There lie the stones of various
sizes, from a pebble to a foot or two in diameter, some of which
have rested from their labor only since the spring, and some
higher up which have lain still and dry for ages,--we noticed
some here at least sixteen feet above the present level of the
water,--while others are still revolving, and enjoy no respite at
any season. In one instance, at Shelburne Falls, they have worn
quite through the rock, so that a portion of the river leaks
through in anticipation of the fall. Some of these pot-holes at
Amoskeag, in a very hard brown-stone, had an oblong, cylindrical
stone of the same material loosely fitting them. One, as much as
fifteen feet deep and seven or eight in diameter, which was worn
quite through to the water, had a huge rock of the same material,
smooth but of irregular form, lodged in it. Everywhere there
were the rudiments or the wrecks of a dimple in the rock; the
rocky shells of whirlpools. As if by force of example and
sympathy after so many lessons, the rocks, the hardest material,
had been endeavoring to whirl or flow into the forms of the most
fluid.
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