58 GEOLOGICAL RECONNOISSANCE 



erly enclosed between walls of the adjacent magnesian limestone, and now 

 forms a conspicuous feature in the landscape of that region. (See plate 

 No. 4.) 



The lead ore of this locality of Carroll county, may be expected to 

 occur in following it, with its downward hade, through the different members 

 of this formation, in irregular masses, " pockets," sheets, strings, and thin 

 veins in the magnesian limestones; but probably sparingly, if at all, inter- 

 spersed in the occasional layers of sandstone, which rock has, perhaps, not 

 retained the openness of fissure, necessary for the reception of the infil- 

 trated or insinuated ore.* 



About 20,000 pounds of lead ore have been raised, in all, at these " dig- 

 gings," the excavations being, however, for the most part, only 5 to 15 

 feet in depth. 



About 500 to 600 pounds were raised at the 40 feet, " Brickey's" shaft, 

 adjacent to the isolated mass of sandstone, represented on plate No. 4. 



Judge Brickey, who has had long experience in the lead business, in 

 Washington county, Missouri, is of opinion that the surface indications in 

 township 20 north, range 19 west, of the 5th principal meridian, are fully 

 as encouraging as in that part of Missouri, perhaps even more so, for 

 profitable mining. 



The great difficulty in pursuing lead-mining in this part of Arkansas, at 

 present, is the want of furnaces for the reduction of ore which the miner 

 could raise. 



For want of these, the ore has either to be smelted in heaps or log fur- 

 naces at considerable loss and disadvantage, or transported at a cost which 

 would consume the profits of the miner, to distant localities in Missouri, 

 where smelting furnaces have been already erected. 



The most common vein-stone of this region is calcareous spar; some 

 " gozzin" is occasionally seen in the crevices; but oftener, near the surface, 

 the materials filling the interstices of the magnesian limestones, are buff 

 and grey argillaceous and shaly earths. 



The distance from these mines to navigation on White river, at Du 

 Buque, is from 8 to 10 miles. The growth is, mostly, small sized black 

 and post-oak and hickory. 



It will be observed, by the Chemical Report, that the lead ores, both of 

 Carroll, Marion, and Independence counties, are, when freed from adhering 

 gangue and rock, remarkable ior their purity. The most important of 

 them have been cupelled, to ascertain the amount of silver, but only one 

 variety examined, up to the present time, viz: that from the Sewell 



* In some few instances, in Missouri, lead ore has been found in sufficient quantity in the sand- 

 stone to pay for working. 



