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intersected by rich and smiling meadows, for the most part watered by a number of small rivulets,whose limpid streams descend, with gentle murmur, from the summit of lofty mountains, tvoodedto the very top, which serve as a basis to the pass of Simplon. The high road thus continues,without much ascent, to the village of Tavernettes, nine miles from Brieg, where every necessaryrefreshment may be procured, prior to encountering the steepest part of the mountain, which isreckoned to take up an hour and a half from thence to the summit. Just before reaching theabove village, I suddenly heard a violent noise, and at once saw, rushing from a forest, a vastconcourse of people of every age and sex, armed with forks, spades, clubs, guns, &c. shoutingwith all their might, and running as fast as their feet could carry them. In an instant they passedme, turning the angle of a meadow, and vanished, like lightning, into another forest. Supposingthey were in pursuit of a wolf, yet desirous of knowing the particulars, I hastened towards anold woman, who was standing close to the road, at the^door of a cottage, who with grief con-firmed my suspicion ; telling me, that as her grand-daughter, a child of ten years of age, wastending their little flock, she saw a wolf take one of them ; but that, unable to prevent him, shehad only been able to run and give the customary alarm, which had collected the people I hadseen, who tvere chiefly composed of their own family and the neghbouring cottagers, and whowere in hopes, by their noise, to make him quit his prey, as he had just been seen with it on hisback. These animals, who are in fact so formidable, and may at all times be said to annoy theinhabitants of the Alps, become yet more so when the tops of the mountains are covered withsnow; for, being thus forced by hunger, they descend into the plains, and dare even make theirappearance in mid-day, enter the cottages most contiguous to the forests, force their way into thestables, where the flocks are kept in winter, and thence forcibly carry off the sheep.

But what is still more horrid to relate, yet a circumstance I perfectly recollect, though at thattime quite a child, when at the village of Vouaches in Savoy, where my father had a house, awolf, during public service on the Sunday, entered a cottage through the window, the door beingfast, and ran off with a beautiful infant, that lay asleep in its cradle. Being, unfortunately, theonly one who had witnessed this horrid catastrophe, ere I had aroused the village, time elapsed, andthe babe was seen no more. Though many years have now passed since this melancholy eventtook place, never can the horror it occasioned, or the cruel idea of my insufficiency to preservewhat might have proved a blessing to its family, be erased from my memory. The inhabitants ofthese mountains are therefore necessitated to be continually on the look-out during the wintermonths, and keep themselves provided with fire-arms, See. for the government, by way ofencouragement, give a stipulated price for every head of that animal, as formerly in England,though unfortunately not with similar success, from the utter impossibility of destroying themtotally, owing to the situation and extent of the country.

But, to return to Simplon. This mountain is six thousand five hundred and seventy-nine feetabove the level of the sea, consequently about fourteen hundred and twenty less elevated than theGreat St. Bernard , and rvooded nearly to the top. I found the rocks from Brieg to Tarvernettes,for the most part, formed of calcareous micaceous stone, though, in many places, strata of atender or soft schistus of a blueish tinge, with an inclined direction, appear to be conspicuous:but from this last village to Dovredo, situate nearly at the basis of Simplon, on the side of Italy ,they are of lamellated rock, containing quartz, mica, and feldspath. In descending the moun-tain, prior to reaching Simpelendorf or Simpelin, I remarked, as I went along, several thickbanks of granitell, in which were schorl, quartz, mica, and steatites, of considerable consistency,whose strata were nearly horizontal. It is however certain that this species of compound rockdoes not resemble, by its spots, the genuine or true granite, the spots being infinitely more regular,smaller, and closer to each other: hence I have been led to believe that its crystallization has beeneffected at a time when the bodies, or molecules, of which it is composed, were in a state ofdissolution, and held, as it were, in equilibria ; for then the most similar parts, attracting eachother, united by the surfaces that were most analogous to each other.

I again observed, at no considerable distance from this village, thick calcareous strata ofwhite stone, lying on a species of rock that doth not effervesce with acids. But the most remark-able circumstance was, that the above strata are in many parts covered by that same non-effer-vescent rock. All these facts, added to others which I have not deemed necessary to dwell uponin the present work, will, I flatter myself, serve, on a future day, to support my opinion relative