Next day I set out for the Giant's Causeway. The wind was still blowing and roaring from the north, with the same violence as it now had for some days. It dashed against the steep, rugged cliffs, it howled skywards up the rocks, in immense arches it again descended on the road I was travelling, and in long-drawn, lofty
In the immediate vicinity of the valley of Ballycastle there seems to be nothing but limestone. The strangest forms show themselves where the basalt again makes its appearance, and the first extraordinary, interesting point is Carrick-a-Rede, as English orthography writes it, or Caraig-a-Ramhad, according to the proper Irish spelling, i. e. the rock on the road. Properly speaking, there are two rocks, formed of two masses of basaltic columns, clustered closely together, each about 200 feet high, with a circumference of some thousands of feet. The one is connected with the mainland by a little isthmus; but the other is pushed out completely into the sea, and separated from the other by a deep chasm. A little island that lies not far from it is called Sheep Island. Even to the Faroe Islands (Sheep Islands) this is a very usual appellation for such islands as afford pasturage for sheep only. Many of these small ‘Sheep Islands’ also lie along the Scottish coast. The fresh, green, grassy summit of this little island contrasts agreeably with the black basalt pillars which support it.
In summer, the island is connected with the headland by a bridge, made in the following manner. Two thick ropes are, by some expert climbers, fastened to two iron rings, which have been driven into the rocks at each side. These ropes are then connected by little cross-ropes, upon which small boards are laid. A third rope, fastened a little higher than the other two, serves as a handrail. This slender bridge, which is more than sixty feet long, swings of course with every step, and sways to and fro
The picture presented by these two rocks of Carrick-a-Rede, with the little black island beside them, is surprisingly beautiful. We were obliged to be content with enjoying it from the shore, where we chose a spot, sheltered by a grass-covered basalt wall, whence we could see it as plainly as if we were sitting in the very middle of it. The mighty breakers ceaselessly rushed against the island, sending their high-dashing foam even to the sheep on its summit. On the side of the island, turned towards us, was a little bay, shut in by high rock-walls, so that it lay like a mirror unruffled by the slightest breath of air; and this although the storm was raging close beside it. In this bay, and in the little strait between the rocks and the island, the people carry on a not-unimportant salmon-fishery in the summer; for as the salmon come in the spring time from the open sea to deposit their spawn in the bays and mouths of rivers, they usually coast along the shore, searching for the sweet water, and linger in the little strait between Carrick-a-Rede and the mainland, and in the quiet bay of the former. The fishermen take their measures accordingly, and have also built a small hut on the low shore of the bay for their convenience. The salmon-fishery of the entire north of Ireland is of great importance, and quantities of salmon have, from time immemorial, been exported thence to the markets of Spain and Italy.
Proceeding along the coast, we again got a view of an old ruin, which lies on the extremity of a mass of rocks, projecting far into
We perceived, by the number of persons who soon surrounded us, offering their services, that we were at last approaching the great work of nature which was the object of our journey. As, in Ireland, there are always a dozen men where one only is requisite, there were here also a crowd of men, old and young, well-clad and in rags, all of whom represented themselves as the best guides for the Giant's Causeway.
‘Take me, your honour,’ cried one: ‘I showed Field-Marshal Mac Donald the Giant's Causeway, when he came to visit Ireland, and his own country, Scotland.’
‘Take me, your honour,’ shouted another: ‘I showed every bit of the Giant's Causeway to his Grace the Duke of Wellington, and his Grace was exceedingly well pleased with me.’
‘And I, your honour,’ said a third, ‘have a certificate from the Most Noble the Marquis of Anglesea, and his lady and his daughter.’
‘Sir,’ boasted a fourth, ‘I am the best friend of Professor Buckland, of Oxford, who said that every thing I told him of the Giant's Causeway was perfectly true, and I can show your honour every stone of it.’
I chose the one who seemed to have the most promising physiognomy, and, in fact, I was not deceived in him. I was, however, greatly deceived in imagining, that, after I had proclaimed my election, the rest would leave me in quietness. No such thing. According to the obtrusive custom of their country, the entire troop followed me every step of the way. At first I conjured them to remain at home, and not to disturb my enjoyment of the sublime work of nature, with their unnecessary chattering. I entreated them, I gave them money, I supplicated them, I cursed them,—all in vain. They hunted me, as dogs would a deer; and I was at last obliged to yield to my fate, and make peace with them. One party collected stones for me; another pulled me by the right
The distance is not far, and the Giant's Causeway is soon gained. ‘Causeway,’ as is well known, means a high paved road, thrown up like a dam or embankment. The strangest thing about this Giant's Causeway is, that at first sight it seems as if people had erred in naming it; and it looks as if it should properly be called the Dwarf's Causeway. It might be appropriately called Giant's Causeway if it were of vast length, or stretched out for several miles into the sea. But it is not longer than 700 feet, which may be considered extremely short, in comparison with the usual length of roads. It is nothing more than the beginning of a causeway, which soon after sinks beneath the waves of the sea. One might, at the first glance, be inclined to ask himself, why all his attention and anxiety on account of this world-famous word, was directed merely to the little portion of this wide and magnificent coast to which this title is pre-eminently applied; but after he has looked about a little, after he has more closely inspected the Causeway itself and its parts, and especially after he has endeavoured to meditate on it, and to ask himself the how and the why it was made, all his contempt for it vanishes immediately, and the warmest admiration takes its place, yea, the most decided enthusiasm, for this wondrous, inconceivable, mysterious, and in every sense unsurpassingly charming, work of nature.
Yet before my readers can sympathise with this enthusiastic admiration of mine, I must communicate to them as much as I can concerning the formation and structure of this coast. I have already said that, at Benmore, the basalt appears in a vast stratum, 250 feet thick, falling into massy, mighty Cyclopean pillars. Here, at the Giant's Causeway, it is different. In its neighbourhood, on the right and on the left, from Bengore Head to the mouth of the river Bush, a distance of about three miles, the basalt exhibits itself on the rugged shore in the following manner. Not one thick stratum, but many, though mostly two, are plainly distinguishable all along the above-mentioned line of coast. Between
I must next remark, that the two colonnades do not every where rest on an horizontal bed, and are not equi-distant from the surface of the sea. They sometimes descend to the surface of the sea, and again rise high above it, so that it looks as if the fluid basalt had spread itself like a cloth over the original inequalities of the ground. At last the colonnades are lost by sinking down beneath the surface of the sea, where they either cease altogether, or are continued beneath it—first, the lower colonnade; and then, near the mouth of the river Bush, the upper. Where this second or upper colonnade or pillar-stratum reaches the surface of the sea, all the other materials, and ochre and clay strata, which rest upon columns, are removed, and the naked pavement formed by the heads of the basaltic pillars is exposed; and this part forms what is called the Giant's Causeway. The descent of the first colonnade beneath the sea probably produces something similar; yet this circumstance is wanting, viz. that the heads of the pillars are not so beautifully bare and exposed to the light of day.
A second irregularity of these rows of pillars is, that they are often broken by great gaps or dykes, such as I have already described. These dykes or gaps, which sometimes run through all the strata of the coast, are manifestly of later origin. They must have been made when every thing already lay in the order in which we now see it. They are usually filled with basalt; but the most curious part is, that the basalt in them is sometimes composed of layers of horizontal pillars. At the same time, together with these dykes, there often occurs a depression or vertical displacement of both the strata and the columns. Such a depression is even sometimes found unaccompanied by a dyke; and this the English call ‘a fault.’ It looks as if an entire piece of the coast had sunk down, with all its strata.
Finally, there are two principal strata or rows of columns every where to be seen; but they are by no means every where the only ones. On the contrary, other parcels of pillars here and there peep up out of the lower or intervening strata; and if these are not as handsome and regularly formed colonnades, there is at least a variety of lower or higher steps or ranges of basalt between them. There are also, of course, between the colonnades, strata entirely composed of mere amorphous basalt or ochre. In the ochre are seen some streaks of iron ore, and in the basalt is a stratum of coal. Here and there, little strata of clay, resembling Puszuolan earth, make their appearance.
The wonderful structure of the columns themselves can no where be studied and admired better than at the Giant's Causeway, where the most beautiful and most regular specimens lie exposed to the inquiring geologist. By far the greater number of the columns are hexagonal. From this hexagonal shape we may conclude that the pillars were all at one period long, soft shafts, which, from being strongly pressed against one another, were of necessity forced to assume the hexagonal form; just as the cells of bees, or any other round body, when pressed equally on all sides by similar bodies. All these columns, however, could become hexagonal without an exception, only under the supposition that all the round shafts were of perfectly equal thickness, and the pressure on all sides equally strong. But as neither was the case, there also arose irregular hexagons, with unequal sides; and then pillars were formed with three, four, five, seven, eight, and nine sides: three and four-sided, when the wide sides of several hexagons met together; seven, eight, and nine-sided, when a thick pillar happened to stand amid many narrow sides of several hexagons. Those with seven and five36 sides are frequent, but eight-sided pillars are rare, and only one with nine sides has
The diameter of the pillars at the Causeway is from a foot to a foot and a quarter: these are, accordingly, the thinnest and most elegant basaltic columns that are found. There are, it is true, still smaller basaltic crystallizations, with a diameter of a few inches. I myself found, in a dyke, a multitude of little prisms, with three and four sides; but they are far from being so regularly and elegantly formed as the larger pillars at the Causeway, which, on the whole, are the most perfect of their kind. Those little prisms, as the guides assured me, are seldom found any where else but in the dykes, in which I saw them lying loosely on one another. If we consider the entire pillars, first, relative to their position, independent of their combination and structure, we will find here too an exceedingly remarkable phenomenon, governed by a tolerably constant rule, not that this rule admits of no exception. I say remarkable phenomenon; for it might be imagined, that, in this crystallization of a dead inanimate body, every thing should go on according to strict and most unalterable laws, and that one should be shaped exactly like the other. The rule is, that all the pillars stand perpendicularly: all the thousands and thousands of columns of the Giant's Causeway are perfectly upright; and only where a breach has been made, where a piece has been thrown down, are they to be found oblique, and in every possible variety of position. But in other places in the vicinity of the Causeway, many pillars have a naturally inclining position, which they must have assumed when the entire mass was still in a soft, yielding condition. I have already mentioned that the pillars in the dykes sometimes lie in an horizontal position. At Ushet, in Rathlin island, a great quantity of pillars lie in an originally slanting posture. At the promontory of Doon Point, on the same island, and not far from the ruins of Dunseverick, they form a multitude of regular curves, and look like bent down fir trees, as if they were not fluid enough to flow into one another, but yet soft enough to bend over, and then to have hardened in this bowed position. On this island, others are in an horizontal position, and this too in every possible direction, either parallel with the coast, so as to show their whole length, or running into the hill, with their extremities only sticking out.
In fine, on a promontory, near the Giant's Causeway, are to be seen pillars of a waving form, of which the wave-lines or bendings are at the same time perfectly parallel to one another. It
I have already remarked, in the description of Fair Head, that the coarse rude pillars are there composed of joints and blocks, and that these blocks seemed to be from eight to ten feet long. In the more elegant columns of the Giant's Causeway and its vicinity, the blocks are usually not more than from six to eight or twelve inches high or thick, so that a pillar of thirty feet high may consist of nearly forty portions. There are even joints which are but four inches thick; and others, on the contrary, which are two or three feet, or even longer. It is a very remarkable circumstance connected with these joints, that the chink or break which separates them does not go quite through, but that at every corner there is a little piece of basalt which is not broken or jointed, and which passes from one block to the other, fastening them more firmly together, like a cramp-iron. The people in the neighbourhood call these cramping-pieces ‘spurs’ and they are as little visible on the outside as the seams of the joints. I cannot describe the regular form of these spurs. Sometimes they may not exist at all; but that they are generally present is evident, among other reasons, from this, that the labourers at the Giant's Causeway assert that they cannot divide any pillar into its natural joints without first breaking off the spurs, which will not break in the middle. For this purpose, they first strike with a hammer the corners of the prism, in the spot where they suppose the two joints meet, and when the spur is thus removed, they then break off the block itself. In many pillars, Nature has herself undertaken the removal
Such is the structure of the coast, the arrangement and order of the columns, the composition of each individual pillar. Let us go a step farther, and consider a single pillar-joint by itself, without regard to the manner of its connexion with the others. Here, also, new wonders make their appearance, for a spheroidal structure of every individual joint becomes apparent on close examination. In general, the mass of which they are composed is so compact that this structure is not perceptible. But the removal of the spurs, which takes off the angle of the prisms, indicates an inclination of the blocks to assume a spheroidal form, for it is the first step towards making it round. In many blocks we can go still further than the striking off the spurs, and, by regularly hewing off spheroidal layers, may make the block more and more round, till at last we arrive at a tolerably round kernel in the centre. On examination of the external surfaces of the above-described concavities and convexities, we also perceive radial lines, running from the centre of the concavity to the circumference, somewhat like those lines seen on the surface of a leaden bullet, flattened against a wall.
All this would lead us to suppose that the entire mass of the Giant's Causeway, and of the other columnar strata in the neighbourhood, originally consisted of a vast multitude of spherical bodies, which were at first soft, and, from being compressed on all sides, thus naturally assumed the form of hexagonal prisms and blocks. This is its appearance; that this compression and joining of the spheroids did not, however, take place from without, but that it was caused by a splitting, dividing, and formation of the mass from within, outwards, according to the mysterious laws of crystallization, is indeed more than probable. The supposition of a pressure from without would not be sufficient perfectly to explain all the phenomena; for as this pressure would have had a greater effect on the external strata of pillars or spheroids than on the internal, the external would unquestionably be pressed flatter, while the internal would have retained a more spherical shape, which is contrary to the fact. It is not necessary, however, that the prismatic blacks should have actually had an internal spheroidal structure, conjointly with an external globular form. Were this the case, we might indeed suppose that they had also lost it again by pressure. But they may have had a tendency to a globular form without being able to arrive at that form, because each disturbed and hindered its neighbour in attaining this. As in a freezing mass of oil, an innumerable multitude of little globules are formed, which, by degrees, are united into one firm mass of ice, so in the cooling mass of basalt, acted upon throughout by the powerful electric and magnetic forces of crystallization, we may imagine a multitude of little globules to have been produced, which continued to increase in size till at length they mutually prevented each other's growth, and consequently assumed the form of hexagonal prisms. In this whirl and commotion of the component globules of the entire mass, many may have separated themselves from it completely; and in fact, as my friend, Dr. Bryce, of Belfast, informed me, perfectly round pieces of basalt, composed of several coatings or layers, like pearls, are found in the superincumbent stratum. They are imbedded in the ochre, and their outer coating presents a kind of transition between basalt and ochre.
All this explanation, as well as every other, however profound, properly comes to nothing. For while we are still as far as ever from discovering the cause by which these phenomena have been produced, even the most superficial inspection of the basaltic pillars suggests so many questions that one scarcely ventures to utter them. But in all investigations concerning inscrutable subjects of this kind, we derive at least this advantage, that we learn
The beauty, accuracy, and, I may say, the care, with which the columns of the Giant's Causeway have been wrought by these obscure, objectless, chance powers, are what especially produce so strong, and even sympathizing and loving admiration for this great masterpiece of nature. I had to touch the columns, and to feel their smooth surfaces, before I could believe what my eyes saw; and so was it with me afterwards, whenever I beheld pillars from the Giant's Causeway in other places. Many columns have been raised, broken into their component blocks, and set up in the gardens or the mansions of the neighbouring districts. In many of the extensive parks and gardens of Belfast, Derry, and the north of Ireland generally, as well as in Scotland and in most museums of England, one meets with basalt blocks from the Causeway, built up into columns. Whenever I again saw these pillars in such gardens, I felt myself drawn towards them, and, as it were, by some magnetic influence, was compelled to touch, to
Even in the chemical composition of the material, there is as great variety as in the form. Thus, for instance, the basalts in the dykes I have mentioned have partly altered the composition of the earthy strata through which they run, and have been themselves partly altered where they come in contact with them. The pure basalt of the Causeway is said to consist of fifty parts of silicious earth, twenty-five parts of argillaceous and calcareous earth, and twenty-five parts of iron. Iron and flint are therefore its chief component parts; and hence arises the extraordinary weight and closeness of the stone, and the beautiful polish it takes; hence, too, its great fusibility, and the rusty brownish tinge with which its naturally deep black surface is sometimes covered; hence, in fine, arises the phenomenon of all these columns and headlands being magnetic. Flint, as well as iron, having a natural tendency to crystallize in regular forms, it is probable that these two principal constituents of the basalt were pre-eminently active in its formation into regular figures. In general, the grains of the basaltic mass of which the pillars of the Causeway are composed, are very close, compact, and smooth; yet there are sometimes found in it many unfilled spaces, little hollows, air-holes, and fissures. These fissures and holes are usually full of a great variety of crystals,—chalcedony and opal, zeolite, stilibite, natrolite, and sometimes rock crystal. All these are offered to visitors in quantities by the guides, who are constantly collecting them; and amongst these, the zeolites are frequently most beautiful, being usually of a fibrous crystallization, which sends out from a centre elegant, white, glittering hairs of stone, sometimes as fine as the down of a swan's feather.
All this it is requisite to know, in order fully to enjoy a visit to the Giant's Causeway, and its neighbourhood, or to reap advantage from perusing a description of it.
The giant who is fabled to have built this Causeway, is Finn Mac-Cul, or Fingal, the Scotch and Irish Hercules. As at one point of the opposite coast of Scotland similar pillars are visible, and were known to the inhabitants of Ireland in times of old, they fabled that Fingal had formed a road from hence to Scotland, but that in more recent times the greatest part of his work sunk into the sea, by which it is now covered. The deep meaning concealed in this fable is, probably, that the basaltic formations in
All this is very grand and poetical in the popular legend; but they were not content with this, and have gone so far as to seek out for the giant all kinds of domestic conveniences, and have discovered the Giant's Loom, the Giant's Chair, the Giant's Theatre, the Giant's Gateway, the Giant's Well, the Giant's Organ, and the Giant's Honeycomb. However far-fetched may be the resemblance with the aforesaid things, every portion has now at least its name, and can therefore be easily described.
The Giant's Well is a little spring, which issues from between some pillars on the western side of the Causeway, and runs down over the cliff into the sea. The Honeycomb and the Organ are the most remarkable of the giant's other utensils. The Organ is not a part of the Causeway itself, but is situated at one side, on the mountain, and consists of a number of large pillars, which grow smaller towards both sides, like the strings of a harp, and is completely apart from the other colonnade, so that one may easily imagine a giant organist sitting before it, particularly since the columns, when struck, actually send forth a metallic ring. Could we discover means for striking them with sufficient force, we might doubtless play on them as on a dulcimer. The Honeycomb is an assemblage of projecting pillars, which stand in the middle of the Causeway; and not far from it is the Giant's Loom, which contains the tallest pillars here exposed to the light of day, being about thirty-three feet high.
This middle portion is called the Middle Causeway; while on the right is a Great, and on the left a Little, Giant's Causeway. The most extreme end of the Great Causeway projects, when the water is smooth, 700 feet into the sea, before it is covered by it. When the sea is stormy, and the waves are thrown up very high, the entire length of the Causeway is seen only at momentary intervals. This was the case when I was there, and was, I believe, the reason why I could not rightly distinguish the three divisions of the Causeway.
Another, and at present actually existing, giant, has, in addition to all the gigantic matters already mentioned, arranged a sort
The guides on the Causeway are particularly zealous in pointing out to the traveller all the pillars which are remarkable either for their extraordinary size, their height, or the number of their sides. First, there are some perfectly square, with all their sides and angles equal; then hexagonal ones, mathematically equilateral and equiangular; then a triangular one; and, lastly, an eight-sided, and a nine-sided pillar. The triangular column is said to be the only one of its kind on the whole Giant's Causeway. The octagonal one they showed me, and which is called the ‘Keystone,’ is surrounded by eight hexagonal pillars. The nine-sided one is also said to be unique at the Causeway: Hamilton, it is true, says that there are three such pillars; but my twenty guides all protested against it, with the exception of one, who could not, however, prove his case, as we could not resolve to admit that the figures he showed us had nine sides. This is often by no means easy to decide. The nine-sided pillar we saw seemed to be composed of two pillars melted together, for it had one re-entrant angle, and was surrounded by eight other columns. Among 100 pillars, there are supposed to be seventy hexagonal ones, twenty-nine to have five or seven sides, and one to be three, four, eight, or nine-sided.
As I have said, it is with difficulty I could tear myself away from the wonders of the Giant's Causeway, and I would fain have carried away in my pocket a specimen of every species of pillar,