-i* 



92 



BULLETIN OF THE 



l^osit of certain species of organic matters whicli have a tendency to 

 increase the electro-chemical action, and which decomposed the sulphu- 

 rets, oxides, etc., which tlie abundant deposit of matter containing traces 

 of talc serpentine and chlorites, has brought together or concentrated 

 in a certain limited space. For nearly all the rocks contain in the 

 crystalline cleavage, and also in the veins these matters which appear 

 sometimes to be a sort of cementation, if, indeed, it be not the state 

 of combination of detritus, of disintegration of primitive rocks which 

 have arrived at the state of sandstone and groywacke.'' {I. c, p. 13.) 



This report is not without interest to the archjcologist as the follow- 

 ing proves : '^ I have in my possession locks of hair enveloped in copper, 

 which tlio natives carried about them as marks of their bravery. When- 

 ever they killed their enemy they used to cut off a lock of hair and carry 

 it about them as a species of decoration. In places where there is no 

 copper they cut off with tlie hair a small portion of the skin, which is 



called the scalp." (/. c, p. 16.) 



The student of Indian customs can, of course, now greatly aid the 

 miner in his prospecting, if he will carefully map the districts inhabited 

 by the non-scalping, copper-bearing Indians, for hereafter it will be of 

 no avail to look for copper outside of their habitat. 



Alb. Muller, in 1856, published a paper relating to the copper of this 

 district.* Ilis facts were taken mostly from the report of Foster and 

 Whitney, and it is unnecessary to repeat them here. Ho regarded the 

 copper as being deposited in the wet way, by the aid of galvanism, and 

 reduced by organic matter and the oxide of iron. The copper, it is sup- 

 posed, might have existed in the trap and its minerals, in minute 

 amomits, until brought to the points where it is now found. The stu- 

 dent interested in the origin and deposition of the copper will do well 

 to read the writings of Foster and Whitney, AVhitney, Muller, Baucrman, 

 and, lastly, those of Marvine and Pumpelly. 



PrincipalJ. W. Dawson remarks t concerning the deposition of the 

 native copper: "The whole of the appearances indicate that tlie depo- 

 sition of copper belongs to the period of aciueous infiltration, by which 

 the veins and vesicles were filled after the consolidation of the trap ; 

 and the copper, like the calc sjiar and zeolites, occurs both in true veins 

 and in the cavities of beds of vesicular trap and tufa. Its deposition 

 must, therefore, be explained, not by igneous causes, but by clectro- 



* Yorhandlungen dcT ■Naturforscliciidcn Gcsellsdiart in Baiicl, 1854-57, pp. 



411-438. 



t Feb. 10, 1857. Canadian Nat. and Geol., II. 1-12, 



