i-iiAi\ ix.] STREAMS OF STONES. 187 



covered in an extraordinary manner by myriads of great loose 

 angular fragments of the quartz rock, forming " streams of stones." 

 These have been mentioned with surprise by every voyager since 

 the time of Pernety. The blocks are not waterworn, their angles 

 being only a little blunted ; they vary in size from one or two feet 

 in diameter to ten, or even more than twenty times as much. 

 They are not thrown together into irregular piles, but are spread 

 out into level sheets or great streams. It is not possible to 

 ascertain their thickness, but the water of small streamlets can be 

 heard trickling through the stones many feet below the surface. 

 The actual depth is probably great, because the crevices between 

 the lower fragments must long ago have been filled up with sand. 

 The width of these sheets of stones varies from a few hundred feet 

 to a mile ; but the peaty soil daily encroaches on the borders, and 

 even forms islets wherever a few fragments happen to lie close 

 together. In a valley south of Berkeley Sound, which some of our 

 party called the " great valley of fragments," it was necessary to 

 cross an uninterrupted band half a mile wide, by jumping from 

 one pointed stone to another. So large were the fragments, that 

 being overtaken by a shower of rain, I readily found shelter 

 beneath one of them. 



Their little inclination is the most remarkable circumstance in 

 these '" streams of stones." On the hill-sides I have seen them 

 sloping at an angle of ten degrees with the horizon ; but in some 

 of the level, broad-bottomed valleys, the inclination is only just 

 sufficient to be clearly perceived. On so rugged a surface there 

 waa no means of measuring the angle; but to give a common 

 illustration, I may say that the slope would not have checked the 

 speed of an English mail-coach. In some places, a continuous 

 stream of these fragments followed up the course of a valley, and 

 even extended to the very crest of the hill. On these crests huge 

 masses, exceeding in dimensions any small building, seemed to 

 stand arrested in their headlong course : there, also, the curved 

 strata of the archways lay piled on each other, like the ruins of 

 some vast and ancient cathedral. In endeavouring to describe 

 these scenes of violence one is tempted to pass from one simile to 

 another. We may imagine that streams of white lava had flowed 

 from many parts of the mountains into the lower country, and that 

 when solidified they had been rent by some enormous convulsion 

 into myriads of fragments. The expression "streams of stones," 



