CHAPMAN AN ANCIENT MINE IN ARKANSAS. 20 



. AN ANCIENT MINE IN ARKANSAS. 



BY WM. A. CHAPMAN. 

 Read before the Academy, May 28th, 18S6. 



In the spring of 1884, while engaged in prospecting for minerals over 

 the southern portions of Polk County, Arkansas, my attention was 

 directed to an excavation, supposed by those who now reside in that 

 locality to have been the work of Spanish miners, who, local traditions 

 state, were once actively engaged in the exploration of this State for 

 gold and other precious metals. My curiosity regarding this so-called 

 Spanish mine being aroused, I decided upon a visit to it, in order to 

 determine, if possible, who the miners were and what had been the ob- 

 ject of their labor. After going about two miles north-west of Hatton 

 post-office, I came to a spur-like appendage of the mountain, which, 

 jutiing out from the main range, formed one side of a narrow, gorge-like 

 valley, through which, in times past, a stream of considerable size had 

 wound its way. Through the erosion of water, a part of this hill had 

 been removed, in such manner as to give to one facing the opening the 

 impression that the dip of the exposed strata was in two directions. It 

 was evident that this face of the hill had once been an overhanging 

 cliff, with all the members of the series of rocks entering into its struct- 

 ure fully exposed ; but the falling of the overhanging mass and the ac- 

 cumulation of rubbish from the mine have in a measure restored the 

 base, and now conceal the greater part of the strata from view. The 

 strata open to inspection — some twenty feet — are metamorphic sand- 

 stones, ranging in hardness from a soft, friable, amorphous sandstone 

 to that of a quartzose rock of crystalline structure, suitable for mill- 

 stones. These form the mass of the exposed strata. Above them are 

 others which have distinct cleavage lines at right angles to each other, 

 and which, under atmospheric influences, display a tendency to part 

 along the cleavage lines. Interstratified with these are irregular masses 

 of hornblende and a white, close-textured rock resembling novaculite. 

 The thickness of the strata varies from two to twenty-six inches. The 

 strike of the series is 10 degrees north of east; the dip, northward at 

 an angle of 45 degrees. 



The mining operations had been confined to the removal of a single 

 stratum — the lowest of those open to inspection — portions of which 



