174 LIFE OF BENJAMIN SILLIMAN. 



from recollection, 1 have been surprised by the fidelity, 

 with which that faithful prompter, memory, summons up 

 scenes and thoughts that have apparently long since passed 

 into oblivion, and have faded away from our minds. Asso 

 ciation is, however, the strongest cord which, woven into 

 a moral and intellectual network, yields to our soliciting 

 force expended upon it, and produces a rich result, as a 

 seine in the sea draws in a multitude, a whole school, when 

 we might have thought that there were only a few strag 

 glers, and they scarcely worthy of the capture. 



Salisbury Craig. Among the visits which I made to 

 this celebrated mountain, that of March 5, 1806, came very 

 near being made memorable. As it was a very fine morn 

 ing, I passed several hours in examining the Craig, in pur 

 suit of its minerals. The columns appeared to be from 

 seventy to one hundred and twenty feet high, and immedi 

 ately at their feet commenced a sloping descent, so nearly 

 vertical, that one could walk only with great care, making 

 his way over it with watchful eyes. The mass is composed 

 of the ruins of the cliffs, brought down, through ages, by 

 frost, rains, wind, and gravity. The accumulation forms a 

 slope of two hundred to three hundred feet. My course 

 lay along at the top of the slope and at the foot of the cliffs ; 

 immediately over my head were the impending cliffs, and 

 at my feet a giddy descent to the bottom of the mountain. 

 Stopping every few minutes to examine the rocks, and 

 freighting my pockets with minerals, I pursued my course 

 at leisure, not without some solicitude lest a false step or 

 a faithless fragment, treacherous to my weight, should pre 

 cipitate me to the bottom. Coasting along the front of the 

 mountain, I had nearly reached its western extremity, when 

 I was induced by a place that looked, very promising, 

 to clamber up over a great mass of loose stones to the 

 very foot of the precipice, and was busily occupied be 

 neath the ragged and ruinous cliffs, which seemed ready 



