holmes] 



ABORIGINAL AMERICAN ANTIQUITIES PART I 



243 



On account of its resistance to the destructive action of heat, sheet 

 mica was used at first by the "whites for lights in 

 Uses of Mica stoves and lamps and later for a number of important 



purposes, among which is the manufacture of elec- 

 trical apparatus, while the inferior grades are ground up for use in 

 the preparation of lubricants, paints for imparting luster to wall 

 papers, etc. 



It is greatly to be regretted that scientific attention was not earlier 

 called to the ancient mines, since all of the diggings 

 Mining Tools liave becH rcopcued and worked for commercial pur- 



poses, the evidences of the ancient operations being 

 largely and in some cases wholly obliterated. But there is some com- 

 pensation in the fact that a number of the miners have intelligently 



Fig. 114. 



Stone implements from tlic ancient mica mines of North Carolina, 

 fourth actual size.) 



(One- 



observed the ancient traces and in a few cases have preserved the tools 

 of stone encountered in the trenches. It is a misfortune, however, that 

 so few of these implements have been preserved, and up to the date of 

 the writer's visit to the mines the National Museum had secured of the 

 digging and fracturing tools onl}^ a dozen examples (figs. 114, 115). 

 The rarity of the mining tools, considering the extent of the opera- 

 tions, was at first extremely puzzling, and the white operators of the 

 mines found it difficult to explain this rarity except on the theory that 

 the ancients employed tools of iron or steel, which had subsequently 

 disappeared through disintegration, but examination of the mines 

 by the writer has led to what may be a more satisfactory interpreta- 

 tion. The ancient workings, which penetrated in cases to the depth 



