1886.] NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 3 



This " find " was made at a depth of only six feet, and at a place 

 distant about five rods from the old original discovery site. 

 As in previous cases, the associated minerals were quartz 

 crystals, rutile, and mica (?), with a vein filling of lithoniarge 

 in which the gem crystals were imbedded. 



On August 9th, at a place yet nearer the shaft of this company, 

 a discovery of emeralds was made which in themselves were the 

 greatest encouragement that this locality (Alexander Co.) has 

 ever given, as proving the existence in that region of fine 

 emerald gems. A narrow ledge of outcropping opaque quartz 

 was worked down upon to a depth of fifteen feet, wliere the 

 quartz became clearer, and a "pocket " began to show itself. 

 Crystals of quartz and of muscovite (?) in profusion were found 

 within the next foot of the vein, imbedded in lithoniarge (kaolin- 

 like clay of a light-brown color), all in rare perfection of form 

 and material. In the next three feet of the vein (it was once an 

 open pocket), imbedded in the lithoniarge, I took out eight of 

 the best crystals of emerald which the locality has furnished 

 since 1882. In point of uniform color, and of crystallographic 

 interest, the " find '^ was peculiar to itself. The best emerald 

 weighed eight and three-quarter ounces, was one and three- 

 quarter inches thick, and three inches long. All the crystals of 

 emerald were wholly or in part doubly terminated and of pure 

 hexagonal forms, with a flat terminal plane. Two crystals had 

 a very low jiyramid occurring partly developed, which may be 

 new to science when its angle is measured. Faces of the sec- 

 ondary prism and of secondary pyramids were only present in 

 traces. The crystals had a very uniform thickness, of about 

 two-thirds their length, with end faces of superb polish. One 

 crystal, the second in size, had implanted upon a prismatic face 

 a crystal of rutile in perfectly parallel position (axially) to that 

 of the emerald. This is curious, for the reason that the two 

 minerals are so diverse in composition and so dissimilar in form. 

 Altogether, the eight crystals of emerald weighed twenty-one 

 ounces. 



Shortly before these "finds" were made, a pocket, the sixth 

 in regular succession of a vein of "pockets," was opened at a 

 depth of forty-three feet in the old shaft, and among a handful 

 of inferior emeralds one was found which yielded a fine-cut gem 

 of four and five-eighths karats weiglit, which gem is very probably 

 the finest cut emerald exhibited in the United States. 



The value, intrinsically, of these gem discoveries is not far 

 from $5,000, which is a most tangible encouragement for future 

 Avork. Of interest, perhaps, is the fact that for the past four 

 jears all the work done at this mine has been a source of profit 

 to the Emerald and Hiddenite Mining Company, and thus with 



