AGENCY OP RUNNING WATER. 137 
.exerted by running water in removing weighty 
masses of rock. In the year 1829, during a flood in 
the Highlands of Scotland, a fragment of sandstone 
14 feet long, by three feet wide and one foot thick, 
was carried* about 200 yards down the river. 
The stone bridge over the Dee, consisting of im- 
mense blocks of granite, which had stood uninjured 
for 20 years, was also carried away during the same 
flood ; and Mr. Farquharson states that the water 
forced a mass of 400 or 500 tons of stones, many of 
them weighing 300 weight, up an inclined plane, ri- 
sing six feet in eight or ten yards. Mr. CuUey also 
states, that, during a flood among the Cheviot Hills, 
several thousand tons' weight of gravel and sand 
were transported by a small rivulet to a great dis- 
tance to the plain ; and that a bridge then building 
was carried away, some of the arch stones of which, 
weighing three quarters of a ton, were carried two 
miles down the stream. A rock also, weighing two 
tons, was transported by the torrent at the same 
.time to the distance of a quarter of a mile. 
The influence of running water in excavating 
jocks is well known, especially in limestone dis- 
tricts. At Trenton Falls, in this state (N. Y.)? there 
is some of the most romantic and beautiful scenery, 
produced by a creek having worn a deep notch in 
secondary limestone to the depth of 100 feet or 
more, between the perpendicular banks of which it 
tumbles over several precipices, foaming and roar- 
ing; while, over head, the cedars and other ever- 
greens gracefully bend from either bank, forming a 
beautiful arch in the centre. In like manner, the 
Genesee River near Rochester, the Connecticut at 
Bellows Falls and at Haddam, the Shenandoah at 
the Blue Ridge, and the St. Lawrence from the 
fallsf to near Lake Ontario, all have worn deep 
* Lyell. 
t Lake Erie is. about 330 feet above Lake Ontario, and the 
distance between them 32 miles. On flowing out of the upper 
M2 
