iv INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 



perpendicular height of 30, and another at 300 feet. Hence it 

 may be inferred, more especially from the correspondency of the 

 veins of red clay, that some violent convulsion has laid open the 

 chasm which is now called James's Valley. 



Although, from all these circumstances, it seems almost demon- 

 stratively certain that the hills on each side of James's Valley 

 have been gradually raised by eruptions from a volcano, succeeded 

 some time after by tremendous shocks, yet upon viewing many 

 other parts of the coast, and the interior of the island, we find no 

 such decisive indications from which a similar deduction can be 

 formed : but there are many indubitable proofs of considerable 

 agitations, or changes, apparently unaccompanied with volcanic 

 eruption. 



The most plausible arguments in support of Mr. Forster's 

 opinion, " that St. Helena has undergone a great and total 

 " change from a volcano and earthquake, tvhich perhaps sunk the 

 " greatest part of it in the sea," may be adduced from the cir- 

 cumstances of the Great Wood ; now called the Plain of Long- 

 Wood and Dead Wood. 



This plain, comprising 1500 acres of fine land, is elevated 

 2000 feet above the sea, and slopes gently towards the south- 

 east. In former times it was covered with wood, and was there- 

 fore called " The Great Wood." So late as ih<tr year 1716, there 

 were many trees upon it : but in 1724 the old trees had mostly 

 falleu ; and, as goats and hogs were at that time suffered to range, 

 all the young trees were devoured. It appears also by the 

 official records that the trees were, unexpectedly, some years after, 

 succeeded by indigenous wire grass ;* which now spreads over 

 its whole extent. 



* On the consultation dated the 4th March, 1724, it is stated that grass was well grown 

 on the Great Wood — and the Government ordered cattle to be pastured there : but on 



