It is just clearing up; and Oliver, as usual, is in the fidgets to set out-so good by; and for fear you will think I have been indulging my imagination at your expense, about Mrs. B's in the mountains, I mention her name, that you may find out the place next summer, and see with your own eyes, and sleep within hearing of one of the most musically melancholy murmuring brooks in all the Alleganies. Good by.

LETTER XXIV.

DEAR FRANK,

You may chance to recollect, in one of my former letters, I warned you Oliver would ere long break out into an ebullition of geology, occasioned probably by the subterraneous heat of Dr. Hutton's theory, which has already performed such wonders. The expected eruption took place the day before yesterday.

We passed from the little retreat in the mountains I gave you a sketch of in my last, through a country of most singularly romantic aspect. The hills became more rugged, barren, and broken, than any we had yet crossed; the declivities more abrupt; and here and there bare and prodigious masses of rocks were piled on their tops, or hung on their sides. Often we rode along the banks of little rivers, foaming at the depth of a hundred feet below; their sides in many places composed of dark limestone rocks, piled one ledge on another, with the regularity of art, and topped with moss or fern. Cascades, with beautiful basins at their foot, fit haunt for the trout and the Naiad, succeeded each other at every little distance, and the whole scene was calculated to awaken the most lofty and affecting musings. I, who fortunately have never seen Dovedale, Matlock, the lakes of Cumberland, the Welch hills, nor any of those famous

places that make such a figure in the picture-booksI enjoyed this succession of interesting objects, and fell into an enormous brownstudy. But Oliver, who, ever since he became a geologist, is much oftener employed in studying how this world was made, than in enjoying its beauties, ran his hobby-horse against my Kentucky pony, and unhorsed my imagination in a twinkling.

"Do you believe in Hutton, or Werner?" said he.

I believe in Moses and the prophets, replied I." "Yes, as to all that sort of thing, we knowthat is, we are willing to acknowledge we believe the world was originally made in six days;-but every appearance indicates that the present is a sort of secondary world, made out of the fragments of the first."

66

'Oh, certainly—like a giblet pie, from the fragments of a roasted goose."

"Pshaw! Can't you be serious on a serious subject? Every man ought to feel an interest in the formation of the planet on which his lot is cast,—the place of his birth, and of his grave. In my opinion, nothing can afford a more noble, as well as useful exercise of the mind, than studying the formation of the earth."

"Assuredly. Knowledge is power,' said the great Ham-I beg pardon, Bacon; and there is very little doubt but that, in the regular progress of science, the knowledge of how the world was formed, will shortly be followed by the art of making worlds for ourselves—if we can only find the materials."

VOL. II-B 2

1

"Confound it! be serious for once;-every man has a right to his hobby, and mine is certainly as innocent and inoffensive as any other."

"Aye, and as useless;-but come, for once I will be serious. Open your theory, either Neptunian or Plutonian; and let the internal fire be as hot as it may, I'll not flinch one jot, I promise you."

He mused a little, and then replied

"Well, if you won't talk rationally on geology, what do you think of Captain Symmes's theory of the concentric spheres?"

"I think it a capital subject for a speculation— not a pecuniary, but a philosophical one, and would believe in it but for one thing."

"What is that?"

66

I can't bring my mind to it." "Pooh !"

We had a long discourse on this interesting subject, in the midst of which we emerged from the recesses of the mountains, and in due time arrived at the little town of Fincastle, where we agreed to sleep. After supper, Oliver again broached his theory, and as we slept in the same room, continued prosing away till I fell fast asleep. The last words I heard him say were, "I should like to know what sort of people they are."

You know, Frank, what a dreamer I am, and that my sleeping reveries are not unfrequently better than my waking thoughts, which, after all, is not much in their favour. However this may be, I fell asleep with my head full of the captain's theory, and was

favoured with the following most extraordinary vision. It made such an impression, that it was some moments after waking before I could recollect where I was.

Methought I was in a country somewhere within the concentric spheres, called the Isles of Engineshow I got there I don't recollect, but I found the people all speaking tolerably good English, only with a little of the Welch accent. This they accounted for, by their being descended from the colony brought out by Prince Madoc, as sung in Mr. Southey's epic of that name. The laureate thinks they went to America, but the fact is, if there be any truth in dreams, they found their way, as I was assured, to the pole, where they were drawn through a great opening, by the force of attraction, into the bowels of the earth, where I found their descendants. Finding myself in this interesting situation, I determined to take a nearer view of the people, their manners and customs. But having unfortunately drank too much of the water, which is strongly impregnated with limestone, I soon found myself considerably out of order, and was fain to send for a doctor. When he came, he surprised me at first, by inquiring how many horse-power I was; whether I was on the high or low pressure system; and how many strokes I made in a minute. He then, without waiting for an answer, told me with great gravity, that my. boiler was affected, but it was of no consequence, for if nothing had been the matter, he could easily have made me sick.