3J8 J50MAIN IV. TALCOU3. 



the main vein, or load, is about eight feet over $ 

 it does not consist purely of the steatites, but 

 also holds quantities of rubble, or fragments of 

 a hard, smooth, dusky, greenish, and red co- 

 loured talcy-like fissile stone, called by the in- 

 habitants a variegated killas, Some small pieces 

 of white spar are also met with, but rarely. 

 About two hundred paces higher, on the left 

 hand, I found a soft and very greasy straw- 

 coloured steatites : in the sides of the country, 

 that is, of the solid strata which enclose the 

 vein, and intermixed with it, lay a reddish brown 

 steatites, but the straw-coloured kind was in the 

 greatest quantity: further down, near the level 

 of the sea, the steatites load has been more regu* 

 larly traced, and makes a course of about four-* 

 teen inches wide between regular sides : the left 

 hand side of the cove is quite perpendicular, 

 and consists of a hard black stone, seemingly 

 divided into strata by small horizontal fissures, 

 placed at great distances from each other* The 

 other sides of the cove are more open and rugged, 

 the sea beats strongly into the creek, which at 

 low water has a small sandy beach/'* 



Of this substance there are two very distinct 

 structures ; the soft, already mentioned, and the 



* Da Costa, 37. 



