274 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
then taking a small " lead," on the walls of which some portions of 
" Erush"-ore still remain, we crawl now into the " Wide road " or 
great " churn." The first thing that we see on raising our heads is a 
rude pyramidal heap of stones, which will prove very useful to us here- 
after, as it forms our directing-post to the " Way out" — and without 
some such indicator it is more than probable we might contribute a 
future ossiferous interest to the caverns ! Separating from each other, 
and holding our candles with upstretched arms into the vault above, 
we gather our first notion of the " Sway-pole Hole" — a notion which 
fills us with deepest wonder — which is even further heightened as we 
gaze backwards and forwards along a vault where the roof and walls are 
dimly discernable, and where 
" Beyond is all abyss, 
TMiose end no eye can reach." 
The dimensions of this " churn," however, are about 350 yards long, 
by an average height of 14 yards, and 12 yards in breadth ; and, con- 
sidering that it must have been filled with ore, which alone has been 
removed, its cubic contents, on the calculation of one ton to the cubic 
yard, equal nearly 60,000 tons, without including any branch-" churns" 
or " pockets," which would probably raise the quantity to 100,000 
tons. This " churn " follows the direction of the strike, but pitches 
across the " bed" at the rate of about six inches in a yard ; the dip of the 
measures is about one in three. Below, following the dip, there are 
other churns of great magnitude, but their size diminishes with their 
depth from the surface ; indeed, the largest deposits of ore would seem 
to have been formed near to the crop of the measures, and it is yet an 
undetermined question whether "inthedeep" themeasures "make them- 
selves," to use a mining term, as strongly as "in the land" : — certain 
it is that the deep mines have not yet revealed any deposits to compare 
either in magnitude or productiveness with such churns as the one I 
have just described. 
The accompanying sketch (PI. YIII,) represents some partly emptied 
churns, laid open by excavation to the light of day, which I am working at 
Old Park, near Bream, and which wiU illustrate the relationship of the 
overlying stratified rock and the un-stratified " crease," showing at the 
same time the " leads " and general structure of the deposits. The 
mystical appearance of the entrances to the excavations and the solitude 
