Page:The History of the American Indians.djvu/249

 An Account of the Cheerake Nation. 237

hill, but the heavy rains which at that time fell on the deep fnow, pre vented the gratifying my curiofity, as the boggy deep creek was thereby rendered impaflable.

In this rocky country, are found a great many beautiful, clear, chry- ftaline ftones, formed by nature into feveral angles, which commonly meet in one point : feveral of them are tranfparent, like a coarfe diamond^ others refemble the onyx, being engendered of black and thick hu mours, as we fee water that is tinctured with ink, flill keeping its fur- face clear. I found one ftone like a ruby, as big as the top of a man's thumb, with a beautiful dark fliade in the middle of it. Many ftones of various colours, and beautiful luftre, may be collected on the topy of thofe hills and mountains, which if fkilfully managed, would be very valuable, for fome of them are clear, and very hard. From which, we may rationally conjecture that a quantity of fubterranean treafures is contained there ; the Spaniards generally found out their fouthern mines, by fuch fuperficial indications. And it would be an ufeful, and profitable, fervice for fkilful artifts to engage in, as the prefent trading white favages are utterly ignorant of it. Manifold curious works of the wife author of nature, are bountifully difperfed through the whole of the country, ob vious to every curious eye.

Among the mountains, are many labyrintfis, and fome of a great length*, with many branches, and various windings ; likewife different forts of mineral waters, the qualities of which are unknown to the natives, as by their temperate way of living, and the healthinefs of their country, they have no occafion to make experiments in them. Between the heads of the northern branch of the lower Cheerake river, and the heads of that of Tuckafehchee, winding round in a long courfe by the late Fort-Loudon, and afterwards into the Miffifippi, there is, both in the nature and circum- ftances, a great phenomenon Between two high mountains, nearly co vered with old moffy rocks, lofty cedars, and pines, in the valleys of which the beams of the fun reflect a powerful heat, there are, as the natives affirm, fome bright old inhabitants, or rattle fnakes, of a more enormous fize than is mentioned in hiftory. They are fo large and unwieldy, that they take a circle, almoft as wide as their length, to crawl round in their fhorteft orbit : but bountiful nature compenfates the heavy motion of their bodies, for

�� �