202 



BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



[bull. 60 



the view of rediscovering the deposits of precious metals supposed 

 to have been worked by the Spanish or otlier peoples in early times. 

 Several shafts were sunk about the old pits, some to the depth, it 

 is said, of 50 or GO feet. As a matter of course nothing of vahie 

 was founcL It is reported that some of the explorers discovered 

 iron tools of a primitive type in the ancient pits, but it must be 

 assumed that these were left by our own pioneer miners, since there 

 is no evidence either that the Spanish were ever here, or that the 

 aborigines possessed metal tools. 



The beds of chert are of unknown area and of great thickness. 

 They are of upper subcarboniferous age and outcrop about the mar- 

 gins of the shallow stream courses, forming in places a low rounded 



scarp. The ancient implement-makers doubtless be- 

 The Quarry Work gan work at the more accessible points along the 



margin of the outcrop and gradually by long- 

 continued operations carried the pits and trenches far back into the 

 slope. The excavations in the main took the form of roundish pits, 



Fiii. 7y. Section tliruugli a sioglc yuarry pit well lilled with shop debris. 



but on the margins of the area trenches in the solid rock a hundred 

 feet or more in length were carried along the ledge. Where the work 



was deep the refuse about the margins accumulated 

 The Fittings and filled the older excavations (fig. 79). It is not 



probable that many of the pits' w^ere more than 10 

 or 15 feet deep. At present the greatest depth is about 5 feet and 

 the width of the roundish depressions does not exceed 40 feet. 



The story of the working of the quarries and the manipidation of 



the stcne is to be read with almost as much ease as 

 Woriishops if the work had closed but yesterda}^ The masses of 



fresh chert were removed from the pits and broken 

 up, and choice fragments were selected for further treatment. Shops 

 were established on the margins of the pits, on the dump heaps, and 

 iit convenient points in the vicinity (fig. 80). To-day in numerous 

 cases circular clusters of chert refuse indicate the position of the 



