It would be easy and pleasant to spend a great deal of money in
such things as we saw there; but all our purchases in Matlock did not
amount to more than twenty shillings, invested in brooches, shawl-pins,
little vases and toys, which will be valuable to us as memorials on the
other side of the water. After this, we visited a petrifying cave, of
which there are several hereabouts. The process of petrifaction requires
some months, or perhaps a year or two, varying with the size of the
article to be operated upon. The articles are placed in the cave, under
the drippings from the roof, and a hard deposit is formed upon them, and
sometimes, as in the case of a bird's-nest, causes a curious result,--
every straw and hair being immortalized and stiffened into stone. A
horse's head was in process of petrifaction; and J----- bought a broken
eggshell for a penny, though larger articles are expensive. The process
would appear to be entirely superficial,--a mere crust on the outside of
things,--but we saw some specimens of petrified oak, where the stony
substance seemed to be intimately incorporated with the wood, and to have
really changed it into stone.
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