this marvellous tree is only a particular deviation from the common standard of its fpecies. Thus does Science, by her divine influence, put to flight the dreams of fuperftition.

A few miles onward, we came to the small, but neat city of WELLS, which, together with Bath, forms a joint bifhopric. It is fituated at the bottom of the Mendip Hills, and derives its name from the great number of fprings that are in and about it. The cathedral is a fine piece of architecture; the front of this gothic ftructure, which has been built upwards of 500 years, is much admired for its imagery and carved ftone work. It has alfo a moft curiously painted window. The palace of the bishop, fortified with walls and a moat, is reckoned the handfomeft in the kingdom. Here the pious Bifhop Ken and his lady were killed in their bed, by the palace falling in during the great ftorm of 1703, which did immenfe damage in different parts of the country. The city abounds with public charities.

Not far from Wells, on the fouth fide of the Mendip Hills, is a remarkable cave, known by the name of Okely Hole. The entrance to this cave is parallel to the horizon, at the bottom of a rock 180 feet high, and over the rock is a steep mountain, the top of which is thought to be a mile above the bottom of the rock. At the entrance into the cave, there is a deep defcent of 50 or 60 feet; the cave itfelf is about 200 feet in length, in fome parts 50 or 60 broad, and the greatest height is 50 feet, though, in fome places, the roof is not above four or five feet from the bottom. There are feveral partial divifions of it, which the imaginations of fome people have diftinguithed into a kitchen, a hall, a dancing room, a cellar, and other apartments. Water, of a petrifying quality, conftantly drops from the roof, and forming a variety of ftony figures, fancy has improved them into refemblances of old women, dogs, bells, organs, and other things. The echo of any noife within this cavern is so strong, that a large stone drop

ped

ped on the rocky bottom of the cave, founds with a noife as loud as the report of a cannon. At the extremity of the cave there iffues a stream of water fufficient to drive a mill, and paffing with rapidity and noise the whole length of the cavern, it bursts out through the rock near the entrance into the valley.

We now took a poft chaife, and croffed the country to Frome. We faw Shepton Mallet on the right, a clothing town, for which it is peculiarly fitted by the rivulets with which it is furrounded. We also paffed by the little retired village of Nunny, where a difmantled castle, of fome extent, tells the fad tale of former times. Ruins indeed, of every kind, form an awful fpectacle, and to a mind difpofed to moralize, fuggeft many melancholy reflections. The evening fun hone ftrongly on thefe battered towers, and reminded me of that tremendous diffolution in which all terreftial things fhall be finally involved. It is not unworthy of obfervation, that a celebrated female author, fpeaking of in fanity, pronounces the most terrific of ruins to be that of the human foul. "What," fays fhe, "is the view of the fallen column, the mouldering arch, of the moft exquifite workmanthip, when compared with the living memento of the fragility, the inftability, and the wild luxuriancy of noxious paffions? Enthusafm turned adrift, like fome rich ftream overflowing its banks, rushes forward with deftructive velocity, infpiring a fublime concentration of thought. Thele are the ravages over which humanity muft ever mournfully ponder with a degree of anguish, not excited by crumbling marble or cankering brafs, unfaithful to the truft of monumental fame. It is not over the decaying productions of the mind, embodied with the happieft art, we grieve moft bitterly. The view of what has been done by man, produces a melancholy yet aggrandizing fcene of what remains to be atchieved by human in tellect; but a mental convulfion, which like the devas tation of an earthquake, throws all the elements of though

thought and imagination into confufion, makes contemplation giddy, and we fearfully ask on what ground we ourfelves ftand."

We reached Frome, a large manufacturing town, whofe ftreets are marked by great irregularities. The clothing bufinefs is carried on to a vaft extent, and about fifty years ago it fupplied all England with wire cards for carding wool. Here is no more than one church, with a ring of fix good bells; but feveral meeting houses, two of which, the Prefbyterian and Baptift, are built of freeftone, and are deemed as handfome and as fpacious as any meeting houfes in England. In the former lie the remains of the ingenious Mrs. Rowe, author of Letters from the Dead to the Living-her writ ings are ftill much read and admired.

We next fet off for Warminster, a little populous town, which formerly enjoyed great privileges. It is now principally famous for its corn and malt, carrying on in each of thefe articles the greatest trade of any town in the West of England.

In travelling this road, a curious phænomenon is feen at fome diftance, being in the county of Berkshire. This is the rude figure of a White Horfe, which takes up near an acre of ground, on the fide of a green hill, whofe foil is formed of chalk. A horfe is known to have been the Saxon ftandard, and fome have fuppofed that this figure was made by Hengift, one of the Saxon Kings. But Mr. Wife, the author of a letter on this fubject to Dr. Mead, published 1738, brings feveral arguments to fhew that it was made by the order of Alfred, in the reign of his brother Ethelred, as a monument of his victory over the Danes, in 871, near Afhen or Ashbury Park, at prefent one of the feats of Lord Craven, and at a little distance from the hill. Others have fuppofed it to have been partly the eff& of accident, and partly the work of thepherds, who, obferving a rude figure, fomewhat refembling a horse, as there are in the veins of wood and stone many figures

figures that refemble trees, caves, and other objects, reduced it by degrees to a more regular figure. But, however this be, it has been the custom immemorial, for the neighbouring peasants to affemble on a certain day, about Midfummer, and clear away the weeds from this white horse, and trim the edges to preferve its colour and shape: after which the evening is spent in mirth and feftivity.

We now posted forwards to Salisbury Plains, those immenfe downs, where the ftranger, without a guide, would be foon bewildered. We drove to the fpot where Rands Stonehenge, the most wonderful curiofity in the kingdom. Here quitting the carriage, we gazed for fome time at the immenfe pile with filent aftonishment. Whence these vaft ftones were brought hither? what could have been the mode of conveyance? and to what purposes the structure was originally appropriated, are queries not easily refolved. Every effect must have an adequate caufe-hence the great learning and ingenuity employed by learned men on the subject.

The following ketch of STONEHENGE affords a juft idea of it:

This celebrated piece of antiquity has been, for many ages, and still is, the admiration of thofe who view it. Various conjectures have been formed, as to the authors, and the use of it; however, as Dr. Stukely has examined it with greater accuracy than others, his account is therefore to be more relied on. Inigo Jones furveyed it many years before the Doctor, and drew up a handfome account of it, making it a Roman temple of the Tufcan order. We fhall give an abstract of both, beginning with Jones's and leave it with the reader to judge for himself.

Within a trench, about thirty-feet broad, and on a rifing ground, are placed huge ftones in three circles, one within another, in the figure of a crown. From the plain it has three entrances, the most confiderable lying north-eaft; on each of which were raised, on the

outfide

fide of the trench, two ftones gate-wife; parallel whereunto, on the infide, were two others of less proportion. The outward circle is about an hundred feet diameter; the ftones of it very large; four yards in height, two in breadth, and one in thickness. Two yards and a half within this circle, is a range of leffer ftones. Three yards further is the principal part of the work, called the cell, of an irregular figure, made up of two rows of ftones; the upright ones in height are twenty feet, in breadth two yards, and in thickness one yard. Thefe are coupled at top by large tranfom ftones, like architraves, which are feven feet long, and about three and a half thick. Within this was alfo another range of leffer pyramidal ftones, of about fix feet in height; and in the inmoft part of the cell, Mr. Jones obferved a ftone lying towards the eaft, four feet broad and fixteen long, fuppofed to be the altar-ftone.

When Dr. Stukely came to view Stonehenge, he could not find the number of ftones mentioned by others. This may be true; for many people are filly enough to look on the ftones as factitious, and often break off large pieces to prove it: this, and the induftry of country-people in carrying them away for building, has greatly diminifhed their number: notwithftanding all the injuries Stonehenge has received, the Doctor beheld it with rapture; the greatnefs of the contour, the dark parts of the ponderous impofts over one's head, the chafms of fky between the jambs of the cell, the odd conftruction of the whole, and the magnitude of every part, ftrike you, fays he, into an extatic reverie, which none can defcribe, and they only can be fenfible of, that feel it. He thus determines the meafure used in this work. Take a ftaff ten feet four inches and three quarters long, divide it into fix equal parts, these are palms, the original measure. founder's intention was to form a circle, whose diameter was to be fixty cubits. Accordingly each stone was to be four cubits broad, and each interval two

The

cubits.