THE CHESTER EMERY BED. 119 



I think that one may hazard tlie conjecture that tlie last sentence in the 

 above was quoted from memory, and thus rather iiiipert'ecitly, troin the opening 

 sentence of the article cited next below, though there is no other indication 

 that the biographer of Dr. Lucas was acquainted with the part taken by Dr. 

 Jackson in the discovery of emery at Chester. It will be well, therefore, 

 to let the account of the matter given by Dr. Jackson himself follow:' 



It has been said in England that " a good mine of emery is worth more to a man- 

 ufacturing iieople than many mines of gold.'' Such being the case, it affords nie great 

 pleasure to be able to announce the discovery of an inexhaustible bed of the best 

 emery in the world in the middle of the State of Massachusetts, in Chester, Hampden 

 County, (juite near to the Western Kailroad, which, with its ramifications, leads to 

 the largest armories and manufactories of metallic articles in this and the adjacent 

 States. 



For more than two years the existence of important beds of magnetic iron ore, 

 originally discovered by Dr. II. S. Lucas, has been known, and endeavors were made 

 by that gentleman to organize a company for the purpose of smelting these oi-es. In 

 consequence of this agitation I was employed by John B. Taft, esq., on the 19th of 

 October, 1863, to examine the locality and to make report of my results to him. 



On examination of my specimens of minerals after returning to Boston, and my 

 notes for sectional profiles of the rocky strata containing the iron ore, I found that 

 the minerals margarite and chloritoid, in talcose, hornblende, and mica slate rocks, 

 indicated the occurrence of emery, the association of the rocks and minerals being 

 identical with conditions known to exist in the localities of emery in Asia Minor. 



I therefore called the attention of the owners of the property to these facts, and 

 directed that search be made for emery, and that every mineral resembling it should 

 be sent to me for examination. Little attention was paid to this prediction at the 

 time, nor until I had invited Dr. Lucas, who resides in Chester, by personal represen- 

 tations and solicitations, to make the required search, the characters of emery being 

 fully described to him. 



On his return to Chester he soon learned that the miners were complaining of 

 the great hardness of the supposed iron ore, and that no less than forty drills were 

 dulled in boring a single hole for blasting. He then sent me pieces of this hard rock, 

 in the belief that it was the emery I had predicted. On examination it was found to 

 scratch quartz and topaz readily and to have all the properties of emery. A chemical 

 analysis proved it to be identical with the emery of Naxos. 



The owners, resident in Boston, being notified of this discovery, went with me to 

 the locality on the 11th of October last, when a full exploration of the premises was 

 made. There are several large beds of rich magnetic iron ore at this locality, and the 

 emery being magnetic (as it always is) has caused it to be mistaken for magnetic iron 

 ore, and many tons of it had been smelted with the carbonate of iron and hematite in 



' Discovery of Emery in Chester, Massachusetts, by Charles T. Jackson, M. D., Geologist and 

 State Assayer: Am. Jour. Sci., 2(1 series, Vol. XXXIX, May, 1865, p. 87. 



