to turn many mills. The water is clear and cold, but to the taste unpleasant, being something like a bad egg. I judged from the nature of its motion that the water would take fire, and having lit my torch, soon put it in a flame. The fire was fierce, and the water ran down the vale in a blaze. It was a river of fire for a considerable way, till it sunk under ground among some rocks, and thereby disappeared. After it had burned some time, I took some boughs from a tree, and tying them together, beat the surface of the well for a few minutes, and the burning ceased. The water was not hot, as one might expect, but cold as the coldest spring could be. There are a great number of such springs in the world, but this is the largest I have read of, or seen. It differs from that of Broseley in Shropshire, within six miles of Bridge-north, in this respect, that Broseley-well will not continue to burn for any time, unless the air be kept from it; to which purpose they have enclosed it in an iron cistern with a cover to it; and to experiment the boiling a piece of meat by the fire of this spring, they clap the pot close down when the cover is taken up, and then it burns as long as they will; making the largest joint of meat fit to eat in half the time the strongest culinary fire could do the work. As to the medicinal virtues of the spring, in the mountains, I can only

say, that as it has a copious sulphur, and from thence flames like a spirit of wine, it is probable it might be as effectual in communicating sanity in various cases, as the famous burning spring is in the palatinate of Cracow of the lesser Poland, mentioned in the Leipsic Acts, for 1684, p. 326. And as to the extinguishing this fire by beating it with twigs, it must be for the reason given by Mr. Denis, that as the inflammability of such springs is to be ascribed to sulphur, and to its exhalations bursting out of the water; so this floating flame, which is too subtle to heat the water, is stifled, by involving these spirits in the aqueous particles, by brushing the surface with brooms.

Conradus tells us, concerning the Polish spring, that at one time, when it was kindled by lightning, the people neglected to put it out, and the stream proceeded on fire for almost three years, and reduced all the neighbouring wood to ashes. It is really a wonderful sight to see such a river of fire, and adorable must be that power, who has caused such things. To say that matter and motion circumscribe and regulate such powers, is idle to the last degree. It is an inversion of reason. The very existence of the water and sulphur of this spring, must be by the power of the Creator constantly put forth upon it, which causes the parts to be what we call such

things; and the motion of both must be an impres→ sion; for motion is not essential to matter. Nothing else could produce them, and a cause there must be equal to the various and wonderful effects of both, a cause that is infinity, wise, and powerful. The Deity is every where present, and every where active. His power is indesinently working, gives existence to the various creatures, and produces the most noble phænomena in nature. All we see, all we feel, fire and water, the universal variety of inanimate and animate creatures, are only the effects of his creating power constantly repeated. The existence of the whole world is a continual new creation; and therefore it becomes the bounden duty of all rational creatures, to worship this Almighty Power, as well for his works of creation, as for the ways of his providence. Great and wonderful are thy works, O Lord God Almighty! and just and righteous are thy ways, O King of saints: who would not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name, because thou only art holy.

From the burning fountain we proceeded for half an hour in the same valley right onwards, and then turned to the left in a course to the west, for about a mile, which brought us to the bottom of a steep mountain, we must ascend, or go no farther. It was hard to get the horses over this, and no less

difficult to descend with them to a deep bottom on the other side of the hill: but with great hazard to ourselves and the beasts, we came down in safety. On the top of this mountain I saw another large loch that was black as ink in appearance, though bright when taken up in a glass; which as before observed, must be owing I suppose to its top communicating with the abyss below; and in the bottom we descend to, there was a swallow larger than the one I saw before. I could make no discovery as to its depth, either by line or sound; nor did my lead touch any water. On the sloping way from the first chasm in day to the gulph, were several lateral chambers, that descended one yard in six; but though the bottom was hard, the horrors of the places hindered me from going far. I went to the end of the first, which was sixty seven yards, and having looked into the second, to which a narrow short pass leads the enquirer, I made what haste I could back; for the opening discovers a space so vast, dismal, and frightful, that it strikes one to the heart. The bottom, as far as my light could enable me to distinguish, was a continuance of stone; but neither top nor sides were to be seen. It is a horrible place.

Leaving this bottom, we mounted another very

high and dangerous hill, and from the top of it descended into twenty acres of as rich and beautiful ground as my eyes had ever seen. It was covered with flowers and aromatic herbs; and had, in the centre of it, a little grove of beautiful trees; among which were fruits of several kinds. A flowing spring of the purest water was in the middle of this sweet little wood, and ran in pretty windings over the ground. It refreshed and adorned the field, and it was beautiful to see the deer from the hills, and the goats come down from the cliffs, to drink at these streams. The whole was surrounded with precipices that ascended above the clouds, and through one of these rocky mountains there was an opening that had a stupendous appearance.

It was a vast amazing arch, that had some resemblance of the Gothic isle of a large cathedral church, and terminated in a view of rocks hanging over rocks in a manner frightful to behold. It measured an hundred yards in length, forty in breadth, and I judged it to be fifty yards high. The pending rocks in view inclosed a space of four acres, as it appeared to me, and the bottom was so very deep that it looked like night below. What line I had could not reach it, nor could I make any thing of the depth by sound. It seemed to me to