Has splintered them. It is a fearful thing
To stand upon the beetling verge, and see
Where storm and lightning, from that huge gray wall,
Have tumbled down vast blocks, and at the base
Dashed them in fragments, and to lay thine ear
O’er the dizzy depth, and hear the sound
Of winds that struggle with the woods below,
Come up with ocean murmurs.”
There is danger, in the impressiveness of a scene of such mingled beauty and sublimity, of forgetting the risk of taking cold, even in the finest weather—after the unavoidable heat and temporary exhaustion of the ascent—from the reduced temperature of the elevation, and the freshness of the sea-breeze sweeping over and around the rock in strong eddies. But reminded of this by a sense of chilliness, and aware of the lateness of the day, at the end of a half hour—grateful for the favorable auspices under which we had enjoyed the view—we gave a farewell gaze and turned our faces for the descent.
I omitted to state that, before reaching the plantation of the Emperor in the dip of the mountains, we had again fallen upon the line of the aqueduct. At this point it passes to the southern side of the range, which here makes an angle in that direction; and Mr. Lefroy, familiar in his walks with all the region, proposed that before descending we should follow it at least a short distance: with the assurance that we would find it equal, in picturesque wildness and beauty, to any thing we had yet seen. Though already pretty well fagged, and a walk of seven miles yet to be made in reaching the city, we readily assented; and most amply indeed were we rewarded. The scenery on every hand—above, beneath and around us, in the strong contrasts of bright sunshine and deep shade, was like pictures of fancy, with a variety and richness of foliage to be found only in the tropics. The aqueduct and path beside it, scarped on the very face of the precipitous mountain, wind round the head of a deep glen, at an elevation of two thousand feet above the valleys beneath and the surf of the ocean; and command uninterrupted views, far and wide, over land and sea, of indescribable beauty and grandeur. Parasitical plants and running vines add to the rich drapery of the woods overhead and beneath the feet, and hang in long pendants from the rocks and in festoons from tree to tree, while, here and there, the tree fern—a novelty to me till now—rises rankly to a height of twenty and thirty feet: throwing out its closely feathered leaves in an umbrella-shaped top, proportionate in size to the height of the stem.