658 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [April 2, 1900, 
is still in vogue. Men are sent out daring the rams 
to search for likely-looking outcrops of mica. The 
micii-schist being softer than the other members of 
this series of rooks, is eroded into valleys— the more 
quartoze beds making the ridges of bills. A certain 
amount of alluvium and talus from the adj-rfcent hills 
covers the valleys. 
After exceptionally heavy rain this surface deposit 
is washed off, and with it the decomposed feUpar of 
the pegmatite veins, having exposed tufts of partially 
decomposed mica. The natives call these tufts " foo- 
foo" and belicTe that they grow during the nuus, as 
they cannot account for their exposure at surface after 
a heavy shower, where there was nothiug apparent 
before the raia. Having discovered several of these 
"foo-foo" spots, these are marked eff for mining 
Operations as soon as the dry season begins. Parties 
of men, women, and children are set to work on those 
outcrops, and the books of mica dug out, packed m 
loads of about 30 lb., and brought in at duak to the 
central store. 
Here several skilled men are seated on the noor 
trimming the mica before it is packed away for market. 
Before each man is a stout peg, driven firmly into 
the gLOund and protruding about 18 in. The books 
of mica are first split into plates about 1 in. in thick- 
ness, the mica easily splittiag into laminae of any 
thickness. The trimmers are provided with sharp 
sickles, and the point of this knife is used for 
opening the sheets. Imperfect lamiuse are now peeled 
off the plates till both surfaces show a clean, even 
face. The plate is supported against the side of the 
peg, and the sickle drawn downwards to trim off the 
jagged ends and irregularities along the edge of the 
sheets of mica. 
After trimming, the plates are sorted for tlie liiii- 
ropean market, the United Kingdom and America 
being the chief buvers. The sheets are first sorted 
according to quality, four kinds being recognised by 
the dealers. 
1. Ruby mica, hard and tough. 
2. Wtiite transparent mica. 
3. Discoloured and smoked. 
4. Black mica and flawed. 
If 8 represents the value of ruby mica, 4 would be 
paid for white, 2 for discoloured, and 1 for black and 
flawed sheets of equal size. The sizing is as follows : 
■ SpecinJ Sheets Measuring more than 50 Square inches. 
No. 1, Sheets of from 36 to .50 squar* inches. 
2. „ 24 36 
3, „ 16 24 
' 4. „ 10 16 
. , r.. „ 6 10 
„ 6. „ 4 6 
Quoting from a recent sale sheet at an auction in 
London, the following prices vrere realised: 
iBesi Ruby. Per Pound. 
^Number! s. d. 
j .. .. .. 6 8 
•;, 2 4 0- 
■• .'. 3 .. .. .. 2 0 
*; 4 10 
■;; 5 0 4 
f- 6 ... .. .. 0 2 
■ Specials bring as much as £1 per ,1b, according to 
size of sheets. 
The sheots are trimmed irregulary into any shape 
they will take to clear them of flaws. Should square 
rectangular, or diamond-shape sheets be wanted, a 
special rate ho,s to be paid for these to allow for the 
great waste. 
The sheets are packed in boxes of 1 cwt., and trans- 
ported on carta to the nearest railway station, 100 
miles distant. From thence they go to Calcutts, and 
are sbipptd to Liondoa or the United States of 
Ameiica. 
Jlfarket and Output.— Daving the year 1895-6, 8,913 
cwt. of mica were exported from India, of which the 
mines under review contributed 8,835 cwfc., valued at 
R995,O0.) or £60,000. The yield of the mines may be 
placed at doi^ble this figure, one-half being require 
for the Indian market, and that chiefly of the inferior 
kinds. 
The export trade is a growing one, as the following 
figures will show: — 
Exportg, 
1892. 1893. 1894. 1895. 1896. 
cwt. cwt. cwt. cwt. cwt. 
Bengal.. 2,298 3,310 4.843 5,126 8.835 
Hard, sound, ruby mica is much used for the doora 
of glass and steel furnaces where extreme heat is 
rpquired. The mica is not affected by the extreme 
heat, and thus enables the woikmen to look into the 
furnace and watch th« crucibles of moltc-n matter. 
Thin sheets are maile into chimneys for incandescent 
gas burners, also for fire screens and for electrial 
purposes, as mica is an extremely bad conductor of 
eleetricity. 
A method of cementing sheets of mica into a card 
board has been recently patented in Germany, and 
this cardboard is used for coating boilers, mica being 
a nonconductor of heai. It is also manufactuied into 
helmets for fire-brigade men, packing for fireproof 
rooms, etc. Thinner sheets are made into envelopes 
for wrapping valuable documents. 
Quantitij of Mica Available. — At present India yieldg 
the bulk of the mica consumed in the Arts, and of 
this quantity nearly all comes from the district 
described. The pegmatite veins in this locality are 
numerous and of large size, and are in places ex- 
tremely rich in mica, nearly one-third of the vein- 
stuff being of this material. The quantity of mica 
available is practically inexhaustible. The present 
method of mining is wasteful in the extreme and fully 
nine-tenths of the mica extracted from the mines ia 
injured and rendered unfit for export. Thousands of 
tons of waste mien, .-'re to be seen at the mouths of 
the mines and at the dressing floors. Probably the 
new patented method of cementing mica into card- 
board may create a market for this. There cannot be 
the slightest doubt thit when Bniopean methods of 
mining are introduced, the cost of production will be 
materially reduced, the waste will be much less, and 
a better quality of mica will be secured. At present 
only the decomposed, or partially decoinpoted, vein- 
stuff is mined. Here the mica must also undergo a 
partial decomposition, but, of course, not to any thing 
like the extent of the felspar. In the hard vein-stuff 
the mica is hard and tough, and this class of mica 
commands a better rice. 
fSome of the veins yield black mica (biotite). This 
is largely used as a drug by Hindoos and Moham- 
medans. Reduced to a powder, it is supposed to be 
very efficacious in cases of dysentery. The sheets of 
mica are at tiiiies very qneerly marked. In places 
one h.-? If of each sheet will be muscovite and the 
other half biotite, the line of division between the 
two colours being a perfectly straight line, and there 
beirg no apparent change beyond the colour in the 
uniformity of the sheet. Other sheets, agaiu, are 
marked with a chequered pattern in black lines, the 
lines being due to magnetite. Again, there are den- 
dritic inclusions of white quartz between the laminae. 
All markings take from the value of the sheets. The 
most esteemed colours are pure ruby, amber, light 
green transparent whits. There is also a silver white, 
which the natives prize for inlaid work. 
A demand for Indian mioa has lately sprung up 
in the United States of America. In 189r) the quan- 
tity taken was. 1,900 cwt., while in 1896 it was 5,076 
cwt. Indian ruby is found to answer the purposes of 
furnace work better than the locally obtained mica. 
[A ifcogether, the export from India in 1897-98 was 
11,608 cvpt. and from Ceylon in 1897 it was 166 cwt. 
—Ed. T.A.] 
BiCHE3.— It w.i.s a saying of Plato, that the only 
certain way to be triilv rich is not to have more 
property, but fewer desires. For whoever is always 
grasping at more avows that he is still in want, and 
must be poor in the midst of aiflnence. Here is a 
jjhiloaophy which many of m can contemplate com- 
placently, — Journal of the Jamaica Agi-icuUural Society, 
