338 GOLD-MINES OF GEORGIA. 



found ; being sometimes crystallized in beautiful 

 six-sided prisms, terminated by a pyramid at one 

 end, and attached at the other to other crystals, or, 

 more frequently, to a nucleus of feldspar. In some 

 of the veins the quartz is compact, resembling 

 horn flint; at other times it is crystalline, the fibres 

 or crystals radiating from a central nucleus ; and 

 these various kinds of quartz are the gangues or 

 matrices in which the gold is found. They also 

 contain " iron pyrites," " brown oxide of iron," &c. 



As to the mode of their formation, it is generally 

 admitted that the fissures were produced by vol- 

 canic agency, and the quartz and elements of the 

 metals were projected from below into the fissures 

 producing the metals and their gangues. From 

 late experiments, it is ascertained that galvanic 

 electricity has much to do in the formation of me- 

 tallic veins, and probably always is concerned in 

 the production of these phenomena. It is difficult, 

 indeed, to imagine how this agent can operate, un- 

 less the metals be compounds of gaseous bodies, 

 which, by the combination of their simple elements, 

 transmitted through conducting substances to im- 

 mense distances, produce by their union the differ- 

 ent metallic bodies. Thus we often see thin veins 

 of gold in the centre of quartz crystals ; how it got 

 there in a solid form is more than we can explain, 

 except on the above principle of its being a com- 

 pound body. It is highly probable, and, indeed, all 

 known facts bear us out in the assertion, that the 

 deeper we penetrate the rocks containing metallic 

 veins, the thicker and more valuable do the veins 

 become. Still the vein may be so thin, that, after a 

 certain depth, it cannot be profitably worked. 



It is impossible to notice all the places where 

 gold has been found in Georgia. It was about the 

 year 1830 that public attention was directed to this 

 subject, by the discovery of gold in Habersham 

 county. It was soon ascertained that the whole of 



