So large were the fragments, that being overtaken
by a shower of rain, I readily found shelter beneath one of them.
Their little inclination is the most remarkable circumstance in
these "streams of stones." On the hill-sides I have seen them
sloping at an angle of ten degrees with the horizon; but in some of
the level, broad-bottomed valleys, the inclination is only just
sufficient to be clearly perceived. On so rugged a surface there
was no means of measuring the angle; but to give a common
illustration, I may say that the slope would not have checked the
speed of an English mail-coach. In some places a continuous stream
of these fragments followed up the course of a valley, and even
extended to the very crest of the hill. On these crests huge
masses, exceeding in dimensions any small building, seemed to stand
arrested in their headlong course: there, also, the curved strata
of the archways lay piled on each other, like the ruins of some
vast and ancient cathedral. In endeavouring to describe these
scenes of violence one is tempted to pass from one simile to
another. We may imagine that streams of white lava had flowed from
many parts of the mountains into the lower country, and that when
solidified they had been rent by some enormous convulsion into
myriads of fragments.
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