JOURNEY THROUGH JERSEY 39 



very profitably. The discoverer is said to have been a 

 negro. The mine lasted only a short time, and I have 

 been able to get no further information regarding it. 

 I have been told that dollars were struck from the 

 metal, but I have seen no specimens of them. There 

 have been traces of precious metals found still farther 

 north. Forty and more years ago, near Boston, there 

 was a silver mine, but worked with little profit, nobody 

 understanding the business, it is supposed. Judging by 

 several circumstances the ore was a silver-bearing lead 

 ore. At Middletown in Connecticut lead ore was once 

 mined, found associated with a yellow copper ore, and 

 yielding three to four ounces of silver in the hundred- 

 weight. Although this content was determined by a 

 goldsmith in New York, who tested specimens, it ap- 

 pears that the trick of separating the metal of the ore 

 was not sufficiently familiar, and this work also came 

 to a stand. At the beginning of the late war the Con- 

 necticut Assembly took up this mine again, for the sake 

 of the lead, but could neither manage the refining prop- 

 erly nor make enough bullets to shoot every English- 

 man, (a hankering after any little silver left was also 

 in vain), and for a second time the business was 

 abandoned. 



From these few items it will be clear enough already 

 that North America was by no means forgotten of 

 nature in the matter of mineral wealth. Even now, 

 when the shell of this new world has been explored 

 in the most superficial way, in a few places only and 

 there, for the most part, by chance, the most useful 

 metals have been found in quantity, and there are at 

 least traces of the precious metals. Several important 

 reasons may be given why mining has not been gen- 

 erally more successful. 



