GROTTO. 



a bird called by authors loxia. See 

 LOXIA. 



GROSS weight, the whole weight of mer- 

 chandize, with their dust and dross : as 

 also the bag or chest wherein they are 

 contained. An allowance is usually made 

 out of the gross weight for tare and tret. 

 See TAU.;. 



GROTTO, a large deep cavern or den 

 in a mountain or rock. Okey-hole, Elden- 

 hound, Peake's-hole, and Pool's-hole, are 

 famous among the natural caverns or 

 groitoes of our country. The entrance to 

 Okey-hole, on the south side of Mendip- 

 hills, is in the fall of those hills, which is 

 beset all about with rocks, and has near 

 it a precipitate descent of near twelve fa- 

 thoms deep, at the bottom of which there 

 continually issues from the rocks a con- 

 siderable current of water. The naked 

 rocks above the entrance shew themselves 

 about thirty fathoms high, and the whole 

 ascent of the hill above is about a mile, 

 and is very steep. As you pass into this 

 vault, you go at first upon a level, but ad- 

 vancing farther, the way is found to be 

 rocky and uneven, sometimes ascending 

 and sometimes descending. The roof of 

 this cavern, in the highest part, is about 

 eight fathoms from the ground, but in ma- 

 ny particular places it is so low that a man 

 must stoop to get along. The breadth 

 is not less various than the height, for in 

 some places it is five or six fathoms wide, 

 and in others not more than one or two. 

 It extends itself in length, about two hun- 

 dred yards. People talk much of certain 

 stones in it resembling men and women, 

 and other things; but there is little mat- 

 ter of curiosity in these, being only shape- 

 less lumps of a common spar. At the far- 

 thest part of the cavern there is a good 

 stream of water, large enough to drive a 

 mill, which passes all along one side of the 

 cavern, and at length slides down about 

 six or eight fathoms among the rocks, and 

 then passing through the clefts of them, 

 discharges itself into the valley. The 

 river within the cavern is well stored with 

 eels, and has some trout in it ; and these 

 cannot have come from without, there be- 

 ing so great a fall near the entrance. In 

 dry summers, a great number of frogs are 

 seen alongthis cavern, even to the farthest 

 part of it; and on the roof of it, at certain 

 places, hang vast numbers of bats, as they 

 do in almost all caverns, the entrance of 

 which is either level, or but slightly as- 

 cending or descending ; and even in the 

 more perpendicular ones they are some- 

 times found, provided they are not too 

 narrow, and are sufficiently high. The 



cattle that feed in the pastures through 

 which this river runs have been known to 

 die suddenly sometimes after a flood ; this 

 is probably owing to the waters having 

 been impregnated, either naturally or ac- 

 cidentally, with lead ore. 



Elden-hole is a huge profound perpen- 

 dicular chasm, three miles from Buxton, 

 ranked among the natural wonders of the 

 Peak. Its depth is unknown, as it is pre- 

 tended to be unfathomable. 



Peake's-hole, and Pool's-hole, are two 

 remarkable horizontal cavities under 

 mountains ; the one near Castleton, the 

 other just by Buxton. They seem to have 

 owed their origin to the springs which 

 have their current through them ; when 

 the water had forced its way through the 

 horizontal fissures of the strata, and had 

 carried the loose earth away with it, the 

 loose stones must fall down of course: and 

 where the strata had few or no fissures, 

 they remained entire; and so formed these 

 very irregular arches, which are now so 

 much wondered at. The water which 

 passes through Pool's-hole is impregnat- 

 ed with particles of Irme-stone, and has 

 incrusted the whole cavern in such a man- 

 ner that it appears as one solid rock. 



Grotto del Cani, is a little cavern near 

 Pozzuoli, four leagues from Naples ; the 

 air contained in it is of a mephitical or 

 noxious quality ; it is in truth carbonic 

 acid gas, whence also it is called Bocca 

 Venenosa, the poisonous mouth. Two 

 miles from Naples, (says Dr. Mead,) just 

 by the Lago de Agnano, is a celebrated 

 mofeta, commonly called la Grotta del 

 Cani, and equally destructive to all within 

 the reach of its vapours. It is a small 

 grotto about eight feet high, twelve long, 

 and six broad ; from the ground arises a 

 thin, subtile, warm fume, visible enough 

 to a discerning eye, which does not spring 

 up in little parcels here and there, but in 

 one continued stream, covering the whole 

 surface of the bottom of the cave ; having 

 this remarkable difference from common 

 vapours, that it does not, like smoke, dis- 

 perse itself into the air, but quickly after 

 its rise falls back again, and returns to the 

 earth ; the colour of the sides of the grot- 

 to being the measure of its ascent : for so 

 far it is of a darkish -grfcen,but higher,only 

 common earth. And as I myself found no 

 inconvenience by standing in it, so no ani- 

 mal, if its head is above this mark, is the 

 least injured. But when, as the manner 

 is, a dog, or any other creature, is forcibly 

 kept below it, or, by reason of its small* 

 ness, cannot hold its head above it, it pre- 

 sently loses, all motion, falls down as 



