Logan stones, or rocking-stones, as they are less technically termed, are stones, often of an immense size, poised on others, or on natural rocks, in such a peculiar manner, as to move with h the slightest belch. They seem to have been erected at vari ous times and places. They were known to the Greeks, and called by them ;_tOot Eitt,,!+cxot. or live stones, also named Petral. Anthrosue, from the ceremony they underwent of tieing anointed with oil. Pliny takes notice of one erected by Lycippits. at Tarentutn. and also of one at Cyzicum, Which is said to have been left by the Argonants ; Inn the most celebrated was the Gvgonerm stone, near the Pillars of llcrculcs, td' which Ptolemy Ilepkestion relates, that it stands near the ocean, and may-be moved with the stalk of alt asphodel, but cannot he removed by any force. Pliny like wise says of one at Harp:Iva, in Asia, that it is of so strange and wondet int a nature, that if even a finger is laid on it, it will move, but if you thrust it with your whole body, it VI ill not move at all.
These stones are very common in Britain ; there are several in Cornwall and Yorkshire, as also in Scotland, where they are called Claea Breath, or stones of judgment ; it is known that there existed formerly several in the island of lona, which have since been destroyed. In some eases the stone rests on two points, in others on one ; it is said that the junction was formed in one instance in Scotland, where the stone' had been removed, by it protuberant knob in the upper stone fitting into a socket.
A stone of this nature is that near Penzance, Cornwall, named Men-amber; it is eleven feet in length, four feet in depth, and six in width. Its equilibrium was destroyed by Cromwell's soldiers, by breaking off a pot lion. Another logan stone situate at Land's End, is said to weigh seventy tons; it stands on one of a stupendous group of granite rocks which rise to a prodigious altitude, and overhang the sea ; it was thrown down by a ship's crew, but the good sense of the inhabitants obliged them to replace it.
Borlase was the first to notice a structure of a somewhat different character to the last, called Tolinen, or Hole of Stone, consisting of a large stone supported at two points by others, leaving a space between them, through which it is supposed devotees passed for religion: purposes. Of a similar opening at the extremity of Malabar !lilt, in the island of Bombay, a writer says—" This place is used by the I ; entoos as a purification Ibr their sins. which they say is effected by their going in at the opening below. and emerging out of the cavity above." We find stones of this hind in Cornwall and in Ireland; the most noted is that in the parish of Constantine, Cornwall, which is thus described by Dr. Borlase:--" It is one vast egg-like stone, placed on the points of two natural rocks, so that a man may creep under the great one, and between its supporters, through a passage about three feet wide, and as much high. The
longest diameter of this stone is thirty-three feet, the depth thirteen feet, and the breadth eighteen feet six inches. 1 measured one half of the circumference, and found it, according to my computation, fbrty-eight feet and a half, so that this stone is ninety-seven feet in circumference, about sixty feet across the middle, and by the best intiirma thm I can get, contains at least seven hundred and fifty tons of stone. Getting up a ladder to view the top of it, we found the whole snrfiice worked like an imperfect or mutilated into basons ; one much larger than the rest was at the south end. about seven feet long ; another at the north, about five : the rest smaller, seldom more than one foot. often not so much : the sides and shape irregular. \lo-t of these basons discharge into the two principal ones (which lie in the middle of the surface) those only excepted which arc near the brim of the stone, and they have little lips Jri channels which discharge the water they collect over the sides of the Tolmen ; and the flat rocks which lie unde• neath, receive the droppings in basons cut into their surfaces. This stone is no less wonderful for its position than for its size. for although the under part is nearly semicircular, yet it rests on the two large rocks, and so slight and detached it stand, that it touches the two under stones, but as it were on their points.
Wring-cheeses, so named from their resemblance in form to an ancient eheese-press. consist of large masses of stone one upon the other for several tiers, the whole resting on it base of much smaller dimen sions than the superincum bent mass. By some it is contended that they are merely the productions of nature, but it seems more reasonable to sup pose, that at least sonic art has been employed in their timnation. They are by some termed rock-idols, under the supposition that they were worshipped as gods.
one such monument, situate in the parish of St. Clare, Cornwall, 1)r, Borlase thus describes :—" The rock now called Wring-cheese, is a group of rucks that attracts the admiration of all travellers. On the top stone of this, were two regular basons ; part of one of which has been broken off. The upper stone was, as I ma informed, a logan or rocking-stone. and might, when it was entire, be easily moved with a pole, but now great part of that weight which kept it on poise, is taken away. The whole heap of stones is thirty-two feet high, the great weight of the upper part and the slenderness of the under part make every one wonder how such an ill-grounded pile could resist, for so many ages, the storms of such an exposed situation." Mr. flay man 'Hooke mentions one situate on Brimham Craggs, Yorkshire, the circumference of which is forty-six feet, and the pedestal on which it rests, only one foot by two feet. seven inches.