is that strange group which gives a name
to the whole. How shall we describe it?
Shall we liken it to a number of large cheeses
piled upon a number of smaller cheeses? The
whole mass is about four and twenty feet in
height; there are at the bottom three or
four huge flattish stones resting one on
another, then one of smaller size, then a
monster block twelve or fifteen feet in diameter,
and then three or four other huge masses
to crown the whole. There are such evident
lines of separation in nearly horizontal planes,
that it is difficult to get rid of the idea that
the mass has been formed by separate stones
piled one on another. Be sure that in such a
place there will be abundance of theories to
account for the existence of the Cheesewring.
An old quarry-man, with whom we conversed
was strenuous in advocacy of the theory that
the superposition of these big stones was
the work of the Deluge; no arguments could
shake him in this view. The archæologists
bend rather to the theory that the Cheesewring
was a Druid altar, or something of the
kind. But the geologists view the matter in
a way which meets with more general
support. They find that the granite of Cornwall
has a great tendency to become fissured,
both horizontally and vertically, whereby it
becomes virtually separated into huge blocks
before the quarrymen have touched it. Air
and water enter the crevices thus formed,
and gradually disintegrate the stone, wearing
away most rapidly those parts of the granite
which happen to be softest. In this view of
the case, the Cheesewring is not composed of
several stones heaped one upon another, but
of one mass of rock which has been worn
away to its present singular appearance by
atmospheric agency. The Druids, or any
other guild of ancients, may have made use
of the Tors or other isolated rocks of Cornwall
as temples or altars, or the Brownies may
have converted them into ball-rooms; but
these masses were, say the geologists, fashioned
by the sun and air, and rain and wind.

On the slopes ot the Cheesewring Hill, the
granite quarrymen are busily at work; and
it is strange to hear the clink of their tools.
The region is so silent, so removed from
towns and dwellings and people, that any
sounds come very sharply upon the ear, and
the sound of working in granite is very sharp
indeed. The granite is very hard, of beautiful
texture, and glitters brightly in the
sunshine; thus the eye has something to
look at while the ear is attending to the simple
music of the quarrying—veritable music—
if the quarrymen do their work steadily.
Three or four men stand in a row, each
provided with a long, sharp-pointed iron pick.
With these picks, they make vertical holes
in the surface of the granite, an inch or two
in depth and a few inches apart. They strike
a long-continued series of blows, each man
bringing his pick to bear repeatedly upon the
same hole. Each blow gives forth a ringing
metallic sound; the men strike the blows
in exact and regular succession; and
as the musical pitch of the emitted sound
depends upon the weight of the pick and the
force of the man's arm, four or five picks
may elicit or emit sounds all varying slightly
in pitch, and hence a simple recurrence of
musical notes may result. We will not go
so far as to call it melody, but it is a
humble substitute for music. When many
such holes have been made in a long row,
strong thick nails or wedges are driven
in by the aid of heavy hammers. In a few
minutes, by this wedge-like action, a fissure
is formed along the line of holes, extending
down to the bottom of the layer into which
the granite naturally divides—that is, to the
level of one of the natural planes of cleavage.
By this means a huge block may be severed
from the parent rock, and wrought into
fitting shape by the patient action of the
mallet, and pick, and chisel, and other
tools.

Granite was confined to the roughest
outdoor uses until it was discovered that the
stone was a beautiful as well as a useful
material; as fit for adorning the refined
and elegant drawing-room, as for making
roads and bridges. Being among the hardest
things in nature, the difficulty was to cut it
in such quantities and into such shapes as may
be required; but at length, machinery was
constructed of power sufficient for that purpose;
and so efficient that there have been produced
objects varying in size, from an obelisk
upwards of twenty-two feet high in a single
block of granite, to a tiny desk-seal; and
varying in weight from thirty-three tons to
the fraction of an ounce. Busts have also
been sculptured in granite with some success.

Cornwall has many other hard stones,
quarried like granite, and applied like it to
building purposes; but we have now to
speak of another kind of stony wealth.
Cornwall is, in truth, rich in those kinds of
hard stone which bear a fine polish, and are
available for decorative purposes. There are
in the chalk and in the gravel numerous flints,
which, when cut and polished, may be worked
into snuff-boxes and other trinkets; these
become especially beautiful when the spongiform
bodies included in the substance of the
flint are veined or marked with colour.
There is, in the green-sand formation, the
beautiful chalcedony often found in pieces
large enough to form cups or small vases;
while the smaller and finer specimens are
frequently cut into seals. Rock-crystal is
found in many localities; the choice bits are
called Cornish diamonds, and are sufficiently
transparent to be cut and set in brooches and
seals; indeed, the old Cornish families
possess a store of these so-called diamonds
among their old-fashioned jewellery. Carew,
in his Survey of Cornwall, written two
centuries and a-half ago, says of these Cornish
diamonds—"in blacknesse and in hardnesse