on the thinness to which its scales could be reduced by splitting. It
was at Bakersville that we saw specimens of mica that resembled the
delicate tracery in the moss-agate and had the iridescent sheen of the
rainbow colors--the most delicate greens, reds, blues, purples, and
gold, changing from one to the other in the reflected light. In
the texture were the tracings of fossil forms of ferns and the most
exquisite and delicate vegetable beauty of the coal age. But the
magnet shows this tracery to be iron. We were shown also emeralds and
"diamonds," picked up in this region, and there is a mild expectation in
all the inhabitants of great mineral treasure. A singular product of the
region is the flexible sandstone. It is a most uncanny stone. A slip of
it a couple of feet long and an inch in diameter each way bends in the
hand like a half-frozen snake. This conduct of a substance that we have
been taught to regard as inflexible impairs one's confidence in the
stability of nature and affects him as an earthquake does.

This excitement over mica and other minerals has the usual effect of
starting up business and creating bad blood. Fortunes have been
made, and lost in riotous living; scores of visionary men have been
disappointed; lawsuits about titles and claims have multiplied, and
quarrels ending in murder have been frequent in the past few years. The
mica and the illicit whisky have worked together to make this region one
of lawlessness and violence. The travelers were told stories of the lack
of common morality and decency in the region, but they made no note of
them. And, perhaps fortunately, they were not there during court week
to witness the scenes of license that were described. This court week,
which draws hither the whole population, is a sort of Saturnalia.
Perhaps the worst of this is already a thing of the past; for the
outrages a year before had reached such a pass that by a common movement
the sale of whisky was stopped (not interdicted, but stopped), and not a
drop of liquor could be bought in Bakersville nor within three miles of
it.

The jail at Bakersville is a very simple residence. The main building is
brick, two stories high and about twelve feet square. The walls are so
loosely laid up that it seems as if a colored prisoner might butt his
head through. Attached to this is a room for the jailer. In the lower
room is a wooden cage, made of logs bolted together and filled with
spikes, nine feet by t