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Page 59:-
"[pro]ceeded along the top of this hill, ascending gently
about half a mile, when I arrived at the top of
Scales-Fell, which may be called the second
landing-place. Here I came to the brink of the first of
those hideous chasms which furrow the southern face of this
mountain. Nearly on a level with this is the Tairn, of which
more hereafter. This first chasm, though by far the least
formidable, is inconceivably horrid; its width is about two
hundred yards, and its depth at least six hundred! There was
now no more climbing, till I came at the mountain properly
called Saddleback, to which the others are appendages: after
a steep and painful ascent of about a mile, I came to the
brink of the other gulfs. Here a point of the mountain juts
out like the angle of a bastion between two of these horrid
abysses. I stood upon this, (though my head turned so giddy
I could not go to the extremity of it,) and had on each side
a gulf about two hundred yards wide, and at least eight
hundred deep! their sides were rocky, bare, and rough,
scarcely an appearance of vegetation upon them; and their
bottoms, which seemed narrow, were covered with pointed,
broken rocks, of many shapes and dimensions. Passing this, I
arrived at the farthest point, where the mountain has every
appearance of having been split; and at the bottom I saw
hills about forty yards high, and a mile in length, which
seem to have been raised from the rubbish that has fallen
from the mountain. From hence I went to the summit, where I
could see the Tairn, which, as I was elevated upwards of two
hundred yards above it, appeared very small: here, likewise,
I had a most beautiful view of the country for many miles
round, and could not help observing, that the back of this
mountain is as remarkably smooth as its front is horrid. I
then descended towards the Tairn, which is an oval piece of
water, about two hundred yards from East to West, and about
an hundred and fifty from North to South; it is surrounded
by rocks, except an opening towards the East, where they
have evidently broken down. Standing near this opening I
discharged my gun, when the echo was inconceivable: it
resembled a peal of thunder bursting over my head, and was
so prodigiously loud and fierce, that my dog (though a
staunch pointer) crept trembling behind me.
"Hence I proceeded along the rivulet which issues from the
Tairn, seeking for minerals, and found some, which I sent to
Edinburgh, to that incomparable chemist Dr Black †,
Professor of Chemistry in that University. I likewise found
several immense stones, whose original places I could
sometimes trace; and one in particular, which must have
weighed near a hundred tons, and which must have been forced
at least three hundred yards from its original situation:
another I remarked of prodigious size separated about a foot
and an half from its parent rock, and which cannot have
fallen, as it lies now rather higher than the place it came
from, as may be plainly traced by the veins and inequalities
of each:- Evident marks of some dreadful convulsion! I then
returned, partly along the rivulet, and partly the road I
came. Upon the whole, I cannot help concluding, that this
mountain has been formerly in a volcanic state, and that
this Tairn has been the mouth or crater of the mountain. A
collateral proof, indeed, I draw from the stones in the
neighbourhood, which have almost every one of them the
appearance of having been burnt."
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† "That Gentleman, (after expressing his thanks in
those terms of politeness which he uses to every one who
wishes to promote knowledge,) objected to me, that some of
the specimens I sent him did not seem to have such evident
marks of combustion as he thought satisfactory, particularly
some taken from the brinks of the rivulet and Tairn, as they
contained small WORN pebbles connected together by a cement,
which consisted of different earths united with iron and
black lead. However, not long after, I met with a
circumstance which seems to me clearly to account for this,
and which I immediately communicated to the illustrious
Professor. I was going towards Keswick, and, according to my
custom, examining the edges of the waters, when I arrived at
a place where there had been formerly a Smelt-Mill; here I
found the flags totally destroyed by time and the action
of the water, and the pebbles clotted together by the
solution into a mass exactly resembling that I found on the
mountain. Now the situation of the Tairn is such as
excludes even the possibility of a work having ever been
carried on there: as such, I think not a doubt can remain
that this mountain has been formerly a volcano."
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