North Carolina and Tennessee. 5 
greatest abundance of gold; most of the veins opened, are near and 
lie parallel to it; thus have been discovered the finest deposits. ~ 
At some distance on either side, the granite rears its wedge like 
top in lines generally parallel. This rock, by disintegration, is usual- 
ly rounded off. Gneiss and mica slate are common ; these alternate _ 
with diabase. Veins of talcose slate, hornblende, garnet, 
euphotide, imperfect soapstone, and with veins and beds of kaolin. 
Most, if not all these lie in parallels, (to use the workmen’s phrase,) 
like the leaves of a book ; their relative position 1 was not enabled 
satisfactorily to fix. The strata are generally vertical, though 
when a dip i is observed, it is to the north-west toward the base of the 
Blue ri 
When it is in veins, more gold has been found in quartz rock than 
in any other substance. The vein of quartz may be found at the 
surface, usually running with the talcose slate, and sometimes with 
that slate passing into mica slate. Very frequently it is associated 
with hepatic pyrites, often greatly decomposed, (particularly at the 
surface.) Such is the quantity of iron in some veins, that it would 
seem to be the gangue ; but much as it may predominate, still a por- 
tion of quartz is present ; and the same remark applies to the talcose 
slate where it is found-to contain gold ; there is always a portion of 
quartz associated with it; usually it is granular, and disseminated with 
the gold ; and with this rock there is less of the pyrites, and if any, 
the cubes are small. 
Gold is found in veins of quartz, running with greenstone, penkitgy 
into chlorite ; often the quartz is diffused and splintery, with a trace of 
iron and kisolins; but in general this substance is in the wall of the 
vein on one sides Some of the best deposits seem to have had their 
supplies from such sources. Loud’s and Hughes’s deposits may be 
placed to this latter class of veins. ‘They are rich; the gold is in 
large and rough pieces, holding in its filaments and thin plates, por- 
tions of finely granular quartz. I did not see any vein of this char- 
acter so far opened as to develop a satisfactory view of its associa- 
tion; one, in which the writer had an interest, contained much gold, 
but it was hard to penetrate the gangue, and for the first ten or twelve 
feet, was found in confusion : my opinion is, that should these veins 
in the descent become ochery, they might be easily worked. 
Humpbrey’s vein on the Chatahoochy, was quartz, walled with 
talcose slate. The masses of quartz containing the gold were reni- 
form; it is rich; it had not been opened to the water. At the base 
