When I was thus attending my Lord _Galway_ at _Tarraga_, he receiv'd Intelligence that the Enemy had a Design to lay Siege to _Denia_; whereupon he gave me Orders to repair there as Engineer. After I had receiv'd my Orders, and taken Leave of his Lordship, I set out, resolving, since it was left to my Choice, to go by way of _Barcelona_, and there take Shipping for the Place of my Station; by which I propos'd to save more time than would allow me a full Opportunity of visiting _Montserat_, a Place I had heard much Talk of, which had fill'd me with a longing Desire to see it. To say Truth, I had been told such extravagant Things of the Place, that I could hardly impute more than one half of it to any thing but _Spanish_ Rhodomontado's, the Vice of extravagant Exaggeration being too natural to that Nation. _MONTSERAT_ is a rising lofty Hill, in the very Middle of a spacious Plain, in the Principality of _Catalonia_, about seven Leagues distant from _Barcelona_ to the Westward, somewhat inclining to the North. At the very first Sight, its Oddness of Figure promises something extraordinary; and given at that Distance the Prospect makes somewhat of a grand Appearance: Hundreds of aspiring Pyramids presenting themselves all at once to the Eye, look, if I may be allowed so to speak, like a little petrify'd Forrest; or, rather, like the awful Ruins of some capacious Structure, the Labour of venerable Antiquity. The nearer you approach the more it affects; but till you are very near you can hardly form in your Mind any thing like what you find it when you come close to it. Till just upon it you would imagine it a perfect Hill of Steeples; but so intermingled with Trees of Magnitude, as well as Beauty, that your Admiration can never be tir'd, or your Curiosity surfeited. Such I found it on my Approach; yet much less than what I found it, was so soon as I enter'd upon the very Premisses. Now that stupendious Cluster of Pyramids affected me in a Manner different to all before; and I found it so finely group'd with verdant Groves, and here and there interspers'd with aspiring, but solitary Trees, that it no way lessened my Admiration, while it increased my Delight. Those Trees, which I call solitary, as standing single, in opposition to the numerous Groves, which are close and thick (as I observ'd when I ascended to take a View of the several Cells) rise generally out of the very Clefts of the main Rock, with nothing, to Appearance, but a Soil or bed of Stone for their Nurture. But though some few Naturalists may assert, that the Nitre in the Stone may afford a due Proportion of Nourishment to Trees and Vegetables; these, in my Opinion, were all too beautiful, their Bark, Leaf, and Flowers, carry'd too fair a Face of Health, to allow them even to be the Foster-children of Rock and Stone only.