94 Sketch of the Mineralogy 



We cannot leave the whin stone mountains, without 

 adverting to the enormous accumulation of the frag- 

 ments of their columns, which is found at the foot of all 

 of them, which the writer has seen, either here, or in 

 Scotland. These fragments, which have every possible 

 size, from a few grains weight, up to 100 tons, very na- 

 turally result from the innumerable seams which divide 

 even the firmest whin stone rocks, into what may be 

 considered as a collection of columns, standing side by 

 side, and so contiguous, as, on the whole, to form one 

 solid mass. Other fractures run at right angles to these, 

 in such a manner as to cut off the perpendicular columns 

 into blocks of various lengths. It happens therefore, 

 that whenever the tops of these columns become expo- 

 sed to the atmosphere, in consequence of the washing 

 away of the less consoUdated matters which cover them, 

 they become peculiarly liable to break off by the action 

 of the weather. This occurs particularly from frost. The 

 water insinuates itself into the crevices, and when it freez- 

 es, it happens, in consequence of the well known expan- 

 sion of water, during its congelation, that the columns be- 

 come strained, and have a tendency to separate, when- 

 ever the cohesive force of the ice is diminished ; there- 

 fore, especially in the spring, when the ice thaws, not 

 only small masses, but even large columns, break off by 

 their own weight, and fall to the bottom. At the TFest 

 Rock particularly, one may see enormous masses which 

 have fallen in this way ; and such is the accumulation 

 ',vhich time has produced there, that a sloping mass of 

 ruins now extends more than halfway up the mountain, 

 affording strong confirmation of what was advanced in 

 the early part of this essay, concerning the gradual de- 

 molition of hills and mountains by the action of the ele- 

 ments. 



The subject of the whin stone mountains (already ex- 

 tended perhaps too far) shall now be dismissed, with the 

 single remark, that the columns so often alluded to, are 

 not always perpendicular; sometimes they are greatly 

 inclined ; a remarkable instance of which occurs at the 

 junction of the Hartford and Cheshire turnpike roads, 

 near Mr. Whitney's, where the columns do not form 



