NATURAL HISTORY of NORWAY. 161 



kind of them decays with age fo like old wood, to which, in its 

 incurvated veins and channels it is not unlike, diflblves between 

 ones fingers; drops from the mountains into the fea, and fome- 

 times occafions the afore-mentioned calamity of a difruption; fo 

 that the traveller round the Norway-coafts, may find fufficient 

 proof to confute thofe vifionaries of all ages, who have imagined 

 the world to be eternal ; and thefe proofs may be drawn a priori : 

 For if the world were eternal, its decline could not be fo conspi- 

 cuous as it is, within the few centuries, which we can compute 

 with certainty. Time, the voracious conmmer of all things, ex- 

 erts its corrofive power every where on the harder! rocks, but 

 more remarkably in certain places; and whoever has lived any 

 time on thefe coafts mull have obferved the flones diiTolved, and 

 the feparation begin in the veins, where the pores and fofter fub- 

 (lance fooner yield to the daily imprellions of the air and fun. 

 In many places the northern grey and black pebbles are inter- 

 mixed with iron, copper, lead, filver, and even gold; of which 

 we mail treat in the fequel. Great quantities of thefe pebbles are 

 at prefent ufed for building houfes, walls, and inclofures, efpecially 

 in and about Bergen, the neighbouring mountains furnifhing 

 them with little labour, nature itfelf having as it were prepared 

 them by fhTures, into which, the wedges being driven, fuch flat 

 angular pieces fall of, that without being fhaped by the chifTel, 

 •they fuit one another fo well, as to form a compact wall. In 

 fome places, efpecially at Gloppen in Nordfiord, I have been 

 amazed to fee whole mountains confirming of thefe pebbles natu- 

 rally divided, and as it were cloven, almofl of equal fizes, that is, 

 from two to three cubits each, as if they had been fawed both 

 longitudinally and tranfverfally. Thefe pieces are eafily lifted 

 with two hands, and refemble the ruins of an old wall. Mr. 

 BufTon fpeaks of a mountain of the fame nature near Fontaine- 

 bleau. Thefe northern fragments lie near the creeks, and being 

 eafily embarked, might load feveral thoufand mips, the quantity 

 being fufficient to build large cities. How thefe regular fiffures 

 and feparations may moil rationally be fuppofed to have happen- 

 ed, fcon after the deluge in the originally foft, and afterwards 

 gradually indurated pebbles, I have offered fome conjectures in 

 the fecond chapter, which treats of the foil and mountains in 



general. 



