On the top of the hill a splendid hotel is erected for visitors to the Causeway; after passing this we descended to the base of the cliffs, which are here upwards of four hundred feet high, and soon began to find, in the columnar formation of the rocks, indications of our approach.  The guide pointed out some columns which appeared to have been melted and run together, from which Sir Humphrey Davy attributed the formation of the Causeway to the action of fire.  Near this is the Giant’s Well, a spring of the purest water, the bottom formed by three perfect hexagons, and the sides of regular columns.  One of us observing that no giant had ever drunk from it, the old man answered—­“Perhaps not:  but it was made by a giant—­God Almighty!”

From the well, the Causeway commences—­a mass of columns, from triangular to octagonal, lying in compact forms, and extending into the sea.  I was somewhat disappointed at first, having supposed the Causeway to be of great height, but I found the Giant’s Loom, which is the highest part of it, to be but about fifty feet from the water.  The singular appearance of the columns and the many strange forms which they assume, render it nevertheless, an object of the greatest interest.  Walking out on the rocks we came to the Ladies’ Chair, the seat, back, sides and footstool, being all regularly formed by the broken columns.  The guide said that any lady who would take three drinks from the Giant’s Well, then sit in this chair and think of any gentleman for whom she had a preference, would be married before a twelvemonth.  I asked him if it would answer as well for gentlemen, for by a wonderful coincidence we had each drank three times at the well!  He said it would, and thought he was confirming his statement.

A cluster of columns about half-way up the cliff is called the Giant’s Organ—­from its very striking resemblance to that instrument, and a single rock, worn by the waves into the shape of a rude seat, is his chair.  A mile or two further along the coast, two cliffs project from the range, leaving a vast semicircular space between, which, from its resemblance to the old Roman theatres, was appropriated for that purpose by the Giant.  Halfway down the crags are two or three pinnacles of rock, called the Chimneys, and the stumps of several others can be seen, which, it is said, were shot off by a vessel belonging to the Spanish Armada, in mistake for the towers of Dunluce Castle.  The vessel was afterwards wrecked in the bay below, which has ever since been called Spanish Bay, and in calm weather the wreck may be still seen.  Many of the columns of the Causeway have been carried off and sold as pillars for mantels—­and though a notice is put up threatening any one with the rigor of the law, depredations are occasionally made.