336 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



the head is that it is all hollow — a vast cavern — with an opening seaward, and 

 another, called the Blow Hole, about the size of _ a finger, on the land, which 

 makes up for its want of size by its noise, which is very great, and most pecu- 

 liar on a quiet day, when there is a ground swell. A curious and unearthly 

 sound it is, like that of a mighty rushing wind proceeding from the interior of 

 the earth, as if all the gnomes of the Hartz Mountains were busy at their 

 work. The cause of the noise is this : a heavy sea breaks into the cave, 

 driving before it all the air into one corner, where the orifice is situated ; for, 

 by listening at the hole, you can mark the approach of each wave by the 

 iiicreasiug volume of air. Leland again mentions this. ' Ther is also a won- 

 derfulle hole at the Poynt of Worme Heade, but few dare enter into it, and 

 men fable there that a Dore withein the spatious Hole hathe be sene withe 

 great nayles on it — but that that is spoken of water reuninge under the 

 grounde is more lykely.' " The cave, as far as is known, has been entered only 

 once, and that was on an extraordinarily calm day, when Beynon rowed a party 

 of visitors into it. He had, however, very vague notions respecting its size, 

 and his prevailing feeling seemed to have been satisfaction at getting safe out 

 again. 



Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers. By Members of the Alpine Club. London : 

 Longman and Co. 1859. 



In the charming volume before us there are many scenes, incidents, and 

 descriptions wliich might delight general readers more than those particulars 

 which we shall here set prommently before our own. We have properly to 

 deal with specialities, and however tempting even to ourselves the digression 

 into the most flowery paths, the pathways of science are the routes we are 

 conscientiously compelled to follow. 



The opening chapter, "Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers," describes to us the 

 passage of the Penetre de Salena by a party of the Alpine Club, with the dan- 

 gers and difficulties of its accomplishment, and their accompanying rewards of 

 wild and magnificent scenery, and those wonderful atmospheric beautifications 

 which seem to be locked up and cherished in those caskets of Nature's recesses 

 to which only the most daring can reach the key. 



Amongst the wild scenes in this expedition, we have a vivid portraiture of 

 a night encampment on the inhospitable slopes of the alpine heights of Salena, 

 where the party halted within a few yards of a glacier-torrent, whence, when the 

 morning dawned, they gazed out " upon a scene of savage grandeur, for wild- 

 ness and desolation almost without a rival, even among the Alps, of which the 

 sole components are crag, precipice, snow, ice, and aiguille, combined in every 

 variety of stern and awful grandeur." Prom this " citadel of winter," a short 

 but arduous walk in the earliest morn brought the mountain-travellers into a 

 " garden of summer," the grass beneath their feet fresh and moist, and almost 

 dazzling to the eye with the brilliancy of its emerald green ; hardly a stone's 

 throw from them, "the rich valley of Perret stretched out on either hand, 

 studded with chalets, dotted with sheep and cattle, sparkling with cultivation, 

 instinct with life and luxuriant beauty. The dark masses of the great chain 

 bounding the valley on the south were clothed with wood and herbage nearly 

 to their summits, and a thin veil of delicate haze which hung upon them, 

 slioAved how great was already the power of the autumn sun." Even the 

 glacier-torrents they had so lately left, now flowed behind a rising ground, 

 so that not an object remained in sight to remind them of the desolate region 

 of eternal frost they had so lately quitted. 



The second chapter, by Professor Tyndall, gives an account of his ascent of 

 the Col du Gcant, in July, 1857, and, connnencing with a not very satisfactory 



