CoUvcitoitx of t/ic Acadoiiif. 23 



(blue vitriol) in water and then place any metallic object 

 in the solution it will be at once coated with pure copper. 

 Some time in the long ago, water holding copi3er in solu- 

 tion was forced up through the broken rocks of northern 

 Michigan and deposited its load of metal, filling everj^ 

 crack and crevice. In this manner were probably made 

 the wonderfully rich deposits of that region. The ores 

 from the Montana and Arizona mines, while very rich 

 in copper, are not pure metal as are these from Michigan, 

 Not man3^ years ago it was thought that tin ores 

 rich enough in metal to pay for mining could not be 

 found in our country, and nearly all the tin we used was 

 brought from Europe or the East Indies. But rich mines 

 of this metal have since been discovered in our western 

 states, and are being worked. These specimens of tin 

 ore do not have any appearance of the pure shining 

 metal that is so common everywhere. Here in the same 

 case are lead ores from many parts of our country. 

 Galena or lead ore was discovered and mined in Wiscon- 

 sin and Iowa by the first white men coming there. It 

 is a very heavy metal and the ore has a bright and shin- 

 ing surface where broken. It is found in two common 

 forms, massive and in cubical crystals. The lead ore of 

 Wisconsin, Illinois and Iowa is generally in the form of 

 cubes, although much of it is massive or uncrystalized. 

 Nearly related to the lead is the metal zinc, which is 

 generally found in the same regions as the lead ores. 

 Here is a fine specimen of very pure zinc ore from Jop- 

 lin, Missouri. Sixty-five per cent, of this piece is pure 

 metal. And here is another specimen from the same 

 mines that is called by the miners, dry bone. It is more 

 porous and less heavy than the first one and does not 

 yield so large a percentage of zinc. And now let us look 

 over these ores of our most valuable metal. We could 

 more easil^^ do without all of those I have before spoken 

 of than we could without the more common iron. Iron 

 is our most useful metal, in its various forms of cast iron, 

 wrought iron and steel. Iron ore is found in vast quan- 

 tities in the United States and in most other countries. 

 Its most common form is called hematite. Then there 

 is limonite, or bog iron ore, magnetite ore, a natural 



