26 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



Indians, or at least their oldest men, are unable to give 

 an account of it. It may probably have been the at- 

 tempt of the exploring party of Spaniards which pene- 

 trated from Pensacola into the interior, and which 

 expedition terminated fatally, according to documents 

 met with in the public archives of Pensacola. 



Numerous as are the vein mines opened and partially 

 developed in the states of North Carolina and Virginia, 

 few have been the subject of any systematic mining ope- 

 rations. Some, however, where a regular plan of mining 

 has been introduced, are at present successful, and 

 yielding returns commensurate with the capital em- 

 ployed. And others are about to be placed in a situa- 

 tion, by means of adequate machinery, to test the value 

 of their mineral load. Occasional failures have taken 



and immediately beneath a large oak tree which measured five feet in diameter 

 and must have been four or five hundred years old. The deposit was alluvial, 

 or what may be termed table land. The stratum of quartz gravel in which the 

 vessel was imbedded is about two feet in thickness, resting upon decomposed 

 chlorite slate. 



It is not difficult to account for the deposit of those substances in alluvial soil, 

 for the hills are generally very high and precipitous, and from the immense 

 quantity of rain which falls, the streams are swollen to a great height, sweep- 

 ing every thing with them and frequently forming a deposit of several feet in 

 thickness in a season ; but some of the alluvial land is from 10 to 15 feet above 

 the present level of the streams. These deposits exhibit appearances of as great 

 attrition as those recently formed. 



There was a vessel or rather a double mortar found in Duke's creek, about 

 five inches in diameter, and the excavations on each side were nearly an inch in 

 'depth, basin like, and perfectly polished. It was made of quartz, which had 

 been semi-transparent, but had become stained with the iron which abounds in 

 quantity in all this country. In the bottom of each basin was a small depres- 

 sion half an inch in depth and of about the same diameter. Some suppose it 

 "was used for grinding paint &c, or in some of their plays or games. 



