C?H] 
are the Grotto’s, very dangerous and difficult to get 
at. It was here the Specimens I fend you were col- 
leded ■f* *, but it is impoffible to give you an Idea of the 
natural Beauty of the Place. The Froft-work, and 
incrufted Plants, are fome of them fo very delicate 
and tender, as to make it imprafticable to bring 
them away with ha if their Beauty, by the moft care- 
ful Conveyance. In one Place there is an Ivy creep- 
ing along the Rock, part of it intirely petrified, an- 
other part only incrufted, and a third ftill vegetating. 
In another Place is a Hazle-tree, the Root whereof 
compofes a Part of this petrified Mountain, the 
Branches fome petrified, and fome tenderly incrufted. 
As thefe are changed, others fpring up, and in Time 
will undergo the fame Fate. In fhort, nothing in 
Nature can give a more clear Idea, or more beautiful 
Reprefentation, of the whole Bufinefs of Petrefadtion, 
than a curious Obferver will fee, and frame in his Mind 
from this Mountain. He will fee, that not only the 
Water, as it diftils out of the Rocks, is capable of 
incrufting and petrifying the Bodies it meets with in 
its Paffage, but that even the Steams and Exhala- 
tions *, being highly faturated with thefe mineral 
Particles, will work the fame Effed j as is evident in 
the Place under Confideration, and will generally 
beft account for the Supply of petrifying Matter, 
brought to fill up the Vacuities that are left by the 
Decay and Wafte of Vegetables incrufted over j and 
which, he will fee, are in Courfe of Time conftantly 
filled therewith. For although the Water of Tome 
f They are depofited in the Mufeum of the Royal Society. 
* Vide Woodward's Natural Hiftory, p, 135. 209. 
Springs 
