Page:Economic History of Virginia Vol 1.djvu/108

 lead and silver ores, intermixed, were brought to light in Nelson County, and so abundant were the deposits of gold in Fluvanna, that in the same year, a mill for crushing the ore was erected in that county by Commodore Stockton. It is an interesting fact that even at the present day, a very considerable quantity of fragments of gold, which have been picked up in the streams by the inhabitants, is brought to the stores in this part of the State to be exchanged for articles of various kinds. In Buckingham County, lying immediately to the south, on the further side of James River, gold mines have been systematically worked for several generations, and at a sufficient rate of profit to compensate the owners for the expense which has been entailed.

Copper was one of the most common ornaments of the Indians when the first colonists arrived, but it seems to have been procured by trading with the tribes living in the northwest, and probably came from the vicinity of the