THE NATURAL HISTORY.--The rock of the Mount has worn the same aspect for ages; tradition however whispers, that at a remote period it presented a very different appearance,--that it was cloathed with wood, and at a considerable distance from the sea! Its old Cornish name, "_Carreg Lug en Kug_," that is, _the hoary rock in the wood_, would seem to add some probability to the tradition. It appears also from the original charter of the Confessor, that the Mount was in his time only _nigh_ the sea, for he describes it expressly as Saint Michael _near_ the sea, "Sanctum Michaelum qui est _juxta_ mare." What this distance was the charter does not inform us, but the words of Worcester, who gained his information from the legend of Saint Michael, are sufficiently decisive, "_this place was originally inclosed within a very thick wood, distant from the ocean six miles, affording the finest shelter to wild beasts._" With respect to the period and causes of the catastrophe which have changed the face of this country, we have already offered some observations. ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.--The Mount appears to have been consecrated by superstition from the earliest period; and, according to monkish legends, from the supposed appearance of the archangel Saint Michael to some hermits, upon one of its craggy points. Tradition has not preserved the place where the vision appeared, but antiquarianism has attempted to supply the deficiency by conjecture; the spot was denominated "_Saint Michael's Chair_," and is said to be one of the large rocks overhanging the battery, an appellation which has been erroneously transferred to the carcase of a stone lantern, situated, as we have just stated, on the tower of the chapel. Our poet Milton alludes to this vision in the following passage of his Lycidas-- "Or whether thou to our moist views deny'd "Sleeps't by the fable of Bellerus old "_Where the great vision of the guarded mount_ "Looks towards Namancos and Bayonas hold. "Look homeward Angel now, and melt with ruth, "And O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth." Spencer also makes mention of this spot in a manner which proves that it was universally hallowed by the devout. "In evil hour thou lenst in hond "Thus holy hills to blame, "For sacred unto Saints they stond, "And of them han their name, "St. Michael's Mount who does not know "That wards the western coast."