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lord of the establishment at the Sweet Springs, an old 

 inhabitant of this part of the country, and a very intelli- 

 gent and worthy person. He assured me that, some 

 years ago, when hunting deer in the hills, he had seen 

 some rocks exactly resembling them. As he is a man of 

 very good judgment, I proposed to him to accompany 

 me there, and he cheerfully assented. Mounting his 

 horse, and accompanied by myself on foot, we went 

 about 6 miles in a north direction; but so many years 

 had elapsed since he had casually observed the place, 

 and the deep dells and hills, clothed with their everlast- 

 ing woods, resembled each other so much, that we pass- 

 ed an entire morning wandering about, climbing one hill 

 and descending another, till I. began to think he had 

 been mistaken, and told him so ; but he proposed trying 

 another hill side, called Snake Run mountain, and there 

 I followed him. Being in advance of me, I heard him 

 hallo, and immediately knew, from the cheerful sound of 

 his voice, that the game was found. He approached 

 me, holding in his hand a piece of very ancient traver- 

 tin, which I recognized at once; and leading me to the 

 brow of a hill, at least 350 feet above the level of the 

 Sweet Spring, I saw, to my great surprise, a huge mural 

 escarpment of travertin skirting the brow of the hill, 

 with the weather-worn remains of old stalactites, whilst 

 the body of the rock resembled in every particular the 

 recent one at the cascade ; abounding in large pipes of 

 calcareous matter, which had formerly inclosed logs and 

 branches of wood. The pendent stalactites consisted of 

 concentric circles, and there was the complete evidence 

 that a stream of mineral water of great breadth, contain- 

 ing carbonate of lime, had for a great length of time 

 passed over this brow and formed the rock. The sur- 

 face of the rock in many parts was interspersed with 

 what are vulgarly called pot-holes, being circular perfo- 

 rations made in rocks by pieces of rock and gravel, kept 



