20 



N A T VJ R A E H I S T OR 



L E T T E R V. 



TO THE SAME. 



Among the singularities of this place 

 the two rocky hollow lanes, the one to 

 Alton, and the other to the forest, de- 

 serve our attention. These roads, run- 

 ning through the malm lands, are, by 

 the traffiek of ages, and the fretting of 

 water, worn down through the first stra- 

 tum of our freestone, and partly through 

 the second ; so that they look more like 

 water-courses than roads; and are bedded 

 with naked rag for furlongs together. 

 In many places they are reduced sixteen 

 or eighteen feet beneath the level of the 

 fields ; and after floods, and in frosts, 

 exhibit very grotesque, and wild appear- 

 ances, from the tangled roots that are 

 twisted among the strata, and from the 

 torrents rushing down their broken sides ; 

 and especially when those cascades are 

 frozen into icicles, hanging in all the 



