18 STAFFA. GEOLOGY. 



provided the water be not too high ; but on the western, 

 they terminate at some distance from the extremity. The 

 lower portions of the last columns lose at length their 

 regularity of form, and coalesce into a rude mass of rock, 

 as I have already remarked. 



It would be no less presumptuous than useless to 

 attempt a description of the picturesque effect of that 

 to which the pencil itself is inadequate. But if this cave 

 were even destitute of that order and symmetry, that 

 richness arising from multiplicity of parts combined with 

 greatness of dimension and simplicity of style, which it 

 possesses ; still, the prolonged length, the twilight gloom 

 half concealing the playful and varying effects of reflected 

 light, the echo of the measured surge as it rises and falls, 

 the transparent green of the water, and the profound and 

 fairy solitude of the whole scene, could not fail strongly 

 to impress a mind gifted with any sense of beauty in art 

 or in nature. If to these be added, as in viewing the 

 Scuir of Egg, that peculiar sentiment with which Nature 

 perhaps most impresses us when she allows us to draw 

 comparisons between her works and those of art, we 

 shall be compelled to own it is not without cause that 

 celebrity has been conferred on the cave of Fingal. 



The most interesting views for the artist are to be 

 found from various points on the southern side of the 

 island ; comprising the whole range of pillars, with the 

 apertures of one or of all the caves. But these are still 

 less subjects for description, and must be left to the 

 painter, whose art will not often meet with objects more 

 worthy of its exertions. 



I HAVE reserved to the last place the geological 

 account, both of the rocks and of the foreign substances 

 found in Staffa, which present but little that is interesting. 



The conglomerate that forms the lowermost bed to the 

 south-west, and is also found in several other parts of the 



