254 Geology and Mineralogy of Salisbury. 
Natural Ice- Houses. 
Chasms of considerable extent are met with in the mica- 
slate,* forming natural ice-houses, where the ice and snow 
remain most of the year. One of these in the east part of 
the town is perhaps worthy of a particular notice. The 
chasm is several hundred feet long, sixty feet deep, and 
about forty in width. The slate is of a very compact kind, 
and must have required a powerful convulsion to have 
separated it. The walls are perpendicular and corres- 
pond with much exactness. At the bottom there is a 
spring of cold water, and a cave of some extent. As you 
enter the chasm, you are struck with the romantic beauty 
of the spot. Above it is completely overreached with 
lofty pines (pinus strobus) and hemlock (p. canadesis), to- 
gether with stately walnuts (juglans porcina) and butter- 
nuts (juglans cinerea), &c. &c.; while below the ground 
is adorned with a great variety of plants, and the rocks 
with numerous species of mosses, lichens, and ferns. 
These, together with its coolness and entire solitude, 
make it a very pleasant retreat in summer. It is called 
Wolf-Hollow from its formerly being a famous haunt for 
wolves. 
Granular Limestone. 
This is a continuation of the western ranke of Dewey, 
commencing in Vermont, and extending through Benning- 
ton, Williamstown, Lanesborough, West Stockbridge, 
Sheffield, and so on through Connecticut, terminating near 
New-York. It has formerly been quarried for building 
stones and other purposes, but at present is not worked. 
Much of it is as fine grained as the Stockbridge marble, 
but in many places, it is very coarsely granular. Jt is 
well adapted for the manufacture of lime ; it is also ex- 
tensively used as a flux in the furnaces, for each of which 
upwards of a hundred tons are anually employed. | have 
already stated that it forms beds in mica-slate, and alter- 
nates with it. It is sometimes stratified, with variously in- 
clined strata. 
* Lat. about 43° N. 
