THE MIXING AX I) M1LL1XG PRACTICE AT SOME OE THE CHARACTERISTIC PLACER AXI) EREE-MILLIXG
MIXES.
THE CRAWFORD (OR INGRAM) MINE, STANLY COUNTY, N. C.
This mine is situated 4 miles southeast of Albemarle, in the Carolina belt. It represents a type of working in virgin placer ground, the gold being coarse, usually in nuggets. The mining tract (180 acres) comprises a Hat hollow or depression, averaging 250 feet in width, which is drained by a small branch. The country-rock is the dark greenish Monroe slate (sedimentary), lying in a flat synclinal trough. The auriferous grit, lying on the slate floor, is composed of angular fragments of quartz and country-rock bound in a clay matrix; the cement is often hard anil stained a brownish or black color. The quartz is of a milky, vitreous variety, seldom showing ferruginous stains; some pieces show parallel walls (vein structure) from a few inches iqi to 1 foot in thickness. Xo free gold has been found in this quartz. The thickness of the grit in the center of the synclinal basin is from 1-J- to 2 feet, and of the over-lay 2 to I feet, thinning out towards the edges. The length of the deposit on the company's property is about a quarter of a mile. The adjoining property on the north is owned by Mr. E. A. Eesperman, whose place has been worked by tributors. The gold found at the Crawford is altogether coarse, from the size of a pin's head to nuggets of considerable weight. The largest nugget was found on August 22, 1805, and weighed 10 pounds. The so-called De Berry nugget, found April 8, 1895, weighed 8 pounds 5 ounces. These nuggets are scarcely at all water-worn, being rough and irregular in shape. The fineness of the gold varies from 850 to 1)00.
On the hillside to the west of the placer mine several quartz-veins have been explored by shallow openings along the outcrop. One of these is from 2 to )5 feet thick, and dips steeply to the east, cutting the slates both in strike and dip. The quartz, so far as explored, has been found generally barren, though in several places gold has been panned from the crushed rock; but no larger pieces have been found giving any possible clue as to the origin of the nuggets of the placer deposits.
Gold was first discovered in this bottom in August, 1892, the prop-
