Page:A Topographical Description of the State of Ohio, Indiana Territory, and Louisiana.djvu/82

 Austin, who has erected a good smelting furnace. This ore is not of the richest kind, but a greater quantity has been worked here, than in any other part of the country, from which the owner has derived great profits. The ore is taken out of the ground in an open prairie which is elevated nearly one hundred feet above the bed of the creek, and is supposed to extend over some thousands of acres. The mineral is found within two feet of the surface, in a strata of gravel, in which it lies in lumps, from one to fifty pounds weight. Under this strata is a sand rock, easily broken up with a pick-axe, and when exposed to the air, readily crumbles to fine sand. The ore intermixed in the sand rock is similar to that in the upper gravel strata. Under the sand rock is a strata of red clay about six feet thick. Beneath the clay is the best ore, in lumps from ten to two or three hundred pounds weight, the outside of which is frequently covered with a gold or silver coloured talky substance; some portion of arsenic and sulphur; and more or less of spar, antimony, and zinc, are sometimes found intermixed with the ore. Some of this ore will yield from sixty to seventy-five per cent.

About five miles from Barton's, in an eastern direction, is an old mine, discovered by the French, as early as their first settlement in this country, and was worked until Barton erected a furnace at his mine. It was then neglected until the year 1802, when a number of French