CHAP. IX. | STREAMS OF STONES. 197 
angles being only a little blunted; they vary in size from one or 
two feet in diameter to ten, or even more than twenty times as 
much. They are not thrown together into irregular piles, but 
are spread out into level sheets or great streams. It is not pos- 
sible to ascertain their thickness, but the water of small stream- 
lets can be heard trickling through the stones many feet below 
the surface. The actual depth is probably great, because the 
crevices between the lower fragments must long ago have been 
filled up with sand. The width of these sheets of stones varies 
from a few hundred feet toa mile; but the peaty soil daily en- 
croaches on the borders, and even forms islets wherever a few 
fragments happen to lie close together. In a valley south of 
Berkeley Sound, which some of our party called the “ great 
valley of fragments,” it was necessary to cross an uninterrupted 
band half a mile wide, by jumping from one pointed stone to 
another. So large were the fragments, that being overtaken 
by a shower of rain, I readily found shelter beneath one of 
them. . 
Their little inclination is the most remarkable circumstance 
in these “ streams of stones.” On the hill-sides I have seen 
them sloping at an angle of ten degrees with the horizon; but in 
some of the level, broad-bottomed valleys, the inclination is only 
just sufficient to be clearly perceived. On so rugged a surface 
there was no means of measuring the angle ; but to givea common 
illustration, I may say that the slope would not have checked 
the speed of an English mail-coach. In some places, a con- 
tinuous stream of these fragments followed up the course of’ a 
valley, and even extended to the very crest of the hill. On these 
crests huge masses, exceeding in dimensions any small building, 
seemed to stand arrested in their headlong course: there, also, 
the-curved strata of the archways lay piled on each other, like 
the ruins of some vast and ancient cathedral. In endeavouring 
to describe these scenes of violence one is tempted to pass from 
one simile to another. We may imagine that streams of white 
lava had flowed from many parts of the mountains into the lower 
country, and that when solidified they had been rent by some 
enormous convulsion into myriads of fragments. The expression 
“ streams of stones,’ which immediately occurred to every one, 
conveys the same idea. These scenes are on the spot rendered 
