Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/279

 FLINDERS FLINT 271 Aposteln Ms auf unsere Zeit (4 vols., 1852- '60). See Winkworth's " Life of Pastor Flied- ner" (London, 1867). FLINDERS, Matthew, an English navigator, born at Donington, Lincolnshire, about 1760, died July 19, 1814. In 1795 he was midshipman on board the vessel which conveyed Capt. Hunter, the governor of Botany Bay, to Australia. At Port Jackson he embarked with the surgeon of the ship, George A. Bass, in a boat 8 ft. long, in which they explored the estuary of George's river. Their discoveries determined them to explore the whole Australian coast. In a large decked boat with six men, sailing S. through a passage afterward named Bass strait, they first discovered that Tasmania was a separate island. In July, 1801, Flinders, now a captain, again sailed from England, surveyed the whole Aus- tralian coast as far as the eastern extremity of Bass strait, then refitted at Port Jackson, and in the summer of 1802, steering N., explored Northumberland and Cumberland islands, and surveyed the Great Barrier reef of coral rocks. He then returned to Port Jackson, where his vessel was condemned, and, unable to procure another, he embarked as a passenger on a store ship to lay his charts and journals before the admiralty, and to obtain another ship to con- tinue his examination of Australia. On the way to England the store ship and a consort were wrecked on a coral reef. Flinders and two or three companions went in an open boat 750 m. to Port Jackson, where he secured a schooner of 29 tons, in which, accompanied by another schooner, he returned and rescued the wrecked crews. He now determined to go to England in the small schooner; but on his way, having made the Isle of France, he was seized by the governor, in spite of a French passport, and was detained for six years; after which his health was so impaired, and his spirit so bro- ken, that he expired in London on the day when his narrative was published (" Voyage to Terra Australis, &c., in the Years 1801, 1802, and 1803," 2 vols. 4to, London, 1814). FLIKT, a peculiar amorphous variety of near- ly pure quartz, found in chalk, in nodular masses or in layers, sometimes forming beds of such extent as to be used for building, as in the counties of Kent, Suffolk, and Norfolk, England. It is usually of a dark color from the presence of carbonaceous matter, supposed | to be derived from animal remains ; but some specimens are almost white and transparent. It breaks with a smooth conchoidal fracture, and very sharp edges may be formed upon it with a hammer ; a quality which adapts it for being made into gun flints and arrow and spear heads. Its specific gravity is 2'59. Berzelius found in a specimen 0*117 per cent, of potash, 0-113 of lime, and traces of iron, alumina, and naceous matter. According to Fuchs, the silica is partly soluble. It was formerly thought ial in the production of flint glass, but is now superseded by pure granular quartz or sand. It is still used in the manufacture of 325 VOL. VIL 18 porcelain. Flint nodules constitute a peculiar feature in the chalk cliffs of the coast of Eng- land. They occur in horizontal layers scattered through the upper portion of the chalk forma- tion, and in a few instances have been seen in vertical rows like pillars, at irregular distan- ces, the nodules not being in contact either in the horizontal or vertical arrangement. They commonly contain a nucleus of parts of marine fossils, such as are abundant in the chalk, as shells, sponges, echini, &c. ; and they also pre- sent the forms of hollow geodes, their cavities lined with quartz crystals, iron pyrites, carbon- ate of iron, chalcedony, &c. Flint is a com- mon mineral production in the United States, but it is converted to no use. It abounds in the tertiary formations of the southern states, and is met with in the older rocks, even to the metamorphic quartz associated with the lowest stratified rocks. On the Lehigh mountain in Pennsylvania, at Leiber's Gap, is exposed in loose fragments in the soil a vast amount of flint rock, associated with cherty quartz in- crusted with chalcedony and mammillary and botryoidal crystallizations. In the woods west of the road 20 acres have been dug over by the Indians, to obtain the flint for arrow and spear heads. Piles of broken flint still lie uncovered by the sides of the excavations. The stone was highly prized by the Indians, and they worked it skilfully. FLINT, a city and the capital of Genesee co., Michigan, on both sides of Flint river, near the centre of the county, about 60 m. N. N. W. of Detroit; pop. in 1850, 1,670; in 1860, 2,950 ; in 1870, 5,386. The city is picturesquely situated, and is laid out with broad streets shaded with fine trees. The principal public buildings are the court house, a handsome brick structure surmounted by a cupola ; the county jail, built principally of iron ; the city hall, of brick ; St. Paul's Episcopal church, in the Gothic style, of stone quarried in the vi- cinity ; five ward school houses, three of brick and two of wood, and a handsome Catholic school house, recently erected. A high school building, to cost $80,000, and a masonic temple are in course of erection. The Michigan in- stitution for the education of the deaf and dumb and the blind occupies a commanding site on the S. W. side of the city, with groves and gardens covering 94 acres. The number of inmates is about 300, nearly equally di- vided between the blind and the deaf mutes. In the S. E. part of the city are the fair grounds of the Genesee county agricultural society, 25 acres in extent. The city is at the intersection of the Flint and Pere Mar- quette with the Chicago and Lake Huron rail- roads. The most extensive manufacture is that of lumber, which employs 10 saw mills, with an aggregate capacity of 100,000,000 feet annually. There are also seven planing mills, three extensive sash, door, and blind factories, and two flouring mills, producing 25,000 bar- rels of flour a year. The other principal man-