22 



height ahout a minute, gave me a violent head-ache. 

 If the view from the top be painful and intolerable, 

 that from below is delightful in an equal extreme. It 

 is impossible for the emotions arising from the sublime, 

 to be felt beyond what they are here : so beautiful an 

 arch, so elevated, so light, and springing as it were up 

 to heaven ! the rapture of the spectator is really inde- 

 scribable ! The fissure continuing narrow, deep and 

 straight, for a considerable distance above and below 

 the bridge, opens a short but very pleasing view of the 

 North mountain on one side, and Blue Ridge on the 

 other, at the distance each of them of about five miles. 

 This bridge is in the County of Rockbridge, to which 

 it has given name, and affcirds a public and commodi- 

 ous passage over a valley, which cannot be crossed 

 elsewhere for a considerable distance. The stream 

 passing under it is called Cedar-creek. It is a water of 

 James' river, and sufficient in the driest seasons to turn 

 a grist mill, though its fountain is not more than two 

 miles above.* 



* Don Ulloa mentions a break, similar to this, in the province 

 of Angaraez, in South America. It is from 16 to 22 feet wide, 

 111 feet deep, and 1. 3 miles continuance, English measure. Its 

 breadth at top is not sensibly greater than at bottom. But the 

 following fact is remarkable, and will furnish some light for con- 

 j^ecturing the probable origin of our natural bridge. ' Esta caxa, 

 o cauce esta cortada en pena viva con tanta precision, que las 

 desigualdades del un lado entrantes corresponden a las del otro 

 lado salientes, como si aquella altura se hubiese abierto expre- 

 samente, con sus bueltas y tortuosidades, para darle transito 6. 

 los aguas por entre los dos murallones que la forman ; siendo 

 tal su igualdad, que si illegasen a juntarse se endentarian uno 

 con otro sin dexar hueco.' Not. Amer. II. } 10. Don Ulloa 

 inclines to the opinion, that this channel has been effected by 

 the wearing of the water which runs through it, rather than 

 that the mountain should have been broken open by any con- 

 vulsion of nature. But if it had been worn by the running of 

 water, would not the rocks which form the sides, have been 

 worn plain ? or if, meeting in some parts with veins of harder 

 stone, the water had left prominences on the one side, would 

 not the same cause have sometimes, or perhaps generally, oc- 

 casioned prominences on the other side also." Yet Don Ulloa 



