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at Mt. Mica, bringing in during the latter part of the nineteenth century
something like $50,000, was most important. The Mt. Apatite
deposits revealed themselves in 1882. In the twenty years following
fifteen thousand crystals were taken out. Cut gems from these
ranged in weight from six to eight karats. The red crystals at Paris
and Goshen, were found surrounded by dark green tourmaline.
People will remember the story by H. H. (Helen Hunt Jackson),
who lived in Chesterfield during the discovery of crystals there, and
wove about one of them the charming fancy found in "My Tourmaline."
Tourmaline is a very complex substance. It contains fourteen
elements, though none have all. Silica and alumina in about equal
proportions form three-fourths of the whole. All tourmaline is
strongly dichroic, except rubellite. Consequently, to obtain the
best results, a crystal must be cut most carefully in a certain direc-
tion. Tourmaline more than any other stone needs a skillful lapidary.
No precious stone, except perhaps topaz, resembles tourmaline
in its electric features, so that alone would easily distinguish rubellite
from spinel, garnet or ruby. This variety runs from pale rose to
rich ruby red. The color of tourmaline is not due to mechanical intermixture
of pigment, but is the property of each substance itself.
Crystals, hexagonal in shape, often have different colors at either
end, as pink and green.
In addition to all the colors mentioned, there is also black tourmaline
(shorl) and white (achroite).
Besides being used in jewelry, cut in slices tourmaline is most
useful for analyzing the polarization of light.
Tourmaline is almost as hard as emerald, 7 to 7.8, and much
heavier, and its lustre is also vitreous. Yet it is difficult to take
seriously stones which in a tray look like nothing so much as Huyler's
"clear squares."
The green tourmaline is the birthstone for May, in Kunz's
American list, as is the rubellite for December.
Tourmaline is not expensive now, so frequently is it found, but
in 1859 Dr. Feuchtwanger, the eminent mineralogist whose treatise
was published by D. Appleton & Co., valued his specimen of rubellite
and green tourmaline as high as any gem. He laments that rubellite
from Paris, Maine, is becoming very scarce and wants attention
paid to obtaining a new supply. A siberite, the fine red Siberian
variety, of five lines, less than half an inch, he quotes as worth $150,
and one of four by twelve lines, an inch long by a third wide, $1,200.
Think of that, in these days when tourmaline rarely costs more
than ten dollars a karat ;
and emerald, which he rates as low as $12,
is now, of good color and quality, cheap at $300!
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