22 GEMS AND PRECIOUS STONES IN THE
ton,
Bartow, Carroll, and Haralson. Dawson, Cherokee, Milton, and Paulding,
lying in the same line, and very possibly other counties adjacent to
the metamorphic belt, should perhaps be included in the list. The mode
of occurrence is similar to that of North Carolina, as previously
described, a few real diamonds, and many supposed ones, having been
found in connection with mining for gold, in the detritus of the
crystalline rocks spread along streams and placers. From time to time
glowing accounts have been published, in which Georgia is announced as
the future diamond-field of the continent ; but up to the present the
specimens actually obtained have been few and small, and it has
not been considered worth while to mine for them. Of these diamonds
interesting stories are told. An Atlanta lady wears in a ring one of
the best specimens ever found in Georgia. Another Georgia lady would
not marry until her prospective husband gave her a ring with a Georgia
diamond for an engagement ring. Several stones have been lost, and it
has been found that they were destroyed by ignorant people who
attempted to test them. The earliest discoveries reported were by
gold-washers in Hall County over forty years ago and later in White
County. Most of the specimens were found near Gainesville, in the
troughs and sluices of the Hall County placers. Two small crystals,
less than 1/2 carat each, are in the cabinet of Samuel R. Carter, of
Paris, Me. They are opaque and without definite form. They were found
in 1866, in the Racoochee Valley, White County, at the Horshaw placer
gold-mine. One was discovered by Dr. Augustus C. Hamlin, of Bangor,
Me., and the other by H. Ashbury. Another specimen from the same
region is thus described by C. Leventhorpe, of Patterson, Caldwell
County, N. C, in a letter to the "New York Sun," in August, 1883. He
says : " Numerous diamonds have been discovered in Georgia. After the
war, during the prevalence of a mining fever, a company was formed, I
believe, for exploring and diamond washings. I heard nothing further of
this enterprise, and if dividends were declared the announcement
escaped my notice." There is in the writer's possession, a rough
diamond taken from a "Long Tom" in White County, Ga. It is of very
perfect water and crystallization, and weighs almost a carat. The "
Long Tom " is a narrow
