101 



greenstone, separated by partings of lignite and red ochre, 

 and in the aggregate is about twice the depth of one range of 

 columns, or somewhere about ioo feet in thickness. 



In addition to the scale of measurement afforded by the 

 columns, it is obvious that the strongly-contrasted structure 

 of the alternate beds of rock, and the variety and piquancy of 

 effect arising from the bright tints of the ochre beds, which 

 draw the eye, as did the rubricated lines in the old MSS., to 

 important passages, all help to create the impression of size 

 and importance of this magnificent headland. 



It has often been remarked that visitors to the Causeway 

 have been disappointed with what they have first seen at the 

 Grand Causeway, but have expressed their admiration after- 

 wards, when brought to Pleaskin and Benmore. Very likely 

 this mainly arises from their carrying with them the idea of the 

 size of the columns with which they had been brought in 

 contact at starting, and which now serves them as a scale when 

 they try to form a notion of the height of the huge sea-wall in 

 which they again find these familiar forms rising in symmetrical 

 ranges one above the other. In short, the effect of natural 

 scenery must depend very much on how the eye has been 

 disciplined previously by the examination of forms of the same 

 or somewhat similar character. 



The principle of aggregation, or multiplicity of parts, in 

 helping to an estimate of vastness, as in the pictorial represen- 

 tation of mountain forms, has been well explained by Ruskin 

 in " Modern Painters," and illustrated by his own exquisite 

 drawing of " A Buttress of the Alps." In architecture, also, it 

 is well recognised ; and by acting on this knowledge, the de- 

 signer of St. Paul's, in London, produced a building which, 

 although much inferior in size, strikes the mind with a greater 

 idea of sublimity than St. Peter's, at Rome, with all its lavish 

 expenditure. 



