LETTER II.

Richmond, September 7.

ALMOST every day, my dear S......., some new evidence presents itself in support of the Abbe Raynal's opinion, that this continent was once covered by the ocean, from which it has gradually emerged. But that this emersion is, even comparatively speaking, of recent date, cannot be ad mitted; unless the comparison be made with the creation of the earth; and even then, in order to justify the remark, the aera of the creation must, I fear, be fixed much farther back, than the period which has been inferred from the Mosaic account.*

* Some error has certainly happened in com puting the aera of the earth's creation from the five books of Moses. Voltaire informs us, that certain French philosophers who visited China, inspected the official register or history of the eclipses of the sun and moon, which, it seems, has been continually kept in that country; that on calculating them back, they were all found. correct, and conducted those philosophers to a period (I will not undertake to speak with certainty of the time; but I think) twenty-three centuries before the Mosaic aera. ous, however, that the Chinese plume themselves on the antiquity of their country; and in order to prop this, it would have been just as easy for the Chinese astronomers to have fabricated and dressed up the register in question, by posterior calculations, as for the French astronomers to have made their retrospective examination of the

It is notori

The following facts are authenticated beyond any kind of doubt. During the last spring, a gentleman in the neighborhood of Williamsburg, about sixty miles below this place, in digging a

accuracy of those eclipses. The same science precisely was requisite for both purposes; and although the improvement of the arts and sciences in China, was found, by the first Europeans who went amongst them, to bear no proportion to the antiquity of the country, yet there is no reason to doubt that the Chinese mandarins were at least as competent to the calculation of an eclipse as the shepherds of Egypt. Indeed, we are, I believe, expressly told, that the Chinese, long before they were visited by the people of Europe, had been in the habit of using a species of astronomical apparatus; and of stamping Almanacks from plates or blocks, many hundred years, even, before printing was discovered in Europe. I see no great reason, therefore, to rely with very implicit confidence on the register of China. Indeed I am very little disposed to build my faith, as to any historical fact, on evidence perfectly within the reach of human art and imposture; comprehending all writings, inscriptions literary or hieroglyphic, medals, &c. which tend, either to flatter our passion for the marvellous, or to aggrandize the particular nation in whose bosom they are found. And, therefore, together with the Chinese register, I throw out of the consideration of this question another record, which goes to the same purpose; I mean

ditch on his farm, discovered, about four or five feet below the surface of the earth, a considerable portion of the skeleton of a Whale. Several fragments of the ribs and other parts of the sy s

the Chaldaic manuscript found by Alexander in the city of Babylon.

The inferences reported by Mr. Brydone, as having been drawn by Recupero, from the lavas of Mount Etna (those stupendous records which no human art or imposture could possibly have fabricated) deserve, I think, much more serious attention. They are subject, indeed, to one of the preceding objections; to wit, that the data from which all the subsequent calculations are drawn, are inscriptions; appealing not only to our passion for the marvellous, but flattering the vanity of the Sicilians, by establishing the great age of their mountain, at once their curse and their blessing. These inscriptions, however, do not rest merely on their own authority; they alledge a fact which is very strongly countenanced by recent and unerring observation. As Brydone may not be in the hands of every person who may chance to possess and read this bagatelle, and as this subject is really curious and interesting, I beg leave to subjoin those parts of that traveller's highly entertaining letters, which relate to it.

"The last lava we crossed, before our arrival there [faci keale] is of vast extent. I thought we never should have had done with it: it cer tainly is not less than six or seven miles broad,

tem, were found; and all the vertebre regularly arranged and very little impaired as to their fi gure. The spot on which this skeleton was found, lies about two miles from the nearest shore of

and appears in many places to be of an enormous depth.

"When we came near the sea, I was desirous to see what form it had assumed in meeting with the water. I went to examine it, and found it had driven back the waves for upwards of a mile, and had formed a large, black, high promontory, where, before, it was deep water. This lava, I imagined, from its barrenness, for it is, as yet, covered with a very scanty soil, had run from the mountain only a few ages ago; but was surprised to be informed by Signior Recupero, the historiographer of Etna, that this very lava is mentioned by Diodorus Seculus to have burst from Etna in the time of the second Punic war, when Syracuse was besieged by the Romans. A detachment was sent from Taurominum to the relief of the besieged. They were stopped on their march by this stream of lava, which having reached the sea before their arrival at the foot of the mountain, had cut off their passage, and obliged them to return by the back of Etna, upwards of 100 miles about. His authority for this, he tells me, was taken from inscriptions on Roman momuments found on this lava, and that it was likewise well ascertained by many of the old Sicilian authors. Now as this is about 2000 years ago, one would imagine if lavas have a regular progress in becoming fertile ficlds, that this must

James River, and fifty or sixty from the Atlantic Ocean. The whole phenomenon bore the clearest evidence that the animal had perished in its native element; and as the ocean is the

long ago have become at least arable; this, however, is not the case, and it is, as yet, only covered with a very scanty vegetation and incapable of producing either corn or vines. There are indeed pretty large trees growing in the crevices which are full of a rich earth; but in all probability, it will be some hundred years yet, before there is enough of it to render this land of any use to the proprietors.

"It is curious to consider, that the surface of this black and barren matter, in process of time, becomes one of the most fertile soils upon earth: But what must be the time to bring it to it's utmost perfection, when after 2000 years, it is still, in most places, but a barren rock?" Vol. 1. Let

ler 6.

"Signior Recupero, who obligingly engages to be our Cicerone, has shewn us some curious remains of antiquity; but they have been all so shaken and shattered by the mountain, that hardly any thing is to be found entire.

"Near to a vault, which is now thirty feet below ground, and has, probably been a burial place, there is a draw-well, where there are several strata of lavas, with earth to a considerable thickness over the surface of each stratum. Recupero has made use of this as an argument to prove the great antiquity of the mountain. For if it requires 2000 years or upwards, to form but a