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produces annually about 245 tons of ore, yielding 664 per cent. There are mines also at Perkiomen, in Pensylvania, 24 miles from Philadelphia. The ore is chiefly a sulphuret; but it is accompanied by the carbonate, phosphate, and molybdate. In Massachusets, there is a vein of galena, traversing primitive rocks, six or eight feet wide, and extending twenty miles from Montgomery to Hatfield. The ore affords from 50 to 60 per cent. of lead.

Gold has only been found in North Carolina. It occurs in grains or small masses, in alluvial earths, and chiefly in the gravelly beds of brooks, in the dry season; and one mass was found weighing 28 lib. In 1810, upwards of 1340 ounces of this gold, equal in value to 24,689 dollars, had been received at the mint of the United States.

Native silver, in small quantities, is met with at different places, but in no other form. Mercury and tin have not been found. Cobalt occurs near Middletown, in Connecticut; and a mine of it was at one time worked. Manganese and antimony are found in several situations. Sulphuret of zinc is found in considerable quantity in Maryland, Pensylvania, New Jersey, and Massachusets. In New Jersey, a new variety of this metal has been discovered, in such abundance, that it promises to be a very valuable acquisition to the United States. It is a red oxide, composed, of zinc 76, oxigen 16, oxides of manganese and iron s. It is reduced without difficulty to the metallic

state.

The chromate of iron, both crystallized and amorphous, occurs in different situations; particularly near Baltimore, and at Hoboken, in New Jersey. This mineral is employed to furnish the chromic acid, which, when united with the oxide of lead, forms chromate of lead-a very beautiful yellow pigment, of which there is a manufactory at Philadelphia. It is sold under the name of chromic yellow, and is employed for painting furniture, carriages, &c.

In the former part of this article, we have noticed the vast extent of limestone of different species that is spread over the United States. Mr Cleaveland enumerates several varieties of the primitive limestones in the Eastern States, which are used as marble in ornamental architecture and in sculpture; but he remarks, that the state of the arts has not yet caused them to be extensively quarried, or even sufficiently explored. Some of the Vermont marbles are as white as the Carrara, with a grain intermediate between that of the Carrara and Parian marbles. At Middlebury, in Vermont, during the years 1809 and 1810, 20,000 feet of slabs were cut by one mill, containing 65 saws;

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Kentucky also furnishes nitre under a very different form, and constituting what is there called the rock ore, which is in fact a sandstone richly impregnated with nitrate of potash. These sandstones are generally situated at the head of narrow valleys which traverse the sides of steep hills. They rest on calcareous strata, and sometimes present a front from 60 to 100 feet high. When broken into small fragments, and thrown into boiling water, the stone soon falls into sand, one bushel of which, by lixiviation and crystallization, frequently yields 10 lib. and sometimes more than 20 lib. of nitrate of potash. The nitre obtained from these rocks contains little or no nitrate of lime, and is said to be superior for the manufacture of gunpowder to that extracted from the afore-mentioned earths. '

Masses of native nitre, nearly pure, and weighing several pounds, are sometimes found in the fissures of these sandstones, or among detached fragments. Indeed, it is said that these masses of native nitre sometimes weigh several hundred pounds. Similar caverns occur in Tennessee, and in some parts of Virginia and Maryland. '

With the exception of the red oxide of zinc, and the native magnesia, the discovery of which by Dr Bruce we noticed in our account of his Mineralogical Journal, no simple minerals have hitherto been discovered in the United States that were not already known to exist in other parts of the world. There are some of the simple minerals, however, which are found in a state of great perfection, such as the cyanite, green tourmaline and rubellite, melanite, precious serpentine, garnet and beryll. A mass of native iron has recently been found near Red River in Louisiana. The form is irregular; its length being three feet four inches, and its greatest breadth two feet four inches-its weight exceeds 3000 lib. Its surface is covered with a blackish crust, and is deeply indented. It is very malleable and compact; but is unequally hard, some parts being easily cut by a chisel, while others have nearly the hardness of steel. Its specific gravity is 7.40. It contains nickel, and is less easily oxidated than purified iron. This is rendered particularly interesting, by its containing in its interior octahedral crystals, which may be easily cut by a knife, and are striated like magnetic iron. The largest crystal is more than half an inch in length.

We look forward with great hopes to the active exertions of our Transatlantic brethren in this interesting field of scientific inquiry; and we shall expect to see the great outline they have traced, filled up by those detailed examinations of particular districts, where the nature and mutual relations of the different rocks have been diligently and accurately studied. The country occupied by the Granite deserves particular attention, from the fun

VOL. XXX. No. 60.

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damental point of theory connected with the history of this rock: -whether, in those situations where it appears to be the lowest rock, there is any evidence of its having been formed subsequently to the strata that cover it ;-if any veins are seen to proceed from the great body of the granite, and to penetrate with numerous ramifications the superincumbent rocks, as has been observed in most situations where granite occurs. The great alluvial formation will doubtless afford many valuable illustrations of the changes which the surface of our globe has undergone, from the animal remains with which it is said to abound; and we trust that this important subject of inquiry will be investigated with the attention it deserves. We should be glad to hear of the establishment of a Geological Society, to excite the zeal, and unite the labours of the Geologists of America, and to be the organ of communication between them and the rest of the Scientific World.

ART. V. 1. Voyage of H. M. Ship Alceste along the Coast of Corea, to the island of Lewchew; with an Account of her subsequent Shipwreck. By JOHN M'LEOD, Surgeon of the Alceste. Second Edition. London, J. Murray, 1818.

2. Naufrage de la Fregate la Meduse, faisant Partie de l'Expedition du Senegal en 1816; Relation contenant les Evenements qui ont eu lieu sur le Radeau, dans le Desert de Sahara, à St Louis, et au Camp de Daccard; suivi d'un Examen sous les Rapports Agricoles de la Partie Occidentale de la Cote d' Afrique, depuis le Cap Blanc jusqu'à l'un Bouchere de la Gambie. Par ALEXANDRE CORREARD, Ingenieur-Geographe, et J. B. HENRI SAVIGNY, Ex-Chirurgien de la Marine; tous deux Naufrages du Radeau. Seconde Edition, entièrement refondue, et augmentée des Notes de MONS. BREDIF, Ingenieur des Mines; avec le Plan du Radeau, et le Portrait du Roi ZAIDE. Paris, 1818.

IN every age and every country, since the foundation of so

ciety, events have been occurring, of which, though too minute and fugitive for the vast and rapid page of general history, we must regret that no record has been preserved.. It has been said, that the true characters of men are best seen in trifles-in those little acts which require no premeditation, and are not of importance enough to call for dissimulation or restraint. Considering the greater deliberation with which Governments usually conduct their public transactions, this is at least as true of nations

as of individuals; and it is much to be regretted, therefore, that there should be so few memorials of those less formal and guarded proceedings, in which national character may be supposed most fairly to disclose itself.

It is this kind of interest, we think, that belongs to the events related in the two narratives which stand at the head of this article. Each of them contains the account of a shipwreck-the one of an English, the other of a French frigate; catastrophes so common, as to attract no permanent notice, and whose memory scarcely outlives the tempest by which they are caused. We had not, however, read many pages of these volumes, before we were struck with the different conduct of the English and French sufferers, in similar circumstances; and we thought that a plain statement of the facts might prove interesting to our readers, and call their attention to some points of Character, which, from their generality, we cannot but consider as national.

On the 17th of June 1816, the Medusa French frigate, commanded by Captain Chaumareys, and accompanied by three smaller vessels, sailed from the island of Aix for the coast of Africa, in order to take possession of some colonies which we had captured in 1808, though, as we are sneeringly told by Mons. Savigny, not by force of arms, but by treachery; and which we restored to the French, by the treaties of 1814 and 1815. The first accident she encountered, was after she had doubled Cape Finisterre-when one of the crew fell into the sea; and, from the apathy of his companions, their want of promptitude in manouvring, together with the absence of every precaution, he was left to perish. On the tenth day of sailing, there appeared an error of thirty leagues in her reckoning. But the recollection of these accidents, which, in the British navy, would be deemed most disgraceful, is lost in the transports and exultations of one of the crew at the sight of Teneriff. There it was,' he exclaimed, that a numerous fleet, commanded by one of the bravest admirals of England, was beaten off by a handful of Frenchmen. Ah! if, at Trafalgar, our Villeneuve had not been betrayed, we would have completed what we had here begun; and who can say what might have been the consequences!"

As the Medusa lay off St Cruz, a boat was sent on shore to procure some necessaries; and it was discovered, that six Frenchmen, who had formerly been detained there as prisoners of war by the Spaniards, had, since their liberation, implored in vain of every ship of their nation which touched there during eight years, to give them a passage to their native land;- and not one would receive them on board. The Medusa was as obdurate as the rest; and the six Frenchmen were again thrown, by their own coun

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