46 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 63 
naments and for sacrificial and mortuary purposes. It is stated on 
good authority also that they were used as mirrors. 
Mr. Holmes visited a number of mines in the vicinity of Spruce- 
tree and Bandana, Yancey County, and near Bakersville in Mitchell 
County. The most important workings in the first mentioned locality 
are known as the Sink Hole mines, near Bandana. Although these 
mines have been operated extensively in recent years, sufficient traces 
of the old work remain to convey a fair notion of the nature and 
extent of the prehistoric mining. There are two main groups of pit- 
tings, each approximately 1,000 feet in length and 20 to 60 feet in 
Fic. 47.—Stone picks used in excavating and freeing the crystals of Mica. 
width. The original depth in many cases was upwards of 4o feet, 
but recent operations of white miners have served to change their 
appearance, and to fill up the deeper excavations. The pittings are 
surrounded by a somewhat uneven ridge of detritus derived from the 
excavations, which has been added to in places by the modern miners, 
and has been dug into of late years to recover the mica rejected and 
thrown out by the aborigines. 
An important site of the ancient operations now known as the 
Clarissa mine, three miles east of Bakersville, Mitchell County, was 
also visited. This is probably the best preserved and most striking of 
the aboriginal workings in this general region, and serves to illustrate 
the importance of the mica industry in prehistoric times. Entering a 
