242 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [Feb. 25, 



and impoverislied the upper side of the lode. Nearer the foot- wall, 

 the ore consisted of rich yellow sulphuret of great purity. The country 

 and horse of ground were of the usual conglomerate, but of very cry- 

 stalline nature. 



The other lode of the northern group has also been sunk upon, and 

 ore was found under similar conditions. The lodes of the southern 

 group are similar in outcrop, but the operations hitherto carried on 

 are too inconsiderable to justify any conclusions. 



The San Fernando lodes possess considerable interest in reference 

 to scientific mining. Their dimensions and the nature of their out- 

 crop, the associated minerals, the calcareous nature of the enclosing 

 country, the existence of horses of barren country within the lodes, 

 and the extraordinary richness of the bunches of ore near the surface, 

 are all phsenomena worthy of notice, not only in themselves, but when 

 considered by the side of the great mineral deposit of Cobre in so 

 many respects analogous. The distance from Cobre (as much as 

 350 miles) does not lessen the interest thus excited, as the relations 

 are much more geological than topographical. As there undoubtedly 

 exist other copper-districts in the island still further west, not hitherto 

 worked, and only known by their rich outcrops under somewhat 

 similar circumstances, the island of Cuba, already remarkable for its 

 mineral wealth, may be expected to preserve for some time to come 

 its extraordinary reputation in this respect. 



The distance of the San Fernando mining-district from the harbour 

 and town of Cienfuegos is about twenty-eight English miles, and a 

 line of railway from the town to Villa Clara crosses the country about 

 fourteen miles to the north. 



2. On some Copper Lodes near Sykesville, in Maryland. 



The eastern flanks of the great mountain-chain of eastern North 

 America, and the comparatively low ground near the mountains to- 

 wards the east, are remarkable as exhibiting in abundance metamor- 

 phic, and even igneous, rocks in belts highly inclined and of the most 

 varied character, while the chief axis of the mountain-chain often con- 

 sists of stratified fossiliferous rocks but little altered. Amongst the 

 metamorphic belts numerous metalliferous veins have been already 

 discovered and partially worked in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, 

 and North Carolina, and as they possess certain peculiarities in com- 

 mon, an account of the most characteristic of them will not be with- 

 out value. 



In the winter of 1854 I had occasion to visit some mines not far 

 from the Sykesville station on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, about 

 twelve miles east of the Blue Ridge, and thirty-two miles west of the 

 city of Baltimore. 



The country here consists of metamorphosed rocks ranging N.N.E. 

 and S.S.W., parallel to the mountain-chain, and dipping at a high 

 angle to the E.S.E. The rocks include syenite, a band of Hmestone, 

 and a mass of steatite, all seen before reaching Sykesville from the 

 west. In the immediate neighbourhood they include decomposing 

 granitic and syenitic gneiss, mica-schist, hard schists alternating with 



