450 



IINITEB STATES 



ineaciows, for many miles below, are covered with 

 immense quantities of wood thus torn in pieces. 



No living creature was ever known to pass through 

 this narrow, except an Indian woman, who was \r\ 

 a canoe, attempting to cross the river, above it, but 

 carelessly siiffered herself to fall within the power 

 of the current. Perceiving her danger, she took a 

 bottle of rum she had with her, and drank the whole 

 of it; then lay down in her canoe, to meet her des*> 

 tiny. She marvellously went through safely, and 

 was taken out of the canoe some miles below quite 

 intoxicated.* 



The natural bridge over Cedar creek, Virginia, 

 which gives name to the county of Rockbridge, ex- 

 tends across k cleft in a mountain, which seems to 

 liave been cloven through its length. The chasm or 

 cleft is about two miles long, and in some places up- 

 wards of three hundred feet deep, but the depth va*. 

 ries. The breadth of the chasm also varies ; but in 

 every part it is uniformly wider at top than towards 

 the bottom. The height of the bridge, from the 

 water, is about 210 or 213 feet. The span of the 

 arch, as measured by the Baron De Turpin of the 

 French army, is ninety feet : the distance betweeu 

 the abutments at bottom is fi'om fifty to seventy feet« 

 The immense mass of rock which loads this arch is 

 from forty to fifty feet thick. It is a limestone, and 

 of course could not be the effect of a volcano : but, 

 that the two sides of the chasm were once united, 

 appears evident, not only from projecting rocks on 

 the one side, corresponding with suitable cavities on 

 the other, but also from the different strata of earthy 

 * Carey's American Museum* vol. ix. 



