region called the "gem country" nearest Hot Springs, the crystals are quite white, but proceeding westward they gradually shade into the dark smoky color found at the other end of the district. The quartz is usually filled with fluid cavities. Some 400 crystals with liquid inclusions were collected by the writer as the result of three days' digging. The quartz pseudomorphs after calcite cleavages from the locality two or three miles north- west from Rutherfordton, Rutherford County, N. C, frequently contain irregularly shaped cavities filled with water, which, if broken out in good shape, can be utilized as curious ornaments. This variety of quartz was also found by J. A. D. Stephenson in Iredell County. Possibly the finest specimen is one that be- longed to William B. Dinsmore, of New York City, and is be- lieved to have been found in Georgia. It is coated with a beautiful, bluish-white chalcedony with a curious rough surface, is about an inch long, and is perfect on all sides, the bubble of air moving freely. Its walls are so thin that the liquid with which it is filled weighs fully twice as much as the quartz walls them- selves. Among other inclusions that might be utilized for gems, the following may be mentioned : Crystals of transparent quartz filled with specular iron found at the Sterling Mine, Antwerp, N. Y. ; quartz including scales of hematite from King's Mills, Iredell County, N. C. ; rhomb-shaped crystals of dolomite in crystals of pellucid quartz from Herkimer County, N. Y. ; crys- raid 1^ I.' t m 'I' f k vi 1 128 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE tals of quartz containing crystals of green spodumene (hid- denite) from Stony Point, N. C; inclosures of muscovite mica, that are green when viewed through the side of the prism, and green chlorite from several localities in Alexander County, N. C; and epidote in smoky quartz from Whitson's, near Sing Sing, N. Y. Agates are not produced in sufficient quantity in the Tjnited States to admit of exportation. Indeed, $2,000 would cover the annual production and sale here. Nearly all the agate jewelry sold in this country, as elsewhere throughout the world, comes from Oberstein and Idar, on the river Nahe in the duchy of Olden- burg, where the manufacture of such articles has flourished for over three centuries. The supplies of agate material are ob- tained principally from Uruguay and Brazil, in South America, QUARTZ COLOFb Locality. .3 3 1 < s i & •E.i u Ha si HO ^0 White, waxy lustre Pale blue to deep blue f Hot Springs, { Ark' f Nelson Co., 1 Va.« f 99-635 99*392 0113 o'o87 o'i6s trace 0-S39 trace 0-069 3-649 1 Analyr.t. C. E.Walt. D. D. Owen, ad. Geo.'. Rep., StattnfArlc.; C. E. Wait, Chemical Newi, Nov. 99, 1873. > AnaWit, R. Robertaon. P.P. DimfiifftoQ, Chemical News, Oct. 31, 1384, p. aor. and so extensive is this industry that it is not an uncommon thing to see in the tavern-yard of Idar great piles of from lo to 100 tons of r ;u}]h agate, varying in size from a few inches to several feet across, ready to be auctioned ofl" in lots to suit pur- chasers. Prices usually range from five cents to several dollars a pound, the average probably not exceeding twenty-five cents. Agate, ch.alcedony, carnelian, sard, and other varieties of the agate group are found in great abundance at many places in the United .States. At Agate Bay, Lake Superior, large numbers of small banded agates, often of a rich red color, arvj found. These are quite extei)'',ively cut. Ofter. '.he natural pebbles are polished ?U over, ther drilled at 7ne end, and sold to tourists as charms, or they are placed in oottles of water, to show the markings to the best advantage, neatly arranged according to color and size, and sold as mementoes. Many fine agates, some of great beauty, i«,) li iih' li UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 129 are found in Colorado and through the Rocky Mountains, but only a small portion are polished, as the agates from Brazil and Uruguay can be cut in Germany, and sold at much lower rates, with the result that nearly all the polished agate specimens sold in America are from the German market. The trap rocks along the Connecticut River, especially at Amherst and Conway, Mass., and Farmington, East Haven, Woodbury, and Guilford, Conn., occasionally afford agates of considerable beauty, though rarely over ;;; inches across. These were the so-called chalcedonic balls of Torringford and are very handsome when polished; the rich carnelian shades with milky transluconcy afford a very pleasing contrast. Many of these were cut into the forms of sealstones as early as 1837, and in the delicate arrangement of the layers and the richness of the colors were fully equal to any from abroad. At Natural Bridge, Jefferson County, N. Y., fine agates have been found. The Belmont Lead Mine, in St. Lawrence County, has afforded some very good chalcedony. Dr. W. H. Horton has described white, yellow, and blue chalcedony that was found in masses of good size near Bellvale, Orange County, N. Y.' Chalcedony is found in Delaware County, Pa., princi- pally at Middletown and Marple. Brown botryoidal masses oc- cur at the Hopewell Mine ; also at Willistown, West Notting- ham, West Goshen, and London Grove Townships, in Chester County ; a pale variety at Cornwall, Lebanon County ; near Rock Spring and Wood's Mine, m Lancaster County ; between Clay and Hamburg ; also, at Flint Mill, Berks County ; in Cherry Valley, Monroe Cornty ; at Conshohocken, Montgomery County, and in other places in Pennsylvania. In many of these localities, especially in Delaware and Chester Counties, the resi- dents wear ringstones, sealstones, and other ornaments, which they have had cut from local material. Dr. Lewis C. Beck in his " Mineralogy of New York " mentions agate nodules over 2 inches in diameter obtained from the trap rock near Paterson, N. J. J. C. and J. B. Anthony say : " Agate is found in great abundance at Diamond Hill and its vicinity, and is a mixture composed of quartz, chalcedony, and hornstone variously arranged in strips, spots, or irregular figures, and is susceptible of a fine ' Geological Survey of New York (1840), Report on Orange County Minerals. I- ,1 i ^' f, 130 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE polish and frequently combines a beautiful blending of colors." Maryland chalcedony of a skyblue color, translucent and beautiful, is found half a mile east of where the Western Run crosses the York turnpike ; agate and carnelian, in thin coatings upon chalcedony, near the Jones Falls turnpike; also at a point four miles from Baltimore, and again on the York turnpike thirteen and a half miles from the same city. A rich fawn and salmon colored chalcedony has been found near Lin- ville, in Burke County, N. C, and fine agates and chalcedony at Caldwell's, Mecklenburgh County, near Harrisburg and Con- cord, Cabarrus County, and Granville, Orange County, and in other localities in North Carolina. Agate pebbles are found all along the Mississippi River, especially in Minnesota, and fine pebbles of chalcedony occur plentifully five miles north of Grand Rapids, Wis. Agate and chalcedony are both found along Fox River, 111., and agate, chalcedony, and carne- lian near Van Horn's Well, Tex., and near Hot Springs, Ark. In Pinal County, Ariz., are found large quantities of amyg- dules of beautifully banded agate, often coated with opal. They vary from i to 8 inches in diameter, and when broken are gen- erally light bluish-gray or light gray in color. They would be extremely beautiful if cut and polisl.'ed. Seven miles south of Cisco, Utah, are extensive beds of flesh-red, pink, and salmon- colored agate, which received a great deal of notice by ^he press a few years ago, under the name of blood-agate. In Colorado, chalcedony is found eight miles south of Cheyenne Mountain at the Los Finos Agency at Chalk Hills; on the bluffs near Wagon-Wheel Gap and along the upper Rio Grande Valley ; in Middle South Parks, Buffalo Park, Fair Play, Fr)'ing Pan, Trout Creek, Gunnison River, and frequently in drift accumulations. Agate is found in fine specimens lined with amethyst on the summit of the range of the Animas ; clouded white and gray in tiie lower trachytic formations of the Uncom- pahgre ; and in a variety of forms, clouded, banded, laminated, and variegated, at the Los Pinos Agency ; also in the drift in the South Park, in the Lower Arkansas Valley, on the Frying Pan, and throughout the Middle Park, in the form of onyx and sar- donyx, on the lower Gunnison and adjacent regions. William P. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 131 Blake mentions the occurrence of large masses of white chal- cedony, delicately veined and in mammillary sheets, near the Panoche, in Fresno County and in Monterey County, Cal. ; on Walker River, Nev. ; of a fine pink color near Aurora, Esmeralda County, Nev. ; and in pear-shaped nodules in the eruptive rocks between Williamson's Park and Johnson's River, Los Angeles County, Cal. A very interesting form of chalcedony is found in the vicinity of Crawford, Darres County, Neb., where nearly all the narrow cavities in the large fossil bones found are entirely filled with cores of gray chalcedony, which are left scattered in great numbers over the ground when the bones are broken or have become weathered. It also fil'- all the seams in this for- mation, which after weathering leaves walls of chalcedony, vary- ing in thickness from a few inches to that of paper, projecting from the ground often to the height of several feet, and some- times extending across the country for miles. At Washougal, Wash., there has been found quite a variety of fine agates and moss agates in the form of pebbles from i to 4 inches in diameter. The corals and sponges of Tampa Bay, Fla., which are so often altered to chalcedony by the silicious waters, are at times filled with a fluid which was imprisoned while ' the regular deposition of the silica was closing the apertures that admitted the water. They are always lined with drusy quartz, iis are those found in Uraguay, the so-called hydrolites, or water- stones, and, if not as beautiful as the latter, they are even more interesting, and have been sold from $2 to $20 each. Beautiful pebbles of agate and chalcedony are found in abundance along the beach of Crescent City, Cal., and are often cut as souvenirs. They are usually of a light color, but delicately veined and marked. Beautiful little agates from Pescadero Beach in Cali- fornia are sold in large quantities, and in different forms, polished and unpolished, loose or in vials of water. Occasionally some of these are found enclosing, like the hydrolites from Uraguay and the chalcedony from Tampa Bay, Fla., a pebble moving in liquid. These pebbles, which may well be called sealed flasks, vary from -^ to \ inch, and rarely are i inch in diameter. They are also found at Yaquina Bay, Ore. In the pebbly drift of the Colorado River the agates are more highly colored, more abun- * f ^ ^ t) t : ( i i ii '•• ii ; i i 132 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE dant, and of larger size. Many of the surf-worn pebbles of Pescadero Beach, Cal., are agate and quartz, of very fine, bright colors, and are occasionally utilized as gem stones. Fine agates have been found with the jaspers on the Willamette, Columbia, and other rivers in Oregon. At Tampa Bay, Fla., red and yellow carnelian and sardonyx result from the silicification of the corals and sponges, and occur in rolled pebbles on the beach, ..nd although the pieces are not large, the colors are very beautiful. The silicified bonts of Atlantasaurus, a great extinct saurian, found at Morrison, Col., have at times a coarse cellular structure, which has been infiltrated with carnelian, giving a very pleasing effect of brilliant red stripes and spots. Chalcedony coats and incloses the crystallized cinnabar of the Redington and other mines of California ; and these crusts, if cut with the cin- nabar, form some of the prettiest and most interesting gem stones ever found. The chalcedony coatings on the blue and green chrysocoUa found in the cavities of the Copper Queen Mine, Ariz., are very beautiful if cut in the same man- ner. (See Agatized Wood.) No stone, used in jewelry, that is found in the United States is cheaper, more beautiful, or more plentiful than the moss agate. Those found in brooks and streams, called " river agates," are the most desirable. Nearly all are sent abroad for cutting, and returned for home use. When this stone was fashionable, fine stones were worth $10 each and upwards, and as much as $20,000 worth was sold in a year, but at present they are only sold to tourists or used in the cheapest jewelry. The principal sources of the sf^pply are Utah, Colorado, Montana, and Wyoming. Large quantities of moss agates were found in the excavations formed in constructing the Omaha and Council Bluffs Bridge over the Missouri River, and near Cheyenne in Wyoming they are found by the ton. A so- called moss agate is found at Rock Springs, Lancaster County, and near Reading, Berks County, Pa. Moss agate was formerly found near Hillsborough, Orange County, N. C. The agatized trees from Holbrook and Specimen Mount show mosslike mark- ing, more like that of the fine tree-stones from Brazil or the Mocha stones from India than of the common moss agate. One fe'-... ' M i km UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 133 curious candle-shaped stalactite of chalcedony, about 3 inches long, had a black core of oxide of manganese, a secondary de- position in a chalcedony stalactite, running through its entire length, at first sight scarcely distinguishable from a half-burned candle ; unfortunately it was cut into a number of matched stones for cuff-buttons, which were rendered quite unique by the black central dot. In the southeastern part of Humboldt County, Nev., are large quantities of moss agate of the dendritic and " fortification " forms. A beautiful moss agate is found in Trego County, Kan. (See Jasper and Moss Opal.) Moss agate has been little used since 1882, the sales not exceeding $1,000 a year. Since the introduction into cheap jewelry of the Chinese natural green and artificially-colored red and yellow moss agate, the sale of native stones has almost entirely fallen off. Jasper is found in many places in the United States, and in a great variety of colors, though, for so common a stone, it is very little used in the arts, the entire annual sales not amounting to $500. Fine red jasper is found on Sugar Loaf Mountain, Me., and a yellow variety with chalcedony has been found at Chester, Mass., and red and yellow by Dr. Horton, at Bellvale, Orange County, N. Y. Pebbles of a fine red color occur along the Hud- son River from Troy to New York, especially at Hoboken, Fort Lee, and Troy, where so-called jasperoid rock crops out. Jasper agate is found in considerable quantity at Diamond Hill, Cum- berland, R. L, in all shades of white, yellow, red, and green, and with these colors intermixed in one specimen, usually mottled, and at times beautifully banded in irregular seams of white, creamy brown, greenish, and brecciated. It is found in large quantities. Fully 1,000 pounds are taken away yearly by vis- itors and collectors, but not over $100 worth is sold in a year. Large pieces of fine yellow jasper are found at Tyringham, and elsewhere in the Berkshire Hills, Mass. In Pennsylvania jaspers more or less impure are abundant in the drifts of the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers ; also in Berks County, near Reading ; a yel- lowish brown variety is found at West Goshen, Chester County, a reddish-brown variety near Texas, Lancaster County, and a brown-banded variety near Bethlehem. The arrow-heads found in this vicinity and near Easton are mostly made of this jasper. The ■WW^SFWPJI ^ 5 Hi , 1 r ! 1 ! j 1 134 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE jaspery sandstone found near Mauch Chunk might be utilized with advantage for large ornamental works. In North Carolina fine jasper, banded red and black, is found in Granville, Person County ; bright brick-red and yellow at Knapp's, Reed's Creek, Madison County ; at Warm Springs ; at Shut-in-Creek in Moore County ; also in Wake County, and elsewhere. In Texas fine jasper has been found near Fort Davis, Jeff. Davis County, and at Barela Springs, where are obtained the jasper agates called Texas agates. The finest jasper is found in great quantity near Collyer, Trego County, Kan., where there is a remarkable bed of the banded variety ; the colors are the various shades of red and yellow, with bands of white, so remarkably even that the stone would furnish an excellent material for cameo work, and should this style of jewelry come into vogue again this deposit may prove of considerable value ; as it is, the beautiful red and yellow are so strikingly relieved by the white that it makes a fine ornamental stone. It affords blocks over a foot in length and 6 to 8 inches in width, and really merits the attention of worker.'; in ornamental stone, as no banded jasper in the world can rival it, and it exists in unlimited quantities. A beautiful moss jasper, equal to any known, is found in this same locality, in pieces nearly a foot long and 5 or 6 inches in diameter. When pol- ished, it is exceedingly beautiful. Dr. John T. Plummer men- tions the occurrence, in Richmond, of "masses of beautiful breccia having a whitish base set with hornstone and bright red and other colored jasper,'" as well as of common jasper. Fine yel- low, brown, and red jasper is found at the Los Pinos Agency ; throughout the Middle and South Parks; along the Gunnison, in the Dakota group ; on the Arkansas, Grand, White, Animas, and other rivers of Colorado ; in the drift, and in some of the tra- chytes, mostly red, green, and brown. A very fine specimen \/as found at the junction of the Lost Trail Creek and the Rio Grande. Small but smoothly worn pebbles of jasper and agate are quite plentiful on the shores of Lake Tahoe, Cal. Red and green jasper are abundant in the neighborhood of San Francisco, where an impure variety of this stone has been used for bu'id- ings and sidewalks. Red, yellow, and brown jasper is found > Suburban Geology of Richmond, !nd., Am. J. Sd. I., Vol. 44, p. 281, Jan., 1843. 1 UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 135 at Murphy's, Calaveras County, Cal, in great variety and of su- perior quality. Red jasper is also found on the Little Colorado River, in New Mexico, and on the Willamette in Oregon. The latter region evidently furnished the material for the arrow-points of the Oregon Indians. Blood-stone or heliotrope in beautiful specimens, with verj; fine red markings, is foun'' in Chatham County, Ga. Helio- tropes from this vicinity are in the cabinet of W. W. Jefiferis, of Philadelphia. Heliotrope was formerly found in the veins in slate at Blooming Grove, Orange County, N. Y. Good speci- mens have been found near the Willamette River, Oregon, near the South Park, Col., and below the Uncompahgre, near Grand River. The so-called green jasper, which is really a chert of Nor- man's Kill, from the Hudson River slates at Albany County, N. Y., was used by the Indians for arrow-points. A fine specimen of heliotrope or blood-stone is reported to have been found here, on the same authority that a similar and entirely unreliable oc- currence was reported in Texas, and the stones from both are evidently of foreign origin. Basanite (the Lydian stone, the touch-stone or test-stone of the jeweler) was found by Dr. Horton at Canterbury and Corn- wall, N. Y. It is also sparingly found in nearly all the drift north of New York City, and in that part of the Delaware River from Easton, Pa., down to the State line, also in many other parts of the United States. A beautiful spear-point, 5 inches long, and a number of arrow-points, made from this material, have been found near Statesville, N, C. Silicified wood, which is variously known as wood agate and wood opal, is found in great abundance in Colorado, California, and other Western States and Territories. Of its mode of for- mation. Prof. Joseph Le Conte' says : " In a good specimen of pet- rified wood not only the external form of the trunk, not only the general structure of the stem — pith, wood, and bark — not only the radiating silver-grain and the concentric rings of growth are discernible, but even the microscopic cellular structure of the wood and the exquisite sculpturing;? of the cell-walls themselves are perfectly preserved, so that the kind of wood may often be ' Elements of Geology, p. 192. " \ " ' 136 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE determined by the microscope with the utmost certainty, yet not one particle of the organic matter of the wood remains. It has been entirely replaced by mineral matter, usually some form of silica." The general theory of petrifaction is derived as follows : When wood is soaked in a strong solution of iron sulphate (cop- peras), then dried, and the same process repeated until the wood is highly charged with this solution and then burned, the struc- ture of the wood will be preserved in the peroxide of iron that remains ; also it is well known that the smallest fissures and cavi- ties in rocks are speedily filled by infiltrating waters with mineral matters ; hence wood buried in soil soaked with some petrifying material becomes highly charged with the same and the cells filled with the infiltrating material, so that when the wood decays the petrifying material is left, retaining the structure of the wood. Furthermore, as each particle of organic matter passes away by decay, a particle of mineral matter takes its place, until finally all of the organic matter is replaced. The process of petrifaction is therefore one of substitution as well as of interstitial filling. From the different nature of the process in the two cases, it hap- pens that the interstitial filling always differs, either in chemical composition or in color, from the substituting material. Thus the structure remains visible, although the mass is solid. Prof. James D. Dana offers the following explanation of the phe- nomenon. " The wood or often trunks of trees, and sometimes standing forests, which have been petrified in the Rocky Moun- tain region, have in general been buried under volcanic ddbris, which constitutes beds of great extent in many regions. This volcanic material, called tufa, undergoes partial alteration through the action of the waters or moisture it may contain, or that may filtrate through it. In this alteration or partial decomposition much silica is set free, and makes the waters or moisture silicious. The silicious solution then made pen- etrates the wood that is buried in the tufa. Very slowly the silica is deposited in all the cells of the wood ; and as the wood decomposes, silica takes the place of the particles of the fibres until finally the wood becomes wholly silica ol* quartz." Concerning the color, he adds that the brownish-yellow is limonite, which if heated will turn red. Among the great IB •*■- i<.-«ij-*r^ i^M^!^:^g:^--g^..:^ CHAIXEDONV CHILF, CHALCKDONY I-AKK, ARIZONA \ lEW IN CHAI.CICDONV PARK, ARIZONA I i c ■ *rr ft .J\!ffi>\' '^iimmmmmm UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 137 American wonders is the silicified forest, known as Chalcedony Park, situated about eight miles south of Corrizo, a station on the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad, in Apache County, Ariz. The country formation is sandstone on volcanic ash, and the trees are exposed in gulches and basins where the water has worn the sandstone away, or are buried beneath the sandstone, their ends protruding from between the formations. (See Illustration.) The locality was noticed in 1853 by the Pacific Railroad Explor- ing Survey. The jasper and agate generally replaced the cell- walls and fibres, and the transparent quartz filled the cells and interstices, especially where the structure was broken down by decay. These cell-centers and cavities produced conditions favorable not only for the deposition of silica as quartz, but also for the formation of the drusy crystalline cavities of quartz and amethyst that so increase the beauty of the material. There is every evidence to show that the trees grew beside some inland sea. After falling they became water-logged, and during decom- position the cell structure of the wood was entirely replaced by silica from sandstone in the walls surrounding this great inland sea. Major John W. Powell, who has visited all these regions, says : " The wood consisted of logs water-rolled before burial, and are now gradually weathering out of their matrix. The en- closing rock is sandstone and cretaceous shale of the series known as Jura-trias and lying immediately above the Chinarump. Agatized wood containing much semi-opal has been formed in California (and possibly in Arizona) under volcanic deposits, but the wood in question is not associated with volcanic material ; its matrix is sedimentary." The red and yellow coloring matter is derived from the oxide of iron in the sandstone, which is red, and the black may be due to partial carbonization or to oxide of manganese. The bark in nearly every case has been decayed before silicification, and even part of the other layers of the tree is often gone ; but the difference between the oxidation on the surface and inside is that the surface, to the depth of half an inch, is so altered and changed that it has the appearance of bark, and it is generally supposed to be such. There is every indication that the deposit is of considerable IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-S) &- ^4£* ^ "S? A % ^ 1.0 Sfi^ia I.I 1.8 1.25 'S 1-4 ill 1.6 Hiotographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4S03 '^':.^ ^\ '"^o^ h 1 138 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE depth. Over the entire area, trees He scattered in all conceiva- ble positions and in fragments of all sizes, the broken sections sometimes resembling a pile of cartwheels. A tree 150 feet in length is often found split into as many sections, of almost uniform length, presenting the appearance of having been sawn asunder for shingle-blocks by some prehistoric forester; or broker: into countless fragments, ranging from the size of a small pebble to that of a fair-sized boulder, also fractured into perfect-shaped cubes, as if cut by a lapidary. These multiplied fractures are the result of alternate heat and cold, produced by atmospheric changes, acting on the water col- lected in fissures of the tree. A phenomenon perhaps unpar- alleled, and the most remarkable feature of the park, is a natural bridge formed by a tree of agatized wood spanning a cafton 45 feet in width. (See Illustration.) In addition to the span, fully 50 feet of the tree rest on one side, making it visible for a let gth over 100 feet. Both ends of the tree are imbedded in the sandstone. It averages 3J feet in diameter, — 4 feet at the thick- est part and 3 at the smallest. Where the bark does not adhere the characteristic colors of jasper and agate are seen. Although the wood is beautiful to the naked eye, a microscope is needed to reveal its greatest charms ; not only does the glass enhance the brilliancy of the colors, but it renders visible the structure, which has been perfectly preserved even to the forms of minute cells, and is more beautiful now than before the transformation. Dr. P. H. Dudley examined microscopically some sections of this wood, and found that part of it at least belongs to the jgenus Araucaria, one species of which, Araucaria excelsa, the Norfolk Island pine of the South Pacific Ocean, according to the same authority, grows to a height of from 100 to 200 feet Other portions were found to resemble our red cedar, Juniperus Virgin- iana, when grown in the extreme south. The cell-structure of some of the wood indicates growth in a mild, uniform climate, the annual rings being marked only by one, two, three or more slightly smaller hexagonal or rounded, not tabular, cells as is usually the case. The name " chinarump " has been suggested for this substance by Major John W. Powell, this being the Indian name for the material. These trees, according to one of the In- '^m M W f- o u N P < b O M O Q CO T I \ UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 139 dian myths, were believed to be the bolts of the arrows used by their god. It has been extensively used by them in making spear and arrow-points. William H. Holmes, of the United States Geological Survey, thus describes the locality in Utah known as Amethyst Mountain, opposite the valley of Soda Butte Creek : " Riding up the trail, a multitude of bleached trunks of the ancient forests are discerned. ... In the steeper middle portion of the mountain, face, rows of upright trunks stand out on the ledges like the columns of a ruined temple, on the more gentle slopes, farther down ; but where it is still too steep to support vegetation, save a few pines, the petrified trunks fairly cover the surface and were at first taken to be the shattered remains of a recent forest. The exposures of strata in the first 300 or 400 feet at the base are not good, and but few of the siliciiied trunks appear above the covering of veg- etation. At the height of 500 feet the occurrences become very numerous, and the great size and fine preservation of many of the trunks was a matter of much surprise. Prostrate trunks 40 and 50 feet in length are of frequent occurrence, and not a few of these are 5 or 6 feet in diameter. The standing trunks are gen- erally rather short, the degradation of the compact inclosing strata being so slow that the brittle trunks break down almost as fast as they are exposed, and in many cases the roots are exposed and may be seen penetrating the now solid rock with all their original ramifications. One upright trunk of gigantic proportions rises from the inclosing strata to the height of 12 feet. (See Illustration.) By careful measurement it was found to be 10 feet in diameter, and as there is nothing to indicate to what part of the tree the exposed section belonged, the roots may be far below the surface, and we are free to imagine that there is buried there a worthy predecessor of the giant Sequoias of California. Al- though the trunk was hollow, and partly broken down on one side, the woody structure was perfectly preserved ; the grain was straight and the circles of growth distinctly marked. The bark, which still remains on the firmer parts, was 4 inches thick and re- tained very perfectly the original deeply-lined outer surface. It was clear, however, that the tree is not a conifer. The strata inclosing the trunk consisted chiefly of fine-grained sandstones. I40 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE indurated clays, and moderately coarse conglomerate, and con- tained many vegetable remains, such as branches, rootlets, fruits, and leaves. In the stratum of sandstone occupying the horizon, nearly on a level with the present top of the giant tree, there was a large variety of most perfectly preserved leaves, speci- mens of which were determined by Leo Lesquereux to belong to the lower Pliocene or upper Miocene, and similar to the Chalk Bluff, Cal., specimens of Prof. Josiah D. Whitney. At a point about a mile further east, trunks and fragments of trunks were found in great numbers and in all conceivable positions. In most cases the woody structure was well preserved, but the trunks had a tendency to break in sections, and on the exposed ends the lines of growth from center to circumference could be counted with ease. In many cases the wood was completely opalized or agatized, and cavities existing in the decayed trunks were filled with crystals of quartz and calcite. Nearly all of the crystals found in the West have been formed in the hollow of silicified trees, notably in the case of the smoky quartz found in the Pike's Peak Region in Colorado. Gen. William T. Sherman, while visiting Fort Wingate, N. M., during his trip across the continent, in the autumn of 1878, suggested to the of- ficer in charge of that post the desirability of securing several large trunks of these fossil trees, found in that vicinity, for the United States National Museum. In the following spring an ex- pedition was sent out for this purpose, under the direction of Lieut. J. T. C. Hegewald, who states that in the locality of Litho- dendron Valley, where they were procured, the soil was com- posed chiefly of clay and sand, and the petrified wood, broken into millions of pieces, lay scattered around the slopes of the valley. Some of the large fossil trees were well preserved, though the alternate action of heat and cold had broken most of them in sections from 2 to 10 feet long, and certain of these he re- garded as having been immense trees. On measuring the ex- posed parts of several, it was found that they varied from 150 to 200 feet in length and from 2 to 4! feet in diameter, and their centers often contained beautiful quartz crystals. A microscopic examination shows the internal structure of all to have been tolerably well preserved, the cells having suffered but little from i 'l',""."t^t!lBSH UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 141 the pressure to which the trunks had been subjected. They all belong to the genus Araucarioxylon, and probably are of the same species. The two from Lithodendron Valley are absolutely identical in structure, and that from Fort Wingate is referred provisionally to the same species, although it lacks some of the essential characteristics. Some eight specimens were collected near Estherville, la., consisting of fragments, completely chal- cedonized and stained a yellowish-brown color, of which the largest were only 6 inches in length and 4 in diameter. They were regarded by Prof. W J McGee as belonging to the Creia- ceous age. Although found in the drift, the Cretaceous strata, from which it was originally derived, formerly extended over contigu- ous parts of Minnesota and were largely removed by glacial ero- sion during the Quaternaiy period. Specimens from Martin County, Minn., could not be distinguished from those obtained in Emmet County, la. Near Barrel Springs, in the Green River basin of Wyoming, Samuel F. Emmons, of the United States Geological Survey, found a silicified tree, the structure of which was admirably preserved, being filled in, wherever the wood had decomposed, with crystals of quartz. It was from 3 to 4 feet in diameter, and was exposed for 18 feet; both ends were imbedded in the soft earth cf the Bridger beds of the Eocene formation. Agatized wood in large quantities, consisting of trees from 12 to 35 feet in length and from 18 inches to 2 feet in diameter, has been found near Calistoga in Napa County, Cal. Specimens of agatized and opalized wood from the vicinity of Gallatin, Mont.» were collected by Dr. Albert C. Peale and George P. MerrilU and later by Frank H. Knowlton, of the United States Geological Survey, who described it as white, banded and streaked with black and yellowish-brown. Although badly decomposed, it ap- peared to be dicotyledonous. From several specimens, camera- drawings were secured that resembled known forms of Betuli- nium and Quercinium, or representations of our modern beech and oak. Of specimens from the Yellowstone Park, examined similarly, some were found to be dicotyledonous and some conif- erous, the latter mostly Cupressinoxylon, or fossil Sequoia. The amount of silicified wood found in Apache County^ 142 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE ' ,1 ) ;' ; 1>, i Ariz., is estimated as high as a million tons, but the material suitable for decorative purposes is comparatively small in quantity. This material was selected to form the base of a beautiful silver testimonial made by Tiffany & Company for presentation to the French sculptor, Bartholdi. It was chosen on account f{ its superior hardness, and the warmth and pleasing combination of its colors ; also, as the designer remarked, it was eminently fitting that the testimonial should rest " on a solid American base." The problem of polishing this exceedingly hard material having been solved,' its application for decorative purposes nat- urally follows. The combinations of color offer a great field for interior designs. In tiling floors, for mantels, and similar pur- poses, it is most valuable ; for clock-cases and table-tops it also promises to take an important place, defying imitation, by rea- son of its marvelous colorings, close texture, and remarkable polish ; and in the future the material may be worked into dec- orative columns for the interior of fine houses. The lustre of its finish cannot be marred or impaired by metal or acid, except hydrofluoric acid, with which it may be etched in the same way as glass. A column i foot in diameter and 2 feet long, bored out of the section of a tree across the grain of the wood, so as to display the heart in the center, was exhibited in New York City and was considered the most beautiful of all the polished specimens thus far shown. Smaller articles of jewelry, mosaic work, paper-weights, paper-cutters, toilet articles, handles for canes and umbrellas, and similar objects made from this material may find a ready sale. A number of pieces of this material was placed on exhibition during the early part of 1889, and attracted considerable notice from those interested in American minerals. Opal shewing a brilliant play of rainbow colors, either of the noble or of the fire opal variety, has been observed in the United States only, near John Davis River, in Crook County, Ore. The specimen found there is transparent, grayish-white in color, with red, green, and yellow flames. The play of colors equals in beauty that of any Mexican material, and it is the first opal found in the United States that exhibits color. It strikingly • See Lapidary Work. UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO 14,3 resembles and has the absorptive properties of tabasheer, the variety of opal which is formed in the joints of the bamboo, and which is used in India for medicinal purposes. Undoubtedly, better material of the kind exists where this was found. The opals sold so extensively at tourists' resorts are generally of Mexi- can origin. A beautiful fire opal without any opalescence occurs in a small vein about i inch thick and 2 inches square, from Washington County, Ga.; this locality was first described by Prof. George J. Brush of the Sheffield Scientific School, and he has the finest piece of this opal in his cabinet. Common opal in small masses of a greenish and yellowish-white color, with vitreous lustre, is found at Cornwall, Lebanon County, Pa., also at Ag^as Calientes, Gilson Gulch, Idaho Springs, Col, of a OPAL CoLOa. Prismatic (Fin oi«i>. LOCAUTV. Washington Co., Ga. 91-89 1*40 0'02 584 Analjmt. G.J. Brush.* > G. J. Brush, Dana, Mineralogy, 5th Ed, p. too. brownish color in narrow seams in the granite. J. W. Beath of Philadelphia, Pa., states that he had seen fine opal specimens showing play of colors, reported to have come from the latter place. William P. Blake ' writes that a rich white variety of opal is found at Mokelumne Hill, Calaveras County, Cal. ; and on the elevation near that place known as Stockton Hill, on the west side of Chile Gulch, a shaft had been sunk 345 feet, and opals were found there in a thin stratum of red gravel varying from the size of a kernel of corn to that of a walnut, and many of them con- taining dendritic infiltrations of oxide of manganese resembling moss. These stones were erroneously supposed to have consid- erable market value, and in 1866 about a bushel of them were raised to the surface in a day. A milky variety, similar to the above and without fire, is found with magnesite on Mount Diablo, Cal., thirty miles south of the mountain ; also in the foothills of the Sierra at the Four Creeks. Yellow fire opals in small nodules not over an inch in diameter, from Mount Pleasant, Bergen I Catalogue of California Minerals (1866) p. 18. J/ ■I ] M t 1 : ■ l| ' H I i 144 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE Hill, N. J.,' were described by the writer. Common opal has been found at Sheffield, Mass. Semi-opal is found together with chal- cedony at the Los Pinos Agency and in trachyte north of Sagrua- che Creek, Col., and coating agate, in Pima County, Ariz., and also at other localities in the United States. Nodules from i to 4 inches in diameter, consisting of dead-white fire-opal filled with dendritic moss-like markings of beautiful moss-opal are found in South Park, Col. A fine moss-opal, in pieces 3 to 4 inches across, is also found in Trego County, Kan. A white opaque variety of hydrophane, in rounded lumps, from 5 millimeters to 25 millimeters (i to i inch) in diameter, with a white, chalky or glazed coating, somewhat resembling the cacholong from Washington County, Ga., has recently been brought from Colorado. It is quite remarkable for its power of absorbing liquid. When water is allowed to drop slowly on it, it first becomes very white and chalky, and then, gradually, perfectly transparent. This property is developed so strikingly that the finder has proposed for it the name " Magic Stone," and has suggested its use ?n rings, lockets, charms, etc., to conceal photographs, hair, or other objects which the wearer wishes to reveal only when his caprice dictates. Speci- mens were examined by Prof. Arthur H. Church of Kew, Eng- land, and he proved that the volumes of the dry and the wet mineral were identical by weighing the bulk of mercury displaced in both instances. His experiments were made in a small, flat- bottomed glass cup having a polished edge and accurately covered with a smooth glass plate. The mean weight of mercury dis- placed in five concordant experiments was 7*415 grams, which figure, corrected for temperature, showed the specific gravity of the hydrophane was, when dry, i '056, when wet, i "545. The increase in specific gravity is due to the replacement of the original inter- stitial air of the mineral by water. From the above calculations it is further determined that the specific gravity of the opal, free from air, is 2*14. The wet opal contained 4775 per cent, by weight of water, and 52*25 per cent, by weight of silicic hydrate; hence the mineral absorbed rather less than half its bulk of water. The specific gravity of several specimens furnished the writer* thefol- « Trans. N. Y. Acad. Sd., Nov., 1888. • Am. J. Sd., III., Vol. 34, p. 479, Dec., 1887. ¥ \ UNITED STATES, CANADA AND MEXICO HS lowing results : Nos. 1-3 were slabs 2 millimeters thick (Vy inch), No. 4 was a natural lump with glazed coating. This stone is iden- tical with one brought from China, several centuries ago, and de- scribed by De Boot, DeLaet, Boyle, and others, as the Oculus Mundi, or World's Eye, and as the Lapis Mutabilis. When wet, it became entirely transparent, except a central nucleus, possibly a core of chalcedony, that remained white. If the central core was black, evidently oxide of manganese, the stone was called Oculus Beli. Hoffmann mentions opalized wood in magnificent colors at San Antonio, Nye County, Nev., and states that on breaking some of the large trunks fine specimens were obtained. Fine large sections of trees altered to wood opal are found at Buena Vista, Col. The color varies from white to brown, and the structure of the wood is preserved. In the hydraulic mines of California. DRY WET WATER WEIGHT SPECIFIC ORAHS ORAIIS ABS. (IN WATER). GRAVITY. I •880 1-342 ■463 •463 3-1 10 3 •644 •934 •290 • -3385 2-091 3 730 1*109 •379 •38a 2097 4 1-8745 I-0595 •864 2-191 and at Murphey's in the same State, large and very beautiful masses of opalized wood, of fine brown, yellow, and black colors, have frequently been found. Hyalite, or Muller's Glass, as it is called, occurs on the trap- rock at Weehawken and Orange, N. J. ; with chalcedony at sev- eral localities in Yavapai County, Ariz. ; at the Philips ore bed, Putnam County; with cachalong at Bellvale, Orange County, N. Y.; in Burke County, N. C, and Screven County, Ga.; in yel- low fluorescent coating upon gneiss at Frankford, Pa. ; at Avon- dale, Delaware County, Pa., in bluish-green; on the Wissa- hickon River in Pennsylvania ; at Concord, Cabarrus County, and at the Culsagee Mine, Macon County, N. C. Associ- ated with semi-opal, it is mentioned as occurring in the Mount Diablo Range about thirty miles south of Mount Diablo. It has also been found at Volcano Pass, Larimer County, Col. At none of these places, however, is it found in masses thick enough to af- ford even a mineralogical gem, and commercially it has no value. During the survey of the Yellowstone National Park, in 1872, by Dr. Ferdinand V. Hayden, United States Geologist, a large 1 ]