PRECIOUS STONES IN THE UNITED STATES. 419
Dr.
C. E. Lucas in the National Museum. It is a turtle-shaped, prehistoric,
dipping two inches and three-quarters in length, two in width, and an
inch and a half in thickness. It is almost flawless, and would afford a
fine gem.
At
the Yellowstone National Park and at Holbrook, Arizona, amethysts line
the hollow trunks of agatized trees. They are usually too small,
however, for gem purposes. Large quantities of the smoky quartz from
Pike's Peak region have been sent abroad for cutting. Transparent
crystals over a foot long and five inches in diameter have been found.
Through the West, this material is familiarly known by the name of
"cairngorm '' or "smoky topaz" (see Fig. 14 on the plate). The plate shows a common tint. Rutile in quartz, flleches d''amour (love's
arrows), or Venus's-hair-stone, as it is called, is found in a number
of localities in the United States, the principal supply coming from
North Carolina. This pellucid quartz is penetrated in all directions by
red, golden, and black rutile, in the form of hair-like crystals,
ramifying through the stone in every direction. It is made into a great
variety of gems, and ornaments. Probably the finest specimens were
those found in 1847 near Mid-dlebury, Vermont. They were of a rich red
color, six inches long a.nd three inches wide, and penetrated by many
rich, red, and yellow crystals, from the thickness of a knitting-needle
to that of a thin lead-pencil. From Rhode Island are obtained pieces of
quartz penetrated by black hornblende, quite equal to anything found
elsewhere.
Agate,
chalcedony, cornelian, silicified woods, and also jaspers, have been
found in an endless variety in many American localities. Fine agate has
been found at Agate Bay, Lake Superior, and in most of our Western
States. The silicified woods from Arizona, rich varied in color, are
perhaps the most remarkable in the world. Sections of trees,
twenty-nine inches in diameter, were recently cut for table tops at
Sioux Falls, Dakota. The magnificent moss-agates from Wyoming, Montana,
Colorado, and Utah, have been sold all over the world. When the stones
were fashionable, many of them sold at over ten dollars each, as much
as twenty thousand dollars' worth being sold in one year.
Banded
jasper, white, yellow, and red, in masses from four to six inches
across, comes from Collyer, Kansas. Beautiful blood-stone, or
heliotrope (green jasper with red markings), is produced in Howe
County, Georgia. Red and yellow jasper has been found at a number of
localities in the United States— at Diamond Hill, Cumberland, Rhode
Island, along the Hudson River from Troy to New York, and especially at
Hobokeu and Fort Lee, where there is a jasper outcrop- Beautiful green
chrysoprase has been discovered in the nickel mountains of Oregon. The
fire opal, without much opalescence, is obtained in Washington County,
Georgia. Beautifully colored opalized wood abounds at many localities
in California.
An opaque white hydrophane (a variety of opal) has been found in Colorado, that, from its curious properly of becoming entirely transparent when
water is dropped on it. has been named by the finder ''magic stone";
and he suggested its use as a stone for seal rings, scarf pins, or
lockets, where it can be put over a photograph or other object, and
when enough water is absorbed, will reveal the concealed object. It
absorbs its own weight of water.
Turquoise
is found at Mount Chalchihuitl, Los Cerillos, Santa Fe County, New
Mexico, and at Mineral Park Mohave County, Arizona. Almost without
exception, all the gems from this locality are apple and pea green.
Occasionally the gems are blue, but this is often changed after a
slight exposure. Some of the green stones are often stained, so as to
resemble the more valuable blue ones- Turquoise is used in jewelry only
for special purposes. The New-Mexican green turquoise was highly prized
by the aborigines for ornament. The turquoise in both New Mexico and
Arizona, like that from Persia, occurs in veins throughout masses of
yellowish trachyte, and many tons of rock may be broken before finding
a valuable stone. The colored plate (Fig. 15) shows a rough pecimen as
it came from Nevada. In both of these districts the waste and
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