P.S. After this avowal, I trust that the
editor of this journal will withhold iny name
and address from all inquirers.

PORTLAND ISLAND.

HAS Dorsetshire no scenery, no mines, no
manufactures; nothing but starving labourers
on bad farms and dusty third-rate watering
places?

Nine people in ten are not aware of the
important fact, that Portland Island is no
island at all; but a peninsula. Formerly, it
is true, the world got over to Portland Island
by means of a ferry-boat. Less than twenty
years ago, the way to the ferry, and the
only way, was over a mound of shingles, into
which horses' legs must plunge knee-deep at
every step. Now, there is a famous road,
ending in a good strong bridge over the
little strait; and, on the bridge—rare sight
on British soil—are sentinels, who, with
fixed bayonets keep guard over the turnpike-gate.

From this bridge there is a fine view of
the north-west side of the island, but the best
first view is to be had from the Weymouth
steamer while crossing the Portland Roads.
From the steamer we see right a-head a
precipitous escarpment of stone, the topmost
point of which is four hundred and eighty
feet above the sea level, and which is relieved
in the foreground by a long grassy slope,
reaching down to the houses and the sea.
Chips of that stone block are Saint Paul's
cathedral, many of our London churches,
and the bridges of Westminster and Blackfriars.
But it does not achieve greatness in
London only, part of it is being transformed
into a Breakwater, that shall make of its
own coasts a haven, even for the largest
men-of-war.

Be it known that the foundations of our
island are laid in Kimmeridge clay, which on
the north side of us rises to some height.
Over the clay are beds of Portland sand,
and of the oolitic limestone, known as Portland
stone. We dip towards the south, and
as the island dips, the beds of clay and sand and
stone dip. Of the stone, the lower bed, just over
the clay, contains kernels and veins of flint.
The middle bed is full of petrifactions. The
upper bed, to within twenty feet of the
surface (surface of the series, not of the
ground) consist of our fine architectural
stone. That is our best bed, we call it the
White-bed. There is a blanket over it
three or four feet thick, of limestone full
of holes, left by shells that have made
impressions and then disappeared; that blanket
we call Roach. Over it is a rather tumbled
sheet of flint nuts, that we call Cap. Over
this is a coverlid of earthy oolitic waste,
known as the Dirt-bed. Beautiful yellow
pyrites, known as sugar-candy spar, and
stalactites of chalky (sugar-plum) spar occur
in the clefts of the limestone. Of stone of
all kinds, the thickness is about nintey-three
feet on the east side of our island, and a
hundred-and-twelve on the west.

The White-bed, or Whit-bed was brought
into fashion by King James the First, who
used it in rebuilding the Banqueting House at
Whitehall. But it was not until after the great
fire of London that vast demands were made
upon it; since that date it has been a valuable
article of commerce. Nevertheless, as
matter of sentiment, I prefer the Dirt-bed. It
is a black loam, rich in the remains of tropical
foliage and in the great trunks of trees changed
into flint. Some of them, more than thirty
feet long, branch at the upper end, and they
bore heavy crops of cones, in days when
there were no men to be convicted of offences
against society, and when there was no
society, except that among animals who were
not likely to use Portland as a convict-station,
and employ the prisoners in work on a great
Breakwater.

Of Portland quarries there are two kinds,
these and those:—These, are the Government
quarries for the Breakwater, three hundred
feet above the sea-level on the east side of
the island; those, are the old private quarries,
lying more to the westward at a lesser altitude.
From both, the stone is lowered on
inclined tram-roads, furnished with ' drums '
for the passage of the chains at the head of
each incline, the loaded wagon in its descent
pulling the empty one up by its weight.
The Government 'drums' are bigger than
the private drums, and—strange to say—
display much more science in construction.
The private quarries export annually about
fifty thousand tons of the valuable Whit-bed,
a duty of two shillings being paid on every
ton. The stones are got out, of different sizes:
upon the average, about one ton each in
weight, but many of the large blocks weigh
five or six tons. The large quantity of stone
just mentioned is less than one-ninth part of
the quantity of rubble-stone (Cap) which
is tumbled every year into the sea through
the massive rafters of the Breakwater cage.
The Cap is not marketable among architects,
being hard, rough, and shelly: and it
is supposed that twenty millions of tons of it
were lying idle on the summit of the island,
when the Breakwater was begun.

The sights of Portland, independent of the
Government works and the quarries, are
Portland Castle at the water's edge, Rufus
Castle over the hill, the ruins of old Portland
Church down the precipitous hill side,
Pennsylvania Castle, a modern house built by a
grandson of William Penn, with feudal
aspirations, and the two light-houses at our Tierra
del Fuego, or the Bill, which warn sailors of
the Race and of the Shambles. These are
not great sights, aud I make no boast of
them; but Portland was well worth going to
see long before any castle was built there.
The bold and noble face of the old island
itself is, after all, the finest thing it has to