Gold Veins of the United States’ Mine, Va. 327 
and again comes into its former line of bearing. Above this deflec- 
tion, the course of the vein in the forty foot level is continuous and 
there does not appear to have been any interruption in its angle of 
inclination, or in its line of bearing. 
he other veins have an average thickness greater than that of 
No.1. They are walled up near the surface in red clay, a perpen- 
dicular escarpment of which shows a succession of black lines or 
seams, in the regular order of stratification. Suppose a bed of gneiss 
to be converted, without undergoing the process of disintegration, 
into a mass of clay, or red earth, and that the lines showing the 
Stratification of the gneiss were to assume a blackish hue, and be re- 
tained in the clay, and you would have a formation similar to that 
of which I am now writing. Disseminated through this clay, are 
numerous untriturated and angular fragments of translucent quartz, 
the largest of them attaining to the weight of only a few grains. 
Veins Nos. 2. and 3. are parallel or nearly so; their general course 
is N. by E; they dip to the east. No. 2. at an angle of 30° with 
a perpendicular. No. 3. is nearly perpendicular from the surface 
to the depth of twenty five or thirty feet; while at the depth of 
sixty feet it has a very great underlay, declining from a perpendicu- 
lar at an angle of near 60°. 
The two veins are about one hundred feet apart; The country 
between them at the depth of sixty feet, is very soft, not being firmer 
than quicksands. The angle of inclination of No. 2. is quite uni- 
form. At the sixty foot level, instead of red clay, the veins are 
contained in decomposed gneiss, which retains its color and texture, 
but is quite friable, yielding as readily as the clay, to the pick. A 
shaft has been sunk perpendicularly on No. 3. vein to the depth of 
twenty five or thirty feet; in this the vein declines from a perpen- 
dicular at a very small angle, say 5°; immediately under this shaft, . 
in the sixty foot level, the vein inclines at an angle of 45°. 1 shall 
not offer at this time any conjecture as to this anomaly in the dip 
of veins. When the ore between the sixty foot level and the sur- 
face, is taken down, this very great underlay will doubtless be found 
to commence at, or near, the junction of the gneiss with the superin- 
cumbent clay. Circumstances which will throw more light on the 
subject may be then brought to view. Could it have been that the 
soft country, or quick sands alluded to, were not sufficiently firm 
and compact to support the vein in its nearly perpendicular position, 
and that for the want of proper support, it has fallen down as it 
