The sandstone, from which this spring issues, is granulated and glimmering, like that about the old lead mines of St. Michael.[60] Like that, it is in horizontal strata, and exhibits sufficient evidence of being a continuation of the same stratum. Perceiving the same indications of fossil coal, lead, and other minerals here, as were known to exist in the same range of country on the other side of the Missouri, we listened with a credulity which seemed rather to disappoint and surprise our host, to his account of the phenomena that had appeared from time to time in his neighbourhood. The combustion of a coalbed, or the decomposition of a mass of pyrites, has, we believe, given rise to many more astonishing stories than he related. [60] The old mining district in Madison County, Missouri, centered around the town of Mine la Motte, named for the Frenchman who discovered the deposits. Mine la Motte was settled as early as 1722; its site is about four miles north of Fredericktown. St. Michael was settled in 1801, by immigrants from North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia, and in 1822 contained fifty dwellings; then it declined and almost disappeared. Its site is on the north bank of Saline Creek, opposite Fredericktown.—ED. He gave an account of several luminous appearances that had been seen at the breaking up of winter, or in unusually rainy seasons, or at other times of the year. These had been witnessed by many persons of unquestionable veracity; but so great had been their terror on the occasion, that they could never afterwards recollect the precise spot where the light had appeared to them. He told us of two itinerant preachers, who had encountered an indescribable phenomenon, at a place about nine miles east of Loutre lick. As they were riding side by side at a late hour in the evening, one of them requested the other to observe a ball of fire attached {100} to the end of his whip. No sooner was his attention directed to this object, than a similar one began to appear on the other end of the whip. In a moment afterwards, their horses and all objects near them were enveloped in wreaths of flame. By this time the minds of the itinerant preachers were so much confounded, that they were no longer capable of observation, and could therefore give no further account of what happened. He also stated as a fact, authenticated by many credible witnesses, that a very considerable tract of land near by, had been seen to send up vast volumes of smoke, which rose through the light and porous soil, like the smoke through the covering of a coal-pit. This had in one instance been witnessed by a son of the celebrated Col. Boon, and was at first mistaken for a prairie on fire. This phenomenon also occurs at the breaking up of winter, or at such seasons as the earth is drenched by uncommon quantities of rain.