VIRGINIA. 



293 



9. JSi'atural Curiosities. The Rock 

 Bridge., over Cedar Creek, s. little stream 

 running into the James, consists of an 

 enormous chasm, 200 feet in depth, near- 

 ly perpendicular, through \\hich the stream 

 passes. A huge rock is thrown across the 

 chasm at the top, forming a natural bridge, 

 80 feet in width, and covered with soil 

 and trees. Jefferson describes it as fol- 

 lows : " Though the sides of this bridge 

 are provided in some parts with a parapet 

 of fixed rocks, yet few men have resolu- 

 tion to walk to them, and look over into the 

 abyss. You involuntarily fall on your hands 

 and knees, creep to the paiapet and peep 

 over it. Looking down from this height 

 about a minute, gave me a violent head 

 ache. If the view- from the top be pain 

 ful and intolerable, that from below is de- 

 lightful in an equal extreme. It is impos- 

 sible for the emotions ai'ising from the 

 sublime, to be felt beyond what they are 

 here ; so beautiful an arch, so elevated, 

 so light, and springing as it were up to 

 heaven ! the rapture of the spectator is 

 really indescribable ! The fissure continu- 

 ing narrow, deep, and straight, for a con- 

 siderable distance above and below the 

 bridge, opens a shoi t but very pleasing view 

 of the North Mountain on one side, and 

 Blue Ridge on the other, at the distance, each of them, of about 5 miles. This bridge is in the 

 county of Rockbridge, to which it has given name, and affords a public and commodious passage 

 over a valley, which cannot be crossed elsewhere for a considerable distance." 



The greatest natural curiosity in Virgi- 

 nia, is JVeyer''s Cavc^ in Augusta county, 

 among the mountains. It was named after 

 its discoverer, who, in 1S06, when hunting, 

 was led by his game to a small hole in the 

 earth ; this being dug into, was found to 

 be the entrance to an immense grolto, 

 which was explored for more than a qnar 

 ter of a mile. It has a great number ol 

 branches or apartments, abounding wv. 

 sparry concretions, and from the descij|j 

 tion given by visiters, seenis to equal, in 

 the singularity and splendor of its contents, 

 the celebrated grotto of Antiparos.* Near 

 the town of I'ort Kepublic, on the south 

 branch of the Shenandoah, is ,j\Tadison''s 

 Cave. It is in the side of a hill, 200 feet 

 in height, and contains a great deal ot 

 Vi'cycr's Care. earth whicli is used for manufacturing salt- 



Xatural Bridrrc, in l iraima. 



" Tho followinrr description, by an e3'ewilne3S, i;; taken 

 from the Boston Daily Advertiser. 



" More than half way up the acclivity of the hill, we en- 

 tered boldly, first into the vestibule or ante-cluiniber, the 

 arch of which is 8 or 10 feet high, abound in jr in spar, thence 

 through a rock of petrifaction, into the Dran-on's room, 

 where, by the percolation of the water through llie roof 



above, there are found thousands of stalactites and stalaor- 

 niites, of the most uncouth figures; these were anciently 

 supposed to be petrified water, but after later researches 

 we find them to be various kinds of earth, carried down 

 in solution with the water, and, by the attraction of compo- 

 sition, collected into bodies, which are congealed after 

 the evaporation of the water, by the cementing <)ualiliee 



