I** 
 
 m
 
 THE 
 
 SCENERY OF SCOTLAND.
 
 
 \ 

 
 THE 
 
 SCENERY OF SCOTLAND 
 
 VIEWED IN CONNEXION WITH ITS 
 PHYSICAL GEOLOGY. 
 
 ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, F.R.S. 
 
 rELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH ; OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF 
 LONDON ; AND OF THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF GREAT BRITAIN. 
 
 WITH A GEOLOGICAL MAP BY SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON, 
 K.C.B. F.R.S. AND ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, F.R.S. EDIN 
 
 AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 anb 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 1865. 
 
 The right of Reproduction and Translation is reserved.
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SON', AND TAYLOR, PR 
 BREAD STREET HILL.
 
 TO 
 
 SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON, 
 
 K.C.B. F.R.S. 
 
 Director -General of the Geological Survey of Great Britain and Ireland. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR RODERICK, 
 
 To no one can a new volume on Scottish 
 Geology be more fitly inscribed than to you, to 
 whom Scottish Geology owes so much ; nor 
 perhaps can such an inscription come with greater 
 appropriateness than from one who has worked 
 with you, hammer in hand, over many a league 
 of Highland ground, and who is further bound 
 to you by many acts of courtesy and kindness. 
 You are of course in no way responsible for 
 the opinions expressed in the following chapters. 
 That they may sometimes be at variance with 
 
 2090S13
 
 your well-known views of the same subjects 
 would only serve, if need were, as an additional 
 motive for offering to you this expression of 
 respect and esteem. 
 
 Believe me to remain, 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 ARCHIBALD GEIKIE. 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY, AYR. 
 2d June, 1865.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 To trace back, if that might be, the origin of the 
 present surface of the country, and by working out 
 the structure of the rocks, to contrast the aspect 
 of the land to-day with its condition in former 
 geological periods, has been to the author of these 
 pages the delightful occupation of years. The 
 writing of this volume has thus gone on side by 
 side with daily labour in the field, amid all the 
 changes of scene and surroundings that fall to the 
 lot of a member of the Geological Survey. Some 
 portions have already appeared in the North British 
 Review and elsewhere ; but these were written with 
 the view of ultimate reunion and republication in 
 some such form as that in which they now appear. 
 
 The principles which have guided me in the 
 following investigation are far from new : they were
 
 viii Preface. 
 
 laid down long ago by Hutton and Play fair, and 
 they have recently received fresh illustration from 
 the pen of Professor Ramsay. I can claim nothing 
 more than to have tried in some detail to develop 
 these principles in an inquiry into the origin of 
 the existing scenery of Scotland. The views to 
 which I have been led, however, run directly counter 
 to what are still the prevailing impressions on this 
 subject, and I am therefore prepared to find them 
 disputed, or perhaps thrown aside as mere dream- 
 ing. That in searching for a pathway through a 
 field of scientific research wherein the travellers 
 have as yet been few, one can hardly fail to go 
 here and there astray, that he must needs miss 
 much by the way, and that a few steps to either 
 side would sometimes have brought him out of 
 the cloud of doubt and uncertainty through which 
 at the time no outlet could be seen, will by none 
 be more frankly admitted than by the traveller 
 himself. Yet in spite of these mishaps, he may 
 believe that on the whole his journey has been a 
 progress in the right direction, and that even his
 
 Preface. ix 
 
 errors may not be without their use in pointing 
 out the right track to other explorers. Such at 
 least is the hope in which I lay these chapters 
 before my brethren of the hammer. 
 
 No one may venture to write on the subjects 
 discussed in this volume without first studying what 
 has been written upon them by Professor Ramsay. 
 To his papers, but still more to many long dis- 
 cussions with him by the fireside and among the 
 hills, and to the stimulus from contact with a mind 
 so original in conception, and so marked for its 
 faculty of grasping at once the details and the 
 broad bearings of a question, it is a pleasure to 
 express my obligations. 
 
 While the following chapters were passing through 
 the press, a very ingenious and original work by 
 Mr. J. F. Campbell has appeared, with the title of 
 Frost and Fire. He refers the glaciation of Scot- 
 land and other countries not to land-ice, as is held 
 by Agassiz, Ramsay, Lyell, Chambers, and Jamieson, 
 but mainly to icebergs and icefloes drifting from the 
 north in ocean-currents. While he is thus opposed to
 
 x Preface. 
 
 my views, I am glad of this early opportunity 
 of acknowledging the markedly courteous terms 
 of his allusions to myself. There is much that is 
 suggestive in his volumes ; he has worked out the 
 theory and proofs of berg-action in a way in which 
 it has never been done before. He has not, how- 
 ever, refuted the proofs of the former wide exten- 
 sion of land-ice in this country. These still remain, 
 it seems to me, as clear and decisive as ever. As 
 this is no place for discussion, I will only add that 
 bergs and icefloes, instead of scooping out valleys, 
 would rather, I think, when their long-continued 
 action is looked at broadly, tend to plane down 
 the inequalities of the sea-bed. In reading Frost 
 and Fire (as yet too hurriedly) it has occurred 
 to me that what we call a plain of marine de- 
 nudation may perhaps not always be the result 
 of wave-action, but may have been more or less 
 ground smooth by the yearly grating of those 
 ice-rafts whose movements Mr. Campbell has so 
 graphically described. 
 
 The accompanying Geological Map was first
 
 Preface. xi 
 
 published in 1861 with a pamphlet of Explanatory 
 Notes. Sir Roderick Murchison and the Messrs. 
 Johnston having readily given their consent to its 
 being used in the present form, I have revised it 
 with some care, so as to bring it up to the state 
 of the science at the close of last year. The plates 
 are mere pen and ink outline sketches which I have 
 copied from my note-books upon transfer-paper. 
 Owing, however, to my inexperience in lithography, 
 they have sadly failed in the printing, and are very 
 far from what I had hoped they would be. The 
 woodcuts were drawn by myself on the blocks, 
 and are likewise only copies of the rough sketches 
 made on the spot.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 POPULAR IDEAS REGARDING THE ORIGIN OF MOUNTAINS AND 
 
 VALLEYS I 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 POWER OF RAIN, RIVERS, SPRINGS, AND FROST UPON THE 
 
 SURFACE OF THE EARTH 14 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ACTION OF THE SEA AND OF WIND 39 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ACTION OF GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS 77 
 
 I. THE SCENERY OF THE HIGHLANDS. 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF THE HIGHLANDS CONNEXION OF 
 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE AND SCENERY ANCIENT TABLE- 
 LAND OF THE HIGHLANDS 9! 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ORIGIN OF THE HIGHLAND VALLEYS VALLEYS CROSSING 
 WATERSHEDS : PASSES OR BEALLOCHS SEA-LOCHSVAL- 
 LEY-SYSTEMS OF THE HIGHLANDS 114
 
 x j v Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 INFLUENCE OF ANCIENT GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS ON HIGH- 
 LAND SCENERY TRACK OF THE FIRST GREAT ICE-SHEET 
 OF THE GLACIAL PERIOD POSSIBLE THICKNESS OF THE 
 j CE _0 R IGIN OF HIGHLAND LAKES DEBRIS MADE BY THE 
 ICE-SHEETHIGHER ELEVATION AND SUBSEQUENT SUB- 
 MERGENCE OF THE HIGHLANDS SECOND GLACIER-PERIOD 
 IN THE HIGHLANDS H9 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 CAUSE OF THE LOCAL VARIETIES OF HIGHLAND SCENERY . . 2O7 
 
 II. THE SCENERY OF THE SOUTHERN 
 UPLANDS. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE SOUTHERN UPLANDS GEOLOGY OF THE DISTRICT CHA- 
 RACTER OF THE SCENERY SURFACE OF THESE UPLANDS 
 AN OLD SEA-BOTTOM VALLEYS INFLUENCE OF GLACIERS 
 AND ICEBERGS 23! 
 
 III. THE SCENERY OF THE MIDLAND VALLEY. 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE MIDLAND VALLEY GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE DENUDA- 
 TION . 266
 
 Contents. xv 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 PAGE 
 CAUSE OF LOCAL VARIETIES OF LOWLAND SCENERY TRACES 
 
 OF GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS 2Q2 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CHANGES IN THE SCENERY OF SCOTLAND SINCE THE ADVENT 
 OF MAN RAISED BEACHES DISAPPEARANCE OF THE AN- 
 CIENT FORESTS; GROWTH OF PEAT-MOSSESINFLUENCE 
 
 OF MAN UPON THE SCENERY OF THE COUNTRY .... 319 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION 340 
 
 DIRECTIONS FOR BINDER. 
 Coloured Map to face Title Page. 
 
 PLATE I to face 154 
 
 II 210 
 
 HI 2l8 
 
 IV ' ^4 
 
 ,, V 262 
 
 VI 29 6
 
 To roam at large among unpeopled glens 
 And mountainous retirements, only trod 
 By devious footsteps ; regions consecrate 
 To oldest time! and while the mists 
 Flying, and rainy vapours, call out shapes 
 And phantoms from the crags and solid earth ; 
 
 and -while the streams 
 
 Descending jrom the region of the clouds, 
 And starling from the hollows of the earth 
 More multitudinous every moment, rend 
 Their, "way before them what a joy to roam 
 An equal among mightiest energies! 
 
 WORDSWORTH, Excursion, b. iv.
 
 SCENERY OF SCOTLAND. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 POPULAR IDEAS REGARDING THE ORIGIN OF MOUNTAINS AND 
 VALLEYS. 
 
 AMONG the many forms of scenery which vary the 
 surface of the earth, none fixes itself more firmly 
 on the memory and the imagination than that of 
 the hills and mountains. The aspect of the lower 
 grounds is liable to constant change. We see the 
 waves wearing down the shore, and the rivers ever 
 and anon devastating the meadows. Man himself 
 does much to transform the landscape: he ploughs 
 up peat-mosses, cuts down forests, plants new wood- 
 lands along the hill-sides, covers the valleys with 
 cornfields and orchards, graves the country with lines 
 of roadway, and builds his cottages, villages, sea- 
 ports, and towns. But high above the din and stir 
 B
 
 2 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of these changes, the great mountains rise before 
 us with still the same forms of peak and crag that 
 were familiar to our forefathers long centuries ago. 
 Amid the fleeting outlines of the lowlands these 
 alone seem to defy the hand of time. And hence 
 " the everlasting hills " and " ancient mountains " 
 have ever been favourite emblems of permanence 
 and grandeur. 
 
 Not that signs of revolution failed to be perceived 
 in the early ages among the crags and valleys of 
 the hills. There is an air of ruin and waste about 
 these high grounds which no eye can miss. But 
 the cleaving of their ravines, the scarping of their 
 precipices, the opening of their valleys, and the 
 strewing of their slopes with piles of loose rock, 
 were looked upon vaguely as the complex result 
 of the first grand upheaval of the mountains out of 
 chaos. 1 
 
 1 This popular belief, which even yet, in spite of modern science, 
 has not become extinct in this country, is well expressed by Milton : 
 
 " When God said, 
 
 ' Be gathered now, ye waters, under Heaven 
 Into one place, and let dry land appear ; ' 
 Immediately the mountains huge appear 
 Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave 
 Into the clouds ! their tops ascend the sky : 
 So high as heav'd the tumid hills, so low 
 Down sunk a hollow bottom, broad and deep, 
 Capacious bed of waters." Paradise Lost, Book VII.
 
 Geological Origin of Myths. 3 
 
 Sometimes, however, the traces of destruction were 
 too marked to be assigned even by the popular mind 
 to the first creation of all things. The hills looked 
 as though, long after their birth, they had been rent 
 in twain ; the cliffs were shattered and broken as if 
 they too had suffered from a like catastrophe ; the 
 huge fragments of crag and mountain scattered over 
 the declivities, or lying thickly in the valleys below, 
 seemed all to tell of some conflict, later, indeed, than 
 the making of the world, yet lost in an antiquity 
 far beyond the records of man. To the influence 
 of scenery of this kind on the mind of a people, at 
 once observant and imaginative, such legends as that 
 of the Titans should in all likelihood be ascribed. 
 It would be interesting to trace back these legends 
 to their cradle, and to mark how much they owe 
 to the character of the scenery amongst which they 
 took their rise. Perhaps it would be found that the 
 rugged outlines of the Boeotian hills had no small 
 share in the framing of Hesiod's graphic story of 
 that primeval warfare wherein the combatants fought 
 with huge rocks, which, darkening the air as they 
 flew, at last buried the discomfited Titans deep be- 
 neath the surface of the land. Nor would it be diffi- 
 cult to trace a close connexion between the present 
 scenery of our own country and some of the time- 
 honoured traditionary stories of giants and hero 
 kings, warlocks and witches, or between the doings 
 B 2
 
 4 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of the Scandinavian Hrimthursar, or Frost-Giants, 
 and the more characteristic features of the land- 
 scapes and climate of the north. 
 
 But apart from the region of fable and romance, 
 it is impossible to wander among the glens and 
 solitudes of a wild mountainous tract without feel- 
 ing a certain vague awe, not merely on account 
 of the magnitude or loneliness of the surrounding 
 scenery, but from the mystery that seems to hang 
 over its origin. The gentle undulations of a low- 
 land landscape may never start in the mind a pass- 
 ing thought ; but we are arrested at once by the 
 stern broken features of the hills, and cannot help 
 asking ourselves how they came into being. 
 
 To such a question the natural answer is sought in 
 vast primeval convulsions, that suddenly tossed up 
 the mountains, rent open ravines and glens for the 
 rivers, and unfolded wide valleys to receive and remove 
 the drainage of the country. There is an air at once 
 of simplicity and of grandeur about this explanation 
 which has made it a favourite and popular one. It 
 deals with that dreamland of conjecture and specu- 
 lation lying far beyond the pathways of science, 
 where one has no need of facts for either the foun- 
 dation or superstructure of his theory. It thus re- 
 quires no scientific knowledge or training ; it can be 
 appreciated by all, and may be applied to the history 
 of a mountain-chain by one to whom the very name
 
 Uncertainty regarding Origin of Scenery, 5 
 
 of geology is unknown. No man, indeed, who is 
 aware of what has been ascertained of the history 
 of the earth can hold this popular notion to the full. 
 For it is now well known that the mountains are of 
 many different ages, that some of them were rent 
 and worn down before others had begun to be, and 
 that the rocks which form the present surface of the 
 earth are the result of many successive ages of 
 geological change. But even where this is familiar 
 knowledge, the vaguest and most indefinite ideas 
 prevail regarding the origin of the scenery which 
 now surrounds us. It seems, indeed, not a little 
 curious, that notwithstanding the amount of geologi- 
 cal knowledge diffused through this country regard- 
 ing the origin of the various systems and formations 
 which lie beneath the surface, so much ignorance and 
 uncertainty should exist with respect to the origin 
 of the surface itself. We know much regarding the 
 history of the Silurian grits and limestones, of the Old 
 Red sandstones and conglomerates, of the Carboni- 
 ferous shales and coals, but when we are asked to tell 
 how these rocks came to be moulded into the out- 
 lines which they wear at the surface, and thus how 
 our present scenery has arisen, we cast about for an 
 answer, and learn that it is not easy to find. And 
 the more the question is pondered over the less 
 obvious is the answer seen to be. 
 
 The following chapters are an attempt to find a
 
 6 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 solution of the problem, in so far as it relates to the 
 history of the scenery of Scotland. That this special 
 application may be made the more intelligible to 
 non-geological readers, it may be well to begin by 
 stating as briefly as possible the terms of the pro- 
 blem to be solved, and, after pointing out the inade- 
 quacy of the common explanation, to direct the 
 notice of the reader to the nature and results of 
 those processes whereby the present surface of the 
 globe is slowly but ceaselessly modified. Having 
 thus considered how scenery is changing at the pre- 
 sent day, we shall be the better able to understand 
 how changes of a like kind have been brought about 
 in the past, and how their accumulated effects may 
 have resulted in that varied contour which now diver- 
 sifies the country. 
 
 To whatever source the origin of the existing con- 
 figuration of the surface is to be traced, the result 
 of the whole has been a system of the most nicely- 
 adjusted symmetry. Hill and mountain, valley and 
 glen seem each as if made to fit in closely with its 
 neighbours. One main office of land is to serve as a 
 channel on which a part of the water which rises 
 from the sea into the clouds may find its way once 
 more to the deep. The manner in which this task 
 is accomplished, familiar and even common-place 
 though it may be, can hardly be thoughtfully con- 
 templated without wonder. From the high grounds
 
 Symmetry of River-systems. 7 
 
 the gathered rains and springs descend in hundreds 
 and thousands of watercourses, which, from the tiniest 
 runnel up to the ample river, are all arranged in the 
 closest harmony with each other, and with the whole 
 orderly system of which they form a part. This well- 
 balanced symmetry cannot but have resulted from 
 some general cause, acting uniformly throughout the 
 land which it fashioned for its own ends. 
 
 The form of the valleys may vary indefinitely 
 without disturbing the general symmetry. They 
 may be wide, open, smooth, with gently shelving 
 sides, or they may be only narrow gorges in which 
 the rivers toil between naked walls of rock. Merely 
 from the map one cannot tell where the valleys 
 are wide and where narrow. The most precipitous 
 ravines fall easily into the general plan, and lie in the 
 paths of the streams just as naturally and uncon- 
 strainedly as do the widest straths. Nor should we 
 fail to remark that the ground-plan of the valleys, 
 as defined on a map by the courses of the streams, 
 is marked everywhere by the same great features, 
 whether the region be one of mountains or low plains. 
 If the map has no hill-shading it may be impossible 
 to tell which are the higher mountain ranges, and 
 which the lower groups of hills and plains, so uniform 
 is the disposition of the valleys and water-courses 
 apart from relative height. 
 
 We have to inquire by what probable means this
 
 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 harmonious grouping of hill, and valley, and water- 
 course, was brought about. 
 
 Two explanations have been given. One calls in 
 the aid of old terrestrial convulsions, and looks on 
 the valleys and ravines as due to fractures and subsi- 
 dences or upheavals of the earth's crust ; the other, 
 while far from ignoring the influence of subterranean 
 movements, holds that these ha\ e not been the chief 
 cause in determining the present form of the ground, 
 but that the valleys are due in the main to denudation, 
 or the erosive action of rains, streams, ice, and other 
 subaerial forces. Of these two opinions the latter 
 alone appears to me tenable with regard to the hills 
 and valleys of Scotland, and as the following chapters 
 are founded upon it, there may be some advantage 
 in stating here in a few words the grounds for the 
 belief. 
 
 It should be borne in mind that in dealing with the 
 past history of our planet the element of time ought 
 never to be lost sight of. To turn away from the 
 known and visible causes of change, and to imagine 
 the former presence of others far more stupendous, 
 because the results achieved seem otherwise inexpli- 
 cable, is to substitute mere speculation for inductive 
 reasoning. In all such attempts we make the fatal 
 error of forgetting that in the geological history of 
 our globe time is power. It may not be easy to get 
 thoroughly rid of the natural tendency to associate
 
 Valleys not due to Dislocations. 9 
 
 great effects with great causes, but if one can free 
 himself from this prejudice he will probably be led, in 
 the spirit of Hutton, to perceive that there appears to 
 be no great change in the configuration of the land 
 which may not have been brought about by the 
 working of those slow every-day processes which are 
 in progress now. 
 
 There can be no dispute regarding the abundance 
 of the upheavals, subsidences, and dislocations which 
 the crust of the earth has undergone. But that our 
 valleys and ravines are not mere cracks, would seem 
 to be put beyond dispute by the fact that for one 
 valley which happens to run along the line of a dis- 
 location, there are, I dare say, fifty or a hundred 
 which do not. 1 Moreover, it can be shown that out of 
 every valley and glen a great mass of solid rock has 
 been carried bodily away, and that even the highest 
 mountain-tops have suffered a similar loss. If we 
 could restore the missing material we should in truth 
 be able to fill up the glens and valleys again, so that 
 the mountainous parts of the country would thus be 
 turned into rolling table-lands. 
 
 But perhaps the most evident argument against the 
 doctrine of fracture and convulsion, and in favour of 
 the Huttonian theory of erosion, is to be found in the 
 
 1 There is no point which the detailed investigations of the Geological 
 Survey have made clearer than this.
 
 io Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 very grouping of the valleys themselves. It appears 
 to me hard to see how a thoughtful survey of the 
 configuration of a land-surface can lead to any other 
 conclusion than that "the mountains have been 
 formed by the hollowing out of the valleys, and the 
 valleys have been hollowed out by the attrition of 
 hard materials coming from the mountains." * The 
 independence of each hydrographical basin, the nice 
 adjustment of all its parts, the union of the different 
 basins in one great system, and the constant reference 
 of the whole to the grand end of conveying the 
 drainage from mountain-top to sea-shore, point not to 
 the random outbreaks of underground violence, but 
 to some general orderly agency, which has shown a 
 wonderful harmony and consistency in every part of 
 its working. What power save that of running-water 
 and of the other forms of atmospheric waste, could 
 have achieved these results ? Or where else may we 
 look for a force that could so accurately carve out the 
 valleys for the requirements of the streams, unless in 
 the action of the rains and streams themselves ? " If, 
 indeed," says Playfair, " a river consisted of a single 
 stream, without branches, running in a straight valley, 
 it might be supposed that some great concussion or 
 some powerful torrent had opened at once the chan- 
 nel by which its waters are conducted to the ocean ; 
 but when the usual form of a river js considered, 
 
 1 Button's Theory of the Earth, voL ii. p. 401.
 
 Illustration from a Sandy Beach. 1 1 
 
 the trunk divided into many branches, which rise at a 
 great distance from one another, and these again sub- 
 divided into an infinity of smaller ramifications, it 
 becomes strongly impressed upon the mind, that all 
 these channels have been cut by the waters them- 
 selves, that they have been slowly dug out by the 
 washing and erosion of the land ; and that it is by the 
 repeated touches of the same instrument that this 
 curious assemblage of lines has been engraved so 
 deeply on the surface of the globe." 1 
 
 Did the reader ever stand on a flat shore and 
 watch how the water which had soaked into the 
 sand just below the upper limit of the tide trickles 
 down the seaward slope towards the pools and 
 shallows on the lower part of the beach ? He could 
 hardly find a better illustration of the drainage of 
 a country. The water that oozes out from below 
 high-tide mark begins by degrees to gather into tiny 
 runnels ; these gain size and speed as they descend, 
 often flowing into each other, and thus with their 
 united torrent cutting narrow and sometimes tortuous 
 channels for themselves out of the sand. If the 
 locality be a favourable one, these miniature rivers 
 
 1 Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory, 99. If the reader has not 
 already read this classic, let me strongly urge him to do so. He will there 
 see how far Hutton and Playfair were ahead of many modern geologists 
 in the breadth of view they took of physical geology. And he will 
 find their opinions set forth with a terseness, clearness, and elegance, 
 such as may be found in no other English treatise on physical geology.
 
 12 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 may be seen undermining their banks, and sweeping 
 the debris away to sea. Thus the sand which wore, 
 perhaps, a perfectly smooth surface when the tide 
 left it a few hours before, is now channelled and 
 worn into diminutive valleys, gorges, and ravines, 
 with narrow ridges and broader plateaux between 
 them. It might then be taken as a kind of relief 
 model of the drainage of one side of a country. As 
 the process of erosion goes on, the likeness of the 
 beach to a series of river-systems grows every minute 
 more marked. But at last the turned tide comes 
 back and levels the whole, thus illustrating what 
 geologists call " a plain of marine denudation." Yet 
 again this levelled surface, when the tide retires, is 
 once more exposed, the same system of water- 
 carving goes on as before, and a new system of 
 valleys, ravines, water-courses, ridges, and table-lands 
 makes its appearance. 1 
 
 Now it is, I believe, in this kind of way that a 
 great river-system is excavated. The process is then 
 of course an infinitely longer one, calling in, as we 
 shall see, the agency of rain, springs, streams, and 
 ice, and making these all work together for the ac- 
 complishment of the general end. But in either 
 case the ultimate result is achieved by denudation. 
 
 1 Since writing the above, I find that a similar illustration has 
 occurred to my colleague, Mr. Jukes. " Student's Manual of Geology," 
 2d edit. p. 105.
 
 Mountains and Valleys the result of Erosion. 13 
 
 Water seeking its way seaward cuts a network of 
 paths for itself; an hour or two is enough to channel 
 the sandy beach, millions of years may be needed 
 to cut down a mass of high ground into mountain 
 and glen ; but in the long lapse of geological time 
 the one result is doubtless as sure as the other. 
 
 The conclusion, therefore, to which an attentive 
 examination of the present surface of the country 
 points is, that although the rocks have unquestionably 
 suffered much from subterranean commotions, it is 
 not to that cause that their present external forms 
 are chiefly to be traced ; that the mountains exist, 
 not because they have been upheaved as such above 
 the valleys, but because their flanks having been 
 deeply cut away they have been left standing out 
 in relief; and that the valleys are there, not by 
 virtue of old rents and subsidences, but because 
 moving water, with its help-mates frost and ice, has 
 carved them out of the solid rock. These principles 
 will be further developed in succeeding chapters, when 
 they are applied to the elucidation of the history of 
 Scottish scenery. In the meantime let us proceed 
 to mark how the various denuding forces, which are 
 held to have done so much in the past, are now carry- 
 ing on their work around us.
 
 14 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 POWER OF RAIN, RIVERS, SPRINGS, AND FROST, UPON THE SURFACE 
 OF THE EARTH. 
 
 SOME hesitation is not unnaturally felt in ad- 
 mitting that such marvellous results as the scoop- 
 ing out of our valleys and ravines can have been 
 brought about by any mere surface-action. It may 
 be well, therefore, to look for a little at the nature 
 of the different processes which are now modifying 
 the surface, and to which the origin of the existing 
 scenery is sought to be referred. 
 
 In such an inquiry we are soon struck by the 
 important part which water plays in these changes. 
 There is a ceaseless passage of water from land to 
 sea, and from sea back again to land. 1 In the latter 
 half of the cycle clouds and winds are the vehicles 
 that carry the moisture, but in the former half, 
 
 1 There is more scientific truth than most readers imagine in Homer's 
 reference of all waters to the parentage of the great Ocean : 
 
 fj.tya ffBevos 'n/ceaj/otb, 
 "E o&n-ep irdvrfs Trora/xoi Kal Traera 6d\affffa 
 Kal iroa-a: Kpijvai, *al tyefara M o/cpu vdovffw.Il. XXI. 195.
 
 Rain. 1 5 
 
 where the water finds its way from the land to the 
 sea, it is conducted in innumerable channels worn 
 into the surface of the earth. When it falls to the 
 ground it is nearly pure, but when after its journey 
 from mountain to shore, it returns to the sea, it is 
 charged with mineral admixture, partly in chemical 
 solution and partly in mechanical suspension. As 
 these ingredients are of course derived from the 
 rocks and soils over which the gathered moisture 
 has flowed, it is plain that a constant waste is thus 
 carried on, and that the spoils of the land are borne 
 ceaselessly downwards to the ocean. Such is one of 
 the first features to arrest the attention ; and even 
 before entering into the details of this process of 
 erosion, the inquirer, on reflection, will be led to 
 perceive that since the waste is universal it must 
 have worked vast changes on the surface of the 
 globe, and that, indeed, if allowed time enough, 
 there may be no limit to its operations until the 
 land is everywhere wholly worne away. 
 
 Rain. The rain which falls on the land partly 
 runs off again at once in brooks and rivers, partly 
 sinks beneath the surface and reappears in springs. 
 Each part has its own share in the general erosion 
 of the rocks. It has been customary, in enumerating 
 the various geological agents, either to pass rain over, 
 or to assign to it a very subordinate place. But it 
 will perhaps be found in the end that no other power
 
 !g Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 has done more to modify the surface of the land. 
 From the very tardiness and apparent insignificance 
 of its results, geologists have been apt to overlook 
 its action. It cannot be doubted, however, that even 
 before the rain collects into brooks it effects some 
 change, especially when flowing over soil or decom- 
 posing rock. This is often well shown after a heavy 
 shower has fallen upon a piece of newly-ploughed 
 sloping land. The finer earth or mud is then found 
 collected in pools between the furrows at the bottom 
 of the field, and, as the result of ages of such wash- 
 ings, the thickest and richest loam is spread along 
 the foot of the slope. Were it not that the soil on 
 the upper part of the field is always being renewed 
 by the decomposition of the stones and the growth 
 of vegetation, the surface there would be in the end 
 swept bare of soil altogether. The rain which washes 
 down the finer particles to the bottom of the declivity 
 likewise carries a portion off to the nearest brook, 
 and thus prevents the indefinite and unchecked accu- 
 mulation of loam on the lower grounds. In the 
 south-east of England, where, as the land did not 
 sink beneath the sea during the glacial period, it has 
 been exposed for a very long period to the uninter- 
 rupted action of the atmosphere, the results of this 
 gentle transporting power of rain are visible in thick 
 accumulations of brick-earth, a fine loam or earth, 
 lying on the valleys and lower grounds, and derived
 
 Rain, 17 
 
 from the adjoining slopes. 1 In Scotland it is only 
 the post-glacial rain-wash that is now to be seen. 
 But this is often several feet thick, and spreads out 
 in patches over the older formations. The effects of 
 rain in washing off the lighter soil from a hill-side 
 may often be well seen among the uplands of the 
 southern counties, where the original covering of 
 boulder-clay has been by degrees carried away from 
 the smooth summits and higher parts of the slopes, 
 but the striated stones of the deposit, being heavier 
 and not so easily removable, still often lie pretty 
 thickly among the turf up even to the hill-tops. 
 
 Such facts show that, apart from the action of 
 streams, rain exerts an appreciable power of abra- 
 sion on the surface of the land. Its influence is gentle 
 and slow, and on that account apt to be overlooked. 
 But with time enough given for its work, we can hardly 
 place a limit to its results. For rain, like the other 
 agencies of waste, does not act alone. It is in close 
 league with chemical decomposition, and the de- 
 structive power of frosts, springs, brooks, and rivers. 
 
 1 The proofs of the vast influence of rain in modifying the surface 
 of the south-east of England, have been carefully studied by my col- 
 ' leagues of the Geological Survey, Mr. Foster and Mr. Topley, who 
 have been led to the conclusion that the well-known denudation of 
 the Weald has been effected by sub-aerial action a deduction in which 
 they agree with Professor Ramsay ("The Physical Geography and 
 Geology of the British Isles," Lect. III.) They are at present 
 engaged in preparing a paper on this subject for the Geological 
 Society. 
 
 C
 
 r g Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Whether it flows over solid rock or loose earth, it 
 is constantly washing off the lighter parts, leaving 
 the rest to be broken up by exposure to the air, and 
 eventually swept away in turn. Thus every year 
 must imperceptibly lower the general level of the 
 land. In dealing with the vast cycles of geological 
 time, we are likely rather to take too low than too 
 high an estimate of the potency of this quiet agency 
 in modelling the present contour of the country. 
 
 Brooks and Rivers. When rain falls it quickly 
 flows into the minor hollows of the surface, gathering 
 there into little runnels that unite into brooks, thence 
 into larger streams, 1 and finally into rivers. An 
 examination of these watercourses will show the 
 evidence of the assertion of Hutton, that they are in 
 general the work of the water which flows in them. 
 Beginning at the hill-tops we first meet with the 
 spring or " well-eye," from which the river takes its 
 rise. A patch of bright green mottling the brown 
 heathy slope shows where the water comes to the 
 surface, a treacherous covering of verdure often con- 
 cealing a deep pool beneath. From this source the 
 rivulet trickles along the grass and heath, which it 
 soon cuts through, reaching the black, peaty layer 
 
 1 Such streams, intermediate in size between brooks and rivers, are 
 known in Scotland as "waters;" for example, the Water of Girvan, 
 the Water of Cree, Water of Leith, Fassney Water, Dye Water, &c. 
 They usually flow into rivers, of which they are then the chief feeders, 
 but some enter the sea.
 
 Brooks and R ivers. 1 9 
 
 below, and running in it for a short way as in a gutter. 
 Excavating its channel in the peat, it comes down to 
 the soil, often a stony earth bleached white by the 
 peat. Deepening and widening the channel as it 
 gathers force with the increasing slope, the water digs 
 into the coating of drift or loose decomposed rock 
 that covers the hill-side. In favourable localities a 
 narrow precipitous gully, twenty or thirty feet deep, 
 may thus be scooped out in the course of a few years. 
 Its rapid growth may often be impressively seen at 
 its upper end. There the stream, flowing in its 
 narrow gutter through the peat, suddenly descends 
 into the gully in a waterfall that tumbles over a 
 vertical face of the superficial detritus. The dash of 
 the spray and the percolation of water are ever 
 loosening large masses both from the sides of the 
 gully and from behind the waterfall. Blocks of peat 
 several yards in circumference still attached to the 
 underlying soil lie in tumbled ruin at the bottom of 
 the ravine, where they are eventually broken up and 
 washed away down to the valleys. The waterfall is 
 thus creeping up the hill, and the gully is becoming 
 longer as well as wider and deeper. Such a scene 
 as this may often be observed in sheep-drains in- 
 cautiously made on steep slopes. The drains, ori- 
 ginally cut, perhaps, merely in the peat, have become 
 the channels of torrents during a rainy season. They 
 have thus been torn up, and turned into long yawning 
 C 2
 
 2o Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 chasms, which every winter dig deeper into the side 
 of the hill. The higher slopes of the hills and 
 mountains are in this way seamed with narrow 
 gullies, cut either by rains or by the outflow of 
 springs, sometimes in a covering of superficial debris, 
 sometimes in the rock itself, and the detritus so 
 excavated is spread out in a fan-shape at the edge of 
 the valley below. 
 
 " Thus oft both slope and hill are torn, 
 Where wintry torrents down have borne, 
 And heaped upon the cumbered land 
 Its wreck of gravel, rocks, and sand." 
 
 Following one of these streamlets to the foot of 
 the hill, let us trace its course as it enters a valley 
 where, joined by tiny tributaries from either side, 
 it slowly gains iir size. For a time its path winds 
 from side to side in endless curves, which sometimes 
 nearly meet and enclose little flat islets of meadow. 
 Listlessly and smoothly it glides along, until after 
 a mile or two its channel becomes deeper and more 
 rocky. The streamlet chafing within its narrowed 
 bounds enters a thick copsewood, in which we hear 
 it murmuring. Then comes the roar of a waterfall, 
 beyond which there is silence. Breaking through 
 the thick wood some way below the waterfall, we 
 find ourselves on the edge of a deep ravine, and 
 yonder at the bottom is our old friend the streamlet 
 once more as placid as among the reeds and mea-
 
 A River-ravine. 21 
 
 dows of the upper valley. The long pendant willow- 
 branches that just kiss the surface of the water are 
 scarcely shaken, while the polished pebbles that 
 strew the channel lie unmoved by the rippling cur- 
 rent that glides over them. How, we involuntarily 
 ask, came this deep ravine into existence ? l As we 
 looked down the valley from above, and saw the 
 green wood along its bottom, we never imagined 
 that it concealed so deep a gash as this. Our eye 
 scans the precipitous walls of the dell, with their 
 rocks cleft through to a depth of perchance fifty 
 feet. It requires no great scrutiny to perceive that 
 the beds of stone on the one side form the prolon- 
 gations of those on the other, and that consequently 
 there must have been a time, ere yet the ravine 
 existed, when these beds stretched along unbroken. 
 Satisfied with this conclusion, our first impulse may 
 be to bethink us of some primeval earthquake, when 
 the solid land was broken up by great rents and 
 yawning chasms. Into one of these clefts we might 
 suppose the little streamlet to have eventually found 
 its way, moistening the bare, raw, barren rocks, 
 until at last their surface put on a livery of moss, 
 or lichen, or liverwort, and the birch, the alder, and 
 the willow found a nestling-place in their crevices. 
 
 i The following illustration of river-action is partly taken, with 
 some verbal changes and additions, from my little volume, "The 
 Story of a Boulder,'' p. 162.
 
 22 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Such a view of the origin of the wooded dell is cer- 
 tainly that which instinctively suggests itself. We 
 know that earthquakes break open the ground into 
 hideous chasms : we do not in the brief experience 
 of a single life-time see such chasms formed by any 
 other agency ; consequently, it appears a legitimate 
 conclusion to infer that such a ravine as that now 
 described can only have been produced by a sub- 
 terranean convulsion. Let us descend into the dell, 
 and see whether there remains any evidence of such 
 a dislocation. 
 
 Standing among the stones in mid-channel, we 
 soon find that the floor on which the stream is 
 flowing consists of sandstone and shale, and that 
 the walls of the little gorge are formed of similar 
 materials. Fixing on one of the sandstone beds 
 which has been hollowed into pools and channels 
 by the running water, we trace it across to the left- 
 hand side of the ravine, and away up into the pre- 
 cipitous cliff, till it is lost amid the ferns and brush- 
 wood. There can be no doubt, therefore, that the 
 ledge on which we were but now standing is a con- 
 tinuous portion of the rocks that form the left side 
 of the ravine. Returning again to the centre of the 
 stream, we proceed to trace out the course of the 
 other end of the same sandstone bed, and find that 
 it, too, strikes across to the rocks on the right-hand 
 side without a break or fissure, and passes up into
 
 A River-ravine. 23 
 
 the cliff of which it forms a part. Clearly, then, 
 this bed runs in an unbroken, unfissured line, from 
 the one side to the other, and the rocks of either 
 cliff form one continuous series. But lest by any 
 chance there may be some part of the section con- 
 cealed at this particular point of the dell, we pick 
 
 SECTION OP A RAVINE EXCAVATED BY A RIVE 
 
 our way along the bottom for some two or three 
 hundred yards higher up, and mark everywhere the 
 same continuity of the strata from side to side, with- 
 out a trace of any crack or fault. It is plain, there- 
 fore, that the ravine does not owe its existence to a 
 subterranean dislocation, for in that case the rocks 
 would show the break. What then ? Whither shall 
 we turn, it may be asked, to find another agency 
 equally grand and powerful in its working and 
 mighty in its results ? 
 
 It is this habit of dwelling not on the nature of 
 the process, but on the magnitude of the results of 
 terrestrial change, which leads most men to view
 
 24 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 these river gorges as the work of some single, potent, 
 and transient force. The completed change is before 
 us in all its details, and the mind naturally associates 
 this unity of effect with one powerful cause. It is 
 only after reflection and study that one is led to 
 perceive how inadequate such an interpretation may 
 be, since it takes no heed of the element of time 
 and the slow working of the many little agencies 
 that are ceaselessly modifying the surface of the 
 globe. 
 
 Returning again to the streamlet, let us continue 
 the ascent of the channel, and by marking the changes 
 in the character and features of the stone that forms 
 the cliff on either hand, we may perhaps learn some- 
 thing as to the origin of the ravine. We come to a 
 bare face of rock, where, as brushwood and herbage 
 find but a scanty footing, the strata can be attentively 
 studied. The cliff shows a number of beds of pale 
 grey sandstone, alternating with courses of a dark, 
 crumbling shale. The sandstones being harder and 
 firmer in texture stand out in prominent relief, while 
 the shales between have mouldered away, covering 
 the bottom of the bank with loose shivers. We can 
 mark, too, that as this decay goes on the harder beds 
 continually lose their support, cracking across, chiefly 
 along the lines of joint, and rolling down in huge 
 angular blocks into the stream. Every year must 
 needs add to this waste, and thus slowly widen the
 
 A River-ravine. 25 
 
 dell. For the broken fragments do not form in un- 
 disturbed heaps over the solid rock below so as to 
 protect it from the weather ; they are evidently worn 
 away by the stream, and their detritus is carried 
 down the ravine onwards to the sea. More special 
 reference will be made a few pages further on to 
 the causes of this slow rotting-away of solid rocks : 
 it is at present enough to note that it is always going 
 on. The rubbish thus produced, whether mere sand 
 or large blocks of stone, is borne away by the run- 
 ning water, so that the rocks of the ravine, instead 
 of getting at last protection under a thick cover of 
 their own ruins, are ever being exposed anew to the 
 wear and tear of the elements. Nay, their very 
 debris is used as a powerful instrument in further 
 increasing their erosion. For every fragment of stone 
 which is driven onward by the current acts as a file 
 on the rocks along the sides or bottom of the channel. 
 It gets worn down itself, but at the same time it 
 helps to grind away the solid rock over which it 
 is rolled. The process is indeed an infinitely slow 
 one. During a short visit we of course cannot see 
 any change actually accomplished, nor even if we 
 were to return after the lapse of a generation might 
 we be able to detect any appreciable difference. But 
 each successive stage in the progress of the waste is 
 illustrated before us, and the evidence is not less 
 convincing than if we could follow the history of
 
 26 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 each block of stone from the time when loosened 
 by springs or frosts, it fell from the cliff into the 
 stream, down to the time when, after a long rubbing 
 and grinding on the rocks of the watercourse, it is 
 at last reduced to mere sand. Nevertheless, it may 
 still be objected that this explanation merely ac- 
 counts for the widening of a channel already formed, 
 and affords no answer to the question how the ravine 
 was formed at first. 
 
 We continue the ascent for a short way further. A 
 scrambling walk through briars and hazel-bushes, 
 sometimes on rocky ledges, high among the cliffs, 
 sometimes among prostrate blocks that dam up the 
 stream, brings us at last full in front of the waterfall 
 whose sound we had heard in coming down the valley 
 a sparkling sheet of water that dashes over a pre- 
 cipitous face of rock some twenty feet high. The 
 appearances observable here deserve a careful atten- 
 tion. Our eyes have not been long employed noting 
 the more picturesque features of the scene ere they 
 discover that the dark brown band of rock forming 
 the summit of the ledge over which the water tumbles 
 is continuous all round the sides of the dell. There 
 is consequently no break or dislocation here. Ap- 
 proaching the cascade, we mark the rock behind it so 
 hollowed out that its upper bars project several feet 
 beyond the under ones. In this way the body of 
 water is shot clear over the top of the cliff, without
 
 A River-ravine.. 27 
 
 touching rock till it comes splashing down among the 
 blocks in the channel. The surface of the rock in 
 this recess is never dry; the spray of the fall con- 
 stantly striking on it keeps it always dank and drip- 
 ping. And thus this part of the sandstone tends to 
 crumble away even more speedily than the ledge over 
 which the water falls. Much depends on the texture 
 and structure of the rock ; sometimes the upper and 
 sometimes the under part of the cliff will decay more 
 rapidly, and thus the form of the waterfall must be 
 ever changing. We can see, for instance, how the 
 waste of the recess may go on until the upper pro- 
 jecting part of the cliff loses its support, and sinks 
 with a crash into the rocky pool below, thus, perhaps, 
 transforming the single cascade into a series of little 
 falls, which tumble over the new surfaces of rock now 
 exposed to the wear and tear of the stream. If, as 
 the waste goes on, it should chance that at last a 
 stratum of soft material, such as a bed of shale, came 
 to form the lower part of the cliff, the rate of 
 destruction would be greatly increased. If, on the 
 other hand, a hard sandstone or limestone should 
 occupy the same position, the rate would be in like 
 manner diminished. But whether more slowly or 
 more speedily, the waterfall is constantly cutting its 
 way backward. Ages ago it stood many yards further 
 down the ravine than it does now, the intervening 
 space having been hollowed out by the recession of the
 
 28 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 fall. And ages hence it will be found much higher up. 
 Thus the cascade recedes, and the ravine is dug 
 deep out of the solid rock. And to this tardy but 
 certain process is the origin of the long, narrow river- 
 gorge to be ascribed. 
 
 We may learn yet a farther lesson by examining 
 the channel of the stream above the fall. The rocks 
 over which the water there flows are seen to be deeply 
 grooved and worn, every exposed ledge and point 
 having a smoothed and polished look. We can mark 
 how the stone has split up along the natural lines of 
 joint, and how large angular blocks are thus loosened 
 and carried down the stream. In not a few places, 
 too, we may notice cylindrical cavities, called pot- 
 holes, in the bottom of each of which lie a few well- 
 rounded and worn pebbles and boulders. These 
 cavities are due to the circular movements of loose 
 
 FIG. II. POT-HOLES EXCAVATED BV RUNNING WATER. 
 
 stones that have been caught in eddies, and have been 
 kept whirling there till by their friction they have gradu- 
 ally worked their way downward into the solid rock.
 
 Streams in Flood. 29 
 
 In time, as these cavities are widened and approach 
 each other, their separating walls give way, the 
 hollows unite, and the channel of the stream is thus 
 materially deepened. In dry summer weather, when 
 these pot-holes are perchance mere quiet pools of 
 water, their well-worn sides, and the abraded look 
 of the rocks over which the water flows, point in the 
 most impressive way to the progressive erosion of the 
 watercourse. But if we visit the same scene when 
 the stream in flood comes roaring down the rocky 
 gorge with a cumbrous burthen of mud, gravel and 
 stones, the reality of the process is vividly borne in 
 upon the mind. While the boulders are heard striking 
 against each other and upon the rocks of the water- 
 course as the torrent sweeps them onward, it is not 
 difficult to understand how, under this powerful 
 rasping and grinding, the bottom and sides of the 
 channel should be worn down, and how, by the long 
 continuance of this action, and the other agencies of 
 atmospheric waste, a narrow deep ravine a mile or 
 more in length should be excavated without the aid 
 of any subterranean convulsion. 
 
 Having thus loitered for a little by the waterfall and 
 the ravine, let us hasten onward down the valley, and 
 mark how the stream, gathering bulk as it descends, 
 changes character with the variations of its banks. 
 Emerging at last from the gorge, it enters an open part 
 of the valley, and winds in wide, graceful curves from
 
 30 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 side to side of a flat alluvial meadow. The surface of 
 this plain is raised only a few feet above the average 
 level of the stream, and during floods is often in large 
 part submerged. The river banks are thus low, and as 
 they consist only of soft loam and sand, are in many 
 places undermined and removed by the current. It 
 is observable, however, that where at some bend of 
 the channel the river cuts into the bank on the one 
 side there is usually an accumulation of shingle and 
 sand on the side opposite, so that what is removed 
 from one place is in great measure heaped up at 
 another. These meadow-flats along the margin of 
 streams bear in Scotland the name of " haughs." 
 They have been formed out of the detritus brought 
 down by the streams from the higher parts of the 
 valleys. There are often traces of similar alluvial 
 terraces at higher levels on either side of a valley. 
 Three or four may sometimes be counted rising above 
 each other. They mark each a level which the river 
 once occupied before cutting its way down through 
 its own alluvium to its present channel. Nor is the 
 present level more likely to remain stationary than 
 those which were once in use. The same ceaseless 
 wear and tear is still going on, and the ultimate 
 result must be the same. Even now, indeed, every 
 heavy flood effects an appreciable change both on 
 the bed of the channel and on its sides. Yonder, 
 for example, is a part of the meadow-land where
 
 River-action. 31 
 
 the proprietor with great labour some years ago 
 straightened the river channel, and saved the stream 
 a deal of toilsome turning and winding on its way 
 down the valley. All went well for a time, but a 
 system of vigilant repair was not maintained, and thus 
 the stream, refusing to loose its liberty and flow like 
 a canal, began to bite a bit out of the embankment 
 here and another there ; during a heavy storm 
 
 " . . . this river comes me cranking in, 
 And cuts me from the best of all my land 
 A huge half-moon, a monstrous cantle out ; " 
 
 and now in the end it has gone back with evident 
 delight to its old twistings and windings among 
 the meadows. 
 
 Descending still further, we find the river enter a 
 gorge cut out of boulder-clay, the sides low at first, 
 but rising by degrees to a height of fifty or sixty feet 
 above the channel. The proofs of rapid waste are 
 here far more striking than in the ravine in solid rock 
 just described. Huge masses of clay loosened by 
 recent rains have slipped down the steep bank and 
 project into the current, where they are almost visibly 
 mouldering away, and their detritus is swept down 
 the ravine. Similar land- slips of many different ages, 
 some so old that the fallen masses have put on anew 
 a protecting coat of vegetation, meet the eye on every 
 side. Nor can it be doubted that here, as in the
 
 32 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 gorge already described, it is the stream itself that 
 has made the excavation. Frost, rains, and springs, 
 loosen the steep banks, and the fallen ruin is worn 
 away by the running water. Thus the ravine is 
 widened and deepened, and though the process may 
 be more rapid here than among hard rocks, yet it is 
 essentially the same in either case. Beyond these 
 ravines the river winds for miles through a fertile 
 champaign country, now stealing quietly among 
 meadows and cornfields, now murmuring through 
 shady woodlands, augmented by many a tributary 
 brook, and bearing its growing width of water through 
 parish and county, until at last, amid sandbars and 
 mudflats, the traces of its own spoils, it enters the 
 sea. 1 
 
 In thus watching the progress of a river from its 
 source to the sea-shore, we learn that the tendency of 
 river-action is to cut out a long, winding channel, 
 narrow or deep in proportion to the nature of the 
 rock, the slope of the ground, the volume of water, 
 and other causes. If a stream acted merely by itself, 
 without the aid of any atmospheric waste, it would 
 cut a series of perpendicular clefts or chasms. This 
 is, perhaps, the reason why in those countries where 
 the rain-fall is comparatively small, or where frosts 
 
 i The reader who wishes to learn what devastation may be worked 
 by flooded rivers, should read Sir Thomas Dick Lauder's graphic 
 narrative of the Morayshire floods.
 
 R iver-Ravines. 3 3 
 
 are either trifling or unknown, the river-ravines are so 
 profound. Thus the Zambesi in plunging over the 
 precipice at the Victoria Falls enters a gorge 100 feet 
 deep, and only 80 feet broad, which runs in a zig-zag 
 course for many miles. The river seems to have cut 
 its way backward through this winding ravine until, 
 owing to some subterranean movement, effecting a 
 change of level, or to some other cause which would 
 probably be detected by a geologist on the spot, the 
 body of water in place of entering at the top of the 
 ravine has been emptied over one of its sides. 1 By far 
 the most astounding proofs of the power of river- 
 action yet described are those given in the report 
 of the United States Exploring Expedition to the 
 Colorado River of the West. A vast plateau has 
 there been cut by the streams into a net-work of 
 profound chasms often passable neither to man nor 
 beast, but only to the fowls of the air. The scale of 
 these excavations, or canons, may be estimated from 
 the fact that the Colorado River has cut a channel for 
 itself through the table-land 300 miles long, and with 
 walls rising, often perpendicularly, to a height of from 
 3,000 to 6,000 feet above the water, which laves their 
 
 1 There is an excellent model of the Victoria Falls in the library 
 of the Royal Geographical Society, which was pointed out to me by 
 Sir Roderick Murchison and Mr. Bates. In looking at it, I was much 
 struck with the resemblance of the so-called " gigantic fissure " to a 
 ravine cut by the action of a stream where springs, rains, and frosts 
 have played only a subordinate part. 
 
 D
 
 34 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 base. Dr. Newberry, the geologist of the Expedition, 
 states that this network of gorges and chasms is not 
 traceable to "volcanic force, that embodiment of 
 resistless power, that sword that cuts so many geolo- 
 gical knots," but " belongs to a vast system of erosion, 
 and is wholly due to the action of water." 1 Where a 
 river not only cuts its way down through solid rock 
 but receives marked aid from springs, rains, and frosts, 
 its channel instead of remaining a deep trench, is 
 widened into a glen or valley by the crumbling away 
 of the sides of the watercourse. Much will, of course, 
 depend upon the nature of the rock, the angle of 
 descent, and, perhaps, on other causes not apparent 
 to us. Where the power of the river is more potent, 
 there will be a tendency to the formation of ravines, 
 and where the influence of atmospheric waste prepon- 
 derates wider and less precipitous valleys will be the 
 result. I do not mean to assert that a river cannot 
 form a valley, but with reference to the glens and 
 valleys with which I am acquainted, it seems to me 
 that the main office of the rivers, after the hollowing 
 out of their earliest channels, has been to deepen their 
 beds and to carry away the waste of the rocks washed 
 down from either side by rain and springs. 
 
 Springs. In the preceding narrative allusion has 
 been made to the co-operative action of springs and 
 frosts. That portion of a rain-shower which does not 
 
 1 Report, Part iii. p. 45.
 
 Springs. 35 
 
 flow off into the streams, sinks into the earth, filters 
 through the rocks, and collects into underground 
 channels, in which the water again rises to the surface. 
 This subterranean journey is always attended with a 
 waste of the rocks through which the water flows. 
 Part of their substance is disintegrated, or dissolved 
 and carried up to the surface, either in mechanical 
 suspension or in chemical solution. The amount of 
 mineral matter thus removed is very variable. Some- 
 times it is so abundant as to be deposited when the 
 water, on reaching the air, begins to evaporate. 
 Hence, the ochry scum that gathers upon the stones 
 and grass washed by the outflow of a chalybeate 
 spring, and the white, stony crust that envelopes 
 whatever comes in the way of water that issues out of 
 calcareous rocks. But no spring, even the purest, is 
 wholly destitute of an admixture of such solid ingre- 
 dients, and thus, the yearly amount of underground 
 waste, due to this cause, cannot but be great. It 
 is the surface-effects of springs, however, that chiefly 
 claim notice here. These are shown in the loosening 
 of masses of rock and earth, from the sides of cliffs 
 and steep slopes. Water filtering through the joints 
 and fissures of the rocks, and always dissolving and 
 carrying away with it part of the sides of the channel 
 through which it flows, loosens the cohesion of a steep 
 bank, and allows portions of different sizes to become 
 detached, and roll down into the watercourse, or 
 D 2
 
 36 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 valley, below. This kind of waste is well exhibited 
 where a stream flows between banks of boulder-clay, 
 or other loose drift. If we visit such a ravine after a 
 season of rainy weather, we find that the slopes show, 
 in some parts, large faces of freshly-bared clay, or 
 earth, which mark where masses of the bank have 
 been loosened, and launched towards the stream. 
 Large semicircular indentations are thus scooped out 
 along the slope, and by the continuance of this process 
 the ravine grows in width. For the masses detached 
 by the landslips do not permanently protect the slopes 
 behind them ; they are attacked by the streams, and 
 in the end removed, so as to leave fresh surfaces 
 exposed to denudation. 
 
 Among solid rocks the same process, though com- 
 monly at a less rapid rate, may everywhere be seen. 
 There is no long escarpment, or cliff, of such material, 
 which is not traversed with joints, faults, or other 
 divisional planes, that serve as subterranean channels 
 for the water. And as years roll on and the cohesion 
 of the walls of these planes gets loosened, blocks, 
 or large portions of the cliff are, from time to time, 
 detached, and sent to increase the mass of ruin that 
 strews the slope, or lies piled at its foot. The geolo- 
 gical structure of the cliff may help to quicken the 
 waste. If, for example, a bed of soft shale should 
 run along the base of an abrupt face of harder rock, 
 the more rapid decay of the soft foundation will cause
 
 Frost. 37 
 
 a proportionately augmented disintegration of the 
 cliff above. A rock full of joints and fractures will 
 usually tend to wear away more quickly than one of 
 equal hardness, but not so jointed, and one which is 
 markedly soluble, as a limestone, generally yields 
 faster to the attacks of time than a hard siliceous 
 stone, such as quartz-rock. 
 
 Frost, In close connexion with the disintegrating 
 effects of springs on cliffs, and steep slopes of rock, 
 comes the influence of frost. When the water, which 
 is trickling between the joints of a cliff, is frozen, it 
 expands, and in so doing exerts a vast disparting 
 force on the rocks within which it is confined. On 
 the thawing of the ice the rocks which have been thus 
 separated do not return to their former position ; the 
 severance remains until it is increased by another 
 severe frost and thaw. Winter after winter, as the 
 loosened masses are pushed further from each other, 
 the size of the wedge of ice increases, and at last their 
 support gives way, and they fall with a crash from the 
 face of the cliff, leaving a raw scar to mark whence 
 they have come. The effects of frost in pulverizing 
 the soil are a familiar illustration of this disintegrating 
 power. Every one knows that when thaw comes after 
 a long black frost, the country roads are often in as 
 bad condition as after long rain or snow, the reason 
 ing that the frost, having separated the particles
 
 2 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of the clay, has allowed the thawed moisture to 
 mix thoroughly with them. 
 
 It will thus be seen that water filtering through the 
 rocks, and frost solidifying it there, are powerful 
 auxiliaries to a river in the working out of its ravines. 
 To these combined influences, also, the present out- 
 lines, if not the first origin, of most inland cliffs should 
 probably be ascribed. No one can look at such 
 precipitous faces of rock, with the usual scattered 
 fragments at their base, without being convinced that 
 in what way soever they may have been formed at 
 first, they are slowly yielding to the powers of atmo- 
 spheric waste, and that they are thus by degrees 
 creeping back, just as the waterfall of a ravine is 
 retreating. The line occupied by the cliff of an 
 escarpment now stands far removed from where it was 
 when the cliff began to be formed. I am strongly 
 inclined with my colleague, Professor Ramsay, to 
 view this recession as mainly, if not wholly, due to 
 the slow wasting powers of the atmosphere. In such 
 an explanation no hypothetical agent is called into 
 play, and it can hardly be denied that if the sources 
 of decay which we see, in the present day, at work 
 upon these cliffs were allowed a long enough time, 
 they could do all that is needed of them.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ACTION OF THE SEA AND OF WIND. 
 
 IN contemplating the gradual waste to which 
 the surface of the earth is everywhere subjected, 
 the observer is soon struck with the signal proofs of 
 decay furnished by that outer border of the land 
 which is washed by the sea. The abrupt cliffs 
 that shoot up from high-water mark, the skerries 
 that rise among the breakers a little way from the 
 shore, and the sunken reefs that lie still further 
 out to sea all tell of the removal of masses of 
 solid rock. A little reflection leads us to perceive 
 that the abrading power of the sea must in all 
 likelihood be confined to that upper part of the 
 water which is affected by winds and tides, and 
 that in the deeper abysses there is probably no 
 actual erosion of hard rock, though the currents 
 there may be capable of carrying along fine ooze 
 and silt. 
 
 The waste that takes place along the line where 
 land and sea meet has a twofold character. In 
 the first place there is a direct abrasion by the sea
 
 4O Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 itself when it throws its breakers, often loaded with 
 coarse shingle, against the coast, and wears down 
 even the hardest rocks. In the second place, cliffs 
 and precipitous banks overlooking the waves, are 
 subject to that never-ceasing atmospheric waste 
 described in the last chapter ; and the sea, in many 
 places, does little more than remove from tide-mark 
 the debris that has been loosened from the cliffs 
 by springs and frosts. Thus sea-cliffs, like the walls 
 of river-gorges, receive no permanent protection 
 from the accumulation of their own ruins in front 
 of them. In looking at the results of the wear 
 and tear along a coast-line, we are apt to assign 
 too much importance to the mere mechanical impetus 
 of the breakers, and too little to the less obtrusive 
 but more constant influences of rains, springs, and 
 frosts. It may be impossible to give to each agency 
 its due share in the wasting of a coast -line, but it 
 should not be forgotten that in what is usually 
 called marine denudation, the atmospheric influences 
 play a great part. 
 
 No one can watch the progress of a storm on an 
 exposed rocky coast without being strongly im- 
 pressed with the powerful effects of breakers in 
 wearing away the margin of the land. A wave 
 which can deal a blow equal to a pressure of 
 6,083 pounds on the square foot (and such is the 
 ascertained impetus of storm waves among the
 
 Breakers. 41 
 
 outer Hebrides) is no feeble instrument of abrasion. 
 Yet such a wave can of itself have little or no 
 power to grind down the surface of the rocks on 
 which' it beats, for that surface, even after a storm, 
 is found to be just as plentifully coated with living 
 barnacles as before. If the friction of the water 
 could rub down the stone these cirripedes would 
 be removed first. It is only where its enormous 
 weight and impetus can break off a loosened mass 
 of rock that a wave may be said to act by its 
 own sheer force. In the great majority of cases, 
 however, breaker-action eats into a coast-line by 
 battering down the rocks with their own debris. 
 A wave that lifts up, and sweeps forward gravel, 
 boulders, and even large blocks of stone, is a far 
 more formidable instrument of destruction than 
 even a large wave which is not armed with the 
 same weapons. The stones that are thus swung 
 on by the tempest fall with prodigious force against 
 the rocks of the shore ; brought back again by 
 the recoil of the wave they are caught up by its 
 successor and again hurled forwards upon the rocks. 
 And thus by what has been aptly termed a kind 
 of sea-artillery, even the hardest rocks of an iron- 
 bound shore are worn away. 
 
 To see these features in perfection, the observer 
 should betake himself to some rocky shore on 
 which falls the full roll of the Atlantic. He will
 
 42 Scenery of Scotland, 
 
 then find, if the coast be a precipitous one, that the 
 rocks above the reach of the waves are rough and 
 rugged, showing everywhere traces of that subaerial 
 waste which, acting along their natural joints, has 
 slowly shattered the crags and sent down huge 
 blocks to the beach below. There the fallen ruin 
 coming within reach of the waves, is turned into a 
 further means of augmenting the destruction of 
 the cliffs. Ground down by the waves into well- 
 worn boulders it is driven up against the cliffs, 
 which along their base are smoothed and polished 
 like the shingle. The line between the rough 
 surface overhead, marking the progress of the atmo- 
 spheric waste, and the well-worn zone of the beach, 
 pointing to the work of the sea, is often singularly 
 sharp. But the base of the cliff is not merely 
 polished by the friction of the boulders : it is in 
 i many places hollowed out into overhanging recesses, 
 clefts, and caves. At the further end of such 
 excavations we often come upon the rounded 
 boulders wet with the last tide that are carrying 
 on the work of demolition, and we may then see 
 how the waves, breaking against the base of the 
 cliffs, and rushing furiously into every cave and 
 cranny to which they can reach, hurl the stones 
 backward and forward against the solid rock. 
 Between the upper limit of the tide and low-water 
 mark crags and skerries may be noted in every
 
 A wave-worn Shore. 43 
 
 stage of decay. Here we mark an outjutting 
 mass of the cliff which has been separated, with 
 the breakers meeting and bursting into foam in 
 the narrow passage. Yonder a mass, once evidently 
 connected with the main cliff in the same way,""\ 
 has been sundered by the roof of the tunnel 
 falling in, and it now stands up as a tall massive 
 outwork of the line of rampart behind. Lower on 
 the narrow beach, worn, tangled-covered bosses 
 of rock rise out of the shingle and boulders, and 
 run out to sea in low reefs that are usually fringed 
 with foam even in the calmest summer day. Here 
 and there, these sunken skerries shoot up into 
 islets haunted by seal and wild -fowl. Whether 
 we take boat and row quietly among these reefs and 
 islands, or pick our way toilsomely over the rocky 
 beach, or ramble along the summit of the crags over- 
 head, we are everywhere met with proofs of unceasing 
 destruction. We see that the cliffs must once have 
 stretched seaward, at least as far as yonder sea- 
 stack, fully a furlong from their present limit, 
 and how much further no man can tell. It is 
 impressively taught that the selvage of land which 
 has been cut off has been carried away by the sea. 
 The whole process in all its stages is before our 
 eyes. We note the weather wasting the cliffs 
 above, and the sea battering them below. And 
 it is impossible to doubt, that if in a comparatively
 
 44 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 short geological period a strip of land, say a 
 furlong broad, has been in this way planed down, 
 there is here revealed to us a power of waste, the 
 effects of which have perhaps no limit short of 
 the total demolition of the dry land. 
 
 In looking more narrowly at the progress of 
 this abrasion, we find it dependent not merely on 
 the prevalent winds and the consequent fetch of 
 the breakers, but in large measure upon the varying 
 geological structure of the coast-line. The waste 
 of the eastern shores of the British Isles is thus 
 much more rapid than that of the western, and 
 the reason is, that though the waves of the German 
 Ocean are not so powerful as those of the Atlantic, 
 yet the rocks forming the coast-line on that side 
 are, as a whole, more easily worn away than those 
 on the west side. If the soft sandstones and 
 shales, clays and sands of the eastern sea-board 
 were open to the full fury of the western ocean, 
 there would be a sad yearly tale of loss and ruin. 
 Perhaps, it may be objected that the western coast 
 is far more indented with inlets and fiords than 
 the eastern, and therefore shows more strikingly 
 the wasteful powers of the sea. But these inden- 
 tations, as we shall afterwards notice, are not the 
 work of the sea; they are, in truth, submerged 
 land-valleys, and point to the prolonged action 
 of subaerial waste on a wide terrestrial surface,
 
 L oss of L and round Britain. 45 
 
 of which our present islands are only a small 
 part. 
 
 It would be beyond the scope of this little 
 volume to enter into the details of the relation 
 between geological structure and the action of 
 the waves. But it may in part serve the purpose, 
 and show at the same time how real is this source 
 of decay, if we inquire what has been the nature 
 and amount of the loss of land which is known 
 to have occurred along our shores in recent times. 
 It would be interesting if we could trace the 
 gradual retreat of the coast-line since man became 
 an inhabitant of this country, or even since the 
 time to which the earliest historical notices of 
 Britain refer. No written records of such changes, 
 however, go further back than, at the most, three 
 or four hundred years. There are, indeed, traditions 
 of land having once existed, where for many a 
 century have rolled the waves of the salt sea ; 
 just as in Cornwall there still survives the memory 
 of a district, called the Lionnesse, now covered by 
 the Atlantic, but which in the days of the Knights 
 of the Round Table is said to have been rich 
 and fertile. But such traditions are too vague 
 to be, at least in the meantime, of any geological 
 service. It is with the time of written history 
 therefore that we must deal : in short with the 
 changes that have taken place along the coast-line
 
 46 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 within the last few hundred years. The period 
 during which observations have been recorded is 
 thus but of short duration, yet it furnishes us 
 with some instructive lessons as to the progress 
 of the marine erosion, and enables us in some 
 measure to see how the decay of the coast-line 
 has gone on in time past. Let the reader imagine 
 himself coasting northwards along the eastern sea- 
 margin of Scotland, and while the breeze drives 
 us merrily onward, it may be a pleasant amusement 
 to listen to some jottings of the wild havoc that 
 has been brought on the shores, by the same sea 
 whose waves are now leaping and laughing around 
 us. 
 
 We set sail from the mouth of the Tweed, and 
 skirt the abrupt rocky coast which forms the sea- 
 board of Berwickshire. The cliffs for many miles 
 are steep or vertical, rising, near St. Abb's Head, 
 to a height of five hundred feet above the waves, 
 and here and there interrupted by narrow bays 
 and coves, which have in several instances been 
 selected as the sites of fishing villages and hamlets. 
 We see from the wasted and worn look of these 
 cliffs what a sore battle they have had to fight 
 with the ocean. Craggy rocks, isolated stacks and 
 sunken skerries, that once formed part of the line 
 of cliff, are now enveloped by the restless waves. 
 Long twilight caves, haunted by otters and sea-mews,
 
 Coast of Berwickshire. 47 
 
 and flocks of rock-pigeons, have been hollowed 
 out of the flat carboniferous sandstones and the 
 contorted Silurian greywacke, and are daily filled 
 by the tides ; and then in storms, the whole of 
 these vast precipices, from base to summit, is buried 
 in foam the pebbles and boulders, even on the 
 sheltered beaches, are rolled back by the recoil 
 of the breakers, and hurled forward again, with 
 almost the force and noise of heavy cannon. But 
 a line of abrupt rock presents such formidable 
 obstacles to the advance of the sea, that the rate 
 of waste is extremely slow. We see everywhere, 
 indeed, from the geological structure of the coast, 
 that the loss of land must have been great, and 
 that it is still in progress. But there does not 
 appear to be any record to show how much has 
 taken place within the times of human history. 
 Passing onward, therefore, along this coast, with 
 its green bays and dark gloomy cliffs, we round the 
 headland of St. Abb's, and observe that it stands 
 there, at once a bulwark against the waves and 
 a mark of their advance ; for, being a mass of 
 hard porphyry, it has been able in some measure 
 to withstand the assaults of the ocean which has 
 worn away the greywacke and shales around. 
 Sweeping across the Bay of Dunglass we pass the 
 sandstone cliffs of Cove (where the old fishermen 
 point to great inroads by the sea during their
 
 48 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 lifetime), and then the shores of Skateraw, where, 
 in the early part of this century, stood the ruins 
 of an old chapel, which were swept away many 
 years ago, the tides now ebbing and flowing over 
 their site. 1 Further west stands the Castle of 
 Dunbar at the entrance into the Frith of Forth. 
 There the proofs of degradation and decay come 
 before us with a melancholy reality. The old 
 castle, once so formidable a stronghold, is almost 
 gone two tall fragments of wall, and some pieces 
 of masonry at a lower level being all that is left. 
 It is not merely that the rains and frosts of many 
 a dreary winter have broken down the ramparts, 
 nor even that the hand of man, more wanton and 
 unmerciful in its destruction than the hand of time, 
 has quarried the stones and blasted the rocks in 
 the excavation of the harbour. The sea has been 
 ceaselessly at work wearing away the islets and 
 the cliff on which the ruin is perched, and the time 
 will come, at no very distant date, when the Dun 
 or hill from which the castle takes its name, will 
 be swept away, and its site be marked only by a 
 chain of rocky skerries. A little to the west of 
 the castle, a huge mass of the sandstone cliffs, 
 undermined by the sea, fell during the night a 
 year or two ago. The scar is yet fresh, and though 
 
 1 Popular Philosophy, or the Book of Nature, laid open upon Chris- 
 tian principles. Dunbar, 1826, vol. ii. p. 160.
 
 Firth of Forth. 49 
 
 a pile of ruin still lies at the foot of the precipice, it 
 is being broken up and carried away by the waves. 
 
 It might have been supposed that the compara- 
 t tively sheltered estuary of the Firth would be free 
 from any marked abrasion by the sea, yet even as 
 far up as Granton, near Edinburgh, during a fierce 
 gale from the north-east, stones weighing a ton or 
 more have been known to be torn out of a wall 
 and rolled to a distance of thirty feet. Hence, 
 within the last few generations, the sea has made 
 encroachments, sometimes to a considerable extent, 
 along the whole coast of the Firth, even as far up 
 as Stirling. Tracing the southern shores in a westerly 
 direction from Dunbar, we find that the low sandy 
 tracts at the mouth of the Tyne, and again from 
 North Berwick to Aberlady, have suffered loss in 
 several places. Further on, near Musselburgh, there 
 was a tract of land on which the Dukes of Albany 
 and York used to play at golf in former days, but 
 which is now almost entirely swept away. The coast 
 of Edinburghshire has in like manner lost many acres 
 of land. Maitland, for instance, in his History of 
 Edinburgh, describes the ravages of the sea between 
 Musselburgh and Leith which had occasioned the 
 " public road to be removed further into the country 
 and the land being now violently assaulted by the 
 sea on the eastern and northern sides, all must give 
 1 Stevenson, Trans. Royal Soc. Edin. xvi. 27. 
 E
 
 5o Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 way to its rage, and the links of South Leith pro- 
 bably in less than half a century will be swallowed 
 up." 1 The road alluded to has had to be removed 
 again and again since this passage was written. Mr. 
 Stevenson 2 remarked in i8i6that even the new baths, 
 erected but a few years before at a considerable dis- 
 tance from the high-water mark, had then barely the 
 breadth of the highway between them and the sea, 
 which had overthrown the bulwark or fence in front 
 of those buildings and was then acting on the road 
 itself. Maitland speaks also of a large tract of land 
 on both sides of the port of Leith, which has likewise 
 disappeared. Nor are the inroads of the sea less 
 marked as we continue our westward progress. The 
 old links of Newhaven have disappeared. If the 
 calculations of Maitland may be believed, 3 three- 
 fourths of that flat sandy tract were swallowed up 
 in the twenty-two years preceding 1595. Even in 
 the early part of the present century, it was in the 
 recollection of some old fishermen then alive, that 
 there stretched along the shore in front of the 
 grounds of Anchorfield, an extensive piece of links 
 on which they used to dry their nets, but which had 
 then been entirely washed away. The direct road 
 
 1 History of Edinburgh, p. 499. 
 
 2 In an excellent paper in the second volume of the Werneran 
 Society's Memoirs, to which I have been greatly indebted in collect- 
 ing the statistics given above. 
 
 3 History of Edinburgh, p. 500.
 
 Firth of Forth. 5 1 
 
 between Leith and Newhaven used to pass along 
 the shore to the north of Leith Fort, but it has long 
 been demolished, and for at least fifty years the road 
 has been carried inland by a circuitous route. 1 The 
 waste still goes on, though checked in some degree 
 by the numerous bulwarks and piers which have been 
 erected along the coast. The waves impinge at high 
 tides upon a low cliff of the stiff blue till or boulder- 
 clay which readily yields to the combined influences 
 of the weather. Hence large slices of the coast-line 
 are from time to time precipitated to the beach. A 
 footpath runs along the top of the bank overhanging 
 the high-water mark, and portions of it are con- 
 stantly removed on the landslips of clay. By this 
 means, as the ground slopes upwards from the sea, 
 the cliff is always becoming higher with every suc- 
 cessive excavation of its sea-front. The risk to 
 foot-passengers is thus great ; so many accidents, 
 indeed, have occurred here that the locality is known 
 in the neighbourhood as the Man-Trap? 
 
 Higher up the Firth of Forth, at the Bay of Barn- 
 
 1 Stevenson, Mem. Wer. Soc. vol. ii. 
 
 2 Since the above was written the man-trap has ceased to be ; not, 
 however, by the destructive force of the waves, but under the combined 
 operations of mattock, wheelbarrow, and waggon. A branch railway 
 has been brought along the coast-line, and the accumulated rubbish 
 from some long cuttings through boulder clay has been shot over the 
 sea cliff, completely covering it up, and thus carrying the land out to 
 sea again. A large piece of ground has thus been reclaimed. It is to 
 be protected by a bulwark. 
 
 E 2
 
 52 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 bougie, a lawn of considerable extent, once interven- 
 ing between the old castle and the sea, has been 
 demolished. Even in the upper reaches of the estu- 
 ary, above the narrow strait at the Ferries, the waves 
 have removed a considerable tract of land, which 
 once intervened between the sea and the present road 
 leading westward from Queensferry. Similar effects 
 have likewise been produced on the northern shores 
 of the Firth, at Culross and eastwards by St. David's, 
 Burntisland, 1 Kirkaldy, and Dysart. The seaports 
 along this coast have all suffered more or less from 
 encroachments of the sea roads, fences, gardens, 
 fields, piers, and even dwelling-houses having been 
 from time to time carried away. In the parish of 
 Crail some slender remains of a priory existed down 
 to the year 1803. These, along with the old gardens 
 and fences, are now wholly removed ; but the adjoin- 
 ing grounds still retain the name of the croftlands 
 of the priory. At St. Andrew's, Cardinal Beaton's 
 Castle is said to have been originally some distance 
 from the sea ; but it now almost overhangs the beach, 
 and must ere long fall a prey to the waves. 2 
 
 i " At the east end of the town of Burntisland the sea comes now far 
 in upon the land ; some persons in the town, who died not long since, 
 did remember the grassy links reach to the Black Craigs, near a mile 
 into the sea now." Sibbald's Fife and Kinross, p. 152. The waste 
 still continues, in spite of the strong railway embankment, much damage 
 having been done by the storms of last winter (1864-5). 
 
 'Stevenson, Ibid. "The learned Mr. George Martine (Reliquia 
 Sancti Andrea, chap. ii. p. 3) relates it as a tradition received that the
 
 Firth of Tay. 53 
 
 Passing northwards along the eastern coast of 
 Scotland we find that the sea has encroached to 
 a marked extent on the sands of Barry, on the 
 northern side of the Firth of Tay. The lighthouses 
 which were formerly erected at the southern ex- 
 tremity of Button Ness have been from time to time 
 removed about a mile and a quarter further north- 
 ward, on account of the shifting and wasting of 
 these sandy shores. The spot on which the outer 
 lighthouse stood early in the seventeenth century 
 was found to be in 1816 two or three fathoms 
 under water and at least three-quarters of a mile 
 within flood mark. 
 
 If the waves can bring about such important 
 changes, even when rolling into more or less shel- 
 tered estuaries, we may expect that their power 
 will be found still greater where, without any 
 bounding land to curb their fury, they can rush 
 in from open sea, and fall with unbroken violence 
 upon an exposed coast-line. That this is the case 
 
 ancient Culdees, Regulus and his companions, had a cell dedicated to 
 the Blessed Virgin about a bow flight to the east of the shoar of St. 
 Andrews, a little without the end of the peer (now in the sea), upon a 
 rock called at this day Our Lady's Craig: the rock is well known, 
 and seen every day at low water. The Culdees thereafter, upon the 
 sea's encroaching, built another house where the house of the Kirk- 
 heugh now stands called Sancta Maria de rupe, with St. Rule's Chapel, 
 and says in his time there lived people in St. Andrew's who remem- 
 bered to have seen men play at bowls upon the east and north sides of 
 the castle of St. Andrew's, which now the sea covereth at every tide." 
 Sibbald's Fife and Kinross, p. 152.
 
 54 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 with the German Ocean is shown by the form 
 of the coast-line, the known effects of storms, 
 and by actual experiment of the power of the 
 breakers. The force with which the waves of this 
 ocean fall on objects exposed to their fury has been 
 measured with great care at the Bell-Rock Light- 
 house. This massive structure, rising 112 feet 
 above the sea-level, "is literally buried in foam 
 and spray to the very top during ground swells 
 when there is no wind." Experiments were made 
 there from the middle of September, 1844, to 
 the end of March, 1845, and the greatest recorded 
 pressure was 3013 pounds on the square foot. 
 Mr. Stevenson, however, under whose direction the 
 observations were conducted, informs us that on 
 the 2/th November, 1824, the spray rose 117 feet 
 above the foundations, being equivalent to a pres- 
 sure of nearly three tons on the square foot. 1 
 Such enormous force cannot but produce marked 
 effects on all rocks exposed to its fury. In May, 
 1807, during the building of the lighthouse six 
 large blocks of stone, which had been landed on 
 the reef, were removed by the force of the sea 
 and thrown over a rising ledge to the distance 
 of twelve or fifteen paces, and an anchor, weigh- 
 ing about 22 cwt. was thrown up upon the rock. 2 
 
 1 Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin. xvi. 28. 
 
 2 Account of Erection of Bell-Rock Lighthouse, p. 163.
 
 Coast oj Forfarshire. 5 5 
 
 This power of transport affecting parts of the sur- <LL 
 
 i- 111- 11 * Thtwr- 
 
 rounding sea-bed during severe gales has been 
 
 frequently observed here. Stones measuring up- 
 wards of 30 cubic feet, or more than two tons in 
 weight, have often been cast upon the reef from 
 deep water. 1 These large boulders are so familiar 
 .to the light-keepers at this station as to be by '(~i M < 
 them termed travellers? 
 
 With breakers of such prodigious force beating win- ^^W" 
 ter after winter on its sands and rocks, the eastern 
 coast of Scotland suffers sorely as the years roll 
 on. Nowhere does it exhibit more striking proofs 
 of the unavailing resistance which it offers to the 
 ocean than along the borders of Forfarshire. There 
 we see some of the wildest scenery on this side of 
 our island : huge beetling cliffs of red sandstone 
 washed and worn, crags of hard trap rocks that seem 
 ready to topple into the surf, creeks in which the 
 gurgling tides are for ever rolling to and fro, caves 
 sometimes out of reach of the waves, and then coated 
 with mosses and ferns, sometimes at a low level and 
 filled well nigh to the brim when the tide runs at its 
 full, while the space between tide-marks is a chaos of 
 craggy rocks and skerries and huge boulders torn 
 from the cliffs overhead. And what has caused 
 
 1 The sea at a distance of 100 yards all round the sunken reef of the 
 Bell Rock has a depth of two or three fathoms at low water. 
 
 2 Edin. Phil. Journ. iii. 54.
 
 56 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 this wild ruin ? Not any cataclysm or convulsion 
 of nature, no earthquake, no outbreak of volcanic 
 fire. It has been done partly by the rains and frosts 
 of ages, and partly by yonder waves that seem to 
 curl so peacefully along the distant strip of sandy 
 shore and break into little eddies of foam around 
 the nearer rocks ; but which, when the north-east 
 gales sweep across the sea, batter against the cliffs 
 with the noise of thunder, and cover them with 
 spray even to the summit. The Forfarshire coast- 
 line is, for the most part, formed of such wall-like 
 cliffs of red sandstone. But here and there, in 
 creeks and bays, there are sandy flats the records 
 of an older sea margin yet to be described. It 
 is upon these softer parts that the breakers have 
 made most rapid inroads. Thus, in the thirty years 
 that preceded 1816, the road trustees were under 
 the necessity of twice removing inland the road- 
 way that skirts the shore westward from Arbroath, 
 and in that year it had again become imperative 
 to make another removal. The loss of land at 
 one point, a short way south-west from the town, 
 has been thirty yards since 1805, while at another 
 spot still nearer the town, it has reached as much 
 as sixty yards within the same period that is, at 
 the rate of fully a yard every year. About the 
 year 1780 a house existed at the latter locality, 
 of which there are now no remains, its place being
 
 Coast of Kincardineshire. 57 
 
 covered by the tides. At Arbroath itself a house 
 which stood next to the sea was a few years ago 
 washed down, and strong bulwarks are necessary 
 to retard further encroachments. 1 But these prove 
 to be ineffectual barriers, for every severe gale 
 damages them, and the sea is sensibly gaining 
 ground. 
 
 The coast as we proceed northwards continues to 
 furnish additional instances of the destructive effects 
 of the sea within the historical period. " On the 
 Kincardineshire coast," says Sir Charles Lyell, 2 " an 
 illustration was afforded at the close of the last 
 century of the effect of promontories in protecting 
 a line of low shore. The village of Mathers, two 
 miles south of Johnshaven, was built on an ancient 
 shingle beach, protected by a projecting ledge of lime- 
 stone rock. This was quarried for lime to such an 
 extent that the sea broke through, and in 1795 
 carried away the whole village in one night, and 
 penetrated 150 yards inland, where it has main- 
 tained its ground ever since, the new village having 
 been built further inland on the new shore." In 
 order to check the further ravages of the waves, 
 a stone bulwark was erected, which is still kept up 
 for the protection of the houses which stand nearest 
 the beach. 3 
 
 1 Stevenson, Op. cii. 
 
 2 Principles of Geology, ninth Edition, p. 302. 
 8 New Stat. Ace. Kincardine, p. 275.
 
 5 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The shores of the Moray Firth afford several in- 
 stances of the destruction by the sea of ancient 
 buildings. Thus, at the old town of Burghead, on 
 the eastern headland of Burghead Bay, a fort, said 
 to be of Danish origin, was built upon a sandstone 
 cliff, between which and the sea, according to tra- 
 dition, there once lay a very considerable tract of 
 land, but the ruin now actually overhangs the waves. 
 
 A few miles westward on the same coast stands 
 the town of Findhorn, which has been the scene of 
 extensive devastations. The shore is low and sandy, 
 and is liable to change its outline, owing to the con- 
 stant drifting of the sandhills. Between these ridges 
 of sand and the sea margin, there runs along the 
 parish of Kinloss, west of Findhorn, a band of 
 coarse gravelly shingle, which acts to some extent 
 as a bulwark against the waves. But that it has 
 proved an ineffectual barrier is shown by the fact that 
 the present village of Findhorn is the third that has 
 borne the name. The first stood about a mile west 
 of the bar, the point at which the river originally 
 entered the Firth, before the eastward progress of the 
 moving sand drove it into the channel it now occu- 
 pies. The second village was planted a little to the 
 north of the present one, but it, too, has been swept 
 away. Nor does it appear that the existing town is 
 free from the risk of being overtaken, partially at 
 least, by a similar catastrophe. "The little space
 
 Moray Firth. 59 
 
 that intervenes between the tide-mark and the north 
 end," says the reverend statist of the parish, "is 
 a broken bank of sand that drifts dreadfully with 
 every hurricane, covering the streets and gardens to 
 the depth of sometimes eight or ten feet, and this 
 constitutes but a feeble bulwark against the tremen- 
 dous surf that beats with a north-easterly swell ; so 
 that if means be not taken to give it a solid surface, 
 either by laying it over with turf or planting it with 
 bent, there is reason to apprehend that it will by 
 and by be blown away altogether, leaving Findhorn 
 that now is to share, at some future period, the fate 
 of its predecessors." l Even into the recesses of the 
 Moray Firth the ocean carries with it its resistless 
 power of demolition. Thus, encroachments that had 
 been made on the coast round Fort George early in 
 this century, were such as to raise fears for the safety 
 of the fortress. Some of the projecting bastions, 
 previously at a distance from the sea, were then in 
 danger of being undermined by the water ; and it 
 was found necessary to break the force of the waves 
 by erecting a sort of chevaux de frise in front of the 
 walls. On the north shore of the Beauly Firth, a 
 number of sepulchral cairns have been engulphed by 
 the sea. One of these stands fully 400 yards within 
 tide-mark, and it has been calculated that an area 
 
 i New Stat. Ace. Scotland, Nairn, p. 203.
 
 60 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of not less than ten square miles, now flooded by 
 the advancing tide, has been the site of the dwell- 
 ings of the ancient cairn-builders. 1 
 
 The long sheltered estuary of the Cromarty Firth, 
 so thoroughly land-locked that it communicates with 
 the open sea only through a narrow channel between 
 the headlands of the two Sutors, might be supposed 
 to be free from any risk of attack by the waves. 
 Yet even there the same tale of waste is told. It 
 is said by Hugh Miller that the tide now flows twice 
 every twenty-four hours over the spot where a 
 hundred years ago there stood a pedlar's shop. 
 
 Along the cliffs of the Caithness shores every 
 winter gives fresh proof of the immense destructive 
 power of the breakers of the North Sea. At some 
 places, in particular to the south of the town of 
 Wick, the waves have quarried out masses of Old 
 Red Sandstone and piled them up in huge heaps 
 on the top of the cliff, sixty or a hundred feet above 
 high-water mark. Some of the blocks pf stone 
 which have been moved from their original position 
 at the base or on the ledges of the cliffs, are of great 
 size. My friend Mr. C. W. Peach has been so kind 
 as to send me some notes regarding them. " The 
 largest disturbed mass," he says, "contains more 
 than 500 tons, and is known as Charlie's Stone. 
 
 1 Wilson's Prehistoric Scotland, p. 63.
 
 Coast of Caithness. 61 
 
 Others varying in bulk from 100 to 5 tons or less lie 
 by hundreds piled up in all positions in high and long 
 ridges, which, before the march of improvement began 
 in the district, extended far into the field above the 
 cliff. 1 Near the old limekiln, South Head, similar 
 large blocks of sandstone have been moved by the 
 gales of the last three years. The great storm of 
 December, 1862, in particular distinguished itself by 
 the havoc which it wrought along these shores. It 
 swept the sea over the north end of the island of 
 Stroma, which lies in the Pentland Firth, 2 and re- 
 distributed the ruin-heaps there. The waves ran 
 bodily up and over the vertical cliffs on the west 
 side, 200 feet in height, lodging portions of the 
 wrecked boats, stones, seaweeds, &c. on the top. 
 
 i This mass of ruin was noticed by Hugh Miller, who suggested that 
 it might have been produced by the stranding of icebergs. Mr. Peach, 
 however, remarks that there is every reason to believe that it is the 
 work of the sea, and even now an occasional stone is added to the 
 pile the last having been a block at least half a ton in weight, which 
 about two years ago was torn up from its position fifty feet above the 
 sea-level. 
 
 * The spring tides of the Pentland Firth are said to run at a rate of 
 nine nautical miles in the hour, while the rate of the neap tides is three 
 miles, These are probably by much the most rapid marine currents 
 round the British Islands. Yet that they do not of themselves produce 
 any appreciable abrasion of the coast-line is shown by the coating of 
 barnacles and seaweed on the rocks even at low water. As currents, 
 their power by mere friction is probably nil ; but when they are aided 
 by powerful winds they lend a prodigiously accelerated impetus to the 
 ordinary wind-waves. Hence the incredible force of the breakers in 
 these northern seas.
 
 62 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 They rushed in torrents across the island, tearing 
 up the ground and rocks in their course towards 
 the old mill at Nethertown on the opposite side. 
 This mill had often before been worked by water 
 collected from spray thrown over these cliffs, but 
 never had such a supply been furnished as by this 
 gale. One curious phenomenon was noticed at the 
 south end of Stroma ; the sea there came in such 
 a body between the island and the Caithness coast, 
 that at intervals it rose up like a wall, as if the 
 passage was too narrow for the mass of water which, 
 forced onwards from the Atlantic between Holburn 
 Head on the Caithness shore and the Old Man of 
 Hoy on the Orkney side, passed bodily over the 
 cliffs of Stroma. The effects of this terrific gale 
 will long be remembered. Some time after its 
 occurrence I was on Stroma and along the Pent- 
 land Firth side, and was deeply struck with the 
 ruin spread around. The huge masses that had 
 been moved exceeded all I had ever seen before. 
 With this evidence, added to a long experience of 
 storms, I am compelled to believe that the ruin 
 of cliffs and the heaping-up of torn rock-masses 
 have been effected by the sea when agitated by 
 storms, and not by icebergs." 
 
 Crossing the wild tides of the Pentland Firth, we 
 find ourselves among the rocky fiords and voes of 
 the Orkney and Shetland Islands. There the power
 
 Orkney Islands. 63 
 
 of the sea comes before us even more impressively. 
 The intricate indented coast-line, worn into creeks 
 and caves and overhanging cliffs ; the crags, and 
 skerries, and sea-stacks, once a part of the solid 
 land, but now isolated among the breakers ; the 
 huge piles of fragments that lie on the beach, or 
 have been heaped far up above the tide-mark, tell 
 only too plainly how vain is the resistance even of 
 the hardest rocks to the onward march of the ocean. 
 The rate of waste along some parts of these islands 
 is so rapid as to be distinctly appreciable within a 
 human lifetime. Thus, in the chain of the Orkneys, 
 the Start Point of Sanday was found by Mr. Steven- 
 son in 1816 to be an island every flood tide; yet 
 even within the memory of some old people then 
 alive, it had formed one continuous tract of firm 
 ground. Nay, it appears that during the ten years 
 previous to 1816 the channel had been worn down 
 at least two feet. 
 
 Probably no part of the British coast-line affords 
 such striking evidence of the violence of the waves 
 as that which may be seen along the margin of 
 the Shetlands. These islands are exposed to the 
 unbroken fury at once of the German Ocean and 
 of the Atlantic, while the tides and currents of both 
 seas run round them with great rapidity. Hence 
 their seaboard wears in many places an aspect of 
 utter havoc and ruin. Against their eastern side
 
 64 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the North Sea expends its full violence, tearing up 
 the rocks from the craggy headlands, and rolling 
 onwards far up into the most sheltered fiords. The 
 island of Whalsey, for instance, lying off the east 
 side of the mainland, about the middle of the Shet- 
 land group, is completely sheltered from the gales 
 of the Atlantic. Yet in . the Bound Skerry of 
 Whalsey, the breakers of the North Sea have torn 
 up masses of rock sometimes 8| tons in weight, 
 and have heaped them together at a height of no 
 less than 62 feet above high-water mark. Other 
 blocks, ranging in bulk from 6 to 13^ tons, have 
 been actually quarried out of their place in situ at 
 levels of from 70 to 74 feet above the sea. One 
 block of 7 T ^ tons, lying 20 feet above the water, has 
 been lifted from its bed and borne to a distance of 
 73 feet from S.S.E. to N.N.W. over abrupt opposing 
 forces of rock as much as seven feet in height. 1 
 On the west side of the Shetland Islands the fury 
 
 i See an interesting paper by Mr. Stevenson. Proc. Roy. Soc. 
 Edin. iv. 100. See also his work " On the Design and Construction 
 of Harbours" (1864), pp. 30 38. Mr. Peach, in a paper on the traces 
 of Glacial Drift in the Shetland Islands, read before the British Associa- 
 tion in 1864, notices further proof of the power of the breakers among 
 these islands. He states that on the top of the cliffs of the island of 
 Honsay, about 100 feet high, the waves break in stormy weather, 
 tearing up the rock and piling its huge fragments into a semi-circular 
 wall a considerable way back from the edge of the cliff. " Between 
 this wall and the cliff a deep river-like gully is scooped out, down 
 which the water rushes again to the sea, a great distance from the spot 
 whence it was thrown up."
 
 SJutland Islands. 65 
 
 of the Atlantic has produced scenes of devastation 
 which it is hardly possible adequately to describe. 
 In stormy winters, huge blocks of stone are over- 
 turned or are removed from their native beds to a 
 distance almost incredible. Dr. Hibbert found that 
 in the winter of 1802 a tabular mass, 8 feet 2 inches 
 in length by 7 ft. in breadth and 5 ft I in. in 
 thickness, was dislodged from its bed and removed 
 to a distance of from 80 to 90 feet. In 1820, he 
 found that the bed from which a block had been 
 carried the preceding winter, measured 17 \ ft. by 
 7 ft. and 2 ft. 8 in. in depth. The removed mass 
 had been borne a distance of 30 feet, when it was 
 shivered into 13 or more fragments, some of which 
 were carried still further, from 30 to 120 feet. A 
 block of 9 ft. 2 in. by 6| ft. and 4 ft. thick, was hurled 
 up the acclivity to a distance of 150 feet. "Such," 
 he adds, " is the devastation that has taken place 
 amidst this wreck of nature. Close to the Isle 
 of Stenness is the Skerry of Eshaness, formidably 
 rising from the sea, and showing on its westerly 
 side a steep precipice, against which all the force 
 of the Atlantic seems to have been expended : it 
 affords refuge for myriads of kittiwakes, whose shrill 
 cries, mingling with the dashing of the waters, wildly 
 accord with the terrific scene that is presented on 
 every side." 1 
 
 1 Hibbert's Shetland Islands, p. 527. 
 F
 
 66 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The result of this constant lashing of the surge 
 has been to scarp the coasts of the Shetlands into 
 the most rugged and fantastic cliffs, and to pierce 
 them with long twilight caves. Dr. Hibbert describes 
 " a large cavernous aperture, 90 feet wide, which 
 shows the commencement of two contiguous immense 
 perforations, named the Holes of Scranda, where in 
 one of them that runs 250 feet into the land, the 
 sea flows to the utmost extremity. Each has an 
 opening at a distance from the ocean, by which the 
 light of the sun is partially admitted. Further north 
 other ravages of the ocean are displayed. But the 
 most sublime scene is where a mural pile of por- 
 phyry, escaping the process of disintegration that is 
 devastating the coast, appears to have been left as 
 a sort of rampart against the inroads of the ocean. 
 The Atlantic, when provoked by wintry gales, batters 
 against it with all the force of real artillery the 
 waves having, in their repeated assaults, forced for 
 themselves an entrance. This breach, named the 
 Grind of the Navir, is widened every winter by the 
 overwhelming surge, that, finding a passage through 
 it, separates large stones from its side, and forces 
 them to a distance of 180 feet. In two or three spots 
 the fragments which have been detached are brought 
 together in immense heaps, that appear as an accu- 
 mulation of cubical masses, the product of some
 
 Skerryvore, 67 
 
 quarry." 1 In other places the progress of the ocean 
 has left lonely stacks, or groups of columnar masses 
 at a distance from the cliffs. Such are the rocks 
 to the south of Hillswick Ness, and the strange 
 tower-like pinnacles in the same neighbourhood called 
 the Drenge, or Drongs, which, when seen from a 
 distance, look like a small fleet of vessels with spread 
 sails. 
 
 The Hebrides not less than the Shetlands illustrate 
 the power of the ocean in working the degradation 
 of the land. The most careful observations of the 
 force of the breakers in this part of the British seas 
 are those made under the direction of Mr. Stevenson, 
 during the progress of the erection of the lighthouse 
 on Skerryvore a rock lying to the south-west of 
 the island of Tiree, and exposed to the full fury of 
 the Atlantic, there being no land between this point 
 and the shores of America. The average results of 
 these experiments for five of the summer months 
 during the years 1843 an ^ 1844, give to the breakers 
 a force of 611 Ibs. per square foot ; and for six of 
 the winter months of the same years 2,086 Ibs. per 
 square foot, or thrice as great as in the summer 
 months. The greatest result obtained was during 
 the heavy westerly gale of 2Qth March, 1845, when a 
 pressure of 6,083 Ibs. per square foot was registered. 
 This was a force of little short of three tons on every 
 
 i Hibbert's Shetland Islands. 
 F 2
 
 68 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 square foot of surface. The next in magnitude was 
 a force of 5,323 Ibs. 1 
 
 North-west of Skerryvore lies the island of Barra 
 Head, the last of the long chain of the broken and 
 deeply embayed Hebrides. It is recorded that on 
 this island, during a storm in January, 1836, a mass 
 of gneiss containing 504 cubic feet, and estimated 
 to be about 42 tons in weight, was gradually moved 
 five feet from the place where it lay, having been 
 rocked to and fro by the waves, until a piece broke 
 off, which, jamming itself between the block and 
 the rock below, prevented any further movement. 2 
 
 Fortunately the rock which has had to withstand 
 this tremendous battery, is a tough gnarled gneiss. 
 But where the coast is low, and more especially 
 where the. hard gneiss passes under a covering of 
 blown sand, the Atlantic breakers have made sad 
 inroads even within the last few generations. " The 
 most destructive process of nature," says the author 
 of the description of the Isle of Harris in the old 
 Statistical Account of Scotland, "is the continual 
 wasting of the land on the western shore by the 
 perpetual drifting of the sand, and the gradual 
 encroachment of the sea. This is evinced by the 
 clearest testimonies. Lands which were ploughed 
 within the remembrance of people yet living, are 
 now no more. Wherever a high sand-bank has 
 
 1 Stevenson, Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin. xri. 25. 2 Ibid, p. 28.
 
 Western Coast. 69 
 
 been entirely worn away the soil under it is found 
 to have been either a rich loam or black moss. In 
 many such situations, vestiges of houses, enclosures, 
 churches, and burying grounds appear." 1 
 
 This chain of islands, which, like a great break- 
 water fronts the western coast of Scotland, has 
 doubtless preserved this side of the country from 
 not a little of the destruction which would other- 
 wise have fallen upon it. The greater hardness of 
 the rocks, as compared with those of the east coast, 
 must also have contributed to retard in some mea- 
 sure the progress of the waves. Nor must we forget 
 that the absence of harbours and maritime villages 
 and towns on the western sea-board has probably 
 deprived us of a record of the waste of these shores 
 within the historical period. Knowing the actual 
 force of the waves, and seeing how much they can 
 effect in a stormy winter, we cannot doubt that 
 during the last few hundred years there must have 
 been more or less loss of land, even along the most 
 iron-bound parts of the coast, although no memo- 
 rial remains to tell how and when exactly the loss 
 was effected. That there must have been con- 
 siderable waste along the more exposed shores may 
 be inferred from the fact, that even in the Kyles of 
 Bute, a tract of low land to the north of Kames 
 Bay has been so encroached upon by the tides, 
 1 Old Stat. Ace. vol. x. p. 373.
 
 70 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 that a road which skirted the beach has been thrice 
 removed further inland within the last thirty or 
 forty years. 1 
 
 Along the shores of the estuary of the Clyde 
 the sea has in some places removed a considerable 
 part of the coast-line even within recent times. 
 Thus to the south of the town of Ayr, a cliff of 
 volcanic ash rises vertically from the beach, bearing 
 on its verge the picturesque ruin of Greenan Castle. 
 The walls overhang the precipice, and the sea is 
 hollowing out the rock below. Yet within the re- 
 collection of a venerable lady who died some years 
 ago, there was room for a horse and cart to pass 
 between the castle and the edge of the cliff. During 
 the last hundred years, therefore, a slice of solid 
 rock, perhaps six or eight feet broad, has been cut 
 away from this part of the coast. A short distance 
 further south a spring in the middle of a field, a 
 few feet above high-water mark, was enclosed as a 
 well some sixty or seventy years ago. Since then 
 that part of the field which lay between the well 
 and the sea has been eaten away, and the spring 
 now rises at the edge of the shingle of the beach. 2 
 The shores of Loch Ryan, which seem so well 
 
 i My much esteemed friend the Rev. Alexander Macbride, of Ardmory, 
 Bute, pointed this fact out to me. 
 8 For these facts I am indebted to Dr. Sloan, of Ayr.
 
 Wigtown and Kirkcudbright Coast. 71 
 
 sheltered alike from the Atlantic and the Irish Sea, 
 have suffered considerably within the last two or 
 three generations. Mr. Stevenson found in 1816 
 that at the town of Stranraer the houses along shore 
 had formerly gardens between them and high water, 
 but that of late years the inhabitants had been 
 under the necessity of erecting bulwarks to secure 
 the walls and approaches to their houses. Further 
 down the loch, at the village of Kirkolm, a neck 
 of land called the Scar Ridge had once extended 
 into the sea about half a mile. Cattle were wont 
 to graze upon it, but it was then nearly washed 
 away, and in high tides it was laid almost wholly 
 under water. 1 
 
 The southern coast-line of Scotland lies open to 
 the full fury of the Irish Sea. When the wind blows 
 strongly from the south-west the rocky precipitous 
 shores of Wigton and Kirkcudbright are white with 
 foam, headland after headland standing out into the 
 breakers that roll eastward far up into the recesses 
 of the Solway Firth. In a series of experiments 
 made during the fine summer of 1842, at the Island 
 of Little Ross, on the coast of Kirkcudbright, it 
 was found that the average force of the waves was 
 about 328 Ibs. on the square foot, or rather more 
 than half the average summer force of those at 
 
 1 Stevenson, Mem. \Yer. Soc. ii. p. 476.
 
 72 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Skerryvore, the greatest recorded pressure being one 
 of 665 Ibs. 1 
 
 From this short and incomplete survey of what 
 has been done by the waves round the Scottish 
 coast during the last two or three hundred years, 
 it is evident that although here and there from local 
 causes, such as the accumulation of sand and shingle, 
 there may have been a slight gain of land, the 
 general result has been a loss. Where the coast is 
 rocky and precipitous this loss may not be measur- 
 able, but yet the ruined masses, undermined by the 
 waves, tell their story not less convincingly than 
 where there are historical records of the devastation. 
 
 Looking at the general results of marine denu- 
 dation we are led, on reflection, to perceive that 
 they tend to the formation of a great plain. As it 
 is only the uppermost layer of the sea the part 
 that is thrown into commotion by disturbance of 
 the atmosphere which possesses any real power of 
 abrasion, the effect must be not to cut out valleys, 
 but to eat into the land horizontally, and reduce 
 it to a general level under the waves. This tendency 
 is sometimes well illustrated on a small scale on a 
 rocky beach. To the south of Girvan, for example, 
 the Ayrshire coast exhibits between tide marks a 
 smooth level platform of Silurian greywacke, indent- 
 ing the line of rugged crags that run along high 
 1 Stevenson, Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin. xvi. 30.
 
 A Plain of Marine Denudation. 73 
 
 water-mark. This platform has been cut out of 
 vertical strata, some of which being harder than their 
 neighbours, rise above it into fantastic knobs and 
 bosses. It abounds in cavities lined with sea-weeds 
 and filled with sea-water each a natural aquarium, 
 
 FIG. 3. INCLINED SILURIAN STRATA NEAR GIRVAN, 
 
 cut into a plane surface by the sea. 
 
 and in some cases, at least, it is evident that these 
 hollows are simply pot-holes, like those in the channel 
 of a river, save that the boulders which lie at their 
 bottom have been kept whirling round in the eddies 
 of a vexed tide-way, instead of a rapid brook or 
 river. The level platform, with its hollows and out- 
 standing crags, is a true plain of marine denudation, 
 and illustrates in detail a process of which the more 
 gigantic results will be considered in a succeeding 
 chapter. 
 
 The sea between the British Isles and the coasts 
 of the Continent from the south of Norway to the 
 north-western headlands of France is so shallow, 
 that an elevation of only 600 feet would convert 
 it all into dry land. 1 And this dry land would present 
 
 1 De la Beche, Theoretical Researches, and Geological Observer.
 
 74 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 a wonderfully level contour ; it would have no hills, 
 or rather undulations, so much as six hundred feet 
 high, and its general character would be that of a wide 
 plain sloping gently up to the higher lands on all 
 sides. This area seems, indeed, to be a great plain 
 of marine, denudation, cut out of ancient Europe 
 by the constant gnawing action of the sea, aided 
 probably by an ultimate depression of the sea-bed 
 and by the tendency of marine sediment to fill up 
 inequalities of the bottom and to reduce it to a level. 
 But even if subterranean movements came into play 
 we shall perchance not err in attributing mainly to 
 the influence of the waves the actual levelling of 
 the ground and the production of the great sub- 
 marine plain. 
 
 WIND. 
 
 As another geological agent capable of making 
 certain minor yet characteristic modifications in the 
 scenery of the country, the wind claims a passing 
 notice here. The influence of high gales in aug- 
 menting the destructive force of the sea is of course 
 sufficiently obvious. . But the wind also acts directly 
 in the production of terrestrial changes. By pros- 
 trating forests it has sometimes given rise to wide 
 barren peat-mosses, by whirling round grains of sand 
 and small pebbles in the crannies of a rock or 
 boulder it excavates little hollows, very much as a
 
 Sand-hills. 75 
 
 river works out pot-holes, and by driving up the 
 sand thrown ashore by the tides, it has converted 
 many a square mile of level ground into tracts of 
 wavy ridge and undulating hollow, like the crests 
 and troughs of a billowy sea. It is when acting in 
 this latter capacity that the wind produces its 
 most familiar effects upon the surface of the ground. 
 Round the Scottish coast-line, wherever prevalent 
 winds blow upon a sandy beach, we usually find a 
 
 " Sand-built ridge 
 Of heaped hills that mound the sea." 
 
 Such is the aspect of the wide Tents Muir between 
 the bay of St. Andrews and the mouth of the Tay, 
 the ridges there running in a general sense parallel 
 to each other and to the coast-line. In the Dornoch 
 Firth, along the west side of the islands of Coll 
 and Tiree, in Macrihanish Bay, Cantyre, and along 
 the Ayrshire shores for fully fifteen miles between 
 Irvine and Ayr, as well as on many other parts of 
 the coast, the characteristic results of wind-action 
 on loose sea-sand may be seen. The inland advance 
 of the sand has sometimes destroyed large tracts of 
 fertile land. Thus along the shores of the Moray 
 Firth the old barony of Culbin has been wholly 
 obliterated. " I have wandered for hours," says 
 Hugh Miller, " amid the sand-wastes of this ruined 
 barony, and seen only a few stunted bushes of 
 broom, and a few scattered tufts of withered bent,
 
 76 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 occupying, amid utter barrenness, the place of what, 
 in the middle of the seventeenth century, had been 
 the richest fields of the rich province of Moray." x 
 So on the Aberdeenshire coast many a fair field has 
 disappeared. " The parish of Forvie," says Pennant, 
 " is now entirely overwhelmed with sand, except two 
 farms. It was in 1600 all arable land, now covered 
 with shifting sands, like the deserts of Arabia, and 
 no vestiges remain of any buildings except a small 
 fragment of the church." 2 
 
 1 Sketch Book of Popular Geology, p. 13. 
 
 2 First Tour, p. 144.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ACTION OF GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS. 
 
 THE agencies of waste described in the preceding 
 pages are still at work around us, and their hand 
 can be seen in every landscape in the country. But 
 in tracing back the origin of our present scenery 
 we are soon led to remark that a vast amount of 
 superficial change must be due not to these agents, 
 but to some other which is no longer busy within 
 our borders. In the northern half of the British 
 Isles, as well as generally throughout northern 
 Europe and America, there is abundant evidence 
 that the surface of the land has been thus specially 
 modified. Had the denudation of these regions been 
 the work only of the sea and ordinary sub-aerial 
 waste, their general outlines would have been more 
 rugged than they are. The valleys would oftener 
 have had steep craggy sides, the hills would have 
 been sharper in form, and more deeply cleft with 
 gullies and ravines. There is on the contrary a 
 general smoothness of contour, characteristic alike 
 of hill and valley, pointing to some abrading agency
 
 78 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 which has in large measure worn off the old rough- 
 nesses, and given a flowing outline to the ground. 
 This agency is now becoming recognised as that of 
 land ice, which must once have thickly covered the 
 whole country, moving steadily downwards to the 
 sea, and in its journey grinding away, smoothing, 
 and striating the surface of the rocks. After long 
 years of doubt and discussion, geologists are at 
 length led to believe that during a comparatively 
 recent geological period the whole of the northern 
 half of Great Britain was cased in ice as North 
 Greenland is to-day. The evidence for this infer- 
 ence will be given in a subsequent chapter, and that 
 it may be the better followed we may glance for a 
 little at the nature of the geological results which 
 are produced by ice at the present time. 1 
 
 The aspect of North Greenland probably affords 
 us a close parallel to the state of Scotland during 
 the climax of those geological changes which were 
 comprised within what is called the Glacial or Drift 
 Period. The interior of that tract of country is 
 covered with one wide sheet of snow and ice, which, 
 constantly augmented by fresh snow-falls, moves 
 steadily downward from the axis of the continent 
 
 i See a Memoir by the Author on "The Phenomena of the Glacial 
 Drift of Scotland," published as Part II. of the Transactions of the 
 Geological Society of Glasgow.
 
 The Glaciers of Greenland. 79 
 
 to the eastern and western shores. This vast mer 
 de glace protrudes in some places for several miles 
 into the sea, where it breaks up into huge masses 
 which drift away as icebergs. Inland it sweeps 
 league after league in one interminable glacier, 
 broken only here and there by some black hill top 
 or mountain peak that rises as an island out of 
 the snow. Its thickness, too, must be very great. 
 Between latitudes 79 and 80, Dr. Kane found it 
 abutting as a solid glassy wall, which rose 300 feet 
 above the sea level, and sank to an unknown depth 
 below it. And this massive ice-sheet is ever slowly 
 and persistently creeping down to the sea. It covers 
 the face of the country, filling up the valleys, mount- 
 ing over the hills, and pressing with constant resist- 
 less force upon all the rocks over which it marches. 
 The geological effects of a mass of ice moving 
 steadily from a higher to a lower level are most 
 important. Blocks of stone, either loosened from 
 the parent mass by frost, or broken off by the 
 moving glacier, are jammed in the ice and pressed 
 along the rocky bed or sides of the valley. The 
 stones, gravel, and sand thus act the part of files ; 
 they scratch and score the hardest rocks, and are 
 themselves striated by the same process. Hence 
 year by year as this rasping and polishing goes on 
 there cannot fail to be a considerable loss of rock. 
 In the Swiss valleys this loss is impressively shown
 
 8o Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 at the lower end of a glacier, where the river, which 
 leaps into the light, is charged with fine mud, the 
 result of the grating of the sand and stones under 
 the ice upon the rocks of the valley. 
 
 FIG. 4. SECTION OF A SHEET OF LAND-ICE, 
 
 going out to sea, breaking off there into bergs, and forming boulder-day, partly on 
 land, and partly in the sea. 
 
 If a single glacier, descending far below the snow- 
 line, as in Switzerland, can grind down, polish, and 
 score the rocks of its channel, it is easy to see how 
 vast and constant must be the erosion carried on by 
 so huge a mass of ice as that which creeps over the 
 whole of North Greenland from mountain top to sea- 
 shore. Could we strip off this icy mantle, we should 
 find the surface of that country worn into rounded 
 and flowing outlines, its valleys and hills smoothed, 
 and its rocks covered with ruts and grooves running 
 in long persistent lines, and marking the direction 
 of the march of the ice. It would probably bear a 
 close resemblance to the surface of Norway, and even
 
 Origin of Rock-basins, 81 
 
 as we shall see to many parts of the hilly tracts of 
 the British Isles. 
 
 One characteristic result of the ice-action of the 
 Glacial Period was the scooping out of hollows in 
 solid rock now holding water and forming lakes. To 
 my old and valued friend, Professor A. C. Ramsay, 
 belongs the merit of having first suggested and 
 worked out this idea. He has shown that the in- 
 numerable rock-enclosed basins of the northern 
 hemisphere do not lie in gaping fissures produced 
 by underground disturbances, nor in areas of special 
 subsidence, nor in synclinal folds of the strata, but 
 that they are true hollows of erosion. Neither rivers 
 nor the sea could scoop out such hollows. The only 
 known agent by which the work could have been 
 done is land-ice? We shall note in a succeeding 
 chapter how well this explanation is borne out by 
 the innumerable lakes, lochans, and tarns that are 
 scattered so widely over the country. 
 
 In a glacier valley with rocky declivities on either 
 side, the frosts, thaws, and rains of every year loosen 
 
 1 Reference should be made to Professor Ramsay's memoir on this 
 subject. Quarterly Journal Geo. Soc. vol. xviii. p. 185. See also his 
 summary in his " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain." 
 Since his memoir was published it has been violently assailed both in 
 this country and on the continent. I have seen no argument, however, 
 to shake my belief in my friend's views and the additional experience 
 of the interval that has passed since their publication has enabled me 
 still further to test their truth. See also the Memoir on the Glacial 
 Drift of Scotland, already quoted, p. 86. 
 
 G
 
 82 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 large quantities of debris. As the glacier threads 
 its way down the valley, its surface gets discoloured 
 with the mud washed from the slopes, piles of rub- 
 bish collect along its sides in long lines called 
 moraines, which are slowly borne onward with the 
 ice, till at last when the glacier melts, they are 
 thrown down in confused heaps that are apt to be 
 washed away by the river as fast as they are de- 
 posited. Where, however, these rubbish heaps re- 
 main they form a more or less continuous rampart 
 along or across the valley. And by the intermitted 
 recession of the glacier successive lines of such 
 barrier-mounds may be thrown down, each line 
 marking a pause in the retreat of the ice. In many 
 Scottish valleys, as will be afterwards pointed out, 
 these moraine mounds remain singularly fresh, still 
 damming up the waters as they did when the ice 
 drew back from them, and still strewed with huge 
 boulders that were once carried on the ice from the 
 higher recesses of the hills and scattered on the 
 heaps of rubbish where they still lie. 
 
 Land-ice is thus a most powerful geological agent 
 in new-modelling the surface of the earth. But in 
 northern latitudes the same ice which plays so im- 
 portant a part on the land descends to the sea-level, 
 and breaking off there into icebergs, performs a new 
 series of feats on the great deep. These ice-islands 
 carry with them any soil or rock rubbish that may
 
 Icebergs. 83 
 
 have fallen upon them from inland cliffs, while they 
 formed part of the ice-sheet of the country. The 
 debris so borne off is, of course, thrown down upon 
 the sea-bottom as each berg melts away after a 
 voyage of perhaps several thousand miles. Year 
 by year whole fleets of these bergs are sent south- 
 wards in the arctic regions, so that the bed of 
 these northern seas must be plentifully strewed 
 with earth and boulders. As only about a ninth 
 part of a mass of ice appears above the water on 
 which it floats, the bulk of many bergs must be 
 enormous. One rising two hundred feet above the 
 waves not an uncommon height must have its 
 bottom sixteen hundred feet below them. Deeply 
 seated in the water, they are acted on much more 
 by marine currents than by winds. Hence, they 
 are sometimes seen careering through a frozen sea 
 in the teeth of a tempest, breaking up the thick 
 ribbed ice before them with a noise like the loudest 
 thunder, yet with as much apparent ease as a 
 ploughshare cuts the loam. Every winter, crowds 
 of these bergs are firmly fixed in the frozen sea 
 of the arctic regions, and when summer comes the 
 united mass drifts southwards towards Newfound- 
 land. Vast sheets of ice, larger sometimes than 
 the whole of Scotland, with ice-hills rising two or 
 three hundred feet above the sea-level and sinking 
 two thousand feet or more below it, are thus borne 
 G 2
 
 84 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 by the ocean currents into warmer latitudes, where 
 they break up and disappear. 
 
 When such current-driven masses grate along the 
 sea-bottom they must tear up the ooze and break 
 down and scratch the rocks. In the course of long 
 ages a submerged hill or ridge may get its crest 
 and sides much bruised, shorn, and striated, and 
 
 FIG. 5. ICEBERG grating along sea-bottom, and depositing mud and boulders. 
 
 the sea-bed generally may be similarly grooved and 
 polished, the direction of the striation being more 
 or less north and south according to the prevalent 
 tread of the drifting ice. 
 
 Besides the land-ice which breaks off into bergs, 
 the ice-foot or frozen margin of the sea deserves notice 
 as a geological agent. It receives huge piles of rub- 
 bish disengaged by frost from the cliffs that over- 
 hang it, and when broken up by storms, masses of
 
 Results of Denudation. 8 5 
 
 it, loaded to the full with earth and stones, are borne 
 seawards, where as they melt, they drop their burden 
 to the bottom ; so that both from bergs and coast-ice 
 the floor of the northern seas must be receiving con- 
 stant additions of mud, sand, and erratic blocks. 
 These modern changes help to throw not a little 
 light on certain wide-spread deposits of clay and 
 boulders which largely influence the scenery of the 
 low grounds of Scotland. 
 
 It appears then that at the present day there are a 
 number of agencies unceasingly at work in altering the 
 present outlines of the dry land. Rains, springs, and 
 frosts, are slowly widening and deepening our valleys, 
 and the sea is eating into the coast and labouring to 
 plane down the country to a general level under the 
 waves. We learn, moreover, that in a comparatively 
 recent period the surface of the greater part of the 
 British Isles has been greatly modified by the erosive 
 action of land-ice and icebergs, and evidence is not 
 wanting that ice has played a like part during 
 earlier geological periods. In the revolutions which 
 befall the surface of the earth it is the province of 
 the sea to wear away the shores and to continue the 
 work of destruction until the land is levelled down. 
 The result of this waste is the formation of a plain 
 of marine denudation. The task of rains, springs, 
 streams, frosts, and glaciers, is to deepen the hollows
 
 86 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of such a sea-worn surface after it has been upheaved 
 into dry land, carving out of it systems of wide and 
 deep valleys and leaving the intervening parts to 
 rise up as chains of hills and mountains. To these 
 various forms of denudation, working during a long 
 succession of ages, the present scenery of the country 
 must, I believe, be mainly attributed. 
 
 The only other great agency which can have had 
 a share in this work is subterranean movement. But 
 it has already been pointed out that the valley sys- 
 tems cannot have been formed merely by that cause, 
 but must have been in the main carved out of the 
 land by the action of the atmospheric powers of 
 waste. So far as we can venture to affirm positively 
 in the matter, it would seem that the chief result 
 of underground movements has been to raise or 
 depress different districts, in the one place elevating 
 a sea-bottom into dry land and thereby exposing 
 it to the erosive action of the elements, in the other 
 case carrying down a land surface beneath the sea 
 and so protecting it from further waste. Such move- 
 ments may no doubt have been accompanied by 
 local and paroxysmal disturbances rending the ground 
 into those cracks and chasms familiar in the history 
 of earthquakes. But even such more violent exhibi- 
 tions of the power of the deep-seated forces may have 
 produced no more extensive or lasting effects on the 
 surface than the most powerful earthquakes in historic
 
 History of a Land-surface. 87 
 
 times have done. More probably the movements were 
 general, gradual, and long continued, the lands slowly 
 rising foot by foot above the sea level, or sinking with 
 like gentleness below it. It is not to be forgotten, 
 however, that these movements, though tranquil, may 
 have been very unequal, even over comparatively 
 limited districts, one part of the country rising or 
 sinking to a much greater extent than other portions. 
 Such inequalities could not fail to have produced great 
 changes upon the drainage of the country, and con- 
 sequently upon the progress of the excavation of the 
 valleys. 
 
 The history of the superficial changes of a country 
 might be theoretically summed up thus. The bed of 
 the sea, which for the sake of illustration may be sup- 
 posed to be a wide plain of marine denudation the 
 worn remnant of an old land is slowly raised above 
 the waves. There is a point or line where the eleva- 
 tion is greatest, and from which the ground slopes 
 down to the sea-level. Perhaps the elevatory force 
 shows itself in the upheaval of one or more anticlinal 
 folds. But whether in one great dome-shaped mass, 
 or in a long ridge, or in several ridges with parallel 
 dividing hollows, the slopes are probably gentle, and 
 the elevation on the whole a quiet protracted process. 
 No sooner does the rock appear above the sea than 
 it is attacked by the waves, and unless the rate of 
 elevation is more rapid than that of the marine waste,
 
 88 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the rising area can never get above the sea-level. But 
 not only is it a prey to the breakers, its surface begins 
 to be carved out by the atmospheric agents. That 
 surface is not a mere dead level, so that when rain 
 falls upon it drainage necessarily sets in from the 
 highest parts down to the shores. The rain gathers 
 into runnels, following the inequalities of the sea-worn 
 slopes, and widening into brooks and rivers ; or the 
 moisture falls in the form of snow, and glaciers grind 
 a path for themselves from the high grounds to the 
 shore. Thus begins the scooping out of a system of 
 valleys diverging from the higher parts of the rising 
 land. These depressions are slowly dug deeper and 
 wider, until at last the ancient elevated sea-bed is 
 worn into a system of hills and mountains, valleys 
 and glens. The land thus modelled may remain 
 stationary for a vast interval, but in the end it 
 descends again beneath the sea, is covered over with 
 newer deposits, and its highest mountains perhaps 
 buried beneath piles of their own ruin, worn from 
 them by the sea, as they slowly sink under its waves. 
 A subsequent elevation of this area into dry land 
 exposes these later accumulations to a similar waste, 
 and a new series of denudations is begun by the 
 rains, streams, ice, and the sea, new valleys are 
 excavated, and new hills are left standing out from 
 them. By such a process of ceaseless change thus 
 summarily stated, carried on during many successive
 
 Types of Scottish Scenery. 89 
 
 geological periods, the present scenery of our country 
 appears to have been produced. 
 
 In the succeeding chapters I propose to attempt to 
 trace the origin of the present scenery of Scotland 
 to these causes. Though we may understand the 
 general character of a process in nature, it is some- 
 times by no means an easy task to follow out the 
 details of its successive stages, and this difficulty is 
 vastly increased when the process was completed 
 long ago, and when, in consequence, its memorials 
 are obscure and incomplete. Such, however, is the 
 task now before us. In entering upon it, I feel that 
 it is possible in the meanwhile merely to grope the 
 way. The only light which can be taken with us is 
 that of existing nature. Without its help all would 
 be utter darkness, but under its direction we may 
 be enabled to advance some little way. I shall en- 
 deavour to lay before the reader the facts on which 
 each inference is based, that he may judge how far 
 there is actual evidence from which to restore in im- 
 agination certain ancient conditions of our country. 
 
 There are in a broad sense three distinct types of 
 scenery in Scotland, each due to certain distinguish- 
 ing geological features. Although they are intimately 
 linked with each other and show the working of the 
 same great geological processes, it will be, perhaps, the 
 most intelligible mode of treatment to describe each 
 separately. There is, therefore : 1st. The scenery of
 
 90 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the Highlands ; 2nd. The scenery of the broad tract 
 of high ground between St. Abb's Head and Port- 
 patrick, sometimes called the Southern Highlands, 
 and to which for the sake of clearness I shall refer as 
 the Southern Uplands : and 3rd. The scenery of the 
 Midland Valley, of the Tay, Forth, and Clyde. My 
 account of the Highlands will necessarily be the 
 longest, since it will not be needful to repeat in detail 
 under the other two divisions the explanation of the 
 formation of valleys and lakes, and the history of 
 the glacial period.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SCENERY OF THE HIGHLANDS. 
 
 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF THE DISTRICT. 
 
 A LINE drawn from the Coast of Kincardine in a 
 south-western direction across the island to the Mull 
 of Cantyre divides the Highlands from the central 
 valley of the Tay, Forth, and Clyde. It coincides ac- 
 curately with the boundary between the old crumpled 
 gneisses and schists of the northern half of the 
 kingdom and the conglomerates, red sandstones and 
 trap-rocks of the broad Lowland Valley. Thus it is 
 both a good geological line and a well-marked limit 
 for two very different types of scenery. To the south- 
 east lie the gently undulating hills and wide agri- 
 cultural plains of the Old Red Sandstone ; to the 
 north-west a sea of mountains rolls away to Cape 
 Wrath in wave after wave of gneiss, schist, quartz- 
 rock, granite, and other crystalline masses. 
 
 This mountainous tract, forming the Highlands of 
 Scotland, is bordered on the north-east with a belt of 
 Old Red Sandstone, which gives rise to a strip of
 
 92 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 fertile land along the shores of the Moray Firth. On 
 the west it is flanked with a chain of islands formed 
 chiefly of igneous rocks of secondary or tertiary age. 
 But within this outer frame the enclosed mountainous 
 region is made up of older Palaeozoic strata which, 
 over the greater part of the surface, have passed from 
 their original character of ordinary marine sediment, 
 sand, gravel, silt, and mud into gnarled crumpled 
 crystalline masses. A few years ago these rocks 
 presented a wild chaos of disorder, out of which it 
 appeared hopeless to think of ever making any 
 recognisable geological structure. An upward order 
 of succession had, indeed, been determined by the 
 late Dr. Macculloch and Mr. Hay Cunningham 
 among the rocks of the west of Sutherland, but no 
 one thought of applying it to the elucidation of the 
 structure of the rest of the Highlands. It was not 
 until 1855 that Sir Roderick Murchison, aided by 
 Mr. Peach's discovery of Lower Silurian fossils in the 
 limestones of Duirness, established the true relations 
 of the rocks of Sutherland and Ross, and obtained 
 the key with which he has revealed the structure of 
 the Scottish Highlands a discovery the importance 
 of which it is hardly possible to over-estimate.' At 
 
 1 See his papers, and new Geological Map of the Highlands, "pub- 
 lished in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for 1858. 
 The section across Sutherland, on the map accompanying the present 
 volume, shows the order of superposition.
 
 Geological Structure of the Highlands. 93 
 
 the bottom of all lies a gnarled highly crystalline 
 gneiss, called by Sir Roderick the Fundamental 
 Gneiss, 1 inasmuch as he has shown it to be the oldest 
 rock in the British Isles, and the foundation on which 
 all the others are built up. Resting on the upturned 
 worn edges of this truly primaeval rock rise huge 
 masses of gently-inclined red sandstone and con- 
 glomerate, supposed to be of the same geological age 
 as the Cambrian rocks of Wales. These strata, for- 
 merly described and mapped as Old Red Sandstone, 
 form the lofty pyramidal mountains on the Atlantic 
 borders of Sutherland and Ross, and are confined to 
 the north-west of the island. They are overlaid with 
 thick quartz rocks and bands of limestone which pass 
 under flaggy micaceous gneisses and schists, and 
 contain in their under-portions Lower Silurian fossils. 
 Hence we learn that the rocks which overlie the red 
 Cambrian sandstones, even though they are crystal- 
 line and wholly changed from the soft loose strata in 
 which they were laid down on the sea-bed, yet do 
 not belong to the age of chaos, as used to be sup- 
 posed, nor to an epoch anterior to the creation of life, 
 but are really the equivalents in time of the Lower 
 Silurian rocks of the south of Scotland, of Cumber- 
 land, and of Wales. A reference to the long section 
 on the map from Skye to the Cheviot Hills will show 
 
 1 He has also called it " Laurentian " from its probable identity with 
 a gneiss occupying a similar position in Canada.
 
 94 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the reader that it is these metamorphosed Lower 
 Silurian strata which form the greater part of the 
 Highlands, and that they are arranged in great folds, 
 whereby the lower portions of the series are brought 
 up to the surface again and again. 1 
 
 The strata of sand and mud which accumulated to 
 a depth of thousands of feet over the sinking floor of 
 the old Silurian ocean have been crumbled up into 
 endless folds and puckerings of which, as may be 
 seen on the map, the long axis, or strike, runs gene- 
 rally in a north-easterly and south-westerly direction. 
 When the wind blows freshly from the north-west 
 the sea is roughened with long broken lines of wave, 
 stretching from south-west to north-east, and rolling 
 in towards the south-east. So over the Scottish 
 Highlands the gneissose and schistose rocks have 
 been tossed, as it were, by a long swell from the 
 north-west into numerous wave-like plications that 
 follow each other, fold after fold, and curve after 
 curve, from Cape Wrath to the Lowland border. 
 
 Thus, instead of a scene of undistinguishable chaos, 
 the Scottish Highlands are found to be governed by 
 the same laws of structure as other hilly regions 
 formed of stratified rocks. We are not left, there- 
 fore, to speculate wholly in the dark upon the origin 
 
 1 See the details of this structure, given in a Memoir on the subject 
 by Sir Roderick Murchison and the author in the Quarterly Journal 
 of the Geological Society, vol. xvii. 171.
 
 Connexion of Geological Structure and Scenery. 95 
 
 of the Highland mountains and glens, as if they had 
 been upheaved among rocks of which the mode of 
 formation and the actual structure were alike un- 
 known. If we were still vaguely surmising that the 
 gneiss and the schist had been thrown down upon 
 the floor of a primaeval thermal ocean, and had been 
 broken up when that hardened floor was upheaved 
 into the first dry land, there might be some excuse 
 for a belief that the ancient convulsions had been the 
 means of throwing up our northern mountains and 
 tearing open their glens. But when these rocks are 
 discovered to be only a modification of ordinary sedi- 
 mentary deposits, and to reveal their geological age 
 by their enclosed organic remains, all such vague 
 conjectures must cease, and the rocks must be exa- 
 mined and determined by the ascertained laws which 
 govern the arrangement of masses of stratified rocks. 
 Connexion of Geological Structure and Scenery, 
 When it is said that the rocks of which the High- 
 lands are made have been thrown into oft-repeated 
 foldings it might be supposed that these undulations 
 of the strata have given rise to the present contour of 
 the surface, each mountain-chain corresponding with 
 an arch or anticlinal axis of the gneiss and schists, 
 and each line of strata or glen with a trough or 
 synclinal axis. On the contrary, the very reverse of 
 this arrangement is often found to hold. What in a 
 geological sense are basins or troughs, frequently rise
 
 96 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 into rugged and lofty mountains, while the arches, on 
 the other hand, are occupied by deep valleys. A 
 striking example of this feature is to be found in Ben 
 Lawers. That wide-based broad-shouldered moun- 
 
 KIG. 6. SECTION OF BEN LAWERS. 
 
 a Quartzose rocks, b Limestone, c Schistose rocks. 
 (See also the section No. 2 in the Map. ) 
 
 tain rises from the valley of Loch Tay on the one 
 side, and sinks into Glen Lyon on the other. It 
 forms thus a huge dome-shaped mass between two 
 deep valleys. But instead of owing this form to an 
 upward curving of the schists, it actually lies in a 
 basin of these rocks which dip underneath the 
 mountain on the banks of Loch Tay, and rise up 
 again from its further skirts in Glen Lyon. Thus 
 Ben Lawers is in reality formed of a trough of 
 schists, while the valley of Loch Tay runs along the 
 top of an anticlinal arch. Hence that which, in 
 geological structure, is a depression has by denu- 
 dation become a great mountain, while what is an 
 elevation has been turned into a deep valley. 
 
 The present heights and hollows of the Highlands, 
 therefore, are not to be traced to any of the original
 
 Geological Structure of the Highlands. 97 
 
 convolutions of the old crystalline rocks. Nor can 
 they be assigned, as they often are in a popular 
 way, to grand primeval eruptions of granite. That 
 rock, it is true, covers a considerable space in the 
 Highlands, and rises up among the highest mountain 
 groups. But there are also wide spaces of low ground 
 abounding in granite. The long lonely Moor of 
 Rannoch, for instance, lies in large measure on 
 granite ; while the range of mountains that bounds 
 its south-eastern margin consists, not of granite, but 
 of quartz rock. Indeed, there is good reason to 
 believe that granite is not an igneous rock in the 
 ordinary sense, but that instead of bursting through 
 and upheaving the gneiss and schist, it is itself only a 
 further stage of the metamorphism of these rocks. 
 
 Until the Highland tracts are surveyed in minute 
 detail, it will not be possible to ascertain how far they 
 are traversed by lines of fault, nor to what extent 
 such features have shewn themselves at the surface, 
 and have served to guide the excavation of the 
 valleys. After a long and detailed examination of 
 the contorted rocks of the Silurian uplands of the 
 southern counties, I have been led to believe that the 
 faults and the folds of the strata on the whole have 
 had only a secondary influence in originating the 
 present irregularities of the surface. And this is 
 probably the case also with the contorted and meta- 
 morphosed Silurian rocks of the Highlands. The 
 H
 
 98 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Great Glen, to be aftenvards more specially referred 
 to, is one of the few examples yet known to me in 
 Scotland of the coincidence of a line of fault with 
 that of a long valley. 
 
 While, however, the character of Highland scenery 
 has not been mainly determined by subterranean 
 movements, it is nevertheless true, as will be after- 
 wards pointed out, tftat the forms into which the 
 rocks were thrown by the contortions and dislocations 
 have, in many cases, materially guided the powers of 
 waste in the long process of denudation. The larger 
 features, hill ranges and lines of valley, have 
 sometimes had their general trend determined by 
 the direction of the anticlinal and synclinal foldings 
 of the strata. The minor details, which give indivi- 
 duality to the forms of cliff and crag and mountain, 
 have likewise been dependent upon the lithological 
 character of the rocks. But alike in the greater and 
 the lesser elements of the scenery, there has been 
 a presiding power of erosion, which, though its 
 working might be modified by local circumstances, 
 has laid its finger on every rood of the surface, and 
 has carved out for itself the present system of glen 
 and mountain, valley and hill. 
 
 It cannot be too strongly impressed upon the mind 
 that the existing surface of the area of the Highlands 
 is far from being the same as that which existed 
 when the rocks were squeezed, crumpled, and broken.
 
 Ancient Highland Table-land. 99 
 
 These changes went on beneath the surface under a 
 vast thickness of rock, which has since been worn 
 away. There is now no trace of the original effects 
 produced by these underground movements upon the 
 exterior of the earth's crust. If they ever made any 
 show there at all (which seems to me by no means 
 certain) it was effaced long ages ago. The present 
 mountain-tops have been revealed to the light of day 
 only after the removal of hundreds and thousands 
 of feet of solid rock, under which they once were 
 buried. Thus one of the first lessons we learn in 
 attempting to restore former aspects of Highland 
 scenery is an impressive one of vast waste. There 
 is not a single mountain or glen by which this lesson 
 is not brought home to us. Each is in itself a 
 monument of denudation telling everywhere of the 
 work of rains and streams, sea, frost, and ice, but 
 giving no clue to the effects of primeval earthquakes. 
 
 ANCIENT TABLE-LAND OF THE HIGHLANDS. 
 
 IF one would grasp at once the leading features of 
 Highland scenery, let him betake himself to some 
 mountain-top that stands a little apart from its neigh- 
 bours, and looks over them into the wilds beyond. A 
 better height could not be chosen than the summit of 
 Ben Nevis. None other rises more majestically above 
 
 H 2
 
 loo Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the surrounding hills, or looks over a wider sweep of 
 mountain and moor, glen and corry, lake and firth, 
 far away to the islands that lie amid the western sea. 
 In no other place is the general and varied character 
 of the Highlands better illustrated. And from none 
 can the geologist, whose eye is open to the changes 
 wrought by subaerial waste on the surface of the 
 country, gain a more vivid insight into their reality 
 and ' magnitude. To this, as a typical and easib 
 accessible locality, I shall have occasion to refer more 
 than once. Let the reader, in the meantime, imagine 
 himself sitting by the side of the grey cairn on the 
 highest peak of the British Isles, watching the shadows 
 of an autumnal sky stealing over the vast sea of 
 mountains that lies spread out, as in a map, around 
 him. And while no sound falls upon his ear, save 
 now and then a fitful moaning of the wind among the 
 snow rifts of the dark precipice below, let him try to 
 analyse some of the chief elements of the landscape. 
 It is easy to recognise the more marked heights and 
 hollows. To the south, away down Loch Linnhe, he 
 can see the hills of Mull and the Paps of Jura closing 
 in the horizon. Westward, Loch Eil seems to lie at 
 his feet, winding up into the lonely mountains, yet 
 filled twice a day with the tides of the salt sea. Far 
 over the hills, beyond the head of the Loch, he looks 
 across Arisaig, and can see the cliffs of the Isle of 
 Eigg and the dark peaks of Rum, with the Atlantic
 
 IO2 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 gleaming below them. Further to the north-west the 
 blue range of the Cuchullins rises along the sky-line, 
 and, then, sweeping over all the intermediate ground, 
 through Arisaig and Knoydart and Claurannald's 
 country, mountain rises beyond mountain, ridge be- 
 yond ridge, cut through by dark glens, and varied 
 here and there with the sheen of lake and tarn. 
 Northward runs the mysterious straight line of the 
 Great Glen, with its chain of lochs. Thence to east 
 and south the same billowy sea of mountain-tops 
 stretches out as far as eye can follow it the hills and 
 glens of Lochaber, the wide green strath of Spean, the 
 grey corries of Glen Treig and Glen Nevis, the distant 
 sweep of the moors and mountains of Brae Lyon and 
 the Perthshire Highlands, the spires of Glen Coe, and 
 thence round again to the blue waters of Loch 
 Linnhe. 
 
 In musing over this wide panorama the observer 
 cannot fail to note that while there are everywhere 
 local peculiarities in the outline of the hills, and the 
 shapes of the sides of the valleys, there is yet a 
 general uniformity of contour over the whole. What 
 seem at a nearer view rough craggy peaks and pin- 
 nacles, seen from this height are dwarfed into mere 
 minor irregularities of surface. And thus over the 
 whole of the wide landscape one mountain ridge ap- 
 pears after another, with the same large features, 
 rising and sinking from glen to glen with the same
 
 View from top of Ben Nevis. 103 
 
 smoothed summits, broken now and again where from 
 some hidden valley a circular corry or craggy cliff 
 lifts itself bare to the sun. 
 
 Much has been said and written about the wild 
 tumbled sea of the Highland hills. But, as he sits on 
 his high perch, does it not strike the observer that 
 there is after all a wonderful orderliness, and even 
 monotony, in the waves of that wide sea ? And when 
 he has followed their undulations from north to 
 south, all round the horizon, does it not seem to him 
 that these mountain-tops and ridges tend somehow 
 to rise up to a general level, that in short there is not 
 only on the great scale a marked similarity of contour 
 about them, but a still more definite uniformity of 
 average height ? (See Figs. 7 and 8.) To many, who 
 have contented themselves with the bottom of the 
 glen, and have looked with awe at the array of peaks 
 and crags overhead, this statement will doubtless 
 appear incredible. But let any one get fairly up to 
 the summits, and look along them, and he will not 
 fail to see that the statement is nevertheless true. 
 From the cairns on Ben Nevis this feature is im- 
 pre"ssively seen. Along the sky-line the wide sweep 
 of summits undulates up to a common level, varied 
 here by a higher cone, and there by the line of some 
 strath or glen, but yet wonderfully persistant round 
 the whole panorama. If, as sometimes happens in 
 these airy regions, a bank of cloud with a level under-
 
 IO4 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 surface should descend upon the mountains, it will be 
 seen to touch summit after summit, the long line of 
 the cloud defining like a great parallel-ruler the long 
 level line of the mountain-ridges below. I have seen 
 this feature brought out with picturesque vividness 
 over the mountains of Knoydart and Glen Garry. 
 Wreaths of filmy mist had been hovering in the upper 
 air during the forenoon. Towards evening, under 
 the influence of a cool breeze from the north, they 
 gathered together into one long band that stretched 
 for several miles straight as the sky-line of the distant 
 sea, touching merely the higher summits and giving a 
 horizon by which the general uniformity of level among 
 the hills could be signally tested. Once or twice in 
 a season one may be fortunate enough to get on the 
 mountains above such a stratum of mist, which then 
 seems to fill up the inequalities of the general plat- 
 form of hill-tops, and to stretch out as a white phan- 
 tom-sea, from which the highest eminences rise up as 
 little islets into the clear air of the morning. 
 
 The long level line of the Highland mountain-tops 
 may be seen not only from some commanding emi- 
 nence among the mountains themselves, but perhaps 
 even more markedly from the lower country outside. 
 From the isles of Skye and igg, for instance, the 
 panorama between the heights of Applecross and the 
 Point of Ardnamurchan shows in a most impressive 
 manner the traces of the old table-land. So too when
 
 IO6 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the observer ascends the ridges behind the town of 
 Greenock, the hill-tops of the opposite Highlands, 
 between Inellan and the head of Loch Long, stretch 
 out before him in a long and almost straight line. 
 
 What does this general uniformity of level mean ? 
 It plainly has nothing to do with geological structure. 
 On the contrary, a cursory examination will show 
 that the abraded edges of the highly inclined strata 
 of gneiss and schist, rise to the surface along and 
 across the hill-tops, and that these strata must once 
 have been prolonged upward to complete the folds 
 which only remain in part. There must consequently 
 have been a vast deal of denudation along these 
 heights, and an enormous mass of rock must have 
 been worn away from the tops of the Highland moun- 
 tains. The uniformity of level among these summits 
 arises not from any structure in the rocks, but from 
 the activity of the powers of waste. If the foregoing 
 observations on the functions of the different denuding 
 agencies were just, it follows that the long flat surfaces 
 and the common average height of so many of the 
 Highland mountains are due to the levelling power 
 of the sea. In other words, these mountain tops are 
 parts of a great undulating plain or table-land of 
 marine denudation. 1 
 
 1 Let me guard the reader against misconception arising from the 
 use of this term plain. I do not at all mean to assert that the area of 
 the Highlands was ever so levelled by the sea as to .approach to any- 
 thing like the flatness of a meadow. The marine denudation probably
 
 Highland Table-land, 107 
 
 That this plain can now be traced only in frag- 
 ments, that it is cut down by wide straths and deep 
 glens, and that its surface has been greatly and un- 
 equally lowered in many places, need not be matter 
 of surprise. When we come to reflect on its extreme 
 antiquity and on the long cycle of geological revolu- 
 tions that have rolled over the country since then, 
 the wonder rather is that any trace of the plain 
 should remain at all. The valleys which now intersect 
 it, as we shall immediately see, have probably been 
 dug out of it by the agencies of denudation. If, 
 therefore, it were possible to replace the rock which 
 has been removed in the excavation of these hollows 
 the Highlands would be turned into a wide undu- 
 
 went on during many oscillations of level, and the general result would 
 hence be the production of a great table-land, some parts rising gently 
 to a height of many hundred feet above other portions, yet the whole 
 wearing that general tameness and uniformity of surface characteristic 
 of a table-land where there are neither any conspicuous hills towering 
 sharply above the average level, nor any valleys sinking abruptly below 
 it. It would require much more detailed surveys than I have yet 
 been able to make, to warrant me in fixing the probable average height 
 of this ancient Highland table-land above the sea. Its highest parts 
 were probably at least as lofty as the present summits of Ben Nevis 
 and Ben Muick Dhui ; its lowest hollows were in all likelihood not less 
 than 1,000 feet above the present sea-level. Nor must we forget that 
 this table-land, since the time of its formation, has doubtless shared 
 in the numerous upheavals and depressions of the country. These 
 movements, though they may have destroyed in part the continuity of 
 the plain, have left it still wonderfully distinct. Hence it is not 
 so difficult to understand why there should have been a wide table- 
 land, as to conceive how it has not been in great measure or wholly 
 effaced. Compare Prof. Ramsay's description of Wales. " Lectures," 
 p. 140.
 
 1 08 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 lating table-land, sloping up here and there into long 
 central heights and stretching out between them 
 league after league with a tolerable uniformity of 
 level. And in this rolling plain we should find a 
 restoration of the bottom of a very ancient sea. 
 
 Is there any evidence of the geological age in 
 which that sea covered the Highlands ? for if this can 
 be obtained some light may perhaps be cast on the 
 subsequent changes that have turned the ocean-floor 
 into a wide region of hill and valley. The evidence 
 which can be gleaned is far from conclusive, yet it is 
 not without value and interest. 
 
 The metamorphism of the strata that form the 
 Highlands must have taken place between the depo- 
 sition of what are known as the Llandeilo or Caradoc 
 rocks and that of the Lower Old Red Sandstone. 
 It is thus in all likelihood of Upper Silurian date. 
 Wherever the Old Red Sandstone lies on these High- 
 land rocks there is satisfactory proof of great denu- 
 dation, for the conglomerates rest upon the worn 
 edges of the inclined or vertical gneiss and schist, of 
 whose ruins, indeed, they are composed. So that the 
 rocks of the Highlands were not only metamorphosed, 
 but largely worn away before the Old Red Sandstone 
 was laid down upon them. The northern and eastern 
 coasts of the county of Sutherland are fringed with a 
 broken band of the Lower Old Red conglomerates and 
 sandstones, which form a chain of rounded, craggy,
 
 Relics of the Old Red Sandstone. 109 
 
 conical hills between Golspie and Helmsdale, rising 
 sometimes to nearly 2,000 feet above the sea, and 
 presenting the abraded ends of the strata towards the 
 interior. It is impossible to look at these brown hills 
 without being convinced that they remain as a mere 
 fragment of a great sheet of conglomerate and sand- 
 stone which stretched away into the interior. But as 
 if to make this point quite certain, in the very heart 
 of the county among the gneisses and granites rise 
 up the two mountains of Ben Griam, the higher being 
 1,935 feet over the sea-level. These are cakes of con- 
 glomerate lying on the worn surface of the crystalline 
 rocks out of the detritus of which they have been 
 formed. They are thus only remnants of a once wide 
 deposit So again, along the northern shores, patches 
 of the same kind are found from the borders of 
 Caithness to Roan Island, sometimes in little outliers 
 standing high among the inland hills. Hence it must 
 be inferred that a large part, if not the whole, of the 
 county of Sutherland was once covered with a sheet 
 of Old Red conglomerate, of which there are now left 
 only a few relics capping some of the heights of the 
 interior and fringing the coast-line. The same de- 
 posit runs southward from Sutherland along the east- 
 tern coasts of Ross and the shores of the Moray 
 Firth. It stretches up the valley of the Great Glen 1 
 
 1 This valley, therefore, would seem to be at least as old as the 
 Lower Old Red Sandstone.
 
 1 10 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 and rises in Mealfourvonie to a height of 2,700 feet. 
 Thence it sweeps eastwards along the seaboard of the 
 counties of Inverness, Nairn, Elgin, Banff, and Aber- 
 deen, and detached portions are found thirty or forty 
 miles in the interior. In this district also it can 
 hardly be doubted that these denuded outliers indi- 
 cate that the Old Red Sandstone once spread over a 
 wide area of the northern Highlands. 
 
 Along the southern border of the Highlands the 
 evidence is less obtrusive, but perhaps not less de- 
 finite. From sea to sea the Highland mountains are 
 there flanked with the Old Red Sandstone, sometimes 
 in low rolling plains that creep up to the base of the 
 hills, but sometimes, as in the Braes of Doune, rising 
 into long heathery heights, that form a kind of outer 
 rampart to the main mass of the Highlands. Even 
 from a distance the stratification of the conglomerates 
 and sandstones of these uplands can be easily traced, 
 the beds presenting their denuded, truncated ends 
 towards the mountains to which they evidently at 
 one time were prolonged, and from the waste of 
 which they were formed. At Callander, and else- 
 where along the border-line, it appears that the red 
 sandstone series has been faulted down against the 
 older rocks to the north-west. Hence to understand 
 the original relation of the formations in this district 
 we must in imagination undo the effect of the fault, 
 and upraise again the depressed sandstones and con-
 
 A ntiquity of the Table- land. 1 1 1 
 
 glomerates for perhaps many hundred feet. When 
 this is done we see, from their abrupt, truncated ends 
 looking to the north-west, that these strata cannot 
 but have stretched for some way over the mountains. 
 And thus, by piecing together the evidence fur- 
 nished by the Old Red Sandstone along the borders 
 and in the interior of these high grounds, we obtain 
 a strong probability that the great denudation which 
 levelled the old Highland table-land, began in the 
 Upper Silurian or at the commencement of the Old 
 Red Sandstone period, and that, as a result of that 
 denudation, a thick pile of conglomerate and sand- 
 stone was made out of the waste of the older rocks, 
 and laid down over many a -square league of the 
 Highlands. The higher mountain ranges, such as 
 the central chain of the Grampians, perhaps rose as 
 islands out of these ancient waters, after the lesser 
 heights had been ground down and buried beneath 
 their own ruins. From the thickness of the con- 
 glomerates it may be inferred that the denudation 
 went on during a slow submergence of the land a 
 condition eminently favourable for marine abrasion. 
 For this downward movement, ever bringing new 
 zones of land within the power of the breakers, could 
 not but greatly help the sea in its task of planing 
 down the irregularities of the sinking country. It 
 may have ceased before the higher summits were 
 reached by the waves. The area worn away by the
 
 H2 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 marine denudation would thus not be a mere flat 
 plain, but would slope gently under the sea away 
 from these unsubmerged high grounds. Yet from 
 the slowness of the subsidence the angle of this 
 inclined sea-bed might be so gentle as to appear 
 to the eye almost a level surface. And this feature 
 is found still to mark the Highland mountain-tops. 
 A line connecting summit with summit across the 
 Grampian chain, from north-west to south-east, would 
 show a very gradual seaward slope on either side 
 until it reached the outer edge of the high grounds,, 
 where it would descend rapidly into the plains. 1 
 
 1 From the top of Ben Muick Dhui (4,300 feet) north-westward to 
 the crest of the hills overlooking the Moray Firth (say 1,300 feet above 
 the sea-level), is a distance of about 28 miles, and the angle of descent 
 would be not more than about i in 50. From the same central 
 elevation to the south-eastern verge of the Highland mountains, the 
 angle would be not quite so much, as the distance is rather more, and 
 the average height of the broad table-land there is greater than on the 
 opposite border. These slopes would not be so steep as some railway 
 gradients now in use. Yet they are perhaps exaggerations of the 
 original average declivity from the central ridge of the Highlands, 
 for the higher parts, such as the Ben Muick Dhui and Ben Nevis 
 groups of mountains, may have risen high above the waves that were 
 planing down the surrounding table-land. Thus the gentle seaward 
 slope may have begun at the foot of groups of hills which had 
 suffered from an earlier marine denudation, and were now undergoing 
 a slow erosion by the atmospheric agencies. For the sake of simplicity 
 I have referred above only to that marine denudation which planed 
 down the Highland mountain-tops previous to and during the deposition 
 of the Lower Old Red Sandstone. But the levelling of the table-land 
 may have gone on during many subsequent geological periods, for the 
 overlying conglomerates and sandstones have been themselves in large 
 part worn away. (See the section in Prof. Ramsay's Lectures, p. 140. )
 
 Section of the Grampians. 
 
 The first great step, then, in 
 the carving out of the present 
 scenery of the Highlands appears 
 thus to have been taken by the 
 sea. The hard, gnarled crystal- 
 line rocks that had been upraised 
 by subterranean movements were 
 planed down by the waves, and 
 once more sank into the deep 
 under a thick mass of their own 
 ruins. In the next stage we find 
 this levelled sea-bottom raised 
 anew into land. It is the changes 
 of that land-surface which re- 
 main to be traced. 
 
 Inverness. 
 
 Spey. 
 
 Ben Muich Dhui. 
 
 Cat Law.
 
 H4 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ORIGIN OF THE HIGHLAND VALLEYS. 
 
 AT what geological epoch the re-elevation of the area 
 of the Highlands above the sea took place has yet to 
 be determined. It must have been very early, for 
 the denudation which has been accomplished since 
 then demands a vast interval for its completion. 
 Such parts of the high grounds as did not sink be- 
 neath the sea-level during the marine denudation 
 just described, would of course be exposed to con- 
 stant sub-aerial waste at the same time that their 
 shores were eaten away by the waves. And no 
 sooner did the submerged land rise again into air, 
 than it became in like manner a prey to the atmo- 
 spheric agencies of erosion. Rain, falling on the new 
 land, would find its way by the readiest paths to the 
 ocean, and the various channels which it took would 
 year after year be deepened and widened, both by 
 the action of the running water and by springs and 
 frosts. It is, I believe, by the working of these 
 slow, silent, unobtrusive forces during the lapse of
 
 Highland Valleys. 115 
 
 those vast geological ages which have passed away 
 since the time of the Lower Old Red Sandstone, 
 that the ancient table-land of the Highlands has 
 been cut into the present system of mountains and 
 glens. 1 In looking at the results of these changes 
 we are very apt to regard them as a completed pro- 
 cess one that, after long ages of preparation and 
 progress, has at last reached its end. But in sober 
 truth the same process is going on still. Instead of 
 coming in at its close, we look into its \vorking when 
 it has still, perhaps, far more to accomplish than has 
 yet been done. With the exception of the ice of the 
 glacial period, the same powers of waste are here still 
 at work, and in watching their slow but certain pro- 
 gress we see exemplified before us the same kind of 
 action which has brought mountain and glen to their 
 present forms, and which may be destined in the 
 long ages of the future to continue until it has worn 
 down the solid land, and mountain and glen have 
 alike disappeared. 
 
 It may not be uninstructive to look for a little 
 at the progress of this waste, as it may be seen in 
 many a Highland glen. A river, as has been already 
 shown, digs out its ravines by gnawing its way back- 
 wards towards its source, and if we wish to study 
 how this erosion takes place, we must visit the higher 
 
 i See Professor Ramsay's Lectures on the Physical Geology of Great 
 Britain. Lect. II. 
 
 I 2
 
 1 1 6 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 end of the gorge, and mark the action of the water- 
 falls and rapids. In like manner, a valley creeps 
 backward and upward, and its origin and progress 
 are sometimes best explained by what may be seen 
 at its upper end. Valleys have step by step carved 
 their way into the very heart of the high grounds ; 
 they may be watched even now eating deeply into 
 the flanks of the mountains. And thus throughout 
 the Highlands we meet everywhere with some rocky 
 glen or rough mountain-slope, 
 
 " Some tall crag 
 
 That is the Eagle's birth-place, or some peak 
 Familiar with forgotten years, that shews 
 Inscribed, as with the silence of the thought, 
 Upon its bleak and visionary sides, 
 The history of many a winter storm." 1 
 
 Nowhere can a better illustration of this universal 
 waste be found than among the deep glens and 
 comes round the flanks of Ben Nevis. If the ob- 
 server be sure of foot and steady of eye, let him 
 ascend that mountain, not by the regular track, but 
 up the long and almost equally lofty ridge which lies 
 to the east, and thence along the narrow and some- 
 what perilous col which circles round to the southern 
 front of the great Ben. The ascent lies first among 
 heathery slopes, channelled with brooks of clear cold 
 water, and roughened with grey, worn, and weathered 
 hummocks of schist and granite. Blocks of granite 
 1 Wordsworth, Excursion, B. i.
 
 Ascent of Ben Nevis. 117 
 
 of every size cumber the ground, standing sometimes 
 on rocky knolls, and sometimes half buried in morass. 
 That the frosts of many a century have been busy 
 here, is shown by the countless boulders and pro- 
 truding knobs of rock which have been split open 
 along their joints. Slanting up the mountain, the 
 observer has leisure to remark, as he crosses streamlet 
 after streamlet, that their channels, sometimes cut 
 deeply into the solid rock, are evidently the work of 
 the running water. He finds them grow fewer as 
 he rises. 1 On the slopes, too, the boggy peat and 
 shaggy heather begin to give way to long streams 
 of angular granite blocks, among which the scanty 
 vegetation is at last reduced to mere scattered 
 patches of short grass and moss, with here and there 
 a little Alpine plant. A wilderness of debris now 
 covers the bald scalp of the mountain. The solid 
 granite itself cannot be seen through the depth of 
 its own accumulated fragments ; but when the crest 
 of the height is gained, the rock is found peering in 
 shattered fragments from amidst the ruin. This 
 narrow mountain ridge is then seen to rise between 
 two profound glens. That to the north-east is crowned 
 by a rampart-like range of pink-hued granite cliffs, 
 
 1 The highest spring noted by Petermann on the flanks of Ben Nevis 
 was at a height of 3,602 feet, or 766 feet below the summit. Another 
 spring on Ben Aulder, one of the highest of the Grampians, was found 
 by the same observer to be 3,650 feet above the sea. Edin. New. Phil. 
 Jour, xlvii. 316.
 
 1 1 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 from which long courses of debris descend to the 
 bottom. The glen that lies far below on the south- 
 west is overhung on its further side by the vast, 
 rugged precipice of Ben Nevis, rising some fifteen 
 hundred or two thousand feet above the stream that 
 wanders through the gloom at its base. That dark 
 wall of porphyry can now be seen from bottom to 
 top, with its huge masses of rifted rock standing up 
 like ample buttresses into the light, and its deep 
 recesses and clefts, into which the summer sun never 
 reaches, and where the winter snow never melts. 
 The eye, travelling over cliff and crag, can mark 
 everywhere the seams and scars dealt out in that 
 long warfare with the elements, of which the whole 
 mountain is so noble a memorial. 
 
 But, passing from the contemplation of the glens 
 on either side and their encircling ramparts of rock, 
 let the observer pick his way southward along the 
 mountain of which he has now gained the top. He 
 will soon find that, from a somewhat rounded and 
 flattened ridge, it narrows into a mere knife-edged 
 crest, shelving steeply into the glens on either side. 
 It is sometimes less than a yard broad, and as it is 
 formed of broken crags and piles of loose granite- 
 blocks, it affords by no means an easy pathway. 
 The rock here, as usual, is traversed with abundant 
 joints. Of these the rains and frosts have made good 
 use, and the result has been to shatter the summit of
 
 Glens round Ben Nevis. 119 
 
 the ridge, and strew the slopes far below with its 
 ruins. The process of waste may be seen in all its 
 stages. In one part the solid granite is only begin- 
 ning to show its lines of jointing, in another these 
 lines have commenced to gape, giving the rock the 
 appearance of rude uncemented masonry, and the 
 severance can be traced on its way until the sun- 
 dered mass has fallen over, and lies perilously poised 
 on a ledge below the crest, 
 
 " As if an infant's touch could urge 
 Its headlong passage down the verge." 
 
 So narrow is the edge of the ridge in some places 
 that a single block of granite may split into two 
 parts, of which one would roll crashing down the 
 steep slope into the valley on the left hand, while 
 the other would leap to the bottom of the glen on 
 the right. In this sharp form the ridge divides, one 
 arm sweeping round the head of the glen on the 
 north-east side, while the" other circles westwards to 
 the shoulders of Ben Nevis. 
 
 A more impressive lesson of the waste of a moun- 
 tain-side, and the lowering of a mountain-top could 
 hardly be found. The narrow ridge is a mass of ruin, 
 like the shattered foundations of an ancient rampart, 
 and its fragments have been thickly strewn on the 
 steep declivities below. The larger pieces lie as a 
 whole nearest the crest, though many a huge block
 
 I2O Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 has toppled down into the depths of the glens. When 
 detached from the solid granite, they still remain a 
 prey to the same ceaseless wear and tear. Rain, 
 frosts, and snows split them up yet farther, and then, 
 as they slowly tumble over each other in their down- 
 ward course, they become by degrees smaller, though 
 still retaining their dry, angular surface. At last, 
 broken up many times in succession, they find their 
 way down into the stream that threads the bottom of 
 the glen. There, chafed against each other and the 
 rocky channel, they are rolled into shingle and gravel, 
 until at last, in the form of fine silvery sand, the waste 
 of the far granite peaks is either spread out in the 
 quiet reaches of the stream, as it winds through the 
 valley, or hurried thence by the floods, and swept out 
 into the waters of Loch Eil. The various agencies of 
 erosion thus work steadily in concert ; those that are 
 wearing down the flanks of the mountains casting no 
 more debris into the streams than these can in the end 
 sweep away. Hence each glen is insensibly widened 
 and deepened, and each mountain, as it decreases in 
 circumference and in height, silently proclaims, 
 
 "The memorial majesty of Time, 
 Impersonated in its calm decay." 
 
 Watching this ceaseless excavation, we cannot fail 
 to be powerfully impressed with the efficacy of these 
 silent atmospheric agencies of waste. Nor can we
 
 Glens round Ben Nevis. 121 
 
 well hesitate to admit that, during a period of sufficient 
 vastness, these agencies could have carved out each 
 of the glens without the aid of subterranean convul- 
 sions. The only element to be granted in the problem 
 is time a concession which the progress of geology is 
 every year making more imperative and exacting. In 
 the scenery just described, there is no evidence of any 
 open fissures or dislocations to which the glens could 
 have owed their origin. On the contrary, these deep, 
 narrow valleys are crossed at their upper ends by 
 the precipitous junction of their sides, and the con- 
 necting wall of granite, though seamed and cracked 
 by the weather, shows no trace of any great sub- 
 terranean fracture. It is indeed quite possible that 
 there may be many faults in this as in the other 
 mountainous parts of Scotland, and, as will be after- 
 wards shown, these faults may have contributed at 
 first to determine the lines of some of the glens. But 
 the profound concavity of these valleys cannot pos- 
 sibly, I think, arise from the sundering of the sides of 
 a fissure. The two deep glens to the east of Ben 
 Nevis are separated by the narrow granite ridge 
 already described ; if one of them had been opened 
 by a rending of the mountain, the expanding of its 
 sides would either have effectually prevented the other 
 from being similarly rent, or would have closed it up 
 had it been already formed. And if it be contended, 
 in answer, that the two narrow open chasms might
 
 122 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 have been produced by underground movements, and 
 afterwards enlarged by running water and the other 
 powers of erosion, such an hypothesis would really 
 assign most of the work to these gentle agencies. 
 Not only so, it might necessitate the admission that 
 every Highland mountain from which glens diverge is 
 an independent focus of disturbance an idea wholly 
 disproved by the geological structure of the High- 
 lands. The radical error of such an explanation lies 
 in the fact that it assumes the present surface of the 
 country to be, approximately at least, the same as 
 that which witnessed the supposed dislocations to 
 which the glens are attributed. It thus ignores the 
 vast denudation which the whole of that region has 
 undergone. But, as I have already tried to explain, 
 hundreds and thousands of feet of hard rock have 
 been worn away from the tops of the Highland moun- 
 tains since the rocks were metamorphosed, contorted, 
 and faulted. The existing outline of the country, 
 therefore, must represent the results, not of these 
 ancient subterranean movements, but of a long sub- 
 sequent process of denudation. And, in looking at 
 the disposition of the Highland glens and straths, 
 their winding course, their orderly system, and their 
 complete subservience to the drainage of the country, 
 it seems hard to see how any one can call in question 
 the conclusion that the valleys have been made by 
 sub-aerial waste.
 
 Passes or Bcallochs. 123 
 
 Valleys crossing Watersheds ; Passes or Beallochs. 
 
 There is one other useful lesson which may be learnt 
 on the sides of Ben Nevis. The upper ends of the 
 glens just described are formed by an abrupt wall, or 
 steep slope of granite, with a narrow, knife-edged 
 summit. On the other side of this rampart is the 
 head of another glen, trending in the opposite direc- 
 tion, so that the granite ridge is a kind of partition- 
 wall between two glens running northward, and one 
 running southward. Now it is easy to see that as this 
 wall is every year insensibly decreasing in height and 
 thickness, the time will come when it will disappear. 
 The glens, eating their way backward towards each 
 other, have reduced the space between them to narrow 
 limits. This intervening and lessening space is doomed 
 in the end to be wholly removed, and then one long 
 glen will run along the east side of Ben Nevis, with 
 perhaps a low, scarcely perceptible watershed marking 
 where the narrow transverse granite-ridge now rises. 
 Such seems to have been essentially 1 the origin of the 
 
 1 It is of course to be borne in mind, that the present forms of the 
 Highland glens show the action of the ice of the glacial period, and 
 that, though essentially the work of atmospheric waste and streams, 
 the erosion of these hollows has been greatly helped by glaciers, as 
 will be shown in the sequel.
 
 124 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 numerous long Highland valleys in which there is a 
 central inconspicuous point whence the water flows in 
 opposite directions. The sea and other powers of de- 
 gradation may have lent their aid in completing the 
 levelling of the barrier between the advancing glens. 
 But the first, and perhaps the main part of the work 
 was probably done by running water and frost. 
 
 Examples of this form of scenery will readily occur 
 to any one who has paid even a cursory visit to the 
 Highlands. Most of the high roads are carried 
 through such continuous valleys, where the watershed 
 is often so imperceptible that it may be crossed un- 
 awares, even by one who is on the outlook for it. 
 The road from Loch Carron, across Rosshire to 
 Contin, seems to run along one great transverse valley 
 bounded on either side by lofty hills, yet if the tourist 
 watches the flow of the water, where the road reaches 
 a height of somewhere about a thousand feet above 
 the sea, he will observe that the streams flow off in 
 opposite directions, one set turning eastwards, and 
 falling into the Cromarty Firth, the other bending 
 south-westward, and joining the Atlantic in Loch 
 Carron. There is no mountain, hill, or ridge, not 
 even a marked mound, to make the watershed ; the 
 valley of Loch Carron ascends inland, and imper- 
 ceptibly merges into another valley, which descends 
 to the sea on the opposite side of the island. In 
 like manner the post-road from Arisaig to Fortwilliam
 
 Passes: Sea-lochs. 125 
 
 passes through a long valley which connects the head 
 of Loch Aylort with the head of Loch Eil. Another 
 transverse glen runs from the banks of Loch Fyne, 
 across Cowal to the head of the Holy Loch, and con- 
 tains the long, narrow fresh-water lake known as Loch 
 Eck. The great north road from Perth to Inverness 
 runs up the valley of the Garry, and thence across the 
 watershed of the Grampians into Glen Truim, the 
 connexion between the two valleys being made by 
 the Pass of Drumouchter a wild glen in which, 
 among the rubbish-mounds of old glaciers, the water 
 flows partly northward down Glen Truim, and partly 
 southward down Glen Garry. In these, and innumer- 
 able other instances, the two glens seem to have been 
 deepened and cut backward toward each other by 
 the action of sub-aerial waste, sometimes aided, per- 
 haps, by the sea, until they have at last united- giving 
 rise in this way to long valleys, that run across high 
 hill-ranges. 
 
 Sea- lochs. 
 
 There is another kind of valley in the Scottish 
 Highlands deserving of special notice. To a small 
 extent on the east coast, but on a great scale along 
 the western side of the island, the sea runs inland in 
 long, narrow firths or fiords. Each of these sea-lochs 
 terminates at the mouth of a glen or strath, and 
 receives there the collected drainage of the interior.
 
 126 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 There is commonly no marked line of demarcation 
 between the land-valley, watered by 'its brawling 
 brook or river, and the sea-valley, filled with the 
 ebbing and flowing tides. The grassy slopes or 
 rocky declivities which form the sides of the one, 
 run on to form the sides of the other. If we could 
 depress the land below the present sea-level, and send 
 the salt water far up into these inland glens, they 
 would become fiords, comparable in every respect to 
 those at present indenting the western coast. If, on 
 the other hand, we were able to upraise the land, the 
 sea-lochs, emptied of their salt water, would become 
 land valleys, and it might in the end be impossible to 
 say where the former limit of the tides had been. In 
 each case we see what is in truth one valley, part of 
 it being submerged and part open to the sky. 1 It is 
 a common idea that the indented character of the 
 western coast is due to the unequal encroachments of 
 the sea. But even a superficial acquaintance with the 
 usual features of these sea-lochs ought to disprove 
 such a notion. For it is well known that the inlets 
 are, as a rule, deep, sometimes much deeper than the 
 sea outside. But the sea, as we have seen, cannot 
 scoop out deep hollows ; its erosive power is confined 
 to its upper part, and its tendency is to plane down 
 its shores. Instead of excavating a fiord, it can only 
 
 1 See Professor Ramsay's remarks, to the same effect, in his paper on 
 the origin of lakes. Quart Jour. Geo. Soc. xviiu p. 185.
 
 Sea-lochs. 127 
 
 level the rocks that are lashed by its breakers. If we 
 are right in regarding the land-valley as the result of 
 an erosion performed by running water and the other 
 sub-aerial denuding agents, a similar origin must be 
 assigned to the continuation of the same valley under 
 the sea-level. And that such is the true explanation 
 I have no doubt. The sea-lochs of the west coast are 
 thus not inlets cut out by the waves, but old glens 
 that have been submerged beneath the sea. They 
 prove that at least the west side of the island has 
 sunk down under the Atlantic in a comparatively 
 recent geological period, and that the tides now ebb 
 and flow where of old there was the murmur of 
 brooks and waterfalls. This conclusion will be seen 
 to possess much interest in its relation to the history 
 of the glacial period in Scotland. 
 
 If this view of the origin of the western sea-lochs 
 be correct, it is natural to expect that traces of dif- 
 ferent stages of the submergence should be found; 
 that, as the downward movement of the land went 
 on, some lake-basins in the valleys should have been 
 carried far down beneath the deep, that others at a 
 higher level should have sunk but a short way below 
 the waves when the depression came to an end, and 
 that others should have no more than escaped when 
 they had approached within a few yards of the sea- 
 level. Examples of these various steps in the process 
 will occur to those who are familiar with the western
 
 128 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 coasts. Of the first, Loch Fyne is a notable illustra- 
 tion, as it deepens a little south of Tarbert into a 
 basin 624 feet below the surface of the loch, and 
 shallows northward and southward. If Loch Fyne 
 were now a land-valley this depression would be 
 filled with a lake. Of the second stage, Loch Etive 
 forms a good example. That fiord narrows at Connal 
 Ferry, and across the straitened part runs a reef 
 of rocks covered at high water, but partly exposed at 
 ebb. Over this barrier the flowing tide rushes into 
 the loch, and the ebbing tide rushes out, with a 
 rapidity which, during part of the time, breaks into 
 a roar of angry foam like that of a cataract. The 
 greatest depth of the loch above these falls is 420 
 feet ; at the falls themselves there is a depth of only 
 six feet at low water, and outside this barrier the 
 soundings reach, at a distance of two miles, 168 feet. 
 Loch Etive is thus a characteristic rock-basin, and an 
 elevation of the land to the extent of only twenty feet 
 would isolate the loch from the sea, and turn it into 
 a long, winding, deep fresh-water lake. Of the third 
 stage, where the lake has been brought down close to, 
 but has not quite reached, the present sea-level, Loch 
 Maree, Loch Morar, and Loch Lomond may be taken 
 as illustrations. 1 If the downward movement were to 
 
 1 For the sake of simplicity I have left out of account the later 
 upheavals of the land, which have to a trifling extent restored what 
 the older depression had submerged. Maritime lakes, such as Loch
 
 Deltas; Sand-spits. 129 
 
 recommence, these lakes would ere long be turned 
 into arms of the sea. 
 
 It is curious to watch the efforts made by the land 
 for the recovery of its lost territory. At the head of 
 many of the sea-lochs, as for instance at Loch Car- 
 ron, the rivers are pushing their alluvial flats out into 
 the salt water, and gradually driving it backward, 
 regaining in this way, step by step, the site over 
 which they once rolled. In other cases the tides and 
 currents of the sea itself are raising barriers against 
 it. Thus Loch Fyne is nearly cut in two by the 
 long sand-bar thrown up by the tides at Otter. The 
 Gareloch in like manner is almost barred across by 
 the similar spit which runs out at Row. In each 
 instance a powerful tidal current tends to keep the 
 narrow channel open by sweeping fresh accumula- 
 tions of sediment out to sea. 
 
 The eastern seaboard of the Highlands presents 
 a striking contrast to that on the west side of the 
 island. Instead of winding far into lochs and kyles, 
 or beating round peninsulas and islands, the sea 
 there rolls along a coast-line that runs mile after 
 mile in a persistent course, interrupted merely by 
 trifling indentations. It is only in the angle between 
 the shores of Caithness and those of Elgin that inlets 
 
 Lomond, must of course have been arms of the sea when the land 
 stood at the level of the 4O-foot raised beach, that is, forty feet lower 
 than it stands to-day. 
 
 K
 
 130 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 occur in any way comparable to those of the west. 
 Beginning at Loch Fleet, on the sea margin of 
 Sutherlandshire, we pass in southward succession 
 the Firths of Dornoch, Cromarty, Beauly, Inverness 
 and Moray. These resemble in outline some of the 
 narrow fiords of the west, Cromarty Firth approach- 
 ing nearest to the western type. But they show 
 many essential points of difference their shores, as 
 a rule, are low and are usually formed, not of rocks 
 shelving down below the water, but of raised beaches 
 and slopes of boulder clay. They have thus a 
 smoothness and tameness of character which is want- 
 ing in the western sea-lochs. Moreover, they are, as 
 a whole, shallow, the tide leaving wide flats at low 
 water, and sometimes even forsaking the firth alto- 
 gether. At Loch Fleet, for instance, advantage has 
 been taken of this feature, and a strong mound hav- 
 ing been built across the firth to keep back the salt 
 water, the higher part of the loch has been turned 
 into dry land. Nearly the whole of these firths are 
 conspicuous for the sand-bars at their mouth which 
 have been thrown up by the tides above high-water 
 mark, and run out from either bank, striving as it 
 were to form a completed barrier against the sea 
 outside. The mouth of the Inverness Firth is a 
 notable example. From the east side a long low 
 sand-ridge stretches half way across and bears Fort 
 George at its extremity. From Fortrose on the west
 
 Cromarty Firth. 131 
 
 side another spit of the same kind runs out into the 
 middle of the firth, the two bars actually over- 
 lapping each other, so that if they lay exactly oppo- 
 site they would meet and turn the Inverness Firth 
 into a lake. The Dornoch Firth is likewise inter- 
 sected by a long ridge of gravel extending from the 
 south bank at Meikle Ferry, and with a correspond- 
 ing but smaller spit a little further down on the 
 north bank. 
 
 The Cromarty Firth perhaps furnishes to the geo- 
 logist more matter of interesting inquiry than any 
 of the others. At its upper end, where the Contin 
 brings down the drainage of a large tract of eastern 
 Ross-shire, the firth has been so encroached upon by 
 the advance of the river alluvium, that several square 
 miles of sandy and muddy flats are laid bare at low 
 water. From these higher shallows the firth stretches, 
 with a tolerably uniform breadth of rather more than 
 a mile, as far as Invergordon, where it reaches a 
 maximum depth of seventy feet. It then expands 
 into a wider basin, forming the sheltered spacious 
 anchorage for which the inlet is so well known. This 
 expansion of the firth is not so deep as the narrow 
 channel at Invergordon. But a little to the east of 
 the town of Cromarty, where it suddenly contracts 
 to a breadth of less than a mile, it shelves down to 
 a depth of 170 feet, and passing between the two 
 precipitous headlands of the Sutors, enters the open 
 K 2
 
 132 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Moray Firth. One who approaches from the east 
 is at once struck with the narrow chasm-like en- 
 trance of the Cromarty Firth cut through a long 
 lofty range of red sandstone precipice. It is wholly 
 unlike the mouth of any other firth in the country, 
 for it is not the seaward expansion of a land valley, 
 but seems, in some abnormal fashion, to have been 
 broken through a high barrier of hard rock. And, 
 in actual fact, it is an abnormal opening, and not the 
 original mouth of the firth. 
 
 To understand the present and the former condi- 
 tions of this sea-loch, one should ascend the heights 
 behind the town of Cromarty. Looking from the 
 crest of the Black Isle over a scene which the pen 
 and hammer of Hugh Miller have made classic 
 ground to the geologist, he sees below him the firth 
 filling the ample basin of Cromarty, creeping over 
 sandy flats in the bay of Nigg, and turning thence 
 abruptly to the south-east to force its way between 
 the Sutors. The north-west side of the estuary is 
 formed by a gently-sloping declivity stretching to- 
 wards Tain. The ridge of the Black Isle rises on the 
 south-east side and runs north-eastward through the 
 two Sutors into the long promontory of Tarbat Ness. 
 The north-easterly line of the firth is continued from 
 the Bay of Nigg to the Dornoch Firth by the low 
 valley or plain of Easter Ross, bounded on the one 
 side by the rising grounds between Invergordon and
 
 Sntors of Cromarty. 133 
 
 Tain, and on the other by the ridge of the Black 
 Isle and its prolongation beyond the North Sutor. 
 Even from a distance it is not difficult to see that 
 this low valley must have been the original outflow 
 of the firth. From the heights above Cromarty the 
 eye looks along the northward drift-covered slope of 
 the Black Isle, and if it were not known that the sea 
 flows between the Sutors, it might readily be sup- 
 posed that the ridge extends in one long continuous 
 and unbroken line from the head of the firth away to 
 Tarbat Ness. It could not be suspected that this 
 ridge is actually cut through by the present narrow 
 precipitous opening. If, then, the Cromarty Firth 
 once entered the Firth of Dornoch between Tarbat 
 Ness and Tain, how has it come to join the Moray 
 Firth by -so abrupt and narrow an outlet as that 
 which is bounded by the Sutors ? 
 
 Here, perhaps, if anywhere, the believers in the 
 efficacy of underground convulsions might make a 
 bold stand. How could the firth, they might ask, 
 quit its old channel and take one so widely different, 
 unless the new outlet had been opened for it by an 
 earthquake shock ? The two Sutors seem to 
 
 " Stand aloof, the scars remaining, 
 Like cliffs which have been rent asunder, 
 A dreary sea now flows between." 1 
 
 It may be impossible absolutely to prove the origin 
 1 Coleridge's Christabel.
 
 134 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of the deep gorge between the Cromarty Sutors ; 
 but it seems to me that there is evidence in the 
 neighbourhood strongly in favour of the supposition 
 that the work has been mainly done by running 
 water. Let the observer cross to the Nigg side of 
 the firth, and traverse the high ridge which is pro- 
 longed from the Black Isle. The rocks there are 
 well ice-worn, the moulded knolls and the striations 
 upon them running in an E.N.E. direction. Passing 
 over to the eastern coast, a line of lofty red sandstone 
 cliffs the continuation of those on the south side of 
 the entrance to the Cromarty Firth rises from the 
 rocky beach and extends northwards to Shandwick. 
 About a mile south of that fishing hamlet, a de- 
 pression or valley, running across the ridge, descends 
 into the flat plain of Easter Ross on the west side, 
 and to the edge of the sea-cliff on the east. The 
 bottom of the valley is coated with boulder clay, 
 through which two runnels, diverging from the low 
 watershed of the hollow, flow in opposite direc- 
 tions. One of them trickles westward into the 
 low grounds between the Bay of Nigg and the 
 Dornoch Firth, the other having a steeper and 
 shorter declivity has cut its way deep into the red 
 sandstone, forming there a ravine which breaks 
 through the cliff and descends upon the beach. The 
 streams are thus busy digging out the valley and 
 working their way backward to each other. The
 
 Croma rty Firth . 135 
 
 same process may have been going on previous to 
 the Age of Ice, for the valley is older than the 
 boulder clay. Nor can it be doubted, that if time 
 enough be allowed, these tiny rivulets will in the end 
 cut down the ridge, and allow the sea to force its 
 way to the plains of Easter Ross through a narrow 
 gorge similar to that between the Sutors. It will 
 be observed that this form of denudation is the 
 same as that which has been already referred to as 
 the probable origin of mountain passes, and of long 
 nearly level valleys crossing watersheds. Only, in 
 the present instance, the changes are going on close 
 to the sea level, and it can be readily seen how much, 
 in the latter stages of the process, may have been 
 done by the co-operation of the wild breakers of the 
 Northern Sea. As I have just said, it cannot be 
 demonstrated that the present outlet of the Cro- 
 marty Firth has been opened in this way, but I 
 think no one can watch the effects of the streams 
 near Shandwick without a conviction that the ex- 
 planation has high probability in its favour. 1 
 
 The greater depth, steepness and number of the fiords 
 on the west side of the island, may be partly attributed 
 to the greater height of the country on that side. 
 
 1 If, as is probable, this excavation was begun long before the glacial 
 period commenced, it may have been greatly helped by the mass of ice 
 which filled up the Cromarty Firth, and, as shown by the striations, 
 slanted across the ridge of the Black Isle. There could not fail to be 
 a great pressure of ice through the gorge between the Sutors.
 
 136 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Perhaps also a more extensive submergence of the 
 West Highlands may have helped to indent the 
 western sea-board, by allowing the waters of the 
 Atlantic to run far up among the recesses of the 
 mountains, and thus fill the glens. 1 The east coast, 
 as a whole, is lower and farther from the hills, and its 
 rivers enter the sea, not between the steep sides of 
 rocky glens, but among level or gently undulating 
 lowlands. A submergence of the seaward ends of 
 these river valleys would not make the coast-line 
 resemble the coast-line of the other side of the king- 
 dom, save only in such parts as the east of Sutherland, 
 where the mountains and their narrow glens come 
 within a short way of the sea margin. Long narrow 
 sea-lochs, like those of Inverness and Argyle, are thus 
 almost wholly absent from the eastern shores ; where 
 they do occur, it is just where the character of the 
 neighbouring ground approaches most to that of 
 the Atlantic sea-board. They are crowded together 
 in the angle between the counties of Caithness and 
 Elgin, where the mountains of Sutherland, Ross, and 
 Inverness, come closest down upon the North Sea. 
 At the same time, there may be some other cause, 
 not at first apparent, to which the singular difference 
 between the outline of the east and west coast may 
 
 1 Does this suggestion derive any support from the rise of level 
 of the deposits of Arctic shells traced from the Firth of Clyde into 
 I-anarkshire ?
 
 Valley Systems of the Highlands. 137 
 
 be due. For it must not be forgotten that precisely 
 the same kind of diversity, but on a larger scale, is 
 prolonged into the Scandinavian peninsula. The 
 west side of Norway, with its thousands of deep 
 fiords and inlets, is a magnified piece of west High- 
 land scenery, and the undulating drift-covered plains 
 of Sweden, with their comparatively unindented 
 coast-line, along the Gulf of Bothnia, recall those of 
 the east side of Scotland. 1 
 
 VALLEY SYSTEMS OF THE HIGHLANDS. 
 
 Having followed in some detail the operation of 
 atmospheric waste in wearing hollows on the surface 
 of the land, and giving rise to capacious valleys, we 
 may now look at the general results of this process 
 upon the country at large, and try to trace the pro- 
 bable origin of the various valleys and river basins. 
 To carry out this inquiry thoroughly, would demand 
 larger and better maps, alike topographical and 
 geological, than yet exist, as well as a far more 
 minute and extended series of observations than has 
 hitherto been made. I cannot pretend to do more 
 than offer a mere outline of the subject so far as I 
 have been able to apprehend it. 
 
 1 There can be no doubt that at least some of the later touches were 
 given to the scenery both of Scandinavia and of Britain by the agencies 
 of the glacial period.
 
 138 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 If the reader will take a map of Scotland, and 
 consider with attention the arrangement of the glens 
 and straths of the Highlands, he will remark, I think, 
 that two systems of valleys can there be made out. 
 Of these, the one has a general trend from north-east 
 to south-west, the other from north-west to south-east, 
 the one series being thus transverse to the other. 
 Between these two systems there are many inter- 
 mediate examples; nay, the same valley may some- 
 times incline to the one and sometimes to the other. 
 But even with such doubtful forms, the two main 
 systems remain tolerably persistent. As illustrations 
 of the north-east and south-west, or longitudinal 
 valleys, reference may be made to the Great Glen, 
 Lochs Carron, Shiel, Linnhe, Fyne, Awe, and to the 
 valleys of the Findhorn, Spey, and Loch Tay. The 
 north-west and south-east, or transverse valleys, are 
 conspicuously seen on the eastern and western sides 
 of Sutherland and Ross, in Inverness and Argyle, and 
 throughout the eastern half of the kingdom, from the 
 headlands of Aberdeenshire to the Forth. 
 
 It must be granted that no clue remains as to what 
 may have been in detail the original form of the 
 surface, when the metamorphosed corrugated schist, 
 gneiss, and quartz-rock of the Highlands were first 
 upheaved above the sea. The land possibly rose in 
 one or more broad ridges, having a north-easterly 
 direction with a seaward slope along either side.
 
 Valley Systems of the Highlands. 139 
 
 Rain falling on such a surface, as has been already 
 remarked, would of course run off as rapidly as it 
 could, selecting for itself the readiest paths which 
 would naturally lie down the declivity from the 
 summit level of the ground to the sea. The drainage 
 would thus collect into streams flowing at right 
 angles to the trend of the land, one series descending 
 to the south-east, and the other to the north-west. 
 When these streams once began to flow they would 
 tend to keep the channels they had chosen. The 
 sides of these channels would simultaneously be 
 attacked by rain and springs, and in due season by 
 frost, so that the ancient Highland table-land, instead 
 of being cut into a network of deep chasms, such as 
 would have resulted from the action of the streams 
 alone, became a prey to a much more diffused and 
 general waste, by which the water-courses were 
 gradually widened and deepened into valleys. The 
 detritus of the slopes was washed down by rain into 
 the streams which both carried off this detritus, and 
 continued to excavate their own beds. Thus valleys 
 slowly sank, as it were, into the table-land. To this 
 process I am inclined to attribute the origin of those 
 transverse Highland glens and straths, which run 
 more or less directly across the strike of the rocks, 
 and descend to left and right of the main chain of 
 high grounds. 
 
 The excavation of these valleys formed part of the
 
 140 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 general denudation and lowering of the surface of the 
 country. But the rain, springs, frosts and streams, 
 which were busy everywhere, would have their effects 
 largely determined by the varying nature of the 
 rocks. As the prevailing strike of the strata forming 
 the Highlands passes from south-west to north-east, 
 the ridges of harder and softer material run in that 
 direction. The larger faults, the anticlinal and syn- 
 clinal axes, follow the same line. It would be natural, 
 therefore, that choosing some original depressions or 
 hollowing them along bands of more easily worn rock, 
 the powers of waste, besides deepening and widening 
 the transverse water-courses, should also in the end 
 cut out a series of long parallel valleys corresponding 
 to the strike of the rocks that is, from south-west 
 to north-east. Such seems to me to be the probable 
 origin of the longitudinal valleys, such as the Great 
 Glen, Upper Loch Fyne, Loch Tay, and the numer- 
 ous parallel glens and fiords of the south-western 
 Highlands. It must be remembered, however, that 
 even these valleys do not in every case, nor even, 
 perhaps, in any case, rigidly conform to the line of 
 strike or fault or axis which at first fixed their direc- 
 tion. The original determining cause has not been 
 permanent or powerful enough to prevent the eroding 
 agents from cutting deeply into the rocks on either 
 side, and turning a straight valley into a more or less 
 winding one. Still, no one can fail to remark that
 
 Valley Systems of the Highlands. 141 
 
 these north-east depressions are, as a whole, far more 
 straight and parallel than those which run in a trans- 
 verse direction. If the explanation of their origin 
 here given is correct, this difference may be thus 
 accounted for. The direction of the valleys that 
 diverge to right and left from the main line of water 
 parting was determined by the first seaward flow of 
 the rain across the strike of the rocks of which the 
 newly upraised land was formed. There were no 
 great geological lines to guide the drainage which 
 thus found its way among the irregularities of the 
 sea- worn slopes of the ancient table-land. Hence the 
 valleys, while they preserve a general trend at right 
 angles to the main chain of heights, are found to 
 sweep into broad curves, cutting across many different 
 rocks in succession, and sometimes coming back 
 again upon themselves, in a manner for which their 
 geological structure will not in anywise account. 
 The valleys that follow, on the other hand, a south- 
 westerly and north-easterly course, run in a general 
 sense parallel to the strike of the rocks, and their 
 straightness and parallelism have no doubt been 
 determined by the trend of the rocks along the edges 
 of which they have been worn. 1 
 
 i Although I have long held the belief of Hutton, that our valleys are 
 mainly the work of atmospheric waste, the history of the process of 
 their excavation was but dimly understood by me until the appearance 
 of the admirable paper by my colleague, Mr. J. B. Jukes, on the 
 River- Valleys of the South of Ireland. The explanation above given 
 
 of
 
 142 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The watershed of the country runs southward 
 from Cape Wrath to the head of Loch Quoich, 
 whence it turns sharply eastward between Lochs 
 Lochy and Oich to the Monadhleadh Mountains and 
 the hills above the head of Loch Laggan. It then 
 follows a curving southerly course, past the west end 
 of the Moor of Rannoch, and the Brae Lyon moun- 
 tains to Crianlarich, thence across Ben Lomond, and 
 south-eastward over the Campsie Fells into the wide 
 Lowland valley. Skirting the south-western parts of 
 Linlithgow and Midlothian, it strikes up into the 
 Pentland Hills, thence due south between the valleys 
 of the Clyde and Tweed to the Hatfell heights, 
 from which it sweeps across the southern uplands to 
 the Cheviot Hills. To the west or left side of this 
 line the water flows into the Atlantic ; to the east or 
 right side it enters the German Ocean. This water- 
 shed, it will be seen, runs irregularly across the course 
 of the main hill ranges, just as the watershed of 
 Europe, for example, from Gibraltar to St. Peters- 
 burg, sweeps in a widely curving line athwart the 
 chief mountain chains. Owing to the comparative 
 
 of the probable relative history of the Highland valleys is essentially the 
 same as that which he has proposed for those of Ireland, see Quart. 
 Jour. Geol. Soc. xviii. (1862) p. 378. There must still be many diffi- 
 culties in the application of these views, arising, among other causes, 
 from a want of minute and correct topographical geology and good 
 maps. But they explain so much and reconcile so many discrepancies, 
 that I have gladly availed myself of them in trying to gain some insight 
 into the history of Highland scenery.
 
 Watershed of the Highlands. 143 
 
 steepness of the west side of the island, the line of 
 water-parting keeps much closer to the Atlantic than 
 to the German Ocean. Hence by far the larger area 
 of the country is drained into the latter sea. In the 
 northern or Highland half of Scotland no river of 
 any notable size enters the Atlantic, while on the 
 east side, the Spey, the Dee, the Don, the Tay, and a 
 number of smaller, but still considerable, rivers carry 
 the drainage of the mountains to the sea. 
 
 On the western side of the watershed, as it runs 
 down Sutherland, Ross, and Inverness-shire from 
 Cape Wrath to Loch Ouoich, almost every great valley 
 that enters the sea comes down from the south-east 
 and has its seaward portion filled by the tides of the 
 Atlantic. The only marked exceptions are Lochs 
 Keeshorn, Carron and Alsh. These belong to the 
 longitudinal or north-easterly system of valleys. In 
 Loch Torridon there is an approximation to a 
 union of the two series ; for the long valley that 
 comes across from Kinlochewe enters Upper Loch 
 Torridon from the north-east, and not until the 
 mouth of that loch is reached does the fiord turn 
 into the prevailing north-westerly course. So at the 
 head of Loch Duich the dark Alpine defile of Glen 
 Shiel opens from the south-east, while another glen 
 comes down from the Bealloch of Kintail on the 
 north-east, and the two valleys unite at a right angle 
 to form Loch Duich.
 
 144 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The rest of the Highlands to the west of the 
 watershed exhibits a predominance of the longitu- 
 dinal valleys, the chief being Loch Linnhe, Loch 
 Awe, Loch Fyne, Loch Long and the glens of which 
 they are seaward continuations. In no part of the 
 Highlands can the direct effect of geological struc- 
 ture in determining the trend of ridges and hollows 
 be better seen than on the east side of the Sound of 
 Jura. The long narrow sea-lochs of Craignish, Swene, 
 Killisport and Tarbert have been cut out along bands 
 of schist and slate, which all run from south-west to 
 north-east ; and even the direction of the little creeks 
 and headlands, and the form of the islands have been 
 largely determined by the same cause. This is the 
 reason why along that part of the coast, island, pro- 
 montory, bay, and fiord seem all ranged in parallel 
 lines bearing towards the south-west. 
 
 Throughout the greater part of the eastern side of 
 the country the water, instead of finding its way 
 to the sea by hundreds of independent streams, is 
 gathered into wide basins, and enters the German 
 Ocean in large rivers. From John o' Groat's House 
 to the Dornoch Firth the valleys belong to the trans- 
 verse or south-east group, like those on the opposite 
 side of the watershed. From the Dornoch Firth 
 eastward to the borders of Aberdeenshire, the valleys 
 of the Cromarty Firth and the Beauly, Ness, Nairn, 
 Findhorn and Spey are illustrations of the longitu-
 
 River Tay. 145 
 
 dinal series. 1 Some of these streams, as the Find- 
 horn and Spey, show well how, though the general 
 direction of the valley has been marked out by the 
 strike of the rocks, the river has not scrupled to cut 
 its way to right and left across the strike, and now 
 wanders in wide winding curves, though its course as 
 a whole is parallel with the trend of the strata. On 
 the eastern side, from Buchan to the Firth of Tay, 
 the transverse system prevails. It is shown by the 
 valleys of the Don, and the Dee, the two Esks, the 
 Isla, the Shee and Ericht, the Garry and Tay. 
 
 Let us look for a little at the basin of the Tay, 
 where the two groups are characteristically developed. 
 The river drains an area of 2,750 square miles, and 
 pours a larger amount of water into the ocean than any 
 river in Britain. 2 It rises among the lofty mountains 
 between Strath Fillan and the head of Loch Fyne, 
 and after a short course down Strath Fillan, strikes 
 in a long north-easterly line down Glen Dochert into 
 Loch Tay, and thence to a point below Grandtully 
 Castle, where it turns sharply round into the trans- 
 verse valley of the TummeL I have already had 
 occasion to point out that Loch Tay runs along an 
 
 1 "SMiy the longitudinal valleys should have the ascendancy over the 
 transverse ones is a question not easily answered. Unequal upheaval 
 or depression of the country may have had a powerful influence upon 
 the river-systems. 
 
 The discharge is estimated 273,000 cubic feet per minute. See 
 A. K. Johnston's General Gazeteer, edit 1864. 
 
 L
 
 146 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 anticlinal axis. 1 The whole of this part of the valley 
 of the Tay, from the head of Glen Dochert to the 
 Tummel, corresponds with the general strike of the 
 rocks, and no doubt owes its origin and direction to 
 that coincidence. It is one of the longitudinal valleys 
 of which the erosion has been determined by geo- 
 logical structure. But at its north-eastern end it is 
 abruptly cut off by the transverse valley which comes 
 from the north-west down Glen Garry. A few miles 
 further north the same transverse valley truncates in 
 like manner the strath of the Tummel, and thus the 
 drainage, which had flowed for many miles through 
 the mountains towards the north-east:, is turned back 
 at a right angle to its previous course, and carried to 
 the south-east, out of the Highlands into the wide 
 plains of Strathmore. 
 
 If one may venture to offer a possible explanation 
 of the history of these valleys, I may suggest that 
 the course of the Garry was defined before any 
 marked hollows ran transverse to it. This valley 
 comes down from the heart of the mountains and 
 passes away to the south-east, like those of the neigh- 
 bouring Forfarshire rivers. It thus follows what 
 would be at first the natural descent of the water, by 
 the shortest and readiest route from the high grounds 
 
 1 The surface of Loch Tay is 355 feet above the sea, and its depth 
 varies up to 600 feet, (A. K. Johnson, loc. tit.). Its bottom is thus 
 nearly 250 feet below the level of the sea.
 
 " Valley of the Tay. 147 
 
 to the sea. The long valley of Loch Tay and Glen 
 Dochert, on the other hand, has been excavated 
 along an anticlinal axis or fold of the quartz-rocks 
 and schists, 1 by the same atmospheric agencies which 
 have carved out Glen Garry. But the latter glen had 
 already been deepened sufficiently to carry off all the 
 drainage that might come from any longitudinal 
 valleys. These valleys, therefore, could not cross it, 
 but must needs pour their waters into it, and help in 
 this way to increase the rapidity of its excavation. 2 
 To the south-west of the valley of the Garry, Tummel, 
 and Tay, there is a number of short valleys or de- 
 pressions running parallel to it across the ridge of 
 hills between Loch Tay and the Lowland border. 
 Some of these, like Glen Ogle, pass completely 
 across this ridge, and on the north-west bank of the 
 Loch Tay Valley they find their counterparts in 
 depressions which trend to the north-west towards 
 Rannoch. It almost seems as if these depressions 
 once ran south-eastward, across what is now the deep 
 hollow of Glen Dochert and Loch Tay, that hollow 
 
 1 The coincidence of a valley with an anticlinal axis may perhaps be 
 traceable to an actual fracture of the strata along this line of severe 
 tension. Not that the present sides of the valley are the sides of the 
 fracture, nor even that there was ever an open fissure at the surface at 
 all, but that after the removal of a great mass of rock by the sea, and 
 other denuding agencies, the crack still gave rise to a feature above 
 ground and guided the subaerial forces in their work of erosion. 
 
 2 Let me again refer the reader to Mr. Juke's paper, already quoted, 
 on the River-valleys of the South of Ireland.
 
 148 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 having since then been gradually cut out so as 
 to sever these transverse valleys and divert their 
 drainage in great part into its own channel. 1 
 
 1 The erosion of the glacial period must not be forgotten. Loch 
 Tay, like the other rock-inclosed Highland lakes, has had its basin 
 scooped out, I believe, by land-ice ; but the valley itself was probably 
 there before the ice filled it. This subject will be discussed a few pages 
 further on. With regard to the power of streams to shift their own 
 course and cut their way to each other across a low watershed, it 
 may be mentioned here in passing that the main watershed of the 
 country between the Tweed and Clyde, crosses at one part a low valley 
 through which it would be easy to cut a channel for the Clyde. Indeed, 
 if good care were not taken of its banks, the Clyde would ere long dig 
 the channel for itself and flow into the Tweed. In offering the above 
 sketch of the origin of the Highland valleys, I make it chiefly as a 
 suggestion in a subject full of difficulty, and standing much in need of 
 thorough discussion. Though I am fully persuaded that these valleys 
 are to be looked upon as the results not of subterranean movements, 
 but of subaerial denudation, I have still very much to learn as to the 
 way in which the process of excavation was carried on.
 
 Ancient Highland Glaciers. 149 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 INFLUENCE OF ANCIENT GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS ON HIGHLAND 
 SCENERY. 
 
 FROM the foregoing narrative it appears that a wide 
 sea-worn tract of land has, since the time of the 
 Lower Old Red Sandstone, been channelled out by 
 running water, and general atmospheric waste, into 
 systems of valleys, between which the intervening 
 ground, having suffered less denudation, rises up into 
 ranges of hills and mountains the whole forming 
 the framework of the Highlands of Scotland. We 
 have now to trace the impress of another agency 
 that of glacier-ice and icebergs, no longer at work 
 in our country, but which once distinguished the 
 British Isles as markedly as the Arctic ice-fields 
 characterise Greenland, and which played an impor- 
 tant part in the changes that brought about the 
 present scenery of the country. It is now well 
 ascertained that during a comparatively recent geo- 
 logical period, the climate of the northern hemi- 
 sphere was much colder than at present, and that in 
 the British Islands, as well as in other countries 
 where glaciers are now unknown, the land was en- 
 veloped in snow and ice. This part of the geological
 
 150 Scenery of Scotland, 
 
 record is known as the Glacial Period. There is a 
 growing belief among geologists that it was not an 
 abnormal condition of things, but that in the past 
 history of the globe there have been older cold 
 periods succeeding each other after wide intervals. 
 
 In following the track of the ancient Scottish gla- 
 ciers and icebergs, and noting how much they have 
 influenced the scenery of the country, it must be 
 borne in mind that the present great leading features 
 of mountain and valley had been fixed before the 
 ice-age began. The Highland hills rose then above 
 the glens and valleys as they still do, and the glens 
 and valleys wound in the same tortuous course to- 
 wards the sea. The minor outlines of the surface-, 
 however, were, perhaps, in many respects, unlike those 
 which it wears at the present day. There may have 
 been, and probably there was, far more angularity 
 and ruggedness about the contour of that ancient 
 land. The passing of the long glacial period did 
 much to remove such irregularities and smooth the 
 general surface of the country. But though the ice 
 must have worn down the valleys, it did not make 
 them. They are to be attributed, I believe, to that 
 earlier process of sub-aerial denudation which has 
 just been sketched. Keeping in recollection, there- 
 fore, that hill and valley were grouped into their 
 present arrangement before the ice began to settle 
 down upon them, let us look for a little at the evi-
 
 Track of the great Ice-sheet. 151 
 
 dence from which this strange chapter in the coun- 
 try's history is deciphered. 1 
 
 Track of the First Great Ice-sheet of the Glacial Period. 
 
 The surface of Scotland, like that of Ireland and 
 large tracts of England, as well as the whole of 
 Scandinavia and northern Europe, has a peculiar 
 contour, visible almost everywhere, irrespective of 
 the nature of the rock on which it shows itself, and 
 therefore to be regarded as the result of one great 
 process, acting upon all the rocks alike, long after 
 they had been formed. This contour consists in a 
 rounding and smoothing of the hills and valleys into 
 long flowing outlines. What were once prominent 
 crags have been ground down into undulating or 
 pillow-shaped knolls, and deep hollows or gentler 
 depressions have been worn in the solid rock, not at 
 random, but in a recognisable system. These fea- 
 tures may be seen throughout the whole of the 
 country. At present we are concerned only with 
 their development in the Highlands. It may seem 
 paradoxical to speak of the well-known rugged 
 Highland mountains as showing traces of a general 
 smoothing of their surface. But such is really the 
 case. There may be places, indeed, where from 
 
 1 See Memoir on the Glacial Drift of Scotland; and North British 
 Revitw, Vol. xxxix. p. 286, et seq.
 
 152 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 height, or steepness, or some other cause, the 
 smoothed surface was never communicated ; and 
 there is everywhere a constantly progressing destruc- 
 tion of that peculiar outline ; the rains, springs, and 
 frosts are re-asserting their sway, and carving anew 
 upon the country its ancient ruggedness. Never- 
 theless, to an eye which has learnt to distinguish the 
 characteristic flowing lines, there are not many land- 
 scapes in the kingdom where they cannot be traced. 
 Even in the wildest Highland scenery, where the 
 casual tourist may see nothing but thunder-riven 
 crags and precipices, and glens blocked up with their 
 ruins 
 
 " Precipitous black, jagged rocks, 
 For ever shattered and the same for ever," 
 
 the geologist can often detect traces of the same 
 universal smoothing and moulding. Nay, it is pre- 
 cisely amid such scenes that he is most vividly im- 
 pressed with the fact that the surface of the country 
 has been ground down by a vast general agent, for he 
 there sees what are the natural outlines which the 
 rocks assume when left to the ordinary attacks of the 
 elements. Instead of smooth undulating outlines he 
 notes craggy precipices and scars, here and there red 
 and fresh, where the last winter's frosts have let loose 
 masses of rock into the valleys below. He can trace 
 how in this way, the hand of Nature is once more
 
 Ice-worn Rocks. 153 
 
 roughening the landscape, restoring to the hard rocks 
 their cliffs and ravines, and to each knoll and crag a 
 renewal of its former angularity. Yet his eye rests 
 continually upon little bosses of rock, or even upon 
 whole hill sides where, owing to a covering of drift or 
 soil or to the nature of the rock, the change has gone 
 on but slowly, and where he can still view the un- 
 effaced traces of that wonderful process by which 
 the surface of the country from Cape Wrath to the 
 Solway has been worn and smoothed. 
 
 This wide-spread abrasion, however, is not only a 
 general moulding of the country on the great scale. 
 It can be traced on hills and crags of every size down 
 to mere hummocks and knolls ; nay, even to the 
 merest knobs and protuberances ; in short, not only 
 is the general configuration of the surface affected by 
 it, but it may be followed out upon all the little 
 dimples and prominences on a freshly exposed surface 
 of rock. The hardest rocks usually show its effects 
 best, and when the soil and superficial detritus are 
 stripped from them, their faces may often be seen to 
 be as smoothly dressed as if they had been cut in a 
 mason's yard, and were meant to form part of the 
 polished ashlar-work of a great building. Further, 
 not only are they thus planed down, they are traversed 
 by long and more or less parallel ruts and striae, 
 varying in depth and width from mere streaks, such 
 as might be made by a grain of sand, up to grooves
 
 154 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 like those worn in old pavements by the cart-wheels 
 of successive generations. The fine striations may 
 be seen descending into the hollows and mounting 
 over the prominences of a rock, keeping all the while 
 their general direction, with about as much regularity 
 and persistence as they do over the most even surface. 
 It is plain that in whatever manner these markings 
 were produced, they must be due to no violent agent 
 rushing like a debacle across the country. They can 
 only have been made in a quiet, leisurely way, by 
 some force that paid little or no regard to the minor 
 inequalities of the ground, but passed on with a 
 steady persistent march, pressing grains of sand, 
 pebbles, and even large blocks of stone upon the 
 rocks below, in such a way as to leave there at last 
 a smooth polished surface, marked by striations of 
 varying coarseness, according as the rude polishing 
 paste of detritus consisted of fine sand, or gravel, or 
 boulders. 
 
 Now, just as the whole country has been smoothed, 
 so has it at the same time, by the same agent, been 
 striated. It is hardly possible anywhere to peel off 
 the upper covering of clay and soil without laying 
 bare a striated surface of rock, if the rock be at all 
 of a kind to receive and preserve such markings. 
 Moreover, these striations are distributed with a re- 
 markable symmetry. They radiate from the main 
 mountain masses outwards to. the sea (see Map,
 
 PL I 
 
 MAP OF SCOTLAND 
 
 s nifli, :,/.- // 7 ,,i,i,-t,,cn( / ,,r tj^ /and ice,- of tht, tHeu-icU tf
 
 Movement of the Glacier. 155 
 
 Plate I). Down all the western fiords they may be 
 traced along the wavy undulating bosses of polished 
 rock until they pass beneath the waters of the At- 
 lantic. Along the Pentland Firth they may be seen 
 in like manner descending from the high grounds of 
 Sutherland northwards to the coast-line. On the 
 eastern side of the island the same seaward trend of 
 the ruts and striae on the rock is traceable from 
 Caithness to Berwick. Into the long valley of the 
 Great Glen the striations come down from the high 
 mountainous tracts on either side, and turn into the 
 line of the valley, so as to run out into the Moray 
 Firth on the north and into the Linnhe Loch on 
 the south. In the glens that open upon the estuary 
 of the Clyde the rocks are striated along the line of 
 each valley, passing up inland into high grounds in 
 the interior, and striking outwards beneath the sea. 
 The very islands in that firth are striated in the same 
 way. Bute, for instance, is a notable example, for the 
 striae, after coming down the glens of Cowal and pass- 
 ing beneath the Kyles, reappear on the Bute shores, 
 actually mount the slopes of the island, so as to go 
 right across it at a height of more than five hundred 
 feet, and descend upon the firth on the south-west 
 side. {Fig. 10.) Again, we can sometimes trace the 
 striations out of one glen or sea-loch over a watershed 
 into another of the numerous long and deep inlets 
 that ascend from the basin of the Clyde. Thus from
 
 156 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Loch Lomond these strange almost indelible mark- 
 ings can be seen striking through the short cross 
 valley at Tarbet and descending upon Loch Long at 
 Arrochar. From the latter loch, again, they may be 
 followed over the watershed which separates that 
 fiord from the Gareloch, and thence down the latter 
 valley into the Clyde. 1 In Loch Fyne, also, con- 
 tinuing in the line of the upper part of that valley, 
 they are not deflected when this loch makes a bend 
 
 FIG. 10. ICE-WORN ROCKS NEAR SUMMIT OF BARONE HILL, BUTE. 
 
 south of Ardrishaig, but actually ascend the hills 
 above Tarbert, and cross heights of eight hundred 
 feet into the Sound of Jura. 2 There is no great sea- 
 loch, or glen on the west coast where these features 
 may not be seen to a greater or less extent. As an 
 
 1 First described by Mr. Maclaren. Edin. New Phil. Jour. vol. xl. 
 
 2 Described by Mr. T. F. Jamieson. Quart. Journal, Geo. Soc. 
 vol. xviii. p. 177.
 
 Ice in Loch Riden. 157 
 
 example, at once easily visited and eminently cha- 
 racteristic, I may refer to the valley of Glendarual, 
 which, descending from the mountains of Argyleshire, 
 opens into the inlet of Loch Riden and thence into 
 the Kyles of Bute. If the observer will take boat 
 and row gently along the rocky shore, and among the 
 numerous islets of the comparatively short estuary of 
 Loch Riden, he will be amazed at the freshness in 
 which the smoothed and striated rock-surfaces have 
 been preserved. Wending his way between the islets 
 and headlands, he will notice that on looking towards 
 the head of the loch, his eye catches the rough blunt 
 faces of the different crags and knolls; that, as he 
 passes them, their sides, parallel in a general way 
 with the sides of the loch, are well polished and 
 striated, and that their upper ends, or those which 
 face up the loch, are all worn down and smoothed off. 
 He could not desire a more instructive lesson as to 
 the nature of that smoothing process to which the 
 surface of the country at large has been exposed. 
 The strise running parallel to the loch, the blunted 
 and worn look of those parts of the crags and hum- 
 mocks of rock that point up the valley, and the com- 
 paratively fresh and rough faces of those that look 
 towards the open sea, indicate, as plainly as words 
 can do, that the agent which smoothed and striated 
 the sides of Loch Riden must have moved downwards 
 along the length of the valley from the high grounds
 
 158 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of the interior. Nor is this all. An ascent of the 
 valley of Glendarual, above the head of the sea-loch, 
 will show that the agent which produced the striations 
 must have filled up the glen to the brim, and actually 
 overflowed it. For the long parallel markings on the 
 rocks can be followed as they slant over the west side 
 of the valley and pass across the hills of Cowal into 
 Loch Fyne. The ground between that loch and the 
 Glendarual valley has been worn down into many 
 hollows which, with the striations, trend away to the 
 south-west 
 
 Geologists are now generally agreed that these 
 smoothed surfaces of rock, along with the striae and 
 grooves which cover them, have been produced by ice. 
 Till lately the commonly received opinion in this 
 country has been that they were caused, during a 
 submergence of the land, by icebergs laden with sand 
 and blocks of stone, whereby the rocks at the sea- 
 bottom were scratched and worn down as the icy 
 masses continued to be driven upon them. Within 
 the last few years, however, this explanation has anew 
 been called in question as inadequate to explain all 
 the phenomena. The striae, as we have seen, do not 
 merely run along the top or side of a hill, they 
 sometimes run up and over it. Moreover, they ac- 
 commodate themselves to all the little inequalities of 
 the surface over which they pass. This could hardly 
 have been done by a rigid mass of ice moving hori-
 
 Action of Land-ice in Highlands. 159 
 
 zontally like a berg or floe, with no determinate 
 motion of its own, but driven by the ocean-currents 
 and by winds : on the contrary, it points to an agent 
 of such plasticity, as to be able to mould itself upon 
 the irregularities of its rocky bed and to rise or fall 
 as the nature of the ground required. And this agent, 
 as shown by the divergence of the striations, must 
 have moved outwards and downwards from the chief 
 mountain masses, such as the Grampians and the 
 chain of heights from Loch Eribol to the Sound of 
 Mull. It must have filled up wide and deep valleys, 
 pressing everywhere steadily and mightily upon the 
 rocks, disregarding the minor features of the surface 
 of the country, passing even over hills six or eight 
 hundred feet high, as if they were but mole-hills, and 
 continuing its operation over so vast a period as 
 finally to leave the country smoothed and polished, 
 or as it were, moulded into a flowing undulating 
 contour. 
 
 To fulfil these conditions the only agent known 
 in nature appears to be land-ice or glaciers. The 
 polished -and striated rocks find their exact counter- 
 parts along the course of every modern glacier. 
 There is hardly a Highland glen, nay, strange as it 
 may sound, there are not many hill-sides, even of 
 the Lowlands, which do not remind one of the roches 
 moutonn/es, or ice-worn knolls of the Alps. The 
 moulded outlines are the same, the striae are the
 
 160 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 same, and the parallelism of the striations with the 
 direction of the long valleys is alike the same, in 
 Scotland and in Switzerland. In comparing the 
 rock-markings of the two countries, we are driven to 
 admit, that as in the one case we see these markings 
 to be manifestly the work of moving glacier-ice which 
 is still visible and still producing the same results ; 
 so, in the other instance, precisely similar effects can 
 hardly but be due to the same cause, although the 
 Scottish glaciers have long disappeared. It is more 
 than twenty years since Agassiz, fresh from a study 
 of the Swiss glaciers, announced this conclusion. But 
 British geologists, after trying every other expedient, 
 have only recently begun generally to adopt it. 
 Their difficulty lay not in the admission of the 
 existence of glaciers in Scotland, for admirable de- 
 scriptions of glacier-moraines and striae in Skye, 
 Forfarshire, and Argyleshire, were published by Prin- 
 cipal Forbes, Sir Charles Lyell, and Mr. Maclaren. 1 
 But if the universal striation \vere everywhere taken 
 as evidence of the existence of land-ice, it was plain 
 that Scotland must not merely have been the seat of 
 local glaciers as Switzerland is at the present day, 
 but must have been actually sealed in ice from 
 mountain-top to sea-shore. This was a supposition 
 
 1 See these and the other papers referred to in chronological order in 
 Appendix II. to my Memoir on this subject Mr. R. Chambers has 
 long believed the whole of Scotland to have been under ice.
 
 G lactation of Greenland. 161 
 
 too violent for ready belief, and hence the attempt 
 to account for the smoothing and striation of the 
 country by iceberg action. 
 
 But the iceberg hypothesis must, I believe, be aban- 
 doned. Geologists are at length reluctantly, and 
 against all their previous speculations, driven to con- 
 fess that, after all, Scotland, and probably at least the 
 north of England, must have been swathed in one 
 vast wintry mantle of snow and ice. The present 
 aspect of the Greenland continent, already referred 
 to, probably gives us a close reproduction of the 
 scenery of our own country when the cold of the 
 glacial period was at its height. It is plain that such 
 a thick mass of ice enveloping the whole land, and 
 ceaselessly pressing down towards the sea to break 
 off there into bergs, must have a constant grinding 
 movement far grander in its geological results than 
 that of any mere valley-glacier. The glacier wears 
 down only the sides and bottom of the valley in 
 which it flows ; but the great Greenland ice-sheet, 
 covering the length and breadth of the country, and 
 allowing the underlying rocks to be seen only in 
 occasional inland peaks, and in a narrow interrupted 
 strip along the sea-coast, must effect an abrasion of 
 the whole surface infinitely greater than any local 
 glacier could do. We have no reason to suppose that 
 the surface of Greenland differs from that of neigh- 
 bouring areas of the northern hemisphere. The 
 M
 
 1 62 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 portions which every summer sets free from the snow, 
 suffice to indicate that those parts which are never 
 bared of their perennial wintry garb, partake of the 
 same inequalities, here intersected by valleys, and 
 there rising into ridges and hills, nay, even sweeping 
 up into lofty peaks, which are sometimes seen pro- 
 truding black and jagged above the snow. Yet these 
 varieties in the contour of its bed do not prevent the 
 steady seaward descent of the ice. Where the ice is 
 much crevassed it may be travelling over rocky or 
 steep ground, while in other places, where the ground 
 probably slopes more gently, the surface of the ice is 
 unbroken. But whether its floor be rough or smooth, 
 steep or level, the ice is ever moving with a resistless 
 march towards the sea. Its mass must thus be so 
 immense that it treats as mere pebbles in its path, 
 ridges and even hills of possibly very considerable 
 elevation. It seems to pass as easily over them as a 
 deep river sweeps over the stones that roughen its 
 channel. 
 
 The Scandinavian peninsula affords an interesting 
 connecting link between the existing condition of 
 Greenland and the state of Scotland during the 
 glacial period. The immense snow fields of Norway 
 are but the relics of the sheet of ice and snow which 
 once covered that country and turned it into another 
 Greenland. This sheet has shrunk up into the high 
 grounds, from which it protrudes into the valleys in
 
 G lactation of Norway. 163 
 
 the form of glaciers, but it has not done so without 
 leaving its stamp on the surface of the country 
 The rocks are there also glaciated, or worn into 
 those flowing outlines which have been described as 
 characteristic of the rocks of Scotland. Down the 
 valleys and fiords may be traced the polished sur- 
 faces, with their ruts and grooves still as fresh 
 as if they had only lately been made. From the sea- 
 margin, where these markings slip under the waves, 
 and where no ice is now to be seen, we can follow 
 them upward step by step, till they pass into those 
 which the great glaciers are now graving on the rocks 
 of the interior. The inference cannot be withheld 
 that at one time these glaciers, instead of melting 
 away where they now do, stretched far down the 
 valleys and went out to sea, and that as the striae can 
 be found high on the hill sides, the valleys must 
 have been filled to the brim with ice. In short, 
 Scandinavia at that time was in the same state in 
 which Greenland still remains. The climate has 
 grown milder, indeed, but the great inland snow-fields 
 and glaciers yet continue as silent witnesses of the 
 severity of the ancient climate. 
 
 Passing southwards, we see the perpetual snow 
 gradually disappear, and when we reach the British 
 Isles, it is gone, although in sheltered crannies of the 
 Grampians gleaming patches may be seen late in 
 autumn which have outlasted the summer and will 
 M 2
 
 164 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 lie till covered by the drifts of the next December. 
 And yet, though snow-field and glacier have fled, they 
 have left their mark as clearly and widely on the 
 rocks of Scotland as on those of Norway. A calm 
 investigation of the rock-markings seems to me to 
 render this conclusion certain. No iceberg action 
 could have moulded the contour of this country to its 
 present form, any more than icebergs could have 
 worn down the hills and valleys of Scandinavia. The 
 more we pursue this supposition the more utterly 
 inadequate does it appear. That icebergs may per- 
 form a good deal of abrasion as they grate along the 
 sea-bottom, and that much may have been done in 
 this way in the British area, more especially over the 
 Lowlands, during some parts of the glacial period, 
 no one will probably deny. But the divergence 
 both of the rock-mouldings and of the striation 
 from the main mountain-ranges shows, I think, con- 
 clusively that the force by which these changes on the 
 surface were produced, did not come from a distance, 
 but had its seat in the country itself. It is quite pos- 
 sible, indeed, that when, during the glacial period, the 
 land had sunk two thousand feet or more below its 
 present level, fleets of arctic bergs may have drifted 
 over the submerged hills and scored them with ruts 
 and grooves running from north to south. By this 
 means it may be just to account for such high-lying 
 groovings and striae (first noticed by Mr. Chambers),
 
 Glaciation by Floating-ice and Glaciers, 165 
 
 as cross what must have been the direction of the 
 flow of the ancient ice-sheet. Floating ice, also, 
 derived from the Highland glaciers, may have drifted 
 out to sea and have rasped the sides and summits 
 of the less elevated Highland hills, as well as the 
 heights in the low country. But this explanation 
 leaves by far the larger part of the glaciation of the 
 country unaccounted for. The striation of Scotland, 
 down even to its minutest features, is similar to what 
 is now effected by the moving of a body of land-ice, 
 such as a glacier. In Switzerland the evidence of a 
 former greater extent of the glaciers rests upon the 
 height and distance to which the striation, moulded 
 surfaces, and travelled blocks can be traced beyond 
 the present limits of the ice. And this evidence is 
 of such a kind as amounts to a demonstration. In 
 Norway the surface of the country between the snow- 
 fields and the sea presents the same rock-mouldings 
 and groovings as are even to this day produced by 
 the movement of its glaciers. In this case, also, these 
 markings are demonstrably the result of moving 
 land-ice. The conclusion therefore can hardly be 
 resisted that the very same markings over the surface 
 of Scotland must have been made by the same 
 agency, and thus that this country must have been 
 covered with ice and snow, which passing from the 
 high grounds outwards and seawards for ages, wore 
 down the rocks and gave the land that undulating
 
 1 66 . Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 and truly ice-worn aspect which it wears to this day. 
 In short, our country in old times must have been 
 very much what Greenland is now a land of per- 
 petual snow and ice, pushing from its numerous 
 fiords and glens huge glaciers to the sea. 1 
 
 Possible thickness of the ice. It is still possible 
 approximately to estimate the thickness which this 
 cake of ice reached in some of the Scottish valleys. 
 Thus, in Loch Fyne, both sides of the valley are 
 smoothed and striated; nay, the whole of the land 
 between that Loch and the western sea on the one 
 side and Loch Long and the Firth of Clyde on the 
 other, bears the same evidence of vast abrasion. 
 Striae have been observed by the Duke of Argyle on 
 the hill -tops at a height of 1,800 feet above Loch 
 
 1 The cause of the cold of the glacial period has been a fruitful source 
 of speculation. That the phenomena of striated rocks, moraine mounds, 
 and transported stones are so wide-spread over the globe has long seemed 
 to me a strong presumption against the attempt to explain the cold by 
 mere changes in the distribution of land and sea. Agassiz, who has 
 been so far ahead of British geologists in this department of the science, 
 saw so long ago as 1842 what some of our more eminent geologists do 
 not seem to see yet, for we find him asking, "who would reject the 
 idea that the cause of this cold has been general, and attribute to local 
 causes effects so diffused over the surface of the globe ?" (Edin. New 
 Phil. Journ. xxxiii. 240.) The true explanation of this confessedly 
 difficult subject is, I believe, that given recently by Mr. Croll, who 
 accounts for the recurrence of cold and warm periods in the geological 
 history of the globe by changes in the eccentricity of the earth's orbit. 
 His paper (in the Philosophical Magazine for August, 1864) is one of the 
 most important contributions which have been made to geology for 
 many years. Among its fruitful results will probably be the key to the 
 value of geological time.
 
 Thickness of Scottish Ice-sheet. 167 
 
 Fyne, running parallel with the valley like those at a 
 lower level. The greatest depth of the loch is 624 
 feet, and as the whole sides and bottom were pro- 
 bably striated in the same way and by the same 
 agent, there is reason to believe that the ice, even if 
 the higher markings were produced some time before 
 those at the bottom, 1 was probably not less, but 
 possibly much more than 2,000 feet. Mr. Maclaren 
 has traced the striae up to heights of more than 
 2,000 feet in the south-west Highlands. Mr. Jamieson 
 also estimates that the ice in Glen Spean must have 
 been two miles broad at the surface, and at least 
 1,300 feet deep. 
 
 And what has been the result of the extension of 
 this thick wide icy mantle over the country ? We 
 
 1 A very necessary qualification, for it should not be forgotten that the 
 ice must have been ever grinding down its bed and deepening the valleys. 
 The markings that run high along a hill-side might thus have been made 
 when the ice was at a considerably higher level than the present bottom 
 of the valley below, while those along the bottom may have been engraved 
 at a far later time when the ice had ground its way down through the 
 solid rock so as greatly to lower the level of the valley. Hence it is not 
 quite safe to say absolutely that because we have striae 2,000 feet above 
 the floor of an old glacier-glen, the ice must have been more than 2,000 
 feet thick, for this estimate makes no allowance for the lapse of possibly 
 a long interval, and an extensive erosion of the valley between the striation 
 of the hill-tops, and that of the rocks at the bottom. Still, to smooth 
 and furrow the ridges at a height of 1, 800 feet above the sea, the ice must 
 have covered them to a considerable thickness. Hence, perhaps, the 
 number of feet to be added for the ancient height of the ice, may more 
 than counterbalance the number to be subtracted for the subsequent lower- 
 ing of the level of the valley. Such estimates can only be approximate 
 in the meantime until some definite information is obtained regarding 
 the actual extent to which the valleys were deepened by the ice.
 
 1 68 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 have seen that the effect of ordinary atmospheric 
 waste is to wear down the surface of the land, but at 
 the same time to roughen and scarp it, loosening the 
 joints and fractures of the rocks, cutting out ravines 
 and valleys, carving high cliffs and precipices, and 
 mottling the mountain-sides with many a rugged scar 
 and crag. It was on such a surface that the ice of 
 the glacial period began to settle down. But ice in 
 motion acts differently from rains, springs, and frosts. 
 Its tendency is to wear down the surface over which 
 it passes, to rub away the roughnesses, to round off 
 the prominent edges, to give a wavy flowing outline 
 to the hills, and to smooth, deepen, and widen the 
 valleys. And such have been its effects upon the 
 surface of the Scottish Highlands. The glens carved 
 out by that long process of subaerial waste already 
 described, have been afterwards filled with ice. They 
 served to drain off the ice as they had previously 
 served to drain off the water. They have thus had 
 their sides and bottom worn down and their rocks 
 smoothed, polished, and striated. And even where 
 the rocks are fast mouldering away under the 
 renewed attacks of the subaerial agencies of waste, 
 the footprints of the ice are seldom so utterly obli- 
 terated as not here and there to reveal their traces. 
 The angularities of the pre-glacial land have indeed 
 been effaced, and their place has been taken by the 
 undulating contour produced by the great ice-sheet
 
 Contrasts in Geology. 169 
 
 But the rains and rivers, springs and frosts are busily 
 engaged in breaking up that smoothed surface. The 
 ancient roughnesses are coming back again, and thus 
 arises that mingling of rugged crag and scar with a 
 well defined flowing outline, which forms so marked 
 a feature in the scenery of the hilly and mountainous 
 tracts of Scotland. 
 
 When we try to sketch to ourselves in imagination 
 pictures of the changes which geology reveals, no 
 matter how vaguely or hesitatingly the lines may be 
 drawn, we are arrested by a feeling of inexpressible 
 wonder at the contrast which is thus often brought 
 before us between the present and past conditions 
 of the country. To sit, for instance, on one of the 
 headlands of the Firth of Clyde, and watch the 
 ships as they come and go from all corners of 
 the earth ; to trace village after village, and town 
 after town, dotting the coast line far as the eye can 
 reach ; to see the white steam of the distant railway 
 rising like a summer cloud from among orchards, and 
 cornfields, and fairy-like woodlands; to mark, far 
 away, the darker smoke of the coal-pit and the iron- 
 work hanging over the haunts of a busy human po- 
 pulation ; in short, to note all over the landscape, on 
 land and sea, the traces of that human power which 
 is everywhere changing the face of nature; and then 
 to picture an earlier time, when these waters had 
 never felt the stroke of oar or paddle, when these hill-
 
 170 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 sides had never echoed the sound of human voice, 
 but when over hill and valley, over river and sea, 
 there had fallen a silence as of the grave, when one 
 wide pall of snow and ice stretched across the land- 
 scape ; to restore, in imagination, the dull sullen 
 glacier threading yonder deep Highland glen, which 
 to-day is purple with heather and blithe with the 
 whirring of grouse and wood-cock ; to seal up the 
 firth once more in ice as the winter frosts used to set 
 over it, and to cover it with bergs and ice-rafts that 
 marked the short-lived Arctic summer ; to bring back 
 again the plants and animals of that early time ; and 
 thus, from the green and sunny valley of the Clyde, 
 with all its human associations, to pass at once and 
 by a natural transition to the sterility and solitude of 
 another Greenland, is an employment as delightful as 
 man can well enjoy. The contrast, though striking, 
 is only one of many which the same district, or indeed 
 any part of the country, presents to a geological eye. 
 And it is the opening up of these contrasts, based as 
 they always must be upon a careful and often a labo- 
 rious collection of facts, which entitles geology to be 
 ranked at once among the most logical and yet amid 
 the most imaginative pursuits in all the wide circle of 
 science. 
 
 Origin of Highand Lakes. 
 
 To the changes that went on during the glacial 
 period must be attributed another characteristic ele-
 
 Origin of Highland L akes. 1 7 1 
 
 ment in the landscapes of both of the Highland and 
 Lowland tracts of Scotland the existence of lakes. 
 Did it ever occur to the reader to account for the 
 formation of a lake-basin ? Perhaps he never thought 
 of the subject, or if it entered his mind at all, he pos- 
 sibly settled the question by recalling the old Scottish 
 proverb, " there never was a heich, but there was a 
 howe." He will find, however, that the answer is 
 often not to be reached without a good deal of labour. 
 Lakes, at least those which mottle the surface of Scot- 
 land, may be grouped into three classes: ist. Those 
 which lie in original hollows of the superficial drifts. 
 2d. Those which have been formed by the deposit of 
 a bar of drift across a valley or depression. 3d. Those 
 which lie in a basin-shaped cavity of solid rock. 
 
 The whole of these appear to be due to the glacial 
 agencies of the last great geological period. Those 
 
 FIG. II. LAKES LYING IN HOLLOWS OF DRIFT. 
 
 of the first class are usually of small size. In the 
 Highlands and in the uplands of the south they are 
 chiefly to be found filling the little cup-like hollows 
 of old glacier moraines. In the wide lowland valley 
 they lie in depressions formed by the unequal depo- 
 sition of the boulder-clay or the upper sandy drift.
 
 172 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The second group is commonly exemplified in the 
 mountainous and hilly regions, where the moraine of 
 a glacier has been thrown down across a narrow glen 
 or opener valley, and has ponded back the water of 
 the streams. At the outflow of the lake thus formed 
 
 FIG. 12. LAKE DAMMED UP BY RIDGE OF DRIFT. [See also Fig. 2O.] 
 
 a. Underlying rocks ; b. Ridge of drift. 
 
 the barrier of loose drift is cut down by the escaping 
 stream, which year by year deepens its bed, and will 
 gradually lower the lake until at last it drains it 
 altogether. 
 
 In neither of these cases is there any obstacle to 
 our seeing how there should be lakes. But in the 
 third kind of lake-basin the difficulty of explanation 
 is greater than at first sight appears. We have, then, 
 to account for the existence of a cup-like or basin- 
 shaped hollow in solid rock, sometimes along the line 
 of a valley, sometimes on a plateau, sometimes on 
 a hill-top or on a watershed. As mentioned in a pre- 
 vious chapter, Professor A. C. Ramsay was the first to 
 point out what I believe will be ultimately accepted
 
 Highland Lakes. 1/3 
 
 as the true origin of these hollows. He has shown, 
 that as they are not helped by deposits of drift, but 
 lie in naked rock, so they are not due to rents, or 
 corrugations, or depressions of the earth's crust, but 
 have been actually scooped out of the rocks. They 
 are, as I have already said, hollows of erosion, just as 
 
 vN 
 
 much as the river valleys. What agency could have 
 produced them ? Not running water certainly, nor 
 the waves of the sea, nor rains, springs, and frosts. 
 Mr. Ramsay has assigned the only cause which we at 
 present know capable of eroding such hollows, when 
 he attributes their origin to the excavating power of 
 land-ice. 1 A river of ice is not bound by the same 
 restraints as those which determine the action of a 
 river of water. When a glacier is, as it were, choked 
 by the narrowing of its valley, the ice actually rises. 
 
 i It is perhaps conceivable that the great fields of drift-ice with 
 enclosed bergs which annually move southward from the Arctic seas 
 may, by grating along the sea-floor, produce occasional hollows com- 
 parable on a small scale to those which are regarded as the result of the 
 Ions- continued action of land-ice.
 
 1^4 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 In such places there is necessarily an enormous 
 amount of pressure, the ice is broken into yawning 
 crevasses, and the solid rocks suffer a proportionate 
 abrasion. The increased thickness of the mass of ice 
 at these points must augment the vertical pressure, 
 and give rise to a greater scooping of the bed of the 
 glacier. If this state of things last, it is plain that a 
 hollow or basin will be here ground out of the rock, 
 and that once formed, there will always be a tendency 
 to preserve it during the general lowering of the 
 bottom of the valley. On the retreat of the ice, 
 owing to climatal changes, this hollow, unless pre- 
 viously choked up with mud and stones, will be filled 
 with water, and form a lake. It will be a true rock- 
 basin, with ice-worn surfaces around its lip, and over 
 its sides and bottom. 
 
 And such is really the appearance of many a lake 
 and tarn in the Highlands of Scotland. One of the 
 largest and noblest of the whole Loch Awe may 
 be taken as an illustrative example. The present 
 outflow of the lake through the deep narrow gorge 
 of the Pass of Brander is comparatively speaking 
 recent. It has been opened across the lofty ridge 
 that stretches from King's House through Ben 
 Cruachan to the Sound of Jura. I regard it as 
 another example of a watershed cut through by 
 streams which flow in opposite directions, aided 
 doubtless both by the sea and by the stream of ice
 
 Loch Awe. 175 
 
 that came down from the opposite mountains and 
 pressed through every available outlet to the ocean. 
 But no one can ascend from the Sound of Jura to 
 Kilmartin, and thence up the terraced valley to Loch 
 Awe, without being convinced that this must have 
 been the old outlet of the great valley of that loch. 
 The drainage from the cluster of long deep glens at 
 the head of the lake came down into the main valley 
 and went out to sea in the Sound of Jura. The 
 excavation of the valley into a long lake-basin, and 
 the cutting of the watershed through the Pass of 
 Brander are later events, both probably dating from 
 the glacial period, while the origin of the main valley 
 of Loch Awe carries us back infinitely far into the 
 past. It is owing to this erosion of the valley and to 
 the cutting through of the Brander Pass that the 
 water now flows into Loch Etive instead of the 
 Sound of Jura or Loch Gilp. One cannot but 
 wonder when, on ascending the valley from Kilmar- 
 tin, he at last finds himself on an ice-worn barrier of 
 schist, and sees stretched out for miles before him 
 the wooded shores of Loch Awe. The lake is 
 dammed back by hard rock, yet the smoothed and 
 polished surface of the barrier and the parallelism of 
 its striations with the length of the valley, show that 
 the mass of ice which once filled up the present basin 
 of the lake passed on down the continuation of the 
 valley towards Kilmartin. And all along the sides
 
 175 Sccttery of Scotland. 
 
 of the loch, and on its rocky islets, the same traces 
 may be seen of the steady southward march of the 
 ice. The rocks are worn into smooth mam mi Hated 
 outlines, and covered with ruts and grooves that trend 
 with the length of the valley. It is, in short, a rock- 
 basin of which all that can be seen is ice- worn ; and 
 if further proof of the old glaciers were needed, it 
 would be found in the heaps of moraine rubbish 
 piled along the side of the valley. 
 
 All the Scottish rock-enclosed lakes lie, I believe, 
 in ice-worn basins. In certain districts, particularly 
 over the area occupied by the Laurentian gneiss, 
 such as the island of Lewis, the surface of the ground 
 has been, as it were, sown broad-cast with tarns, 
 lochans and lakes lying in dimples and depressions 
 worn out of the rock. But throughout the Highlands 
 one cannot fail to note that the larger sheets of water 
 all lie along the glens in the paths of old glaciers. 
 Like the glens, they are arranged with reference to 
 the drainage of the country ; and just as it is incon- 
 ceivable that the country could have been rent 
 originally into the pattern of its drainage system, so 
 it is impossible to admit that the lakes can be due to 
 a series of rents and subsidences which in each case 
 were neatly adjusted to the size and direction of the 
 valley. These lake-basins are truly hollows of erosion. 
 The conditions under which they were scooped out 
 may have greatly varied, depending now upon the
 
 The Gnat GUm. 177 
 
 form of the ground, BOW upon the nature of the 
 locks, and sometimes periiaps upon canscs which aie 
 not at present evident Occasionally the lakes must 
 coincide with a fine of fault, just as the glens do. 
 But they axe not on that account to be set down 
 
 motions. The most striking example of this coin- 
 cidence is shown in the line of the Great Glen. That 
 singular depression, cutting Scotland into two, inns 
 probably along a fine of fracture throughout its 
 entire length. 1 It will not be denied that the trend 
 of the glen has been defined by that of the fracture 
 underneath. It may be further insisted, however, 
 that the sides of the glen are themselves the sides of 
 the open fissure, worn down indeed, by subsequent
 
 1 7 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 denudation, yet still gaping asunder as when they 
 
 were first parted. But an examination of the valley 
 
 will convince the observer that the amount of rock 
 
 which can be shown to have been worn away would 
 
 have sufficed to fill up the supposed cavities. Let 
 
 him, for instance, stand on the ice-worn barrier of 
 
 rock between Loch Ness and Loch Oich. He will 
 
 see there that even on the supposition of an open 
 
 fissure the deep concavity of the glen at this point 
 
 must be due to denudation, for as the rocks can be 
 
 traced across the bottom of the valley there is no 
 
 room for a wide open fissure. The very arrangement 
 
 of the rocks is enough to prove, that the hollow has 
 
 been worn out by the erosive agencies of nature ; the 
 
 upturned strata, vertical or highly inclined, present 
 
 their truncated ends to the sky, and can be followed 
 
 bed after bed across the glen till they rise high into 
 
 the hills on either side. These bared ends, of 
 
 course, were once prolonged upward : no fissure or 
 
 fault could have exposed them ; the lost parts can 
 
 only have been removed by some agent which acted, 
 
 not vertically like a fracture, but in a general sense 
 
 horizontally, such as rains, rivers, frosts, ice, and the 
 
 sea. In short, the glen at Fort Augustus must be due 
 
 mainly to denudation ; the direction of the erosion 
 
 being determined originally by the feature which the 
 
 long line of crack made at the surface. And if this 
 
 be the case at one part of the glen where both its
 
 The Great Glen, 179 
 
 bottom and sides can be examined, it is plain that 
 the same structure can hardly fail to characterise the 
 rest of the valley where it is filled by the lakes. The 
 same evidence of extensive denudation, indeed, can 
 be followed along the sides of the lakes. There 
 cannot be any doubt that since the dislocation began 
 the Great Glen has suffered to a vast extent from the 
 inroads of time. The material worn off its sides 
 would doubtless first find its way to the bottom, and 
 if the lakes had existed they would have been far 
 more than filled up. The lakes are therefore later 
 than the formation of this long valley. It seems to me 
 that this conclusion must be conceded even by those 
 who most strenuously oppose the erosive power of ice. 
 If then the deep cavities of the Great Glen * are of 
 later date than the scooping out of the valley itself, 
 to what source must their origin be traced ? There 
 seem to be only two possible answers to this pro- 
 blem ; the lochs must either be due to special frac- 
 tures or subsidences after the formation of the valley 
 in which they lie, or they have been dug out by ice. 
 The question is thus narrowed to the same issue as 
 that which every rock-enclosed lake proposes to the 
 geologist. It may perhaps be impossible to prove 
 that a valley, which had its course defined at first by 
 
 1 The deepest sounding in Loch Ness gives a depth of 129 fathoms 
 opposite the Falls of Foyers ; in Loch Oich, 23 fathoms ; in Loch 
 Lochy, a little below Letterfinlay, 76 fathoms. 
 N 2
 
 i8o Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 a rent of the earth's crust, and which since then, up 
 even to recent times, has been subjected to subter- 
 ranean tremors, has not been rent open into deep 
 lake-basins at a late geological period. But to affirm 
 that it has been so sundered is a mere assertion 
 without proof. So far as the evidence of the ground 
 goes, it seems to me to bear strongly in favour of 
 Professor Ramsay's doctrine that the hollows are the 
 work of glacier-ice. The Great Glen receives the 
 drainage of a wide mountainous region on either side, 
 and in old times a larger amount of ice probably 
 flowed into it than into any other valley in Scotland. 
 It received from the west the large glaciers of Loch 
 Eil, Loch Arkaig, Glen Morriston and Glen Urquhart, 
 from the east those of the Glens of Lochaber, and 
 those which come down from the north-western 
 flanks of the Monadhliah mountains. Its sides show 
 everywhere the flowing rounded outlines that mark 
 the seaward march of the ice, and its rocky bottom, 
 where visible, bears the same impress. That it has 
 been ice-worn is thus rendered plain. Were there no 
 other examples of such ice-worn cavities in Scotland 
 it might be too bold to affirm these lake-basins of the 
 Great Glen to have been scooped out by ice. But 
 when the same features can be seen in hundreds of 
 other instances where no fracture or subsidence can 
 be shown to exist, this view of their origin seems in 
 the highest degree probable.
 
 L ake- basins and Ice-work. 1 8 1 
 
 I have been thus particular in referring to the 
 chain of lochs along the Great Glen, because they, 
 more than any other Scottish lakes, appear to bear 
 out the hypothesis of subterranean fracture and dis- 
 turbance. And if it can be shown that even they do 
 not prove this hypothesis, but, on the contrary, point 
 to the grinding power of ice, some advance is made 
 in the explanation of the history of this characteristic 
 feature in the scenery of Scotland. At the risk of 
 tediousness let me sum up in one paragraph the 
 argument in favour of the theory of glacial erosion. 
 
 All the Scottish lakes, without exception, lie on a 
 surface that has been enormously denuded. Those 
 that are held in rock-basins exhibit along their 
 margin, on their islets, and on their bottom, as far 
 as it can be examined, the same polished and striated 
 rock-surfaces which are found universally through- 
 out the kingdom. 1 These basins appear to be as 
 thoroughly moulded and striated from end to end 
 as any part of the, country. It is admitted that this 
 polishing and grooving of rock-surfaces has been 
 produced by the grinding action of sheets of solid 
 ice. It follows that the polishing and grooving of 
 the Scottish lake-basins has been the work of ice. 
 But this process could not have been accomplished 
 unless the ice had actually gone down into the basins 
 
 i The above summary of the argument was used by me in the 
 Reader for 4th June, 1864.
 
 1 82 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 and grated along their bottom. That it did so seems 
 proved beyond dispute by the grooves and strise 
 which can be traced slipping under the waters of a 
 lake, rising and sinking again over the surfaces of 
 the islets and submerged bosses of rock, and finally 
 re-emerging with the same steady line of bearing 
 from under the water at the farther end. But, if 
 ice could do this, if it could score and furrow the 
 rock of a lake-bottom from end to end, it must, in 
 so doing, have helped to deepen the basin : and if 
 ice can deepen a basin, it can make one entirely. 
 There must indeed be a limit to this erosion when, 
 for instance, the pressure behind is no longer able 
 to drive the ice out of the hollow, or beyond 
 its lower end. But that up to such a point 
 ice is a powerful excavating agent I cannot 
 doubt. Weighing the matter well, it seems to me 
 that the origin of the rock-basin lakes of Scotland 
 is inseparably interwoven with the general glaciation 
 of the country, and that geologists must either reject 
 the theory of such a general glaciation, with all its 
 cumulative proofs, or admit that these lake-basins lie 
 in hollows that have been mainly scooped out by ice. 1 
 When this view of the origin of these rock-basins 
 
 1 There may indeed be difficulties in the way of explaining how ice 
 can mount a slope in the manner in which it is held to have done. But 
 with the long striations and deep furrows before me and the moulded 
 ridges all running up hill, I cannot but believe that the ice actually did 
 ascend, and in so doing, wore down the rocks.
 
 The Western Fiords are old Glacier-valleys. 183 
 
 is taken, a new light is cast upon the history of the 
 western sea -lochs. These deep inlets, as I have 
 tried to show, are probably submerged land-valleys. 
 Some of them, Loch Fyne, for example, are in part 
 deeper than the sea immediately outside them, as 
 Loch Ness is deeper than the German Ocean. These 
 abysses, if the land were sufficiently upheaved, would 
 be marked by lakes lying along the valleys. Were 
 Loch Fyne raised in this way above the sea-level, 
 it would be like any wide inland glen or strath 
 of the present day a deep, broad valley with tribu- 
 taries entering from the hills on either side, and with 
 a stream in the centre flowing through one or more 
 lakes. Nay, more, its sides and bottom, so far at 
 least as they can be seen at the present time, would 
 be found smoothed and striated like all that now 
 rises above low-water mark. These markings are 
 unquestionably the work of ice, and, if so, there is, 
 I think, a high probability that the deep basins in 
 the western fiords have been scooped out by the 
 same powerful agency. But the land in that case 
 may have had a considerably greater altitude than 
 it has now, to enable the thick ice-sheet to fill and 
 wear down the wide valleys that are to-day washed 
 by the tides of the Atlantic. And this conclusion 
 in favour of a much higher elevation of Scotland 
 during a part of the glacial period, tends to confirm 
 the inference already drawn from the fact that it is the
 
 1 84 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 prolongation of the glen into the sea which gives 
 rise to the fiord. 
 
 Thus, by the evidence of the rounded and worn 
 outlines of the hill-sides and glens, the smoothed 
 and striated surface of the rocks, and the frequent 
 occurrence of rock-enclosed tarns and lakes, we 
 learn that the extent to which this country suffered 
 from the abrading action of its ancient land-ice must 
 have been enormous. 
 
 As the amount of rock worn away was so vast, 
 the quantity of detritus produced must have been 
 proportionately great. The rivers which issue from 
 Alpine glaciers are thickly charged with the fine 
 mud made by the friction of the sand and stones 
 borne along under the ice : and in the Arctic regions 
 the sea is sometimes discoloured for miles from shore 
 by the mud ground down from the surface of the 
 land. In Scotland, too, since we have such abundant 
 evidence of abrasion, there can be no doubt that 
 there was. a corresponding production of detritus. 
 What, then, has become of it? If the rock-mould- 
 ings, and striation and the endless rock-basins, are 
 enough to prove the passage of a massive sheet of 
 ice from mountain to sea, it will add not a little to 
 the impressiveness of that testimony if we can still 
 point to the detrital matter which the ice left behind 
 it. Happily this is not far to seek.
 
 Boulder-clays. 185 
 
 Debris made by the great Ice-sheet. 
 Boulder Clays. Away from the mountains in 
 such flat tracts as Caithness, the shores of the 
 Moray Firth, with those of its tributary inlets, and 
 the low land bordering the German Ocean, the 
 solid rocks are to a large extent covered with a 
 stiff clay full of stones varying in size up to 
 boulders that measure, occasionally, a yard or more 
 in diameter. To this deposit the name of boulder-clay 
 or till has been given. It attains its chief develop- 
 ment in the great Lowland valley. Hence, perhaps, 
 its detailed description had better be deferred until 
 the surface of that valley comes before us for exami- 
 nation. Its origin has long been involved in mystery. 
 The older geologists called it diluvial, and regarded 
 it as a proof of a violent flood, or a series of floods, 
 which, sweeping across the country, produced the 
 striation on the rocks by driving over them the 
 stones, sand, and clay which now form the Till. The 
 introduction of land-ice into the list of agencies con- 
 cerned in changing the surface of the country has now, 
 however, given us the clue to the history of this re- 
 markable superficial deposit. As will be afterwards 
 pointed out, its internal structure, and its striated 
 stones, show it to be the result of the abrasion 
 carried on by the ice-sheet as it moved over the 
 land.
 
 1 86 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The scenery of the districts where boulder-clay 
 prevails, though tame and monotonous, has certain 
 characteristic features of its own. The surface is 
 usually smooth and undulating, save where some knob 
 or hill of the rock below rises rough and broken 
 above the soil. It is along a sea-cliff, or better still, 
 along the sides of a river, that the more prominent 
 features of the deposit can best be seen. It there 
 forms a line of steep green bank, projecting at 
 frequent intervals into massive turf-covered buttresses, 
 and receding in the spaces between into grassy 
 hollows furrowed here and there by runnels from the 
 level or sloping ground above. It is by the alternate 
 influences of rains and frosts that these strange ram- 
 part-like slopes have been made, and the process may 
 be seen still in progress, for every winter loosens 
 here and there a mass of the clay which, slipping 
 down the bank, leaves a semicircular scar of raw 
 clay above, as if a huge spadeful had been dug out 
 of the slope. The fallen portion, with its covering 
 of turf, continues to slide as the water trickles below 
 it, but at last, if it does not reach the stream below 
 it becomes so far shielded by the coating of grass 
 and weeds which creeps over it. It then remains 
 one of many verdurous mounds and hummocks, 
 mottling the sides and base of the declivity like the 
 ruins of a set of earthworks older than the steep glacis 
 that rises behind them. A sloping bank of boulder-
 
 Influence of Boulder-clay in Landscapes. 187 
 
 clay under the wasting hand of time thus assumes 
 a strangely uneven outline, and when the action 
 which gave rise to these features ceases for a time, 
 and the irregular surface puts on everywhere a cover- 
 ing of turf which gets trodden into narrow undula- 
 ting terraces by the sheep, the result is often a 
 confused series of mounds and ridges, so artificial in 
 their general appearance as to give rise to legends 
 of giant's graves, and fairy knowes, or to traditions of 
 ancient camps, and forts, and tumuli. The influence 
 of the boulder-clay as an element in the landscape 
 may be well seen along the sides of the Cromarty 
 Firth. It forms there a smooth slope from the side 
 of the bare high grounds down to the inner edge of 
 the platform of the last raised-beach, where it runs as 
 a sinuous grassy bank worn here and there into some 
 of its characteristic and fantastic forms. 1 From the 
 Cromarty Firth eastward to the headlands of Aber- 
 deenshire, the strip of low land between the hills 
 and the sea owes much of its fertile character to its 
 covering of boulder-clay and gravelly drift A pre* 
 vailing evenness of surface marks where the rocks are 
 concealed by those deposits, which further reveal 
 themselves on the sea-margin in lines of the same 
 green rampart-like slopes, and along the river-courses 
 
 1 See Hugh Miller's description of this scenery in his Schools and 
 Schoolmasters.
 
 1 88 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 in steep banks or scaurs. From Inverness, north- 
 ward, masses of boulder-clay are found here and 
 there along the coast-line. It forms high cliffs at 
 Rosemarkie. At Tain, too, it rises in a line of bold 
 bluffs, that mark the limits of an ancient shore. At 
 the Ord of Caithness it is seen capping the headlands 
 of granitic rock, but northward, where the moun- 
 tainous tracts of Sutherland sink into the plains of 
 Caithness, the boulder-clay spreads far and wide 
 over the surface. At Wick it is largely developed, 
 and it has there long been known to contain marine 
 shells. 
 
 Higher Elevation and subsequent Submergence of the 
 
 Highlands. 
 
 The boulder-clay is a deposit of the lower grounds 
 rather than of the hilly and mountainous regions. 
 As it now remains it is characteristically a lowland 
 formation, and this arises partly from the circum- 
 stance that it must always have been more thickly 
 developed in the low grounds than among the 
 mountains, and partly because such parts of it as 
 were laid down among the high grounds have been 
 in large measure cleared away. When the boulder- 
 clay began to be formed, the land probably rose 
 considerably higher out of the sea than it does now, 
 and there can be little doubt that, as the formation 
 of that deposit went on, this old ice-covered land
 
 Elevation and Submergence of tJie Highlands. 189 
 
 was slowly settling down into the ocean. It has 
 already been pointed out that the sea-lochs of the 
 western coast give evidence in favour of a greater 
 elevation of the country at the time when these 
 valleys were worn down by the ice. How much 
 higher it may have been than it is at present we do 
 not know. Perhaps the land was not only higher as 
 a whole, but special parts of it such for example as 
 the western half of the Highlands may have had a 
 greater altitude relatively to the surrounding country 
 than they have now. Unequal oscillations of level 
 would help to remove several geological difficulties 
 of a local kind which occur when we try to conceive 
 of the movement of a large body of ice over such a 
 surface as the country wears at present. 1 
 
 If the evidence for the extreme height of the land 
 during the glacial period is inconclusive, that for the 
 extreme depression is equally so. In Wales the sub- 
 mergence was not* less than 2,300 feet beneath the 
 sea level, and in the southern half of Scotland it may 
 have been as much as 2,000 feet. The difficulty of 
 
 1 The notable example of the depression of Wales to a depth of 
 more than 2,000 feet while the south-east of England was not sub- 
 merged, should not be forgotten. We are too apt, unconsciously, 
 to regard as permanent the present relative levels of different parts of 
 the country to each other, and to think of the land rising or sinking as 
 a whole ; though we may be ready enough to admit when required, 
 that there may have been unequal and partial elevations in recent 
 geological times, one region remaining at rest, or actually sinking, 
 while other parts were undergoing upheaval.
 
 lOyO Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 fixing the former limits of the sea upon the Highland 
 mountains arises from the fact that when the land 
 began to rise again, it was still cased in ice, which, 
 pushing its way out to sea, would of course destroy 
 the beds of marine sand, gravel or clay, from 
 which, had they been spared, the old sea-margin 
 might have been traced. So that although there is 
 no reason to doubt that the area of the Highlands 
 participated in greater or less degree in the general 
 sinking of the British Isles, conclusive proof of the 
 inference is not easily found. 1 Perhaps the most 
 satisfactory evidence is to be drawn from the occur- 
 rence of large erratic blocks of granite, gneiss and 
 schist, lying high on the sides and on the summits of 
 the Sidlaw and Ochil Hills, and even on the rising 
 grounds to the south of the Forth. These boulders 
 were probably carried by icebergs which, breaking 
 off from the ends of glaciers that came down to the 
 sea-level from the heart of the* Highlands, were 
 drifted southwards, and dropt their mud and stones 
 over the submerged lowlands of Scotland. They 
 will come before us again when we trace the history 
 of the great midland valley. 
 
 1 Neither the occurrence of perched boulders, "nor of mounds and 
 terraces of drift, is of itself sufficient to prove a former sea-level, unless 
 there be other corroborating evidence. For boulders among mountains 
 might be carried and left by land-ice, and drift arranged by fresh water 
 could not, I suppose, in the absence of fossils, be certainly distinguished 
 from a marine deposit.
 
 Highland Glaciers. 191 
 
 Second Glacier Period in tlie Highlands. 
 
 Such parts of the country as remained above water 
 when the submergence was greatest, continued in all 
 likelihood to be covered with snow and ice. And 
 when the land began once more to rise out of the 
 deep, the same thick wintry mantle, probably for a 
 time, still wrapped it round. As the elevation went 
 on, however, and the climate grew less severe, the 
 massiveness of the ice-sheet became impaired. In- 
 stead of covering the whole country as it had done 
 before, it now shrank up into the uplands, whence 
 long glaciers threaded their way down the glens. 
 But though its dimensions after the submergence 
 were lessened, it yet remained in such force that from 
 some of the higher groups of mountains, glaciers still 
 descended to the sea until the land had risen to 
 within at least forty feet of its present level. These 
 ice-rivers in place of creeping onwards over an arctic 
 surface, where the rocks were everywhere buried be- 
 neath snow and ice, were now confined between the 
 sides of valleys and glens whose bare rocky slopes 
 often rose high above the glacier that crept along 
 their bottom. Mud, stones, and huge blocks of rock, 
 disengaged by springs and frosts from the heights, 
 rolled down upon the ice, which carried them slowly- 
 down the valley, and, where it finally melted, heaped 
 them together into irregular mounds or moraines. The
 
 192 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 rocks over which the ice moved were, of course, sub- 
 jected to a renewed process of abrasion, and thus a 
 new series of roches montonnees was produced. 
 
 There are few minor features in the scenery of 
 the Highlands better fitted to impress the fancy than 
 the memorials of these last remnants of the ancient 
 ice. Huge mounds, cumbered with blocks of every 
 size, some of them larger than many a Highland 
 cottage, extend across a glen as if to bar all at- 
 tempts to penetrate into its recesses. As these ram- 
 parts sometimes stretch without break from one side 
 of the glen to the other, and rise to a considerable 
 height, the traveller who picks his way up the valley 
 among scattered blocks of rock and ice-worn knolls 
 is puzzled to conjecture what may lie behind the 
 rugged boulder-covered barrier of detritus that rises 
 so formidably in his front. He mounts its outer 
 slope, and on reaching the summit, sees below him, 
 perhaps, a loch or tarn. The barrier is, in short, a 
 glacier moraine which has been thrown across the 
 glen ; and though the ice has long since retreated, 
 this bank of ice-borne rubbish has been left behind, 
 serving to dam back the drainage of the upper part 
 of the glen. A lake has thus been formed whose 
 surplus waters are now laboriously cutting for them- 
 selves a pathway through the moraine. The time 
 will come when the stream will have dug its channel 
 as deep as the bottom of the lake, which will then
 
 Highland Glacier-moraines. 193 
 
 be emptied, leaving a broad, flat meadow to mark 
 where it stood. In many a Highland glen it is easy 
 to trace the successive backward steps of the ice as 
 it continued to shrink up into the higher recesses of 
 the mountains. Each moraine shows, of course, a 
 point at which the lower end of the glacier con- 
 tinued for a while stationary, . melting there and 
 throwing down its accumulated piles of rubbish. 
 These moraines may be followed up the valley, 
 mound within mound, each of which represents a 
 pause in the retreat of the glacier, until at last we 
 gain the upper end, where the stream of ice finally 
 shrank up into the snow-fields, and where these, as 
 the climate grew warmer, at last melted away. 
 
 I have said that the ice after the submergence was 
 not so extensive as it had been before. But it still 
 existed in such mass as to choke up many deep and 
 long valleys, and powerfully to grind down the rocks 
 over which it moved. The evidence of its magnitude 
 and effects cannot be better seen in any part of the 
 Highlands than among the glens to the north and 
 east of Ben Nevis. Let the summer traveller who 
 is in search of the picturesque, and who cares to 
 follow the traces of ancient geological changes, as- 
 cend from the shores of Locheil up the valley of 
 the Spean into the wilds of Lochaber. Quitting 
 the shore, with its fringing terrace that marks a 
 former limit of the sea, when the land was about 
 o
 
 194 Scenery oj Scotland. 
 
 forty feet lower than it is now, he enters Glen Spean 
 among mounds of debris. These heaps probably 
 mark where a glacier threw down its load of earth 
 and stones either in the sea or in a former fresh- 
 water lake. As he gradually advances up the valley 
 he finds this old glacial detritus cut here and there 
 into terraces, level as a meadow, and contrasting 
 strangely with the ruggedness of the surrounding 
 ground. He is reminded perhaps of some of the 
 broad alluvial haughs so common along the banks 
 of the larger rivers. But these terraces, in the lower 
 part of Glen Spean, rise high above the stream, and 
 must be due either to the action of the sea, or, more 
 probably, to that of a lake once filling the glen. As 
 he approaches the foot of Glen Roy, however, his 
 eye falls on a still more wonderful terrace. Far 
 away up the valley, if the day be a favourable one, 
 he can trace a line, carved along the steep hill-side 
 to the south of the river, and running with seemingly 
 mathematical precision in a horizontal course till it 
 is lost in the distance. Before turning up Glen Roy 
 he would do well to continue the ascent of Glen 
 Spean, that he may see the marvellous proofs of 
 the magnitude of the Scottish glaciers even after 
 the submergence of the country. A short way be- 
 yond Bridge of Roy Inn the road, after running so 
 long over the re-assorted glacial rubbish, begins to 
 rise over hummocks of hard schist. These, instead
 
 Glacier of Glen Spean. 195 
 
 of presenting the jagged, rough surface which they 
 would have had if they had suffered only from rains 
 and frosts, are rounded, smoothed, and polished, and 
 they show in perfection the long, close, parallel striae 
 and scorings already described. They are in short 
 examples of roches moutonne'es, indicating that a thick 
 body of ice once passed down the glen and ground 
 out its sides and bottom. On the right hand the 
 river Spean brawls and foams in a narrow ravine 
 which it has cut for itself through the same hard 
 schist. One could not find a better contrast of the 
 results produced by the different denuding agents. 
 Along the roadway all is rounded and smoothed as 
 the ice left it ; in the ravine below everything is 
 angular and rugged ; rains, springs, and frosts are 
 there busy splitting up the schist along its numerous 
 joints, and pushing large blocks of it into the river, 
 where they are dashed against each other and slowly 
 worn away. 
 
 Further up the glen the ice-worn aspect of the 
 rocks becomes still more striking. When the ob- 
 server reaches a point opposite the mouth of Glen 
 Treig he finds that the striae on the rocks, instead 
 of running down the valley, actually mount the hill 
 to the north, while the glen is cumbered with huge 
 ramparts of glacier rubbish. It was this piece of 
 scenery which so powerfully impressed Agassiz in 
 his first visit to Scotland, and seemed to him such 
 O 2
 
 1 96 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 a demonstration of the existence of glaciers in this 
 country. " I shall never forget," he says, " the im- 
 pression experienced at the sight of the terraced 
 mounds of blocks which occur at the mouth of the 
 valley of Loch Treig, where it joins Glen Spean ; 
 it seemed to me as if I were looking at the numerous 
 moraines of the neighbourhood of Tines in the valley 
 of Chamounix." * Since Agassiz wrote, the district 
 has been again examined in detail by Mr. T. F. 
 Jamieson, to whose careful descriptions the reader 
 should refer. 2 The glacier which came down Glen 
 Treig went right across Glen Spean, and ascended 
 the hills for some height on the opposite side. Mr. 
 Jamieson has shown that it not only did so, but that 
 it then branched into two, one part turning to the 
 left down Glen Spean, the other taking to the right, 
 through that part of the glen where Loch Laggan 
 now lies, and striking thence into the valley of the 
 Spey. The great size of the Treig glacier is further 
 proved by the magnitude of its moraines. As it 
 issued from its own valley into the wider strath of 
 the Spean, it spread out in a fan-shape, and the piles 
 of rubbish which it carried down on its surface were 
 tumbled over along its edges. There they gathered 
 into mounds, which followed the curving margin of the 
 ice, and still stretch* for some miles across the valley 
 
 1 Agassiz, On the Glacial Theory. Edin. New Phil. Journ. xxxiii. 222. 
 
 2 See Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. xviii. and xix.
 
 Glacier of den Treig. 197 
 
 to mark where the glacier halted for a long while in 
 its gradual decline. There are two chief lines of 
 moraine, of which the outer one, a narrow, steep- 
 sided mound, rises in some places sixty or seventy 
 feet above its base. Its surface is loaded with frag- 
 ments of gneiss and schist of all sizes up to blocks 
 fourteen feet long. On the inner line of mound, 
 which is often composed wholly of large blocks of 
 syenite, Mr. Jamieson found one mass measuring 
 twenty-six feet in length, and he compares the 
 moraine to a ruined breakwater. 1 
 
 The valley of Glen Treig furnishes everywhere 
 proofs of the enormous erosion effected by the ice. 
 Its sides, for a great height above the bottom, are 
 shorn off, rounded, smoothed and striated, and it 
 encloses a long lake, which points still more to the 
 massiveness of the ancient glacier, for it lies in 
 one of those basins of rock which, with Professor 
 Ramsay, I believe have been excavated by ice. 
 
 Returning now to Glen Roy, the traveller should 
 ascend that valley to see what light its famous 
 " Parallel Roads " have to cast upon the history of 
 the old glaciers of the Highlands. The same long 
 straight line which, as he drew near to the Bridge of 
 Roy, he noticed running high along the mountain- 
 side, on the south of the Spean Valley, is now seen to 
 turn up Glen Roy, winding along the hills of that 
 i Quart. Journ, Geol. Soc, xix. 248.
 
 198 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 valley with the same singular horizontally. When 
 he gets several miles up the glen, he begins to see 
 traces of two other terraces, until, on reaching a turn 
 of the road, the long deep glen lies before him, with 
 its three bars, straight and distinct as if they had 
 been drawn with a ruler, yet winding into all the 
 recesses of the steep slopes, and coming out again' 
 
 FIG 14. VIEW OF THE PARALLEL ROADS OF GLEN 
 
 Y FROM THE GAP. 
 
 over the projecting parts without ever deviating from 
 their parallelism. The "roads," so long a subject of 
 wonderment and legendary story among the High- 
 landers, and for so many years a source of sore 
 perplexity among men of science, seem at last to be 
 understood. Each of them is a shelf or terrace, cut 
 by the shore waters of a lake that once filled Glen
 
 Parallel Roads of Glen Roy. 199 
 
 Roy. The highest is of course the oldest, and those 
 beneath it were formed in succession, as the waters of 
 the lake were lowered. They are seen not only in 
 Glen Roy. A little beyond, where the first good 
 view of the glen is obtained, there is a hollow 
 through the hills on the left side of the valley, 
 marked on the maps as Gap. This hollow forms a 
 short col between Glen Roy and a small valley that 
 strikes away to the south-west. Standing on the top 
 of the ridge, the observer looks up Glen Roy on the 
 one side, and down this narrow valley on the other, 
 and he can mark that, while the lowest of the parallel 
 roads in Glen Roy runs along the hill-side, a short 
 way below him the two upper roads come through 
 the hollow, and wind westward into Glen Collarig. 
 So that the old lake not only filled up Glen Roy, 
 but also some of the other valleys to the west. 
 Until Agassiz suggested the idea of a dam of 
 glacier-ice, the great difficulty in the way of under- 
 standing how a lake could ever have filled these 
 valleys, was the entire absence of any relic of the 
 barrier that must have kept back the water. Mr. 
 Jamieson has recently shown, however, that Agassiz's 
 suggestion is fully borne out by the evidence of 
 great glacial erosion, both in Glen Spean, and in the 
 valley of the Caledonian Canal. The latter valley, 
 as I have already pointed out, seems to have been 
 filled to the brim with ice, which, choking up the
 
 2OO Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 mouths of Glen Gluoy and Glen Spean, served to 
 pond back the waters of these glens. The Glen Treig 
 glacier, in like manner, stretched right across Glen 
 Spean and mounted its north bank. When the lake 
 that must thus have filled Glen Roy and the neigh- 
 bouring valleys was at its deepest, its surplus waters 
 would escape from the head of Glen Roy down into 
 Strath Spey, and at that time the uppermost beach or 
 parallel road (1,140 feet above the present sea-level) 
 was formed. The Glen Treig glacier then shrank a 
 little, and the lake was thus lowered about eighty 
 feet so as to form the middle terrace, which is 1,059 
 feet above the sea, the outflow being now by the 
 head of Glen Glaster, and through Loch Laggan 
 into the Spey. After the lake had remained for a 
 time at that height, the Glen Treig glacier continued 
 on the decline, and at last crept back out of Glen 
 Spean. By this means the level of the lake was 
 reduced to 847 feet above the sea, and the waters of 
 Glen Roy joined those of Loch Laggan, forming 
 one long winding lake, having its outflow, by what is 
 now the head of Glen Spean, into Strath Spey. 
 While this level was maintained, the lowest of the 
 parallel roads of Glen Roy was formed. As the climate 
 of the glacial period grew milder, however, the mass 
 of ice which choked up the mouth of Glen Spean, 
 and ponded back the water, gradually melted away. 
 The drainage of Glen Roy, Glen Spean, and their
 
 Parallel Roads of Glen Roy. 201 
 
 tributary valleys was then no longer arrested, and as 
 j;he lake crept step by step down the glen towards 
 the sea, the streams one by one took their places in 
 the channels, which they have been busy widening 
 and deepening ever since. Such seems to have been 
 the history of the mysterious parallel roads of 
 Lochaber. Instead of tracing back their origin to 
 the days of Fingal, they stand before us as the 
 memorials of an infinitely vaster antiquity the 
 shores, as it were, of a phantom lake, that came 
 into being with the growth of the glaciers, and 
 vanished as these melted away. 1 
 
 It would be far beyond the limits of this little 
 work to describe or even enumerate the various valleys 
 among the Highlands, where distinct traces are to be 
 seen of the glaciers of the second period. It may 
 be said, indeed, that there are probably few valleys, 
 descending from the higher groups of mountains, 
 where- moraines and roches moutonnees are not to be 
 seen. When we ascend a glen which receives the 
 drainage of a connected cluster of lofty broad- 
 bosomed hills, we may, with not a little confidence, 
 expect to find, somewhere along its course, mounds of 
 
 1 The above sketch of the successive stages in the history of the 
 parallel roads is taken from Mr. Jamieson's memoir to which I would 
 again refer the reader. See also the papers by Agassiz. Proc. Geol. 
 Soc . iii. 327. Edin. New Phil. Journ. xxxiii. 217, and the Atlantic 
 Monthly for June, 1864.
 
 2O2 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 glacier-borne rubbish, or hummocks of ice-worn rock. 
 The traveller who has occasion to pass northward, by 
 the Inverness and Perth Railway, may see some 
 good examples of the characteristic features of a 
 glacier valley. As he ascends the course of the 
 Garry beyond the Falls, bosses of hard quartz-rock 
 and schist meet his eye, with their surfaces smoothed, 
 polished, and striated, and heaped over with mounds 
 of rubbish. The whole bottom of the valley, indeed, 
 shows that it has been worn down by a glacier that 
 descended from the mountains in front. The mounds 
 increase in number towards the head of the glen, 
 until, at the watershed, the ground from side to side 
 is covered with vast piles of rubbish true glacier- 
 moraines. To the west lies Loch Garry a lake 
 seemingly held back by moraine matter, which is 
 there cut into a succession of terraces, marking 
 former levels of the water. The same piles of debris 
 which can be traced to the head of Glen Garry cross 
 the watershed, and go down Glen Truim, showing 
 that the glacier of Loch Garry split upon the water- 
 shed, and sent one branch into Glen Garry, the other 
 into Glen Truim. The deep pass of Drumouchter 
 (1,450 feet above the sea), where this division took 
 place, is as wild a scene as can be reached in the 
 Highlands by a turnpike road certainly by far the 
 wildest through which any railway passes in this 
 country. Even the comforts of a railway carriage
 
 Glacier-moraines of Brora. 203 
 
 and a good locomotive do not wholly deprive it 
 of its terrors, but no one who cursorily makes its 
 acquaintance under these circumstances can realize 
 what the Pass of Drumouchter was in the old coach- 
 ing days. 
 
 Let me refer to but one other locality where the 
 relics of the second glacier period remain with a 
 singularly picturesque vividness, and where some of 
 their features can be better examined than in any 
 other part of the kingdom with which I am ac- 
 quainted. On the eastern coast of Sutherland the 
 mountains come down to within a mile or two from 
 the sea, the space between their base and the shore 
 being occupied by a long narrow strip of compara- 
 tively level and cultivated ground. Of the glens 
 which open upon this selvage of lowland, one of the 
 largest is Strath Brora. It descends from the heart 
 of the lofty Sutherlandshire mountains, and, after a 
 course of some thirty miles, terminates at the inner 
 edge of this narrow belt, nearly three miles from the 
 sea. Looking at the map, one would be quite pre- 
 pared to find glacier-moraines somewhere in this 
 valley, but he could hardly expect to meet with 
 such a striking series of mounds as roughen the 
 dark plain between the mouth of the valley and the 
 sea. The old glacier of Strath Brora must have 
 spread out over the flat as soon as it escaped from 
 its confinement between the walls of the glen, and
 
 2O4 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the rubbish which it threw down gathered into long 
 rampart-like mounds, that sweep round in a rude 
 crescent form, from the foot of the hills towards the 
 sea. Within the outer ridges, which are most con- 
 tinuous, there is a confused grouping of mounds, 
 which, when they come together, enclose little pools 
 of water, or basins of peat that mark where similar 
 pools originally lay. Above the mouth of the valley 
 the same detritus extends towards the loch a quiet 
 sheet of water lying under the shadow of dark crags, 
 and held back still by the moraine rubbish of the 
 glacier which once occupied its place. It is the 
 relation of the moraine mounds to the sea-level, 
 however, which gives them their greatest interest. 
 They can be traced seawards in straggling hummocks 
 and ridges, until, about a mile south of the village of 
 Brora, one of the mounds is seen to overhang the 
 beach, and a section of it, along with the gravelly 
 beds on which it rests, has been laid bare by the 
 waves. The glacier, in all likelihood, descended to 
 the sea-level when these mounds were formed an 
 inference borne out by the loose materials on 
 which they rest, and by the gravelly, water-worn 
 character of the detritus of which the mounds are 
 made up. And, if this be so, it shows us that 
 so severe did the climate of Scotland still continue, 
 that the valley-glaciers of some of the more moun- 
 tainous districts continued to come down to the
 
 Final Disappearance of the Ice. 205 
 
 shore, until the land had risen to within forty or fifty 
 feet of its present level. 
 
 At length the wide wintry mantle that had so 
 long enveloped the mountains and valleys of the 
 Highlands, crept from the sea slowly up the glens ; 
 each glacier shrank step by step backwards into the 
 snow-fields of the uplands, and finally the snow-fields 
 themselves melted away. The gradual increase of 
 temperature, which thus drove the ice alike from 
 land and sea, must have had no small influence upon 
 the plants and animals of the time. Some of the 
 forms which lived in the glacial period, such as the 
 woolly elephant and the two-horned woolly rhinoceros, 
 have become extinct ; others, such as the reindeer 
 and the musk-ox, have retreated to more congenial 
 haunts in the far north. Among terrestrial plants we 
 seem to see traces of the same northward migration 
 of the more Alpine and Arctic species. They have 
 been expelled from the warmer plains and lower 
 hills, and have retreated into the mountains, on 
 whose summits, struggling to maintain their place, 
 they remain as the surviving relics of that northern 
 vegetation which probably once covered the British 
 Islands before they were cut off from the continent. 
 The sea, too, furnishes proofs of the same gradual 
 amelioration of the climate. In the deeper abysses 
 of the western fiords, such as Loch Fyne and the 
 Kyles of Skye, there are still lingering groups of the
 
 2o6 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Arctic shells which peopled our seas during the age 
 of ice. Like the plants, they have been driven out 
 by the migration of more temperate forms, and 
 instead of now ranging from the shore-line down to 
 the profoundest depths, they are confined to the 
 latter parts of our seas, where they seem to be 
 slowly but certainly dying out. The time may yet 
 be distant, but it is probably not the less surely 
 approaching, when the last of the Arctic forms, both 
 of mountain-top and sea-bottom, will disappear, and 
 when species of a more temperate character will 
 spread over land and sea. And yet, such is the 
 unceasing progress of terrestrial change, alike in 
 organic and inorganic nature, that these newer forms 
 will in all likelihood be themselves displaced by 
 migrations from other parts of the globe, as the 
 climate or the relative position of sea and land are 
 changed, or as other mutations are brought about by 
 those great geologic causes which, though seeming to 
 operate at random, and wholly irrespective of either 
 the animal or vegetable worlds, have yet been mys- 
 teriously linked with the grand onward march of life 
 upon our globe.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 CAUSE OF THE LOCAL VARIETIES OF HIGHLAND SCENERY. 
 
 FROM what has been said in the foregoing pages, 
 it appears that the larger elements of Highland 
 Scenery the grouping of the mountains, the exca- 
 vation of the glens and straths, and the scooping- 
 out of the lake-basins are to be attributed to the 
 action of the various powers of denudation the sea, 
 rains, springs, frosts, and moving ice. These features 
 are everywhere to be seen, no matter what may be 
 the nature of the rocks. We find the valleys cut 
 out of gneiss, schist, slate, limestone, sandstone, 
 quartz-rock or granite ; but we feel sure there would 
 still have been valleys and hills had the rocks been 
 wholly different. The larger features of the scenery 
 have probably been influenced rather by geological 
 structure on the great scale, by anticlinal and syn- 
 clinal axes, or lines of fault, or the boundaries of 
 formations, than by mere diversities in the nature of 
 the rocky masses that come to the surface. 
 
 But though the mineralogical changes in the High- 
 land rocks may not have determined the framework
 
 2o8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of the country, they have had much to do in lending 
 character to its surface. There is not a glen or strath 
 where their influence may not be seen. It is this 
 influence, due to differences of weathering, which has 
 given to Highland scenery its variety, and to each 
 district or to each rock its own peculiarites of outline. 
 There are glens and valleys and lakes, for instance, 
 in the Isle of Skye, around the Trosachs, and among 
 the Cairn Gorm mountains. They all can be traced to 
 the action of those powers of waste already described, 
 their formation has been carried on in accordance 
 with the same laws. Yet the results are in each case 
 very different. And why ? Because in each of the 
 districts the rocks are distinct, and yield after a 
 fashion of their own to the ceaseless attacks of time. 
 In the north of Skye the valleys wind among soft 
 green terraced hills of igneous rocks, and almost recall 
 some of the pastoral uplands of the southern counties. 
 Around the Trosachs the glens and lakes have been 
 cut out of tough, gnarled schist, which is worn away 
 unequally into knobs and bosses and steep craggy 
 declivities. Among the Cairn Gorms the savage 
 caldron-like corries and precipices have been carved 
 out of granite a rock which, from its usual decom- 
 posing character and its abundant vertical joints, 
 combines in its decay a grandeur of lofty cliff with a 
 smoothness of mountain-top such as none of the 
 other Highland rocks can boast.
 
 Weathering of Rocks. 209 
 
 These local peculiarities of scenery are brought out 
 only during the course of a long process of subaerial 
 waste, when the rains, rivers, and frosts have had 
 ample leisure for their quiet work. They must have 
 reached their highest development just before the 
 glacial period began. The ice-sheets, however, did 
 much to break off the sharpness of the angles every- 
 where, and to give to the whole country a much 
 tamer aspect than it had worn before. Since that 
 time the atmospheric agencies of erosion have been 
 busy upon the ice-moulded surface. They have been 
 re-asserting their old sway, and though the track of 
 the ice still remains singularly fresh, it bears every- 
 where the proof that it is disappearing, and that in 
 time the rains and frosts will restore to the outlines 
 of our hills and mountains all the ruggedness which 
 they possessed before they were swathed in the 
 wintry folds of the ancient glaciers. In comparing 
 and contrasting, therefore, the different forms of 
 scenery to which the different geological formations 
 give rise, it should not be forgotten that the distinc- 
 tions between them are not so great as they were 
 once, nor so marked as they will be again, when the 
 ice-worn surfaces have faded away. 
 
 Perhaps the most interesting way of tracing this 
 
 relation of the minor outlines of the landscape to the 
 
 nature of the rocks, will be to take some of the more 
 
 important rock-masses of the Highlands and compare 
 
 p
 
 2IO Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 their scenery with each other. Beginning with the 
 oldest formation of the British Islands the Funda- 
 mental or Laurentian gneiss, we find it stretching as 
 a broken belt along the western coast of Sutherland 
 and Ross, from Loch Inchard for forty miles or more 
 to the south. Nothing can well be more impressive 
 in its barrenness than the aspect of this great fringe 
 of gneiss. You stand on one of its higher eminences 
 and look over a dreary expanse of verdureless rock, 
 grey, cold, and bare, protruding from the heather in 
 endless rounded crags and knolls, and dotted over 
 with tarns and lochans, which, by their stillness, 
 heighten the loneliness and solitude of the scene. 
 Acres of sombre peat-moss mark the site of former 
 lakes, and their dinginess and desolation form no 
 inconspicuous features in the landscape. 1 Few con- 
 trasts of scenery in the Highlands, when once 
 beheld, are likely to be better remembered than that 
 between the cold grey hue and monotonous undula- 
 tions of this ancient gneiss, and the colour and form 
 of the sandstone mountains that rise along its inner 
 margin. These heights are among the noblest in the 
 
 i If the hypersthene rock of the Cuchullin Hills of Skye belongs to 
 this ancient formation, it forms an illustrious exception to the general 
 monotony of outline above noticed. (See Plate II.) Several years 
 ago I stated my belief that this rock was of metamorphic origin 
 ( Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin. vol. xxii. p. 633, note), and more recent obser- 
 vations of Dr. Haughton tend to confirm the inference. (Geological 
 Magazine for February, 1865.)
 
 Mountains of Ross and Sutherland. 2 1 1 
 
 whole Highlands. They consist of red Cambrian 
 -sandstone lying on the upturned edges of the gneiss, 
 and with their strata so little inclined that these can 
 be traced by the eye in long horizontal bars on the 
 sides of the steeper declivities. Viewed from the sea, 
 the gneiss belt runs in a line of bare rough hills and 
 low headlands, among which, save here and there 
 along a larger water-course, or on a straggling patch 
 of gravelly soil, one looks in vain for tree or field or 
 patch of green to relieve the sterility of these lonely 
 shores. Behind, rise the sandstone mountains in a 
 line of irregular but stately pyramids, their nearly 
 level strata running along the hill-sides like lines of 
 masonry. Here and there the hand of time has rent 
 them into deep rifts, from which long mounds of 
 rubbish are rolled into the plains below, as stones 
 are loosened from the shivered walls of an ancient 
 battlement. Down their sides, which have sometimes 
 well-nigh the steepness of a wall, vegetation finds but 
 scanty room along the projecting ledges of the sand- 
 stone beds, where the heath and grass and wild 
 flowers cluster over the rock in straggling lines and 
 tufts of green. And yet, though nearly as bare as 
 the gneiss below them, these lofty mountains are far 
 from presenting the same aspect of barrenness. The 
 prevailing colour of their component strata gives 
 them a warm red hue which, even at noon, contrasts 
 strongly with the grey of the platform of older rock. 
 P 2
 
 212 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 But it is at the close of day that the contrast is seen 
 at its height. For then, when the sun is dipping 
 beneath the distant Hebrides, and the shadows of 
 night have already crept over the lower grounds, the 
 gneiss, far as we can trace its corrugated outlines, is 
 steeped in a cold blue tint that passes away in the 
 distance into the grey haze of the evening, while the 
 sandstone mountains, towering proudly out of the 
 gathering twilight, catch on their giant sides the 
 full flush of sunset Their own warm hue is thus 
 heightened by the mingling crimson and gold of the 
 western sky, and their summits, wreathed perhaps 
 with rosy mist, glow again, as if they were parts, not 
 of the earth, but of the heaven above them. Watch- 
 ing their varying colours and the changes which the 
 shifting light seems to work upon their strange forms, 
 one might almost be tempted to believe that they are 
 not mountains at all, but pyramids and lines of battle- 
 ment the work perhaps of some primeval Titan, 
 who once held sway in the north. 
 
 These huge isolated mountains are probably the 
 most striking memorial of denudation anywhere to 
 be seen in the British Islands. Suilven, Quinaig, 
 and other hills, rising more than 3000 feet above the 
 sea, in Sutherland and Ross, are merely detached 
 patches of a formation, not less than 7000 or 8000 
 feet thick, which once spread over the north-west of 
 Scotland. The spaces between these mountains were
 
 Mountains of Ross and Sutherland. 2 1 3 
 
 onceoccupied by the same dull red sandstone ; the hori- 
 zontal beds of one hill, indeed, are plainly continuous 
 with those of another, though perchance a deep and 
 wide valley now lies between. The valleys have been 
 worn down through the sandstone, and the fragments 
 that have been left rise up into those strange pyra- 
 midal mountains that form so noble a feature in the 
 
 FIG. 15. OUTLINE OF A MOUNTAIN BETWEEN LOCHS MAREE AND TORRIDON. 
 
 (Dull red Cambrian Sandstone capped with white Quartz-rock.) 
 
 landscapes of the north-west Highlands. They stand 
 there, like lonely sea-stacks in mid-ocean, and tell not 
 less impressively of long ages of waste. 
 
 The Lower Silurian formation, which overlies the 
 Cambrian sandstone, consists, at the base, of a thick 
 group of white quartz-rocks with bands of limestone.
 
 214 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 These strata, as I have already remarked, lie upon 
 the red sandstone just described. They, too, have 
 suffered sorely from denudation. They may be seen 
 stealing up the backs of the Cambrian mountains, 
 and even capping the very summits ; and as they are 
 marked by a snowy whiteness, the contrasting hues 
 of the two rocks give rise to some of the most un- 
 expected features in the scenery of these tracts. In 
 certain phases of the sky, when the light falls brightly 
 on the tops of these dark red pyramids, the white 
 quartz-rock looks like a scalp of gleaming ice, and 
 the long lines of white rubbish that seam the slopes 
 might pass for glaciers which have shrunk up the 
 mountains almost to the limit of perpetual snow. 
 
 Where a mountain consists wholly or mostly of 
 quartz-rock it commonly tends to take a more 
 or less conical form. Examples occur in Assynt, 
 and further south between Loch Maree and Loch 
 Torridon. The beautiful cone of Schehallien is 
 an excellent illustration. But nowhere in Scotland 
 can the whole of the distinctive features of quartz- 
 rock scenery be seen on so grand a scale as among 
 the mountains of Islay and Jura. In the latter 
 island, the quartz-rock rises into the group of lofty 
 cones known as the Paps of Jura, 2,569 feet above 
 the sea which almost washes their base. The pre- 
 vailing colour is grey, save here and there where a 
 mass glistens white as if it were snow; and as the
 
 Paps of Jura. 
 
 215 
 
 vegetation is exceedingly scanty, the character of the 
 rock and its influence in the landscape can be seen 
 to every advantage. The ascent of the mountains 
 is impeded by a thick covering of loose angular 
 rubbish, broken up by the rains and frosts from the 
 rock underneath. But when once their summit is 
 gained, the whole island and a wide panorama of sea 
 and land beyond lies spread out as in a map below. 
 Nothing can exceed the distinctness with which the 
 lines of stratification in the quartz-rock are traced 
 
 FIG. l6. OUTLINE OF SCHEHALLIEN (A MOUNTAIN OF QUARTZ-ROCK). 
 
 on the cliffs and along the ridges. We can follow 
 almost the line of each separate bed of rock as it 
 winds over hill and crag, valley and tarn, among 
 solitudes that are haunted only by the red deer or 
 the eagle. Here and there on the grey cliffs we 
 detect the dark line of a basalt dyke pursuing the
 
 216 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 even tenor of its way towards the north-west, alike 
 over precipitous mountain and deep glen. And far 
 below, along the northern shore of that deep inlet 
 which almost cuts the island into two, we can see 
 the line of caves worn of old by the breakers out 
 of the same pale rock, and the mounds of shingle 
 that now lie between them and the sea. 1 There are 
 few localities in the Western Islands where greater 
 scope is offered to the painter than among the glens 
 and corries of Jura. The scenery possesses in itself 
 much of the rugged dignity of the Highlands ; the 
 mountains have the advantage of rising directly from 
 the sea, and thus among scenes of the most lonely 
 and savage wildness, there are glimpses of the wide 
 Atlantic on the one side, and of the blue mountains 
 of Argyleshire on the other. The island has not 
 yet been inundated by the flood of summer tourists, 
 and the artist may pursue his task undisturbed. He 
 will find himself almost driven to enter upon a care- 
 ful analysis of rocky scenery ; for, amid the prevailing 
 grey hue of the hills, his eye will be less apt to lose 
 sight of the intricacies of form among the rich blend- 
 ings of colour. And even if he should never make 
 a picture out of his sketches, it will be strange if he 
 does not find this enforced study of the structural 
 character of rocks fraught with usefulness to him in 
 all his after career. 
 
 1 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. for May, 1861, p. 211.
 
 Origin of Conical Mountains. 217 
 
 The conical form of quartz mountains is likewise 
 characteristic of other rocks which have a uniformity 
 of texture. It seems to me to be due entirely to 
 subaerial decay, and indeed to be a strong evidence 
 of the reality and efficacy of this form of denuda- 
 tion. A homogeneous rock traversed with minute 
 joints and cleavage lines, tends to break up into 
 angular debris or shivers. Hence the thick coating 
 of rubbish along the sides of the Paps of Jura, Ben 
 Nevis, and hundreds of the other Highland hills. 
 As soon as this detritus is broken from the rock it 
 begins a slow descent to the valley below. The 
 upper part of the mountain is thus left exposed to 
 continual waste, while the sides, as they shelve down- 
 wards, are better and better protected under the 
 coating of rubbish that becomes thicker towards the 
 foot. When the structure of the rock and the activity 
 of the powers of waste are duly proportioned, the 
 result is that the mountain, worn away above and 
 shielded under Its ruins below, grows more and more 
 tapering, until it passes into a perfect cone. 
 
 In this quartz-rock series lie some bands of lime- 
 stone. These are easily recognised even from some 
 distance, for they are commonly clothed with a 
 bright verdure, which forms a pleasing contrast to 
 the dun-coloured heath of the surrounding tracts. 
 From a hill-top we fnay thus trace the course of 
 a limestone band for miles. The rock itself only
 
 2 1 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 comes to the surface in knobs and hummocks, but 
 its position is none the less surely marked by the 
 line of soft green grass that winds from brown hill- 
 side into browner valley. 
 
 Over the quartz-rock and limestone comes that 
 enormous and extensive group of gneisses and schist- 
 ose rocks already noticed. These are not charac- 
 terised by any uniform type of scenery their variety 
 of outline being doubtless traceable to their diver- 
 sities of mineralogical texture, and to the conse- 
 quently unequal waste which they undergo. The 
 long chain of uplands that runs from the Sound of 
 Mull to the Pentland Firth is formed of these 
 gneisses and schists. Where the rocks are harder 
 and more quartzose they give rise to a gnarled 
 craggy outline, and though the mountains may not 
 be lofty, yet their ruggedness gives them a wildness 
 which almost compensates for their want of height. 
 The scenery of the Trosachs is probably the most 
 familiar example. But the same features may be 
 seen on a much grander scale farther north, with- 
 out that fairy-like garniture of mountain-ash, oak, 
 birch, and willow, which lends such a charm to the 
 Trosachs. Perhaps the defile of Glen Shiel in the 
 west of Invernesshire, with its encircling group of 
 lofty naked mountains , may be taken as one of the 
 best examples of the more savage and rugged forms 
 which these rocks assume. Dark masses of bare
 
 -J '
 
 Mountains of Gneissose Rocks. 219 
 
 rock seem there piled upon each other, giving a cor- 
 rugated outline to the steep acclivities that rise up 
 into an array of grey serrated ridges and deep corries, 
 over which tower the peaks of Glenelg. Less acces- 
 sible, but not less striking examples of the same 
 savage scenery, may be found along the shores of 
 Loch Hourn (Plate III.) and Loch Nevis. The height 
 and the angular spiry forms of the mountain ridges, 
 the steep and deeply rifted slopes, and the rugged- 
 ness and sterility of the whole landscape, distinguish 
 these two sea-lochs from the rest of the fiords of the 
 west coast. 
 
 Amid such scenes as these, the influence of the 
 stratification and joints of the gneiss and schist on 
 the decomposition of the rocks can be traced by a 
 geological eye far along the summits and slopes of 
 the mountains. To this influence are due those 
 parallel clefts which give rise to dark rifts down the 
 steep scarps, and to deep angular notches on the 
 crests of the ridges. To the same cause also, com- 
 bined with the unequal waste that arises from varie- 
 ties in the texture of the rocks, we may ascribe 
 that gnarled craggy contour so characteristic of the 
 gneissose hills of the Highlands, as well as the 
 frequent tendency of the summits to assume spiry 
 forms. Sometimes a whole mountain has been worn 
 into a conical shape, but more frequently it is along 
 the crests or at the ends of ridges that this outline
 
 22O Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 occurs, and the reason seems to be that the gneiss 
 is usually too various in its texture and the rate of 
 its decomposition to allow of the formation of a 
 great cone like those of quartz-rock, while it is never- 
 theless uniform enough over lesser areas to give rise 
 to small cones and spires along the summit of a 
 mountain ridge. 
 
 Again, the influence of the internal structure of 
 gneiss and mica-schist upon the rocky foregrounds of 
 a Highland landscape must be familiar to many a 
 visitor of the north. The mingling of mouldering 
 knolls with rough angular rocks, the vertical rifts that 
 gape on the face of crag and cliff as if they had been 
 rent open by an earthquake, the strange twisted 
 crumpled lines of the stratification, the blending of 
 white bands of quartz with dark streaks of horn- 
 blende that vary the prevailing grey or brown or pink 
 hue of the stone, the silvery sheen of the mica and 
 the glance of the felspar or the garnets, the crusts of 
 grey and yellow lichen or of green velvet-like moss, 
 the tufts of fern and foxglove that rise ^bove the 
 clustered wild-flowers, the bushes of deep purple 
 heather, and the trailing briars these are features 
 which we recognise at once as distinctively and 
 characteristically Highland. With all deference I 
 would urge, upon our landscape painters the pro- 
 priety of studying these details of rock scenery more 
 than they have yet done. It is not as a mere mass
 
 Geological structure and L andscape-painting. 221 
 
 of light and shade thrown into the foreground to give 
 depth and distance to the picture that a group of 
 rocks and boulders is faithfully rendered on canvass. 
 There is an individuality even about the boulders, to 
 which no conventional style of treatment can at all 
 do justice. And no man will truly paint these 
 features unless he is content patiently and lovingly 
 to study them a task which, I doubt not, he will 
 find very pleasant in practice and eminently bene- 
 ficial in result. 1 
 
 1 In the recent exhibition of the Royal Scottish Academy (1865) no 
 feature struck me more than the conventionality of the Scottish artists 
 in the painting of rocks. One of the more noted of their number is 
 content to mottle the foreground of his Highland landscapes with 
 lumps of umber and white, worked up indeed into the external out- 
 line of rocks and stones, but utterly without character. It seemed 
 strange that in an exhibition containing so many pictures with High- 
 land scenes as subjects, there should scarcely be one which showed 
 that the painter had tried to study the individuality of rock-masses and 
 boulders, over and above that of hills and mountains. In painful con- 
 trast to the work of the living artists was the picture of Pegwell 
 Bay, by the late W. Dyce, R.A. a work in which the geological 
 structure of a chalk-cliff, not in itself a very attractive subject, was 
 given with all the fidelity of a photograph, but with a poetry of tone 
 and colour such as no photograph can give. The worn floor of chalk 
 on the beach was admirably rendered, and the scattered stones were 
 so well characterized that one could as easily pick out the large fractured 
 flints from the rolled pieces of chalk as he could do on the beach 
 itself. Yet this accuracy was not obtained at the expense of breadth 
 and symmetry of treatment It shows that, without descending to 
 mere servile copying, a great addition of variety may be obtained for 
 the foreground of a picture by a careful study of the structural forms 
 of rocks. Mr. Ruskin's eloquent pages on this subject are familiar to 
 every one. The most remarkable sketches of rock-scenery which I 
 
 have
 
 222 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 When the schistose rocks are of a softer and more 
 uniform texture they form large lumpy hills with 
 long smooth slopes covered with heath or peat, 
 through which the rock seldom protrudes, save here 
 and there where a knob of harder consistency comes 
 to the surface, or where a mountain torrent has cut 
 a ravine down the hill-side. Those wide tracts of 
 the Highlands where the rocks are of this nature, 
 possess a tame uniformity of outline which even their 
 occasional great height hardly relieves. The traveller 
 who crosses Ross-shire from Loch Broom to Ding- 
 wall, through the dreary Dirie More, will be able to 
 realize this oppressive monotony, and to contrast it 
 with the scarped and precipitous mountains that rise 
 on the south round Loch Fannich. I do not know 
 a better illustration of the effect of these softer schists 
 in producing smooth-sloped hills than along the west 
 side of the Firth of Clyde between the Kyles of Bute 
 and the Gareloch. A band of clay-slate runs across 
 the Island of Bute, skirts the firth by Innellan and 
 Dunodn, crosses the mouth of Loch Long and the 
 Gareloch, and strikes thence to Loch Lomond. It is 
 easy to trace this strip of rock by the smooth undu- 
 lating form of its hills, which remind us rather of the 
 
 have yet seen are those by my friend Mr. E. W. Cooke, R. A. In look- 
 ing at them I am at a loss whether to wonder more at their scrupulous 
 truth, or at the amount of thought and feeling which glows through 
 each of them.
 
 Granite Mountains. 223 
 
 scenery of the southern uplands than of the High- 
 Jands. Behind the clay-slate lies a region of hard 
 quartzose rocks, and the contrast between their rough 
 craggy outlines and the tame features of the clay- 
 slate is a familiar part of the scenery of the Clyde. 
 It is to these harder rocks that we owe the rugged- 
 ness of the mountains that sweep from the shores of 
 Loch Fyne through Cowal, across the Holy Loch, 
 Loch Goil, Argyle's Bowling Green, and Loch Long, 
 into the heights of Ben Lomond. Their craggy 
 Highland character, when seen from the east, is not a 
 little enhanced by the softly undulating contour of 
 the clay-slate hills that come into the nearer land- 
 scape. 
 
 The granite (including the syenite) of the High- 
 lands is not always characterized by a special type of 
 scenery. Sometimes, as in the Moor of Rannoch, it 
 covers leagues of ground without ever rising into a 
 hill ; or, as seen from the top of Cairngorm, it swells 
 into wide, tame, undulating uplands ; or it mounts in 
 huge craggy precipices far up into the mists", and 
 encloses dark tarns like Loch Aven, or it sweeps into 
 dome-shaped eminences like the red hills of Skye, or 
 into a stately cone like that of Goatfell. (Plate IV.) 
 I have already remarked, that some of these various 
 and apparently incongruous forms may be found 
 combined in the same district, nay, even in the same 
 mountain. From the summits of some, the granite
 
 224 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 mountains in the Grampian chain, the eye wanders 
 over a wide, smooth, undulating table-land of hill-tops, 
 and yet one or more of the flanks of each of these 
 mountains may be a dizzy precipice 2,000 feet in 
 descent, with its rifts of winter snow hidden deep 
 from the sun. Such is the character of the highest 
 parts of the Grampians, 
 
 "Around the grizzly cliffs which guard 
 The infant rills of Highland Dee." 
 
 Granite is usually traversed with innumerable joints, 
 both parallel and oblique to each other, whereby the 
 rock in weathering is broken up. The form which 
 the granite mass assumes under the action of the 
 wasting powers of nature depends greatly upon the 
 angle of its surface. On a horizontal or gently 
 inclined surface of granite, rains and frosts are com- 
 paratively helpless to split open the joints, for the 
 upper layer of the rock breaks up into angular 
 rubbish, which, though always wasting away, is al- 
 ways renewed in such a manner as to protect the rock 
 below, and to preserve the uniformity of the surface. 
 But where a vertical wall of granite rises into air, it 
 may tend for a long while to maintain its precipitous- 
 ness ; for if it decays with tolerable equality through- 
 out, slice after slice will be removed from its face, and 
 if the springs, frosts, and streams at the foot of the 
 cliff are active enough, the accumulated rubbish 
 below may be swept away as it is loosened from the
 
 Landscapes along the Highland Borders. 225 
 
 crags above. Hence the precipice would shrink back- 
 ward into the mountain. To this unequal weathering 
 I believe we should ascribe the singular extremes in 
 the scenery of granite mountains, as well as the 
 picturesque forms which are often assumed by groups 
 of granite boulders. 1 
 
 Throughout the Highlands, where the older palaeo- 
 zoic rocks adjoin formations of later date, there is 
 usually a well marked contrast of scenery. Thus 
 along the shores of the Moray Firth the brown rough 
 mountains of the interior are fringed with a border of 
 fertile ground, marking where the Old Red Sandstone 
 takes the place of the schists. Further north a simi- 
 lar contrast shows where the Oolitic sandstones and 
 shales of Sutherlandshire run as a strip along the 
 coast, at the base of the line of rounded bare conglo- 
 merate hills which rise above them. On the west 
 side of the island also, the Liassic and Oolitic strata, 
 owing to the comparative richness of their soil and 
 their low level, are sharply marked off from the 
 Cambrian and Lower Silurian mountains which sur- 
 round them. 
 
 1 1 must confess, however, that the Highland precipices present not 
 a few difficulties to the geologist who would explain their origin and 
 persistence. I should much like to know to what extent they and the 
 deep glens from which they rise were modified during the glacial period. 
 One may feel sure that they are not due to subterranean convulsion, 
 though he may not be able to follow back to the first beginning the 
 various stages of their formation during the slow excavation of the 
 rock. 
 
 Q
 
 226 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 As a final example of the close relation between 
 the contour of the Highland hills and the nature of 
 the rocks that compose them, let me refer to the 
 Inner Hebrides. These islands, from the north end 
 of Skye to the south of Mull, are formed in great part, 
 of greenstone, basalt and other masses of volcanic 
 origin, piled above each other in horizontal or gently 
 inclined beds, to a height of many hundred feet. 
 Some of these rocks weather away more rapidly than 
 others. Hence the profile of a hill in these districts 
 
 FIG. 17. VIEW OF A TERRACED TRAP HILL, ISLE OF EIUG. 
 
 usually shews a succession of terraces, each of the 
 harder beds standing out sharply against the sky like 
 one of the steps of a staircase. Moreover, the general 
 decay of the rocks gives rise to a rich loam, and thus 
 these trap-islands are marked by the verdure of their 
 valleys and the close bright sward which is found in 
 patches even on the tops of their hills. No one who, 
 in a sunny day, has sailed through the Sound of Mull 
 can fail to remember how strikingly these features
 
 Landscapes in the Inner Hebrides. 227 
 
 are there brought out. The green mountains of Mull 
 rise from the water's edge, sometimes in steep rocky 
 banks seamed with glistening waterfalls, and sweep 
 inland, terrace above terrace and hill after hill, till 
 their minor features are lost in the distance. The 
 profile of one of these terraced slopes sometimes shows 
 twenty or thirty distinct steps with gentle green 
 slopes between them. The effect is often heightened 
 where a soft shale or yellow sandstone is banded 
 with the greenstones and basalts ; for then, as the 
 soft stratified intercalation moulders away, the 
 igneous rock above it may be traced as a dark crag, 
 running far along the side of the hill, and keeping 
 parallel with the other terraces overhead and below. 
 The landscapes in the interior of Mull and of the 
 northern half of Skye owe the singularly artificial 
 look of many of their lower hills, and the general 
 terraced character of the whole surface, to the man- 
 ner in which the bedded igneous rocks have yielded 
 to denudation. The penning of these lines recalls to 
 the writer many a pleasant reverie among the wilds 
 of the Inner Hebrides, when, sitting in the light of the 
 long autumn evenings, he used to mark the sinking 
 beams strike along the sides of those truncated pyra- 
 midal hills, revealing terrace over terrace in alternate 
 bars of dark crag and green slope features that were 
 but faintly seen in the glare of noonday to look 
 over the wild heathy uplands that stretched around 
 Q2
 
 228 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 to right and left in utter solitude and stillness; to 
 watch how hill-top after hill-top would lose its blush 
 of sunset, as if the dying day were slowly climbing 
 the steps cut along the flanks of the western hills, 
 and how the chill shadows, struggling upward from 
 dark and lonely glens, crept up the same gigantic 
 staircase until the whole landscape melted into grey 
 gloom, and the night began to falL 
 
 These and other local but characteristic parts of 
 Highland scenery are to be traced, then, to the varying 
 nature of the rocks of the country. I have already 
 said that before the great erosion of the Ice Age 
 began, these peculiarities were in all likelihood more 
 strongly marked than they are now, and that, slowly 
 recovering from the effects of the glaciation, they are 
 returning to their former condition. I have been 
 often struck with the progress of this change along 
 the shores of Loch Fyne. The hard quartzose rocks 
 opposite Tarbert are beautifully ice-worn and smoothed ; 
 their striae, still fresh and clear, may be seen running 
 out to sea under the w r aves. The lower parts have 
 been protected from decay, owing partly to the recent- 
 ness of their upheaval into dry land, and partly to 
 their having been shielded by a coating of boulder- 
 clay, not yet worn away from the bays. But above 
 high-water mark, though the track cf the old ice-sheet 
 is still strikingly shewn, the rocks have begun to split 
 up along their joints. Hence the low cliff that rises
 
 Fading of tJie Ice-marks in tJie HigJdaiids. 229 
 
 along the shore is rent into endless chinks and clefts, 
 large angular blocks have been detached from it, and 
 its base is cumbered with the ruins. Some of the 
 islands show well the union of the glaciated outlines 
 with this subsequent weathering. They still rise out 
 of the water in long flat curves, like so many whales, 
 the form that was impressed upon them by the ice ; yet 
 they are split across along the joints into open cracks 
 which one might fancifully compare to deep paralle 
 gashes made across the whale's back. 
 
 FIG. A 1CE-WOEX ISLETS IX LOCH FYKE, WEATHEXtSG ALOXG THK PARALLEL 
 
 The examples already cited from Ben Nevis and 
 elsewhere, of the waste of cliffs and ravines, illustrate 
 this obliteration of the marks of the ancient glaciers. 
 It is unnecessary to multiply instances of a feature of 
 Highland scenery which may be seen more or less 
 distinctly on almost every hill-side and valley. Nor 
 need I again point to the numerous ravines and river- 
 channels which have been excavated or deepened 
 since the ice disappeared, and which show that the
 
 230 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 same forces that carved out the valleys are still busy 
 at their task. 
 
 Since the glacial period came to a close, not only 
 have the various powers of waste been ceaselessly at 
 work upon the land, there has likewise been an up- 
 heaval of the country to a height of fully forty feet 
 above the level at which it stood when the glaciers 
 crept back from the mouth of Glen Spean. The later 
 stages of this rise will be further alluded to in a 
 subsequent chapter in their relation to the kingdom 
 generally. Forests, too, have sprung up and dis- 
 appeared. Lakes have given place to bogs and peat- 
 mosses. And man, a more rapid agent of change than 
 the elements, has done much to alter the aspect of 
 the Highlands. I think it better, however, to defer the 
 notice of these later changes until the solid framework 
 of the rest of the kingdom has been considered. 1 
 
 i It will, of course, be understood that the scope of this volume 
 permits me to treat only of those geological changes of which there are 
 marked proofs in the scenery of the country. Hence I must pass over 
 the evidence of oscillations of level afforded by the sunk forests, and 
 other subjects which, though of great interest, do not specially eluci- 
 date the present inquiry.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE SOUTHERN UPLANDS. 
 
 FROM the iron-bound coast of St. Abb's Head, on 
 the one side of the island, to the cliffs of Portpatrick 
 on the other, there stretches a continuous band of hilly 
 ground, sometimes called the South Highlands, and 
 which for the sake of clearness has been referred to 
 in the foregoing Chapters as the Southern Uplands. 
 This tract corresponds closely to the area occupied 
 by the Lower Silurian formation, and its geology 
 on the large scale is remarkable for simplicity. The 
 whole district from sea to sea consists fundamentally 
 of hard greywacke and shale, with occasional lime- 
 stone bands, of Lower Silurian age, arranged in highly 
 inclined or vertical strata that strike from south-west 
 to north-east. These rocks, though hardened and 
 even in some places changed into schist, serpentine, 
 felstone, granite and other rocks, have not suffered 
 from the same wide-spread metamorphism which has
 
 232 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 so altered the Lower Silurian rocks of the Highlands. 
 Yet they have been squeezed into endless foldings, as 
 if, to use the oft-quoted simile of Sir James Hall, 
 they had been great piles of carpet, and had been 
 crumpled up by a strong pressure from the north-west 
 on the one side and from the south-east on the other. 
 Hence the folds run from south-west to north-east 
 that is, at right angles to the direction of the pressure. 
 And if the student would see the results of the 
 process, let him traverse the rocky shores of Wigton 
 and Kirkcudbright, or the cliffs of Berwickshire. He 
 will there find a cross section of the rocks, and see 
 the hard greywacke and shales bent into great arches 
 and troughs, or squeezed into little puckerings, and 
 will be able to trace these plications following each 
 other from top to bottom of the cliffs, mile after mile 
 along the coast. He will thus learn that in a long 
 section of strata that are piled on end there may be 
 endless repetitions of the same beds, very much as 
 the leaves of a bound book are made up of numerous 
 foldings of a comparatively small number of sheets ; 
 the top of the arches of the rocks having been cut 
 away by denudation, somewhat as the edges of the 
 leaves have been pared off by the book-binder. 1 
 
 One result of such a visit to the coast sections of the 
 Silurian uplands is to assure us that, just as in the 
 
 1 See this structure shewn in Sections II. and III. along the margin 
 of the accompanying map.
 
 Geology of the Southern Uplands. 233 
 
 Highlands, so here, the arches of the strata have not 
 given rise to hills, nor have their troughs formed valleys. 
 Indeed, along the crest of the sea-cliffs we see the 
 rocks cut sharply off by the surface of the country, 
 whether they consist of hard greywacke or crumbling 
 shale, whether they are on end or gently inclined, and 
 whether they have been thrown into anticlinal or 
 synclinal axes. It is plain that to whatever origin the 
 present irregularities of the ground are to be assigned, 
 they are not due to the upward and downward folds 
 of the rocks. It will be seen in the sequel, that these 
 uplands, like the Highlands, are a stupendous monu- 
 ment of denudation ; that a vast thickness of rock 
 has been ground away from their present surface, and 
 that their hollows and hills have been determined by 
 the same powers of waste that have played a like part 
 in the history of the northern half of the kingdom. 
 
 By referring to the map the reader will observe 
 that, in addition to these contorted strata, the Silurian 
 tract of the south of Scotland contains a few outlying 
 patches and strips of the later formations, which run 
 up into the hills from the plains on either side. Thus 
 the Old Red Sandstone lies in bays along the northern 
 edge of the Lammermuirs, caps their summit south 
 of Fala, and ascends from the low grounds of the 
 Tweed up the valley of the Leader. The Carboni- 
 ferous rocks indent the Silurian belt in a tongue 
 which runs south from Cumnock, and contains the '
 
 234 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 little coal basin of Sanquhar. The Permian breccias 
 and sandstones likewise mottle the surface of the 
 older rocks of the chain in strips and patches, in the 
 valleys of the Annan and Nith, and even westward 
 on the coasts of Wigton and Ayrshire. Wherever a 
 large enough mass of such later deposits occurs it 
 forms a distinct feature in the landscape. 
 
 With these trifling interruptions, the Silurian belt 
 is found to have a well-marked scenery of its own, 
 which is confined with notable strictness between 
 the boundary lines of the Silurian rocks. Its north- 
 western limit in particular is as well marked as the 
 line that separates the Highlands from the Low- 
 lands between the Clyde and Stonehaven. In East 
 Lothian and Edinburghshire it mounts into the long 
 chain of the Lammermuirs, whose steep bare front 
 seems to project headland after headland into the 
 fertile plains below, as a high river-bank rises out of 
 its alluvial haugh, or as a lofty sea-cliff sweeps 
 upward in promontory and bay above the waves 
 that foam along its base. Across the counties of 
 Peebles and Lanark, the edge of these uplands, 
 though still well defined geologically, is sometimes 
 not so marked in the landscape, owing to the rise 
 of the ground in its front. But in Ayrshire it regains 
 well-nigh all the boldness which marks its course 
 through the eastern counties, and from the head of 
 Nithsdale to the sea at Girvan, it is traceable in
 
 The Southern Uplands. 235 
 
 the long line of abrupt rocky hills which overlook 
 the coal fields of Cumnock and Dalmellington, and 
 rise so picturesquely out of the woods and corn-fields 
 of the vale of the Girvan Water. The south-eastern 
 border of the district is less exactly defined. There 
 is, consequently, on that side an occasional gradation 
 from the characteristic features of the great upland 
 country into that mingling of wild moorland and 
 cultivated valley which gives so peculiar a charm to 
 the landscapes of the Borders. 
 
 The scenery of this broad belt of hilly ground is 
 distinct from that of any other part of the kingdom. 
 It maintains, indeed, a great uniformity and even 
 monotony throughout its whole extent. No one can 
 journey, however, through Galloway or Carrick, and 
 thence through the uplands that stretch north-east- 
 ward to the German Ocean, without marking that 
 this long chain of high grounds divides itself naturally 
 into two not very unequal portions, each of which, 
 while retaining the same family likeness, possesses 
 nevertheless certain individual and distinguishing 
 features of its own. The valley of the Nith passes 
 completely across the Silurian region, and its course 
 serves as an approximate boundary line between 
 the two districts. This may be partly seen, even 
 from a glance at the map ; the tracts that lie be- 
 tween the Nith and St. Patrick's Channel will be 
 observed to be broken up into irregular groups
 
 236 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of mountains and hills dotted over with lakes and 
 tarns, but traversed by few large rivers. The country 
 between Nithsdale and St. Abb's Head, on the other 
 hand, will be found to be marked as long connected 
 chains of hills, nearly destitute of lakes, but with 
 numerous confluent valleys, whose united waters, after 
 a course of many miles, enter the sea as important 
 rivers the Clyde, Tweed, Esk, and Annan. But this 
 distinction is, of course, much more marked in nature, 
 where it can be seen in all its details. 
 
 The north-eastern half of the Silurian belt from 
 Nithsdale to the German Ocean may be regarded as 
 a wide undulating table-land, cut into coalescing ridges 
 by a set of valleys which are usually narrow and 
 deep. It has no determinate system of hill-ranges, 
 the grouping of its eminences seeming in most 
 cases to be defined by the circumstances which aided 
 or retarded the excavation of the intervening hollows. 
 Thus its seaward end, forming the heights of Lam- 
 mermuir, when seen from the plains of East Lothian, 
 has a long undulating summit, with an average level 
 of 1,500 or 1,600 feet above the sea, and rises 
 abruptly with a steep bare slope high above the rich 
 champagne country that stretches to the shore. 
 Standing on the north-western verge of these heights, 
 on such an eminence for instance as Lammer Law 
 (1,733 feet), the spectator sees below him, to the 
 north and west, a rolling plain of woodlands and
 
 The Southern Uplands. 237 
 
 corn-fields, dotted with villages and mansions, down 
 to the edge of the blue firth, and ranging westward 
 beyond the crags and hills of Edinburgh. But he 
 has only to turn round to the south and east to look 
 over a dreary expanse of bare hill-top and bleak 
 moor wide lonely pastoral uplands, with scarce any 
 further trace of human interference visible from this 
 height, than here and there a sheep-drain or grey 
 cairn. Far away south, beyond the limits of this 
 solitary region, the Eildon Hills, Ruberslaw, and all 
 the long chain of the Border heights eastward to the 
 Cheviots, rise up with a softened outline from the 
 green vale of Tweed. The surface of the Lam- 
 mermuirs, like that of the greater part of these 
 uplands, is singularly smooth. It is coated with short 
 heath or coarse grass, save where a mantle of peat 
 covers the hollows, or where the streams keep open 
 their channels through the bare drift or hard rocks. 
 So smooth, broad, and grassy are these hill-tops, that 
 they may be traversed from Lammer Law to the 
 eastern end of the chain without showing anywhere 
 the solid rock at the surface, and but for the distant 
 view of the rich lowlands lying far below, the traveller 
 might walk mile after mile in the belief that he was 
 passing over a piece of wild moorland, such as occurs 
 in the lower parts of the country, instead of the 
 summit of a chain of hills, some 1,500 or 1,600 
 feet above the sea. If, however, while moving,
 
 238 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 along the ridge he approached its edge, especially 
 towards its western end, he would find that it 
 descends abruptly into the plains, and is deeply 
 trenched with gullies and narrow glens, through 
 which its drainage escapes to the low grounds. 
 
 These heights of Lammermuir may be taken as a 
 fair sample of the general scenery of the country 
 between the German Ocean and the vale of the Nith. 
 Yet in the higher parts of the district the smoothness 
 and verdure of the hills are here and there ex- 
 changed for bold rocky scarps, bare crags and cliffs, 
 and deep narrow defiles, that remind us now and then 
 of parts of the Highlands. Such is the nature of the 
 romantic pass of Dalveen among the Lowther Hills. 
 Where the ground rises into the group of Broad Law 
 and Hart Fell, the same features are seen in the 
 deep dark glens that lead into Moffatdale, as those 
 of Black's Hope, Carreifran, and the Grey Mare's 
 Tail; in the solitary glen of the Talla, and in the 
 crescent-shaped cliffs of White Coomb and the Loch 
 Craig, that "frown round dark Loch Skene." 
 
 Yet, though the flanks of the hills which form the 
 higher parts of the uplands are thus cut into rocky 
 declivities and narrow defiles, the prevailing character 
 of a table-land is still impressively retained. Let the 
 geologist ascend to the top of the Broad Law which, 
 at a height of 2,754 feet, overlooks the whole of the 
 surrounding country. The summit of this hill is so
 
 The Southern Uplands. 239 
 
 wide and level that, as has been suggested, it might 
 be used as a race-course. Standing upon its flat 
 heathy surface he sees around him a vast sweep of 
 hills rising one after another, with long smooth sum- 
 mits that join on to each other and form, where seen 
 from this height, a wide table-land. Were it not, 
 indeed, for the deep valleys that can be traced 
 threading their way through these hills, a stranger 
 spirited away and set down on the Broad Law, might 
 easily imagine he had been taken to some league- 
 long moorland in the lowland plains. And even if he 
 cannot get to the top, save by the prosaic and some- 
 what toilsome process of climbing, his walk, while it 
 will give him a lively sense of the height of the table- 
 land, will not diminish the wonder with which his 
 eye wanders over the landscape, nor will it in aught 
 lessen his conviction that this great expanse of 
 elevated moorland must at one time have been an 
 undulating plain, and that but for the scooping out 
 of its valleys by subaerial waste, it would be a great 
 plain still. 
 
 The scenery of these valleys is likewise charac- 
 teristic. The heathy or peaty covering that often lies 
 along the flat summits gives place to a coarse sward 
 as the hills slope towards the streams, which they 
 do sometimes steeply, sometimes gently, yet almost 
 always with a smooth grassy surface, broken now and 
 then by a scar or knob of grey rock. Where they
 
 240 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 approach each other closely they form such narrow 
 deep glens as those of the Talla and Manor Waters, 
 and where they are less shelving and wider apart, 
 the broader space between their bases is spread out 
 into alluvial meadow lands like those of the Tweed. 
 Except along the water-courses, or where they have 
 been planted along the lower parts of the hills, as a 
 shelter for sheep, there are no trees. Nor do we meet 
 with that union of crags and scars and broken 
 ground, with masses of purple heather, ferns and wild 
 flowers which enters so largely into a typical High- 
 land landscape. It is in short, a smooth, green, 
 pastoral country, cultivated along the larger valleys, 
 with its hills left bare for sheep, yet showing enough 
 of dark bushless moor to remind us of its altitude 
 above the more fertile plains that bound it on the 
 northern and southern sides. 
 
 Yet, with all this tameness and uniformity of out- 
 line, there is something irresistibly attractive in the 
 green monotony of these lonely hills, with their never 
 ending repetitions of the same pasture-covered slopes, 
 sweeping down into the same narrow valleys, through 
 which, amid strips of fairy-like meadow, the same 
 clear stream seems ever to be murmuring on its way 
 beside us. Save among the higher districts, there is 
 nothing savage or rugged in the landscapes. Wan- 
 dering through these uplands, we feel none of that 
 oppressive awe which is called forth by the sterner
 
 The Southern Uplands. 241 
 
 features of the north. There is a tenderness in the 
 landscape, 
 
 " A grace of forest charms decayed 
 And pastoral melancholy," 
 
 that in place of subduing and overawing us, calls 
 forth a sympathy which, though we cannot perchance 
 tell why it should be given, we can hardly refuse to 
 give. It may be, indeed, that with this feeling, 
 human associations have much to do. For all this 
 wide region of hill and valley is a part of that Border 
 Country which has been. hallowed by story and song. 
 One cannot wander without dreamy thoughts of the 
 past by Gala and Tweed, Ettrick and Yarrow, with 
 their castles, and peels, and chapels, lonely and grey, 
 and the traditions that seem to cling with a living 
 power to every ruin and hill-side. And though, 
 sharing in Wordsworth's experience, we may " see 
 but not by sight alone," and allow "a ray of fancy" 
 to mingle with all our seeing, we come back to 
 these bare hills and quiet green valleys ever with 
 fresh delight, and find that as we grow older they 
 seem to grow greener, and to enter with a renewed 
 sympathy into the musings of the hour. 1 
 
 1 To the reader who has not wandered through these uplands in sun- 
 shine and storm, I cannot hope to convey an adequate idea of their 
 fascination. There is an interesting account of their different influence 
 on Washington Irving and on Scott, in Lockhart's Life of Scott. See 
 also Wordsworth's two exquisite poems of Yarrow Unvisited and 
 R
 
 242 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The south-western half of the Silurian region 
 stretches from Nithsdale to Portpatrick. As I have 
 already said, it is marked by the same great features 
 as the north-eastern half between the Nith and 
 St. Abb's Head. It has the same character of a wide 
 table-land cut into distinct ridges by systems of 
 valleys. Yet it shows a good many local peculiari- 
 ties. It rises in Galloway into a cluster of mountains, 
 of which the highest, Merrick, is 2764 feet above the 
 sea the most elevated ground in the south of 
 Scotland. 
 
 These heights present the same Highland-like 
 wildness as those to the north-east of Nithsdale, but 
 on a far larger scale. Their tops indeed are smooth, 
 but their sides are often deeply gashed with gullies 
 and glens, or scarped with abrupt precipices. No 
 scenery in the whole of the uplands of the southern 
 counties can compare, for naked and rugged grandeur, 
 with the glen's of the Merrick hills. There are no 
 trees, no cultivation, no trace of man. The moun- 
 tains descend in a wilderness of shattered crags into 
 the dark glens, where the streamlets are often caught 
 in little tarns, or dashed in foaming cataracts over 
 ledge and cliff. Between these hills and the coast of 
 Wigtonshire, lies a region of rough moor, mottled 
 
 Yarrow Visited. Descriptions of the scenery of these regions abound 
 in Scott's novels, as, for instance, in St. Ronaifs Well, The Abbot, and 
 The Bride of Latnmermuir.
 
 244 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 with endless hummocks of glacier drift, and scores of 
 gleaming lakes. 
 
 Some of the scenic peculiarities of this region will 
 be again alluded to in connexion with its old glaciers. 
 Its greater wildness is perhaps to be attributed partly 
 to the fact that it has undergone a far more decided 
 metamorphism than any other part of the Silurian 
 belt of the southern counties, partly to its greater 
 height, and partly to the effects of the mass of ice 
 which its elevation and extent enabled it to foster. 
 The metamorphism is unequal and sporadic, but the 
 general contour of the surface sometimes approaches 
 closely to that of the metamorphosed rocks of the 
 Highlands. Nevertheless, these broken rugged fea- 
 tures are, at the best, but partial. They do not 
 efface the traces of that undulating line which con- 
 nects hill-top with hill-top in one wide sweep of 
 table-land. Seen from the western side of the moors, 
 or from the plains of Ayrshire, the glens and corries 
 and defiles disappear, and we trace only a long mass 
 of high ground, sloping gently away from a central 
 point. (Fig. 19.) 
 
 THE SURFACE OF THE SOUTHERN UPLANDS, AN OLD 
 SEA-BOTTOM. 
 
 In the wide, smooth, undulating surface of this great 
 table-land of the southern counties the geologist can 
 have little hesitation in tracing the results of a long
 
 Table- land of the Southern Uplands. 245 
 
 protracted denudation by the sea. The lesson of 
 enormous waste which we have seen to be taught by 
 every Highland mountain top, is brought home to us 
 not less vividly here. For it requires but a casual 
 scrutiny to perceive that these long flat summits, in- 
 stead of being made by the broad surfaces of hori- 
 zontal strata, have been in reality planed down upon 
 the upturned edges of contorted greywackes and 
 shales. In crossing a smooth hill-top among these 
 uplands, we pass over bed after bed, tilted on end, 
 crumpled, inverted, broken ; yet the whole complex 
 mass has been shorn away to a common level. By 
 prolonging the truncated arches of the rocks (as 
 shown in Sections II. and III. on the accompanying 
 map), some idea may be formed of how vast a mass 
 of material must have been worn away, and how 
 entirely the surface of these high grounds has been 
 fashioned by denudation. The cutting of such a 
 great undulating plain out of hard rock must have 
 been mainly the work of the sea, during perhaps 
 many ups and downs of this part of the earth's crust. 
 In short, the long belt of high ground between St. 
 Abb's Head and St. Patrick's Channel is an ancient 
 sea-bottom ; the broad green tops, dotted to-day with 
 sheep and grouse and black-cock, took their levelled 
 outline under the grinding power of the breakers, 
 and partly, perhaps, of drift-ice borne by ocean- 
 currents.
 
 246 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 In what geological period did this wide-spread de- 
 nudation begin ? Within certain limits it is possible 
 to answer this question. As the rocks are of Lower 
 Silurian age, their denudation must be later than 
 Lower Silurian times. They are overlaid here and 
 there, especially in East Lothian and Berwickshire, 
 with cakes of conglomerate and sandstone belonging 
 to the Upper Old Red Sandstone. These deposits 
 are only fragments of a once continuous sheet that 
 spread over a large part of the Silurian region. They 
 are made of the waste of the underlying rocks, and 
 by their contents and position they show that before 
 they were laid down, the contortion and metamorphism 
 of the Silurian rocks had been completed. They lie 
 upon the truncated worn edges of the older strata, 
 like a series of books laid horizontally upon a lower 
 set placed on end. It is plain, therefore, that a great 
 part of the levelling of this wide Silurian table-land 
 was effected before the conglomerates and sandstones 
 were deposited. The work was in all likelihood done 
 in great part during the Old Red Sandstone period, 
 and even perhaps to some extent during the accumu- 
 lation of the conglomerates of the Upper Silurian 
 series. Thus the cutting down of the great Silurian 
 table-lands of the Highlands and of the Southern 
 Uplands probably took place during the lapse of the 
 same vast geological period, viz. that of the Old Red 
 Sandstone, although, counting by years, the Highland
 
 Table-land of the Southern Uplands. 247 
 
 table-land may be thousands of centuries older than 
 that of the south. 1 
 
 After the Silurian rocks had been thus planed 
 down into a broad undulating surface, they were 
 carried beneath the waves, and as they sank, their 
 own ruins were heaped upon them in piles of shingle 
 and sheets of sand. These deposits are still visible, 
 here and there, in patches of red conglomerate and 
 sandstone. It remains to be ascertained to what 
 extent the Silurian region was ever continuously 
 buried under later deposits. That the Upper Old 
 Red Sandstone covered a great part of its surface, 
 both at its eastern and western end, can be satis- 
 factorily proved. The remarkable faults which 
 bring down the Carboniferous strata against the 
 northern edge of the Silurian belt, raise a strong sus- 
 picion that these rocks once stretched completely 
 across the Uplands, connecting the Carboniferous 
 area of Central Scotland with that of Berwickshire 
 and the north of England. Again, the patches of 
 Permian breccias and conglomerate resting in valleys 
 of the Silurian tracts, show either that the Old Red 
 and Carboniferous Sandstones never existed there, or 
 (which seems to me the more probable supposition) 
 
 1 The removal of the Old Red Sandstone and Carboniferous rocks 
 from the Southern Uplands may point to subsequent marine denudation, 
 so that though the great table-land had its formation begun during 
 Upper Silurian or Old Red Sandstone times, it may not have been 
 ground down to its present level until a far later geological period.
 
 248 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 that they had been cleared out of those valleys before 
 the Permian deposits had been laid down. 
 
 FORMATION OF THE VALLEYS OF THE SOUTHERN UPLANDS. 
 
 To understand the progress of its subsequent 
 changes, we must bear in mind that as the broad 
 undulating plain, laboriously cut out of the Silurian 
 rocks, sank stage by stage beneath the waves, it was 
 covered over, at least in part, with a mass of detritus, 
 hundreds or thousands of feet in thickness. When 
 again this overlying mantle of later deposits, hardened 
 into conglomerate, sandstone, shale, limestone and 
 other rocks, rose into land, it had all to be worn away 
 before the old Silurian table-land could again be laid 
 bare. Since its first re-emergence it has doubtless 
 been often sunk and raised anew. Each time that it 
 came to the level of the breakers (or drift-ice), the 
 cake of newer strata would suffer abrasion more or 
 less extensive, according to the length of time it was 
 exposed. So that with the sweeping away of the 
 overlying Old Red and Carboniferous Sandstones the 
 sea may have had not a little to do. At the same 
 time, it must be granted that a great deal of the waste 
 may have been carried on by subaerial agents. There 
 is one part of the subaerial denudation which can 
 be approximately measured the excavation of the 
 valleys, for after what has been said in the previous
 
 Valleys of the Southern Uplands. 249 
 
 chapters there need be no further argument here to 
 shew that these valleys are really hollows that have 
 been scooped out of the solid rock, and that the ero- 
 sion has probably been performed by running water 
 and the other atmospheric powers of waste. 
 
 In no part of Scotland is the relation of valley to 
 water-course more strikingly shown than in these 
 Southern Uplands. The valleys are usually narrow 
 and deep, and the streams either fill up the whole 
 bottom, or wind from side to side in short curves, 
 laving the base of the opposite hill-sides alternately. 
 With the exception of the very ancient depressions in 
 which flow the Leader, Nith, and Annan, there are no 
 wide dales or straths. The valleys seem in each 
 case proportioned to the size of their streams, and 
 wind through the table-land with all the sinuosity 
 characteristic of channels cut by running water. 
 Seen from a height, indeed, this district looks like a 
 kind of model of the drainage-system of a country ; 
 for the hills are so smooth and uniform in contour, 
 that almost the only prominent varieties of outline 
 are those marked out by the confluent lines of valley 
 and water-course. Following the same subdivision 
 which was used with reference to the Highlands, we 
 may class the valleys of these uplands as transverse 
 or stretching across the high grounds, and longitu- 
 dinal or running along them. 
 
 By far the larger number of the main valleys
 
 250 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 belong to the transverse series. Beginning at the east 
 end, we find the Monynut, Whiteadder, and Leader 
 among the Lammermuir hills. Farther west are 
 the Gala, Eddleston and Lyne Waters, and beyond 
 the wide basin of the Tweed lie the valleys of the Esk, 
 Annan, Clyde, Nith, Dee, Boon, and Cree, with others 
 of less note. As a rule, these streams rise close to the 
 north-western edge of the table-land, and flow across 
 to the low grounds on the south-east. The Leader, 
 for example, takes its rise within two miles and a 
 half from the northern base of the Lammermuirs, and 
 runs thence southward to join the Tweed. The Dee, 
 also, has its source not three miles from the edge 
 of the table-land on the one side, but fully fifty miles 
 from the opposite margin. There is no example of a 
 river rising near the southern edge of the uplands 
 and flowing across them to the north. But not 
 only do most of the large streams begin close to the 
 north-western flank of the Silurian belt ; two of 
 them, the Lyne Water and the river Nith, actually 
 take their rise beyond the Silurian belt altogether, 
 and flow completely across it. The Lyne has its 
 source among the Pentland Hills, from which it 
 descends into a broad plain between Linton and 
 Romanno. It then strikes right into the Silurian 
 hills, and joins the Tweed. The Nith takes a still 
 more singular course. Its springs well out of the 
 north flank of the Uplands, and the infant river
 
 Valleys of the Southern Uplands. 25 1 
 
 descends into the Ayrshire Coalfield, as if to wind 
 away towards the Firth of Clyde. Instead of turning 
 in that direction, however, at New Cumnock it bends 
 round to the south-east, and then entering the Silu- 
 rian table-land, traverses its entire breadth, and 
 merges into the Solway. 
 
 How these streams have been able to flow across 
 a broad tract of hilly ground completely from side 
 to side is a question which will need much additional 
 inquiry for its satisfactory solution. In trying to see 
 how it is to be answered we should bear in mind that 
 some of these transverse valleys are of immense 
 antiquity, and that they were begun when the con- 
 tour of the country to the northward, forming now 
 the central lowlands, may have been vastly different. 
 The depression in which the Leader flows, known as 
 Lauderdale, is as old as the Upper Old Red Sand- 
 stone, and may be much older. The gravel and sand 
 which in that ancient geological period filled up the 
 valley, have been in great part worn away, and the 
 long hollow has become a valley again. Yet in the 
 same chain of hills there is another depression of 
 similar age, from which the sediment that filled it has 
 not been removed. It stretches between Dunbar and 
 Greenlaw, completely across the present chain of the 
 Lammermuirs. The red conglomerate and sand- 
 stone still choke it up, and it remains a buried valley 
 of as least as high antiquity as the Upper Old Red
 
 252 Scenery of Scotland, 
 
 Sandstone. Nithsdale, in like manner, cannot be of 
 younger date than the Carboniferous rocks which lie 
 along its bottom. Both Nithsdale and Annandale 
 must have existed as deep transverse valleys when 
 the Permian conglomerates and breccias were in the 
 course of deposition. The depression filled by the 
 waters of Loch Ryan and Luce Bay seems to be 
 another transverse land-valley, once stretching away 
 to the north-west, and as old as the Carboniferous 
 period, for both Carboniferous and Permian strata 
 line its western sides. 
 
 Again, it must not be forgotten that the long line 
 of faults by which the greater part of the north- 
 western margin of the uplands is bounded, shows that 
 the ground to the north-west has been depressed. 
 The table-land has, in fact, been broken through, and 
 the part which remains was once continuous with a 
 portion now buried deep beneath the lowland plains. 
 How far it went northwards, whether it descended 
 into a central valley, or sloped upward into still 
 higher ground, there is, perhaps, no way of discover- 
 ing. So far as we can tell, the Nith may originally 
 have taken its rise on a higher part of the table-land, 
 now sunk by the dislocations, and on the re-excava- 
 tion of the valley, after the Carboniferous period, part 
 of the drainage of the high-lying coal-measure ground 
 to the north would naturally find its way into this old 
 channel.
 
 Valleys of the Southern Uplands. 253 
 
 The longitudinal valleys are most numerous towards 
 the eastern end of the table-land, the more important 
 being those of the Teviot, Borthwick, Ettrick, and 
 Yarrow, and that of the Tweed as far down as Peebles. 
 They are also well-marked at the west end in the 
 glens of App, Stincher, and Muck. The course of 
 the Tweed is Singularly suggestive of the relation of 
 the one class of valleys to the other. From its source 
 down to its junction with the Lyne, the Tweed flows 
 north-eastward, though without strictly conforming 
 to the north-easterly strike of the strata. It is turned 
 round to the south-east by the Lyne, and after wind- 
 ing through the gorge of Neidpath, it is again bent 
 to the south-east, where it receives the Eddleston 
 Water. The united stream of the Ettrick and 
 Yarrow has been able to deflect it once more for a 
 few miles to the north-east, but as soon as it reaches 
 the valley of the Gala, it immediately turns round 
 to the south-east, and flows out into the Old Red 
 Sandstone plains. We see here a sort of compromise 
 between the two systems ; yet, though by much the 
 largest body of water comes down the longitudinal 
 valleys from the south-west, the influence of the 
 dominant (and, I believe, the older) class of valleys 
 prevails, the drainage being bent round to the 
 south-east, and carried in that direction out of the 
 Uplands. 
 
 As the general strike of the Silurian rocks in this
 
 254 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 part of the country runs from south-west to north- 
 east, there can be little doubt that this structure has 
 determined the course of the longitudinal valleys. 
 The influence of the dip of the rocks, and of disloca- 
 tions, in directing the excavating agents, is beautifully 
 shown by the valleys in the south-west of Ayrshire. 
 Glen App runs along the line of a fault. 1 The course 
 of the Stincher for miles is parallel to but not coin- 
 cident with a large fault, which may have given rise 
 to some long hollow at the surface, whereof the river 
 at first took advantage. But instead of rigidly fol- 
 lowing that line, the watercourse now lies some way 
 on the north side of it, and actually cuts across it 
 twice. 
 
 While the longitudinal valleys are to be traced to 
 subaerial erosion effected under the guiding influence 
 of the prevailing strike of the rocks, the transverse 
 series, like those of the Highlands, are due to some 
 cause apart from geological structure. They pass 
 over all the rocks indiscriminately, and they show 
 no proof of being cross fractures. They seem to me 
 to have had their direction given them by the first 
 seaward flow of the rain that fell on the table-land 
 as it rose out of the waves. The ground probably 
 
 1 Recently ascertained by Mr. James Geikie, in the course of the 
 geological survey of Ayrshire. Professor Ramsay has detected the 
 same fault on the west side of Loch Ryan, but there it does not give 
 rise to any such marked feature at the surface as in Glen App.
 
 Valleys of the Southern Uplands. 255 
 
 had a gentle slope towards the south-east, and winding 
 among the sea-worn channels, the drainage would 
 arrange itself into water-courses, of which the main 
 direction would be south-easterly. Once selected, 
 these channels would be deepened and widened until, 
 as age followed age, the upraised table-land was cut 
 down into a network of valleys. The north-westerly 
 slope of the table-land has been in great part 
 thrown down by faults, and covered over with later 
 formations. 
 
 It is unnecessary to enter into further details of 
 the process of subaerial waste, for it has gone on in 
 the same way in these high grounds as in the High- 
 lands. Numerous examples might be cited of the 
 recession of two glens towards each other and of the 
 final result of this degradation in the formation of a 
 valley or pass across a ridge. Nor need more than a 
 passing allusion be made to the influence of the cha- 
 racter of the rock upon the aspect of the scenery. I 
 have already noticed the rugged outlines of part of 
 the south-western half of the district, as contrasted 
 with the smooth monotony of the north-eastern half, 
 and have referred to the greater metamorphism 
 and more unequal texture of the rocks of the High- 
 land-like tracts as probably related closely to the 
 difference of scenery. There is a wonderful uni- 
 formity throughout the whole Uplands in the nature 
 of the rocks, and there is a corresponding uniformity
 
 256 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 in the character of the landscapes. Where a change 
 takes place among the mineral masses, it sometimes 
 shows itself, as among the wilds of Merrick, in deep 
 corries and rugged glens, where the Silurian strata 
 are highly altered and pierced with granite, or in a 
 green fertile valley like those of Lauderdale and Niths- 
 dale, where the older rocks are covered with Old 
 Red Sandstone or some later formation. 
 
 INFLUENCE OF ANCIENT GLACIERS AND ICE-BERGS ON THE 
 SCENERY OF THE SOUTHERN UPLANDS. 
 
 Although the present system of valleys among 
 these high grounds has probably been marked out 
 by the erosive action of running water, no one can 
 wander among them without being struck with the 
 proofs which they still retain of having been modified 
 by the ice of the glacial period. Indeed, the whole 
 surface of this part of the country bears that general 
 smoothed flowing outline so characteristic of glacial 
 action. Yet, owing to the tendency of the rocks to 
 decay and to conceal themselves under a smooth 
 coating of turf or heath, the polished and striated 
 surfaces which tell so unequivocally of the move- 
 ments of glacier or ice-floe, are comparatively rare. 
 Now and then, where a recent landslip of boulder 
 clay has taken place, the rock is laid bare with its 
 striae and scorings as fresh as when they were made. 
 From the evidence of such occasional exposures, it
 
 Glaciers of the Southern Uplands. 257 
 
 appears that, like the Highlands, the Southern Up- 
 lands were deeply buried under ice which pressed 
 its way down towards the low grounds outside. The 
 heights about the sources of the Clyde, Tweed, 
 Annan and Yarrow, formed a nucleus from which 
 the ice crept down the diverging valleys. The great 
 mass of high land in Galloway and Dumfriesshire 
 became a still larger centre of movement. Even yet, 
 the smoothed and grooved surface left by the ice- 
 sheet as it overrode hill and valley may be traced for 
 many miles away from the mountains, and the striae 
 are invariably found to point to the distant heights 
 from which the glaciers moved outwards to the sea. 
 Indeed on the south side of the high grounds the 
 very trend of the minor valleys seems connected with 
 the seaward divergence of the ice. 
 
 A further proof of the presence of the ice is found 
 in the thick till or boulder-clay which lies in most of 
 the valleys, and even mounts far up the hill-sides. 
 This deposit, as I have already had occasion to remark, 
 is so characteristically developed in the Lowland region 
 that its description may be advantageously deferred 
 till a succeeding chapter. The upper boulder-clay 
 and the overlying sands and gravels, belonging to the 
 period of submergence, likewise take their place 
 among the superficial deposits of this district. But 
 they, too, had better be included in the account of 
 the similar accumulations of the Midland Valley. 
 S
 
 258 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 There can be no doubt that after the high grounds of 
 the south of Scotland were cased in ice, they began 
 slowly to sink into the sea. How far the submergence 
 went, whether it was total, or whether the higher hill- 
 tops rose above the waves as dreary ice-clad islets, 
 cannot be easily determined. The difficulty is the 
 same as that already noticed with regard to the High- 
 land mountains. When the country was upheaved 
 again, the climate was still so severe that the ice con- 
 tinued to creep down to the sea, and in so doing it 
 must of course have largely, if not wholly, swept 
 away the traces left by the sea on the surface of 
 the rising land. During the subsidence, also, there 
 may have been much abrasion of the land by the 
 grating of bergs and ice-rafts, which came partly, 
 perhaps, from the north, and partly from the unsub- 
 merged hills of the neighbourhood. 
 
 The records of this second series of glaciers remain 
 still fresh and distinct. Among the valleys that run 
 up into the mass of high ground between the upper 
 part of Tweeddale and the sources of the Yarrow, 
 the moraine mounds are as perfect as if the glaciers 
 had only vanished a few years ago. In ascending the 
 defile of the Talla, above the picturesque linns, we 
 come upon mound after mound, sometimes fifty or 
 sixty feet above the stream which has cut its way 
 through them. They run in curves across the glen, 
 from the foot of the hill on the one side to the cor-
 
 Glaciers of the Southern Uplands. 
 
 259 
 
 responding slope on the other, the curves having their 
 "convex sides facing down the valley. Each mound 
 marks of course a pause made by the glacier as it 
 shrank, step by step, up into the narrowing snowfield 
 at the head of the glen. Beyond the top of the Talla 
 valley two deep semicircular recesses or corries have 
 been scooped out of the sides of the mountains. One 
 of these, that of the Midlaw Burn, is accurately 
 described in Wordsworth's picture of a similar corry 
 in the Cumbrian Chain. 
 
 " A little lowly vale, 
 A lowly vale, and yet uplifted high, 
 Among the mountains ; 
 Urn-like it was in shape, deep as an urn, 
 With rocks encompassed, save that to the south 
 Was one small opening, where a heath-clad ridge 
 Supplied a boundary, less abrupt and close." 
 
 A level meadow occupies its bottom, and the " heath- 
 clad ridges " which close it on the south are successive 
 
 FIG. 20. SECTIC 
 
 moraines huge piles of rubbish cumbered with mas- 
 sive angular blocks of greywacke. The meadow was 
 evidently at no distant day a lake, ponded back by 
 S 2
 
 260 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the moraine heaps which have been cut through by 
 the outflow of the water, until the lake has been 
 drained. The other corry, or rather open recess, is 
 that of Loch Skene. On the north and west sides, 
 steep and, in part, precipitous slopes of craggy rock 
 rise up from the margin of the lake, while on the east 
 and south the water is held in by moraine mounds. 
 I shall not soon forget the surprise with which, after 
 climbing with my old friend and colleague, Dr. John 
 Young, the ravine of the Grey Mare's Tail, and wan- 
 dering through the heaps of glacier rubbish that lie 
 along the valley above the linns, I saw from the top 
 of the last moraine mound the deep blue waters of 
 Loch Skene dancing in the sun. Everything around 
 told of the old glaciers ; mound after mound stretch- 
 ing in crescent-shape across the valley, and coming 
 down in irregular piles from the Midlaw Corry on the 
 left, huge masses of rock still perilously poised on the 
 summits of the ridges where they had been tumbled 
 by the ice that bore them from yonder far dark cliffs, 
 and then the lake itself so impressively the result of 
 the damming back of the water by the bars of detritus 
 thrown across the glen. 1 (Fig. 20.) 
 
 1 Mr. Robert Chambers published an allusion to the moraines of 
 Loch Skene in the second vol. of the Edin. New. Phil. Journ., New 
 Series, p. 184. The first description of them was, I believe, that given 
 in the memoir of the Glacial Drift of Scotland, p. 160. Since that 
 work was published the glacier relics of these high grounds have been 
 carefully mapped, in great detail, by Dr. Young, and the chief results
 
 Glaciers of the Southern Uplands. 261 
 
 But the mass of high ground between Nithsdale 
 and St. Patrick's Channel was the chief seat of 
 glaciers in the south of Scotland. Indeed the proofs 
 of intense glacial action there are hardly less striking 
 than in the mountainous parts of the Highlands. 
 Most of the innumerable lakes of that district lie 
 either in hollows among moraine mounds, or in ice- 
 worn basins scooped out of the rock. Thus, between 
 the foot of the range of the Merrick Hills and the 
 Bay of Luce, the ground is one wide expanse of 
 moor, roughened with thousands of heaps of glacier 
 detritus, and dotted with scores of lakes enclosed 
 among these rubbish mounds. The mass of ice 
 which came down from the high grounds and moved 
 westward and southward must have been very great. 
 That it went out to sea, and hence that the moraine 
 heaps of the great Galloway moors may have been 
 to some extent submarine, is suggested by the com- 
 position of some of the mounds. If one continuous 
 sheet of ice descended from the chain of mountains 
 between the head of the Stincher and Wigtown Bay 
 it must have been fully five and twenty miles broad. 
 But whether in one mass, or in separate, yet ad- 
 joining, glaciers, the ice certainly moved towards the 
 south and west with resistless force, for all the hills 
 and hummocks of rock in its way are ground down, 
 
 are given by him in a paper communicated to the Geological Society. 
 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. for 1864.
 
 262 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 polished and striated, the boulder clay of the older 
 ice-sheet and the marine drift are wholly, or almost 
 wholly, removed over a space many square leagues in 
 extent, and the surface of the country is strewed with 
 mounds, ridges, and heaps of clay, gravel and 
 boulders brought down from the mountains. It 
 gives us a lively idea of the continued severity of 
 the climate when we reflect that so limited a group 
 of hills, the summits of which could scarcely have 
 been more than 1,800 or 2,000 feet above the sea, 
 should yet have nourished such masses of ice and 
 snow. The seaward ends of the glaciers broke off as 
 bergs, and carried huge masses of granite away north, 
 south and west, dropping them over what are now 
 the fertile fields of Ayr. 1 
 
 As an example of extreme glaciation, I may refer 
 to the valley of Loch Doon. A rugged amphitheatre, 
 some four or five miles wide, lies among mountains 
 that reach a height of fully 2,750 feet above the 
 sea. The bottom of this great hollow is roughened 
 with prominences which, were they not dwarfed by 
 the lofty summits around them, \vould be looked on 
 as noteworthy hills. It is dark with peat, shaggy 
 with heather, and dotted with numerous tarns and 
 lochs. Its collected drainage finds an exit by a narrow 
 valley at the northern end, and it is there that Loch 
 
 i Part of this ground has been mapped in the course of the Geological 
 Survey of Scotland by my colleague Mr. B. N. Peach and myself.
 
 264 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 up out of the lake. Not only so. For a hundred feet 
 or more above the level of the water the rocks which 
 rise above the end of the lake are similarly worn. 
 There can be no doubt, I think, that the ice which 
 filled the hollow of Loch Boon went up the slope at 
 its northern end and so passed down into the valley 
 beyond. The deep gorge of Glen Ness, by which the 
 river escapes, seems to be partly the work of the 
 glacial period, but much deepened since then by the 
 wasting action of the roaring torrent which fills the 
 narrow chasm from side to side. Besides the polished 
 and striated rocks, the Loch Doon valley shows 
 abundant moraine rubbish. Among the detritus, 
 granite-boulders brought from the far mountains are 
 especially numerous. They are sometimes thickly 
 clustered in patches along the margin of the loch, or 
 heaped on its islets. Some of the islets, indeed, look 
 like the tops of moraine mounds appearing above the 
 water. In short, there is no locality in the south of 
 Scotland where the existence and effects of ancient 
 glaciers can be more impressively seen, and none 
 where, as it appears to me, the glacial origin of such 
 rock-encircled lake-basins is more clearly evinced. 
 Since the last remnants of the great snow-fields 
 and glaciers melted away from the uplands of the 
 south of Scotland, there has been a good deal of 
 minor change in the general features of the district. 
 The crags and cliffs where the naked rock comes out
 
 Southern Uplands. 265 
 
 into the light have suffered from long centuries of 
 exposure to the elements, and their ruins are seen 
 below them in streams of loose rubbish and piles of 
 large blocks of stone. Many a runnel has deepened 
 its first channel into a gully that runs as a narrow 
 gash down the smoothed hill-side. The brooks and 
 rivers too have been busy in eating away their banks 
 and lowering their beds. Some of the most pictu- 
 resque ravines, such as that of the Crichhope Linn in 
 Nithsdale, have been cut by running water since the 
 glacial period. The lower terraces and alluvial 
 haughs that flank the margins of the larger streams, 
 have likewise been made since then. Into the 
 changes due to vegetation the growth and dis- 
 appearance of forests, and the formation of peat-moss 
 I do not here enter, reserving until a following 
 chapter a brief reference to the nature and proof of 
 such changes over the whole country.
 
 266 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE MIDLAND VALLEY. 
 
 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE. 
 
 BETWEEN the southern flank of the Highlands and 
 the northern edge of the uplands of the pastoral 
 counties, lies that wide hilly plain or valley which, for 
 want of a better name, I have been accustomed to 
 call the Midland Valley. It is only in the broad 
 sense, as a band of lower ground between two moun- 
 tainous tracts, that it can be spoken of as a valley ; 
 nor can a district so plentifully dotted with hills, and 
 even traversed by long chains of heights, be in 
 strictness termed a plain. Geologically, however, this 
 belt of lowland country is a valley. Either side is 
 bounded by Lower Silurian rocks, rising on the north 
 in the rugged schists and gneisses of the Highland 
 mountains, and on the south in the contorted grey- 
 wackes and shales of the Southern Uplands. Between 
 these two boundaries the rocks belong to newer 
 formations, which may be broadly looked at as
 
 Geological Structure of Midland Valley. 267 
 
 dipping away from the flanking hills, the oldest strata 
 lying along the borders and the newest along the 
 middle. This arrangement, however, has been sadly 
 disturbed by numberless faults and depressions, so 
 that some of the older rocks are found coming up to 
 the surface far into the centre of the plain, while here 
 and there the later rocks, in place being confined to 
 the middle, stretch across to the margin and even go 
 over into the Silurian district beyond. 
 
 Along the northern border of this valley there runs 
 a broad well-defined belt of Lower Old Red Sand- 
 stone. It is exposed on the coast between Stone- 
 haven and the Firth of Tay, whence it extends 
 south-westward across the island to the Firth of 
 Clyde. It contains a great abundance of igneous 
 rocks the product of volcanoes that were active in 
 Scotland during the deposition of the Lower Old 
 Red Sandstone. These volcanic materials form nu- 
 merous detached eminences, as well as the long hill- 
 ranges of the Sidlaws and the Ochils. There is no 
 corresponding broad belt along the southern borders 
 of the valley. The Lower Old Red Sandstone does 
 appear there in a tract of moory heights between the 
 Pentland Hills and the Ayrshire Coal-field, and has 
 there been cut through in the well-known ravines and 
 Falls of the Clyde. But it is surrounded by Car- 
 boniferous strata which overlie it and stretch away 
 south to the Silurian uplands. The Upper Old Red
 
 268 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Sandstone follows the lower division for some way 
 along the south flank of the Ochils, till it is overlapped 
 by Carboniferous strata. It reappears from under 
 these later deposits on the south side, rising into 
 conspicuous hills among the Lammermuirs and ap- 
 pearing at intervals westwards into Lanarkshire. 
 
 The next formation in ascending series the Car- 
 boniferous covers by far the larger part of the 
 central valley. From St. Andrew's Bay it stretches 
 through Fife and Clackmannan to Stirling, and thence, 
 sweeping round the flanks of the Campsie Hills, to 
 the Clyde below Renfrew. A high bank of older 
 igneous rocks here interrupts its continuity. On the 
 west lies the large coal-field of Ayrshire ; on the east 
 the Carboniferous rocks spread over the valley of the 
 Clyde up nearly as far as Lanark, and strike east- 
 ward through the broad lowland country till they 
 abut against the Pentland chain. Immediately below 
 the eastern slope of that range, they reappear and 
 sweep through the rich lands of Edinburgh and Had- 
 dington to the sea at Dunbar. 
 
 It is the abundance of its igneous rocks which gives 
 to the broad Midland Valley its most characteristic 
 features. Besides the chains of the Sidlaws and 
 Ochils, the Old Red Sandstone 1 contains the felspathic 
 rocks of the Pentlands, and groups of hills in Carrick. 
 
 i Including both the Middle (?) series of the Pentlands and the Upper 
 Old Red Sandstone.
 
 Geological Structure of Midland Valley. 269 
 
 At the top of the Upper Old Red Sandstone or base 
 of the Carboniferous series there is a great develop- 
 ment of volcanic material, which shows itself in the 
 long chain of heights stretching from the Campsie 
 Fells to the south of Arran, and from Greenock south- 
 eastward into the range of high grounds between the 
 coal basin of the Clyde and that of Ayrshire. The 
 lower half of the Carboniferous system up to the top 
 of the Carboniferous Limestone abounds with igneous 
 rocks. They form in some cases a small cluster of 
 connected hills like those between Linlithgow and 
 Bathgate, or like the Garlton Hills in Haddington- 
 shire. But their more usual form is in broken hum- 
 mocky ground like that of the greater part of Fife, 
 or in crags and small sharply-defined hills, such as 
 those of Stirling and Edinburgh Castles, Binny Craig, 
 the Bass Rock, North Berwick Law and many others. 
 There are likewise igneous masses of still later age 
 which have broken through even the newest rocks of 
 the district, and, when of large enough dimensions, 
 reveal themselves at the surface in the usual rugged 
 features characteristic of the trap-rocks. 
 
 But for the existence of these igneous intercalations 
 the stratified formations of the Lowlands would have 
 formed mere wide undulating plains. It is the green- 
 stones, basalts, felstones, and other igneous rocks 
 which, rising up into bold hills, have relieved the 
 uniformity of the surface, and have given rise to much
 
 270 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 of what we recognise as distinctly lowland scenery. 
 It will be seen that the greater prominency of these 
 rocks is a fresh and impressive proof of enormous 
 denudation. 
 
 Allusion has already been made to certain long 
 lines of fault which separate the formations of the 
 Midland Valley from the Silurian rocks on either 
 side. The boundary of the southern edge of the 
 Highlands, and of the northern margin of the South- 
 ern Uplands, is in each case so remarkably straight 
 that it naturally suggests a line of fault on either 
 side of the lowland plain. There can be no doubt 
 that the boundaries along part of their course are 
 formed by dislocations. Thus the north-western 
 flank of the Lammermuir Hills is defined by a fault 
 which lets down the Carboniferous and Old Red 
 Sandstones to spread over the low grounds of East 
 Lothian. Another fault, with similar effect, runs 
 along the foot of the Silurian hills that sweep east- 
 ward from Girvan. And across the centre of the 
 island the Silurian boundary-line, which runs so 
 evenly from sea to sea, seems to coincide with dis- 
 locations, perhaps older than the Carboniferous period. 
 Along the edge of the Highlands the junction of the 
 Old Red Sandstone with the metamorphic rocks 
 appears sometimes to be defined by a fault, as at 
 Callander. But in other parts, as from Bute along 
 the Clyde shores to the Gareloch, and at Dunkeld,
 
 Geological Structure of Midland Valley. 271 
 
 the conglomerates rest undisturbed on the edges of 
 the schists, as sand and shingle may be seen resting 
 against the base of cliffs and rocky shores, exposed 
 to the dash of the waves. It may thus be that the 
 Highland boundary was marked out before the de- 
 position of the Old Red Sandstone, and that the 
 edge of the Southern Uplands was in part, if not 
 wholly, defined before the accumulation of the Car- 
 boniferous series. 
 
 Be this as it may, there can be no doubt that the 
 broad lowland valley is geologically a valley of de- 
 pression. It has sunk down below its ancient level, 
 so that the strata which originally were deposited 
 horizontally, or nearly so, are now bent into deep 
 troughs. Thus, in the county of Edinburgh the coal- 
 bearing beds lie in a long basin, the one lip or edge 
 of which comes to the surface at Gilmerton, the other 
 at Roman Camp Hill, the bottom of the basin being 
 more than three thousand feet deep. If these beds 
 could be flattened out it would perhaps be found that 
 they must originally have lain high over the tops of 
 the Lammermuir and Moorfoot Hills, and that they 
 are thus merely the fragments of an extensive sheet 
 of Carboniferous rocks that swept over the middle of 
 Scotland, and may even have joined the coal-fields 
 of England. That the different coal-basins of the 
 Lowlands were once united is almost certain. At 
 that time the strata must have been approximately
 
 272 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 horizontal, stretching across the country in one long, 
 level sheet. Subsequent subterranean movements 
 allowed certain portions to sink down into deep 
 troughs, while the intervening parts were bent over 
 into an arched form. During the lapse of centuries 
 of denudation these connecting arches have been 
 removed ; the whole surface of the Lowlands has 
 been worn down, and only those parts of the coal 
 strata which have been preserved in the basins now 
 
 DENUDATION OF THE MIDLAND VALLEY. 
 
 From this slight sketch it is plain that the present 
 comparatively level or undulating surface of the great 
 lowland valley is not due to the horizontal arrange- 
 ment of the rocks, nor merely to peculiarity of geo- 
 logical structure. A section across any part of the 
 district shows that the strata, so far from being flat, 
 are really curved to a remarkable degree. If no 
 change had been wrought upon the surface after the 
 rocks began to bend, we should now find them sink- 
 ing and rising into broad folds, the bottom of the 
 basins being sometimes several thousand feet below 
 the tops of the arches. In all likelihood, however, 
 
 1 The trough form of the strata filling up the Midland Valley is 
 shown in the long sections on each side of the map. It will be seen 
 from the truncated ends of the strata that the amount of denudation in 
 this as in the other parts of Scotland has been great.
 
 Denudation of the Midland Valley. 273 
 
 such irregularities were never suffered to make their 
 appearance to this extent upon the surface. The 
 subterranean movements by which the rocks were 
 folded were probably very slow. Hence the arches, 
 as they rose above the sea, would be wasted by the 
 waves and the weather, and their detritus would be 
 spread over the troughs that were sinking beneath 
 the ocean. If the rate at which the rocks were 
 curved and that at which they were wasted chanced 
 to be equal, the upward folds would never make any 
 show at the surface. And even if the arches were 
 bent up somewhat faster than they could be worn 
 away, the waste was perhaps always rapid enough 
 to make the actual gain of land less in propor- 
 tion than the total amount of upheaval. So much, 
 at least, is certain, that if ever the folds of the 
 strata rose into the air as wide dome-shaped hills 
 and mountains, they have been all planed down as 
 thoroughly as the furrows of a ploughed field are 
 effaced by the harrow and roller. Millions upon 
 millions of cubic yards of solid stone have thus been 
 worn away, and the surface of the Lowlands has been 
 again reduced to a general uniformity of level. Some 
 idea of the magnitude of this denudation may be 
 formed if we take one limited part of the district, 
 and estimate the amount of rock removed from it. 
 The Pentland Hills have at one time been covered 
 with Carboniferous rocks to a depth of perhaps 6,000 
 T
 
 274 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 or 7,000 feet. If the thickness of this covering be 
 estimated at 5,280 feet, or one mile, and the hills as 
 fourteen miles long by three miles broad, we find 
 that the mass of material worn away must have been 
 equal to forty-two cubic miles. This lost portion 
 would surpass by more than five times the bulk of 
 the present Pentland Hills ; and, if it could be set 
 down upon the Lowland Valley, it would form a 
 group of mountains nearly a thousand feet higher 
 than the loftiest of the Grampians. 1 
 
 Again, the valley of the Firth of Tay lies on what 
 is in geological structure not a depression, but an 
 arch or anticlinal axis. Yet not only has the whole 
 of the top of the arch been worn away, but the work 
 of erosion has gone on until the upward curve of the 
 rocks has been actually hollowed out into the present 
 wide valley. The trappean ridges which along the 
 edge of the Carse of Gowrie mount up in successive 
 terraces, dipping away to the north-west, once rose 
 high above what is now the Firth of Tay, and arched 
 over till they came down into the Fife Hills. The 
 connecting portion has been removed, but we see the 
 truncated ends of the beds rising up to the south- 
 east from the sides of the Sidlaws on the one hand, 
 and up to the north-west from the Fife slopes on 
 the other. The accompanying woodcut (fig. 21) is 
 
 1 Memoirs of the Geol. Survey. Geology of the Neighbourhood of 
 Edinburgh, p. 120.
 
 276 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 from a sketch taken on the top of Moncreiff Hill, 
 looking eastward towards the mouth of the Firth. 
 It will be observed that the hills on the left, or north 
 side, present their abrupt escarpments to the south, 
 while those on the south side look in like manner 
 to the opposite quarter, the sudden truncation of the 
 beds pointing in either case most impressively to the 
 extent of the waste. 
 
 Throughout the whole of the wide Lowlands, there- 
 fore, the present undulating surface is the result of 
 enormous denudation. The abrupt solitary crags 
 rising from smooth swept plains, the long, narrow 
 valleys, the truncated ends of strata, as in Salisbury 
 Crags, shooting up into mid-air, the deep defiles that 
 trench the highest hills, even on the water-shed of 
 the country, all tell of the long-continued action of 
 the abrading forces. Moreover, it requires but a 
 casual survey of the rocks to see proofs of enor- 
 mous dislocations, but these make no appearance at 
 the surface. Fissures and faults which, had they not 
 been effaced, would have left the country an impas- 
 sable network of interlacing precipices and ravines, 
 have been all planed down, until not even a geologist 
 would, from the form of the ground, suspect their 
 existence. In short, it is impossible to turn in any 
 direction without meeting proofs of this vast and 
 wide-spread denudation. 1 
 
 i Id. loc. cit.
 
 Denudation of the Loivlands. 277 
 
 It will be observed that the chief hills and emi- 
 nences throughout the Lowland Valley are formed of 
 igneous rocks. There is a vague, and not uncommon, 
 opinion that these rocks have been upheaved bodily 
 through the other formations into the light of day, 
 and that it is to the forms assumed by them on 
 their eruption that the present irregularities in the 
 surface are to be traced. Such an idea, however, 
 cannot be held by one who knows that the greater 
 part of the igneous material was ejected contempo- 
 raneously with the deposition of the strata among 
 which it occurs, and that it has suffered along with 
 these strata in all the long series of foldings and 
 denudations. Even those igneous masses, which have 
 been thrust up among rocks previously formed, can 
 often be shown to have consolidated beneath the sur- 
 face, and to be now at last exposed, only because the 
 rocks under which they lay have been worn away. 
 The truth is that the hills and crags of trap-rock are 
 among the most striking proofs of denudation. For 
 in by far the larger number of cases it may be shown 
 that they were once buried deep under stratified for- 
 mations now removed, and that they rise up into 
 prominent elevations, mainly because they are harder 
 than the sedimentary rocks, and better able to hold 
 their own in the long warfare with the elements. 
 Binny Craig, Arthur's Seat, North Berwick Law, Stir- 
 ling Rock, the Abbey Craig, and many other isolated
 
 278 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 rocks throughout the Midland Valley, may be cited 
 as illustrations ; while of the larger and longer chains 
 of hills conspicuous examples are seen in the Brown 
 Carrick Hills of Ayrshire, in the range of heights 
 which separates the coal-basin of the Clyde from 
 that to the west, and runs north-eastward into the 
 Kilpatrick and Campsie Fells, in the Linlithgow, Pent- 
 land, Garlton, and Fifeshire Hills, and in the chains 
 of the Ochils and the Sidlaws. The reader who 
 wishes to understand the structure of some of these 
 trappean masses may consult the works cited below. 1 
 Instead of describing, by way of illustration, the 
 details of one of these examples, I shall give an 
 account of the structure of the Scuir of Eigg. 2 The 
 same lesson of vast waste is there taught which 
 comes before us everywhere in the Lowlands ; but 
 in this case the details present a more impressive 
 picture of the successive stages and final result of 
 denudation than can perhaps be found in any Low- 
 
 1 Maclaren's Geology of Fife and the Lothians. Memoirs of the Geo- 
 logical Survey, Geology of the Neighbourhood of Edinburgh (especially 
 chapter xiii). On the Chronology of the Trap-rocks of Scotland. Trans. 
 Roy. Soc. Edin. xxii. 633. (See/orf, p. 295, Fig. 22.) 
 
 ' 2 The above description is the result of a careful survey of the 
 island, made by me in company with my friends the Rev. Mr. Mac- 
 bride, of Ardmory, Bute, and Dr. John Young of the Geological Sur- 
 vey. Eigg has been several times described, but never before surveyed 
 in detail. The singularly instructive history of the Scuir has thus 
 hitherto escaped observation. The full description of the island will 
 form the subject of a paper by Dr. Young and myself.
 
 Scuir of Eigg. 279 
 
 land hill. No feature of the western coast takes the 
 traveller so much by surprise as the singular ridge 
 which runs along the hill-tops at the south end of 
 the island of Eigg, and forms the well-known Scuir. 
 Seen from the sea on the east side, this ridge rises 
 as a lofty massive column, towering to the height of 
 some four hundred feet above the high ground on 
 which it stands, and 1.335 feet above the sea. Its 
 sides are quite vertical, so much so, that if one has 
 a steady enough head to stoop over the edge of the 
 precipice he may see its base four hundred feet 
 below. What seems a broad and lofty tower, when 
 looked at from the east, is really the abrupt end of a 
 long narrow ridge, which widens out westward until 
 it loses itself in a mass of rugged ground, abounding 
 in little rock-basins filled with water. The Scuir 
 itself, with these broken heights into which it merges, 
 consists of the long-known pitchstone-porphyry (c in 
 section on the map) almost everywhere columnar, 
 the columns being sometimes piled up horizontally 
 with their weathered ends exposed, sometimes slant- 
 ing inwards or outwards, like a chevanx de frise, and 
 often built round a hummock of rock very much in 
 the way the peasants stack their peats. 1 In walking 
 among these rocks one is constantly reminded of 
 
 1 The drawing by Fortis of some columnar basalt in the Vicentin 
 might have been taken from the sides of the Scuir of Eigg. See 
 Lyell's Elements, 6th Edit. p. 612.
 
 280 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the fantastic arrangement of the columns in lava 
 streams. And in truth this hard rugged rock, form- 
 ing the highest part of Eigg, is the remnant of an 
 old lava-flow. It lies upon a bed of compacted 
 shingle, in which there is an abundance of coniferous 
 wood, in chips and broken branches, yet so well 
 preserved that, when newly taken out and still damp, 
 it might be taken, but for its weight, for the relics 
 of some old pine-forest buried under a peat-bog. 
 The pitchstone-lava, however, has been a better pre- 
 server than even a peat-bog would have been. The 
 shingle, as shown in the section on the map, lies on 
 a worn surface of a much older volcanic series, con- 
 sisting of almost horizontal beds (a) of greenstone and 
 basalt, which, after being piled up sheet after sheet, 
 until their accumulated mass had reached a thick- 
 ness of many hundred feet, were hollowed out, ap- 
 parently by running water, into winding channels. 
 These water-courses can in part be traced under 
 the pitchstone, with their gravel and drift-wood still 
 remaining. At that time the island of Eigg must 
 have been joined to some higher land, probably to 
 the west or north-west, for the stream brought down 
 with it blocks of hard Cambrian sandstone a rock 
 not found in Eigg, but abundant on the opposite 
 island of Rum. What is now the ridge of the Scuir 
 was therefore a valley watered by a stream that 
 flowed with considerable volume to carry along the
 
 Scuir of Eigg. 28 1 
 
 blocks, sometimes two or three feet in diameter, 
 which are found in its shingle. It was when this 
 was the aspect of the ground that the pitchstone 
 was erupted. As a stream of molten-rock it rolled 
 along the river-channel, and ascended for a short 
 way the courses of some tributary streams, burying 
 the whole under a mass of solid rock. Since that 
 time the various powers of waste have been cease- 
 lessly at work. They have succeeded in wearing 
 down the land that united the greenstones and basalts 
 to mountains of Cambrian sandstone, and they have 
 made Eigg an island. But more than all, they have 
 worn away the greenstones and basalts forming the 
 higher grounds that bounded the old river-valley, and 
 reduced them to slopes that shelve down into the 
 sea ; and so complete has been the change, that the 
 buried valley, under protection of the singularly in- 
 destructible pitchstone, now runs along the top of 
 a group of hills. What were once hills have dis- 
 appeared, and what used to be a valley is now the 
 crest of a lofty hill. The pitchstone which, when it 
 rolled down that ancient water-course, sought the 
 lowest level it could find, rises to-day into one of 
 the most conspicuous landmarks on the west of Scot- 
 land. Yet even this firm rock is itself mouldering 
 into ruins, for its fragments are strewn thickly along 
 the base of the cliffs. Already it has been largely 
 diminished from its original size, and we can look
 
 282 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 forward to a time when it shall have wholly dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 The denudation of the Lowland Valley has probably 
 to a large extent been the work of the sea, during 
 many upheavals and depressions throughout a long 
 course of geological periods. Viewed indeed on the 
 large scale, this district may be regarded as a great 
 plain of marine denudation, which has been modified 
 in its outlines partly by geological structure, and 
 partly by subsequent subaerial waste. The successive 
 stages of this long course of denudation have still to 
 be made out. At present we have only glimpses of 
 some of them. 1 
 
 The river systems of the Lowlands, and the sub- 
 aerial denudation to which they appear to be mainly 
 due, deserve careful study. 2 There are, in this part of 
 
 1 Among the reasons why the plain of marine denudation in the 
 Midland tract has so much more varied an outline than that of the 
 Southern Uplands seem to be the facts that it lies upon many widely 
 different kinds of rock, and that its site has during a number of geo- 
 logical periods been marked by great volcanic activity, and by many 
 local, but important changes of level. 
 
 2 I do not wish to undervalue the effect of unequal subsidence or 
 elevation in producing wide depressions, and thereby influencing the 
 form and grouping of basins of drainage both in the Lowland Valley 
 and in the high grounds on either side. That such movements have 
 taken place on a great scale, a slight acquaintance with the structure of 
 the coal-fields is enough to show. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied 
 that the surface of the country has been so planed down that its pre- 
 sent inequalities bear but a slight proportion, and often have no rela- 
 tion at all, to the curvatures of the rocks underneath. The prominent
 
 L oivland R ivers, 283 
 
 the country, three chief rivers, the Tay, Forth, and 
 Clyde, the two former descending from the high 
 "grounds of the Highlands, and the latter from those 
 of the southern counties. The basins of these streams 
 are not separated from each other by continuous 
 ranges of high grounds. Sometimes the watershed 
 coincides with a chain of trappean hills, such as that 
 between the Firths of Tay and Forth, but between 
 the Clyde and Forth the ground undulates across the 
 great coalfields from the Campsie to the Pentland 
 Hills, where the parting of the waters may frequently 
 be crossed without being noticed. 
 
 What may have been the form of the ground when 
 
 riclges and hills are composed of hard materials, the lower grounds as 
 a whole lie on the softer rocks a difference which must result, I think, 
 from unequal denudation, and not from unequal movements of the 
 earth's crust. For it can hardly be believed that only the harder rocks 
 were upraised, or only the softer ones depressed. This is a subject, 
 however, which requires very cautious handling. All that I can venture 
 to say about it at present is that, while proofs of denudation stare me 
 in the face at every turn, I have been unable hitherto to find any posi- 
 tive evidence that the origin of the valleys of the Lowlands has been 
 connected with subterranean movements. These valleys sometimes 
 run along synclinal troughs of this strata, but they likewiss cross lines 
 of anticlinal axis, and in either case in such a capricious way as to 
 show their independence of geological structure. Yet though the 
 ancient curvatures of the strata have not had a main share in guiding 
 the course of the valleys, there may have been subsequent local risings 
 and sinkings of the land, of which no geological evidence remains, but 
 which were not without their influence in the growth of the valleys. 
 And though the chief work may still have fallen to the share of the 
 denuding agents, we must not overlook the possible modifications pro- 
 duced by subterranean movements.
 
 284 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the drainage of the high lands to the north and 
 south first began to flow across the present rocks of 
 the Midland Valley, is a question to which no definite 
 answer can as yet be given. We cannot tell what 
 inequalities, due in part perhaps to unequal sub- 
 sidence or elevation, and in part also to unequal 
 marine denudation, may have existed to guide the 
 streams in their seaward course. The rivers, how- 
 ever, have certain features in common, which may 
 perhaps give some clue to the ancient configuration 
 of the district. It is to be noted that they each break 
 through the chain of hills at the head of their firths. 
 The Tay has cut its channel through the hard trap- 
 rocks and - conglomerates that form the Sidlaw 
 Hills, and flows across them in a deep valley between 
 Kinnoul Hill and the Hill of Moncrieff. The Forth 
 at Stirling has forced its way between the Ochils and 
 the Campsies. The Clyde has severed the Kilpatrick 
 Hills on the north side from those of Renfrewshire on 
 the south, and flows in a broad stream between them. 
 It may be that in one or all of these cases the breach 
 of the hills corresponds with a line of dislocation. 
 But we have no reason to believe that, if such dislo- 
 cations ever existed, they were visible at the surface 
 in the shape of wide open rents, through which a river 
 could make its way. According to the analogy of all 
 the faults and fissures which have been explored in 
 pits and mines, they were probably close, their walls
 
 Valley of the Tay. 285 
 
 either touching each other or separated only by a few 
 feet of mineral matter. But I am not aware that, 
 save in the case of the Forth, there is any proof of 
 dislocation at all. The defiles, or valleys, are com- 
 parable with hundreds of others in all parts of the 
 country. If then the chain of the Sidlaws once ran 
 unbroken to the south-west, through the Hills of 
 Kinnoul and Moncrieff, into the range of the Ochils, 
 of which geologically it is a prolongation, how 
 could the Tay trench it ? Two explanations may be 
 suggested. The ridge of hills may have been cut 
 across to a certain depth by two streams eating their 
 way back towards each other, in the manner already 
 pointed out as at work to the north of the Cromarty 
 Firth. The transverse hollow thus formed would 
 become a strait during a subsidence of the land, and 
 might be considerably widened and deepened by the 
 sawing action of the waves, until after repeated 
 changes of level the trench was cut down so low that 
 the drainage of the country to the north was drawn 
 into it. Or we may regard the channel as dating 
 from that immensely remote period when the present 
 broad valley between the Sidlaw range and the 
 Grampians was filled up with Old Red Sandstone, long 
 since removed, and when the Tay flowed in a gentle 
 depression worn by the sea across the trappean rocks. 
 The river gradually worked its way downward through 
 these rocks, while the whole surface of the country
 
 286 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 was undergoing denudation, both from atmospheric 
 causes and from the sea. During the frequent sub- 
 mergences of the land, the breach would suffer from 
 the waves as well as from subaerial waste, so that on 
 each re-elevation, the river would tend to return to 
 the gap through which it found a ready passage to 
 the sea beyond. In what way soever we account for 
 this defile we must rely, I think, on the help of the 
 various powers of denudation, not on subterranean 
 convulsion. And thus the high antiquity even of the 
 minor features of the existing surface of the country 
 is powerfully impressed upon the mind. 1 
 
 The narrow valley at Stirling, through which the 
 Forth flows out into the wide level carse lands, may 
 possibly be connected with the prolongation of the 
 large faults that bring down the Alloa coal-field 
 against the southern flank of the Ochil Hills. If the 
 line of weakness indicated by these faults ran west- 
 ward it would pass between Stirling and the Bridge 
 of Allan, and might well have shown itself at the sur- 
 face as a long hollow worn down by springs and rains. 
 And were this hollow once formed we can see how it 
 might be dug out by the ceaseless wear and tear of 
 the elements, until it became a channel fit for an ample 
 river. When we cast our eye over this singular strait, 
 
 1 The occurrence of the Upper Old Red Sandstone at Clashbinnie 
 seems to indicate that the broad valley of the Firth of Tay is at least 
 as old as that formation.
 
 Valley of the Forth. 287 
 
 with its abrupt sides, and its flat meadow-like bottom 
 stretching away into the wide mosses of Menteith on 
 "the one side, and the broad Carse of Falkirk on the 
 other, we cannot but feel that in the cutting down 
 and widening of this gap the Forth has had powerful 
 helpmates in the waves of the sea. Yonder, indeed, 
 not many miles to the east, is the blue firth ; the level 
 valley is plainly an old sea bottom, and sea-shells are 
 dug up abundantly from its sands and clays. Even 
 now so little is it above high-water mark that a de- 
 pression of ten feet would send the tide up the valley 
 for eighteen miles, 1 and if the land were sunk very 
 little more, the firths of Clyde and Forth would meet, 
 and a set of vexed tides would ebb and flow across 
 the centre of Scotland. Such has doubtless often 
 been the condition of the country in the geological 
 past. Hence the deepening and widening of the 
 strait at Stirling, like that of the Tay at Perth, may 
 be traced in no small measure to the prolonged action 
 of waves and tidal currents. 
 
 In the case of the Clyde at Bowling there is a 
 transverse valley cut through the trappean rocks and 
 sandstones. It resembles that of the Tay in its geo- 
 logical structure, and is susceptible of the same 
 explanations which were suggested as to the origin of 
 the defile below Perth. 
 
 While the three main rivers resemble each other 
 
 i Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin. iii. 268.
 
 288 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 in thus breaking through a chain of hills to find their 
 way into their firths, they present many points of differ- 
 ence in their respective courses across the Lowland 
 Valley. Perhaps the most interesting is the Clyde. 
 Drawing its waters from the very centre of the 
 Southern Uplands, it flows transverse to the strike 
 of the Silurian strata until, entering upon the rocks 
 of the lowlands at Roberton, it turns to the north- 
 east along a broad valley that skirts the base of 
 Tinto. If the reader will glance at the map he will 
 notice that at that part of its course the Clyde ap- 
 proaches within seven miles of the Tweed. Between 
 the two streams, of course, lies the watershed of the 
 country, the drainage flowing on the one side into the 
 Atlantic, and on the other into the North Sea. Yet, 
 instead of a ridge or hill, the space between the rivers 
 is the broad flat valley of Biggar, so little above the 
 level of the Clyde that it would not cost much labour 
 to send that river across into the Tweed. Indeed, 
 some trouble is necessary to keep the former stream 
 from eating through the loose sandy deposits that line 
 the valley, and finding its way over into Tweeddale. 
 That it once took that course, thus entering the sea at 
 Berwick instead of at Dumbarton, is probable, and if 
 some of the gravel mounds at Thankerton could be 
 reunited, it would do so again. 1 Allusion has already 
 
 1 The occurrence of salmon in the Clyde above the Falls has been 
 explained from the relative levels of the streams in the Biggar Valley.
 
 Valley of the Clyde. 289 
 
 been made to this singular part of the watershed. 1 
 Its origin is probably traceable to the recession of two 
 valleys, and to the subsequent widening of the breach 
 by atmospheric waste and the sea. 
 
 From the western margin of the Biggar flat the 
 Clyde turns to the north-west, flowing across a series 
 of igneous rocks belonging to the Old Red Sandstone 
 series. Its valley is there w r ide, and the ground rises 
 gently on either side into low undulating hills. But after 
 bending back upon itself and receiving the Douglas 
 Water, its banks begin to rise more steeply, until the 
 river leaps over the linn at Bonnington into the long, 
 narrow, and deep gorge in which the well-known Falls 
 
 " It is a singular circumstance," says Stoddart, in his Angler's Com- 
 panion for Scotland, " that salmon and their fry have occasionally been 
 taken in the upper parts of the Clyde above its loftiest fall, which, 
 being eighty feet in height, it is utterly impossible for fish of any kind 
 to surmount. The fact is accounted for in this way. After passing 
 Tinto Hill, the bed of the Clyde approaches to a level with that of the 
 Biggar Water, which is close at hand, and discharges itself into the 
 Tweed. On the occasion of a large flood, the two streams become 
 connected, and the Clyde actually pours a portion of its waters into one 
 of the tributaries of the Tweed, which is accessible to, and frequented 
 in the winter season by, salmon." Angler's Companion, p. 417. Yarrel 
 states the highest salmon leaps to be from eight to ten feet ; Stoddart 
 supposes they may sometimes be more than twelve feet, and he says 
 that in the Tummel the fish must leap eighteen feet, for they are caught 
 above the falls. (But perhaps salmon ova might be carried by birds.) 
 The Biggar flat, however, is not the only place in that neighbourhood 
 where the watershed of the country crosses a nearly level valley. A 
 few miles to the north the upper waters of the Tarth and the Medwin 
 flow along the same meadow land, but the former stream turns eastward 
 into the Tweed, and the latter westward into the Clyde. 
 1 Ante, p. 148, note. 
 
 U
 
 290 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 are contained. That this defile has not been rent 
 open by the concussion of an earthquake, but is really 
 the work of subaerial denudation, may be ascertained 
 by tracing the unbroken beds of Lower Old Red 
 Sandstone from side to side. Indeed, one could not 
 choose a better place in which to study the process of 
 waste, for he can examine the effects of rains, springs, 
 and frosts, in loosening the sandstone by means of the 
 hundreds of joints that traverse the face of the long 
 cliffs, and he can likewise follow in all their detail the 
 results of the constant wear and tear of the brown 
 river that keeps ever tumbling and foaming down the 
 ravine. A little below the town of Lanark, the 
 Mouse Water enters the Clyde through the dark 
 narrow chasm beneath the Cartland Crags. There, 
 too, though 
 
 " It seems some mountain rent and riven, 
 A channel for the stream has given, " 
 
 yet after all it is the stream itself that has done the 
 work. Nay, it would even appear that this singularly 
 deep gorge has been in great measure, if not wholly, 
 cut out since the end of the Age of Ice, for there is 
 an old channel close to it, filled up with drift, but 
 through which the stream has evidently at one time 
 flowed. 1 
 
 Running still in a narrow valley, the Clyde, after 
 receiving the Mouse Water, hurries westward to throw 
 
 1 See Memoir on the Glacial Drift of Scotland, p. 51.
 
 Valley of the Clyde. 29 i 
 
 itself over the last of its linns at Stonebyres, and to 
 toil in a long dark gorge until, as it leaves the Old 
 Red Sandstone, its valley gradually opens out, and it 
 then enters the great Lanarkshire coalfield. From 
 the top of the highest Fall to the foot of the lowest 
 is a distance of rather more than 3^ miles, in which 
 the river descends about 230 feet, or 65 feet in a mile. 
 From the Stonebyres Linn to the sea at Dumbarton 
 the course of the Clyde is fully 50 miles, yet its fall is 
 only 170 feet, or about 3^4 feet in a mile. 1 As it winds 
 among its broad meadows and fair woodlands, no one 
 ignorant of the geology of the district would be likely 
 to imagine that this wide, level valley really overlies 
 a set of strata which have been tilted up and broken 
 by innumerable dislocations. Yet such is the fact. 
 The flat haughs of the Clyde were. not laid out until 
 after the curved and fractured coal-measures had been 
 planed down, and no external trace of these under- 
 ground disturbances remained. The sea may have had 
 much of the earlier part of the work to do, and may 
 have lent its aid now and again during the successive 
 uprisings and sinkings of the land, but we shall, per- 
 haps, not greatly err in attributing mainly to the pro- 
 longed action of rains and frosts, and of the Clyde 
 itself, the excavation of the broad valley in which the 
 river flows across the coalfield until it reaches the sea 
 between the hills of Renfrew and Dumbarton. 
 
 i See Petermann, Edin. New Phil. Joiirn. xlvii. p. 309. 
 U 2
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CAUSE OF LOCAL VARIETIES OF LOWLAND SCENERY. 
 
 IN following the details of that vast denudation which 
 has levelled the Lowlands, it is not uninteresting to 
 trace, as in the case of the Highlands, how each 
 marked variety of rock has not been worn away 
 without imparting its own peculiar outlines to the 
 scenery. Of course by much the most noticeable 
 rocks in this respect are those of igneous origin the 
 felstones, greenstones, basalts, and trap-tuffs which 
 cover so large a space and enter so conspicuously into 
 the Lowland landscapes. I do not know of any large 
 mass of such material that does not form a ridge or 
 hill ; even the smaller protrusions usually show them- 
 selves at the surface as little mounds, or craggy knobs. 
 Moreover, the leading varieties of the igneous rocks 
 weather each in a fashion of its own. Thus the fel- 
 ston^s are often worn into smooth conical eminences, 
 usually coated with turf which, when broken here and 
 there along the slopes, allows long streams of angular
 
 Trap-Hills of the Lowlands. 293 
 
 rubbish to crumble from the rock, and slide down the 
 hill. The noblest example in the whole of the district 
 is Tinto, a huge mass of bright flesh-coloured felstone 
 which rises to a height of nearly 1,700 feet above the 
 Clyde, which washes its base, and 2,300 feet above the 
 sea. Smaller and less perfect cones may be traced 
 towards the north-east, from Quothquan into the 
 Pentland Hills, and far to the east they reappear in 
 Traprain and North Berwick Law. The cones are 
 sometimes united to each other, thus forming a long 
 range of hills, such as the Pentlands. In other cases 
 the felspathic rocks have been worn into smooth un- 
 dulating billowy hills, which nevertheless tend, ever and 
 anon, to take the conical form, as may be seen in the 
 eastern half of the Ochils. It is hardly necessary to 
 remark, that though the cones sometimes look not 
 unlike volcanos, as North Berwick Law, for instance, 
 their form is entirely due to denudation. The reason 
 that they take this outline seems to be the same as 
 that which I have already suggested with regard to 
 quartz-rock mountains. The felspathic igneous rocks 
 have often a remarkable uniformity of texture ; and, 
 instead of breaking up into large blocks, crumble into 
 loose angular shivers, which slide down and form a 
 smooth covering for the lower parts of the hill, leaving 
 the upper slopes exposed to continual waste, so that, as 
 the hill moulders away, it becomes more conical. In 
 the end, however, the cones must begin to get blunted
 
 294 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 at top, and as the angle of the declivity changes, the 
 rate and tendency of the waste will be proportionately 
 affected. 
 
 The greenstones and basalts on the other hand 
 (and sometimes the felstones), are marked by a more 
 craggy and rugged outline. Where they occupy a 
 considerable breadth of surface, they rise into broken 
 irregular ground, protruding ever and anon through 
 the soil in rounded hummocks of dun-coloured rock, 
 which crumbles into rich brown loam. Hence they 
 present a curious blending of bright green sward with 
 bare lichen-crusted stone. The numerous parallel 
 joints in these rocks afford pathways for rain, springs, 
 and frosts. The texture of the masses, too, varies inde- 
 finitely; sometimes we see the stone so firm and com- 
 pact, that on its bare weather-beaten surface the dark 
 augite crystals glance in the sun, while in other places 
 it is decayed into a mere loose yellow or brown sand. 
 Between these two extremes every variety of hardness 
 may be seen, and hence probably the hummocky 
 aspect of the ground over which greenstone and 
 basalt prevail. Where one of these rocks has been 
 intruded of old into the Carboniferous sandstones and 
 shales, it may be seen rising into a steep-fronted 
 crag, such as Stirling Rock, Binny Craig, or the rock 
 on which Edinburgh Castle stands. The soft strata 
 which surrounded and covered it have been all worn 
 away, and the hard trap-rock now towers above the
 
 Trap- Hills of the Lowlands. 
 
 295 
 
 low grounds. It is to this denudation that the well- 
 known form of hill called Crag and Tail is due. The 
 worn edge of the bed of greenstone or basalt shoots 
 up into a crag, and the strata which rest upon it, 
 though swept off the top of the eminence, are often 
 preserved on the declivity behind, and form in this 
 way a tail. 
 
 FIG. 22. SECTION OF THE FORM OF HILT. IN THE LOWLANDS OF SCOTLAND 
 
 KNOWN AS "CRAG AND TAIL." 
 
 a. " Cra? " of basalt. 6. "Tail" of softer rocks which have been worn away 
 from around the hard basalt c. Hollow often found in front of the crag. 
 d. Covering of drift 
 
 Around Edinburgh, where these features were first 
 noticed, the crag usually faces the west, as in Salisbury 
 Crags, Calton Hill, and Castle Rock, because the 
 escarpment or outcrop of the rocks is in that direction, 
 and consequently any rock which stood out above the 
 others would naturally give rise to an eminence, steep 
 on the west side and shelving on the east. Where the 
 dip of the strata is to the west, and therefore their 
 escarpment to the east, the crag will look eastward 
 of which there is an instance in Corstorphine Hill. 1 
 
 1 See the original descriptions of Sir" James Hall, Trans. Roy. Soc. 
 Edin. vol. vii ; Maclaren, Geol. Lothians, pp. 52, 218. It seems to me 
 that " Crag and Tail" is a form of hill due mainly to the influence of 
 
 the
 
 296 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 If, instead of being inclined, the rocks are flat or 
 nearly so, we find that the hard greenstone or basalt 
 has served in some measure to protect the strata 
 underneath. The hard rock then lies as a cake or 
 capping on the top, while the sandstones or shales 
 form the main mass of the hill. In the West Lomond 
 of Fife, for example, the stratified deposits rise almost 
 horizontally to a height of 900 feet above the vale of 
 Eden, their bared edges being cut away into a steep 
 declivity. Over them comes a thick bed of green- 
 stone, which runs as a dark precipice along the crest 
 of the slope, and supports a little patch of sandstone 
 and limestone, on which lies the knob of greenstone 
 that forms the conical summit 1,713 feet above the 
 sea. It is plain that 'a mass of rock, fully 900 feet 
 thick, has been hollowed out of the valley of the 
 Eden, and, as the strata are flat, and show here and 
 there their yellow edges along the green slopes, 
 with the vertical bar of greenstone at top, the hill 
 presents a suggestive monument of denudation. The 
 
 the geological structure of the rocks upon their denudation, though 
 probably modified to some extent by the various agents at work during 
 the glacial period. (See Memoir on the Glacial Drift of Scotland, p. 30. ) 
 But I am now much inclined to doubt whether any inference as to a 
 general denuding agency acting from a given direction can justly be 
 drawn from " crag and tail," as developed in the Lowlands of Scotland. 
 This form of ground has been compared, and even identified with the 
 lee seite and stoss seite of Scandinavian geologists ; but there is really no 
 analogy between them, for it can be shown that in the Scottish examples 
 the crags or lee sides face the wrong way.
 
 ,: 
 
 ^ 
 
 ^5 I
 
 298 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 water, and that after long ages of change, they have 
 come at last to be shaped into ranges of quiet pas- 
 toral hills! In fig. 21 the influence of the bedded 
 structure of the trappean rocks is seen in the escarp- 
 ments of the Sidlaw range on the north side of the 
 Tay, and in the Fife hills on the south. 
 
 It is thus the igneous rocks which, in the general 
 waste of the surface, have, by their greater perma- 
 nence, given rise to the hills and crags of the Low- 
 lands. The stratified rocks as a whole are singularly 
 featureless. They form the tame level groundwork 
 which is relieved by the igneous masses. Now and 
 then they rise into such rounded eminences as the 
 conglomerate and sandstone hills of the Pentland 
 chain, or the rolling moorlands that lie on the con- 
 fines of Lanark and Ayr. But they are usually 
 buried under a smooth-swept covering of drift, so 
 that any features which they might have lent to the 
 landscape are concealed. It is for the most part only 
 in such confined spaces as ravines, or along the sea- 
 margin, that we can learn after what fashion the 
 softer rocks yield to the attacks of time. 
 
 The disappearance of the older stratified deposits 
 under a wide-spread mantle of drift, leads us to con- 
 sider how far the scenery of the Lowlands has been 
 modified by the glaciers and icebergs of the long 
 Ice- Age.
 
 Glaciation of the Midland Valley. 299 
 
 TRACES OF GLACIERS AND ICEBERGS IN THE LOWLAND VALLEY. 
 
 When the great ice-sheet of the glacial period 
 began to settle down upon Scotland the main features 
 of the broad Midland Valley were probably very 
 much what they are still. There has been not a little 
 obliteration of the minor details of the scenery ; the 
 hills have been rounded and smoothed, many an old 
 valley and river-course has been partially or wholly 
 filled up with boulder-clay. The whole country has 
 been smothered up, as it were in drift, and hundreds 
 of new hillocks and mounds have been scattered over 
 its surface. Yet the larger elements of the landscape 
 have in all likelihood undergone no marked change. 
 
 Throughout the Lowlands there is no chain of hills 
 which seems to have been high and broad enough to 
 nourish an independent group of glaciers. But the 
 great ice-sheets from the Highlands on the one side 
 and from the Southern Uplands on the other streamed 
 down into the low grounds and through them to the 
 sea. Hence the hills have that worn or " glaciated " 
 surface so characteristic of Scottish scenery. And 
 they still retain abundantly on their sides and sum- 
 mits the striation and moulding which mark the 
 direction in which the ice moved. From the position 
 of these markings we learn that the massive ice of 
 the great Highland area came down into Strathmore
 
 30O Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 and kept steadily southward in such force as to 
 mount over the chain of the Sidlaws, and even, it 
 would seem, over the Ochils, until it went out to sea 
 by the basin of the Forth. Further west a huge body 
 of ice descended from the north into the basin of the 
 Clyde, filling the firth and overriding the hills on 
 either side. From the Southern Uplands, the ice went 
 north into the plains of Ayrshire, until, meeting 
 the stream from the Highlands, it turned southward 
 into St. Patrick's Channel. No wonder therefore that 
 there should be roches moutonnees even on the tops 
 of many of the Lowland ridges, and that the rocks 
 should show such wide-spread proofs of having had 
 their roughness rounded off. 1 But the hills of the 
 broad Midland Valley had their sides and tops 
 
 1 The evidence for the above statements will be found in the Memoir 
 on the Glacial Drift already cited, as far as it had been ascertained by 
 geologists up to the end of 1862. Since that time I have been able to 
 extend the proofs of glaciation over a wide area in Ayrshire and the 
 west of Scotland. I may likewise take this opportunity of stating that 
 an upper boulder-clay which I had been disposed to regard as a mere 
 local variety of the Till now seems to me an interrupted yet wide-spread 
 deposit. The meaning of this upper clay began to dawn upon me in 
 the autumn of 1863, when I mapped it out in detail in the south-west 
 of Ayrshire. My colleagues in the Geological Survey likewise com- 
 menced to separate, where practicable, the upper from the under 
 boulder-clay, and this method has been carried on since the spring of 
 1864. The reader will find a brief account of the two clays in a little 
 volume published in October last, under the title of Outlines of the 
 Geology of the British Isles a handbook to accompany the geological 
 map in Mr. Keith Johnston's Educational Series. See also Proceedings 
 of Royal Society of Edinburgh, for February 6th, 1865.
 
 Boulder-Clays of tJie Lowlands. 301 
 
 smoothed and worn, not only by the downward 
 movement of the great glaciers, but probably in 
 some degree also by the icebergs, which, during the 
 submergence of the land, broke off from the ends of 
 the glaciers, or which were drifted from a more 
 distant region. If, as the country settled down be- 
 neath the sea, a fleet of bergs were driven annually 
 by the prevailing winds and currents over a par- 
 ticular tract of submerged land, the sunken hill-tops 
 that were brushed and rasped year after year by 
 those ponderous masses, would doubtless suffer no 
 slight loss. They would be still further worn down, 
 scratched and polished, for although drifting icebergs 
 could not, as it seems to me, produce that universal 
 striation which mounts over the hills and crosses the 
 valleys, moulding itself to all the inequalities of the 
 rocky surface, they might have done much in rubbing 
 away and furrowing the slopes and summits along or 
 across which they were driven. 
 
 When the surface of the country was thus ground 
 down both by glacier-ice and floating bergs, a large 
 amount of detritus must necessarily have been pro- 
 duced. It is this material which, over so much of the 
 Lowlands, hides the rocks from sight. It is known as 
 till or boulder-clay, and may be divided into an upper 
 and an under part, each of which points to different 
 aspects of Central Scotland during the glacial period. 
 The lower boulder-clay or true till may be seen in
 
 302 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the course of almost every Lowland brook, from the 
 sea shores up to a height of perhaps 1,700 feet. Its 
 thickness in the Carse of Stirling is said by Mr. Bald 
 to be 1 60 feet, though possibly part of this mass may 
 belong to the upper clay. The streams in the lower 
 parts of the country have in many cases cut deep 
 ravines through it, and it then stands up in steep walls 
 on which the characteristic features of the deposit 
 are well displayed. Certainly there are not many 
 localities better fitted to perplex and discomfit an 
 eager geologist than one of these cliffs of boulder- 
 clay. He sees before him a stiff sandy clay, without 
 any traces of stratification, full of stones of every size 
 up to blocks several feet in diameter. These are 
 grouped in no order whatever ; large boulders and 
 small pebbles are scattered indiscriminately through 
 the clay from top to bottom. They are stuck at 
 every angle, their smoothed and polished surfaces are 
 covered with ruts and striae running chiefly along the 
 longer diameter of the stones, and if the face of the 
 rock below be uncovered, it may be seen to retain 
 the same markings. Using his hammer upon them 
 he finds them to consist, almost wholly, of fragments 
 from the rocks of the immediate neighbourhood. In 
 a coal-measure district, for instance, he sees a mix- 
 ture of bits of sandstone, shale, ironstone, coal and 
 other Carboniferous strata, with a few pieces of the 
 harder rocks of an adjacent geological area. He can
 
 The Boulder-Clay. 303 
 
 perceive that this deposit must have been produced 
 in the district from which it obtained its pebbles and 
 boulders, but the mode of its formation has been for 
 at least half a century one of the obscurest problems 
 in Scottish Geology. From the almost universal 
 striation of the boulders, and their local origin, it 
 is now inferred that the boulder-clay or till has 
 been ground up by a moving mass of land-ice, and 
 has been deposited partly on the land, where it could 
 remain protected from destruction by the moving 
 glaciers, and partly in the sea under the sheet of ice 
 that was pushed out from the shores and broke up 
 into wandering bergs. (See Fig. 4.) It thus corrobo- 
 rates the inferences to be drawn from the striated 
 rock-surfaces, and though there are still difficulties 
 connected with the details of the process of formation 
 and deposit, these might perhaps be easily and satis- 
 factorily solved if a competent observer could bring 
 himself to spend some time along the margin of the 
 great ice-sheets of Greenland. 1 
 
 * That arctic bergs probably had nothing to do with the formation of 
 this deposit is indicated by the absence of far-travelled stones in the clay. 
 After years of patient exploration, I have never succeeded in detecting 
 in the Scottish boulder-clay a single stone which might not have come 
 from rocks not many miles away. I have been in the habit of taking 
 percentages of the stones at different localities in a district, and the 
 result has invariably been to establish the prevailing local character ot 
 the deposit, and to point out the direction from which the ice moved. 
 In the course of a ramble from Berwick-on-Tweed to the mouth of the 
 Humber, Professor Ramsay and myself did not meet with traces of 
 
 Scandi-
 
 304 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 The Upper Boulder-clay is usually a looser and 
 more gravelly deposit than the Lower, though the 
 line of demarcation between them is not always very 
 distinct. It contains larger boulders, and among them 
 a greater per centage of stones that have come from 
 a distance. It seems to be a thoroughly marine de- 
 posit, formed some little way from the shore, as the 
 land was sinking, when masses of ice floated off, 
 not merely from the neighbouring coast, but even 
 from distant shores, and dropped their burthens of 
 mud, sand, and stones upon the bottom. Marine shells, 
 usually in a fragmentary state, occur in this deposit. 
 
 The boulder-clay furnishes us with some scanty 
 indications of the denizens of the country during 
 these wintry ages. Bones of the " Mammoth," rein- 
 deer, and of, probably, several species of oxen and 
 deer have been from time to time dug up. And 
 doubtless there must still remain the relics of other 
 animals yet to be discovered in the older glacial de- 
 posits of Scotland, for scanty though the fauna could 
 not fail to be, it need not perhaps have been less than 
 that of Greenland. Besides the remains of mammalia, 
 the Scottish till near Airdrie has yielded traces of 
 land vegetation : thin beds of peat and trunks of 
 
 Scandinavian rocks till we had reached the mouth of the Tees, and 
 they became more and more common the further south we went, as if 
 the main trend of the arctic bergs had been towards the eastern or 
 south-eastern coast of England.
 
 Arctic Shells in Boulder-Clay. 305 
 
 trees in what seem to have been little lakes or 
 tarns lying in hollows of the glacial detritus. And 
 on a ridge overlying the valley where these interest- 
 ing relics occur, shells of an Arctic type have been 
 found, lying below a mass of boulder-clay, and serving 
 further to support the inference that the boulder-clay 
 was formed during a depression of the land, when 
 successive terrestrial surfaces were submerged and 
 covered over with marine accumulations. 
 
 Among the deposits which date from this same 
 period of subsidence are certain beds of brick-clay, 
 which have a classic interest in Geology. They are 
 well seen along the low grounds on the banks of the 
 Clyde below Glasgow, and on the shores of many 
 of the sheltered bays and sea-lochs of the Firth of 
 Clyde. They occur also along the eastern shore, at 
 intervals, from the Forth to the Moray Firth. Their 
 chief interest to the geologist arises from the fact 
 that they contain an abundant series of shells, from 
 which strong additional evidence is obtained as to 
 the former intensity of the climate. More than a 
 quarter of a century has passed away since the 
 occurrence and true character of those organic re- 
 mains were ascertained by Mr. Smith of Jordanhill. 
 Cruising with his yacht among the kyles and lochs 
 of his own Firth of Clyde, he had been collecting 
 materials from the raised beaches of the west to show 
 that the land had undergone a comparatively recent 
 X
 
 306 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 elevation. One day, in company with a friend, he 
 chanced to walk alofig the beach of a little bay in 
 the Kyles of Bute. His attention was directed to a 
 number of shells lying among the shingle, but differ- 
 ent from any which his companion or himself had 
 ever dredged in the adjoining sea. On closer inspec- 
 tion it was found that the shells had been washed 
 out of a bed of clay, where they existed by hundreds, 
 and that their association on the beach with the 
 recent shells thrown up by the tides was merely an 
 accident. What then constituted the difference be- 
 tween the shells of the clay bed and those living in 
 the neighbouring kyles and firths ? It was at first 
 supposed that some of them were of new species. 
 But by degrees it was ascertained that they all 
 belonged to species yet living, that some of them 
 were still natives of the seas of Scotland, but that 
 others were now to be found only in the seas of 
 Norway and the Arctic circle. Having once fully 
 grasped this fact, Mr. Smith was not slow to perceive 
 its significance. He traced the clay-bed along many 
 parts of the west coast, and, in order the better to 
 compare its contents with the shells still inhabiting 
 the British Seas, he instituted a careful dredging of 
 the basin of the Firth of Clyde. A more charming 
 employment can hardly be conceived. In the midst 
 of some of the finest scenery on the west of Scotland, 
 within easy reach of all the comforts of home, and
 
 Arctic Shells in Drift. 307 
 
 yet among scenes almost as lone and retired as the 
 .wildest Highland tarn, his self-imposed task was to 
 bring up to the light of day the denizens of these 
 quiet sea -lochs and bays, to explore the deeps and 
 shallows, sunken reefs, shoals, and abysses, and thus, 
 while his vessel perhaps lay asleep on the face of a 
 summer sea, to walk, as it were, in fancy along 
 the sea-floor many fathoms underneath; and* to 
 pick up there, from its nestling place among tangle 
 or coral sand, many a tiny shell which had never 
 before been known to live around the coasts of 
 Britain. The result of his explorations, and of those 
 subsequently carried on by Forbes, Macandrew, 
 Jeffreys, and others, went to show that the assem- 
 blage of shells in the clay had a strongly northern 
 character, that among them were some which are 
 now rare in British seas, though common in the 
 far north, and that fourteen or fifteen species no 
 longer live around our shores, but are confined to 
 the boreal and arctic regions. The value of these 
 researches, made fully five and twenty years ago, was 
 not thoroughly perceived at the time, but they were 
 eventually found to lend a powerful support to the 
 attempts of geologists to account for some of the super- 
 cial phenomena of the country by the agency of ice. 
 Neither the boulder-clays nor the brick-clays form 
 any prominent features in the landscape. They are 
 spread out either in flat sheets covered with fields 
 
 X 2
 
 308 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 or in smooth rolling ridges. It is only where the 
 underlying rock rises through this wide mantle that 
 the monotony and tameness of the surface is in- 
 terrupted. Above the boulder-clay, however, there 
 occur two deposits, which play a minor but not 
 unimpressive part in many a piece of Lowland 
 scenery. These are mounds and ridges of sand and 
 gravel, and scattered boulders or erratic blocks. 
 
 Among the formations which overlie the till, and 
 belong to the closing ages of the glacial period, 
 must be placed those long rampart-like ridges of 
 gravel and sand, known as Kames in Scotland, eskers 
 in Ireland, and osar in Scandinavia. Notwithstanding 
 all that has been said and written about them, they 
 are as complete a mystery as ever to the geologists 
 of this country. They look not unlike the earthen 
 mounds of some antique fortification, only that they 
 are greatly loftier, longer, and not less perfect than 
 any such fortification which has survived in this 
 country. They rise up sharply and boldly, sometimes 
 from the side of a hill, sometimes along a wide moor, 
 and sometimes across a valley. They do not appear 
 to occur in Scotland except in the neighbourhood of 
 hills and rising ground. They may be traced at all 
 levels from less than a hundred feet above the sea up 
 to at least a thousand feet. They consist of sand or of 
 gravel, or of both, varying in texture to the coarsest 
 shingle, without fossils, save on the Aberdeenshire
 
 Geology and Popular Legends. 309 
 
 coast, where they have yielded a few sea-shells. 
 These ridges have been a fruitful source of wonder 
 and legend to the people. It was a quaint and 
 beautiful superstition that peopled such verdurous 
 hillocks or tomans with shadowy forms, like dimi- 
 nutive mortals, clad in green silk, or in russet grey, 
 whose unearthly music came sounding out faintly 
 and softly from underneath the sod. The mounds 
 rose so conspicuously from the ground, and, whether 
 in summer heat or winter frost, wore ever an aspect 
 so smooth and green, where all around was rough 
 with dark moss-hags and moor, that they seemed to 
 have been raised by no natural power, but to be in 
 very truth the work of fairy hands, designed at once 
 to mark and guard the entrance to the fairy world 
 below. The hapless wight who, lured by their soft 
 verdure, stretched himself to sleep on their slopes, 
 sank gently into their depths, and after a seven years' 
 servitude in fairy-land awoke again on the self -same 
 spot. Like young Tamlane, 
 
 " The Queen of Faeries keppit him 
 In yon green hill to dwell." 
 
 According to a tradition in Roxburghshire, the 
 Kames are the different strands of a rope, which a 
 troublesome elfin was commanded to weave out of 
 sand. The strands were all prepared, but when the 
 imp tried to entwine them, each gave way, and hence 
 the broken parts of the Kames have remained to this
 
 3 1 o Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 day. Michael seems to have had no small amount 
 of work in altering the surface of the country. There 
 is a deep gash through a sandy ridge part of the 
 Kame series at the south end of the Pentland Hills, 
 and not far off stands a green conical sand-hill. The 
 wizard is said to have dug the trench and piled up 
 the hill in the course of a single night. It was he, 
 too, that 
 
 " Cleft the Eildon Hills in three, 
 And bridled the Tweed with a curb of stone." 
 
 Throughout the south of Scotland the more obtrusive 
 minor features of the scenery are often traced up 
 to the agency of Michael Scott and his band of 
 witches and warlocks. Fanciful and sometimes gro- 
 tesque as these legends are, they are yet interesting, 
 inasmuch as they indicate the prominence of the 
 phenomena, and the difficulty of accounting for them 
 by any of the common operations of nature. 
 
 That the Kames are connected in some way with 
 the action of ice is shown by the fact that they dis- 
 appear as we advance southward from Scotland 
 through the northern counties of England, and by 
 the occurrence of occasional striated stones in them, 
 and of large boulders lying upon them. But that 
 they are not the ordinary moraines of glaciers, as 
 some geologists have imagined, seems to be con- 
 clusively indicated by the absence of angular rub- 
 bish, by the well-worn water-rolled character of
 
 Kames. 3 1 1 
 
 the stones, and by the stratification which is almost 
 everywhere visible in them, when a sufficiently large 
 section is exposed. Moving water, therefore, must 
 also have been concerned in their production. He 
 will be a lucky observer who succeeds in harmonizing 
 the difficulties, and presenting a satisfactory expla- 
 nation of these remarkable ridges. 
 
 Connected with the Kames, and perhaps nearly as 
 old, is a series of tarns and of former lake-basins 
 
 FIG. 23. SECTION OF SAND AND GRAVEL RIDGES ^KAMES) AT CARSTAIRS, LANARK- 
 SHIRE. (The dark portions mark little basins of peat occupying the site of former tarns. ) 
 
 now filled with peat. I do not know a district where 
 these features play so conspicuous a part in the 
 scenery as in the eastern parishes of the county of 
 Lanark. Behind the little village of Carstairs, for 
 instance, the ridges of sand and gravel run one after 
 another from south-west to north-east, somewhat like 
 the larger mounds of a tract of sand-hills by the sea. 
 Instead of following straight parallel lines, however, 
 they are singularly tortuous, so that they often come 
 together, and in this way form loops, which enclose 
 basins of water or of peat. One such hollow in 
 particular is so circular, and shelves so steeply into 
 the pool which fills its bottom, that it at once sug- 
 gests the crater of a volcano like one of those in
 
 312 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the Eifel. As the Kames there stretch across the 
 mouth of a broad valley, they must at one time have 
 dammed back the drainage so as to form a lake. 
 Since then they have been cut through by the Mouse 
 Water, and the lake has thus been drained. But its 
 site is still visible in the wide moss-hags and bogs 
 of the Carnwath Moor, and in at least one place a 
 shrunk remnant of the water, with the peat creeping 
 into it, may even yet be seen. The gradual inroads 
 of the peat upon the smaller ponds and lochans is also 
 well exhibited. Standing on the crest of one of the 
 higher ridges, the observer can at once understand 
 how, after the formation of these mysterious mounds, 
 there must have been dozens of little tarns or pools 
 lying in dimples and basins among the Kames. But 
 he can see only three or four which have not been 
 converted into peat-bogs. 
 
 The last illustration which I shall give of the in- 
 fluence of the various agencies of the glacial period 
 upon the scenery of the Central Valley of Scotland 
 is to be found in what are known to geologists as 
 Travelled or Erratic Blocks. Scattered over the 
 island from sea to sea are numberless boulders of 
 all sizes, up to masses of many tons in weight. 
 Thus 
 
 " A huge stone is sometimes seen to lie 
 Couched on the bald top of an eminence ; 
 Wonder to all who do the same espy, 
 By what means it could thither come and whence,
 
 Legends of Travelled Boulders. 313 
 
 So that it seems a thing indued with sense, 
 Like a sea beast crawled forth, that on a shelf 
 Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun itself." 1 
 
 Unhappily, the progress of modern agriculture is 
 inimical to the preservation of these stones, and they 
 have as a consequence disappeared from the more 
 cultivated districts. But in many a mossy tract, 
 especially round the flanks of the main hill ranges, 
 they may still be counted by the score. To the 
 north of the higher hills of Carrick, indeed, the 
 grey granite boulders lie strewn on the ground by 
 hundreds, and when seen from a little distance they 
 look like flocks of sheep. So conspicuous are the 
 erratic blocks of the Lowlands as to have long at- 
 tracted the notice of the peasantry, and so strange 
 sometimes are their positions, and so markedly do 
 they often differ in composition from the general 
 character of the surrounding rocks, that, like the 
 Kames, they have been from the earliest times a 
 theme of endless wonder. Many a wild legend and 
 grotesque tale of goblins, witches, and elfins has had 
 its source among the grey boulders of a bare moor. 2 
 
 1 Wordsworth's Poems of the Imagination, xxii. 
 
 * In wandering over the south of Scotland I have met with some 
 curious traditions of this kind. The following was told me on the spot 
 by an intelligent native of the village of Camwath. Before farming 
 operations were there carried to the extent to which they have now 
 arrived, large boulders, now mostly removed, were scattered so abun- 
 dantly over the mossy tract between the river Clyde and the Yelping 
 Craig, about two miles to the east, that one place was known familiarly 
 
 as
 
 314 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 " Giant's Stone," " Giant's Grave," " Auld Wives' 
 Lift," " Witches' Stepping Stanes," " Warlock's Bur- 
 dens," " Hell Stanes," and similar epithets, are com- 
 mon all over the Lowland counties, and mark where 
 to the people of an older time the singularity of 
 these blocks proved them to be the handiwork, not 
 of any mere natural agent, but of the active and 
 sometimes malevolent spirits of another world. Nor 
 need this popular belief be in any measure a matter 
 of surprise. For truly, even to a geological eye, which 
 has been looking at the same phenomenon for years, 
 each fresh repetition of it hardly diminishes the in- 
 terest, nay, almost the wonder, with which it is beheld. 
 
 as "Hell Stanes Gate" [road], and another " Hell Stanes Loan." The 
 traditional story runs that the stones were brought by supernatural agency 
 from the Yelping Craigs. Michael Scott and the Devil, it appears, had 
 entered into a compact with a band of witches to dam back the Clyde. 
 It was one of the conditions of the agreement that the -name of the 
 Supreme Being should never on any account be mentioned. All went 
 well for a while, some of the stronger spirits having brought their 
 burden of boulders to within a few yards from the river, when one of 
 the younger members of the company, staggering under the weight of 
 a huge block of greenstone, exclaimed, "Oh, Lord ! but I'm tired." 
 Instantly every boulder tumbled to the ground, nor could witch, warlock, 
 or devil move a single stone one yard further. And there the blocks 
 lay for many a long century, until the rapacious farmers quarried them 
 away for dykes and road-metal. 
 
 Another explanation of a somewhat different kind was given by a 
 stonemason among the Carrick Hills, who, on being asked how he 
 imagined that the hundreds of granite boulders in that, district came to 
 lie where they do, took a little time to reply, and at last gravely re- 
 marked that he "fancied when the Almichty flang the warld out, He 
 maun hae putten thae stanes upon her to keep her steady."
 
 Travelled Blocks. 3 1 5 
 
 We have rudely dispossessed the old warlocks and 
 brownies ; and yet, though we can now trace, it may 
 be, the source from which the stones were brought, 
 and the manner in which they were borne to their 
 present sites, their history still reads like a very fairy 
 tale. There they lie crusted with mosses and lichens, 
 and with tufts of heather, and harebell, and fern 
 nestling in their rifts, while all around perhaps is bare 
 bleak moorland. How came they there ? They have 
 not tumbled from any cliff, for we may see them 
 rising boldly above the soil, when not another vestige 
 of naked rock appears within sight. They have not 
 been transported by rivers, for they are often seen 
 perched on the summits of the hills, high above all 
 the streams, and even out of hearing of their sound. 
 They cannot have been washed up by floods and 
 oceanic convulsions, for not only are they in many 
 cases of enormous size, but they consist of rock 
 which is frequently foreign to the district, and may 
 not be found nearer than fifty or sixty miles, beyond 
 successive ranges of hills and valleys. What force, 
 then, could carry these huge masses to such great 
 distances across wide and deep valleys, and lines of 
 high hills ? Again we must answer, Ice. 
 
 Scattered over the chains of the Sidlaw and Ochil 
 Hills lie large masses of gneiss and schist that have 
 come across from the opposite ranges of the Gram- 
 pians. Boulders of the same kind are likewise found
 
 3 1 6 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 both on the plains and hills to the south of the Forth. 
 So from the granite mountains of Carrick and Gallo- 
 way, millions of boulders have been strewn over the 
 heights and hollows to the north-west and north, 
 up to, and perhaps beyond, the town of Ayr. It 
 can hardly be doubted that these large masses of 
 stone have been carried on floating ice across the 
 sea, and dropped on the surface of the submerged 
 land. They must thus be assigned to that part of 
 the long glacial period when a large area of the 
 country had sunk beneath the waves, and the cold 
 still continued so severe, as to keep snow-fields and 
 glaciers among the mountains, and even, perhaps, 
 to freeze in winter the water of the ocean. It was 
 then that the Lowland Valley of Scotland, and the 
 less elevated portions of the rest of the kingdom, 
 were covered with a sea, across which bergs and 
 ice-rafts were ever drifting to and fro, grating along 
 the bottom, and carrying with them the debris of 
 many a Highland glen and shore, to drop it at 
 random over the drowned land. 
 
 When the great Ice Age came to a close, and 
 this country had once more risen above the sea, the 
 lower grounds, especially throughout the Midland 
 Valley, must have worn a very different aspect from 
 that which had distinguished them before either 
 glacier or iceberg had begun to modify their sur- 
 face. Their old pre-glacial roughness had been, to a
 
 Fading of the Footprints of the Ice. 3 1 7 
 
 large extent, planed down, and new hollows had 
 doubtless been scooped out by the ice ; but a thick 
 mantle of clay and sand had been spread over the 
 ground, leaving only the harder and higher masses of 
 rock to rise above the general monotonous undu- 
 lations. We have seen how in the case of the High- 
 lands and of the Southern Uplands the atmospheric 
 forces of waste have been busy since these tracts 
 re-emerged, how they have trenched the hill-sides 
 with water-courses, and dug ravines in the valleys, 
 and how they are still everywhere at work in destroy- 
 ing the smoothed outline that was left by the ice. 
 The same changes are likewise going on in the 
 Lowlands. The wide covering of drift which there 
 overlies the country has been greatly worn. It is 
 furrowed in all directions by runnels and brooks ; 
 the larger streams have cut ravines through it down 
 to the solid rock below, nay, in numberless cases 
 they have even hollowed out deep gorges in the 
 rock itself. And if we turn to the hills that rise 
 out of the wide plain of drift, and lift their bare 
 rocks to the sky, proofs of the same waste meet 
 us on every side. The hummocks of greenstone 
 are split and broken, the crags of basalt are rent 
 and splintered ; the base of the cliffs and the sides 
 of the hills are cumbered with the ruin that marks 
 how quietly, yet how well, the rains, springs, and 
 frosts of centuries have done their work. Slowly
 
 3 1 8 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 the impress of the ice is fading away, and though 
 thousands of years may pass before all trace of its 
 action is obliterated, the time must nevertheless come 
 when the present surface of the land shall have dis- 
 appeared as completely as the sand ripple of last 
 night's tide was washed away by the tide of this 
 morning.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CHANGES IN THE SCENERY OF SCOTLAND SINCE 
 THE ADVENT OF MAN. 
 
 AMONG the more marked changes which have in- 
 fluenced the scenery of the country since the close of 
 the glacial period, let me refer, in conclusion, to two 
 that are intimately linked with the human history of 
 the island the Raised Beaches and Peat Mosses. 
 
 RAISED BEACHES. 
 
 If, after its submergence, the country rose again 
 slowly, with long intervals of rest, each of these 
 pauses would give the sea an opportunity of cutting 
 a notch, or horizontal terrace, along the margin of 
 the land. A succession of such terraces, or " raised 
 beaches," might thus be traceable at different eleva- 
 tions above the present sea-level, becoming generally 
 fainter according to their height and their consequent 
 antiquity. The thickness of the coating of snow and 
 ice which still enveloped the rising land, seems, how- 
 ever, to have either prevented these indentations from
 
 320 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 being distinctly made, or to have in great measure 
 effaced them. For, save in a few exceptional cases, 
 as near St. Andrew's, where well-marked terraces are 
 seen up to a height of 290 and even 350 feet, it is 
 only the lower and more recent examples which form 
 conspicuous features in the landscape. Round the 
 west coast a terrace, having a height of about forty 
 feet above high water-mark, winds as a green plat- 
 form along the dark rocky coast of Argyleshire and 
 Inverness. It probably dates from the later part of 
 the glacial period, for Arctic shells have been found 
 in it. It is succeeded by a lower and later terrace, 
 long ago described by Mr. Smith, of Jordanhill, and 
 Mr. Maclaren, which runs at a height of about twenty 
 or twenty-five feet above high water. This, on the 
 whole, is the most marked of all the raised beaches, 
 for it is of comparatively recent date. As it has 
 yielded in several places works of human fabrication, 
 it must be of later date than the time when man 
 became an inhabitant of this island. From the 
 nature of these remains, and other evidence, I have 
 been led to infer that its formation has taken place, 
 either in whole or in part, since the first century of 
 our era. 1 
 
 Round the greater part of the sea-margin of Scot- 
 
 1 Edin. New Phil. Journ. for 1861, and Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 
 for 1862. My inference, however, has been disputed by Mr. A. Bryson 
 (Edin. New Phil. Journ. for 1862,) and Mr. W. Carruthers (Quart. 
 Journ. Geol. Soc. 1862).
 
 Raised Beach. 321 
 
 land this terrace runs as a flat selvage of sandy, 
 gravelly, or clayey ground, varying in breadth from 
 six or seven miles to not more than a few feet. It 
 rises from twenty to thirty feet above high water- 
 mark, and is composed of horizontal layers of sand, 
 gravel, or clay, often full of littoral shells, the whole 
 having been laid down by the sea. Along the inner 
 margin of the terrace the ground usually rises as a 
 line of shelving bank or precipitous cliff, just as a 
 shelving bank or steep cliff shoots upward from the 
 sea. Moreover, the inland cliff that bounds so many 
 portions of the terrace is not unfrequently scarped 
 into clefts and creeks, and perforated with long 
 dim caverns. The resemblance to a sea-cliff goes 
 still further, for the terrace itself is often dotted with 
 prominent crags and worn pillars of rock, like the 
 tangle-covered skerries and sea-stacks that roughen 
 many a wild beach, open to the full swell of the 
 North Sea or the Atlantic. These inland rocks, 
 indeed, whether on the terrace or rising steeply from 
 its inland edge, are feathered over with ferns and ivy 
 and trailing briers ; they are tinted with mosses and 
 lichens, and gay with many a bud and blossom, 
 luxuriant bunches of hart's tongue hang from the 
 roofs of the caves, and swallows build their nests in 
 the crannies of the cliff. But divest the rocks of all 
 this tapestry of verdure, strip the terrace of its mantle 
 of gardens and fields, its highways and hedgerows 
 Y
 
 322 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 its villas and hamlets, busy sea-port towns and water- 
 ing-places, and you then lay bare a sandy flat that 
 ends at the foot of a gentle slope, or at the base of a 
 line of bleached and wasted rocks. You, in fact, 
 reconstruct an old coast line, and there can be no 
 more doubt that the sea once rolled over that terrace, 
 and broke against that cliff, than that the waves are 
 breaking over the beach to-day. Instead of the level 
 corn-fields and orchards of the terrace, imagine a 
 tract of sand or mud ; for the mosses and lichens, 
 ferns and flowers, substitute a shaggy covering of 
 sea-weed ; in place of swallows, martins, and rock- 
 pigeons, people the rocks with gulls, and auks, and 
 cormorants ; let the tides come eddying across the 
 terrace among the rocks and the cliff: and you thus 
 restore that old coast-line to the condition in which 
 it existed at a comparatively recent geological period. 
 If you could gently depress the land for some twenty 
 or thirty feet you would actually bring back the old 
 outline of the Scottish shores ere the last upheaval 
 had begun. 
 
 Evidence of the truth of these remarks must be 
 familiar to every one who has visited almost any part 
 of the coast-line of Scotland. The old or upraised 
 beach runs as a terrace along the margin of the 
 Firth of Forth ; it forms the broad carses of Fal- 
 kirk and of Gowrie ; it is visible in sheltered bays 
 along the exposed coasts of Forfar, Perth, Kincar-
 
 Raised Beach. 323 
 
 dine, Aberdeen, and westwards along the Moray 
 Firth. On the Atlantic side of the island, its low 
 green platform borders both sides of the Firth of 
 Clyde, fringes the islands, runs up the river beyond 
 Glasgow, and winds southwards along the coast of 
 Ayrshire and Wigtown into the Irish Channel. 
 
 This great terrace cannot be accounted for in any 
 other way than by admitting that it was formed by the 
 action of the sea, and that since its formation there 
 has been a rise of the land to a height of from twenty 
 to thirty feet above the level which it previously 
 occupied. This upheaval was of course brought 
 about by the operation of those igneous forces that 
 are lodged within the earth, but whose origin and 
 mode of working still remain such a mystery. It 
 probably went on slowly, the land rising inch by 
 inch, and foot by foot, just as the coast of Sweden is 
 rising at the present time. At last the elevation 
 ceased, and the old beach, now high above the tides, 
 became a level platform coated with turf. Few geo- 
 logical changes have been more directly serviceable 
 to man. He has found this upraised sea-margin an 
 inestimable site for his maritime towns and villages ; 
 and along many a coast-line, where, before the ele- 
 vation, the ground shelved down in a cliff or steep 
 bank to the sea, he now finds ready to his hand a 
 firm level terrace, bounded by the former cliff on the 
 one side, and by the present sea-beach on the other. 
 Y 2
 
 324 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 Leith, Burntisland, Dundee, Arbroath, Cromarty, 
 Rothsay, Greenock, Ardrossan, Ayr, and many other 
 towns on the coast stand, either wholly or in part, 
 on this terrace. Indeed it is in no small degree 
 owing to the facilities afforded by the terrace that 
 the banks of the river and Firth of Clyde are so 
 thickly fringed with towns, villages, and watering 
 places. At Glasgow, which is partly built on the 
 same platform, some interesting relics of the early 
 history of these geological and historical features 
 have been found. From the silt and sand of which 
 the terrace there consists, no fewer than eighteen 
 canoes have at different times been obtained, some 
 of them from under the very streets and houses. 
 Apart from questions of science, it is not uninterest- 
 ing to mark at how early an epoch the advantages 
 of the Clyde, as a maritime station, were recognised. 
 The number of canoes seems to show that the river 
 was much frequented, although no record remains 
 to indicate what may have been the traffic in which 
 they were engaged. 
 
 I have already alluded to the singular contrast 
 between the present aspect of the Clyde and its 
 appearance during the bleak glacial period. Another, 
 not less striking in its features, and bearing a closer 
 human interest withal, is suggested by these relics of 
 the early races. To-day all is bustle and business. 
 Ships from the remotest corners of the earth come
 
 Raised Beach of the Clyde. 325 
 
 hither with their merchandise. Vast warehouses and 
 stores are ranged row upon row along the margin of 
 the river, and in these are piled the productions of 
 every clime. Streets, noisy with the rattle of wheels, 
 and the tread of horses, and the hum of men, stretch 
 away, to the right hand and the left, as far as the eye 
 can reach. The air is heavy with the smoke belched 
 out from thousands of chimneys. And so, day after 
 day, the same endless din goes on ; every year adding 
 to it, as the streets and squares creep outward, and 
 the tide of human life keeps constantly flowing. 
 But how different the scene when our hatchet-wield- 
 ing forefathers navigated these waters ! Down in the 
 earth, beneath those very warehouses and streets, lies 
 the bed of the old river, with the remains of the 
 canoes that floated on its surface silent witnesses of 
 the changes that have been effected, not less on the 
 land than on its inhabitants. We can picture that 
 dim, long-forgotten time, when the sea rose at least 
 five-and-twenty feet higher in the valley than it does 
 now, and covered with a broad sheet of water the 
 site of the lower parts of the present city of Glasgow. 
 We see the skirts of the dark Caledonian forest 
 sweeping away to the north, among the mists and 
 shadows of the distant hills. The lower grounds 
 are brown with peat bogs and long, dreary flats of 
 stunted bent, on which there grows here and there 
 a hazel or an alder-bush, or, perchance, a solitary fir,
 
 326 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 beneath whose branches a herd of wild cattle browse 
 on the scanty herbage. Yonder, far to the right, a 
 few red deer are pacing slowly up the valley, as the 
 heron, with hoarse outcry and lumbering flight, takes 
 wing, and a canoe, manned by a swarthy savage, 
 with bow across his shoulders, pushes out from the 
 shore. The smoke that curls from the brake in front 
 shows where his comrades are busy before their huts 
 hollowing out the stem of a huge oak, that fell on 
 the neighbouring slope when the last storm swept 
 across from the Atlantic. And there stretches the 
 broad river its surface never disturbed save by the 
 winds of heaven, or the plunge of the water-fowl, 
 and the paddles of the canoes its clear current 
 never darkened except when the rain clouds have 
 gathered far away on the Southern hills, and the spate 
 comes roaring down the glens and waterfalls, and 
 hurries away red and rapid to lose itself in the sea. 
 Such was the landscape when our ancestors first 
 looked upon it. How came it to undergo so total a 
 change? It is not merely that man himself has 
 advanced, that he has uprooted the old forests, extir- 
 pated the wild cattle, driven away the red deer to the 
 fastnesses of the mountains, drained the peat-bogs, 
 covered the country with corn-fields and villages, and 
 built along the margin of the river a great city. 
 True, he has done all this, and has undoubtedly been 
 the chief agent in the general change. But nature,
 
 Prehistoric Forests and Peat Mosses. 327 
 
 too, has helped him. Those vast forces that are 
 lodged beneath the crust of the earth have slowly 
 upheaved the land, and have converted a large part 
 of the bottom of the old estuary into good, dry 
 ground, covered with the richest soil, and fitted in 
 no common degree for the growth of streets. And 
 hence, where his forefathers floated their rude boats 
 he builds his warehouses, and on tracts that were 
 ever wet with the ooze of river and sea, and bore few 
 other inhabitants than the cockle and mussel, he now 
 plants his country villas and lays out his pleasure- 
 grounds. 
 
 DISAPPEARANCE OF THE ANCIENT FORESTS; GROWTH OF 
 PEAT MOSSES. 
 
 The disappearance of the ancient woods deserves 
 more than a mere passing allusion, for it has ma- 
 terially influenced the present scenery of the country, 
 and it has a still further interest from the close way 
 in which it is linked with human history. Duly to 
 appreciate the nature and extent of the change 
 which is traceable to this cause, it is necessary to bear 
 in mind the magnitude of the forests which, when 
 man first set foot in Scotland, swept in long, with- 
 drawing glades across its surface, of the wide black 
 mosses and moors, of the innumerable lakes and 
 fens, dense and stagnant indeed on the lower
 
 328 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 grounds, but which, in the uplands, were the sources 
 whence streamlets and rivers descended through glen, 
 and valley, and dim woodland, into the encircling 
 sea. Beasts of the chase, and among them some 
 that have been for centuries extinct here, abounded 
 in these ancient forests ; birds of many kinds haunted 
 the woods and waters; fish swarmed in lake, river, 
 and sea. Among such primeval landscapes did our 
 aboriginal forefathers excavate their rude earthen 
 dwellings and build their weems of stone ; from the 
 stately oaks they hollowed out canoes, which they 
 launched upon the lakes and firths ; and through the 
 thick glades of the forest they chased the wild-boar, 
 the tints, the bear, the wolf, and the red deer. The 
 traces of these old scenes are still in part preserved 
 to us. From the lakes and peat-mosses are some- 
 times exhumed the canoes, stone celts, bronze vessels, 
 and ornaments of the early races, along with the 
 trunks of oak and pine that formed the ancient 
 forest, and bones of the animals that roamed through 
 its shades. It is from such records that we know 
 both what used to be the aspect of the country and 
 how it has come to be so wholly changed. 
 
 It is a common opinion that the peat-mosses of 
 Scotland are of a comparatively modern date not 
 older, indeed, than the Roman invasion, because " all 
 the coins, axes, arms and other utensils found in 
 them are Roman." But these relics are better under-
 
 Prehistoric Forests and Peat-Mosses. 329 
 
 stood now than they were some years ago ; and 
 though in some cases their Roman date is beyond 
 doubt, they are admitted to belong generally to the 
 earlier time, known to the antiquary as the Bronze 
 Period. Their evidence, therefore, cannot prove more 
 than that the mosses in which they have been found 
 may be later than the time when the natives of this 
 country fashioned their implements of bronze : may 
 be later ; for the occurrence of the antiquities in the 
 peat is of itself no proof that the peat is not actually 
 very much older than they. They may in fact have 
 been dropped on the moss when it was in a soft, boggy 
 condition, and so have sunk to some depth beneath 
 the surface. It would require not a little careful 
 observation to show conclusively that the portion of 
 the peat lying above such remains was really formed 
 after they were left there by their human owners. 
 If, however, the remains occur not in the substance 
 of the moss, but below it, on what was once a soil, 
 or a lake-bottom, and if they are of such a kind, or 
 in such a position, as to show or to make it probable 
 that they were left exactly in the place where they 
 still lie, the inference may be drawn that they are 
 of older date than the peat which overlies them. 
 Tried by such a rigid test as this, comparatively few 
 of the Scottish peat-mosses can at present be proved 
 to be later than the Roman invasion. There is 
 ground for believing that a good many, however,
 
 330 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 have probably been formed since that time ; others, 
 though later than the first coming of man into the 
 country, must be far older than our era ; while some 
 may even go back into the glacial period. It is in 
 the depths of this last-named series, and in the beds 
 of clay and marl underneath which mark the bottoms 
 of former lakes, that we may look with most hope 
 for the discovery of the remains of the animals that 
 first inhabited the country, after it rose out of the 
 glacial sea. No opportunity should be lost of watch- 
 ing the cutting and draining of such peat-mosses. 
 It is there that we may expect to meet with the 
 great extinct Irish elk, and with the progenitors of 
 our present races of cattle ; and there, too, we may 
 chance to light on the mammoth, rhinoceros, rein- 
 deer, musk-ox, bear, and other animals which pre- 
 ceded or may have been contemporary with the 
 earliest human population of these wilds. 
 
 Peat can only be formed in lakes, or on wet, 
 marshy ground. In the former case the water is 
 gradually displaced by the growth of marsh-plants, 
 creeping steadily from the margin to the centre, until 
 a surface has been formed over the site of the old 
 lake. This process may be seen going on in many 
 parts of the country ; and so rapidly does it some- 
 times advance, that the sheet of water becomes 
 almost visibly smaller every year, while the en- 
 circling morass gains in proportion. Such seems to
 
 Peat-Mosses. 331 
 
 have been the origin of not a few of our peat-mosses, 
 ,and especially of the older ones. The pools and 
 lakes formed by the unequal accumulation of the 
 deposits of the glacial period have in many cases 
 passed into basins of peat ; and the cotter now cuts 
 his fuel where of old the wild duck made its nest. 
 Some of these peat deposits, for ought we can tell, 
 may be almost as old as the time when the basins 
 in which they lie were first filled with fresh water. 
 There are proofs, however, that some of the basins 
 were still lakes when man was living in the island, 
 for canoes have been found beneath several feet or 
 yards of peat, and lying on fine sand and gravel, 
 evidently the bottom of the old lake. 
 
 Peat-mosses not only mark the site of lochs and 
 tarns; they cover the ruins of ancient woodlands. 
 That the mosses which stretch over so many wide 
 moors in Scotland have sprung up after the destruc- 
 tion of forests which once grew there, is shown by 
 the numerous trunks and branches of trees which are 
 so constantly found among the lower parts of the 
 peat. A thick grove of oaks would not be likely to 
 spring up on the surface of a quaking bog. On the 
 contrary, it was owing to the destruction of the 
 forests that the bog arose. The prostrated trunks 
 would of course intercept any of the little runnels 
 that might have been wont to trickle through the 
 woods, and thus stagnant swamps would be formed,
 
 332 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 in which water-mosses would readily take root ; and 
 there would grow up in this way a true peat-moss. 
 When we consider how large an extent of surface 
 was covered with wood in the early times of history, 
 and how much of what must then have been 
 woodland is now morass and bog, slowly being 
 reclaimed by the farmer, there is ground for the 
 inference, as has just been said, that a good deal 
 of this kind of peat must be later than the days 
 of the Romans. 
 
 There are several ways in which a forest may be 
 destroyed and turned into a peat-moss. The growth 
 of a thick mass of wood for many successive cen- 
 turies on the same spot, tends to impoverish the soil, 
 and, in the natural course of events, the trees must 
 decay and give way to other races of plants, which 
 will draw nourishment from the mouldering trunks. 
 And thus, on tracts which at one period bore a dense 
 array of wood, there might spring up in later ages 
 long brown morasses and peat-bogs. Again, a fierce 
 hurricane sweeping across the country may prostrate 
 the trees over wide areas ; and the fallen trunks and 
 rotting leaves, by collecting moisture and facilitating 
 the growth of marshy vegetation, may in like manner 
 give rise to a peat-moss. Or the weight of snow in 
 a severe winter may be so great as to break the 
 branches, and even drag down the trees upon each 
 other:
 
 Peat-Mosses. 333 
 
 " Nee jam sustineant onus 
 Sylvae laborantes, geluque 
 Flumina constiterint acuto." 1 
 
 Or, lastly, man, armed with axe and hatchet, may 
 come and fell oak and beech and pine, taking, 
 it may be, little or none of the wood away, but 
 leaving it there to rot, and to gather around and 
 over it a mantle of peat-forming plants. Peat-mosses 
 appear to have arisen in each of these ways in Scot- 
 land. In the Forest of Mar, Aberdeenshire, large 
 trunks of Scotch fir, which fell from age and decay, 
 were soon immured in peat, formed partly from the 
 decay of their perishing leaves and branches, and 
 partly from the growth of sphagnum and other marsh- 
 plants. About the middle of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury, a storm swept down from the mountains of 
 Loch Broom, in Ross-shire, and levelled a forest so 
 completely, that in less than fifty years thereafter 
 peat was dug from the same spot. In 1756 a similar 
 fate was experienced by the whole Wood of Drum- 
 lanrig, in Dumfriesshire. And other cases are known 
 where, at the bottom of the moss, lie the remains of 
 old forests, with their trees prostrated all in one 
 direction, showing the point from which came the 
 storm that hurled them to the ground. 2 
 
 The Moss of Kincardine, in the upper part of the 
 
 1 Hor. Carm. I. ix. 2. 
 
 2 Rennie's Essays on Peat, pp. 30, 65.
 
 334 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 valley of the Forth, owes its existence to the fact 
 that the thick oak forest which once covered these 
 grounds has been felled by man. Below the moss 
 the stumps and trunks of large trees were found 
 crowded as thickly upon the clay as they could be 
 supposed to have grown there. The roots were still 
 fixed in the clay, as when the trees were in life, and 
 the stems had been cut down at a height of about 
 two feet and a half from the ground. Marks of a 
 narrow axe were sometimes traced on the lower ends 
 of the logs, completing the proof that the wood had 
 been cleared by human agency. 1 Here we see how 
 a district of fair woodland the home, doubtless, of 
 many a stag and hind, and the nesting place of many 
 a cushat dove and blackbird has been turned by 
 man into a waste of barren morass and mire a 
 place of shaking bog and stunted heath, where he 
 cannot build his dwelling nor plant his crops, and 
 from which he can extract nothing save fuel for his 
 hearth. Such has been the condition of these dis- 
 tricts for many a long century ; and it is only within 
 the last two or three generations that an exertion has 
 been made, with much labour and cost, to strip off the 
 covering of peat, and restore again to the light of day 
 that old soil which nourished the early oak forest. 
 It is curious to mark on many a peat-moss, particu- 
 
 i Tait, On the Mosses of Kincardine and Flanders. Trans. Ro)-. Soc. 
 Ed in. iii.
 
 Decay of Peat Mosses. 335 
 
 larly on those along the crests of hills, how the same 
 universal system of decay, which we have now traced 
 among the solid rocks and surface soils over the 
 whole country, is at work in eating away the black 
 peat, and washing its waste into the valleys. It is to 
 this cause that the singularly rugged surface, known 
 in the south of Scotland as moss-hags, is due. The 
 peat is no longer growing, or at least grows so feebly 
 that it cannot repair the damage done by rains and 
 frosts. Hence deep gutters and pools are dug out 
 of the crumbling mass black, soft, and treacherous, 
 only passable in dry weather, and even then often 
 like the march of the Salian priests, "cum tripicdiis 
 sollemnique saltatu." Why the peat-mosses should 
 thus die out is a question deserving of inquiry. 
 Although there may be some more general cause, the 
 draining of the country in agricultural operations 
 has doubtless had a material effect upon the mosses. 
 Throughout the uplands of the southern counties, the 
 black cappings of peat which cover so many of the 
 flat hill-tops, and extend down their sides, may now 
 be seen to be shrinking up again towards the top. 
 They have a ragged fringe, some parts running in 
 long tongues down the slope, or in straggling isolated 
 patches. These features are well seen from the high 
 grounds above Loch Skene. The long, bare, flattened 
 ridges have each their rough scalps of peat, of which 
 the black, broken edges hang down the slopes of
 
 336 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 brown heath and bent, while far below are the green 
 valleys, with their clear winding streams, and their 
 scattered shepherds' hamlets. 
 
 INFLUENCE OF MAN UPON THE SCENERY OF THE COUNTRY. 
 
 It would lead to too wide a discussion to enter 
 fully here upon the influence of man in bringing the 
 scenery of the country to its present condition. He 
 has uprooted the old forests, drained many of the 
 mosses, and extirpated or thinned many of the wild 
 animals of ancient Caledonia. In place of the woods 
 and bogs, he has planted fields and gardens, and 
 built villages and towns ; instead of wild beasts of 
 the chase, he has covered the hills and valleys with 
 flocks of sheep and herds of cattle. The cutting 
 down of the forests and the draining of the mosses 
 has doubtless tended to reduce the rainfall, and 
 generally to lessen the moisture of the atmosphere 
 and improve the climate. Sunlight has been let in 
 upon the waste places of the land, and the latent 
 fertility of the soil has been called forth ; so that 
 over the same regions which, in Roman times, were 
 so dark and inhospitable, so steeped in dank mists 
 and vapours, and so infested with beasts of prey, 
 there now stretch the rich champagne of the 
 Lothians, the cultivated plains of Forfar, Perth and 
 Stirling, of Lanark and Ayr, and the mingling fields
 
 Geological Influence of Man. 337 
 
 and gardens and woodland that fill all the fair valley 
 of the Tweed, from the grey Muirfoots and Lammer- 
 muirs far up into the heart of the Cheviots. 
 
 In effecting these revolutions, man has introduced 
 an element of change which has extended through 
 both animate and inanimate nature. He has amelio- 
 rated the climate, and by so doing has affected the 
 agencies of waste that are wearing down the surface 
 of the land. The rivers are now, probably, a good 
 deal less in size than they were even in the days of 
 the Romans, and there may be fewer runnels and 
 streamlets. The old mosses acted as vast sponges, 
 collecting the rain that fell upon them or soaked into 
 them from the neighbouring slopes, and feeding with 
 a constant supply the brown peaty rivulets that car- 
 ried their surplus waters to the lower grounds. The 
 evaporation from these wide swampy flats could not 
 but be extensive, and the rain-fall was thus, in all 
 likelihood, proportionately great. But the clearing 
 away of the forests and of the peat- mosses has re- 
 moved one chief source alike of the rivulets and of 
 the rain. The amount of denudation by the com- 
 bined influence of rain and streams ought accord- 
 ingly to be less, on the whole, than it was eighteen 
 hundred years ago. At the same time, it should be 
 borne in mind that the extent to which draining 
 has now been carried all over the country has had 
 the effect of allowing the rain to run off more easily 
 z
 
 338 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 into the rivers. Hence the latter swell and fall 
 again more rapidly than they used to do. Floods 
 or "spates," though the rainfall may be the same or 
 less, have -thus a tendency to be more sudden and 
 violent than formerly, and hence, in the increased 
 amount of erosion performed by the river in flood, 
 there may, perhaps, be an equivalent for the diminu- 
 tion of the stream in its ordinary state. 
 
 Among the plants and animals of the country, 
 too, traces of the influence of man's interference are 
 everywhere apparent. He has altered the character 
 of the vegetation over wide districts, driving away 
 plants of one kind, such as the heaths, to put in 
 their stead those of another type, like the cereals. 
 The gradual change of climate must also have 
 affected the distribution of the vegetation of the 
 country : some herbs grow now more abundantly 
 than they did before ; or they may now be able to 
 flourish at a higher level than of old. Others, to 
 which the change has been unfavourable, may have 
 been greatly thinned in numbers, and even extir- 
 pated altogether. In like manner the coming of man 
 has worked mighty transformations in the animal 
 world. Over and above the extirpation of the beasts 
 of the forest, and the introduction of foreign forms 
 into the country, he has waged incessant war against 
 those which he considers injurious to his interest. He 
 has thus altered the natural proportion of the different
 
 Influence of Man. 339 
 
 species to each other, and introduced a new element 
 into the universal "struggle for existence." No species, 
 whether of plants or of animals, can notably increase 
 or diminish in number without, of course, thereby 
 exerting an influence upon its neighbours. And here 
 a boundless field of inquiry opens out to us. Man's 
 advent has not been a mere solitary fact, nor have 
 the alterations which he has effected been confined 
 merely to the relations that subsist between himself 
 and nature. He has set in motion a series of changes 
 which have reacted on each other 'in countless 
 circles, both through the organic and the inorganic 
 world. Nor are they confined to the past ; they still 
 go on ; and, as years roll away, they must produce 
 new modifications and reactions, the stream of change 
 ever widening, carrying with it man himself, from 
 whom it took its rise, and who is yet in no small 
 degree involved in the very revolutions which he 
 originates. 
 
 Z 2
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION. 
 
 IN this final chapter let me present the reader with 
 a brief summary of what has been said in the chap- 
 ters that have gone before. At the outset I tried to 
 show that the common and popular notion which 
 assigns the present inequalities on the earth's sur- 
 face indiscriminately to the results of early earth- 
 quake and upheaval is untenable ; that the only 
 principles on which we can advance with confidence 
 in seeking to decipher the history of our hills and 
 valleys are those laid down by Hutton and his illus- 
 trator, Playfair ; and that by studying the different 
 agencies at work in altering the face of the globe at 
 present, we take the only way open to us of inves- 
 tigating the progress of change in the geological past. 
 In this course we are led to perceive that, although 
 there have been many upheavals, depressions and 
 fractures of the earth's crust, nevertheless the pre- 
 sent inequalities of the land are probably due in 
 the main to the unequal waste of the rocks by rains,
 
 Recapitulation. 341 
 
 springs, streams, ice, and the sea; and that, as Hutton 
 long ago complained, it is inability or unwillingness 
 to grant the enormous periods of time demanded 
 by the working of these slow but constant forces, 
 which has long stood in the way of the general 
 acceptance of this part of the Huttonian Theory. 
 
 When, in accordance with these principles, we begin 
 to inquire into the origin of the present scenery of 
 the country, we are soon taught that each hill and 
 valley, each mountain and glen, has a twofold history. 
 There is first the story of the formation of its com- 
 ponent rocks, whether these have been laid down 
 layer after layer as sand, gravel, or mud upon the 
 bottom of a former sea, or piled up as shingle along 
 an ancient beach, or drifted as the finest ooze over 
 the bed of a lake ; whether formed of the decay of 
 extinct forests, or from the gathered fragments of 
 corals and shells ; whether rolled along in the form 
 of liquid lava, or thrown up in showers of volcanic 
 dust and ashes. And after we have tried to trace 
 out the succession of events imperfectly chronicled in 
 the rocks, and have learnt, in so doing, how little we 
 know, and how utterly beyond human realization is 
 the vastness of the antiquity thus recorded, there still 
 remains the story of those after changes, whereby the 
 various rocks that were piled over each other came to 
 be upheaved and carved into the present framework 
 of the country. Between the time when the rocks
 
 342 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 were formed and that in which they were raised into 
 the land on which our hills and valleys have been 
 moulded, long millions of years must in many cases 
 have passed away, during which metamorphism 
 and other underground processes were at work ; for 
 when these rocks appeared in the light of day they 
 were often vastly different from their original con- 
 dition. Sand, silt, and mud had been changed into 
 schist, slate, gneiss, and granite ; and this not in mere 
 local patches, but, as in the Highlands, over an area 
 many thousands of square miles in extent. 
 
 The hills and valleys of Scotland, we have seen, are 
 not all of one age. They differ greatly also in geologi- 
 cal structure, with a corresponding variety of scenery. 
 As a convenient subdivision they were grouped into 
 three districts, the Highlands, the Southern Uplands, 
 and the Midland Valley. In taking leave of them, 
 however, for the present, let us regard them finally 
 as a whole, and picture briefly the changes by which 
 their rocks, whether formed in lake, river, or sea, have 
 come at last to wear their present outlines on the 
 surface of the land. We watch them raised by sub- 
 terranean movements within reach of the waves, and 
 there for long ages 
 
 " Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean," 
 
 until hundreds and thousands of feet of solid rock 
 had been worn away. During possibly many risings
 
 Recapitulation. 343 
 
 and sinkings of the land this marine denudation went 
 on, and by degrees the waves succeeded in levelling 
 the country into broad undulating table-lands. It 
 was out of such sea-worn platforms that the Scottish 
 mountains and valleys appear to have been carved. 
 We mark how simply the present grouping of the 
 valleys may have arisen. Rain falling on the land that 
 was rising above the sea-level, found its way from the 
 centre by devious paths outwards and downwards 
 to the shore. These paths, once chosen, would ever 
 be deepened and widened as century after century 
 rolled away. The wide table-lands, like a sandy 
 beach on the recession of the tide, were thus slowly 
 hollowed out on every side by little runnels, that 
 gathered into brooks, thence into larger streams, and 
 lastly into broad rivers that swept the drainage out 
 to sea. Year by year the process of excavation went 
 on, every shower of rain, every spring, every frost, 
 every stream contributing its share in the general 
 waste. In the contemplation of such 'a history we 
 are in a manner baffled and overawed by the vastness 
 of the time which is required ; the work accomplished 
 is so vast, and the workers, even if we suppose that 
 they once worked more rapidly and vigorously than 
 they do now, seem so feeble. We may in imagination 
 watch that ancient land for a thousand years, and yet 
 detect no appreciable change upon its surface. We 
 return to it after the lapse of a thousand centuries, '
 
 344 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 and find perhaps that the valleys are only a little 
 deeper, and that the broad undulations between them 
 begin to bear but a far-off resemblance to hills. At 
 the end of another long interval, during which per- 
 chance the land has undergone not a few unequal 
 upheavals and depressions, the hollows have sunk a 
 little more. But how impossible to realize, even if we 
 may yet be able to estimate, the time which was 
 needed to change the ancient table-lands into a 
 region of mountains and valleys ; to excavate the 
 wide straths and glens ; to scarp the cliffs and pre- 
 cipices ; to roughen the mountain-sides with crag and 
 scar and rocky pass ; to dig the ravines and twilight 
 gorges ; and to carve out all that varied scenery which 
 we know so well ! 
 
 Perhaps it may yet be ascertained, that among the 
 agents which in successive geological periods helped 
 in no small degree to alter the surface of the globe 
 were sheets of land-ice and fleets of floes and bergs. 
 There are indications of old glacial periods in Palae- 
 ozoic, Secondary, and Tertiary times, and we may 
 eventually learn that the glaciers and bergs of some 
 of these remote ages took a part in carving out the 
 valleys and planing down the table-lands of this 
 country. But, be that as it may, we know that the 
 last great glacial period wrought marvellous changes 
 upon the surface of the British Islands. In now 
 glancing once more at the history of these changes,
 
 Recapitulation. 345 
 
 let us imagine the land, at the beginning of that 
 period, rising into the same wide sweep of hill and 
 valley as it does to-day. Gradually its plants and 
 animals are displaced by those of more northern 
 latitudes, as the temperature becomes year by year 
 more wintry and ungenial. The snow creeps down from 
 the hills, the forests and their inhabitants are pushed 
 nearer and yet nearer to the sea ; until at last, save 
 perhaps in a narrow stripe along the shore in summer, 
 one wide mantle of snow and ice has enveloped the 
 land from the mountain peaks to the sea. Still the 
 cold increases. The very ocean freezes into solid 
 sheets around the shores. The high grounds of the 
 interior higher, perchance, by several thousand feet, 
 than they are to-day receive a constant accession of 
 snow, and the accumulated mass, pressing down the 
 valleys, goes out to sea in long wide walls of ice. As 
 it descends, year after year, and century after century, 
 the surface over which it moves is ground and po- 
 lished, the hardest rocks are shorn down, the rugged- 
 ness of the ancient land is largely worn off, countless 
 lake-basins are excavated in the rocks, and an undu- 
 lating outline is impressed upon the whole length and 
 breadth of the country. The moraine-rubbish of this 
 great ice-sheet gathers into the thick deposit known 
 as boulder-clay. The summer, brief and feeble, has 
 yet strength enough to melt the last winter's snow 
 along the coast and in the maritime valleys ; and
 
 346 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 doubtless, under the fading skirts of winter, the 
 bright flowers of an Arctic type saxifrages, ranun- 
 culi, willows, mosses, and the rest spring rapidly into 
 bloom. Nor are the larger mammals wanting; in 
 such sheltered nooks the mammoth and the rhino- 
 ceros would find their appropriate food, as their sur- 
 vivors, the rein-deer and the musk-ox, still do in the 
 far north. The storms of summer work dire havoc 
 on these shores, for the ground - swell, setting in 
 strongly on the land, breaks up the coast-ice into heaps 
 of ruin, which, laden with rocks and mud, are borne 
 off, until they melt in mid-ocean or are stranded on 
 other coasts. 
 
 The next act in this strange drama brings before us 
 this ice-covered land slowly sinking beneath the sea. 
 The higher mountain-tops, however, remain above 
 water, and send out their fleets of bergs and ice-rafts, 
 for the climate is still severe enough to nourish on the 
 narrowed land an abundant growth of ice and snow. 
 Many a huge mass of granite or gneiss or schist is 
 thus dropt quietly over the coal-measures of the 
 Lothians ; many a block of grit and greywacke is 
 borne from the lonely islets of Lammermuir, Moor- 
 foot, Dumfries, and Galloway, and sunk upon the hills 
 and valleys of the north of England. Nay, large 
 boulders of mountain-limestone are lifted from the 
 coast-line skirting the half-submerged hills of North- 
 umberland and Yorkshire, and scattered far and wide
 
 Recapitulation. 347 
 
 over the central counties. Even from the distant 
 shores of Scandinavia bergs bring fragments of 
 gneiss and granite to the plains of Central and 
 Southern England. To this and the later parts of the 
 history the upper boulder-clay and sandy drift are 
 probably to be assigned. Moreover, the grating of 
 these ice-islands over the sunken hills must doubtless 
 have given rise to much abrasion of the solid rocks. 
 Many a Scottish hill-top may thus have been smoothed 
 and striated anew; and we probably see proof of the 
 same process in the large number of scratched frag- 
 ments of chalk from the Yorkshire Wolds in the 
 boulder-clays of the east of England. The land once 
 more begins to rise ; the glaciers in the mountains of 
 Wales, Cumberland, the south of Scotland, and the 
 Highlands resume not a little of their former massive- 
 ness, as the country gathers increase of size. The 
 sand and clay which the sea may have left behind 
 it are by the ice cleared out of the glens. With the 
 widening area of land, and the lessening severity of 
 the climate, the hills and valleys, where free from pe- 
 rennial snow, are clothed with vegetation and haunted 
 by beasts of the chase. By a succession of changes, 
 as slow and silent, doubtless, as those which ushered 
 in the Age of Ice, that long era begins to draw to a 
 close. The glaciers feel the breath of a warmer clime 
 coming over them, and shrink step by step back into 
 the mountains, leaving, at every pause in their decline,
 
 348 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 great heaps of earth and rock memorials, as it were, 
 of their final and fruitless conflict with the adverse 
 elements. But their doom has come, and the last 
 lingering remnant of the old ice-sheet vanishes away. 
 The very plants and animals of that cold period are 
 involved in the same fate. Slowly and reluctantly 
 they are driven from the lower grounds, as species 
 after species makes its appearance from other lands, 
 like the successive hordes of a conquering people. 
 And now at last, on the bleakest and barest of our 
 uplands, from which there is no escape, they carry on 
 the struggle still. But the skirmishers of the invading 
 army are amongst them, and the time will doubtless 
 come when the ancient and Alpine races will dis- 
 appear from our highest mountain-top, and with them 
 the last living terrestrial relic of the great glacial 
 period. 
 
 Since the ice melted away, the sea, rains, streams, 
 springs, and frosts have renewed their old work of 
 demolition. The smoothed and flowing outline which 
 the ice left behind it is now undergoing a slow de- 
 struction, and the rocks are quietly resuming the 
 rugged outlines which they had of old. The sea- 
 coasts are receding before the onward march of the 
 waves ; former ravines are deepened and widened by 
 the rivers, and new ones have been formed. Man too 
 has come upon the scene, and has set his mark upon 
 well nigh every rood of the land from mountain-top
 
 Recapitulation. 349 
 
 to sea-shore. He has helped to demolish the ancient 
 forests ; he has drained innumerable fens and mosses, 
 and turned them into fertile fields ; he has extirpated 
 the wild beasts of the old woods, thus changing both 
 the aspect of the country and the distribution of its 
 plants and animals. He has engraved the country 
 with thousands of roads and railways, strewn it with 
 villages and hamlets, and dotted it with cities and 
 towns. And thus more has been done by him, in 
 altering the aspect of the island, than has been 
 achieved during the brief period of his sojourn by all 
 the geological agencies put together. 
 
 Such in outline is the explanation which I have 
 ventured to propose for the origin of the present 
 scenery of Scotland. It is based not upon specula- 
 tions regarding former Titanic convulsions, of which 
 we know nothing, but upon the order of nature as it 
 has been ascertained by experience. Not that the 
 brief recorded experience of man is to be taken as a 
 standard by which the past eternity is in everything 
 to be measured. But it is vain to feign causes which 
 cannot be shown to have existed except by the 
 evidence which they are invented to explain. It is 
 not only safer, but it seems the only philosophical 
 course, to interpret the past changes of the earth's 
 history by constant reference to the well-ascertained 
 economy of nature. And that the various processes 
 now at work in altering the surface of the globe are
 
 35O Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 enough to have given rise to all the varieties of scenery 
 in these islands must, I believe, be admitted by every 
 one who is not unwilling to allow the necessary lapse 
 of time. But while it appears to me certain that 
 our glens and valleys were excavated by the same 
 agencies of denudation which are performing a similar 
 task to-day, there is no proof that the rate of waste 
 has always been the same. There may have been 
 periods when rain and frost, for instance, were much 
 more abundant and severe than they are now, and 
 when in consequence the general waste of the land 
 was .more rapid. Geological evidence favours this 
 supposition. Hence, to take the present rate of waste 
 as the standard for all past time may be to fix the 
 estimate much too low. 
 
 But, even with this limitation, we cannot contem- 
 plate the present landscapes of our country as the 
 result of a necessarily slow and unequal decay without 
 being impressed with a sense of the vastness of the 
 time which is demanded. The astronomer may yet 
 perhaps be able to calculate for us the length of some 
 of these periods ; but, even though they were expressed 
 in figures, the mind would relinquish in utter despair 
 the attempt adequately to realize them. In this dim, 
 shadowy antiquity, so impressive from its immensity, 
 and from the slow and stately march of the events 
 which it witnessed, there is surely an ample equiva- 
 lent for the grandeur of the Titanic upthrows of the
 
 Recapitulation and Conclusion. 351 
 
 older faith. It was doubtless pleasant to contrast the 
 peace and quiet of the living world, with what seemed 
 the records of fierce cataclysms in earlier times ; to 
 see the fair meadows and cornfields of the Lowlands 
 sweeping in waves of verdure up to the base of crags 
 that were believed to have been heaved into the air 
 when the earth was shaking and tossing like a storm- 
 vexed sea ; to listen to the ripple of the river, and 
 think that the tree-shaded ravine in which it flows 
 was rent asunder by some primeval earthquake. But 
 surely it is not less pleasant, nor less fraught with 
 material for suggestive meditation, to wander away 
 among the purple hills, and to meet everywhere with 
 the proofs of slow change carried on during innumer- 
 able centuries ; to trace the lines of scarred cliff and 
 precipice with the chaos of fallen ruins below ; to 
 linger by the side of lake and glen ; or to climb the 
 heights above, that the eye may sweep over a wide 
 sea of mountain-tops: and to believe that all this 
 range of scenery has, inch by inch, been carved out 
 by the joint labours of the powers of waste. 
 
 The story of the origin of our scenery, as thus 
 interpreted, is of a piece with the rest of the teach- 
 ings of nature. It tells of no sudden and random 
 changes. It leads us back into the past infinitely 
 further than imagination can follow, and, with an 
 impressiveness which we sometime can hardly en- 
 dure, points out the vastness of the antiquity of our
 
 352 Scenery of Scotland. 
 
 globe. It shows that in the grander revolutions of 
 the world, as well as in the humbler routine of 
 every-day life, it is the little changes which by their 
 cumulative effects bring about the greatest results ; 
 that the lowly offices of wind and rain, springs and 
 frosts, snow and ice, trifling as they may appear, 
 have nevertheless been chosen as instruments to 
 mould the giant frame-work of the mountains ; and 
 that these seemingly feeble agents have yet been 
 able, in the long lapse of still untold ages, to pro- 
 duce the widest diversity of scenery ; and to do this, 
 not with the havoc and ruin of earthquake and con- 
 vulsion, but with a nicely balanced harmony and 
 order, forming out of the very waste of the land a 
 kindly soil, which bears, year by year, its mantle of 
 green, yielding food to the beast of the field and the 
 fowl of the air, and ministering to the wants and the 
 enjoyment of man.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Abbey Craig, 277. 
 Aberdeenshire, Old Red Sandstone 
 
 of, no. 
 Aberlady, 49. 
 Agassiz, Professor L. cited, 160, 
 
 166, 195, 201. 
 Airdrie, 304. 
 Alluvial Meadows, or "Haughs," 
 
 29. 
 
 Annandale, 234, 249, 252. 
 Applecross, 104. 
 Arbroath, 56, 324. 
 Ardnamurchan Point, 104. 
 Ardrossan, 324. 
 Arisaig, Valley Road to Fort 
 
 William, 124. 
 
 Argyle, Duke of, cited, 166. 
 Argyle's Bowling Green, 222. 
 Argyleshire, Hills of, 222. 
 Valleys in, 138, 157. 
 Arthur's Seat, 277. 
 Assynt Mountains, 212, 214. 
 Atlantic, Breakers of, 42, 65, 67. 
 Atnospheric waste, 15 38, 40, 
 
 42, 114, 195, 209, 228, 264, 
 
 292, 317, 335- 
 Ayrshire Coast, 70, 72, 75, 234, 
 
 323. 324. 
 
 Scenery of, 234, 262, 278, 
 297. 
 
 Banff, Old Red Sandstone of, no. 
 Barnbougle (Linlithgowshire), 51. 
 Barra Head, 68. 
 
 Basalt, Mode of weathering of, 
 294. 
 
 Bass Rock, 269. 
 
 Beach, Formation of a, 42. 
 
 Illustrates a river-system, ii. 
 "Beallochs," or passes, 123. 
 Beauly Firth, 59, 144. 
 Bell Rock, Force of waves at, 54. 
 Ben Aulder, Height of Spring on, 
 
 117. 
 
 Griam, 109. 
 
 Lawers, Structure of, 96. 
 Lomond, 142, 223. 
 Nevis, Ascent of, 1 16. 
 
 Height of Spring on, 117. 
 Glens on East Side of, 
 
 117, 123, 217. 
 View from top of, 99. 
 Berwickshire Coast, 46, 232. 
 
 Old Red Sandstone of, 246. 
 Biggar, 288. 
 
 Binny Craig, 269, 277, 294. 
 Black Isle, 132. 
 Borthwick Water, 253. 
 Boulders, Travelled, 190,312, 346. 
 Boulder-clay, Composition of, 303. 
 Fossils of, 304. 
 Origin of, 185, 1 88, 257, 
 
 300, 345. 
 
 Ravine of, 31, 36, 302. 
 Scenery produced by, 185, 
 
 307- 
 
 Subdivisions of, 301. 
 Brae Lyon, 142. 
 Braes of Doune, 1 10. 
 Brander, Pass of, 174, 175. 
 Breaker-action, 40, 60. 
 Brick-earth, 16. 
 
 A A
 
 354 
 
 Index. 
 
 Broad Law (Peebleshire), 238. 
 Brooks, Action of, 18. 
 Brora, 203. 
 Burntisland, 52, 324. 
 Bute, 155, 270. 
 
 Kyles of, 69, 155, 157, 222. 
 Button Ness, 53. 
 
 Cairn Gorm, 208, 223. 
 Caithness Coast, 60, 109. 
 
 Ordof, 188. 
 Caledonian Canal, Valley of. See 
 
 Great Glen. 
 Callander, no. 
 Calton Hill, 295. 
 Cambrian Sandstones, Occurrence 
 of, inN.W. Highlands, 93. 
 Influence on scenery, 210. 
 Campsie Fells, 142, 269, 278, 297. 
 Carboniferous Rocks on Southern 
 
 Uplands, 233, 247, 252. 
 of Midland Valley, 267, 268, 
 
 270, 271. 
 Carnwath, 312. 
 Carrick, 235, 268, 316. 
 Carstairs, 311. 
 Cartland Craigs, 290. 
 Cataclysms, 8. 
 Chambers, Mr. R. cited, 160, 164, 
 
 260. 
 
 Cheviot Hills, 142. 
 Clyde, Firth of, 70, 155, 169, 222, 
 
 270, 300, 305, 323, 324. 
 River, 148, 267, 284, 287, 
 
 35- 
 Coast Scenery, 41 76, 125, 169, 
 
 226, 232, 320. 
 Coll, Island of, 75. 
 Colorado, River of the West, 33. 
 Conical form of Mountains, Origin 
 
 of, 214 217, 219, 292. 
 Contin River, 131. 
 Corstorphine Hill, 295. 
 Cove, Berwickshire, 47. 
 Cowal, 223. 
 "Crag and Tail," 295. 
 Crail, 52. 
 
 Crianlarich, 142. 
 Crichhope Linn, 265. 
 Croll, Mr. James, on Cause of 
 Cold of Glacial Period, i66,note. 
 Cromarty Firth, 60, 131, 141, 187, 
 
 324- 
 
 Sutors, 132. 
 
 Cuchullin Hills, Skye, 2IO. 
 Culbin, Ruined Barony of, 75. 
 Culross, 52. 
 Cumnock, 235. 
 
 Dalmellington, 235. 
 
 Dalveen, Pass of, 238. 
 
 Dee, River (Aberdeenshire), 145. 
 (Galloway), 250. 
 
 Deltas in Scottish Rivers, 129. 
 
 Denudation, Results of, 85, 98, 
 106, 114139, 149, 184, 212, 
 217, 244, 248, 262, 272. 
 
 Dirie More, The, 222. 
 
 Don, River, 145. 
 
 Dornoch Frith, 75, 131, 144. 
 
 Drift. See Boulder-clay. 
 
 Drift-wood under pit chstone, Eigg, 
 280. 
 
 Drumouchter, Pass of, 125, 202. 
 
 Dumfriesshire, Glens in, 238. 
 
 Dunbar, 48. 
 
 Dundee, 324. 
 
 Dunglass Bay, 47. 
 
 Dunoon, 222. 
 
 Dysart, 52. 
 
 Earthquakes, commonly supposed 
 to explain many forms of scenery, 
 8,21. 
 
 Earth's crust, its dislocated struc- 
 ture, 9. 
 
 Eathie, 177. 
 
 Edinburgh Castle Rock, 269, 294. 
 
 Edinburghshire, 234, 268, 271, 294. 
 
 Eigg, Isle of, 226 (fig.) 278. 
 
 Elgin, Old Red Sandstone of, no. 
 
 Ericht, River, 145. 
 
 Erratic Blocks, 312. 
 
 Escarpments, Formation of, 36, 38.
 
 Index. 
 
 355 
 
 Esk, River, 145. 
 Ettrick, 253. 
 
 Falkirk, Carse of, 287, 322. 
 
 Faults, Influence of, in determin- 
 ing the form of the surface, 97, 
 121, 140, 177, 252, 254, 270, 
 285, 291. 
 
 Felspathic Igneous Rocks, their 
 influence on scenery, 292. 
 
 Fifeshire, 52, 75, 274, 278, 296. 
 
 Findhorn, 58. 
 
 Valley of the, 138, 144. 
 
 Fiords, or Sea-lochs, 125, 144, 183. 
 
 Floods in rivers, 338. 
 
 P'orbes, Principal, J. D. cited, 160. 
 
 Forests, Prehistoric, and Peat- 
 mosses, 327. 
 
 Forfarshire Coast, 55, 322. 
 
 Fort George, 59, 130. 
 
 Forth, Firth of, 48, 287, 322. 
 River, 283, 286. 
 
 Fortrose, 130. 
 
 Fort William, Valley between, and 
 Arisaig, 124. 
 
 Foster, Mr. C. L. Neve (Geologi- 
 cal Survey), cited, 17. 
 
 Frost, 37. 
 
 Galloway, 235, 242, 257, 261, 316. 
 Gareloch, 129, 156, 222, 270. 
 Garlton Hills, 269, 278. 
 Geological Structure, its connexion 
 with scenery, 91, 95, 98, 219, 
 232, 254, 270. See also under 
 Faults and Subterranean Move- 
 ments. 
 
 Geological Contrasts, 169, 324. 
 German Ocean, Breakers of, 53 
 
 64. 
 
 Bed of, 73. 
 Girvan, 234, 270. 
 
 Valley of the, 235. 
 Glacial Period, Stages of the, 149, 
 
 166, 191, 205, 344. 
 Close of, 205, 230, 264, 348. 
 Cause of Cold of the, 166, 
 note. 
 
 Glacial Periods, Successive, in the 
 
 Geological Past, 344. 
 Glaciation of the Highlands, 123, 
 note, 149 206. 
 
 of the Midland Valley, 299 
 3I7. 
 
 of the Southern Uplands, 
 
 256265. 
 Glaciers, Action of, Chap. iv. 149, 
 
 159, 197- 
 
 Glasgow, 323, 324. 
 Glens, Origin of, Highland, 115. 
 Glen App, 253, 254. 
 
 Collarig, 197. 
 
 Darual, 157. 
 
 Do chert, 146. 
 Glenelg, 219. 
 Glen Garry, 125, 146, 202. 
 
 Glaster, 200. 
 
 Gluoy, 200. 
 
 Lyon, 96. 
 
 Morriston, 1 80. 
 
 Ogle, 147. 
 
 Roy, 194, 197. 
 
 Shiel, 143, 218. 
 
 Spean, 167, 193. 
 
 Treig, 195. 
 
 Truim, 125, 2O2. 
 
 Urquhart, 180. 
 Gneissose Rocks ot Highlands, 
 
 93- 
 Influence of, on Scenery, 
 
 218. 
 
 Goatfell, 223. 
 Golspie, 109. 
 Cowrie, Carse of, 322. 
 Grampians, 1 12, note, 113, 163, 224. 
 Granite, Occurrence of, 97. 
 
 Influence of, on scenery, 
 
 208, 223. 
 
 Mountain, Waste of a, 117. 
 Granton, 49. 
 Great Glen, 97, 109, 138, 140, 155, 
 
 177. 
 
 Greenland, Present Aspect of, 
 like that of Scotland dmi..;.; 
 the glacial period, 78, 161. 
 Greenock, 324.
 
 356 
 
 Index. 
 
 Greenock, View of Highland 
 
 Table-land from, 105. 
 Greenstone, Weathering of, 292. 
 Grey Mare's Tail, 238, 260. 
 
 Haddingtonshire, 234. 
 
 Hall, Sir James, cited, 295. 
 
 Harris, Isle of, 68. 
 
 Hartfell, 142, 238. 
 
 "Haughs," 30. 
 
 Hebrides, 67. 
 
 Helmsdale, 109. 
 
 Hibbert's Shetland Islands quoted, 
 
 65- 
 Highlands, Geological Structure 
 
 of, 91, 108, 270. 
 Denudation of, 98, 114, 122, 
 
 139, 149185, 212, 217. 
 Ancient Table-land of, 99. 
 Geological age of table-land 
 
 of, 108 in. 
 Origin of Valleys of, 114. 
 Glaciation of, 151. 
 Origin of Lakes of, 171. 
 Glaciersof, 180, 191, 201, 299. 
 Higher Elevation of, during 
 
 glacial period, 183, 188. 
 Submergence of, during glacial 
 
 period, 189. 
 Local varieties of scenery 
 
 in, 207. 
 
 Precipices in, 224. 
 Landscapes on borders of, 
 
 225. 
 Atmospheric waste in; 119, 
 
 208, etseq. 
 Holy Loch, 223. 
 Hutton, 10. 
 
 Ice, Geological Effects of, 37, 77, 
 etseq. 151, 159, 173, 181, 195, 
 256, 299. 
 Icebergs, 82, 161, 164, 173, 256, 
 
 304, 316, 344- 
 Ice- worn Rocks, 151, et seq. 228, 
 
 262, 299. 
 
 Weathering of, 228, 264, 316. 
 Innellan, 222. 
 
 Invergordon, 131. 
 
 Inverness and Perth Road, 125, 
 
 202. 
 
 Firth, 130. 
 
 Invemesshire, Mountains of, 218. 
 Valleys in, 125, 138, 143, 
 
 218. 
 
 Isla, River, 145. 
 Islay, Isle of, 214. 
 
 Jamieson, Mr. T. F. cited, 167, 
 
 196. 
 
 John O' Groat's House, 144. 
 Jukes, Mr. J. B. cited, 141, note. 
 Jura, Island of, 214. 
 
 Sound of, 156, 174. 
 
 Kames, 308. 
 
 Kane, Dr., on Greenland gla- 
 ciers, 79. 
 Kilmartm, 175. 
 Kilpatrick Hills, 278. 
 Kincardineshire Coast, 57. 
 Kinlochewe, 143. 
 Kinloss, 58. 
 Kinnoul Hill, 284. 
 Kintail, 143. 
 Kirkcaldy, 52. 
 Kirkcudbright Coast, 71, 232. 
 
 Lakes, Origin of, 81, 171, 192. 
 
 Lammermuir Hills, 233, 234, 236, 
 250, 251, 270. 
 
 Landscape painting and geology, 
 216. 
 
 Land-surface, Sketch of the his- 
 tory of a, 87. 
 
 Lanarkshire, 234, 311. 
 
 Lauder, Sir T. D., on Moray- 
 shire Floods, cited, 32. 
 
 Laurentian or Fundamental Gneiss, 
 
 Occurrence of, 93, 176. 
 Its influence on scenery, 210. 
 
 Leader, Valley of, or Lauderdale, 
 233, 249, 250, 251. 
 
 Legends, Connexion of, with geo- 
 logical features, 3, 309, 313. 
 
 Leith, 49.
 
 357 
 
 Lewis, Isle of, 176. 
 Limestone, Influence of, in High- 
 
 Lothian, Mid, 234, 268, 269, 271. 
 West, 269, 278. 
 
 land landscape, 217, 220. 
 Linlithgowshire, 269, 278. 
 
 Lowther Hills, 238. 
 Luce, Bay of, 252, 261. 
 
 Lochaber, 180, 193. 
 
 Lyell, SirC. cited, 57, 160. 
 
 Loch Alsh, 143. 
 
 Lyne Water, 250. 
 
 Arkaig, 180. 
 
 
 Aven, 220. 
 
 Maclaren, Mr. C. cited, 160, 167, 
 
 Awe, 138, 174. 
 
 295, 320. 
 
 Carron, 124, 129, 138, 143. 
 Craignish, 144. 
 
 Macrihanish Bay, Cantyre, 75. 
 Maitland, History of Edinburgh, 
 
 Doon, 262. 
 Duich, 143. 
 
 quoted, 49. 
 Mammoth, Bones of, in drift, 304. 
 
 Eck, 125. 
 
 Man, Aspect of Scotland at first 
 
 Eil, 1 80, 193. 
 
 coming of, 327. 
 
 Etive, 128, 175. 
 
 Influence of, upon scenery, 
 
 Fannich, 222. 
 
 336. 
 
 Fleet, 130. 
 
 Changes of scenery since his 
 
 Fyne, 128, 129, 138, 140, 
 
 advent, 319. 
 
 144, 156, 1 66, 183, 205, 
 
 Marine denudation, Chap. III. 
 
 223, 228. 
 
 Forms a platform or plain, 
 
 Garry, 202. 
 
 72, 106, 244. 
 
 Hourne, 219. 
 
 Mathers, Kincardine, 57. 
 
 Keeshorn, 143. 
 
 Merrick, 242, 256, 261. 
 
 Killisport, 144. 
 
 Midland Valley, 266. 
 
 Laggan, 142, 196. 
 Leven (Kinross), 296. 
 
 Geological structure of, 266. 
 Denudation of, 272, 291. 
 
 Linnhe, 138, 144, 155. 
 
 River-systems of, 282. 
 
 Lochy, 142. 
 
 Local varieties of scenery in, 
 
 Lomond, 128, 156, 222. 
 
 292. 
 
 Long, 144, 156, 166, 222. 
 
 Prominence of igneous rocks 
 
 Maree, 128, 214. 
 
 in, 292. 
 
 Morar, 128. 
 
 Tameness of stratified rocks 
 
 Ness, 177, 183. 
 
 in, 298. 
 
 Nevis, 219. 
 
 Glaciation of, 299 317. 
 
 Oich, 142, 178. 
 
 Miller, Hugh, cited, 66, 75, 187. 
 
 Quoich, 142. 
 
 Moffatdale, 238. 
 
 Riden, 157. 
 
 Monadhleadh Mountains, 142, 180. 
 
 Ryan, 70, 252, 254. 
 
 Moncrieff Hill, 274, 284. 
 
 Shiel, 138. 
 
 Mountains and Valleys, Popular 
 
 Skene. 259, 335. 
 
 ideas regarding, I. 
 
 Swene, 144. 
 
 Due to erosion of valleys, 
 
 Tarbert, 144. 
 
 10, 13. 
 
 Tay, 96, 138, 140, 146. 
 
 Moraines, 81, 192. 
 
 Torridon, 143, 214. 
 
 Moray Firth, 58, 75, 92, 109, 
 
 Lomonds of Fife, 296. 
 
 155, '77, '87, 225. 
 
 Lothian, East, 234, 236, 246, 268, 
 
 Muck, Water of, 253. 
 
 269. 
 
 Mull, Isle of, 226.
 
 358 
 
 Index. 
 
 Mnrchison, Sir R. cited, 92, 94. 
 Musselburgh, 49. 
 Myths, Geological origin of, 3, 
 309, 3I3- 
 
 Nairn, Old Red Sandstone of, 
 no. 
 
 River, 144. 
 Ness, River, 144. 
 Newhaven, 50. 
 Nithsdale, 234, 235, 249, 250, 
 
 252. 
 North Berwick, 49. 
 
 Berwick Law, 269, 277, 293. 
 Norway, 162. 
 
 Ochil Hills, 190, 267, 278, 286, 
 
 293. 300, 315- 
 Old Red Sandstone of Highlands, 
 
 91, 108, no, 225. 
 Midland Valley, 267, 270. 
 Southern Uplands, 233, 246, 
 
 249. 
 Oolitic strata, Influence of, in 
 
 landscape, 225. 
 Orkney Islands, 62. 
 
 Parallel Roads of Glen Roy, 
 
 197. 
 
 Peach, Mr. C. W. On force of 
 waves along Caithness 
 Coast, 60. 
 
 Shetland Islands, 64. 
 Peat-mosses, 327. 
 
 Decay of, 334. 
 Peat, Encroachments of, on lakes, 
 
 3". 330. 
 
 Peeblesshire, 234, 238, 258. 
 Pennant's First Tour quoted, 
 
 76. 
 Pentland Firth, 61, 155. 
 
 Hills, 142, 268, 272, 293. 
 Permian rocks of Southern Up- 
 lands, 234, 247, 252. 
 Perth and Inverness road, 125, 
 
 202. 
 
 Pitchstone -porphyry of Eigg, 279. 
 Playfair, 10. 
 
 Pot-holes in bed of a river, 28. 
 formed by sea on a beach, 
 
 73- 
 Precipices of the Highlands, 224. 
 
 Quartz-rock, Occurrence of, in 
 
 Highlands, 93. 
 Scenery of, 214. 
 Queens Jerry, 52. 
 
 Rain, 15, 139. 
 " Rain-wash," 16. 
 Raised Beaches, 193, 318. 
 Ramsay, Professor A. C. cited, 
 I7> 38, 81, 107, 112, 115, 126, 
 J 7 2 33- 
 
 Rannoch, Moor of, 97, 142, 223. 
 Ravines, Popular view of their 
 
 origin, 21. 
 
 Geological history of, 22, 32. 
 Reindeer, Bones of, in drift, 304. 
 Renfrewshire, 268, 297. 
 River-action, 20, 34. 
 
 Systems, their nice adjust- 
 ment, 6. 
 Valley, Playfair's description 
 
 of a, 10. ' 
 Terraces, 30. 
 
 Rivers of Highlands, 137. 
 Midland Valley, 282. 
 Southern Uplands, 249. 
 Scottish, Diminution of water 
 
 in, 337- 
 
 Roan Island, 109. 
 " Rock -basins" in glaciated coun- 
 tries, 8 1, 128. 
 Rosemarkie, 188. 
 Ross, Easter, Plains of, 132. 
 Ross-shire, Coast of, 210. 
 Geology of, 92, 109. 
 Mountains of, 210. 
 Valleys in, 124, 138, 143. 
 Rothesay, 324. 
 Roy, Bridge of, 194. 
 
 St. Abb's Head, 46. 
 
 Andrew's, 52, 75, 320. 
 David's, 52.
 
 Index. 
 
 359 
 
 Salisbury Crags, 276, 295. 
 Salmon in rivers above high falls, 
 , 288, note. 
 Sand-spits, 129, 130. 
 Scenery, Prevalent uncertainty re- 
 garding origin of, 5. 
 Schehallien, 214. 
 Schistose rocks of Highlands, 
 
 Influence of, on scenery, 208. 
 Scottish scenery, Types of, 89. 
 Sea, as a geological agent, 39 ctseq. 
 Sea-lochs, 125, 144, 183. 
 Shanchvick, 134, 177. 
 Shee, River, 145. 
 Sheep-drains converted into gullies 
 
 by rain, 19. 
 
 Shells, Northern, in deeper parts 
 of Scottish seas, 205, 306. 
 
 in glacial drift, 305. 
 Shetland Islands, 63. 
 Sidlaw Hills, 267, 274, 278, 284, 
 
 3o 3I5- 
 Silurian Metamorphic Rocks of 
 
 Highlands, 92 95. 
 Their scenery, 208, 214 225. 
 Rocks of Southern Uplands, 
 
 231. 
 Influence of, on scenery, 234 
 
 244. 
 
 Skateraw, 48. 
 Skerries and reefs, Production of, 
 
 42. 
 
 Skerryvore Rock, Breakers at, 67. 
 Skye, Hills of, 208, 210, 223, 
 
 226. 
 
 Kyles of, 205. 
 Smith, Mr. James, of Jordanhill, 
 
 305. 320. 
 
 Spey, River, 138, 144. 
 Springs, 34. 
 
 Stevenson, Mr. quoted, 49 et seq. 
 Stincher, Valley of, 253, 254. 
 Stirling, 286, 302. 
 
 Castle Rock, 269, 277, 294. 
 Stranraer, 71. 
 Strath Brora, 203. 
 
 Spey, 200. 
 Stroma, 62. 
 
 Submergence of Scotland during 
 glacial period, 1 88, 190, 258, 
 287, 316. 
 
 Subterranean movements, In- 
 fluence of, in determining the 
 configuration of a country, 86, 
 121, 133, 140, 146, 270, 282, 
 note, 323. (See also under 
 Earthquakes and Faults. ) 
 Sutlicrlandshire, Coast of, 203, 
 
 210, 225. 
 
 Geology of, 92, 108. 
 Mountains of, 210. 
 Valleys of, 138, 143. 
 
 Tain, 132, 188. 
 
 Talla, Valley of, 238, 240, 258. 
 
 Tarbat Ness, 132. 
 
 Tay, Firth of, 53, 75, 274, 283. 
 River, 145, 284. 
 
 Tent's Muir, 75. 
 
 Teviot, 253. 
 
 Till, or boulder-clay, 185. 
 
 Time, its value in geological his- 
 tory, 8, 121, 350. 
 
 Tinto, 288, 293. 
 
 Tiree, Island of, 75. 
 
 Topley, Mr. (Geological Survey), 
 cited, 17. 
 
 Traprain Law, 293. 
 
 Trap-rocks, Influence ofon scenery. 
 208, 215, 226, 267, 268, 274, 
 292. 
 
 Trosachs, 208, 2 1 8. 
 
 Tweed, River, 46, 148, 253, 2S8. 
 
 Tyne, 49. 
 
 Uplands of South Scotland, 231. 
 Geology of, 231. 
 Scenery of, 234, 255. 
 Surface of, an old sea-bottom, 
 
 244. 
 
 Age of table-land of, 246. 
 Valleys of, 248. 
 Ancient glaciers and icebergs 
 
 of, 256, 300. 
 Recent atmospheric waste in, 
 
 264.
 
 Index. 
 
 Valleys due to atmospheric waste, 
 10, 34- 
 
 or passes across watersheds, 
 123. 
 
 of Highlands, Origin of, 1 14, 
 !37, 139- 
 
 Longitudinal, in Highlands, 
 138. 
 
 Longitudinal, in Southern 
 Uplands, 249, 253. 
 
 Transverse, in Highlands, 138. 
 
 Transverse, in Southern Up- 
 lands, 249, 254. 
 Victoria Falls of River Zambesi, 33. 
 
 Wales, Submergence of, during 
 glacial period, 189. 
 
 Water, Circulation of, upon the 
 
 globe, 14. 
 Waterfalls, Geological history of, 
 
 26. 
 
 Watershed of Scotland, 142. 
 Waves, Force of, 40, 54, 60, 64, 
 
 67, 71. 
 Their inability to rub down 
 
 the surface of rocks, 41. 
 Wick, 60, 1 88. 
 
 Wigtown Coast, 71, 232, 234, 323. 
 Wind, Geological effects of, 74. 
 Wrath, Cape, 142. 
 
 Yarrow, River, 253. 
 Young, Dr. John, F.R.S.E. 
 cited, 260, 278. 
 
 R. CLAY SON, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS, BREAD STREET HILL LONDON. 

 
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