196 By Stream and Sea. 



peculiarity of the formation is at once seen, and where you 

 walk upon the heads of the columns, forming a grand floor- 

 work of distinct Mosaic. The largest column is about 

 eighteen inches at the greatest width, and whatever shape 

 a pillar may assume its fellows fit closely as wax to it. No 

 wonder incredulous persons refuse to believe it is a curiosity 

 of nature. The guides here use immense words and technical 

 expressions. They talk about pentagons, hexagons, and 

 heptagons, which they point out are the general shapes of 

 the columns. A very few of the pillars are nearly square, 

 one is seven-sided, and there are a good many octagons. 

 The main Causeway is an enormous mass of columns, about 

 forty thousand in number, and each as perfect as if formed 

 and fitted by a skilled workman. Not the least singular 

 feature is that each pillar is composed of joints. There is 

 one pillar, for example, composed of thirty-eight distinct 

 joints, the end of one fragment being convex and the other- 

 concave, and each fitting the other with Chinese exact- 

 ness. 



Turning away from the Causeway, the rocks and cliffs, 

 showing here and there fantastic varieties of basaltic pillars, 

 assume new shapes as your boat moves gently along near 

 the shore. Even the rocks have separate names and his- 

 tories of their own. Pleaskin Head is the furthest headland 

 visited by ordinary tourists, and there is no view on the 

 coast to equal that obtainable from Hamilton's Seat. Below 

 there are rocks, and two wonderful galleries on colonnades 

 of pillars sixty feet high, while the shore stretches away on 

 either hand, always grand in its ruggedness, 



To examine the Giant's Causeway and see its surroundings, 

 the latter being frequently omitted, although the one is the 

 supplement to the other, you must follow the line of rocks 

 in a boat, and climb the heights ; that done, your time and 



