THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 The RALPH D. REED LIBRARY 
 
 BWAKTMEOT OF GEOLOGY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LO S ANGELES, CALIF.
 
 ROBEBT DICK
 
 ROBERT DICK 
 
 BAKER, OF THURSO 
 
 GEOLOGIST AND BOTANIST 
 
 BY SAMUEL SMILES, LL.D. 
 
 AUTHOR OF "LIFE OF A SCOTCH NATURALIST" ' SELF-HELP " "THRIFT" 
 ' ' CHARACTER ' ' ETC. 
 
 WITH A PORTRAIT AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 'In Nature's infinite book of secrecy 
 A little I can read." 
 
 SlIAKESPEARE. 
 
 'The heights by great men reached and kept 
 Were not attained by sudden flight; 
 
 But they, wh le their companions slept, 
 Were toiling upwards in the night." 
 
 LONGFELLOW. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS 
 
 FRANKLIN SQUARE
 
 BY SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 ' ; with Illustrations of Character, Conduct, and Perseverance. A 
 New Edition. 12mo, Cloth, $1 00 ; 4to, Paper, 20 cents. 
 CHARACTER. 12mo, Cloth, $1 00. 
 THRIFT. 12mo, Cloth, $1 00. 
 
 DUTY ; with Illustrations of Courage, Patience, and Endurance. 12mo, Cloth, 
 $1 00 ; 4to, Paper, 15 cents. 
 
 HISTORY OF THE HUGUENOTS. The Huguenots: their Settlements, 
 Churches, and Industries in England and Ireland. With an Appendix 
 relating to the Huguenots in America. Crown 8vo, Cloth, $2 00. 
 
 THE HUGUENOTS AFTER THE REVOCATION. The Hnunenots in 
 France after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes: with a Visit to the 
 Country of the Vaudois. Crown 8vo, Cloth, |2 00. 
 
 LIFE OF THE STEPHENSONS. The Life of George Stephenson, and of 
 his Son Rohert Stephenson ; comprising, also, a History of the Invention 
 and Introduction of the Railway Locomotive. With Portraits and nn- 
 merons Illustrations. 8vo, Cloth, $3 00. 
 
 ROUND THE WORLD; including a Residence in Victoria, and a Jonrney 
 by Rail across North America. By a Boy. Edited by SAMFKI. SMII.KS. 
 With Illustrations. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50. 
 LIFE OF A SCOTCH NATURALIST: Thomas Edward, Associate of the 
 
 Linnsean Society. With Portrait and Illustrations. 12mo, Cloth, $1 60. 
 ROBERT DICK. Robert Dick, Baker of Thurso ; Geologist and Botanist. 
 
 With Portrait and Illustrations. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50. 
 
 JAMES NASMYTH. James Nasmyth, Engineer. An Autobiography. Ed- 
 ited by SAMCBL SMILBS. With Portrait and Illustrations. 12mo, Cloth, 
 $1 50; 4to, Paper, 20 cents. 
 
 MEN OF INVENTION AND INDUSTRY. 12mo, Cloth, $1 50 ; 4to, Pa- 
 pr, 20 cents. . 
 
 PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW Top*. 
 
 gent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States or Canada, 
 on receipt of the price.
 
 Geology 
 Library 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE preparation of this book has occupied me at 
 intervals during several years. It would have been 
 published before the Life of a Scotch Naturalist, but 
 for want of the requisite materials. 
 
 I have to thank my reviewers, one and all, for their 
 favourable notices of that work. It has, however, been 
 objected that I should have culled my last example of 
 Self-Help from a career not already concluded, and 
 exposed the Scotch Naturalist, after his long unmerited 
 neglect, to the harder trial of intrusive patronage, to 
 which my premature biography was likely to expose 
 him. 
 
 Whatever truth there may be in this objection, it 
 certainly does not apply in the present case. Robert 
 Dick died twelve years ago, without any recognition of 
 his services to the cause of science, and without any of 
 that Royal Help which, as in the case of Edward, is 
 likely to render the later years of his life more free 
 from care and anxiety. 
 
 The first account that I heard of Robert Dick was 
 from the lips of the late Sir Roderick Murchison. He 
 
 860880
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 delivered a speech at Leeds on the occasion of the 
 meeting of the British Association, which was held 
 there in September 1858. 
 
 " In pursuing my researches in the Highlands," 
 said the Baronet, " and going beyond Sutherland into 
 Caithness, it was my gratification a second time to meet 
 with a remarkable man in the town of Thurso, named 
 Robert Dick, a baker by trade. I am proud to call 
 him my distinguished friend. When I went to see him, 
 he spread out before me a map of Caithness and pointed 
 out its imperfections. Mr. Dick had travelled over the 
 whole county in his leisure hours, and was thoroughly 
 acquainted with its features. He delineated to me, by 
 means of some flour which he spread out on his baking 
 board, not only its geographical features, but certain 
 geological phenomena which he desired to impress upon 
 my attention. Here is a man who is earning his daily 
 bread by his hard work ; who is obliged to read and 
 study by night ; and yet who is able to instruct the 
 Director-General of the Geographical Society. 
 
 " But this is not half of what I have to tell you of 
 Robert Dick. When I became better acquainted with 
 this distinguished man, and was admitted into his 
 sanctum which few were permitted to enter I found 
 there busts of Byron, of Sir Walter Scott, and other 
 great poets. I also found there books, carefully and 
 beautifully bound, which this man had been able to
 
 PREFACE. vii 
 
 purchase out of the savings of his single bakery. I also 
 found that Robert Dick was a profound botanist. I 
 found, to my humiliation, that this baker knew infinitely 
 more of botanical science ay, ten times more than I 
 did ; and that there were only some twenty or thirty 
 British plants that he had not collected. Some he had 
 obtained as presents, some he had purchased, but the 
 greater portion had been accumulated by his own 
 industry in his native county of Caithness. These 
 specimens 'were all arranged in most beautiful order, 
 with their respective names and habitats ; and he is so 
 excellent a botanist that he might well have been a 
 professed ornament of Section D [Zoology and Botany]. 
 I have mentioned these facts," concluded the Baronet, 
 " in order that the audience may deduce a practical 
 application." 
 
 This notice of Robert Dick, by a man of so much 
 eminence as Sir Roderick Murchison, interested me 
 greatly. His perseverance in the cause of Science, 
 while pursuing the occupations of his daily labour his 
 humility, his modesty, and his love of nature were 
 things well worthy of being commemorated. But I was 
 at that time unable to follow up my inquiries. I could 
 merely mention him in Self-Help, which was published 
 in the following year, as an instance of cheerful, horest 
 working, and of energetic effort to make the most of 
 small means and ordinary opportunities.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Many years passed. Robert Dick died in 1866, 
 Was it possible that he had left any memoranda on 
 which a memoir of his life and labours could be written ? 
 On inquiry I found that many of his letters were still 
 in existence. I believe that I have been successful in 
 obtaining the greater part of them, or, at all events, 
 those which are the most interesting. In fact, by means 
 of these letters the story of Dick's life has in a great 
 measure been told by himself. 
 
 One of his principal correspondents was the late 
 Hugh Miller, author of My Schools and Schoolmasters, 
 The Old Red Sandstone, and other geological works. 
 His son, Mr. Hugh Miller, of the Geological Survey, has 
 kindly sent me Dick's letters to his father; though 
 Hugh Miller's letters to Dick have not yet reached me. 
 They are supposed to be in Australia. 
 
 Mr. Charles W. Peach, A.L.S., one of Dick's best 
 friends, has sent me all Dick's letters to him, together 
 with much other valuable information as to his life and 
 character. But perhaps the best of Dick's letters 
 those containing his references to his private life 
 were those written to his sister, principally for her 
 amusement ; and these have been kindly placed in 
 my hands by Dick's brother-in-law, Mr. Falconer of 
 Haddington. 
 
 I am also indebted to Dr. Meiklejohn, to Dr. 
 Bobcrt Brown, F.L.S., for many letters; and to the
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Rev. William Miller, A.M., Thurso, for the letters sent 
 by Dick to his uncle, the late Mr. John Miller, F.G.S. 
 
 Among those who have also favoured me with 
 \ aluable information as to Dick's life, I have to mention 
 Mr. Brims, Procurator- Fiscal, Thurso; Mr. G. M. 
 Sutherland and Mr. Fielding, Wick ; Professor Shearer, 
 Airedale College, Bradford ; and Dr. George Shearer, 
 Liverpool. 
 
 With respect to the Illustrations, they have, for the 
 most part, been the result of several journeys which I 
 have made round the coast of Caithness, and also into 
 the inland districts frequented by Robert Dick, while 
 making his numerous journeys in search of fossils, 
 boulder clay, ferns, plants, and grasses. 
 
 The illustrations have been much improved by being 
 drawn on the wood by such accomplished artists as 
 Leitch, Skelton, and Boot, and engraved by Cooper, 
 Whymper, and Paterson. 
 
 Mr. Sheriff Russell of Wick and Mr. Charles Peach 
 of Edinburgh have also given me their assistance in the 
 preparation of the illustrations. 
 
 The engraving of Mr. Peach has been executed by 
 Charles Roberts, after a photograph by Mr. Dallas, 
 Edinburgh. 
 
 LONDON, NOVEMBER 1878.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 T0LLIBODY. 
 
 The village of Tullibody Windings of the Forth and Devon Scenery 
 of the Devon The Ochils Castle Campbell Rift in the Ochill 
 Menstrie Bencleuch The Picts The " Standing-Stane" 
 Cambuskenneth The French at Tullibody The Abercromby 
 family ....... Pages 1-7 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ROBERT DICK'S BOYHOOD. 
 
 Robert Dick's birthplace His mother The children sent to school 
 Teacher of the Barony School Robert Dick an apt scholar His 
 talent for languages Resides at Dam's Burn Schoolmaster at 
 Menstrie Climbs the Ochils Life at home His stepmother 
 Family difficulties What Dick learnt as a boy He leaves 
 home ....... Pages 8-16 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ROBERT DICK APPRENTICED. 
 
 Apprenticed to a baker Life of a baker's boy His early and late 
 hours Delivering the bread His observations of Nature First 
 acquaintance with Botany Remembrance of the plants of the 
 Devon His sister Agnes His day of rest A great reader Mr. 
 Dick removes to Thurso Robert Dick leaves Tullibody A journey- 
 man baker at Leith, Glasgow, and Greenock Removes to Thurso 
 Begins business in Thurso Thurso Bay His delight in the sea 
 The sea-bird's cry ..... Pages 17-2* 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF CAITHNESS. 
 
 rhe name "Caithness" Nesses along the coast Caithness Scaudl> 
 navian Wicks in Caithness Saetrs, Dahls, Thorsa The people -
 
 xii CONTENTS. 
 
 Firths or fiords The Picts drowned Currents in the Pentland 
 Firth Stroma Pentland Skerries The furious winds in Caith- 
 ness No trees or hedges Barrogill Castle The coast scenery 
 Wick Bay Duncansby Head The Stacks John o' Groats The 
 old castles Al-wick, Keiss, Girnigo The Gyoes The inland 
 country The Caithness mountains The great mountain, Morven 
 Agriculture The old Caithness plough Thurso Roads Crab- 
 bans Ord of Caithness Sir John Sinclair Thurso Castle Road 
 over Bencheilt Sir John Sinclair's improvements . Pages 26-39 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 DICK BEGINS BUSINESS. 
 
 Wilson Lane, Thurso First flour bought Studies conchology 
 Botany His father leaves for Haddington Dunnet Head, Hoi- 
 born Head, and the Clett The Gyoes The inland country- 
 Entomology Beetles, Bees, Butterflies, and Moths The boya 
 follow Dick Makes friends of the boys Rare insects brought to 
 him Astronomy, Geology, Phrenology Dick invited to marry 
 Annie Mackay Mechanical method for making biscuits His 
 biscuits . ... Pages 40-49 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 BOTANICAL WANDERINGS. 
 
 * 
 
 His entomological collection Tested everything by observation His 
 books Books imbedded in his flour His microscope Hogarth's 
 works A great reader Botanical excursions Spring in the North 
 Watching the growth of the flowers The ferns Caithness flora 
 Study of Botany Midsummer time Solitude The moors The 
 soaking rain Walking for a fern Standing on a hill-top Letters 
 to his sister Walking over a moor Journey to Morven top 
 Dift taken for a salmon-poacher . . . Pages 50-69 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 DISCOVERS THE "HOLY GRASS." 
 
 Business and science Want of friends His dress His love of nature 
 A deputation from the boys Dick a general referee His know- 
 ledge of plants The Hierochloe borealis Retains the discovery 
 for twenty years Dick's paper on the subject The Royal Botani- 
 cal Society, Edinburgh The Moonwort The Stork's-bill Pursuit 
 of ferns Dunnet Sands The Dorery Hills Loch Shurery Dick's 
 fernery at the Reay Hills .... Pages 70-80
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 DUNNET HEAD. 
 
 The coast scenery near Thurso Holborn Head The rockbound coast 
 The Gyoes Fury of the waves Scrabster Roads New rocks laid 
 bare Dunnet Head a favourite haunt Height of the cliffs 
 Extent of the peninsula Dwarwick Head Yachting trip round 
 Dnnnet Head The gyoe near Dwarwick The sea-birds The 
 lighthouse Slips of the rocks Dick's journey to Dunnet Head 
 Dunnet sands Over the heather Down the cliffs Search for 
 ferns Overtaken by the sea Dick found by a pleasure party 
 Geology of Dunnet Head Devoid of organisms The sandstone 
 cliffs Sandstone from shore to shore Rocks at Brough Dunnet 
 Loch A superstition of Caithness . . . Pages 81-97 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 GEOLOGY DISCOVERT OP A HOLOPTYCHIUS. 
 
 Studies Geology Mantell and Buckland Hugh Miller's Old Red 
 Sandstone Addresses Hugh Miller The Holoptychius Describes 
 the beginning of his studies Hugh Miller's account of Dick 
 Gentlemen-geologists The scalding theory Dick sends his fossils 
 to Hugh Miller Hugh Miller's acknowledgments . Pages 98-109 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 GEOLOGY OF THE THURSO COAST. 
 I 
 
 Invitations to Hugh Miller Description of the coast Thurso East 
 Fossiliferous beds "That man is mad" View from the coast 
 Pudding Gyoe Murkle Bay View of Dunnet cliffs Geologising 
 at Scrabster The sea The Coccosteus An old burying-ground 
 Bishop's Palace Scrabster Roads Holborn Head The Deil's Brig 
 The Clett Slater's monument Brims Searching for fossils on 
 Holborn Head Pages 110-128 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 HUGH MILLER VISITS DICK. 
 
 Dick's observations in geology Opposed to theorising Dip of tha 
 strata How came the fossil fish ? The flagstones of Caithness- 
 Geological formation of Caithness Elevation and depression of th
 
 xiv CONTENTS. 
 
 land Differences of climate The glaciers The boulder clay- 
 Beds of coal Dick sends his fossil remains to Hugh Miller A 
 bundle of findings Dick publicly mentioned Weydale An auld 
 bachelor Dipteras and Diplopterus The quarrymen and the fossils 
 
 Banniskirk "Fresh herring" Walking sentry Reconnoitres 
 
 for Hugh Miller Hugh Miller visits Robert Dick Their walks 
 along the shore Dunnet sands and Dunnet Head Holborn Head 
 Description of Hugh Miller The expatriated Highlanders 
 " Donald's Flittin " . . Pages 129-150 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 DEATH OF DICK'S FATHER THE BOULDER CLAY. 
 
 Thomas Dick at Haddington Removes to Tullibody His illness and 
 death Letter to his sister Competition at Thurso His absence 
 from "the Kirk" The reason why Dick's solitary service His 
 collection of fossils Researches into the boulder clay His journeys 
 by daylight and moonlight Boulder clay along the Thurso river 
 Finds marine shells and flints Thurdistoft Belts of clay 
 Harpsdale Sends Hugh Miller the marine shells Pages 151-166 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 DICK'S SEARCHINGS AMONGST THE BOULDER CLAY. 
 
 A journey to Freswick Starts at midnight Castle of Freswick 
 Wanderings up the burn Finds marine shells Hugh Miller's 
 conclusions The eastern side of Dunnet Head Dick's walk under 
 the break-neck rocks Cliffs at Brough Goes into a boulder clay 
 ravine Proceeds down a ledge Wonder upon wonder Dick's 
 reflections Journey to Harpsdale Another visit to Freswick 
 Boulder stones Village of Castletown Wild bulls of Dunnet 
 Moss of Mey The Skerry Lights Stroma Isle The Wart Hill- 
 Wades along Freswick Burn Searches amongst the boulder clay 
 All the country once occupied by the sea Dick's conclusions 
 
 7-191 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ICEBERG PERIOD. 
 
 Action of icebergs Journey to Dunbeath Crosses Caithness from 
 north to south Granitic debris Dunbeath Water Finds marine 
 shells Granite and conglomerate The boulders The moors 
 I/>ch More The auld carle The want of sneeshin Deceived by
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 the anld carle Formation of Caithness Journey to Acharynio 
 Picturesque appi-antnce of the river Dirlot Castle Dallmore and 
 Cattack Strathbeg Journey to Sinclair Bay Noss Head Various 
 other journeys Visit to Shurery View from the Ben Walk up 
 Strath Halladale Journey along the Pentland Firth The Haven 
 of Mey The Caddis worm . . . Pages 192-213 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 END OF CORRESPONDENCE WITH HUGH MILLER. 
 
 Dick's assistance to Hugh Miller Professor Agassiz's testimony 
 Professor Sedgwick Specimen of the Diplopterus Professor Owen 
 Hugh Miller's acknowledgments Ruling by authorities Geo- 
 logical maps Dick's travelling map Government should make 
 the maps One first creation Winter in Caithness Groovings of 
 ice Rolling home an Asterolepis How Dick polished his fossils 
 Working among the rocks, at Barrogill, Mull of Mey, Scarskerry 
 The base at Gill's Bay Scotland Haven Ramble to Bencheilt 
 The Dniid's Temple Stemster Loch Bed over bed Hugh Miller's 
 works Popes of all sorts Hugh Miller's death Dick's story of 
 "Tb Fairies" Dick's lamentations over Hugh's death 
 
 Pages 214-237 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 CHARLES W. PEACH, A.L.S. 
 
 Another worker among the rocks in Cornwall Charles Peach How 
 working men may advance knowledge Peach and Dick Peach 
 born at Wansford His schooling Assists in his father's inn Is 
 appointed riding officer in the Coastguard service Studies Natural 
 History His frequent removals in Norfolk The Rev. J. Layton 
 Superintendent at Cley Removed to Lyme Regis, Beer, Paignton, 
 aiid Gorranhaven Studies Zoology The Geology of the Cornish 
 coast Reads a paper at the British Association Constant, attender 
 at the meetings The meeting at York Dr. R. Chambers' descrip- 
 tion Discovery of the Holothuria nigra Charles Peach promoted 
 to Landing Waiter at Fowey His discovery of organic fossils 
 Testimony of the Royal Cornish Geological Society Removes to 
 Peterhead Continues his studies in Zoology and Botany Removes 
 to Wick His first visit to Robert Dick His second visit to 
 Dick Their walks Battles in Dick's bakehouse Peach dis- 
 covers fossils in the limestone of Durness Effects a revolution in 
 Geology ...... Pages 238-258
 
 xvi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 EGBERT DICK AND CHARLES PEACH. 
 
 Peach finds a new fossil Dick's reply The monk of Cambray reading 
 backwards Views of Geology Ill-will to geologists Mr. Peach's 
 paper at Liverpool Fossil wood Dick's botanical collection 
 Mr. W. L. Notcutt Dick's correspondents His Sunday walks 
 Dr. Macleod " Ta tail pe brak "Encounter with a Highlander- 
 Sir Roderick Murchison Calls on Robert Dick Letter from Sir 
 Roderick Second visit to Dick Moulds a map of Caithness in 
 flour Sir Roderick's letter Voyage of Murchison and Peach to the 
 Shetland Islands Sir Roderick's speech at Leeds " Hammers an' 
 chisels an' a' "Amygdaloid Dick's rhymes Another letter from 
 Sir Roderick Another rhyme . . . Pages 259-281 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 LION-HUNTERS FERNS AND MOSSES. 
 
 rai hurso people and Dick Opinions about his rhymes Lion-hunters 
 Annie Mackay The Duke of Argyll Sir George Sinclair Thomas 
 Carlyle and Baroness Burdett Coutts Lady Sinclair "Welcome 
 Charlie" Medical students Dr. Shearer Dr. Meiklejohn Dr. 
 Brown The Juncus squarrosiis Study of mosses Club mosses 
 Finds the Osmil/nda regalis Ferns on Dunnet Head Cornish 
 heaths Studies from Nature Fossil wood Illness Hart's-tongue 
 fern Section of Caithness strata Plants the Royal Fern over 
 Caithness Darwin's Journal The littleness of things Dr. 
 Shearer's question Correspondence with Dr. Meiklejohn Influence 
 of climate on roses ..... Pages 282-311 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 ROBERT DICK IN ADVERSITY. 
 
 Dick's attention to business Is oppressed by competition Loses his 
 money Loses his health Thinks of removing from Thurso More 
 bakers Bakers and whisky dealers John Barleycorn No coddling 
 and nursing Improvement of Thurso Annie Mackay's conversa- 
 tion, Dick's housekeeper Dick's honesty His cheerfulness- 
 Keeps moving Pores over dried mosses Jacob's son Eyesight 
 becomes defective His struggles to live SirWyville Thomson His 
 description of Dick Dick resumes his researches among the fossils 
 His great labour Finds an extraordinary fossil . Pages 312-328
 
 CONTENTS. xvii 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 DICK COMPELLED TO SELL HIS FOSSILS. 
 
 The ' ' Prince Consort " shipwrecked Dick's flour lost Unable ta 
 pay the loss Appeals to his sister Obtains 20 from her Pre- 
 pares to sell his fossils Mr. John Miller, F.G.S. Correspondence 
 with him Writes to Sir Roderick Murchison Sells his fossils to 
 Mr. Miller Pays his bill for the lost flour His business again 
 falls off Nature comes to his relief His lonely walks His 
 favourite resorts The Daisy The Bulrush and Lapland Reed 
 Troubled with rheumatism Native roses Professor Babington 
 Professor Owen Mr. Notcutt Mr. Pringle, Farmer 's Gazette "0 
 waft me o'er the deep blue sea" Dick a sleepless man St. Peter's 
 burying-ground A believer in the unseen world . Pages 329-347 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 RECOMMENCES A COLLECTION OP FOSSILS. 
 
 Again searches for fossil fish His wondrous astonishment The dead 
 fish Platform of death View of Caithness and Orkney Death a 
 necessity Interview with a quarryman Hugh Miller's views 
 referred to The Old Red conglomerate Searchiugs among the 
 rocks A large fossil found Searches for an entire fossil fish Hia 
 constant diggings Mr. Salter's lecture Digs in hard frost Order 
 of succession Bed of rolled pebbles on Morven top Stony clays 
 on Thurso river Metamorphic action Liquid silica Flint casts 
 The chalk formation Dick's letters . . Pages 348-37'J 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 DICK'S FRIENDS FOSSILISING AND MOSS-HUNTING. 
 
 How the Thurso people regarded Dick His antediluvian garments 
 His appearance His inner thinkings The little we really know 
 Dignity and purity of Dick's character Dr. Shearer's statement as 
 to his thoroughness Peach and Dick Careful and abstemious 
 " No pampering " Correspondence with his sister Ferns in De- 
 cember, Peri Dick nearly shot Death of his sister A new friend 
 His meeting with Dick His frequent interviews Dick's museum 
 described His herbarium Walls of his bakehouse His interest
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 in Egypt Natural History Society of Thurso A museum More 
 correspondents Mr. Jamieson, Ellou Lines to Charles Peach 
 Award to Peach for his discoveries in geology Peach finds new 
 fossils A sea-suake Pterichthys Dicki Peach's duties Retires 
 from the service Continues the study of geology and zoology Dick's 
 letter on receiving his photograph . . . Pages 371-394 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 DICK'S LAST YEAR HIS DEATH. 
 
 Dick afflicted by rheumatism Competition in business His trade sus- 
 pended His biscuits Scarcely earns the wages of a day-labourer 
 / A good new year Collecting mosses and ferns Reform The 
 rain Working at fossils again The old days gone for ever A 
 boulder stone from Helmsdale Bishop Colenso's book The Thurso 
 merchants Mr. Carlyle's o\"ation Railway projects Dick pictures 
 himself Dick's last walk His description His illness Mr. 
 Miller's helpfulness Continues to work His last letters Mrs. 
 Harold Robert Dick's death A public funeral Followers to his 
 grave Winding up of his affairs Sale of his library The proposed 
 pension Too late Pages 395-416 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 Dick self-sacrificing life TJnhappiness in his bringing up His delight 
 in nature His love of facts The mystery of geology Its wonders 
 His researches among the rocks and boulder clay His unselfish- 
 ness His givings to Hugh Miller Hugh Miller's acknowledgments 
 His extraordinary journeys Necessity for work His intellectual 
 labour His modesty His enthusiasm His closeness of observa- 
 tion His idea of geology His collections of fossils His herbarium 
 His character His childlikeness Sir George Sinclair's testimony 
 Profeseor Shearer Charles Peach His poverty Annie Mackay 
 Dick a reverent and devout man Moral of Dick's life 
 
 Pages 417-432
 
 ILLUSTBATIONS. 
 
 POETRAIT OF ROBERT DICK. Etched by Paul Rajon. Frontispiex. 
 
 Engraved by 
 PORTRAIT 01 CHARLES W. PEACH, A.L.S. C. JRoberts. Tofcuxpage 238 
 
 BENCLEDOH OCHIL HILLS , 1 
 
 RIFT IN THE OCHILS, NEAR MENSTRiE .... page 3 
 
 ROBERT DICK'S BIRTHPLACE, TULLIBODY 8 
 
 DAM'S BURN, FOOT OF THE OCHILS 11 
 
 DUNMYAT, FROM CAMBUSKENNETH , . ,,17 
 
 THDRSO BAY . 26 
 
 MAP OF CAITHNESS To face page 26 
 
 GIRNIGO CASTLE, EAST COAST OF CAITHNESS . . . page 32 
 
 ORD OF CAITHNESS ,,36 
 
 DUNCANSBY HEAD, NEAR JOHN o' GROAT'S ... ,,39 
 
 THE CLETT, HOLBORN HEAD To face page 44 
 
 OLD THURSO CASTLE, FROM THE SHORE .... page 54 
 
 MORVEN MOUNTAIN To face page 66 
 
 THE DORERY HILLS . .... page 79 
 
 DWARWICK HEAD 84 
 
 DUNNET HEAD, FROM THE EAST .... To face page 86 
 DISTANT VIEW OF DONNET HEAD, FROM BARROGILL CASTLE page 97 
 
 MAP OF COAST NEAR THURSO ,,110 
 
 HOY HEAD AND MAN OF HOY 115 
 
 BISHOP'S PALACE AND SCRABSTER ROADS ... 121 
 
 THE DEIL'S BRIO, HOLBORN HEAD . . . To face page 111 
 
 DUNNET SANDS . page 143 
 
 ROCKS AT HOLBORN HEAD SLATER'S MONUMENT To face page 146 
 
 THURSO RIVER, FROM THE BRIDGE page 160 
 
 STACKS OF DUNCANSBY . . . . . . . ,,166 
 
 FRESWICK CASTLE AND HEADLAND ... 169
 
 xx LIST OF ILLUSTRA TIONS. 
 
 DUNNET CLIFFS, EASTERN SIDE page 172 
 
 ROCKS AT BROUGH To face page 17 4 
 
 CASTLEHILL HOUSE, CASTLETOWN page 180 
 
 THE SKERBY LIGHTS, PENTLAND FIRTH : FROM CANISBAY 
 
 To face page, 182 
 
 BOULDER CLAY AT FRESWICK page 184 
 
 FRESWICK BRIDGE 186 
 
 DUNBEATH : EAST COAST OF CAITHNESS . . . ,,193 
 
 RUINS OF DlRLOT pASTLE . .... 202 
 
 SINCLAIR BAY AND Noss HEAD ,,205 
 
 STRATH HALLADALE To face page 208 
 
 MOUTH OF STRATH HALLADALE RIVER .... page 210 
 DUNNET HEAD : WEST FRONT NEAR THE LIGHTHOUSE 
 
 To face page 232 
 
 WANSFORD, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE page 24C 
 
 CHARLES PEACH'S HOUSE AT FOWEY .... 249 
 
 ROBERT DICK'S HOUSE, WILSON'S LANE, THURSO . . 271 
 
 THURSO HARBOUR : THE OLD CHURCH . . . . ,, -74 
 
 OLD THURSO CASTLE ,,286 
 
 DUNNET HEAD : WEST FRONT .... To face page 296 
 DICK'S SEAT AT DORERY : VIEW INTO SUTHERLANDSHIRE page 303 
 THURSO PARISH CHURCH, FROM THE WICK ROAD . . ,,317 
 
 RUINS OF ST. PETER'S, THURSO ,,347 
 
 DISTANT VIEW OF MORVEN AND MAIDEN PAP . . 350 
 
 MOUTH OF THURSO RIVER ,,384 
 
 MILLATFORSS To face page 388 
 
 MONUMENT TO ROBERT DICK IN THUESO CEVETEB.Y 416 
 NKW THURSO CASTLE ....... page 432
 
 BENCLEUGH : OCHIL HILLS.
 
 ROBERT DICK. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 TULLIBODY. 
 
 THE village of Tullibody stands upon a rising ground 
 situated between the windings of the Forth and the 
 Devon, in Clackmannanshire, Scotland. The Devon 
 takes its rise among the burns and rivulets which 
 flow down from the Ochil Hills. 
 
 At the upper part of the river, some of the most 
 romantic scenery in Scotland is to be found. At the 
 Caldron Linn the Devon forms a series of cascades, 
 which rush down through precipitous rocks into almost 
 unseen depths. Boiling about in the Caldrons, it passes 
 with a violent noise under the Eumblin' Brig, which 
 spans the rocks about a hundred and twenty feet above 
 the bed of the river. 
 
 Another affluent of the Devon comes down from the 
 Ochils at Castle Campbell Castle of Gloom, as it used 
 to be called a ruined building occupying a wild and 
 romantic situation on the summit of a high and almost 
 insulated rock. The mount on which it is situated is 
 nearly encompassed on all sides by tliick bosky woods ; 
 and the mountain rivulets which tumble down through
 
 THE DEVON. 
 
 the chasms on either side, become united at the base. 
 The whole of the scenes about the upper Devon are of 
 the most romantic kind, and are strikingly different 
 from all other Scottish scenery. 
 
 As the river winds out from its rocky bed below the 
 Caldron Linn, it enters the beautiful open valley which 
 runs along the foot of the Ochils, taking on its way the 
 rivulets which flow down from the mountains. It runs 
 westward near Dollar, Tillicoultry, Alva, and Menstrie ; 
 then, winding sharp round towards the south near Tulli- 
 body, it joins the Forth at Cambus, a little below the 
 ruins of Cambuskenneth Abbey. 
 
 Among his many beautiful verses descriptive of the 
 rivers of Scotland, Burns has not forgotten the Devon : 
 
 " How pleasant the banks of the clear winding Devon, 
 With green spreading bushes and flowers blooming fair !" 
 
 The verses werer composed as a poetic compliment to 
 Miss Charlotte Hamilton, a charming lady, then residing 
 at Harvieston, near Dollar.* 
 
 The lofty range of the Ochils is a prominent feature 
 in the scenery of the Devon. The hills are soft, green, 
 and pastoral. Their sunward slopes are here and there 
 varied with magnificent wooded glades, intermingled with 
 copse and whins, which in their golden summer yellow 
 are supremely beautiful. The burns and streamlets come 
 down in cascades through the deep rifts of the hills, and 
 are turned to use in many mills along the valley. 
 
 * Near Dollar is "Tait's Tomb," the family burial-place of the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury, whose father built Haivieston, and became 
 the possessor of Castle Campbell.
 
 THE OCHILS. 
 
 The most south- 
 erly of the Ochil Hills is 
 Dunmyat, which is famous 
 for the extensive view obtained 
 from its summit. A little to 
 the east of it rises Beucleuch, 
 the highest hill in the range, 
 2352 feet high. It shoots up 
 into a tall rocky point, called 
 Craigleith, famous in ancient 
 times for the production of fal- 
 cons. In a hollow behind the 
 point, where the sun's rays never 
 extend, the snow lies far into the 
 summer. The people of the 
 neighbourhood give it the 
 name of Lady Alva's Web. 
 
 The little town of Alva 
 lies close to the 
 
 
 A EIFT IN THE OCHILS, NEAR MRNSTRIE.
 
 TULLIBODY. 
 
 foot of Bencleuch. The glens and wooded copsea 
 behind it are full of beauty. The old ballad never- 
 theless assumes the supremacy of Menstrie, near the 
 foot of Dunmyat : 
 
 " Oh, Alva's woods are bonnie, 
 Tillicoultry's hills are fair, 
 
 But when I think o' the bonnie braes o' Menstrie, 
 It makes my heart aye sair." * 
 
 The village of Tullibody looks down upon the 
 "bonnie braes o' Menstrie." A valley lies between, 
 along which runs the clear winding Devon. A bridge 
 spans the river near Tullibody, from which a fine view 
 is obtained of the winding Devon, the hill of Bencleuch. 
 and the village and woods of Alva at its base. In thie 
 neighbourhood the famous adventure of James the Fifth 
 and the Gudeman of Ballangeich occurred. On the 
 Gudeman's visit to Stirling, the King designated him as 
 " King of the Muirs." The cottage in which King James 
 took shelter lay on an eminence near Tullibody, about a 
 mile south of the Ochils. 
 
 Tullibody seems in some way to have been connected 
 with that mythical people the Picts.-f Who were the 
 Picts or Pechs ? Many have tried to unravel the story, 
 but the result has been mere guesswork. Som } say that 
 
 * Menstrie House was formerly the seat of the Earl of Stirling. It 
 was destroyed by the Parliamentarian army during the reign of 
 Charles I. ; in return for which the clans under Montrose devoted 
 Castle Campbell to flames and ruin in 1645. 
 
 t The name of Tullibody is said to be derived from the Celtic 
 language Tulach, a little green eminence, and Boidich,a,vovf, a solemn 
 promise. Hence Tulachboidich, the knoll of the oath.
 
 THE STANDING STANE. 
 
 they occupied the Orkneys, Caithness, and Sutherland ; 
 others that they inhabited Mid-Scotland, between the 
 West Highlands and the Lowlands north of the Forth. 
 We hear of them at Brechin, at Galloway, and along the 
 Picts' Wall. Some say they were Celts, others Scandi- 
 navians. The riddle is as yet quite unsolved. 
 
 The story goes that the Picts were totally defeated 
 by King Kenneth in the neighbourhood of Tullibody, or 
 Dunbodenum,* in the year 843, after five successive 
 battles. It is said that the final overthrow of the 
 Picts took place near the village of Logic, close under 
 Dunmyat; and others that it took place at Cambus- 
 kenneth Abbey, which " was built by David the Second 
 on the very spot where his royal ancestor gave the final 
 blow to the Pictish dominion." 
 
 In commemoration of the event it is said that a 
 " Standing Stane " was first erected at Tullibody, a 
 usual method of distinguishing the site of a battle in 
 ancient times. The "Standing Stane" was, however, 
 demolished about fifty years ago, the broken fragments 
 being found useful in mending the roads. 
 
 The Abbot of Cambuskenneth took Tullibody under 
 his charge, whether in connection with the victory of 
 Kenneth Macalpine over the Picts, or because the place 
 was in his immediate vicinity, does not appear. At all 
 events, a primitive place of worship was erected at 
 Tullibody, which long continued to be an appendage to 
 the wealthy Abbey of Cambuskenneth. 
 
 * From Dun Buddran, the fort of Buddran, a celebrated Celtic 
 thief. 
 
 2
 
 TULLIBODY BRIDGE. 
 
 At the period of the Eeformation in Scotland, when 
 the French troops under Mary of Guise were flying 
 westward through Fife and Clackmannan on the arrival 
 of the English fleet in the Forth, William Kirkaldy of 
 Grange, to impede their progress, destroyed the eastern 
 arch of Tullibody bridge. 
 
 The French, under General D'Oysel, never at a loss in 
 an emergency, unroofed the church at Tullibody for the 
 purpose of repairing the bridge. To use the words of 
 John Knox : " Ye French, expert enough in sic feats, 
 tuke downe ye roofe of a paroch kirk, and made ane 
 brig over ye water called Devon, and sae they escapet 
 and gaed to Stirling, and thereafter to Leath."* 
 
 For a long time nothing was done to repair the 
 church, after the French had unroofed it. The ancient 
 walls fell to decay, and became covered with wild weeds. 
 The body of the church was used as a burial-place. The 
 place might have gone to utter ruin but for the Aber- 
 cromby family, who own the estate of Tullibody. They 
 
 * John Knox adds "As ye Frenohe spullyed ye cuntry in their 
 returning, ane captane or soldiour, we cannot tell, but he had a reid 
 clocke and a gilt murrion, entered upon a pure woman, that dwelt in 
 ye Quhytsyid, and began to spoille. Ye pure woman offer-it unto him 
 sic breid as sche had redy prepairit, but he, in no ways tharewith 
 content, wold have ye meil and a littill salt beef, quhilk ye pure 
 woman had to sustein hir own lyif, and ye lyves of hir pure childrein ; 
 nowther could teirs nor pitifull words mitigate ye merciles man, bot 
 he wold have quhatsoevir he micht cary. The pure woman perceaving 
 him so bent, and that he stoupit down in hir tub for the taking furth of 
 sick stuff as was within it, first coupit up his heilles, so that his heid 
 went down, and thairafter be hirsetf, or if ony uther companie came to 
 helpf, hir, but there he enc/it his unhape fyif."
 
 THE ABERCROMBIES. 
 
 roofed over the church, and seated it as a place of 
 worship. They erected some fine monuments and memo- 
 rials in and about it to the memory of the distinguished 
 men of the family. Among them is a cenotaph to 
 the distinguished Sir Ealph Ahercromby, the hero of 
 Aboukir. 
 
 Having thus described the scenery of the Ochils and 
 the Devon, amongst which Robert Dick spent many of 
 his early days, we proceed to relate the story of his hie.
 
 ROBERT DICK'S BIRTHPLACE. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 ROBERT DICK'S BOYHOOD. 
 
 ROBERT DICK was "born at Tullibody in January 1811.* 
 He "was one of four children Agnes, Robert, Jane, 
 and James. 
 
 Thomas Dick, his father, was an officer of excise. 
 He was an attentive, diligent, and able man. He 
 eventually rose to one of the highest positions in his 
 calling. At the time when Robert Dick was born, 
 
 * Miss Dick, his half-sister, says he was born in 1810, though 1811 
 is on his tombstone.
 
 CH\P. ii. BARONY SCHOOL, TULLIBODY. 9 
 
 it was his business to attend daily at the Cambua 
 Brewery, close at hand. 
 
 Margaret Gilchrist was Robert Dick's mother. Very 
 little is known of her, excepting that she was a very 
 delicate woman, and died shortly after having given 
 birth to her fourth child. Thomas Dick was thus left 
 without a wife, and his children without a mother. 
 
 The house in which the Dick family lived, and in 
 which Robert was born, is situated in the principal 
 street of the village. It is a two-storied, red-tiled, 
 " self-contained" house. Looking down the street from 
 the Tron Tree, you see the Ochil hills forming the 
 back-ground of the village ; the Devon winding in the 
 valley below. 
 
 The children, as they grew up, were sent to school. 
 Tullibody was fortunate in its Barony School, founded 
 and partly endowed by the Abercromby family. Thus 
 all the children in the village were able to obtain a fair 
 education at a moderate, price ; for in Scotland it is 
 considered a disgrace if a parent, of even the meanest 
 condition, does not send his children to school. 
 
 Mr. Macintyre was the teacher of the Barony School 
 He was a man of considerable attainments. Above all 
 things, he was an enthusiastic schoolmaster. He main- 
 tained discipline, inculcated instruction, and elevated 
 the position of his school by steady competition. He 
 endeavoured to avoid corporal punishment, and only 
 appealed to it as the last resource. 
 
 Robert Dick was one of his aptest scholars. He 
 learned everything rapidly. When he had mastered
 
 10 DICK'S DOMINIE. CHAP. n. 
 
 reading, he read everything he could lay hands on. 
 He was fond of fun and sport, and, like all strong 
 and active boys, he sometimes got into scrapes. When 
 he infringed the rules of the school, the master gave 
 him a number of verses to commit to heart. But he 
 learnt them so quickly and recited them with such ease, 
 that the task was found of no use as a punishment, 
 and then, on any further indiscretion being committed, 
 the master resorted to the last extremity the Taws !* 
 
 In a letter to Hugh Miller, Dick afterwards said, " My 
 auld dominie used to say that I had a good memory. 
 Every morning, in his introductory exercise, before the 
 business of the day began, he used to pray that teacher 
 and scholars might all be taught, and that discipline 
 might be followed with obedience." 
 
 Eobert had a great talent for languages. He learnt 
 Latin so quickly that his master recommended Mr. Dick 
 to send him to "college, with the object of educating him 
 for one of the learned professions. Such was his inten- 
 tion, when an event occurred which prevented its being 
 carried into effect. 
 
 This was Mr. Dick's second marriage. It occurred 
 in 1821, when Eobert was ten years old. Mr. Dick 
 married the daughter of Mr. Knox, the brewer at Cambus, 
 whose premises he inspected. As the excise regulations 
 did not permit of his surveying the premises of a relative, 
 he was removed to Dam's Burn, a hamlet at the foot of 
 the Ochils, where he inspected the whisky distillery of 
 
 * The Taws, a thick leather strap about three feet long, cut into tails 
 at the end.
 
 J>AM'S BUR A?. 
 
 Mr Dall. The distillery is 
 now called Glen Ochil. 
 
 Dam's Burn is so called because 
 of a noisy burn, which leaps from 
 rock to rock down the hills, to join 
 the Devon, which runs through the 
 valley below. On its way, the burn 
 used to be dammed up, so as to 
 drive a mill while on its way (~' 
 to the river. Mr. Dick occu- / 
 pied the best house in the place, 
 the slated house, with its gable end towards the street, 
 as shown in the annexed engraving. The slopes of the 
 Ochil hills, the Abbey Craig, on which the Wallace 
 Monument now stands, and the Campsie Fells, beyond 
 Stirling, are seen in the distance. 
 
 While at Dam's Burn, Eobert Dick went to the parish 
 school at Menstrie, a village about half a mile westward. 
 
 DAM'S B0KN.
 
 12 DICK ON THE OCHfLS. CHAP. it. 
 
 The teacher's name was Morrison. He was not equal 
 in accomplishments to the Barony schoolmaster at Tulli- 
 body. He took to teaching because he had not limbs 
 enough to fit him for anything else. He had only one 
 arm. He used to mend his pens dexterously, while 
 holding them firmly under the little stump that remained 
 on the other side. 
 
 Robert Dick made little progress under this master. 
 He learned his lessons well enough, and read as many 
 books as he could find or borrow. But he had a great 
 compensation at Dam's Burn for his want of school 
 learning. It was at Dam's Burn that he imbibed his 
 love of Nature. The green Ochils rose right behind his 
 father's house. By stepping into the back-green, he could 
 at once ascend the heights. He could ramble up the 
 burns, and in the sheltered corners, behind the rocks, find 
 many precious flowers and plants. 
 
 The boy who" plays about a mountain side, or among 
 the clefts of the hills, finds many things to amuse him. 
 In spring time there are the birds ; in summer there are 
 the plants and flowers; and in winter there are the 
 icicles hanging down the ledges of the rocks. Robert 
 also found out a variety of stones among the hills, 
 the felspar, porphyry, and greenstones, which are com- 
 mon in the Ochils. He wondered at the difference 
 between them, made a collection of them, which he 
 treasured at a dike-side, behind his father's house, 
 and tried to find out the cause of the difference between 
 one stone and another. 
 
 This climbing of the Ochils led him into difficulties.
 
 DICK'S STEP-MOTHER. 13 
 
 And this leads us to a point in the history of Bobert 
 Dick's life which cannot be omitted, inasmuch as it 
 coloured his whole future life. The years of childhood 
 and boyhood are, as it were, a sort of prophetic recital 
 of the years of manhood. They constitute the little 
 stage on which, with puny powers, we unconsciously 
 rehearse the scenes of after life. 
 
 The boy has in him the seeds of good and the seeds 
 of evil. Which will prove the stronger ? No one can 
 tell. But, to a large extent, it depends upon the effects 
 of love and sympathy at home. The presence of these 
 may call into life the best growths of the soul, and the 
 absence of them may raise up the noxious miasmas that 
 poison the whole human heart. 
 
 It will be remembered, that when Thomas Dick 
 removed to Dam's Burn, he married again. Other chil- 
 dren were soon added to the household. Then the 
 feelings of the step-mother came into play. It requires 
 great tact and temper to manage a family in which there 
 are two elements, the children of the first mother, and 
 the children of the second. 
 
 The new Mrs. Dick was a good wife and an excellent 
 mother, so far as her own children were concerned. But 
 she did not get on well with her husband's children by 
 his first wife. Perhaps they regarded her as an intruder 
 in the household ; and where her own children were con- 
 cerned, she naturally regarded them with preference'. 
 
 Nor were her husband's attentions to his children by 
 his first wife at all to her taste. What was done for them 
 evoked many a pang of maternal jealousy. Mother-lika
 
 14 PERSECUTIONS. 
 
 human-like, she could not but regard these young things 
 as intruders upon her own children's standing room. All 
 that was given to them was so much taken from her 
 own offspring. 
 
 Hence arose family difficulties in the household. 
 Eobert stayed out, rather than remain indoors. He 
 wandered about among the hills. He wore out his 
 shoes. To prevent him going out, his step-mother hid 
 them. Still Robert climbed the hills, and came home 
 with bleeding feet. He was punished for his misdoings, 
 and commanded to stay at home. This did not hinder 
 him from going out again. He would wander along the 
 Devon looking for birds' nests. This was as bad as 
 climbing the Ochils, and he was again thrashed with a 
 stick. 
 
 It was the same with the other step- children. James, 
 the youngest son of the first wife, struck back. Poor 
 fellow! He was pommelled so hard that he could 
 scarcely stand. Was he a "dour," hard, perverse 
 boy? Very likely. He had no mother's affection to 
 bear him up. Eobert Dick never complained. He 
 took his thrashings without grumbling. Still he went 
 on in his old way, though he could not but feel the hol- 
 lowness of his new motherhood. 
 
 At last the children were got out of the house, 
 Instead of being sent to college (as had been his father's 
 intention), Eobert was sent to Tullibody, where he was 
 apprenticed to a baker. Shortly after, James, the 
 youngest boy, went to sea ; and Agnes, the eldest, went 
 to be a servant at Edinburgh.
 
 THE DARK SHADOW. 
 
 Of course this was a very bad training for an intelli- 
 gent, high-spirited boy. It was not calculated to liber- 
 ate the ideal human being which lies concealed in every 
 child. It was, on the contrary, calculated to sour the 
 boy's nature, and to thwart his temperament at every 
 point. It threw a dark shadow along the whole of his 
 future life. 
 
 Long afterwards, in speaking to Charles Peach about 
 his early struggles, he said " All my naturally buoyant, 
 youthful spirits were broken. To this day I feel the 
 effects. I cannot shake them off. It is this that still 
 makes me shrink from the world." It will be necessary 
 to bear these facts in mind while reading the story of 
 Robert Dick's after life. 
 
 There were, however, two or three things that 
 Eobert had already learnt. He was educated, as Scotch 
 boys usually are, at the parish school. He had learnt 
 reading, writing, arithmetic, and a little Latin. It did 
 not amount to much, but it was the beginning of a 
 great deal. The rest of his education he owed to him- 
 self. As Stone, the son of the Duke of Argyll's gardener, 
 said, " One needs only to know the twenty-six letters of 
 the alphabet to be able to learn everything else that one 
 wishes." 
 
 Another thing that he learnt during this trying 
 period of his life, was self-control. Though treated with 
 capricious restraint, he never retorted. He bore uncom- 
 plainingly all that was laid upon him. Though strong 
 and spirited, he was a good-natured boy. He felt that, 
 under the circumstances, the ill-treatment of his step-
 
 16 LEA VES HOME. 
 
 mother was a thing that he must bear ; and he bore it 
 uncomplainingly, looking forward to better times. 
 
 There are compensations in all things. He was 
 happy to leave home. It was a pleasure to him to find 
 that there was some other roof under which he could 
 live in comparative comfort. 
 
 But he never forgot the circumstances under which 
 he had left home. When he afterwards heard of a neigh- 
 bour losing his wife, he said, "Ah! a sad thing for 
 the bairns ! Had my own mother been alive I would 
 never have been a baker ! "
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 ROBERT DICK APPRENTICED. 
 
 EGBERT DICK was apprenticed to Mr. Aikman, a baker 
 in Tullibody, when he was thirteen years old. Mr. 
 Aikman had a large business, and supplied bread to 
 people in the neighbouring villages as far as the Bridge 
 of Allan. 
 
 The life of a baker is by no means interesting. One 
 day is like another. The baker is up in the morning 
 at three or four. The oven fire is kindled first. The
 
 18 LIFE OF A BAKER. CHAP. in. 
 
 flour is mixed with yeast and salt and water, laboriously 
 kneaded together. The sponge is then set in some warm 
 place. The dough begins to rise. After mingling with 
 more flour, and thorough kneading, the mass is weighed 
 into lumps of the proper size, which are shaped into 
 loaves and "bricks," or into "baps," penny and half- 
 penny. This is the batch, which, after a short time, is 
 placed in the oven until it is properly baked and ready 
 to be taken out. The bread is then sold or delivered to 
 the customers. When delivered out of doors, the bread 
 is placed on a flat baker's basket, and carried on the 
 head from place to place. 
 
 Eobert Dick got up first and kindled the fire, so as to 
 heat the oven preparatory to the batch being put in. 
 His nephew, Mr. Alexander of Dunferrnline, says " he 
 got up at three in the morning, and worked and drudged 
 until seven and eight, and sometimes nine o'clock at 
 night." - 
 
 As he grew older, and was strong enough to carry 
 the basket on his head, he was sent about to deliver the 
 bread in the neighbouring villages. He was sent to 
 Menstrie, to Lipney on the Ochils, to Blairlogie at the 
 foot of Dunmyat, and farther westward to the Bridge 
 of Allan, about six miles from Tullibody. 
 
 The afternoons on which he delivered the bread were 
 a great pleasure to Dick. He had an opportunity for ob- 
 serving nature, which had charms for him in all its moods. 
 When he went up the hills to Lipney, he wandered on 
 his return through Menstrie Glen. He watched the 
 growth of the plants. He knew them individually, one
 
 CHAP. in. BEGINNINGS OF BOTANY. 19 
 
 from the other. He began to detect the differences 
 between them, though he then knew little about orders, 
 classes, and genera. When the hazel-nuts were ripe he 
 gathered them and brought loads of them home for the 
 enjoyment of his master's bairns. They all had a great 
 love for the 'prentice Kobert. 
 
 He must also, in course of time, have obtained some 
 special acquaintance with botany. At all events, he 
 inquired, many years after, about some particular plants 
 which he had observed during his residence at Dam's 
 Burn and Tullibody. " Send me," he said to his eldest 
 sister, " a twig with the blossom and some leaves, from 
 the Tron Tree in Tullibody." The Tron Tree is a lime 
 tree standing nearly opposite the house in which Eobert 
 was born. 
 
 " Send me also," he said, " a specimen of the wild 
 geranium, which you will find on the old road close by 
 the foot of the hills between Menstrie and Alva. I also 
 want a water-plant [describing it] which grows in the 
 river Devon." The two former were sent to him, but 
 the water-plant could not be found. 
 
 Eobert's apprenticeship lasted for three years and a 
 half. He got no wages only his meals and his bed. 
 He occupied a small room over the bakehouse. His 
 father had still to clothe him, and his washing was done 
 at home. On Saturdays he went with his " duds " to 
 Dam's Burn. But either soap was scarce, or good-will 
 was wanting. His step-mother would not give him 
 clean stockings except once a fortnight. His sister 
 Agnes used to accompany him home to Tullibody in the
 
 20 A GREA T READER. CHAP, m 
 
 evening, and at the Aikmans' door she exchanged stock- 
 ings with him, promising to have his own well darned 
 and washed by the following Sunday. 
 
 The day of rest was a day of pleasure to him. He 
 did not care to stay within doors. He had shoes now, 
 and could wander up the hills to the top of Dunmyat 
 or Bencleuch, and see the glorious prospect of the 
 country below ; the windings of the Devon, the wind- 
 ings of the Forth, and the country far away, from the 
 castle of Stirling on the one hand to the castle of 
 Edinburgh on the other. 
 
 Dick continued to be a great reader. He read every 
 book that he could lay his hands on. Popular books 
 were not so common then as they are now. But he 
 contrived to borrow some volumes of the old Edinburgh 
 Encyclopedia, and this gave him an insight into science. 
 It helped him in his knowledge of botany. He could 
 now find out fo himself the names of the plants ; and he 
 even began to make a collection. It could only have 
 been a small one, for his time was principally occupied 
 by labour. Yet, with a thirst for knowledge, and a deter- 
 mination to obtain it, a great deal may be accomplished 
 in even the humblest station. 
 
 In 1826, Mr. Dick was advanced to the office of 
 supervisor of excise, and removed to Thurso. Eobert 
 was then left to himself in Tullibody. He had still two 
 years more to serve. One day followed another in the 
 usual round of daily toil. The toil was, however, 
 mingled with pleasure, and he walked through the 
 country with his bread basket, and watched Nature 
 with ever-increasing delight.
 
 LEAVES TULLIBODY. 21 
 
 He made no acquaintances. The Aikmans say 
 " that he was very kind to his master's children that 
 he was constantly "bringing them flowers from the fields, 
 or nuts from the glens, or anything curious or interesting 
 which he had picked up in the course of his journeys." 
 He occupied a little of his time in bird-stuffing. He 
 stuffed a hare, which he called " a tinkler's lion." It 
 need scarcely be said that the children were very fond 
 of their father's 'prentice. 
 
 At length his time was out. He was only seventeen. 
 But he had to leave Tullibody, and try to find work as 
 a journeyman. He bundled up his clothes and set out 
 for Alloa, where he caught the boat for Leith. He never 
 saw Tullibody again, though he long remembered it. 
 His father and mother were buried in the churchyard 
 there ; and he could not help having a longing affection 
 for the place. But he could never spare money enough 
 to revisit the place of his birth. 
 
 Long after, when writing to his brother-in-law, he 
 said, "And ye have been up to Alloa. Well, I do 
 believe that is a bonnie country, altho' I fancy it is not 
 in any sense the poor man's country. Nothing but men 
 of money there; though fient a hair did I care for 
 their grandeur while I lived there. The hills and woods, 
 and freedom to run upon them and through them, was 
 all I cared about. 
 
 " ' What though, like commoners of air, 
 We wander out we know not where, 
 
 But either house or hall ? 
 Yet Nature's charms, the hills and woods, 
 The sweeping vales, and foaming floods, 
 Are free alike to all.'
 
 22 DICK A JOURNEYMAN. CHAF. in. 
 
 I daresay I might pick up a plant or a stone with very 
 different feelings from those I felt in the days of old. 
 But let them go ! There is no use in repining." 
 
 Again, when writing to a fellow botanist, who 
 doubted whether Digitalis purpurea was a native of 
 Caithness, he said, " I have seen more of the plant in 
 Caithness than I ever saw about Stirling, Alloa, or on 
 the Ochil hills, more than I ever saw in the woods of 
 Tullibody." 
 
 Eobert Dick found a journeyman's situation at Leith, 
 where he remained for six months. His life there was 
 composed of the usual round of getting up early in the 
 morning, kneading, baking, and going about the streets 
 with his basket on his head, delivering bread to the cus- 
 tomers. It was a lonely life ; and the more lonely, as he 
 was far away from Nature and the hills that he loved. 
 
 From Leith he went to Glasgow, and afterwards to 
 Greenock. He was a journeyman baker for about three 
 years. His wages were small ; his labour was heavy ; 
 and he did not find that he was making much progress. 
 He continued to correspond with his father, and told 
 him of his position. The father said, " Come to Thurso, 
 and set up a baker's shop here." There were then only 
 three bakers' shops in the whole county of Caithness, 
 one at Thurso, one at Castleton, and another at Wick. 
 
 In that remote district " baker's bread " had scarcely 
 come into fashion. The people there lived chiefly on 
 oatmeal and bere,* oatmeal porridge and cakes, and 
 
 * Bere or bar (Norwegian) a commoner kind of barley. 
 " I sing the juice Scotch bear can make us. " BURNS.
 
 DICK GOES TO THURSO. 
 
 barley bannocks, with plenty of milk. Upon this fare 
 men and women grew up strong and healthy. Many of 
 them only got a baker's loaf for " the Sabbath." 
 
 Eobert Dick took his father's advice. He went 
 almost to the world's end to set up his trade. He 
 arrived at Thurso in the summer of 1830, when he was 
 about twenty years old. A shop was taken in Wilson's 
 Lane, nearly opposite his father's house. An oven had 
 to be added to the premises before the business could 
 be begun; and in the meantime Eobert surveyed the 
 shore along Thurso Bay. 
 
 Thurso is within sight of Orkney, the Ultima Thule of 
 the Eomans. It is the northernmost town in Great 
 Britain. John o' Groat's the Land's End of Scotland 
 is farther to the east. It consists of only a few 
 green mounds, indicating where John o' Groat's House 
 once stood.* 
 
 Thurso is situated at the southern end of Thurso Bay, 
 at the mouth of the Thurso river, the most productive 
 salmon river in Scotland. The fish, after feeding and 
 cleaning themselves in the Pentland Firth, make for the 
 fresh water. The first river they come to is the Thurso, 
 up which they swim in droves. 
 
 Thurso Bay, whether in fair or foul weather, is a 
 grand sight. On the eastern side, the upright cliffs of 
 Dunnet Head run far to the northward, forming the 
 most northerly point of the Scottish mainland. On the 
 
 * A very comfortable hotel has recently been erected close to the 
 site of John o' Groat's. Many pleasure parties come from Wick and 
 Thurso to spend the day there, and pick up the John o' Groat's buckiea.
 
 24 ASPECTS OF THE SEA. CHAP. HI. 
 
 west, a high crest of land juts out into the sea, forming 
 at its extremity the bold precipitous rocks of Holborn 
 Head. Looking out of the bay you see the Orkney 
 Islands in the distance, the Old Man of Hoy standing 
 up at its western promontory, At sunset the light glints 
 along the island, showing the bold prominences and 
 depressions in the red sandstone cliffs. Out into the 
 ocean the distant sails of passing ships are seen against 
 the sky, white as a gull's wing. 
 
 The long swelling waves of the Atlantic come rolling 
 in upon the beach. The noise of their breaking in 
 stormy weather is like thunder. From Thurso they are 
 seen dashing over the Holborn Head, though some two 
 hundred feet high; and the cliffs beyond Dunnet Bay 
 are hid in spray. 
 
 Eobert Dick was delighted with the sea in all its 
 aspects. The sea opens many a mind. The sea is the 
 most wonderful" thing a child can see; and it long con- 
 tinues to fill the thoughtful mind with astonishment. 
 The sea-shore on the western coast is full of strange 
 sights. There is nothing but sea between Thurso and 
 the coasts of Labrador. 
 
 The wash of the ocean comes by the Gulf Stream 
 round the western coasts of Scotland, and along the 
 northern coasts of Norway. Hence the bits of drift- 
 wood, the tropical sea-weed, and the tropical nuts, 
 thrown upon the shore at Thurso. 
 
 In the same way, bits of mahogany are sometimes 
 carried by the ocean current from Honduras or the Baj 
 of Mexico, and thrown upon the shore on the northern
 
 THE SEA-MEW'S CRY. 25 
 
 most coasts of Norway. One evening, while walking 
 along the beach near Thurso, Eobert Dick took up a 
 singular-looking nut, which he examined. He remarked 
 to the friend who accompanied him, " That has been 
 brought by the ocean current and the prevailing winds 
 all the way from one of the West Indian Islands. 
 How strange that we should find it here !" 
 
 Kobert Dick always admired the magnmcent sea 
 pictures of Thurso Bay its waves that gently rocked or 
 wildly raged. He enjoyed the salt-laden breath of the 
 sea wind ; and even the cries of the sea birds. Here is 
 his description of the sea-mew : " ' Ha ga tirwa ! ' How 
 strange and uncouth ! How very unnatural the cry 
 seemed. It was only the cry of a sea bird. It was 
 within sight of the ocean. There had been a storm. It 
 was over, but the waves in long rolling breakers dashed 
 themselves in a rage on the sandy shore, and then were 
 quiet. But quiet only for a moment. 'Ha ga tirwa!' 
 Kestless and unwearied, another and another long wave 
 followed and burst into spray. And thus it has ever 
 been 'since evening was, and morning was.' It was 
 then evening, the stars began to twinkle ; and after a 
 little the full moon rose. But still ' Ha ga tirwa !' " 
 
 But before proceeding with Eobert Dick's history, 
 it is necessary that we should give a short account of 
 the county of Caithness, over the whole of which 
 he afterwards wandered in search of the botany, as 
 well as of the geological formation of the district.
 
 THURSO BAV. 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 CAITHNESS. 
 
 THE name of Caithness is derived from the old Norse. 
 It indicates the ness, naze, or nose of Cattey.* Many 
 of the headlands are also denominated ness, from Brim's 
 Ness to the west of Thurso, to Noss Head north of Wick. 
 Indeed, the same word is applied to headlands along the 
 east coast of Scotland and England from Tarbat Ness 
 in Eoss to Dungeness in Kent. The same word is 
 applied to the Naze in Norway and in Essex, and to 
 
 * Caithness, supposed to be the peninsula of the Catti, a tribe cele- 
 brated by Tacitus in his account of the Low German tribes. TACITUS, 
 C. xxx. Germania,oT perhaps from the Ugnan (Lapp) " Ketje "an 
 end or extremity./. Taylor.
 
 MAP OF CAITHNESS.
 
 CHAP. iv. CAITHNESS SCANDINA VI AN. 27 
 
 Cape Gris Nez (Gray Nose) near Calais. It usually in- 
 dicates a headland which the Scandinavians have named, 
 or near which they have settled. 
 
 Caithness seems to have been almost entirely Scan- 
 dinavian. The creeks or bays in which the Norsemen 
 anchored, or where they ran their boats ashore, are 
 called by Norwegian names, from Wick, the greatest 
 fishing station in the world, to Freswick, Sleswick, 
 D Warwick, and such like inlets. 
 
 The Gaels seem to have been pushed inland towards 
 the hilly country of Sutherland, while the Scandinavians 
 occupied the low-lying ground along the coast. Almost 
 every farm steading is called by a Scandinavian name. 
 Hence Scrabster, Lybster, Seister, Thurster, Ulbster, and 
 such like the word ster being from " saetr," the Scandi- 
 navian word for farm. Dahls, or dales, penetrate the 
 country to the southward, though the Celtic word Strath 
 is still preserved. Hence Strath Halladale and Strath 
 Helmsdale in Sutherlandshire. North of that region, 
 the rivers are called forss or water. Worsaae derives 
 the name of Thurso from Thor the pagan god, and aa a 
 river. Hence Thorsa, or Thor's river. 
 
 The people also resemble their progenitors. The fair 
 hair, blue eyes, and tall figures of the Scandinavians are 
 still preserved throughout the county, in contradis- 
 tinction to the small size, the dark hair, the swarthy 
 skin, and the black or steely-blue eyes of the Celts, to 
 the south and west of Scotland. 
 
 All the firths, or inlets of the sea, are known by Norse 
 names. The Pentland Firth, which runs between the
 
 28 PENTLAND FIRTH. CHAP. iv. 
 
 north coast of Caithness and the Orkneys, was in old 
 Norse called the Petland Fiord. Here we have the 
 mythical Picts again. Bleau, in his Geographical Atlas, 
 says that the Picts, when defeated by the Scots, fled to 
 Duncansby, from whence they crossed to Orkney. But, 
 meeting with resistance by the natives, they were forced 
 to return. On their way back to Caithness, they all 
 perished in the firth; from which catastrophe it was 
 ever after called the Pictland or Pentland Firth. 
 
 Heavy currents run through the Firth. The tide runs 
 at the rate of ten miles an hour. A full-rigged ship, 
 with her sails set and a favourable wind, is sometimes 
 driven back by the tide. This I have seen when jour- 
 neying along the shores of the Firth. Sometimes it is 
 whirled round amidst the eddying currents. Where the 
 currents of the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea meet, 
 the water is churned and eddied about as in a maelstrom. 
 At the east end of the Firth is the island of Stroma, which 
 in old Norse means " the island in the current." The 
 population of the island is of pure Norwegian descent ; 
 the men being excellent sailors and boatmen. 
 
 Not far from this island, and in sight of John o' 
 Groat's, are the two Pentland Skerries, commanding the 
 eastern entrance to the Firth. They were originally 
 called Petland Skjaere. The largest skerry contains 
 two lighthouses, one higher than the other, to be a surer 
 guide to the mariner. 
 
 During the equinoctial gales, the wind sweeps across 
 the county with great fury. It is scarcely possible to 
 hold one's feet. Cattle are blown down, and trees are
 
 CHAP. iv. TREES IN CAITHNESS. 23 
 
 blown away. The thatched roofs of the cottages are 
 held down by strong straw ropes with heavy stones 
 hanging at their ends; otherwise the roofs would be 
 blown away, as well as the cottages themselves. 
 
 It is scarcely possible to grow a tree in the northern 
 part of the county. Hedges are almost unknown. Instead 
 of hedges, the fields are separated from each other by 
 Caithness flags set on end. To one accustomed to the 
 beautiful woods and hedgerows of the south, the cheer- 
 lessness of Caithness scenery may well be imagined. 
 Kobert Chambers said of the county " The appearance 
 of Caithness is frightful, and productive of melancholy 
 feelings." " It is only a great morass," says another 
 writer ; " the climate is unfavourable ; the stormy 
 winds are always blowing across it; mists suddenly 
 come on, and the air is always damp." 
 
 A desperate effort has been made to grow trees at 
 Barrogill Castle, within sight of the Pentland Firth. A 
 wood surrounds the east side of the castle. The trees 
 .are planted thick, and they are protected by a high wall. 
 But at the point at which the wall ends, the tops of the 
 trees are sharply cut away as if by a scythe. They are 
 chilled and eaten down by the sea-drift. 
 
 The best wood in the northern part of the county is 
 at Castlehill, where the imported trees are protected by 
 rising grounds on all sides. The only tree that thrives 
 in Caithness is the common bourtree or elder. The 
 trembling poplar, the white birch, and the hazel, are 
 also occasionally found in sheltered places. 
 
 But though the county of Caithness is for the most 
 3
 
 30 THE COAST SCENERY. CHAP. iv. 
 
 part flat and cheerless, it is redeemed from monotony by 
 its glorious coast scenery. On the east, as well as on the 
 west, the rocks jut out into the ocean in stupendous 
 cliffs. "When the stormy winds do blow" is the 
 time to see the wonders of the north at Duncansby 
 Head, at Dunnet Head, at Holborn Head, at Noss Head, 
 and, indeed, all round the coast. At Wick Bay, only a 
 few years ago, a tremendous storm from the east dashed 
 to pieces the new breakwater, lilting up stones of tons 
 weight and dashing them on the beach, thus setting at 
 defiance the skill and ingenuity of the engineer who had 
 built it. 
 
 Duncansby Head is also exposed to the full fury of 
 the North Sea. It is a continuous precipice about two 
 miles in extent, and of a semicircular shape. It is re- 
 markable for its stupendous boldness, and the wild and 
 striking appearance of the chasms and goes by which it 
 is indented. In front of the cliff are three Stacks, which 
 have been washed round by successive storms, and 
 stand out bare and red several hundred yards from the 
 mainland. The cliff consists principally of old red sand- 
 stone, and partly of Caithness slate. 
 
 The huge, long, white-crested billows, lashed into fury 
 by the storm, chase each other up the beach, and burst 
 with astounding force. At high tide, they dash up the 
 cliffs and rush over the summit into the mainland. 
 Fiom thence they run down over the inland slopes, into 
 a rivulet which joins the Pentland Firth near John o' 
 Groat's. From the summit of the cliff a fine view is 
 obtained of the Skerries at the mouth of the Firth, of
 
 CHAP. iv. CAITHNESS OLD CASTLES. 31 
 
 Stroma, the island in the current, and of the Orkney 
 Islands as far as the bold headland of Hoy. 
 
 Along the east coast, numberless castles are built 
 upon the cliffs. They are mostly in ruins. Many ot 
 them are prehistoric. Wick Castle, Girnigo Castle, 
 and Keiss Castle, are the oldest. No one knows who 
 built them. Most probably they are the strongholds of 
 the Scandinavian chiefs, who, at some unknown period, 
 took possession of the lowland part of the county. 
 
 The castle of Al-Wick or, as it is usually called, the 
 Auld Man of Wick seems to be one of the most ancient. 
 It consists of a grim-looking tower or keep of the rudest 
 masonry, perforated here and there with arrow -slits. 
 It is three stories high; but entirely roofless and floorless. 
 It is surrounded by an outer wall, within which are the 
 ruins of some old houses. A deep broad. moat defends 
 it on the land side. At present, it forms an excellent 
 landmark to vessels approaching that part of the coast. 
 
 Girnigo Castle, situated on the promontory of Noss 
 Head, is also very old. Castle Sinclair, which was added 
 to it, has a history, which Girnigo has not. But the 
 old builders were so much better than the new ones, 
 that while Castle Sinclair has fallen to ruins, Girnigo 
 Castle stands as firmly as it did at the time at which it 
 was built. 
 
 The constantly rolling sea, ever for ever, washes itself 
 against the rocks, grinding away the softest parts. 
 The red sandstone goes first, leaving long hollows 
 amongst the slates, through which the sea drives in- 
 land. In stormy weather, the waves wash in with
 
 GIRNIGO CASTLE. 
 
 greatforce, some- 
 times a quarter of a 
 mile or more* and at the" 
 far end, they d^ive up into 
 the open air, blowing like a whale. 
 These hollows under the rocks are 
 called goes or gyoes. They are common x ^ 
 all round Caithness. One of them is 
 near Wick, at the castle of Al - Wick. 
 Eobert Dick describes another near Thurso, 
 which will be found referred to in a future part 
 
 Of the Story. [GIRNIGO CA 
 
 From the northern part of Caithness, where the 
 ground is comparatively flat inland, and full of lochs 
 from Thurso to Wick, the land gradually ascends, 
 until we find hills and then mountains close upon 
 the borders of Sutherland. Morven, Maiden Pap,
 
 AGRICULTURE. 32 
 
 and Skerry Ben, form part of a range of mountains, 
 extending from Sandside Bay on the north, to Helms- 
 dale on the south. Morven is the great mountain of 
 Caithness. It is 2331 feet high. It is regarded as the 
 great weather-glass of the county. When the mist 
 gathers about its base, rain is sure to follow ; but when 
 the mist ascends to the top and disperses, leaving the 
 majestic outline of the mountain exposed to view, then 
 the weather will be fine. " During harvest especially," 
 says a local writer, "all eyes are directed towards it; 
 and it never deceives. 
 
 " In vision I behold tall Morven stand, 
 And see the morning mist distilling tears 
 Around his shoulders, desolate and yrand." 
 
 From what we have already stated, it will be under- 
 stood that Caithness is by no means a fertile county. 
 Until a comparatively recent period agriculture was in 
 a very backward state. When Pennant visited the 
 county about a hundred years ago, he describes it as 
 little better than " an immense morass," with here and 
 there some fruitful spots of oats and here, and much 
 coarse grass. 
 
 In those places where any agriculture was carried 
 on, the women did the work of horses. They carried 
 the manure on their backs to the field; and did the 
 most of the manual labour. The land could scarcely 
 be called ploughed. The Caithness plough was one- 
 stilted. It was dragged over the ground by a yoke of 
 oxen, driven by a woman. There were neither barns 
 nor granaries in the county. The corn was preserved
 
 34 ROADS. 
 
 in the chaff in bykes, which were low stacks in the 
 shape of bee-hives, thatched quite round. 
 
 Thurso, the chief place in Caithness, carried on a 
 trade with Norway and Denmark, long before it began 
 to communicate with the rest of Scotland. The sea 
 was by far the easiest mode of transit; and all tne 
 people along the coast were sailors. But, indeed, there 
 was very little traffic to be carried on. The only two 
 clusters of houses in the county were Thurso and 
 Wick. Thurso must have been the more important 
 place, as it not only had a church, but also a bishop 
 the Bishop's Palace being close at hand. Thurso was a 
 small fishing town, and Wick contained only a few 
 hundred inhabitants. But the fishing ha,s long left 
 Thurso, and gone to Wick. " The only fishing at 
 Thurso now," said Dick, "is sillocks and sillock scrae. 
 The salmon fishing, however, is the best in the king- 
 dom." 
 
 There were then no roads in Caithness. The exten- 
 sive hollows in the flat slaty ground were filled with 
 morasses. There was not a single wheel-cart in the 
 county before 1780. Crubbans were the substitutes for 
 carts. They were wicker baskets. Two of them, hung 
 one on each side of a pony from a. wooden saddle, be- 
 neath which was a cushion of straw, carried corn, goods, 
 and other articles. Six or seven ponies thus loaded, 
 says Henderson in his Agricultural Survey of Caithness, 
 might be seen going in a kind of Indian file, each tied 
 by the halter to the other's tail, a person leading the 
 front horse, and each of the others was pulled forward
 
 THE ORD OF CAITHNESS 35 
 
 by the tail of the one before him. Yet traffic was car- 
 ried on throughout England in the same manner, about 
 three hundred years ago. 
 
 Caithness was behind in everything. The only geo- 
 graphy of the county was known from Danish sources. 
 Timothy Pont made his first map in 1608. It was shut 
 out from the rest of Scotland by the mountainous county 
 of Sutherland.* It was long before a road could be 
 made to enable the people to communicate with their 
 countrymen farther south. The only road lay along the 
 eastern shore, among rocks and sand, which were often 
 covered by the tide. The inland road lay over the Ord 
 of Caithness. The Ord is a formidable pass between 
 Sutherland and Caithness. It is situated at the eastern 
 boundary of the two counties. There is a lofty mountain 
 on one side of the road, and a steep precipice on the 
 other, at the foot of which is the sea. 
 
 The Ord is the termination of a long mountain ridge, 
 and is the brow of a steep hill overhanging the ocean. On 
 the Sutherland side, the headland is cleft into a gorge of 
 great depth, which runs a long way inland. The old 
 road before the present bridge was built over the gorge 
 was a mere path or shelf along the outer edge of the 
 promontory twelve hundred feet above the sea. When 
 
 * It may seem strange to us that the extreme north-western corner 
 of Great Britain should be called Sutherland. No inhabitants of Scot- 
 land could have bestowed so inappropriate a name. It was evidently 
 given by a people living still farther to the , north. Sutherland, in 
 short, is the mainland to the south of the Orkney Jarldom. Here, as 
 well as in Caithness, we find numerous Norwegian names. The barren 
 uplands were left to the Gael. TAYLOB, Words and Places.
 
 THE ORD OF CAITHNESS. 
 
 the weather was stormy, it could not be passed in safety. 
 Even in fair weather, the road was so difficult and dan- 
 gerous that, when the chaise of a landed proprietor had 
 to pass it, a force of fifteen or twenty persons was 
 employed to help on the carriage and horses. 
 
 JBD OF CAITHNESS. 
 
 Pennant, who travelled into many strange places, 
 described the pass as " infinitely more high and horrible 
 than Penmaenmaur in Wales ;" and another writer says, 
 " that if any stumble thereupon, they are in danger of 
 falling down a precipice into the sea at the bottom of 
 the rock, which is very terrible to behold." The old 
 path is still to be seen from Helmsdale. It is like a
 
 ROAD OVER BEXC11EILT. 37 
 
 sheep-track winding up the steep brow of the hill, some 
 three or four hundred feet above the rolling surge. 
 
 The road to Thurso from the Ord road was almost 
 impassable. It was a mere horse track over the hill of 
 Bencheilt. This road was made passable for carriages 
 through the energy of Sir John Sinclair. The Abbe" 
 Gregoire denominated Sir John " the most indefatigable 
 man in Europe." To him the improvement of the county 
 of Caithness in a great measure belongs. He was born 
 at Thurso Castle, an ancient edifice built by the sixth 
 Earl of Caithness. It has since been pulled down to 
 make room for a spick-and-span new castle, much less 
 picturesque than the old one. It stood almost within 
 sea-mark on Thurso Bay. In stormy weather, the sea 
 spray sometimes passed over the roof. Miss Catherine 
 Sinclair has said that fish have been caught with a line 
 from the drawing-room window ; and vessels have been 
 wrecked so close under the turrets, that the voices of 
 the drowning sailors have been heard. 
 
 When Sir John succeeded to his estates, three-fourths 
 of Caithness consisted of deep peat-moss, and of hills 
 covered with heath, or altogether naked. On arriving at 
 his majority, he determined upon the improvement of 
 his estates, and of the county generally. One of the 
 first things that he did was to endeavour to make a roaa 
 to Thurso over Bencheilt, in the centre pf the county. 
 He himself surveyed the road and marked out its lines. 
 He called together twelve hundred and sixty labourers 
 to meet him early one morning, and set them all simul- 
 taneously to work. They began at the dawn of day, 
 3*
 
 38 SJK JOHN SINCLAIR. CHAP. iv. 
 
 and before nightfall, the sheep-track, six miles in 
 length, was converted into a road perfectly easy for 
 carts and carriages. This showed what energy could 
 accomplish. 
 
 The young laird was not satisfied with that. He 
 formed a large number of farms on his own estate. He 
 enclosed, drained, and reduced them to order, entirely at 
 his own expense. He built bridges ; he made roads ; he 
 introduced the best cattle ; he provided the best turnip, 
 rye-grass, and clover seeds ; he enjoined upon his farmers 
 to adopt a regular rotation of crops ; and in a short 
 time converted what had been a barren wilderness into 
 a well-cultivated district. He enclosed on his own 
 estate about 12,000 English acres of waste land, all of 
 which eventually repaid the outlay. Among his other 
 achievements, he introduced the Cheviot breed of sheep 
 into the whole^of Scotland, and thus doubled the value 
 of the grazing grounds north of the Tweed. 
 
 Sir John tried to introduce trees at Thurso, but he 
 found it difficult to make them grow. It was necessary 
 to dig a hole of large dimensions through the subsoil of 
 slaty rock, over which the tenants of the neighbouring 
 townlands were obliged annually, for seven years, to 
 heap a large mound of compost. And even when the 
 trees did grow they were often blown away by the 
 furious winds from the north and west. 
 
 Sir John even tried to introduce nightingales into 
 Caithness ! But Nature baffled his efforts. He obtained 
 nightingales' eggs from the London bird fanciers. They 
 were substituted for those of the robin redbreast. The
 
 THURSO NIGHTINGALES. 
 
 eggs were hatched. The young nightingales soon flew 
 about the bushes round Thurso Castle. But so soon as 
 the summer had ended, the birds disappeared and never 
 returned. 
 
 DUNCANSBY HEAD.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 DICK BEGINS BUSINESS. 
 
 DICK began business for himself at the age of twenty. 
 His house was in Wilson's Lane, not far from the old 
 church. The river Thurso flows past the bottom of the 
 lane into the sea, which is close at hand. 
 
 Mr. Smith, of Olrig, was the proprietor. After he 
 had built a small oven behind the house and added it 
 to the shop, Dick went over from his father's house to 
 live there and begin his trade. The only other baker in 
 the town was a Mr. Mackay, who was also a Baptist 
 preacher. 
 
 There was not much trade to be done ; but Eobert 
 baked a little every day, and sold his bread over the 
 counter. When he was out, his sister Jane attended to 
 the business. He contrived to live on very small earn- 
 ings, for he had only himself to provide for. He required 
 very little capital, for every day's batch returned the 
 money's worth of the flour, as well as the profit to the 
 baker. 
 
 Shortly after he began business, we find him writing 
 to Mr. Aikman, of Tullibody, and requesting him to send 
 four bags of third flour, one bag of second, and one bag 
 of best. Mr. Aikman sent the flour to Thurso. Dick
 
 CHAP v. CONCHOLOGY. 41 
 
 remitted 5 ; but his old master said " he need not re- 
 mit the balance, as he would have need of the money." 
 In fact, three years elapsed before Eobert Dick could 
 send him the balance of the account. 
 
 When Dick's bread was sold, or while his sister Jane 
 was watching the shop, he went out to walk along the 
 shore. He crossed the river by the stepping-stones while 
 the tide was out, and was at once in Thurso East. He 
 passed under the castle and walked along the shore, some- 
 times as far as Dunnet Bay. He delighted to see the 
 long rolling waves come thundering in and break upon 
 the shore in clouds of spray. The broken surge, churned 
 into foam, rushed rapidly up the beach with the speed 
 of a racehorse, and then rushed rapidly back again. 
 Even in calm weather, there is a ceaseless moaning of 
 the surge, indicating the remnant of some storm far away 
 in the Atlantic. When the storm comes nearer the 
 land, the waves are stronger and louder, spending their 
 billows on the shore. " Sometimes," says Dick, " the 
 noise of the bay is heard booming over the town with a 
 terrible roar." 
 
 His walks along the shore awakened in him a taste 
 for conchology. He gathered shells by the score, and 
 arranged them in a cabinet. He gathered up numerous 
 things besides shells. He found a specimen of the nut 
 of the cow-itch shrub of the West Indies, such a 
 nut as the brother-in-law of Columbus found floating 
 near Madeira, which led the great navigator to infer the 
 existence of a western continent. He found also wood, 
 drilled by the Teredo navalis, and many specimens of
 
 42 BOTANY. 
 
 seaweed, which had been washed by south-westerly 
 winds from the Gulf of Mexico.* 
 
 Shells, and the mollusks which inhabit them, were 
 not, however, sufficient to occupy his attention. He 
 had plenty of spare time. Indeed, after his bread was 
 baked, his work was nearly over for the day. He had 
 to set the sponge at night, ready for next day's batch. 
 But that occupied comparatively little time. Meanwhile 
 he was busy with his books and his studies. 
 
 He did not make any companions. He had never 
 felt much of the comforts of home. His social nature 
 had been almost soured there. The feeling never left 
 him, but clung to him through life. He therefore 
 roamed about by himself along the shore, or studied 
 by himself in his solitary household. 
 
 He reverted to his study of botany, though it might 
 not be supposed that Thurso was a fit place for such 
 a study. The neighbourhood was without trees, with- 
 out hedges with only flagstones dividing one field from 
 another. Yet the seeing eye is never without proper 
 aliment. It finds wonders in everything. Where the 
 unseeing eye sees nothing, it detects differences, and 
 varieties, and classifications. But he did not as yet go 
 
 * In a specimen of fucoid, about two and a half feet in length, which 
 I owe to the kindness of Mr. Dick of Thurso, there are stems continu- 
 ous throughout, that though they ramify into from six to eight branches 
 in that space, they are quite as thick at top as at bottom. They are 
 the remains, in all probability, of a long flexible fucoid, like those 
 fucoids of the intertropical seas, that, streaming slantwise in the tide, 
 rise not uufrequently to the surface in fifteen and twenty fathoms water. 
 HUGH MILLER, Rambles of a Geologist.
 
 CHAP. v. THE SEA SHORE. 43 
 
 deeply into the subject, for he could not afford to buy 
 books. Nevertheless, he accurately distinguished the 
 differences of one plant from another. The further 
 pursuit of botany was held in reserve for some future 
 time. 
 
 About two years after Robert Dick had begun 
 business in Thurso, his father was promoted to the office 
 of Collector of Excise, and was removed to Haddington, 
 where he ended his official career. His eldest sister 
 Agnes married Mr. Alexander, and afterwards removed 
 to Tullibody. When all the family had left, Eobert was 
 left alone literally alone. He then took into his 
 service Annie Mackay, a Highland woman, who served 
 him long and faithfully to the close of his life. She 
 was his housekeeper, and attended to the shop while 
 Dick was on his journeys through Caithness. 
 
 Yet Robert, though alone, was not solitary. Nature 
 was all in all to him. He enjoyed his walks along the 
 sea-shore, and sang to himself as he went along. He 
 wandered about Dunnet Head, and the rocky cliffs at 
 Holborn Head. He saw many things that had never 
 been seen before. He detected the scales of fish, and 
 even the heads of fossil fish amongst the rocks. 
 
 The Clett on Holborn Head was one of his favourite 
 spots. It is a huge isolated mass of rock, composed of 
 dark flagstone. It is inaccessible by human foot. The 
 rock is quite perpendicular. The surges of the ocean 
 have washed it away from the mainland. It is screaming 
 with sea birds. Miles away you hear the cries of the 
 okies, or auks, which haunt it. They sit in long rows,
 
 44 THE COUNTRY INLAND. CHAP. v. 
 
 " like a lot of bottles on end," as Dick described them, 
 on the ledges of the Clett, and there they 'breed and 
 bring up their young. 
 
 Here, as on the east coast, great Goes are found. The 
 sea dashes in through the washable rocks, and drives up 
 in clouds of vapour far inland. One of the Goes is 
 about three miles in length. In great storms the sea 
 deluges the whole headland, and pours back in clouds of 
 spray. In some places the rocks are hollowed into 
 arches by the surge, and in great gales the sea pours 
 into them with a rush of foam. To the west of Holborn 
 Head there is a long line of projecting headlands, and 
 in a clear day Cape Wrath may be seen some fifty 
 miles off. There is no land between you and the coasts 
 of Labrador nothing but the boundless ocean. 
 
 Dick also explored the country inland. The river 
 Thurso was the scene of some of his future discoveries. 
 He went far up to the castle of Dirlot, one of the oldest 
 buildings in Caithness. He went up the hills near 
 Thurso, from which he saw the gigantic Morven far away 
 in the distance. He visited the Eeay hills and the Shurery 
 hills, which were afterwards his favourite botanic 
 grounds. He was thus laying the foundations of his 
 future knowledge, not only in botanical, but in geological 
 science. 
 
 In the meantime he turned aside to pursue the study 
 of entomology. Here his seeing eye was of great use ;o 
 him. He worked out the natural history of the insects of 
 Caithness from his own personal observation. Notliing 
 escaped him. He collected no less than 256 specimens
 
 CHAP. v. BEETLE GATHERING. 45 
 
 of beetles in nine months, in fact, all that could be 
 collected in Caithness. He collected 220 specimens 
 of bees, and 240 specimens of butterflies and moths. 
 These are all to be seen in the Thurso Museum. They 
 are now covered with living moths, grubs, and woodlice, 
 and fast going to decay. 
 
 The boys soon found out the strange baker and his 
 ongoings. Boys are great critics. They immediately 
 detect nonconformity. When they saw Dick coming out 
 of his shop in his chimney-pot hat, his swallow-tailed 
 coat, and jean trousers, they were immediately after 
 him. They followed him at a little distance. He went 
 up the green sward alongside the river ; knelt down on 
 his knees ; crawled onward ; and then brought his hand 
 slap down. It was perhaps some insect that he had 
 been long seeking for. The boys saw him take off his 
 hat, put in the object, perhaps impaling it with a pin. 
 
 When Dick went away, the boys went up to the spot 
 to see what he had been about. They found nothing 
 whatever, only green grass. They did not know that 
 Dick had found a splendid beetle. They went home to 
 their friends, and told them what they had seen. It 
 thus became known that he was an insect-collector. 
 What could he want with the beetles and grubs ? Surely 
 he could not put them into his bread ! Faugh ! Then 
 they whispered about that they had got a mad baker 
 amongst them. 
 
 Dick, however, made friends of the boys. He said to 
 them, "Whenever you can find a rare butterfly, bring it to 
 me, and I will give you something for it. If it be in
 
 46 THE DRAGON FLY. CHAP. v. 
 
 any way injured I will not have it." Away the boys 
 went hunting butterflies. Sometimes they brought him 
 in a good specimen, and he gave them sixpence for it. 
 Sixpence was a fortune to them. It bought no end of 
 tops, clagum, and sweeties. If the butterfly was of no 
 use, he would take it in his hand, and let it out of the 
 back window. " Perhaps," he said, " they may bring 
 something valuable next time." When an unusual 
 butterfly was brought to him, he took great care of it, 
 saw it go through its various transformations, and noted 
 the results. s 
 
 His love of insects became known, and his curiosity 
 about them spread throughout the neighbourhood. 
 Country people called upon him and brought what they 
 thought rare things. One day a man called upon him, 
 and, standing right before him, took out of his pocket a 
 paper lucifer box, and cautiously screwing off the lid, he 
 said " See !" Dick looked into the box, and seizing the 
 creature within it by the tail, he pulled it out, and then 
 shoved it in again. " Won't it sting ?" asked the man. 
 " Oh, no," said Dick, " it is a very humble creature, 
 only the Green Dragon My : it lives by devouring small 
 flies." " Oh !" said the man, " the country folks call it 
 the Bull Adder, and they say that it stings." " I 
 wouldn't have taken it by the tail if it did." "Won't you 
 have it ?" " No !" The man accordingly went away 
 with the dragon-fly in his box. 
 
 Robert Dick's mind was athirst for knowledge at this 
 time. He was searching for facts of all sorts. In 1835 
 he attended three courses of lectures delivered by Mr.
 
 CHAP. v. PHRENOLOGY. 47 
 
 Keir. They were upon astronomy, geology, and phreno- 
 logy. He was greatly interested by the lectures. He 
 not only heard them closely, but followed them up by 
 study. He was particularly impressed by the lectures 
 on astronomy. Halley's Comet was then careering 
 through the heavens. Appearing, as it did, once in every 
 seventy-five years, it was calculated to make a deep 
 impression upon his thoughtful mind. 
 
 He borrowed such books on astronomy as he could 
 obtain, and read them eagerly. He thus gathered a 
 general notion of the subject ; but he had no means of 
 following it up. Telescopes were unknown at Thurso. 
 He could only look up to the heavens, and admire and 
 wonder. He was thus in a measure forced to inquire 
 into such matters as lay within his own reach. He was 
 sent back to mother earth, the secrets of which still 
 remained to be unveiled. Hence his love for geology, 
 and the beginning of his knowledge of the rocks of 
 Thurso, which he first obtained from Keir's lectures. 
 
 Phrenology also excited his deep interest. The sub- 
 ject had been made popular throughout Scotland by 
 the lectures and works, and probably by the personal 
 influence, of George Combe of Edinburgh. Though the 
 " science," as it was then called, is now nearly forgotten, 
 it was then the subject of much discussion. George 
 Combe started the Phrenological Magazine to advocate 
 his views, and to maintain the principles of phrenology. 
 He also established the Phrenological Lecture Hall and 
 Museum, where he collected an immense number of 
 busts of distinguished and notorious characters.
 
 BOTANY. 
 
 Dick, in his enthusiasm, had his head shaved, and a 
 cast was taken of it in plaster of Paris. He gave half 
 a crown to a brave little girl, and induced her to have 
 her head shaved; after which he made a cast of her 
 head in the usual way. He sent to Edinburgh and had 
 a phrenological cranium from O'Neil, the famous cast- 
 maker. Writing to his eldest sister, he said, " Mind, 
 Nan, that when you seek for a wife for Robert, you must 
 find one with a high forehead. None else are genuine." 
 
 But Eobert could not go on looking at people's heads, 
 and studying their development. Big heads and little 
 heads, big bumps and little bumps, seemed a profitless 
 study. So he condescended to study more practical 
 subjects, things that lie at every man's door. He could 
 no ': grasp the heavens. He could understand the planetary 
 system ; but he could not unravel the deeper meanings 
 of the vast circle cf creation. He could, however, de- 
 scend to the things that lay at his feet, to his commoD 
 mother earth, which is as full of wonders as the stars. 
 He could pursue his first love, the love of flowers and 
 plants, which he had pursued while wandering among 
 the Ochil hills. 
 
 Dick was still a bachelor. He had a house and a' 
 shop to manage ; and some of his friends advised him to 
 marry. His old master, Mr. Aikman of Tullibody, writing 
 to him in 1834, said : " Mrs. Aikman sends her kind 
 respects to you. She is happy to think that you are 
 still a bachelor, as her family is mostly girls." Another 
 friend at Greenock, where Dick had lived when a 
 journeyman, wrote to him thus : " My wife sends her
 
 CHAP. v. BISCUIT MAKING. 43 
 
 best wishes. She hopes you will soon get married. You 
 are losing time completely. If you wait much longer I 
 will be speaking to you about my daughter. We are 
 beating up. We have two married already. Come, 
 come, look sharp!" But the fly, however skilfully 
 thrown, could not draw the fish from his depths. 
 
 We have been informed that Eobert once made a 
 proposal of marriage to a young lady, but that she refused 
 him. Some overtures of reconciliation were afterwards 
 made. But he had been refused once; he would 
 not be refused again. The disappointment only threw 
 him back upon himself. He became more recluse, soli- 
 tary, and companionless, than before. He was satisfied 
 to remain unmarried, with Annie Mackay as his servant 
 and housekeeper. 
 
 Among the things which occupied Dick's attention, 
 was a mechanical method which he proposed for work- 
 ing up his biscuit, instead of using the baker's rail. For 
 it must be known that he was the best biscuit-maker in 
 Thurso. He had brought this art from Tullibody. Be- 
 sides, his master sent him the proper receipts for the 
 different kinds of biscuit and " parlyment." In making 
 biscuit, the practice is to work the dough in the trough ; 
 the baker sitting on a rail, bumping the stuff up and 
 down in a radiating manner. Dick thought this might 
 as well be done by machinery. He got a mechanic to 
 help him to perfect the machine ; but though it was 
 completed, it was not used. His trade was not great ; 
 and he found that his own hands were amply sufficient 
 for the purpose of making his daily bread.
 
 CHAPTEE VI 
 BOTANICAL WANDERINGS. 
 
 ROBERT DICK proceeded with his study of natural 
 science. From conchology he went on to entomology 
 and botany. He gathered insects while he collected 
 plants. They both lay in the same beat. After his 
 bread was baked in the morning and ready for sale, 
 he left the shop to the care of his housekeeper, and 
 went out upon a search. Or, he would take a journey 
 to the moors and mountains, and return home at night 
 to prepare for the next day's baking. 
 
 He began to' make his entomological collection about 
 the year 1836, when he was about twenty- five years 
 old. He worked so hard at the subject, and made so 
 many excursions through the country, that in about 
 nine months he had collected nearly all the insect tribes 
 that Caithness contained. He spent nearly every 
 moment that he could spare until he thought he had 
 exhausted the field. 
 
 He worked out the subject from his own personal 
 observation. He was one of those men who would not 
 take anything for granted. Books were an essential 
 end ; but his knowledge was not founded on books, but 
 on Nature. He must inquire, search, and observe for
 
 CHAP. vi. CAREFUL OBSERVATION. 51 
 
 himself. He was not satisfied with the observations of 
 others. He must get at the actual facts. He must 
 himself verify everything stated in books. 
 
 He was not satisfied with the common opinion as 
 to the species or genus to which any individual of the 
 insect world belonged. He tested and tried everything 
 by the touchstone of science and careful observation. 
 If he had any doubts about an insect, from a gnat to a 
 dragon-fly, he would search out the grub, watch the 
 process of its development from the larva and chrysalis 
 state, until the fly emerged before him in unquestion- 
 able identity. It will thus be observed that he was 
 from the first imbued with the true scientific animu? ; 
 and in the same spirit he continued to find out and 
 discover the true workings of Nature. 
 
 The Thurso people did not quite understand the 
 proceedings of their young baker. He made good bread, 
 and his biscuits were the best in the town. But he 
 was sometimes seen coming back from the country 
 bespattered with mud, perhaps after a forty or fifty 
 miles' journey on the moors in search of specimens. 
 What were they to make of this extraordinary conduct ? 
 It could have no connection with baking. What could 
 he have been doing during these long journeys ? 
 
 He was now doing fairly in business. He was not 
 yet distracted by the competition that afterwards ruined 
 him. His wants were very small. He had only him- 
 self and his housekeeper to provide for. He was 
 accordingly able to save money, and with his surplus 
 capital he bought books.
 
 52 PURCHASES OF BOOKS. 
 
 "How painfully, how slowly," he once said in a 
 letter to Hugh Miller, "man accumulates knowledge! 
 How easily, how quickly, it escapes and is gone ! 
 Blessings on the noble art of printing, under the shadow 
 of whose dominion, thoughts, words, and deeds, are 
 piled up like the proliferous corn of old in the store- 
 houses of Pharaoh ! " 
 
 Dick was now buying his flour from a merchant in 
 Leith. He requests the merchant to send him books as 
 well as flour. The books were purchased, packed in 
 paper in the centre of the bags, and despatched to 
 Thurso, by way of Aberdeen, Wick, and the Pentland 
 Firth. We find him thus receiving the Gardener's 
 Dictionary, the Naturalist's Magazine, and the Flori- 
 graphia Britannica. He also directs the flour merchant 
 to buy him a microscope, and to send it him as soon as 
 possible. Hie correspondent says, "I have at length 
 bought for you the long-wished-for microscope. It is a 
 very powerful one. I hope you will find yourself 
 amply rewarded for your time and expense." The 
 microscope was despatched in July 1835, and it reached 
 Dick in safety. He found that, in the course of his 
 investigations into the minutiae of objects, he could not 
 do without the microscope. 
 
 The flour merchant afterwards sent Dick numerous 
 volumes of the Naturalist's Library, and bought for him a 
 copy of Hogarth's Works, the large edition, with the 
 original plates restored. We find, from the bill of 
 lading accompanying the flour and the volume, that its 
 oinding cost Dick two guineas. Other books, relating
 
 CHAP. vi. A DEVOURING READER. 53 
 
 principally to botany, conchology, and geology, shortly 
 followed. Sometimes a phrenological cast from O'Neil 
 was imbedded in the flour. We find, from the com- 
 munications that passed between the correspondents, 
 that Dick paid his accounts promptly, usually within 
 a fortnight after the delivery of the flour. 
 
 When the books arrived at Thurso, and were 
 unearthed from the flour, Dick set to work and devoured 
 them. For Dick was a great reader, almost a ferocious 
 reader. He read everything about air, earth, sea, and 
 heaven, as the multitude of books collected by him 
 sufficiently indicate. He had plenty of leisure. When 
 his bread was baked, and ready for sale, he had nothing 
 else to do for the day but read and wander. When the 
 weather was wet and stormy, as it often was, he read, 
 drew, and wrote letters to far-away friends. For he 
 had many correspondents, as the following pages will 
 show. 
 
 When the weather was fine, he set out on his walks, 
 along the shore, or up the country, sometimes as far as 
 Morven. '"Many is the walk," says one of his old 
 acquaintances, " which I have enjoyed in his company on 
 the sea-beach near Thurso Castle. I was once with him, 
 when I found a new shell, and it was truly delightful to 
 hear him explain its history and habits, as if it had been 
 his next-door neighbour, and he had known the tiny 
 thing all his life long. How kindly and meekly he 
 spoke, and how ready he was for a joke; and what 
 a keen perception he had of the ridiculous in everything 
 ihat crossed his observation. The same night we also 
 4
 
 54 HIS WALKING POWERS. CHAP. vi. 
 
 found a curious sort of nut, which he told me had been 
 carried by the ocean currents and prevailing winds all 
 the way from the West Indies, and was cast up 011 the 
 beach just below Thurso Castle." 
 
 " On another occasion," says the same writer, " I 
 walked with him on a botanical excursion, as far as I 
 
 OLD THURSO CASTLE : FROM THE SHORE. 
 
 could, up the Thurso river; and I am not far from the 
 truth when I say that he talked all the way. ' I begin 
 slowly,' he said, referring to his walking, 'but we'll 
 improve before long,' and so it proved; for before he 
 had reached Oldfield he had got into a four-miles-an- 
 hour pace, and by the time we reached Isauld it was a 
 regular trot and race down the banks and across the 
 river to one of his favourite haunts. I cannot now
 
 HIS LONELY JOURNEY. 55 
 
 remember what were the special prizes of the excursion, 
 though I well remember that we came home richly 
 loaded with things, to me rich and rare, which, with his 
 usual kindness, he named and labelled for me next day. 
 After a lapse of more than sixteen years, I lighted 
 accidentally one day on a pile of plants, collected princi- 
 pally in Caithness, and forming my first herbarium. It 
 had passed through the hands of Mr. Dick, and bears his 
 sign-manual on every sheet. Any one would say it is 
 the handwriting of an educated man a bold, full, 
 fluent hand without any trace of the crampedness and 
 angularity of those who earn their bread by manual toil. 
 Besides, the technical names of the plants are always 
 spelt correctly." 
 
 But it was very seldom that he made his botanical 
 excursions with others. He almost invariably went 
 alone. When he had arranged his work, and had a 
 journey in view, he had everything in order by the hour 
 that he intended to set out ; and then nothing would 
 detain him. When about to start on a long journey, he 
 wore thick-soled boots, with hob-nails in them. He 
 soaked his stockings with water ; and when he came to 
 a burn he soaked them again. He took with him some 
 ship biscuit, which was easily carried. This constituted 
 his principal refreshment during his long journeys. The 
 burn or the mountain tarn supplied beverage enough for 
 one of the most temperate and enduring of men. " I 
 never drink much when travelling," he used to say. "It 
 takes the wind out of me, and seriously interferes with 
 my comfort and endurance/''
 
 56 SPRING IN THE NORTH. CHAP. vr. 
 
 How he delighted in spring ! He welcomed its 
 approach with joy. The winters were usually cold and 
 stormy. The cold winds blew violently over Caithness, 
 and prevented any green thing appearing on the surface. 
 But Dick was up before the sun was up. He was out 
 before the flowers were out. He watched them thrust- 
 ing their way upwards into the air, watched them while 
 they blossomed into flowers, and watched them while 
 they shrank into decay. 
 
 Spring is late in the north. Even at the beginning 
 of May the earth is still brown. Only in some sheltered 
 spots by the river-side are any green things to be seen. 
 There are very few hedges near Thurso. " On the 4th of 
 May," says Dick, " the buds are only swelling. There 
 is no ' May blossom ' in Caithness. Even at the end of 
 May the few hedges are not in full leaf." The first 
 flowers that appear are the yellow Coltsfoot, the yellow 
 Primrose, the yellow Buttercup, the Marsh Marigold, 
 the little yellow Celandine, and a few blue flowers ot 
 the Dog Violet. These are all the beauties of the 
 northern flora in May. The cold winds are still sweep- 
 ing over the county. 
 
 Dick went out one morning at the end of May, 
 towards the Eeay hills, to see how the flowers were 
 growing. The morning was cold and cheerless. The 
 flag fences along the road were hung with rain pearls. 
 When he reached the Reay links, he found the ground 
 covered with cowslips. From thence he went up the 
 hills to the waterfall to gather ferns. They were only 
 beginning to expand. The summer moss, Polytrichum
 
 CHAP. vi. FERNS IN JUNE. 57 
 
 was there in thousands. By and by everything would 
 be in bloom. 
 
 Even on the 24th of June midsummer day 
 the ferns were not fully out. " The first fern I saw," 
 says Dick, " was Lastrea dilatata, but it was so ugly that 
 it was not worth looking at a second time. The next I 
 saw was Asplenium trichomanes, or Common Maiden 
 Hair ; but the specimens were too small for my pur- 
 pose. The next was the Black-stalked Spleenwort. I 
 passed through a forest of brackens, and saw the Northern 
 Hard Fern, and the Black Bog-rush a plant rare in 
 Scotland, even on the west coast. I passed on and went 
 up-hill, where I saw the Beech Fern and many other 
 plants, of which European Sanicle was the most abun- 
 dant. It was once thought to cure every disease, and 
 was called ' Self-heal.' I saw the Common Polypody, 
 and the Oak Polypody. Up the hill the Foxglove was 
 the most conspicuous. I also found "Woodruff, Spotted- 
 leaved Hawkweed, and Persian Willow; white roses and 
 red roses ; and other plants too numerous to mention. 
 I wound along by a sheep-road to the hill-top, and lay 
 down, looking across the dead level of the county. I 
 counted thirteen lochs ! " 
 
 At the beginning of July, he adds, "We are just 
 getting into first-rate order here as to wild plants. We 
 shall by and by have a grand display of yellow flowers 
 all yellow ; tens of thousands, and ten times ten, 
 all destined to pass away after fulfilling the great end 
 for which they came into flower leaving seed for times 
 to come times without end."
 
 58 CAITHNESS FLORA. 
 
 On the 24th of July he says, " Now it gets warmer. 
 The corn becomes half full of marigold. The heather 
 begins to bloom. I made for the seaside," he adds, 
 " and found a butterfly sleeping on the heather ! Poor 
 thing !" As the summer heat increases, the Caithness 
 grasses, plants, and flowers, make their appearance in 
 succession. " People in the south," says Dick, " think 
 that as Caithness is so far north, its flora must differ 
 greatly from that in their own neighbourhood. No 
 doubt the general aspect of a district in the south 
 differs very strikingly in its prominent features. And 
 yet, after all, we have very few plants that may not also 
 be found in the south. 
 
 " The Caithness flora is not alpine not even sub- 
 alpine. I know of only three Baltic plants in Caith- 
 ness ; and of these only one is a rarity. Indeed it is 
 peculiar to Caithness ; for Caithness is the only British 
 district in which it grows. We have the Baltic rush by 
 the river-side. But then Juncus balticus grows at Barry 
 Sands, near Dundee. Last summer, I was much pleased 
 to meet the Baltic rush growing in a small marsh about 
 six miles inland. I was highly delighted. I had never 
 seen it so far from the sea." 
 
 Robert Dick proceeded with the study of botany in 
 the most resolute way. He would take nothing for 
 granted. Where others had observed, he also would 
 observe, and verify for himself. Hence, with the 
 utmost toil and labour, he wandered over Caithness, to 
 see the plants growing in their native habitats. He 
 must find them where they grew, and study them, from
 
 CHAP. vi. THE NORTHERN MIDSUMMER. 59 
 
 time to time, on the spot. He determined to master 
 the entire subject. He mapped out the country into 
 districts, and resolved carefully to examine each of them 
 in turn. It was a long and arduous work, but he suc- 
 cessfully carried out his purpose. At length the plants 
 of Caithness, from one end of the county to the other 
 from the Morven hills in the south to Dunnet Head 
 in the north from Noss Head in the east to Halladale 
 Head in the west became as familiar to him as the 
 faces of familiar friends. 
 
 The banks of the river Thurso were among his favourite 
 haunts. He searched the valley in its remotest nooks, 
 from its source in Bencheilt to its entrance into the 
 sea at Thurso. The flats along its serpentine course 
 abound in plants and grasses, which he scanned with the 
 true naturalist's eye. During the long summer nights, 
 when " day never darkens into mirk," he would make 
 journeys of forty or fifty miles, for the purpose of gather- 
 ing some favourite plant in its far-off native habitat. 
 He would return home in glory, bringing with him a 
 stem of grass, a flower, or a bulb. 
 
 During midsummer time in the north, it is light 
 nearly all the night through. The sun slightly descends 
 below the horizon, but the light still remains. Farther 
 north, the sun is seen at midnight. When it rises in 
 Caithness, the morning is a prolonged dawn. An eloquent 
 writer says, " The earth is most beautiful at dawn ; but 
 so very few people see it, and the few that do are 
 almost all of them labourers, whose eyes have no sight 
 for that wonderful peace, and coolness, and unspeakable
 
 60 SOLITUDE NOT LONELINESS. CHAP. vi. 
 
 sense of rest and hope which He like a blessing on the 
 land. I think if people oftener saw the break of day 
 they would vow oftener to keep that dawning day holy 
 and would not so often let its fair hours drift away with 
 nothing done that were not best left undone." 
 
 Dick had many a long and lonely walk at sunset, at 
 dawn, and even at midnight. And yet he was not 
 lonely. His love of nature made a paradise of that bare 
 north country. His solitude was not loneliness. Solitude, 
 to him, was sweet society. He felt the companionship 
 of nature about him on the moors, in the mountains, 
 and along the sea-shore. On calm evenings, when the sea 
 was at rest, he walked along the sands. The sea, though 
 quiet, seemed to breathe. It was like a living thing 
 like a creature at rest. 
 
 Dick was an insatiable wanderer. When he had 
 done his daily work, and the weather was fine, he set 
 out on his botanical excursions. The county was all 
 before him. He would go to the Reay hills in search 
 of ferns ; or up the Thurso river in search of plants and 
 grasses ; or to the extreme point of Dunnet Head. His 
 eyes were always open to receive new impressions. 
 He wondered at the infinite varieties of nature, even in 
 that cold bare country. The lines written by Longfellow 
 upon another great lover of nature, are quite as appli- 
 cable to Dick : 
 
 " And he wandered away and away 
 
 With Nature, the dear old nurse, 
 Who sang to him night and day 
 The rhymes of the universe.
 
 CHAP. vi. JO Y ON THE MOORS. 61 
 
 " And whenever the way seemed long, 
 
 Or his heart began to fail, 
 She would sing a more wonderful song, 
 Or tell a more marvellous tale." 
 
 He was more joyful on the moors than amid the 
 noise of streets. There he was alone with himself. 
 Not a sound was to be heard as he trudged along, save 
 the beating of his own heart not a voice save that of 
 heaven. The clouds threw their purple shadows over 
 the moor. The grouse flew up with a whirr, whirr! 
 The blue mountain hare flew past him, though there 
 was no danger to be apprehended from him. 
 
 The deluge sometimes caught him. One afternoon, in 
 August, he walked thirty-two miles amidst soaking rain. 
 He had gone up to the top of a mountain, and found 
 only a plant of white heather. He walked and ran all 
 the way back, through moors, mosses, and heather, 
 jumping the flagstone fences ; and at last reached home 
 after nine and a half hours' walking and running. Yet 
 he was up next morning at six, and went through his 
 day's work as usual. 
 
 The following is a pleasanter day's adventure. It 
 was written to his sister at the end of August : " Since 
 I wrote you last, I have managed to walk thirty-six 
 miles. Long, long ago, I chanced to find a Fern eighteen 
 miles up the country. It was not new, consequently 
 not a discovery ; but it was as good as such to me. It 
 had never crossed me in all my wanderings, or rather I 
 had never found it until then. No one told me where 
 it grew, for the best of reasons that no one knew,
 
 A HIGHLAND GLEN. 
 
 Since I first found it, I have every year gone a- walking 
 to it, just to visii it, again and again. Tliis year, I have 
 been there and back. The fern is very small : I enclose 
 a specimen. It is the Rue-leaved, or Wall Spleenwort. 
 The rocky spot in which it grows contains many other 
 ferns, some of them not at all common. 
 
 " Besides the wild rocky scenery of the place, there 
 is the only approach to a Highland glen which we have 
 in Caitliness. You set out from Thurso, and for the 
 first three or four miles there is nothing but corn and 
 bere on each side of the road ; and in dry leas, showers 
 of yellow Crowfoots and Ragworts ; with here and there 
 the blue heads of Scabious, or yellow Dandelions, or 
 yellow Hawkbits. All is yellow, yellow, dashed here 
 and there with masses of purple heath, redder by far 
 than you can possibly imagine. 
 
 " On you go? .diverting the time as you best can, foi 
 all is wonderful. Then, at the distance of ten miles 
 from Thurso, you are on a hill-top, and you stand and 
 look around you. It is sweet to stand on a hill-top, and 
 gaze far up the country. Southwards you see farther 
 than you will ever wander. Of course you cannot tell 
 in words all that you see. You gaze eastward, north- 
 ward, and westward ; and then, after satiating yourself 
 with the prospect, you move down the farther side of 
 the hill, and get onward. Twelve miles, thirteen miles, 
 and many wonders are to be seen. And in due time 
 you get among the heather heather everywhere and 
 water black to drink. After going a mile through a 
 moor, you find yourself all at once on the brink of a
 
 CHAP. vi. A LONELY MOOR. 63 
 
 precipice. You look down, and the waters are tumbling 
 and surging below; you are satisfied, and could sing 
 with joy too. After a time, I went my way home- 
 wards." 
 
 Dick often relieved his solitary moments by writing 
 to his sister, then living at Haddington. She had com- 
 plained to him of her lowness of spirits, when he thus 
 wrote : " Cheer up, cheer up, my bonnie sister, and I 
 will tell you a story. One fine summer evening, not 
 long ago, your brother set out for the far-away hills. 
 He had been there before. The sun's heat was strong 
 when he set out (it was then August), but on he went, 
 past bothies, and houses, and milestones, until he was 
 'o'er the muir amang the heather.' Then past burns 
 and lochs, up a hill and over a hill, through a bog and 
 through a mire, until the sun set, and still he was toil- 
 ing on, with a long, long moor before him. 
 
 " Have you ever been all alone on a dreary moor, 
 when the shadows of the coming darkness are settling 
 down, and the cold clammy fog goes creeping up the 
 hill before you ? It is hard work and very uncanny 
 walking to pick your steps, as there is no proper light to 
 guide you. For you must remember that moors are not 
 bowling-greens or finely-smoothed lawns. They may 
 be flowery paths, it is true, but very rough ones, full of 
 man-traps, jags, and holes, into which, if you once get, 
 you may with difficulty wade your way out again. 
 
 "But on I went, hop, step, and, jump, now up, 
 now down, huffing and puffing, with my heart rapping 
 against my breast like the clapper of a mill. Then
 
 64 A HILL-TOP AT NIGHT. 
 
 everything around looked so queer and so quiet, with 
 the mist growing so thick that it was difficult to distin- 
 guish one hill from another. Had I not been intimately 
 acquainted with every knowe and hillock of the country 
 through which I was travelling, I never could have got 
 through it. But, cheer up ! never lose heart ! There's 
 the little loch at last, and there's the hill ! Ay, but 
 your work's not done yet. You must climb the hill, for 
 what you seek is only upon its very top. 
 
 "It's rough work running through a moor, but it 
 takes your wind clean out of you to climb the hill that 
 lies beyond it. Were you ever up a hill-top at night, 
 your lee lane, with the mist swooping about you and 
 drooking your whiskers and eyebrows ? I daresay no. 
 But up this hill I had to clamber on my hands and 
 knees to find the plants that I had come in search of. 
 Yes ! I found them, though I was not quite sure until 
 the sun had rise*n to enlighten me. Then I found that 
 I had made out my point 
 
 "The light enabled me to make my way downhill. 
 Feeling thirsty, as well I might, I clambered over rocks, 
 and braes, and heather, to a very pretty loch at the hill- 
 foot. Picking my steps to a place full of large stones, I 
 came to a pair of them where I stooped down into the 
 clear water and drank my filL It is a grand thing to 
 dip your nose down into the water like a bird, with the 
 shingle and gravel lying below you, and then take your 
 early morning drink. 
 
 " But 1 have no time to say out my say. Only this, 
 sister, only this : never lose heart in the thickest mists
 
 CHAP. vi. JOURNEY TO MORVEN. 65 
 
 you should ever get into ; but take heart, for assuredly 
 the sun will rise again, and roll them up and away, to 
 be seen no more." 
 
 In a future letter to his sister, written on the 12th 
 of November, he thus describes his journey to Morven 
 top : 
 
 "On Tuesday last I set out at two o'clock in the 
 morning to go to the top of Morven. Morven is a hill 
 to the south of this, and by measurement on the map 
 28 miles as the crow flies. But taking into account the 
 windings and turnings of the road up hill, down hill, 
 and along valleys it is a good deal more : say 32 miles 
 from Thurso to Morven top. 
 
 " For the first 18 miles I had a road : the rest of 
 the way was round lochs, across burns, through mires 
 and marshes, horrid bogs, and hummocky heaths. I 
 tucked up my trousers, and felt quite at ease, though I 
 was ankle deep, and often deeper, for fifteen minutes on 
 end, and sometimes more. When I had a marsh to 
 wade I had it level, but when I had heather I had an 
 awful amount of jumping. ... At last, however, I 
 found myself on the top of the famous Morven. 
 
 " The Caithness people have few hills. They think a 
 mighty deal of Morven and Maiden Pap and Skerry Ben. 
 But these hills are not much to boast of. They are none 
 of them as big as books make them, and I laughed when 
 I thought of what people had said to me about this 
 wonderful Morven. One said that it was so very high 
 that it would take half a day to climb from the toot of 
 the hill to the top. Another account, given in a book,
 
 66 MORVEN TOP. 
 
 stated that Morven could only be ascended from the 
 west side, being totally inaccessible on all other sides. 
 Downright nonsense! Morven is accessible on every 
 
 " My object in ascending the hill was to gather 
 plants, and of course I went up the steepest face to get 
 among the crags and stones near the top. Morven is 
 poor in plants. I found nothing new. True, the 
 season was too far gone, but there in sheltered spots 
 many of them still lived. On the top Alchemilla alpina 
 was in flower. I observed from the decayed leaves on 
 all sides that the various species were not many. 
 Braalnabin, a much lower hill, and much nearer to Thurso, 
 is better for ferns. Two weeks since I went there and 
 got nine different ferns all in bloom, though none of 
 them were new to me. 
 
 " Strange it was to look around me. The day was 
 cold and stormy. The sun was shining above me, but a 
 snowstorm was battling far below. Skerry Ben was 
 grey-white with snow. The sound of the wind among 
 the crags was like the roaring of the sea along the shore. 
 
 "I reached Morven top at eleven o'clock A.M. and 
 left it at two P.M.* It was now mid-day. The river of 
 Berridale runs at the foot of Morven. The best way 
 of getting over it is to wade through it ; but what of 
 that ? The Highlandman walks best when his feet are 
 wet, and so does the Lowlandman, if he could only be 
 persuaded to try. In going to Morven I had waded no 
 fewer than six burns, and at least a score of marshes. 
 My feet had not been dry since seven in the morning.
 
 MORTEN MOUNTAIN.
 
 WIND AND FIRE. 67 
 
 It was all the same to me which way I took. 'Onward !' 
 was the word. And yet the light of day was gone and 
 the moon was up, long long before I gained a civilised 
 road. 
 
 " The night became windy and stormy. Tremendous 
 sheets of hailstones and rain impeded my progress, so 
 much so that I thought, as Burns says, that ' the deil had 
 business on his hand,' and that he was determined to 
 finish my course with Morven. But no ! In spite of 
 hail, rain, wind, and fire (in fact I had them all), I got 
 home at three o'clock on Wednesday morning, having 
 walked, with little halt, for about twenty-four hours. I 
 went to bed, slept till seven o'clock, then rose, and went 
 to my work as usual. Sixty miles is a good walk to 
 look at a hill. Oh, those plants, those weary plants ! " 
 
 On one of his midnight excursions Dick was taken 
 for a poacher. It may be mentioned that the rivei 
 Thurso is one of the best salmon rivers in Scotland, 
 Indeed, in early spring, there is no river that comes up to 
 it. Sir John Sinclair boasted that on one occasion 2500 
 salmon had been caught at one haul a draught that has 
 never been exceeded. The price paid by the salmon- 
 fishers is so high at present 20 per rod monthly 
 that the river is carefully watched to prevent poaching. 
 
 One night a gentleman in charge of the river went 
 out to see that the keepers were doing their duty, and 
 also to detect the poachers if he could. He went to a 
 particular spot where there were evident traces of poach- 
 ing. The river was then in good poaching order. 
 
 Just at the break of day, an hour or more before sun-
 
 68 STALKING A POACHER. CHAP. vi. 
 
 rise, the watcher saw the figure of a man on the horizon, 
 some hundred yards distant. He shrank down, and crept 
 forward, watching the man's movements in the grey 
 dawn of morn. He was seen close by the river's side, 
 prowling up and down the banks. Surely this must be 
 a poacher. The man moved on. When he appeared 
 on some liigh bank, the watcher hid himself so that he 
 might not be seen between him and the horizon. He 
 crawled forward on all fours, stalking the poacher as 
 he would a deer. 
 
 At last, after nearly two hours' stalking and dodging, 
 the man suddenly disappeared in some low crevices in 
 the rocks, just below Dirlot Bridge. The sun was just 
 rising ; the watcher saw him crouching down, as if 
 hiding something amongst the ferns. Of course it must 
 be a salmon ! -With beating heart, he suddenly rushed 
 up to the man," and shouted, "Now I have caught you 
 poaching!" 
 
 The man's back was towards him. He was intently 
 gazing on some object before him. He turned round in 
 a composed manner, and said, " No, sir, I am not poach- 
 ing ; I am only gathering some specimens of plants !" 
 He then opened his handkerchief, which contained some 
 herbs, plants, and flowers. The watcher was disap- 
 pointed and disgusted. He had been crawling for two 
 hours on his hands and knees, coming up with his 
 man, and finding in his possession, not a salmon, but a 
 lot of things which, in his estimation, were worse than 
 useless ! 
 
 Dick was then sixteen miles from Thurso, He had
 
 CHAP. vi. THE STALKER DISAPPOINTED. 69 
 
 left home at midnight in search of his favourite botanical 
 specimens. Some of them were so minute and delicate 
 that they could only be seen at sun-dawn. It was only 
 at the break of day that they unfolded their delicate 
 tints, spread their leaves, and put forth their lovely 
 blossoms to the rising sun perhaps revealed to the per- 
 fervid botanist by the glistening of a dew-drop. 
 
 Thus Dick was rewarded, but not the salmon-watcher 
 who had stalked him.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 DISCOVERS THE "HOLY GRASS." 
 
 " IT is surely," said Dick to a Mend, " a strange time we 
 live in, when a poor devil cannot gather weeds without 
 being made a nine days' wonder of to some, and a butt 
 of derision to others." 
 
 Many people about Thurso, who saw Dick coming 
 into the town with his feet bedabbled with dirt and his 
 jean trousers wet up to the knees, said that he would 
 have been much better employed in attending to his 
 bakery than in wandering about the country in search 
 of beetles, bumbees, ferns, and wild plants. 
 
 But he never missed attending to his business. 
 Science was his pleasure; and the. pursuit of it became 
 his habit. One science led to another. From Con- 
 chology he went to Entomology, and from these he 
 went to Botany and Geology. Nothing came amiss to 
 him. He found " sermons in stones, and good in every- 
 thing." 
 
 For a long time he kept all that he did to him- 
 self. He had no friends to whom he could com- 
 municate the knowledge he had acquired. He was 
 only a poor baker. He did not mix with the educated 
 class. He spent his thrifty savings on books. His
 
 CHAP. vii. RECEIVES A DEPUTATION. 71 
 
 dress cost little. His best clothes were many years old. 
 His long swallow-tailed coat with brass buttons was 
 considered antediluvian. His tall chimney-pot hat was 
 entirely out of date. Sometimes he was jeered at as 
 he passed along. 
 
 The boys knew that he had a love of nature. This 
 is the first taste that a country boy develops. Some- 
 times they were a little frightened at him. They viewed 
 him with awe, if not apprehension, when they encountered 
 him among the rocks with his hammer and chisel, or 
 came upon him as he emerged from a ditch, or from 
 behind a turf wall, in his pursuit of insects, or grasses, 
 or mosses. But their fear was always tempered by the 
 knowledge that any curiosity they alighted on, in the 
 shape of a stone, or a butterfly, or a beetle, would always 
 be repaid by the mysterious man when brought to him, 
 by a roll, or a cookie, or a biscuit, or sometimes by a 
 sixpence. 
 
 One boy now a well-known minister called upon 
 Dick when about twelve years old. He was sent, with 
 another boy, as a deputation from a number of their 
 schoolfellows, to ascertain something about the bones of 
 a cuttle-fish which they had found upon the shore. The 
 boys went into his shop with considerable fear; but 
 they found the baker in excellent humour. He brought 
 down from his library several books, which he spread 
 out among the loaves of bread on his counter, and 
 pointed out to them specimens of other cuttle-fish bones 
 that had been found. "We were much astonished," 
 says the minister, " to be told that if we came back when
 
 72 A GENERAL REFEREE. CHAP, vn 
 
 he was less busy, he would tell us more about it ; but 
 neither of us ever mustered courage for a second visit." 
 
 Another says " Boys out bird-nesting on the braes, 
 or fishing by the river-side or amongst the rocks, have 
 often got from him a lesson in Natural History which 
 they would hardly forget in a lifetime." 
 
 Dick began to be considered a general referee. When 
 anything unusual was found a plant, a stone, a butter- 
 fly, or a fish he was at once appealed to. One day a 
 boy came in with a message from a fisherman. A sun- 
 fish had been caught in Thurso Bay, and brought ashore. 
 Dick was sent for to come and see it. He was busy 
 with his bread at the time, and could not leave the 
 bakehouse. The fisherman sent another message, saying 
 that if Dick did not come down immediately, he would 
 cut up the fish. "Then tell him to cut away," said 
 Dick ; " I don't like these peremptory orders." 
 
 A person who made considerable pretensions to 
 botanical knowledge met him one day, and asked if he 
 knew whether the county produced any Statice armeria. 
 "Oh!" said Dick, "if you will just call it Lea Gilly- 
 flower, or, if you please, Thrift, you will find it at any 
 roadside." 
 
 Another gentleman found a pretty flower growing 
 profusely in a small strath a few miles out of Thurso. 
 He took it to Dick. "Do you know that?" he asked. 
 " Yes," he said ; " you got it at the side of the burn at 
 Olrig." " How do you know that ?" " Because it grows 
 in two or three more places in Caithness ; but these are 
 loo far off for you to have been there to-day."
 
 CHAP. vii. THE HOLY GRASS. 73 
 
 Another called upon him with a strange flower. " I 
 have got a new thing for you to-day, Mr. Dick !" " Oh 
 no," said Dick, " I know it quite well. You got it near 
 Shebster " indicating a small hillock on a moor in the 
 western part of the parish of Thurso. " Yes," said the 
 inquirer; "but how do you know that?" "Simply 
 because it grows nowhere else in Caithness." 
 
 Thus, in course of time, he had pretty nearly mastered 
 the botany of Caithness. Among his other discoveries 
 of plants in Caithness, which had before been altogether 
 unknown, was his discovery of the Hierochloe lorealis, 
 or Northern Holy Grass, on the banks of the river 
 Thurso. It is called Holy Grass, because the people in 
 Sweden and Norway were in the habit of strewing their 
 churches with it. It emits a scent when lying in quan- 
 tities, and when trampled on by the feet of the wor- 
 shippers. It is detected, when growing, by its beautiful 
 spiral stem and its rich golden seed. 
 
 The plant had been first admitted into the British 
 Flora on the authority of Don. But no one else had 
 found it. After the death of Don the plant was placed 
 in the doubtful list of the London Catalogue, and it 
 . was finally dropped out altogether. Dick was surprised 
 at the discovery, but he took no means to make it known. 
 He kept the plant for about twenty long years beside 
 him. He was too solitary and too bashful to rush into 
 print with his botanical findings. It was only when a 
 young botanist, who had heard of Mr. Dick's scientific 
 knowledge, called upon him, saw the plant and ascer- 
 tained its habitat, that the information about the new
 
 74 DICK'S REPORT. 
 
 plant was communicated to the Professor of Botany 
 at Edinburgh. 
 
 The professor at first doubted the existence of the 
 plant in Britain. He could scarcely believe that it existed 
 in Caithness, the northernmost county of Scotland. He 
 observed, however, that if Dick had really found the 
 plant, he had rescued the celebrated botanist Don from 
 an undeserved calumny. For Don had asserted that the 
 plant was found in Britain, whereas all the botanists of 
 note averred that the Holy Grass was not indigenous, 
 but had been imported from other countries. 
 
 Dick was specially requested to send a communica- 
 tion respecting the plant, and where it was to be found. 
 He accordingly did so in July 1854. He also sent a 
 specimen of the Holy Grass to Professor Balfour of 
 Edinburgh. We must here anticipate ; and insert the 
 paper which Dick prepared for the Botanical Society, 
 twenty years after the plant had been found. The paper 
 runs as follows : 
 
 " About ten minutes' walk from the town of Thurso 
 there is, by the river-side, a farm-house known by the 
 name of the Bleachfield, opposite to which, on the eastern 
 bank of the river, there is a precipitous section of boulder 
 clay ; opposite to the clay cliff, and fringing the edge of 
 the stream. Any botanist can, in the last week of the 
 month of May, or in the first and second weeks of June, 
 gather 50 or 100 specimens of Hierochloe borealis. 
 Passing upwards along the river bank, and at no great 
 distance, there is another clay cliff, where a few hundreds 
 of Hierochloe may likewise be got. It also fringes the
 
 THE MOONWORT. 75 
 
 edge of the river. But the plant must be looked for at 
 the time indicated ; for by the third week of June the 
 beauty of Hierochloe has passed away, and by the first 
 of July the herbage has become so rank that the Holy 
 Grass, now ripe, and turned of a silky brown, and is com- 
 pletely hidden from view. Farther up, between Giese 
 and a section of boulder clay a little below Todholes, 
 the plant may likewise be picked in hundreds. Hiero- 
 chloe has never failed to appear in these localities 
 during the last twenty years."* 
 
 The Eoyal Botanical Society afterwards sent Dick a 
 special vote of thanks for his paper, and also for the 
 specimen of the plant which he had sent for the Bota- 
 nical Gardens. 
 
 To return to his botanical wanderings. His sister, 
 who lived at Haddington, was very delicate, and he 
 often tried to amuse her with the descriptions of his 
 walks in the country. 
 
 In the beginning of July he writes to her as follows : 
 " I have had two walks one of five miles, the other of 
 ten miles. The five miles' walk was to see a fern called 
 the Moonwort. It grows in abundance in a spot not 
 far away. I shall never forget the strange wonder with 
 which I first saw it. So I again walked off to the locality, 
 where I knew it grew in all its glory. The season has 
 been very dry here, and the fern has not attained its 
 usual height. Nevertheless I found it. During my 
 journey I saw much to admire. 
 
 * Annals of Natural History, October 1854. Botanical Society of 
 Edinburgh.
 
 76 THE STORKSBILL. CHAP, vn, 
 
 "My ten miles' walk I had yesterday evening. It 
 was fearfully warm. The sky was full of fire, but it did 
 not rain. There were great black mountains of clouds 
 in the air. It was a dead calm, with not a breath of 
 air. I was told that I must not go out, for it would be 
 a downpour before long. But ' he that will to Cupar 
 maun to Cupar.' My imagination told me of beautiful 
 geraniums (Storksbill), which I longed to see. Off I 
 went ! The clouds were in motion, but without wind. 
 It was terribly sultry. After a long perspiring walk I 
 arrived at my journey's end a small precipice, lined 
 with plants. 
 
 " I was now at home intensely at home. The pre- 
 cipice was not in length a stone's throw. It was only 
 about twenty feet in height. But there I found many 
 most interesting plants. There were a few of the 
 Trembling Poj)lar trees, about four feet high. There 
 were Eoses and Willow Herb in flower (Epilobium 
 angustifolium, E. montanum, and E. quadrangulum). 
 There was Ardbis hirsuta, a plant I never get in Caith- 
 ness but here : Stone Bramble, Common Sanicle, Carices, 
 and Butterworts in scores. And in the crevices of the crags 
 ferns Male ferns and Lady ferns Black Spleenworts, 
 Maiden-hair Spleenworts, and many other plants. Among 
 the rest I found plenty of Rough Brome Grass a grass 
 I saw alive for the first time alive by scores. So here 
 was my reward ! Well, I am increasing in knowledge, 
 if not in wisdom. I hope to get up at one o'clock to- 
 morrow morning." 
 
 A little later in the month he says " This being one
 
 WALKS FOR FERNS. 
 
 of my rambling days I did not leave Thurso until the 
 postman had gone round with his letters between one 
 and two o'clock. Of course I could not go far to-day. 
 But there is a fern growing about a mile and a half off, 
 which I should like to see once more. I once thought 
 the fern to be very rare, not having met with it in all 
 my rambles, except at the foot of the hill of Morven, in 
 the extreme south of the county. Then I found the 
 same fern about four or five miles from this, eastward of 
 the Fairies' Hill (Lysa) ; afterwards about a mile and 
 a half out of Thurso ; and then about three-quarters of 
 a mile eastward of the town. The search for plants is 
 amusing ; and when I come unexpectedly upon plants in 
 a spot which I had before minutely searched, I wonder 
 where my eyes had been all the time." 
 
 " On Saturday last," he says in another letter to his 
 sister, " I got up in the morning at three, worked until mid- 
 day, and then I set off on a journey of nine miles to gather 
 a specimen of a plant. Before I started I took off my 
 shoes and dipped my feet, stockings and all, into a basin 
 of water. I then tied my shoes on and set off. When I 
 had gone six miles I came to a burn ' roarin' fou,' through 
 which I walked ankle-deep. Fifteen minutes later I 
 walked through another burn, and then through another 
 and another burn four burns in all. 
 
 " I pulled the plant and returned homewards. My 
 route lay across Dunnet sands. The tide was ebbing. 
 I kept close by the waves. As they rolled in, in long 
 breakers, they went far up the sands. For about three- 
 quarters of an hour I walked ankle-deep in salt water.
 
 78 WALK TO DORERY. CHAP. vn. 
 
 After leaving the shore I had six miles to walk. I 
 reached home at eight in the evening with my plant, 
 having walked eighteen miles in four hours and forty 
 minutes." 
 
 On another afternoon in July he goes to the Dorery 
 hills. "I had a ramble," he said, "on Saturday last, 
 after my day's work was over. While on my way I found 
 in a quarry, at a loch, a fossil fish snout or two, and 
 some plants. I got to the hills, about ten miles off, 
 and examined ferns and roses. I had a grand view 
 of the Sutherland hills. I stood in a sheltered nook, 
 and gazed at the sunlight shining far over the distant 
 mountains. I never forget any of these moments. I 
 turned aside this morning just to gaze upon the moon. 
 It was about two o'clock in the morning. All was 
 still, solemn, and impressive." 
 
 The road to the Dorery hills lies through a bare 
 and slightly undulating country. The fields are sepa- 
 rated from the road by fences of Caithness flag. On 
 either side you observe here and there mounds of green 
 earth, underneath which are said to be the so-called 
 Picts' Houses. After the cultivated fields, come the moors 
 quiet, solitary, and sublime. 
 
 After the moors you reach the heathery hills. The 
 highest of the hills is called Ben Dorery. There is a 
 cleft between the two principal hills, and at the farther 
 side of the main hill is a hollow, surrounded by projec- 
 tions of slaty rock, in which Dick would sit down, and 
 look with delight on the prospect before him. In the far- 
 reaching plain below there was nothing but heather
 
 DORERY HILL. 79 
 
 moor, and moss, in the midst of which twelve lochs 
 might be seen glittering in the sunshine, with the 
 Sutherland hills far in the distance. 
 
 The scene is lonely and solitary. Not a house is to 
 be seen. Not a sound is to be heard, excepting the shot 
 of a sportsman during the grouse season. Below the 
 hill, is Loch Shurery, quietly sleeping in the sunshine. 
 
 THE DOS3RY HILLS. 
 
 Rising the hill and looking north, you see the flat county 
 of Caithness, with moors and lochs in the toreground, 
 and beyond them the flag-fenced fields in the distance. 
 The Dorery hills were attractive to Dick, not only 
 because of the solitary scenery, but because they were 
 lull of ferns of many sorts, togetliei with many of the 
 plants and grasses of which he was constantly in search.
 
 80 DICK'S FERNERY. CHAP. vii. 
 
 Dick had another special fernery at Achavaristil, 
 under the Reay hills, about ten miles from Thurso. It 
 was nearly opposite Sir Robert Sinclair's shooting-lodge. 
 It was a sheltered place, where ferns grew in beauty. 
 Dick kept the place an entire secret. For a long time, 
 no one obtained access to it. No one knew of it. He 
 transplanted ferns from all parts of the county, that 
 they might grow and spread there long after he was dead. 
 But alas, some mischievous person found out the place, 
 and pulled up the " weeds." What a bitter day that was 
 for Robert Dick !
 
 CHAPTEE VIH 
 
 DUNNET HEAD. 
 
 THE coast scenery, east and west of Thurso, is very grand. 
 On the one side it rises into Holborn Head, and on the 
 other into the long perpendicular rocks of Dunnet Head. 
 Holborn means Hell's child, from Holla the goddess of 
 hell, and biorn child. Many a ship has been dashed 
 against the rocks there. This has probably originated 
 the peculiar name of the headland. 
 
 When a ship in the North Atlantic is caught by a 
 storm, and the wind blows violently from the west, she 
 is driven towards the rockbound coast of the Hebrides. 
 If she can weather the Butt of Lewis, she is driven 
 towards the gigantic rocks of Cape Wrath, which extend 
 for about fifty miles towards Holborn Head. If she can 
 manage, by backing, to enter Scrabster Eoads, she is 
 safe. If not, she is driven upon the rocks, and utterly 
 destroyed ship, men, and cargo. 
 
 The faces of the rocks are hollowed into gaping 
 caverns, where the waves thunder in, and roll along the 
 gyoes far inland. The leap of the waves is only exceeded 
 by their rebound seaward again. They rush up the 
 face of the rock like a pack of hounds, and spread them- 
 selves along the summit in blinding showers of spray
 
 82 SCRABSTER ROADS. CHAP. vm. 
 
 As you stand upon the top of the rocks in fine weather, 
 they seem to precipitate themselves into the sea, in 
 many cases overhanging the water. 
 
 Inside of Holborn Head is Scrabster Eoads. Many 
 ships ride at anchor there while the wind blows hard 
 from the west. They are well protected by the head- 
 land, which juts out towards the north-east. Scrabster 
 Harbour is also comparatively safe. 
 
 But when the wind blows from the north or north- 
 east, the ships riding at anchor there are in great danger. 
 The waves come in with great force. They come hissing 
 along with their fleece of froth, and break with violent 
 force upon the shore. They rebound again, dragging the 
 pebbles under them with a rattle, and to quote the words 
 of Hardy are like " a beast gnawing bones." 
 
 After one of these storms, Dick went down to the 
 sea-shore to ascertain whether any of the secrets of 
 Nature had been laid bare. " We have had a terrible 
 storm here," he says ; " such a force of wind that I have 
 never felt the like, so terribly strong and continuous. 
 It has caused great disaster to the shipping. The 
 storm fairly whipped six vessels out of Scrabster Eoads, 
 and dashed them ashore to ruin. 
 
 " When the wind abated, I went down to the shore, 
 and found a piece of old land strewed here and there 
 with prostrate hazel stems. I picked out of the clay five 
 nuts. How long it is since they grew I know not, but 
 it must have been ages ago. Perhaps geologists would 
 say that they grew when Britain stood thirty feet higher 
 than it does now. But that is all conjecture. Certainly
 
 SHIPWRECKS. 83 
 
 the land along our shores had once a very different 
 appearance." 
 
 On another occasion he says "The wind to-day 
 blows fearfully hard. A large ship, with seventeen men 
 on board, is ashore at Ham, thirteen miles off. About 
 mid-day we expected a ship ashore here. Unless the 
 wind abates, I should not be surprised if others came 
 ashore to-morrow. The wind is howling like mad, and 
 roaring like thunder over the town." 
 
 Dunnet Head, north-east of Thurso, was one of Dick's 
 favourite haunts. It was a long walk to the lighthouse, 
 which fronts the Pentland Firth. But he often wan- 
 dered to it, and descended the headland to the sea by 
 paths known only to himself. The perpendicular rocks 
 which surround the head, average about two hundred 
 feet high; but at the northern end, which forms the 
 northernmost point of Scotland, the rock rises three 
 hundred feet above sea level ; and from the summit of 
 the contiguous eminence, the height above the sea is 
 more than four hundred feet. 
 
 Dunnet Head forms a peninsula, extending from the 
 village of Dunnet on the south to the village of Brough 
 on the north. From these points it extends northward. 
 The peninsula contains about three thousand acres of 
 uncultivated moor, with no fewer than ten small lochs 
 or tarns on its summit. In winter time the lochs are 
 crowded with swans, geese, ducks, and northern seafowl. 
 Most of the birds summer in Greenland, and winter on 
 Dunnet Head. 
 
 This immense rampart of rocky headland runs along
 
 84 
 
 D WARWICK HEAD. 
 
 the northern shore of Dunnet Bay, by Dwarwick Head, 
 in an easterly direction. Then turning sharp round to 
 the north by Eough Head, the rocks wend northwards, 
 then slightly eastwards, until you find yourself under 
 Easter Head, where the lighthouse is erected. This is 
 the highest point of the cliffs. They then extend to the 
 
 DWARWICK HEAD. 
 
 south-east, and afterwards towards the south, ending at 
 the village of Brough. 
 
 In fine or even rough weather, when the wind is east- 
 erly, a yachting trip under the cliffs is full of interest. 
 In Dunnet Bay the sea is quiet, being protected from 
 the east by the high grounds of the peninsula. Dwar- 
 wick Head forms a singular headland, the strata dipping 
 slightly towards the sea. Between this and Eough
 
 CHAP. vni. DUNNET LIGHTHOUSE. 85 
 
 Head is a wick or bay, in which ships find safe shelter 
 an old retreat of the Vikingers. 
 
 Eough Head is a bold headland. Numerous boulders 
 are strewn at the bottom of the cliff. There are points 
 near Dwarwick Head and Rough Head, where an 
 approach to the sands is possible, though, in some places, 
 it is rather precipitous. There are numerous gyoes along 
 the headland, worn out into inland caves by the powerful 
 washings of the sea. There is one near Dwarwick which 
 penetrates far inland. When the sea is rough, and drives 
 in from the west, the sea dashes up far inland, and blows 
 through the opening like a whale, throwing abroad sheets 
 of spray. 
 
 The precipices gradually rise. In certain places the 
 rocks seem to have slipped away towards the bottom, and 
 left steep slopes overgrown by ferns. There are numer- 
 ous wild birds among the cliffs. Cormorants are seen 
 winging their solitary way towards the north. Deep 
 caves appear in the face of the rock ; with here and there 
 a recent slip from the summit to the sea, where the 
 stones lie in a rough slope. The red sandstone of the 
 rocks looks so clear, so solid, and so near at hand, that 
 it might be thought they were only a gunshot distant, 
 though they are a mile and a quarter away. 
 
 And now we are under the lighthouse, where the 
 strata are nearly level. The precipice here is some three 
 hundred feet high. The lighthouse is on the crest of 
 the rocks, only about thirty feet from the precipice. It 
 is the highest lighthouse in Scotland. The height of 
 the lantern above the highest spring tides is 346 feet,
 
 FORCE OF THE SEA. 
 
 and the light is seen twenty-three miles off, on either 
 side of Dunnet Head. 
 
 Even here there seem to have been recent slips, for 
 there are long slopes of rock at the bottom overgrown 
 with ferns and greenery. The sea is constantly washing 
 and grinding away the red sandstone and slates, so that, 
 in course of time, the lighthouse will have to be removed 
 farther inland. 
 
 Notwithstanding the height of the cliffs, the sea, 
 when driving strongly from the west, rushes right up 
 the face of the rocks, and dashes over the lighthouse, 
 sometimes breaking the glass with the stones which it 
 carries with it. Such is the prodigious force of the wind 
 and the sea united, that the very rock itself seems to 
 tremble, while the lighthouse shakes from top to bottom. 
 
 We are now in the Pentland Firth, and the waves are 
 rolling strong ^from the eastward. The wind and the 
 waters dash about the little ship, and she tacks and bears 
 round under the shelter of the headland. But not before 
 her decks have been well drenched by the billows. She 
 has now to make headway against the tide, which is 
 rushing into the Pentland Firth at the rate of some ten 
 miles an hour. At last, retracing her pathway under the 
 rocks, Eough Head is passed ; a calm comes on ; the ship 
 makes a tack across the bay ; and at length Dwarwick 
 Head is passed, and the buoyant little yacht makes her 
 way into Castletown harbour, from whence she set out. 
 
 We have thought it necessary to give this account of 
 Dunnet Head, because it was so often the scene of 
 Robert Dick's explorations. Sometimes also, Hugh
 
 DUN'XET HEAD : FROM THK EAST.
 
 CHAP. vin. TRIP TO DUNNET. 87 
 
 Miller accompanied him in his researches after the Old 
 Eed Sandstone, which is found on both sides of the head- 
 land. This will afterwards be found in the course of the 
 narrative. 
 
 In the course of one of his letters to his sister, Dick 
 thus describes one of his journeys to Dunnet Head. It 
 was made in April, while the weather was still very 
 wild: 
 
 "Determined not to be beat, I waited over snow, 
 hail, frost, and rain, until I could set out. Then I had 
 my ramble. It was a fine morning, but after I had set 
 out it began to rain. It blew and rained for five miles. 
 I saw little beyond a bare country. The fields were red, 
 and the grass by the road-side was withered and brown. 
 All was of a sad, desolate appearance. I was walking 
 in an easterly direction, and the wind was blowing 
 south-west. To fend me from the rain, I turned my face 
 northerly, and saw only a tossing sea, and the Orkney 
 hills overspread with snow. I passed through the mile- 
 long village of Castletown, and there I saw trees, yes, 
 most respectable trees !* 
 
 " On the top of a stone wall to the right I saw some 
 tufts of moss. I went to the moss and looked. It was 
 all in fruit. I think it was Hypnum popuieum. I had 
 seen it before. I crossed burn after burn, and then the 
 
 * There are not only trees but woods about Mr. Trail's seat at 
 Castlehill. There is a hollow valley there, along the river Duran, which 
 has been beautifully planted. The place is well protected from the 
 north and east winds, and the trees grow to as fine dimensions as they 
 do in the south of England. But this is the only wood in the north 
 of Caithness.
 
 DUNNE T CLIFFS. 
 
 long dreary sands of Dunnet lay before me blank and 
 bare, or tossed into fantastic hillocks. The sand was 
 blowing before the wind. The waves were thundering 
 along the shore. 
 
 " I saw a man breaking sandstone boulders. He little 
 thought of what he was doing, or of the time when ice 
 went grinding along the surface of the stone he was 
 hammering. No : he was building a cottage, and the 
 stone was only a stone to him, and nothing more. 
 
 " Passing on, I left all human habitations behind, and 
 had only heather, heather, before me. The heather was 
 brown and burnt-like, so severe had been the weather 
 during the past winter. As I passed on, I found a 
 cocoon of the Emperor Moth sticking on a piece of 
 heather. I was next brought to a stop by some crimson- 
 tipped lichens moss cups. They were taller than any 
 specimens I had seen before, but they were under shelter. 
 
 "After crossing another burn, and striding through 
 heather only ankle deep, I found myself on the edge of 
 the precipitous cliffs of Dunnet Head. Before I de- 
 scended down their front I looked around. Orkney 
 seemed quite near, with the snow-wreaths on its hills. 
 The waves of the Pentland Firth were rolling away 
 westerly. 
 
 " Down I went ! down ! It was at that place only 
 about 100 feet deep. When I reached the foot of the 
 cliff, I gazed upward in wonder and admiration, full of 
 intense curiosity to see the various layers of sand for 
 such it once was. It is not every day that one stands 
 at the foot of such a cliff.
 
 CHAP. vin. FERNS AT DUNNET. 89 
 
 "I moved westwards. I passed along delighted. 
 The scene was grand and unusually striking. I came 
 at length to a narrow fissure, up which I forced my way 
 in quest of Ferns. Yes, Ferns ! Ferns grow green on 
 Dunnet Cliffs all the year round. In fact, Dunnet Head 
 is a forest of ferns. It was the Sea Spleenwort that I 
 wanted, and sure enough I found it growing green in all 
 its glory. I gathered a few, and left the rest. 
 
 " Retracing my steps, I ascended the cliff. It then 
 began to rain, and it rained nearly all the way home." 
 
 Dick often descended the cliff, sometimes to gather 
 ferns, and at other times to inspect the geological 
 conditions of the rocks. One day he went down the 
 face of the headland a little to the west of the light- 
 house. He went searching about among the rocks and 
 clefts, finding many new things to wonder at. But he 
 completely forgot the lapse of time. Looking round, he 
 found that the tide had risen and completely overflowed 
 the path among the rocks by which he had come. On 
 one side was the precipice, on the other was the sea, 
 coming in higher and higher at every wave. He had no 
 alternative but to go onward, for the sands were still dry 
 in front of him. At length he discovered a portion of 
 the headland which he thought might be attempted, and 
 he succeeded, with much difficulty and danger, in reach- 
 ing the summit of the cliff. 
 
 In fine weather, when the billows are asleep and the 
 waters merely lave the base of the cliffs, pleasure parties 
 sometimes set sail from Thurso, and, when the tide is 
 low, they land on the sands under Dunnet Head. On one
 
 90 DUNNET SANDS. CHAP. vm. 
 
 occasion, Dr. Smith and a party who had just landed 
 from their boat, found to their amazement that Dick was 
 there before them. He seemed to have got there by 
 miracle. But no ; he had merely come down the 
 rocks by a path known only to himself, for assuredly 
 nobody else would have risked his life in so perilous 
 a descent. 
 
 Dr. Smith asked him to return with his party in 
 the boat. No ! he would ascend the rocks by the path 
 down which he had come. Besides, he never accepted 
 any accommodation of this sort while on his journeys. 
 His skin was in a state of perspiration, which he desired 
 to maintain. If he took a seat in a boat or in a road 
 conveyance, with his wet feet, he was sure to get chilled, 
 and the result was a severe cold. Hence he strode back 
 to Thurso by the heather, the sands, and the road, as he 
 had come. 
 
 On one occasion Dick describes the geology of 
 Dunnet Head. It is during the month of June that 
 he undertakes his journey. He has already reached 
 Dunnet sands, which are about seven miles by road from 
 Thurso. The description is best given in Dick's own 
 words : 
 
 "Dunnet sands are a long and a weary trail in a 
 warm day in June, when the dark thunder-clouds creep 
 overhsad, when not a breath of air stirs, and all is still 
 and motionless, save the dull, sluggish fall, at solemn 
 pauses, of the incoming and retreating waves on the 
 burning sands, or the humming of the overjoyed flies 
 feeding on the dead fish cast up by the tide ; when the
 
 GEOLOGISING. 91 
 
 cattle from the benty links have come down towards the 
 sea, where they stand knee-deep in it, stooping and 
 eyeing it wistfully, but yet unable to drink ; when the 
 parched sands stretch away in the distance, the heated 
 air nickering upwards like the breath of a furnace ! 
 
 " I look up, and implore the ' all-conquering sun to 
 intermit his wrath.' He only continues to shine out 
 stronger and fiercer ; till at last, faint and exhausted. I 
 throw myself down, and drink out of the burn which 
 flows across the sands, careless of the consequences. 
 Your very wise people may say what they please about 
 the consequences of imbibing cold water when over- 
 heated, but I have never found any harm, but much good 
 to be the result, and in no case more than in taking this 
 drink out of the burn as I crossed the sands towards 
 Dunnet. 
 
 " Refreshed and invigorated, I rose and pursued my 
 way. Not long after, I had the pleasure of striking iny 
 first hearty blow on the yellow stones which crop out 
 through the unconsolidated beach. I examine and 
 search for organic remains. But no. Again and again 
 my efforts are renewed, and still the answer is, No. 
 
 " Passing on along the foot of the cliffs now yellow- 
 ish, then reddish now thin and slaty-like, then in thick 
 solid beds I go rambling along. 
 
 " ' Owre mony a weary ledge he limpit, 
 An' aye the tither stane he thumpit ; ' 
 
 but thumped in vain. Oh for one scale ! But no ; no 
 organisms; not one, though you upturned the whole 
 stupendous accumulation of quartzy sand, which rears
 
 92 DESCENDING THE CLIFFS. CHAP. vin. 
 
 its lofty and weathered front to the wasting waves and 
 
 " We have chosen the right time, when the tide is at 
 the lowest. Consequently we are enabled to move 
 along at the foot of the cliffs, which otherwise would be 
 impassable. We actively and untiringly explore, but 
 with no success; and are at last so wearied that we 
 clamber up to the top of the headland by a rugged sort 
 of footpath, and, moving along the edge of the precipice, 
 we make through the grass and heather for the crags 
 immediately facing the Western Ocean. How strange 
 to find, as we move along, a white butterfly or two 
 flitting about, a solitary mason wasp, and a sparrow- 
 hawk looking out for prey, the sun all the while beating 
 down upon us. 
 
 " It is possible to get down the western face of the 
 rugged cliffs of Dunnet Head. We got down, and what 
 do we find ? ibe sight is worth all the toil of walk- 
 ing to see it. Immense masses of sandstone, fallen from 
 the cliffs overhead, skirt the mighty wall. The masses 
 lie in rude confusion. Applying the hammer to them, 
 no remains of fish or quadruped are to be found, but 
 pieces of quartz, clay pebbles of a reddish brown, and in 
 some places balls of sulphur-yellow clay, as big as a 
 man's fist. Here and there are large patches of some- 
 thing like rusty sheet-iron, which would almost make 
 one fancy that they were the remains of some Antedilu- 
 vian Frying-pan that had been swept to sea and buried 
 there. 
 
 " There is very little real red sandstone at Punnet
 
 CHAP. vin. THE SANDSTONE BEDS. 93 
 
 Head. By far the greatest bulk is what I take to be a 
 yellow quartzose sand. In one place, and in one place 
 only, is the sand in any way red. In crossing Dunnet 
 sands we had not failed to notice little stones, standing 
 out here and there in the sand, left by the retiring tide, 
 and great was my surprise to find the same appearances 
 here. In some places, where the boulders are a little 
 asunder, the exact beds of the strata are to be seen, 
 walked over, handled, and hammered. I had seen sand- 
 stone beds with here and there a pebble, but they nevei 
 struck my imagination so forcibly as now, when I was 
 down upon my knees and busied in the work of extrac- 
 tion. 
 
 " What a vast gathering of sand ! I was forced to 
 exclaim. Where did it all come from ? How long did 
 it take to pile up this heap in the silent depths of the 
 sea ? How long ? How many years ? These are perti- 
 nent questions, questions which enter one's very soul. 
 Then man feels instinctively his own littleness, and his 
 utter inadequacy to solve even the simplest of his 
 questionings. 
 
 " But however amazed he may feel at this vast pile of 
 sand, it was at one time unquestionably much greater. 
 Looking across to the Orkneys, immediately opposite, 
 the spectator cannot fail to remark that they are of the 
 same material. Then, turning from the Orkneys to Hoi- 
 born Head, where a strong sea now rolls, one cannot help 
 looking back, and we are led to picture the time when 
 there was no sea between them, but only sandstone 
 beds, stretching continuously from shore to shore !
 
 94 DUNNET HEAD SUBMERGED ! CHAP. vm. 
 
 " The beds have been burst through by the ocean, and 
 where dry land once was, the grampus now rolls, and 
 the tall ship speeds on her way to the farthest ends of 
 the earth. Amazing change ! 
 
 " ' Art, empire, earth itself, to change is doomed ; 
 Earthquakes have raised to heaven the humble vale, 
 And gulphs the mountain's mighty mass entombed ; 
 And where the Atlantic rolled wide continents have 
 bloomed.' 
 
 " Who told Beattie this ? It seems to prove Lyell's 
 theory of the sameness of ancient and existing causes 
 for geological changes in the earth's surface. And the 
 change is still going on ; and ' come it will, the day 
 decreed by fate,' when not a vestige of the sandstone of 
 Dunnet Head will be found above the encroaching 
 ocean. 
 
 " What induces me to think so is this : 1st, Dunnet 
 Bay does not, in my opinion, owe its existence to a fault, 
 but has been literally hammered out by the force of 
 the Atlantic waves. The sandy links are the broken 
 remains, in part, of the dispersed strata; and were 
 they now to become solidified, they would be found as 
 rich in fossil remains as the present beds are barren. 
 2d, The ocean tempests are telling surely on the western 
 face of the beds of Dunnet Head; and time alone is 
 wanted to effect their ruin. 3d, The beds on the south, 
 at Brough, are in some places in a mouldering, crumb- 
 ling state, and the sea will ultimately effect a junction 
 with the upper end of Dunnet Bay. Dunnet Head will 
 for some time be an island ; but it will ultimately be
 
 CHAP. viii. HA VEN OF B ROUGH. 95 
 
 blotted out of existence altogether. There is a prophecy 
 for you ! 
 
 " I remember once getting up, towards the end of 
 harvest, while the blue canopy above was still adorned 
 and enriched with innumerable stars. I was gaily crossing 
 Dunnet sands in the first peep of day, when I made 
 directly across the peninsula for the stupendous cliff 
 immediately westward of the little haven of Brough. I 
 found that the tide did not retire far from the coast, but 
 rose and fell close to the cliffs, wetting and allowing to 
 dry the big stones at the base of the precipice. 
 
 " The cliff, under which I rested for a time, was about 
 150 feet high. It seemed sound and hard. The morn- 
 ing sun rose in beauty. I hammered away, and kept 
 moving down upon the hamlet of Brough. There I found 
 the cliffs in sad decay ; in fact, they were a sloping mass 
 of rotten materials. A little out to sea there is a ledge 
 of what was once red sandstone. It is a mouldering 
 hint of what is to come. It is 50 feet in height, and 
 rests upon slate. 
 
 " I had made this long journey in the hope of find- 
 ing some very fine organisms where the slate cropped 
 out from beneath the sand. I found a few fish scales 
 and droppings, but no fossils ; and sounded a retreat, 
 very much chagrined at having to return home almost 
 empty-handed. 
 
 " There is a loch or two near Dunnet Head. There is 
 one on the top of the hill. It is a quiet secluded spot, 
 a place of great attraction for wild swans, geese, and 
 ducks, during their autumnal migration, when winging
 
 96 THE HALIE LOCH. CHAP. vnr. 
 
 their way southward. There is another loch lower down, 
 famed for its miraculous cures. It is quite common for 
 mothers to carry their sickly children there on the first 
 Monday morning of a Wraith; and, going round the 
 puddle three times, they dip in the chick at the end of 
 each revolution. The children have sometimes returned 
 home cured. So they say. 
 
 " I remember a sort of cure. A poor woman took 
 thither a child who could neither sit, stand, walk, nor 
 talk. She performed the customary observances, and 
 returned amidst much derision. But lo! a marked 
 change took place in the child. He gained strength, 
 walked, and learned to speak. He often came to my 
 back premises, and called out : ' Bakie, bakie, gie's a 
 lopie;' but still he was very ancient-looking in the face. 
 About two or three years after he died of gravel. So that 
 the cure, whateyer it might be, was not permanent." 
 
 The piece of water referred to by Dick is Dunnet 
 Loch, or the Halie Loch, not far from the village of 
 Dunnet. It was once supposed to possess great healing 
 virtues. People came from all parts of Caithness and 
 the Orkneys, to be cured by the waters. The patient 
 had to walk round the loch, or, if not able to walk, he 
 was carried round it. He washed his hands and feet in 
 the loch, and then threw a piece of money into it. He 
 had to do this early in the morning, and must be out of 
 sight before sunrise. There was in ancient times a 
 Roman Catholic chapel dedicated to St. John at the east 
 end of the loch. Some say that the alleged healing 
 virtues of the waters were converted into a source of
 
 THE " WITCH HAG: 
 
 97 
 
 pecuniary emolument by the priests. The loch is 
 merely a collection of water dropped from the clouds, 
 and possesses no healing or other qualities, except those 
 of rain water. 
 
 Among the superstitions of Caithness, the Swallow 
 is called " Witch hag." They say that if a swallow flies 
 under the arm of a person, it immediately becomes 
 paralysed. Is it because of the same superstition, that 
 in some parts of England the innocent Swift is called 
 " the Devilin " ? 
 
 DISTANT VIEW OF DUNNET HEAD: FROM BARROGILL CASTLE.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 GEOLOGY DISCOVERY OF A HOLOPTYCHIUS. 
 
 ROBERT DICK had now been engaged for many years in 
 studying the wonderful aspects of Nature in the North. 
 Caithness was not too wild or dreary for him. The 
 shells on the sea-shore, the grasses along the river-sides, 
 the mosses growing on the boulders, the ferns abounding 
 in Dunnet cliffs, were all full of interest. And now he 
 proceeded to probe the ground under his feet. 
 
 He had long had a taste for geology. While gather- 
 ing his botanical specimens he had often found fossil 
 fishes in the slaty rocks. He first observed them in 
 1835, a few years after he had settled at Thurso. At 
 first they excited his wonder ; then his surprise, for dis- 
 tinguished geologists had asserted that no fossil remains 
 were to be found in the Scotch Highlands.* But here they 
 were under his own eyes ! Why should he not explore 
 
 * The Rev. W. D. Conybeare and William Phillips, Esq., in their 
 Outlines of the Geology of England and Wales (1822), said, "A cir- 
 cumstance cannot fail to have struck the observer during the course of 
 his researches, which opens to his view a far more extensive and 
 interesting field of his inquiry with regard to the relations of these 
 rocks to the general revolutions of nature ; for he will have found in 
 many of these beds spoils of the vegetable and animal kingdom im- 
 bedded, particularly the remains of marine zoophytes and shells, often
 
 CHAP. ix. GEOLOGY OF CAITHNESS. 99 
 
 them ? Why should he not study them, and verify the 
 facts for himself? 
 
 Among the first books that he bought was Mantell's 
 Wonders of Geology. This revealed to him quite a new 
 world the world of wonders at his feet. He after- 
 wards bought Dr. Buckland's Bridgewater Treatise. This 
 book also greatly excited his imagination. But there 
 was nothing in it about the fossils of Caithness. He 
 next borrowed a book from Sir George Sinclair, contain- 
 ing a journal of Mr. Bushby's travels through Caithness. 
 He made copious extracts from it, and endeavoured to 
 verify the facts therein stated. 
 
 Mr. Bushby's object seems to have been to discover 
 whether Caithness contained any metalliferous ores. 
 He also bored largely for shell marl, with the object of 
 mixing it with the mosses, and thus producing culti- 
 vable land. Bushby was not a geologist, and, in his 
 search for what was valuable, he overlooked the flags, 
 the fossils, the old red sandstone, and many of the most 
 interesting facts in the geology of Caithness. 
 
 It was not until the appearance of Hugh Miller's 
 publications that Dick's mind was set in the right 
 direction. In the month of September 1840, there 
 appeared in the Witness newspaper the first of a series 
 of articles under the title of " The Old Eed Sandstone." 
 
 in such abundance as to constitute nearly the entire mass of the parti- 
 cular strata. ... In some counties, he will perceive, none 
 of these remains occur for instance, in Cornwall and the Scotch 
 Highlands ; in others (as in the south-eastern counties of England) 
 not a well can be sunk, or a pit opened, without presenting them in 
 abundance."
 
 100 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 The articles were collected and published in the form of 
 a book in the following year. Dick purchased a copy, 
 and read it with great interest. 
 
 He immediately set to work to investigate the geology 
 of Caithness. He again wandered over it from one end 
 of the county to the other. But his best findings were 
 near Thurso. Along the coast there, he had already 
 found fish bones, fish heads, fish snouts, fish scales, 
 sufficient to freight a large ship. But he had never 
 yet found an entire specimen. At last he succeeded ; 
 and then began his correspondence with Hugh Miller. 
 
 He did not know Hugh Miller ; so that he addressed 
 him through an intermediate friend, Mr. Alexander 
 Sinclair. The letter is dated the 10th of March 1845. 
 Dick intimated that he was about to send off from 
 Thurso to Leith, by the " Union " steamer, a number of 
 fossil bones fpr Mr. Miller. He said, " If Mr. M. has 
 seen anything similar to the piece No. 1, with the tri- 
 angular knob, all my dreams of astonishing the geological 
 world by something new are in a measure at an end ; 
 for 'tis not alone the size of the pieces that I value, but 
 their singularity. 
 
 " An acquaintance here has suggested that the piece 
 I have attempted to delineate was the plate that covered 
 the lower half of the Coccosteus ; but in this I find it 
 hard to agree, for I have two lower halves of Coccosteus 
 tilted over on their backs, and they are not at all like 
 this strange piece. The lower half of these pieces has 
 no triangular knob at the upper end in the centre of the 
 plate. Nor will it do, in my opinion, to say that per*
 
 CHAP. ix. A HOLOPTYCHIUS FOUND. 101 
 
 haps the knob and the rib-like processes were separated 
 from the centre plate, and washed away before it was 
 buried, for, to my certain knowledge, they were originally 
 solidly united in one piece, and the knob could not even 
 have been wrenched away without leaving a mark 
 
 " Besides, in these two pieces of Coccosteus cuspidatus 
 alluded to, there is a knot-like bone, with a long stalk 
 at the lower end, and nothing of the same kind in the 
 piece now sent. If this piece, strange as it is, was in 
 reality the lower half of a Coccosteus, Mr. Miller must 
 correct his description when he speaks of it as one plate 
 or piece, save the two small side pieces that ' fill up the 
 angle.' Mr. Miller knows what I mean. 
 
 " I am pretty confident that I have got something 
 new to geologists, and for this reason rude as my 
 sketch of the fish jaws is Mr. Miller must know them 
 to be the remains of a Holoptychius." 
 
 Five days later (15th March) Mr. Dick again writes 
 to Mr. Miller : " Not a moment shall be lost in sending 
 you by steamer those curious Old Bones. At the same 
 time, I cannot send you one of them the largest piece 
 as it was found ; but I will send you a cast of it a 
 stucco likeness of what the huge buckler was when it 
 lay in the bed of the rock, after I had brought it to 
 light after its long entombment." 
 
 The fossil fish found by Dick was indeed a discovery. 
 The frontal plates of the Holoptychius measured full 
 sixteen inches across, and from the nape of the neck to 
 a little above the place of the eyes, full eighteen ; while 
 a single plate belonging to the lower part of the head
 
 102 BEGINNINGS OF GEOLOGY. CHAP. ix. 
 
 measured thirteen and a half inches by seven and a half. 
 Dick was rejoiced to find that Hugh Miller valued the 
 discovery so much, and that he complimented him on 
 the results of his laborious investigations. 
 
 In the same letter in which he communicated the 
 finding of the fossil Holoptychius, Dick described to 
 Hugh Miller the beginning of his geological studies. 
 He had been long wandering about Caithness, making 
 general inquiries, gathering fossils, finding old sea- 
 beaches, and watching the grindings made by icebergs 
 on the rocks j but now he had begun to excavate the 
 rocks, and endeavoured to dissect them so far as he 
 could. 
 
 " I never," he said, " wielded the hammer and chisel 
 until last spring March 1844; and the laying bare of 
 the large fossil (of which I send you the cast, and the 
 remaining fossjls) was one of my first exploits. It was 
 about the vernal equinox. The wind blew off the land. 
 A merry sea tripped through the Pentland Firth. The 
 tide was about full. The waves came dashing in on the 
 rocky shore, in long rolling billows, scattering in spin- 
 drift. 
 
 "I had laid the large plate bare, and was resting 
 in mute astonishment at the size of the fossil for I 
 measured it with the handle of the hammer, and found 
 it fully eighteen inches in length when I was roused 
 from my reverie by the waves dashing against my feet. 
 The tide was now coming in ! What was I to do ? To 
 raise it, stone and all, was impossible, and I feared that 
 it might be damaged or taken away if I left it until
 
 CHAP. ix. RAISES THE FOSSIL. 103 
 
 next evening. There was no time to deliberate. The 
 tide was nearly up to the stone. 
 
 "I then attempted to lift it whole out of its bed, 
 little thinking, in my ignorance, of the extremely brittle 
 nature of petrified bones. Alas ! the bone broke across ! 
 I gave a gasp, and cried ' Oh !' But I set to work and 
 lifted the rest out, and put the whole in my handker- 
 chief. When I reached home they were a mass of 
 broken debris. I managed, however, to put the bits 
 together again, and of these I send you the plaster 
 cast. 
 
 " What was it ? was it really a Coccosteus, six feet 
 long including the tail ? What do you think I imagined 
 it to be ? Nothing more nor less than a gigantic King 
 Crab ! wanting the tail ; eighteen inches one way and 
 sixteen inches the other. I wandered through Buck- 
 land in vain, and then believed that it was the upper 
 piece of a Trilobite. But the ' Old Eed ' dissipated all 
 these fancies. 
 
 " I have a piece or two of fossil bone that would 
 puzzle Agassiz himself. They shall all be sent you. 
 Whether you engrave any of them or not, you are on no 
 account to return them. They would never see the light 
 with me. 
 
 " I have taken note of what you say, and will endea- 
 vour to comply with your kind suggestions that I should 
 make further searches. ... I have been along the shore 
 once or twice already, and know of a job or two one of 
 them rather promising a bone, as long as my finger, is 
 standing out of an impure bituminous limestone, but
 
 104 MILLERS ACKNOWLEDGMENT. CHAP. ix. 
 
 what the bone may be can only be known when it is 
 dug out." 
 
 Hugh Miller afterwards refers to the circumstances 
 under which Dick sent him the Holoptychius. He 
 says, " I do not know what the savans of Eussia have 
 been doing for the last few years ; but mainly through 
 the labours of an intelligent tradesman of Thurso, Mr. 
 Kobert Dick one of those working men .of Scotland, of 
 active curiosity and well-developed intellect, that give 
 character and standing to the rest I am enabled to 
 justify the classification and confirm the conjectures of 
 Agassiz. Mr. Dick, after acquainting himself in the 
 leisure hours of a laborious profession with the shells, 
 insects, and plants of the northern locality in which he 
 resides, had set himself to study its geology ; and with 
 this view he procured a copy of the little treatise on the 
 Old Red Sandstone, which was at that time, as Agassiz's 
 monograph of the Old Eed fishes had not yet appeared, 
 the only work specially devoted to the palaeontology of 
 the system so largely developed in the neighbourhood of 
 Thurso. With perhaps a single exception for the 
 Thurso rocks do not yet seem to have yielded a Pterich- 
 thys he succeeded in finding specimens, in a state of 
 better or worse keeping, of all the various ichthyolites 
 which I have described as peculiar to the Lower Old 
 Eed Sandstone. He found, however, what I had not 
 described, the remains of apparently a very gigantic 
 ichthyolite; and, communicating with me through the 
 medium of a common friend, he submitted to me, in the 
 first instance, drawings of his new set of fossils ; and
 
 CHAP. ix. WORKING MEN AND GEOLOGY. 105 
 
 ultimately, as I could arrive at no satisfactory conclu- 
 sion from the drawings, he with great liberality made 
 over to me the fossils themselves." 
 
 With reference to the manual labour by which Dick 
 earned his bread, Hugh Miller says " There is no work- 
 ing man, if he be a person of intelligence and informa- 
 tion, however unlearned, in the vulgar acceptation of the 
 phrase, who may not derive as much pleasure and 
 enlargement of ideas from the study of geology, and 
 acquaint himself as minutely with its truths, as if he 
 were possessed of all the learning of Bentley." * 
 
 In a subsequent letter, written during the same month, 
 Dick says "We have gentlemen-geologists here; but 
 not one of them though they have been many years in 
 the pursuit have a single piece similar to those I send 
 you. They have repeatedly gone down to Thurso East, 
 and returned empty. And why ? For this simple reason, 
 that they were afraid to fylef their trousers !" 
 
 Certainly, Dick discovered and elucidated many things 
 which lie hidden from the eyes of common men. His 
 indefatigable industry in the cause of science enabled 
 him to accomplish much more than thousands of men 
 furnished with the best available education, and with 
 ample means and time at their command, had been able 
 to achieve. His was only another case of " the pursuit 
 of knowledge under difficulties." 
 
 In a future letter to Hugh Miller he said" I got 
 your enclosed extract. I will proceed to make you a 
 
 * Footprints of the Creator, pp. 25, 26 ; Ed. 1876. t Dirty.
 
 106 THE SCALDING THEORY. CHAP. ix. 
 
 map of Caithness. As to the dip of the strata, the 
 geologists are right; but as to the localities of the 
 fossils, they are greenhorns. I have traced all the 
 shores, from Ratter on the east to Drumholiater on the 
 west. Some beds are perfect Museums of fish heads and 
 bones. I will send you some coprolites of a size that 
 will make you doubt if they really have been voided by 
 fish. Sometimes I think larger animals must have in- 
 habited the sea of the Old Eed Sandstone." 
 
 On the 8th of April he writes " In your outlines of 
 Mr. Eose's lecture, in your last paper [the Witness], I 
 find a more rational view of the probable use of the 
 thick coverings of the animals of the Old Eed. Dr. 
 Buckland's scalding theory always appeared to me to be 
 ludicrous, and not in keeping with facts. Thus, in the 
 same strata in which I found the very large plate, there 
 were scattered ^promiscuously scales of the Osteolepis. 
 You know how thick they are, and you now also know 
 that some kind of animal was covered with mail in 
 snme places nearly <m inch thick. 
 
 " Now, there is no proportion between the protecting 
 fi igments of the two creatures ; and if Buckland was 
 right in his views, it must have been as perilous for poor 
 Osteolepis to swim side by side with Coccosteus as it 
 would be for a modern dandy to attempt braving the 
 rigours of a polar winter in night-gown and slippers. 
 The heat must have been as speedily fatal in the one 
 instance as the cold would be in the other. 
 
 "S jvg beneath his impenetrable bone, methinks I hear 
 sa'j'y '"/occo laughing at poor Osteolep, and ironically
 
 CHAP. ix. EYES OF THE COCCOSTEUS. 107 
 
 saying, ' Poor fellow, how I pity you ! Why don't you 
 put on more clothes ? You will never be right till you 
 get a thicker jacket to keep out the heat.' 'Well, 
 Cocco,' replies his comrade, ' I am very warm already. 
 This coat of mine is horrid hot, and I do not see how it 
 would mend the matter to put on another!' This 
 would be the proper answer to scalding seas, oceans of 
 hot water, and fish with thick coats to keep out the 
 heat ! " 
 
 From this time forward Eobert Dick sent all the new 
 fossils that he found to Hugh Miller for the purpose of 
 illustrating his books on geology, especially that describ- 
 ing The Old Red Sandstone. He sent numerous speci- 
 mens of the Coccosteus, the Diplopterus, the Asterolepis, 
 the Dipterus, the Osteolepis, the Glyptolepis, and many 
 other remains of ancient fishes, now found only in a 
 fossil state. In 1845, he sent Hugh Miller the first 
 specimen of the Coccosteus minor, which he had found 
 near Thurso. " It was from one of Mr. Dick's specimens 
 of this species," says Mr. Miller, " that I first determined 
 the true position of the eyes of the Coccosteus a position 
 which some of my lately found ichthyolites conclusively 
 demonstrate, and which Agassiz, in his restoration, 
 deceived by ill-preserved specimens, has fixed at a point 
 considerably more lateral and posterior, and where eyes 
 would have been of greatly less use to the animal." 
 
 In his future editions of The Old Red Sandstone 
 Hugh Miller found it necessary to make many altera- 
 tions in the text, consequent upon the observations and 
 discoveries of Robert Dick. In his preface to the third
 
 108 HUGH MILLER'S MODIFICA TIONS. CHAP. ix. 
 
 edition, published in 1846, Mr. Miller says that he had 
 found it necessary to make a good many additions tc 
 the volume, and several alterations in the text, where 
 the statements appeared to require modification. 
 
 " I need here," he says, " refer to but one of those modi- 
 fications ; and this chiefly that I may have an opportu- 
 nity of acknowledging my obligations to the meritorious 
 individual through whose kindness I have been furnished 
 with the data on which it has been made. It was stated 
 in the two former editions that there is a gradual increase 
 of size observable in the progress of ichthyolitic life, 
 from the minute fish of the Silurian System up to the 
 enormous Holoptychius of the Coal Measures, the largest 
 of all the ganoids ; and that the Old Eed System, whose 
 lower beds border on the deposits of the Silurian fish, 
 and upper beds on those of the gigantic ganoid, ex- 
 hibited in its various formations this gradation of bulk, 
 beginning with an age of dwarfs, and ending with an 
 age of giants. 
 
 " Since the appearance of the second edition, however, 
 it has been ascertained that there were giants among 
 the dwarfs. The remains of one of the largest fish 
 found anywhere in the system have been discovered in 
 its lowest formation near Thurso by Mr. Eobert Dick, 
 who, by devoting his leisure hours to the study of 
 geology, in a singularly rich locality, has been enabled 
 to add not a few interesting facts to those previously 
 accumulated truths of the science on which its sounder 
 theories can alone be erected, and who has kindly placed 
 at my disposal his collection of fossils. And the positive
 
 CHAP. ix. THE GIGANTIC HOLOPTYCHIUS. 109 
 /proof which they furnish has convinced me that the 
 
 I theory 
 
 of a gradual progression in size, from the earlier 
 to the later Palaeozoic formations, though based originally 
 on no inconsiderable amount of negative evidence, must 
 be permitted to drop." 
 
 He afterwards refers to the comparatively recent 
 discovery of a gigantic Holoptychius in the Lower Old 
 Red Sandstone of Thurso by Mr. Robert Dick of that 
 place. " It bears shrewdly," he says, " against the line 
 of statement in the text of the book, and it serves to 
 show how large an amount of negative evidence may be 
 dissipated by a single positive fact, and to inculcate on 
 the geologist the necessity of cautious induction."* 
 
 * Hugh Miller's Old Red Sandstone, p. 176. Ed. 1875. 
 6*
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 GEOLOGY OF THE COAST NEAR THURSO. 
 
 A CORRESPONDENCE began between Eobert Dick and 
 Hugh Miller, which went on apace. Nothing would 
 satisfy Dick but an early visit from his friend to see the 
 fossils actually lying in their beds. "I have some 
 famous things for you to see," said Dick. " There is a 
 head of Holoptychius, which I have left for you to pick 
 out for yourself. There is a cranial buckler of an 
 Asterolepis, which I want you to see in its proper site. 
 Come, come without delay : there is no end of wonders 
 here no end of (lead fish. Even the town of Thurso is 
 
 COAST NEAR THURSO.
 
 CHAP. x. THE EAST SHORE. Ill 
 
 built of dead fish !" In the meantime, to strengthen hia 
 invitation, Dick proceeded to sketch in words the 
 scenery of the sea- shore at Thurso east and west of 
 the town. He gave a map in outline of the coast, in- 
 dicating the convolutions of the headlands and the dip 
 of the rocks. 
 
 " Come," said Dick, on the 8th of April 1845, " come, 
 I will lead the way. We shall go round the east shore 
 in the direction of Murkle Bay, and I will direct your 
 attention to a few of the varied peculiarities of our 
 rocky path. Though the tide is at low ebb, we must go 
 round by the bridge, for the wintry spates have driven 
 away the stepping stones across the river. . . . We 
 go on, and are now snuffing the sweet sea-breeze, and 
 through the openings of the land we see the fair blue 
 sea, rippling bright in the morning sun, and stretching 
 far away into worlds of wonders. Behind us lies 
 Scrabster roadstead. You see the Bishop's Palace, and 
 above it the little burying-ground on the brink of 
 the cliff, sea-worn and ragged, where the echoes of 
 the murmuring waves sing a never-ending requiem to 
 the departed. And there is the old kirk; and there, 
 almost beneath our feet, is the bed of the river. See, 
 there is a nearly horizontal bed of clayey flagstone, 
 highly calcareous and charged with organic remains 
 scales, bones, spines, snouts of fish, and plants. 
 
 "We pass onward. On the beach between us and 
 Thurso East Castle lies a moderate heap of rolled stones 
 of various sizes, and could they be bound together they 
 form a fine specimen of modern conglomerate,
 
 112 THURSO EAST. 
 
 " We are now between the castle and the sea, and 
 look ! yonder lie the upper beds, which dip away north 
 and a little west. The underlying beds are beneath our 
 feet, for the tempests of many years have washed away 
 the upper surfaces at high- water mark ; but the under- 
 lying strata do not dip in the same direction as the 
 overlying, but nearly west, in fact a little south-west. 
 How is this ? Were the edges of the underlying beds 
 turned up before the upper were thrown down ? 
 
 " We go on for about a gunshot, and come upon a 
 noted fault. We tread on the edges of the strata, which 
 dip apparently due east or north-east. Forty-eight 
 paces farther on we meet another fault. The strata here 
 appear to dip west. We tread again on the edges of the 
 strata. How is this ? These are the underlying beds. 
 The cliff is from eight to nine feet high, and look! yonder 
 lie the upper b$ds, which stretch unbroken out to sea. 
 The lower beds are highly charged with organic remains, 
 and so are the upper. The latter is bituminous and cal- 
 careous, and here I find stout bones, droppings, scales of 
 Holoptychius, and plates with warts on them. 
 
 " We come to a bit burnie a little brawling noisy 
 thing in the month of April. We step across, and are now 
 on firm rock, highly calcareous, a rude, ill-cemented, 
 cross-grained piece of stuff, which, in some places, re- 
 minds me of the riddlings of lime. As we pass on, the 
 fossiliferous beds are on our right hand and on our left. 
 They are not all ' calcareous flag beds,' as described by 
 Murchison. Indeed, none of them resemble the ordinary 
 which are sawn into pavement. They are more
 
 CHAP. x. " THE MAN IS MAD." 113 
 
 bituminous. And see ! here is a bed of highly siliceous 
 stuff, and there is one of green clay, slightly sandy. On 
 taking a decomposed piece in the hand, and rubbing it 
 between the fingers, it feels greasy. 
 
 " We are now among the low reefs, and look ! there 
 are multitudes of black, brilliant, quadrangular scales, and 
 numerous remains of fish, snouts innumerable, scales 
 of Holoptychius, pieces of fish jaws, teeth, spines, bones, 
 warty plates, and even plants. A little round the point, 
 almost in the line of a fault, under a rock, I found that 
 enormously big plate [of the Holoptychius], thirteen and 
 a half inches across. 
 
 " While occupied in belabouring the rock to dig it 
 out, I was so meditative and so wondrously affected, 
 that some ' town bodies,' not understanding my object, 
 looked down upon me, and speaking to each other said, 
 'That man is mad!' But I was not so mad as they 
 thought me to be. 
 
 "The dip is nearly north, and the fossils are most 
 abundant in the beds of rock close in with the land. I 
 march on over the remains of departed days, and medi- 
 tate among the tombs of deceased millions of living 
 creatures, tombs such as Hervey never dreamt of. As 
 I proceed, I pass successively cliffs innumerable, faults 
 innumerable, fossiliferous beds innumerable; for they 
 occur in detached patches, and are to be seen on the 
 very brink of the precipice. The sea is now dashing its 
 billowy spray unceasingly, and along the outer edge of 
 the breakers the crested cormorant and spotted divei 
 ply their ceaseless vocation.
 
 114 FOSSILIFEROUS BEDS. CHAP. x. 
 
 " The cliffs are now about forty feet high. The bitu- 
 minous bed underneath is charged with the remains of 
 fish. I used to wonder how the bed here, after running 
 fifty paces or so, suddenly became much harder and 
 highly siliceous. The sea has worn it into ruts deep 
 ruts and the remains of fish can be seen peeping out of 
 the sides. There are numerous fossil plants here. 
 
 " On we go, and soon tread upon a highly siliceous 
 bed, very rugged, and worn into many strange shapes 
 and gnarled knots. A little after, we pass a fossiliferous 
 bed, charged, as usual, with fragments of fish. In a 
 short while, we meet something like an abrupt wall of 
 rock stretching across the path, over which we must 
 climb. Once up, we find that the sea, which has told 
 on every bed we have hitherto passed, has made no 
 impression here. A highly siliceous bed stretches from 
 the land in a long slope, sheer down into the waves, 
 nearly as entire' as it was thousands of years ago, when 
 the real red sandstone beds once continuous across the 
 Firth from Orkney to Caithness lay upon it; and though 
 the billows break at every tide with tremendous force, 
 the siliceous bed seems to lie as firm and unworn as 
 ever. The wildest north-west winds that ever blew, and 
 all the rushing force of the dashing waves, have availed 
 but little in shaking the foundations or even abrading 
 the surface of this hard siliceous rock. 
 
 "No bed similar to this neither on the east to 
 Castlehill, nor on the west to Reay is to be seen at this 
 part of the coast. The beds have everywhere been broken 
 down, more or less.
 
 A FINE SEA VIEW 
 
 " It is with a feeling of enjoyment that the ardent 
 admirer of Nature contemplates the surrounding pro- 
 spect. The view is grand ! On the right is Dunnet 
 Bay, with a schooner or two in the offing, beating up 
 the Tentland Firth. Then there are the red cliffs of 
 Dunnet Head. In long perspective, adown the Pentland 
 Firth, we see the white waves chafing the island of 
 
 Waas; and right over, in solitary state, the swelling 
 Orkney hills and the Man of Hoy close the distance. 
 Westward we look over the wide main, no land be- 
 tween us and the coast of Labrador. To the left, along 
 the land, we see Holborn Head and the bay of Thurso, 
 a complete panorama. 
 
 " We go on, and pass fossiliferous beds, when we are 
 stopped by a deep gully worn by the waves, over which
 
 116 PUDDING GYOE. 
 
 it is impossible to leap. We therefore climb the cliff, 
 and pass along the grassy bank on the top. The rocky 
 beds there assume varied appearances ; faults in abun- 
 dance ; here an opening to the sea, there an irregular 
 wall ; until we reach Pudding Gyoe, where the cliffs are 
 steeper, and the sea comes closer in. 
 
 " Pudding Gyoe is a hollow cave, worn into the solid 
 rock by the ceaseless grinding of the sea. The entrance 
 can only be seen when the tide is at low ebb. The water 
 from above percolates through the strata, highly charged 
 with lime, so that, in creeping through the rocks under- 
 neath, it has formed a stalactitic covering, not unlike the 
 entrails of a cow, or cow's puddings, and hence the name 
 of Pudding Gyoe. 
 
 " There is an old tradition of a piper who ventured 
 'too far ben,' and ultimately lost himself; and many 
 people, good people, heard him long long after, playing 
 his pipes in a low hollow sound, some four miles up the 
 country. 
 
 " The beds have hitherto been dipping northerly ; but 
 at a small distance farther on, a range of rocks dips east; 
 then there is a most notorious fault. The strata drop 
 down almost on end, dipping east. You then enter 
 Sandy Bay. 
 
 " On the farther side you come to more fossiliferous 
 rocks. The remains are invariably the same quad- 
 rangular scales, scales of Holoptychius, snouts of Diplo- 
 pterus, teeth, warty bones, and some other large bones." 
 
 Dick resumes the subject of the above ramble along 
 the north-eastern coast on the 29th of April 1845.
 
 MURKLE BA Y. 117 
 
 " On leaving Sandy Bay and moving eastward in the 
 direction of Murkle Bay, the strata continue to dip 
 northerly. We shortly come upon a fault, when a total 
 change in the direction of the dip takes place. It is 
 now nearly due west We tread upon their upturned 
 edges, and are soon involved in the mazes of a wilder- 
 ness of broken rocks. Stones of every shape, size, and 
 description are lying around, as if a multitude of men 
 had been at work with sledge hammers, and left the 
 place a scene of the rudest confusion. 
 
 " The truth is, the sea rolling in winter and summer 
 across the strata, in placid or in sullen majesty, or in 
 whirling or dashing storms, has broken but not removed 
 this mass of stony wreck. It is, nevertheless, a noted 
 phenomenon of the scenery. 
 
 " Murkle Bay owes its existence to a noted fault, and, 
 in my opinion, every little inlet or bay along the coast 
 is due to the same cause. In moving round the sandy 
 shore, the explorer has time to muse on the sandstone 
 cliffs of Dunnet, now distinctly visible across the waters ; 
 and the dip of the yellow cliffs can be seen to have the 
 same general strike as the calcareous, and the other beds 
 of clay he has just left. 
 
 " At the eastern inner angle of Murkle Bay the strata 
 are in great confusion bent, twisted, contorted, and 
 dipping in various directions. Moving on a little 
 farther, they assume the usual appearance of dipping 
 away in the direction of Dunnet Head ; and here, for the 
 last time in this direction, the explorer detects a bed of 
 bituminous calcareous slates, full of organic remains.
 
 118 HAMMERING TILL MOONLIGHT. CHAP. x. 
 
 They crop out between two dissimilar beds, and many 
 warty and other bones are to be found here." .... 
 
 Dick then proceeds onwards to Dunnet sands and 
 Dunnet cliffs, which have already been described. 
 During the same evening on which he begins the above 
 description, he proceeds to geologise on the west shore 
 of Thurso. He says : " Shouldering an old poker, a four- 
 pound hammer, and with two chisels in my pockets, I 
 set out for the burn of Scrabster. After a great deal of 
 hammering, I found no end of young Coccosteus. I might 
 have filled a barrel with them, but they were all broken. 
 What hammering! what sweating! Coat off: got my 
 hands cut to bleeding. Found a very hard bituminous 
 bed. It rings like a piece of metal. What pokering ! 
 Got three or four fish, not much worth. Don't think 
 them new. Found a plant. Found scales of Holopty- 
 chius. Wrought on till the moon shone clear in the 
 water of the burn. Returned home at twenty minutes 
 past ten." 
 
 The correspondence between Robert Dick and Hugh 
 Miller proceeds. Dick tells his correspondent of all his 
 findings of fossils. Everything he collects is immediately 
 sent to the Witness office at Edinburgh. Dick had many 
 wanderings for the purpose of finding the richest fossil 
 districts near Thurso before Hugh Miller's visit. Hav- 
 ing described the sea-shore to the east of Thurso; he 
 next proceeded to describe the sea-shore to the west of 
 Thurso. He begins his letter of the 4th of May 1845 
 by quoting the stanza from Byron's Childe Harold, 
 beginning
 
 CHAP. x. VIEW FROM THURSO BAY. 119 
 
 " ' He that has sailed upon the deep blue sea 
 Has viewed at times, I ween, a full fair sight.' 
 
 " Such," he goes on to say, " is Byron's beautiful descrip- 
 tion of a scene at sea ; and such has often been my own 
 feeling, when, at evening's hour, my steps have measured 
 the beach that lies spread out so temptingly fair between 
 this little town and its beautiful bay. For, 'tis not 
 unusual, in the month of May, to observe, out in the 
 Firth, some eight or ten large vessels with ' every white 
 sail set,' ' curling the waves before each dashing prow.' " 
 
 But Dick had not gone down to look at the beauti- 
 ful bay and the passing ships, or at Dunnet Head and 
 Hoy Head, with the setting sun glinting along their 
 sides, throwing out their rocky projections, and leaving 
 their hollows and gyoes in the shade. No ! He had 
 gone down to the coast " geologically bent." He wan- 
 dered westward on the sand and then on the rocks, 
 hammer in hand, ready to strike a blow, or any number 
 of blows, for the honour of science. 
 
 " Passing on," he says, " I walk over a bed of loose 
 sand smoothed and levelled by the tide, and after a time 
 I reach the solid rocks, of a bluish-grey cast, and dip- 
 ping northerly, with a little of west. The first beds I 
 meet are not decidedly fossiliferous, though a few scales 
 and droppings may be found. A little farther on I see 
 some warty bones, and still farther, there is a bed 
 decidedly charged with organic remains. Pieces of fish 
 jaws, bones, and tail-half plates of Coccosteus, are seen 
 in considerable numbers. 
 
 " Moving on, I reach an opener space, strewed with
 
 120 AN OLD BURYING-GROUND. CHAP, x, 
 
 fragments of a dark blue flag, charged, more or less. 
 with organisms. Some very fine fossil fish have been 
 found there. I next come in sight of the human bury- 
 ing-ground on the top of the bank, as distinguished from 
 the fish burying-ground on the rocks underneath. 
 
 " The family to which the burying-ground belonged, 
 though once numbering among the Caithness aristocracy, 
 have experienced a sad reverse. The last of the race is 
 now toiling for his bread in a foreign land. Yet, one 
 cannot help heaving a sigh in passing, to think that 
 through his follies and imprudence, the dust of his 
 fathers should be exposed to the contempt of passers-by. 
 The door of their sepulchre is battered to pieces, and the 
 ground is overspread with dank nettles and hemlocks, 
 and other abominations. 
 
 " It must surely have been a refined, a poetic feeling, 
 which prompted the founder of the burying-ground to 
 pitch it in such* *a spot, close by the murmuring sea 
 the image of eternity. He thought to have slept in 
 undisturbed security. Yet the sea is already under- 
 mining the graveyard, and it is not improbable that the 
 rock on which the family vault stands may itself be 
 washed away, and the dust of the dead be driven hither 
 and thither by the wasting and unfeeling waves. 
 
 " A little past the burying-ground, and on the beach. 
 I find a change in the dip of the strata. The beds dip 
 east, though almost immediately thereafter they return 
 to their former dip namely northerly, with a little of 
 west ; and continue so until we arrive at the Bishop's 
 Palace, where yellowish, whitish, and striped beds of
 
 CHAP. x. THE BISHOPS PALACE. 121 
 
 sandstone prevail. The beds on which the ruined palace 
 stands are reddish and yellowish looking, and dip in the 
 same direction. 
 
 " The ruins of the palace occupy an interesting spot. 
 
 RCINS OF BISHOP'S PALACE AND 8CRABSTER ROADS. 
 
 It must have been selected by one possessed of a true 
 relish for the beauties of nature. On the south-east side 
 you observe a wide circular hollow of land, swelling 
 gently up to the heath-clad hill of Forss. The headland, 
 running round towards the north, breaks the force of 
 the western storms. On the east there is a series of
 
 122 THE RUINED PALACE. CHAP. x. 
 
 swelling uplands. Looking seaward the prospect is 
 grand. Towards the north, the Orkneys are seen in 
 the distance, with the Man of Hoy standing out to sea. 
 Nearer, Dunnet cliffs are observed boldly fronting the 
 Pentland Firth; and the eye aches in its inability to 
 penetrate the mystery beyond. 
 
 " I can well imagine the warm, sunny, summer even- 
 ings of bygone days, when the bishop would sit watch- 
 ing the rippling waters, or gazing at the last beams of 
 the setting sun, going down behind the world of waters 
 in a blaze of crimson and gold ! 
 
 " Sixteen years ago, I remember making an attempt 
 to explore the inner recesses of the ruined palace. I 
 entered the cave underneath with a lighted candle ; but 
 I found it utterly impracticable to make my way without 
 pick and spade. There is a low door, which seems 
 to lead to subterraneous chambers ; but the passage is 
 choked with rubtish. 
 
 " The little burn of Scrabster runs round the rock, 
 entering the sea at its north-west side. The water would 
 be useful to the castle inmates. I have sometimes seen 
 sailors ashore filling their barrels there. 
 
 " Close beside the burn, a ridge of clay occurs, and 
 sweeping round Scrabster Bay it rises in some places to 
 about a hundred feet. It is blue and full of stones of 
 various sizes. I have often been astonished at its appear- 
 ance, and wondered where it could have come from. 
 Some call it boulder clay, and say that it is similar to 
 what skirts the base of some of the Alpine mountains. 
 It may be a Moraine. It seems to fill an irregular
 
 CHAP. x. THE DEWS BRIG. 123 
 
 hollow. The bare rocks are through the soil on the hill- 
 top, immediately behind. Can it really be that those 
 hill-tops, now so insignificant, once towered above the 
 clouds, capped in snow, bound up in ice, and that they 
 have gradually mouldered away down to their present 
 elevation of a few hundred feet above the level of the 
 sea. 
 
 "Low down, at the Coastguard house, beneath a 
 weight of clay, the strata crop out, and are at first 
 slightly charged with organisms. A little farther on I 
 find beds charged with warty bones ; and the strata dip 
 northerly. Then there is a fault, the strata are in 
 confusion, and dip westerly. They then become nearly 
 horizontal, and continue so until the extreme end of 
 Holborn Head ; where I find them slaty, and highly 
 calcareous, bituminous, and containing many remains of 
 fish. 
 
 " There is a noted fault to be seen almost atop of the 
 point of the promontory. The strata slope in different 
 directions. They are bent, twisted, contorted, and in 
 great confusion. At one place, they are quite on end. 
 What a subterraneous convulsion there must have been 
 here at one time ! 
 
 " We pass along, and walk over the Deil's Brig. The 
 sea washes underneath. It is one of the great goes, or 
 gyoes, which abound along the coast. In stormy 
 weather, the sea drives into it with overpowering force, 
 and sends clouds of spray far inland. The Brig clearly 
 shows the hard clay-flag of which the headland is 
 composed.
 
 124 THE CLETT. 
 
 " Then we come to that very singular rock, THE 
 CLETT. Who, in reading about Caithness, has not 
 heard of Thurso Clett? In fact, it is our great lion. The 
 Clett is an oblong rock of calcareous slate of about 100 
 feet high. It has been separated by the action of the 
 sea from the adjoining mainland. It is the resort, in 
 summer, of innumerable sea-birds, who breed on the 
 ledges of the cliffs. When sitting on end, in rows, they 
 have not inaptly been compared to rows of bottles in an 
 apothecary's shop. 
 
 " Passing on, the cliffs begin to rise until we reach a 
 monument of white sandstone, erected to the memory of 
 Captain M. A. Slater, who, it is said, either fell down or 
 threw himself down the precipice, and was never after- 
 wards heard of.* 
 
 " A very little past the monument we meet a kind of 
 a ditch, with a,, very little water trickling over the slates 
 at its bottom. In these slates are fish ; fish without end, 
 but very rotten. Going on a little farther, we come to 
 a, spot of rocks washed bare by the wintry storms and 
 ihe dashing sea-spray. There we find a patch of calca- 
 reous slates full of fish ! The flags are for the most part 
 much decayed ; and the fish themselves have long been 
 dead and decayed, and their scales and head bones had 
 lain scattered about, ere the limy mud and dust wrapped 
 them up. 
 
 * It is said that the monument is a sham. The horse on which 
 Captain Slater was mounted, galloped back into Thurso without its 
 rider ; but it is said that Captain Slater was afterwards seen in Aus- 
 tralia. Jealousy was at the bottom of the affair.
 
 THE DEIL'S BRIG : HOLBORN HEAD.
 
 CHAP. x. HOLBORN HEAD. 125 
 
 " This fish bed reminds me very much of the fish bed 
 at Weydale, a few miles south of Thurso. The fish are 
 of the same species. I remember very well hiring a 
 flagman, and toiling with him half a day, and all that 
 we gathered was two fossil fish out of some hundreds of 
 broken worthless stuff. 
 
 " Beyond the ditch the cliffs rise again, and continue 
 of the same height about 190 feet; and then they 
 swell up suddenly about ten feet more, into a sort of 
 round hill. From thence the cliffs gradually fall, and 
 slope away down to Brims. Before arriving there we 
 find a bed of calcareous slates, of noted appearance, full 
 of the remains of fish, snouts of Diplopterus, jaws, 
 scales, and warty bones. Westward of the house of 
 Brims, there is the same appearance of fish remains 
 amongst bituminous rocks. 
 
 " The strata west of Brims are well worthy the 
 inspection of the geologist, on account of the very extra- 
 ordinary position many of them assume. Their appear- 
 ance is singular in the extreme." 
 
 Holborn Head, and the rocks beyond, continued to be 
 a favourite haunt of our geologist. He not only haunted 
 the top of the cliffs, but by a difficult and dangerous 
 path descended to the rocks underneath them. He 
 resolved that nothing should remain concealed where 
 the pick and chisel could reach them. "Determined," 
 he says, in a letter addressed to Hugh Miller, dated the 
 6th of May, only two days after the above inspection, 
 " to put down nothing but what I had seen with my 
 own eyes, I started this evening at seven o'clock ; and
 
 126 REGIONS OF THE DEAD. CHAP. x. 
 
 walking double-quick time, I reached the extreme point 
 of Holborn Head at a little after eight. By this time 
 the sun had set, and I felt it cruel cold. But I had 
 scarcely set my foot upon the bare slates ere I picked up 
 a. very stout piece of fish bone, about seven inches in 
 length. I also found a warty bone, a piece of fossil 
 wood, a scale of Holoptychius ; and I left two pieces 
 sticking in the flags until to-morrow, when, if I can, I 
 will hammer them out. These will be sent to you, not 
 so much for their value, as because of their being found 
 at the extreme point of the promontory. . . . And yet I 
 was told by Mr. Manson that nothing was to be got 
 there." 
 
 On the 12th of May following, he proceeds 
 
 " ' To the regions of the dead 
 Long and painful is the way ! ' 
 
 " I have thought that this ought to be reversed, more 
 especially in the case of poor geological bone-hunters ; 
 for it is not when a man sets out on his journey ' to the 
 regions of the dead,' full of hope and strong in spirit, 
 that he is inclined to feel the way long. No; even 
 though he has 3 pounds of iron chisels in his trousers 
 pocket, a 4-pound hammer in one hand, and a 14-pound 
 smiddy forehammer in the other; and his old beaver 
 hat filled with paper and twine. Away he speeds 
 
 " ' The folk still thinking as before 
 That Gilpin rode a race,' 
 
 Nor does he halt, nor lag, nor look behind, till fairly 
 hammering at the blue slate.
 
 HOLBORN CLIFFS. 127 
 
 " But the matter is sadly altered when, after playing 
 for some three hours at Blind Man's Buff, he looks round 
 and finds that the sun has gone down, that a cold wind 
 is whistling along the crags, that 'gloomy night is 
 gathering fast,' and that he finds he must begone 1 
 When he looks at the result of his toil, he is forced to 
 sigh at its very meagreness when contrasted with his 
 splendid opening dreams. Then, with a shrug of his 
 shoulders, he trusses up his burden, whistles ' o'er the 
 lave o't,' speeds up the brow of the hill, and sees before 
 him the six or eight miles that he has to walk between 
 him and his home, then it is that he desponds, and 
 sighs 
 
 " ' From the regions of the dead 
 Long and painful is the way.' 
 
 " As intimated in my last palaver, I returned to Hoi- 
 born Head, and after digging out the two pieces of bone 
 left by me on the previous night, I explored a little 
 longer, and found the pieces of very stout bones sketched 
 on the other side. [Six pieces of fossil bone are sketched 
 in pencil one is the ' tail half of the Coccosteus,' two 
 are warty bones.] These are all taken from the point 
 of the promontory. I think they must have belonged 
 to some very large fish, similar to those which had the 
 very thick skull-caps, found at Thurso East." 
 
 With respect to the cliffs of Holborn Head, he says 
 " They are rugged and fearful-looking in many places. 
 They are hollowed out by the winter tempests. The 
 whole force of the North Sea breaks in violently upon 
 the rocks, while a strong tide runs continually eithei
 
 128 GETTING DOWN THE CRAGS. CHAP. x. 
 
 east or west. So that one might almost prophesy death 
 and ruin to Holhorn Head. In that case, the tide must 
 rise considerably higher in Thurso, for the Head has a 
 great effect in turning aside the flood, and throwing it 
 back into the open firth. 
 
 " Fearful as the crags seem, there is a possibility of 
 getting down at one particular spot. I have been down 
 there. I intend to go down again. I should be enrap- 
 tured to find a fish head in such a place, or even a piece 
 of jaw."
 
 CHAPTEE XL 
 
 HUGH MILLER VISITS DICK. 
 
 ROBERT DICK, by dint of continuous industry, was gra- 
 dually acquiring a notion of Caithness geology. His 
 knowledge was for the most part derived from direct 
 personal observation. He never accepted a statement 
 without having verified it himself. He saw with no 
 man's eyes but his own; he thought with no man's 
 brains but his own. Thus what he did know was thor- 
 oughly exact, accurate, and reliable. 
 
 As you proceed from letter to letter, in his communi- 
 cations with Hugh Miller, you see him unlearning his 
 old views and learning new ones. Every ramble throws 
 some new light on the geology of Caithness. He notes 
 down everything that he sees. About the dip of Caithness 
 rocks, his observations are for the most part at variance 
 with the views of his "superiors," his "masters in 
 geology." Nevertheless, he notes down his own facts, 
 and no doubt they will by and by be confirmed and 
 adopted. 
 
 He was very cautious in adopting conclusions. He 
 must first be quite sure of the premises. He found many 
 writers on geology starting with a theory and then mak- 
 ing the so-called facts fit into the theory. " Here has
 
 130 FACTS VERSUS THEORY. CHAP. xi. 
 
 been some one writing upon the geology of Caithness," 
 he said. " His writing is very good, but his premises 
 are incorrect. He cannot have seen the rocks, except 
 from a gig, when he passed along the road ; and now he 
 drags them in to elucidate his theory. When I want tc 
 know what a rock is, I go to it. I hammer it ; I dissect 
 it. I then know what it really is. I object to this 
 eternal theorising. My idea is that we know very little 
 of geology, yet these men have got it dignified by the 
 name of a science. The science of geology! Why, 
 don't they see that there are only a very few exposed 
 rocks which we can study. It is only a small bit of 
 the crust of the earth that we can inspect. What are 
 the rocks that we can see, compared with the immense 
 mass lying underground, or forming the ocean bed, 
 which we can never see ? No, no ; we must just work 
 patiently on, colled facts, and in course of time geology 
 may develop into a science." 
 
 Dick even found that some of the fossil fish and 
 fossil branches that he had found in the course of his 
 investigations were turned against himself. He had 
 sent a fossil branch, which had been found in a Caith- 
 ness quarry, to a friend in the south, thinking it to be 
 of value. He was afterwards surprised to find an 
 engraving of the fossil branch given in a geological pub- 
 lication, with an amount of letterpress, arguing out a 
 theory which Dick had expressed himself as decidedly 
 opposed to. Not only was the theory incorrect, but the 
 fossil was misengraved, having received additions which 
 were not warranted, and illustrated by sections which
 
 CHAP. xr. ORIGIN OF FOSSIL FISHES. 131 
 
 in his opinion were impossible. In short, it was twisted, 
 like many a fact, to suit a theory, and Dick was in- 
 dignant that a fossil furnished by himself should be 
 used for such a purpose. 
 
 It will be observed that Dick's first study in geology 
 consisted in observing the dip of the strata round the 
 Thurso coast, from Dunnet Head to the end of the Hoi- 
 born rocks. He did this with great care, and indicated 
 the faults, disturbances, and fossiliferous rocks, with 
 their various dips, in the letter he sent to Hugh Miller 
 in April 1845. He found many of the rocks abounding 
 in dead fish, quantities of scales, heads, bucklers, and 
 fossil fish, sometimes in great confusion. Sometimes he 
 found them in abundance on the top of the highest rocks 
 at Holborn Head. How came they there ? 
 
 This led him into a consideration of the causes of the 
 abundance of dead fish in a fossil state on the shores of 
 Caithness. It was clear that the northern part of the 
 county, where the fossil fish so abundantly exist, had at 
 one time been entirely under the sea. It had formed part 
 of the bed of the ocean. An upheaval of the bed 
 occurred, when or how was not known. The multitude of 
 fishes were caught as in a trap. They were smothered 
 amidst thin clay. They died in agonies. Hugh Miller 
 says " The figures of the fossil fish are contorted, con- 
 tracted, curved ; the tail in many instances is bent round 
 to the head, the spines stick out, the fins are spread to 
 the full, as in fishes that die in convulsions. The atti- 
 tudes of all the Ichthyolites on the platform of death, are 
 attitudes of fear, anger, and pain."
 
 132 CAITHNESS FLAGSTONES. CHAP, xi 
 
 The clay formed, layer upon layer, on the fishes, and 
 was transformed by pressure into flagstones. The pro- 
 cess of depression and elevation may have been repeat- 
 edly performed, but every elevation brought up from the 
 sea bottom dead fish without end. In fact, the commer- 
 cial value of Caithness flags consists in the amount of 
 dead fish they contain. " Thurso is built of dead fish," 
 said Eobert Dick ; " and the capitalists and labourers 
 are also maintained by the same article." 
 
 Sir Roderick Murchison says of the flagstones of 
 Caithness, " that they are highly valuable for many uses, 
 and must prove eminently durable from the nature of 
 their composition. Their well-known durability is attri- 
 butable, in part, to the large amount of bitumen they 
 contain, which has been produced by the abundance of 
 fishes which existed at the time those rocks were depo- 
 sited, the fossil remains of which still abound. Tar and 
 gas may be distilled from them." Hugh Miller also says 
 " The animal matter of the Caithness Ichthyolites is a 
 hard, black, insoluble bitumen, which I have used more 
 than once as sealing-wax." 
 
 But the geological formation of Caithness was still 
 in progress. These dead fishes existed long before the 
 appearance of man on the earth. If we stretch our view 
 over, long intervals, it will be found that, in consequence 
 of the depression of one portion of the earth's crust, 
 and the elevation of another, what has at one time been 
 dry land becomes covered with sea ; and what has at 
 one time been sea, at another becomes dry land; and 
 that, partly in consequence of the eccentricity of the
 
 GLACIER ACTION. 133 
 
 earth's motions, and partly in consequence of the shift- 
 ing distribution of land and sea, what at one time has 
 been tropical, at another becomes arctic, and what at one 
 time has been arctic, at another becomes tropical. 
 
 Astronomers tell us that more than 200,000 years 
 ago, the earth was so placed in regard to the sun, that a 
 series of physical changes was induced, which eventually 
 resulted in conferring upon our hemisphere a most 
 intensely severe climate.* All the northern lands of 
 Europe were then covered with a thick crust of ice 
 and snow. The climate of England and Scotland was 
 what Greenland is now. 
 
 Glaciers, laden with boulders, some torn from the 
 rocks on which they rested, some fallen from over- 
 hanging heights, flowed down the valleys, leaving their 
 ice-tracks along the sides of the hills. When the 
 glaciers melted, they dropped the boulders which they 
 contained, either on the land, or in the sea, far away 
 from the place from which they had been reft from the 
 rocks. Then was laid down the boulder clay, con- 
 sisting of an agglomeration of ground-down rocks of 
 various kinds, old red sandstone, chalk, or coal, inter- 
 spersed with boulders, pebbles, and sometimes shells. 
 
 There must have been constantly recurring alterna- 
 tions of climate, from arctic frost to tropical heat, though 
 separated, it might be, by hundreds of thousands of years, 
 before the dry land was prepared for the occupation of 
 man. Again, every bed of coal presumes an elevation 
 of the land, and a subsequent depression. Near New- 
 
 * Geikie's Great Ice Age, p. 561. 
 7*
 
 DICK'S FINDINGS. 
 
 castle, there are numbers of these beds, some of them 
 from eight to ten feet thick. These successive beds of 
 coal consist of the remains of peat mosses, ferns, jungle, 
 cypress swamps, and forest growths. They were either 
 submerged where they grew, or were drifted into seas of 
 deposit. When compressed by the superincumbent strata 
 of sandstones, limestones, shales, mudstones, and iron- 
 stones, they formed the coal fields of every country. 
 Then, at last, the present land and the present sea took 
 their places, and man entered on the scene. 
 
 Full of curiosity, or perhaps full of the desire for 
 knowledge, Dick proceeded, in course of time, to look 
 into the geologic formations of the ground on which he 
 lived. He dug into the rocks, inquired into the nature 
 of the soil, and found many things which excited his 
 surprise and his wonder. He found many dead things 
 under his feet dead foliage, dead ferns, dead seaweed, 
 dead fish, the dead remnants of chaos. 
 
 Such was the subject on which Robert Dick was now 
 spending the remnants of his spare time. He not only 
 spent his days but his nights in his search for dead 
 objects. He himself was not before the public, but Hugh 
 Miller was. Hugh was the editor of the Witness news- 
 paper, in which he entered all that he knew about geolo- 
 gical matters. Accordingly Dick sent all that he dis- 
 covered during his rambles to his friend at Edinburgh. 
 Here, for instance, is a bundle of his findings, which he 
 sent to Hugh Miller on the 21st of July 1845 : 
 
 " I send a stone, with a fossil fish in it, from "Weydale; 
 a stone from the salmon cruives in the Thurso river, with
 
 CHAP. xi. DICK PUBLICLY MENTIONED. 135 
 
 a fish on each side of it ; a stone from the little burying- 
 ground of Pennyland, with a bit of fish on it ; a stone 
 from the burn of Scrabster, with a fish wanting the head 
 on it ; a bone or two from the extreme point of Holborn 
 Head ; a fish, a stone or two from the fish-bed, Holborn; 
 and some bits of fish from Brims. Some bones from 
 Thurso East one, two, three of this form [giving a 
 drawing], and a fragment of a skull-cover of great 
 strength, but not so strong as the monster plate I sent 
 
 you ; but the triangular knob thus / \ is of such size as 
 
 fully to confirm you in the faith of my report of last 
 year. The fragment is altogether of a massive appear- 
 ance. I am much chagrined at my ill luck in not find- 
 ing a whole fish of respectable size. I am not, however, 
 cast down, but may yet be triumphant." 
 
 Hugh Miller received with gratitude the fossil fish 
 sent him by Dick. He also referred to them in his 
 articles in the Witness, and mentioned Dick by name, 
 as the discoverer of the principal fossil fish. Dick had 
 no desire to appear before the public in this or any other 
 way. He was an extremely shy man. Some who did 
 not really know him, thought him morose. But lie was 
 nothing of the sort. He enjoyed science merely for its 
 own sake, and it always gave him the greatest pleasure 
 to hand over his fossils to others who could make use of 
 them, and bring them under the notice of scientific men. 
 
 Hence, in the letter to Hugh Miller accompanying 
 the above bundle of fossils, he says : " Your letter, with 
 the 10th and llth Geological Eambles, came safely
 
 136 QUARRYMAN AT WEYDALE. CHAP. XT. 
 
 to hand. That of the llth arrived this morning.* I 
 turned to it without a moment's delay. I had not read 
 very far when I had a notion of what was coming, and 
 the perspiration began to rise profusely from my brow. 
 . . . Seriously, nothing could be better handled than 
 your ingenious mode of broaching the subject, noi 
 exceed your masterly manner of carrying it through. . . 
 Only, like a good man, do not speak so often about 
 me by name. I am a quiet creature, and do not like to 
 see myself in print at all. So leave it to be understood 
 who found the old bones ; and let them guess who can." 
 Dick again repeated his invitations to Hugh Miller 
 to come to Thurso, and see what he had been doing on 
 Holborn Head, in Thurso East, and at Dunnet Head. 
 But in order to explore the country further, he went 
 inland to see what had been found in the flag quarries 
 at Weydale and Banniskirk. He had been to Weydale 
 several times, and made the acquaintance of a quarry- 
 man. He had made an appointment to visit him on a 
 certain day, and, as Dick was a most punctual man 
 and kept his appointments to a minute, he accordingly 
 made his appearance at "Weydale. 
 
 "As I drew near the place," he says, "the auld 
 bachelor came out, pipe in cheek, and sitting down on a 
 stone, he made a motion for me to come and sit down 
 beside him, ' I saw you coming,' he said, ' but I thocht 
 you wudna come the day, it was so blawey.' 'Oh,' 
 said I, ' I always keep my word, blawey or no. Did ye 
 tirr a bit?'-f* 'No, man,' said he, 'the grun was so 
 * 21st July 1845. t Work a bit.
 
 CHAP. xi. A DIPLOPTERUS. 137 
 
 hard that feint a bit o' the pick wud go through it. 
 The grun's like iron. But/ he added, ' I've got a fish ! ' 
 ' Have ye ?' said I. ' Yes/ he said, ' oot o' anither place. 
 Ye can see it in the barn.' And away we went to inspect 
 the fish in the barn ; and there it was, spread out on the 
 clay floor. 'See!' said he. 'O man/ said I, that's 
 grand, it's a new kind' [Dipterus]. It had been much 
 wasted ere it was buried up in the mud ; the tail rays 
 were all scattered; the head plates were spread out; 
 but a piece of the body was standing up wonderfully 
 full and round. 
 
 " ' See/ said he again, ' there's a head !' It was that 
 of a Diplopterus much broken, but of a good size. ' I 
 must see the place from which it was taken/ said I. 
 ' Come away then.' So, shouldering a pick and spade, 
 away we set. About three good stonethrows from the 
 burn, we came to what some people had been trying to 
 make a ditch rough and rude and in the ditch was a 
 rock, and in the rock, fish and abundance of loose 
 scales. But the fish are much wasted. We worked at 
 the place an hour, but did not get one fish that would 
 bear carrying away. We saw plenty of broken Diplo- 
 pterus. I cut my hand and broke my chisel, and then 
 left the spot, and went back to the burn, where I got a 
 few small things. 
 
 " If you choose to come here and stay three or four 
 days with me, you can have a fair trial upon a third 
 locality close by, which has never yet been fairly 
 tested. I will make you welcome, to my little house, 
 and you can give Scrabster, Holborn Head, a trial also
 
 138 JOVRNEY TO BANNISKIRK. CHAP. xr. 
 
 say a day at each. The Diplopterus is abundant at 
 the Cruives, and Dipt/eras also." 
 
 The quarrymen in the neighbourhood had now 
 begun to learn the value of fossils. The publication by 
 Hugh Miller of the specimens of the Holoptychius, 
 Dipterus, Diplopterus, and other fossil fishes found by 
 Robert Dick near Thurso, had the effect of sending 
 many fossil -hunters into the neighbourhood. It was 
 holiday time the month of August, and wherever 
 curiosities are to be found, there is a rush to see them, 
 to find them, and to carry them home as treasures. 
 Accordingly, when Dick went out fossil -hunting, he 
 found the strangers from the south very much in his 
 way. One day in August, before the arrival of Hugh 
 Miller, he extended his investigations to Banniskirk. 
 It was about eight miles from Thurso, and he had never 
 been there before. 
 
 "I have been seventeen years in Thurso," he said 
 (13th August 1845), "but never saw Banniskirk. I 
 have been two years a fossil man, but never saw 
 Banniskirk. You were one blessed week there; but 
 what were you doing ? 
 
 " Eleven o'clock was ringing this forenoon when I left 
 Thurso for Banniskirk. I went on and on until I reached 
 it. Most fortunately I directed my steps to a point of 
 th3 rubbish which, in my opinion, had not been touched 
 since the first opening of the quarry. The day was cold 
 and wet, and there I stood hammering away, as shower 
 after shower went driving by. I was alike indifferent 
 to wind and weather for some hours.
 
 CHAP. xi. QUARRYMEN AND ENGLISH GOLD. 139 
 
 " When I had tied up my bundle I went to the upper 
 end of the quarry a good gunshot off where four or 
 five men were at work. Accosting them, I said, 'Is 
 there any sign of fish with ye ? ' '0 no, boy,' they said, 
 ye're on the wrong scent. But what wad ye gie for a 
 score o' them ? ' 'I don't know,' said I, ' what wad ye 
 seek ?' 'I got five shillings for one' said a buck-toothed 
 man with a long nose. 'Ay,' said I, 'the siller has 
 been plenty.' ' Yes,' said another ; ' he was an English- 
 man ! ' ' Oho,' said I, ' that's the stuff ! Nothing like 
 English gold ! ' Yes,' said he ; ' away wi' yer scabbit 
 Thurso folk ! ' 
 
 " ' But,' said I, growing saucy in my turn, ' they're 
 lying in hundreds at Weydale in hundreds at Hoi- 
 born Head in hundreds at Brims in hundreds at 
 Thurso East!' 'Ay,' said they, with a girn TKESH 
 HEKKING!' 'Not so fast,' said I. 'What then?' 
 ' Fossil bones.' ' Not so good as this ?' said they. 'Yes, 
 far better,' and then I came away. 
 
 "Dirty, greedy vagabonds. I knew them perfectly 
 well. To get a price for a few old bones, they have 
 thrown rubbish on the face of the strata. I had, how- 
 ever, got as many fossil fish as I wanted, no thanks to 
 them. 
 
 " I said I had beat you no harm ! Did you meet 
 with any trace of Coccosteus at Banniskirk ? or did you 
 meet with any trace of a Holoptychius ? I found both. 
 I think, if you had met with any sign of either, you 
 would have mentioned it. The head of the Holoptychius 
 that I found, was about three and a half inches wide ; a
 
 140 DICK PURSUED. CHAP. xi. 
 
 prize from Banniskirk! When I was tying up my 
 bundle, a stone beside me drew my attention. ' A gill- 
 cover!' said I. Lifting my hammer I gave it a blow. 
 Huzza ! Warty ! Coccosteus ! Huzza again ! 
 
 " I had a heavy bundle home ; and about eight miles 
 to walk." 
 
 Hugh Miller had not yet paid his visit. Dick was 
 eagerly expecting him. He determined to give Hugh a 
 great treat when he came. He would have a number of 
 fossil fish for him to dig out with his own hands. For 
 this purpose he went along the shore, east and west. 
 One day he crossed the stepping-stones at the mouth of 
 the river, and was passing under Thurso Castle, when 
 Sir George Sinclair hailed him. Dick was deaf that 
 day. He had lost a whole afternoon a few days before, 
 by being caught and involved in a conversation by Sir 
 George. Therefore he rushed up the cliff and disap- 
 peared instanter. 
 
 But he was not yet at liberty. " One of the salmon- 
 fishers," he says, " left his employment, and came 
 and walked sentry over me on the brae head. This 
 was annoying, but I pushed on. Then some boys 
 fishing cuddins left their sport and dogged me, tramp- 
 ing almost on my tail. This was horrible. When I 
 threw a stone aside, they impudently lifted it and looked 
 at it. Wherever I went, they went also. I saw the 
 snout of a Dipterus ; then two in succession of the snouts 
 of Diplopterus ; then a broken skull-cap, standing out 
 for about nine or ten inches, but it is broken, for some 
 stupid fool had given it a passing blow not knowing
 
 CHAP. xi. PRIZES FOR HUGH MILLER. 141 
 
 what it was. I saw it and quaked, for the boys were 
 still behind me. I did not betray myself, by look or 
 by sign. Then I got angry, and ran away at my utmost 
 
 " Next day was very wet, but as I was eager to know 
 if my bone was safe, I put up my umbrella, and walked 
 over. As I neared my prize, I ventured to reconnoitre. 
 Thief-like, I looked round in every direction, and then 
 moved forward, and found it quite safe. ... I can now 
 say confidently that you will have the pleasure of dig- 
 ging out the remains of this Holop with your own hands 
 at Thurso East. I am very glad ! 
 
 " I will next go to Holborn Head, pass Slater's 
 monument, and with a spade turn aside a piece of the 
 clay and turf, that you may have the pleasure of striking 
 a passing blow, and get a fossil fish there, also with your 
 own hands. 
 
 " I was at Weydale on the 9th, and managed to ' tirr 
 a bit.' The remains of the Diplopterus are there in 
 abundance ; but they are very much knocked about 
 heads, scales, gill-covers, bits of tails, and such like. I 
 only brought off one moderately passable specimen for 
 you. 
 
 " I expect that you will strive to drop me a note, as 
 to what time I may expect you ; so that I can have my 
 work snugged, and all in order. I shall be most happy 
 to see you, and we shall have a Glorious Day ! ' 
 
 Hugh Miller at last paid his visit to Robert Dick. 
 They had been corresponding for a long time, but had 
 never yet met. Their meeting was full of cordiality.
 
 142 MILLER VISITS DICK. CHAP. xi. 
 
 Robert gave up his bed to Hugh, and he was to stay 
 there as long as he liked. But his visit was to be 
 very short. He had very little spare time at his dis- 
 posal. The Witness must be kept up to the mark ; and 
 like many other newspaper editors, he thought that if he 
 remained long away, the world would come to an end. 
 Then, there was his new book to write, the Asterolepis of 
 Stromness. Hugh Miller's first visit to Robert Dick was 
 therefore of only a few day's duration. 
 
 The weather was fine, and most of their time was 
 spent out of doors. They walked along the east shore, and 
 along the west shore. First they went with hammer 
 and chisel to Thurso East, to dig out the Holoptychius, 
 the head of which Dick had noted only 'a few days 
 ago. Dick pointed out the bed from which he had 
 taken the gigantic fossil fish the year before. After this 
 work had been done, the brother geologists proceeded 
 eastward, Dick pointing out the scales and teeth, the 
 tuberculated plates, and the coprolites of the fossil 
 fishes. Hugh Miller afterwards gave a sketch of the 
 coast, of Dunnet Head on one hand, and Holborn Head 
 on the other, with the Orkneys " rising dim and blue 
 over the foam-mottled currents of the Pentland Firth." 
 We have already given Dick's sketch of the same view ; 
 and we prefer it, as it was done from the quick.* 
 
 But we quote a passage from Hugh Miller's descrip- 
 tion, a bit of nature painted by a poet. " We are still 
 within an hour's walk of Thurso ; but in that brief hour 
 
 * For Hugh Miller's description, see The Oruise of the Betsy, or A 
 Summer Eamble among the Hebrides, pp. 181-6. Ed. 1873.
 
 CHAP. xi. HUGH MILLER'S DESCRIPTION. 
 
 143 
 
 how many marvels have we witnessed ! how vast an 
 amount of the vital mechanisms of a perished creation 
 have we not passed over! Our walk has been along 
 ranges of sepulchres, greatly more wonderful than those 
 of Thebes or Petrea, and a thousand times more ancient. 
 
 DUNNET SANDS. 
 
 There is no lack of life along the shores of the little 
 solitary bay. The shriek of the sparrowhawk mingles 
 from the cliffs with the hoarse deep croak of the raven , 
 the cormorant, on some wave- encircled ledge, hangs out 
 his dark wing to the breeze ; the spotted diver, plying 
 his vocation on the shallows beyond, dives and then 
 appears, and dives and appears again, and we see the 
 glitter of scales from his beak ; and far away in the offing 
 the sunhght falls on a scull of sea-gulls, that flutter
 
 144 VISIT TO HOLBORN HEAD. CHAP. xi. 
 
 upward, downwards, and athwart, now in the sea, now in 
 the air, thick as midges over some forest brook in an 
 evening of midsummer." 
 
 The geologists passed on towards Dunnet Bay. 
 They crossed Dunnet sands, and at length reached the 
 tall sandstone precipices of Dunnet Head, with their 
 broad decaying fronts of red and yellow. They had 
 reached the upper boundary of the Lower red formation, 
 and found it bordered by a desert, and void of all trace 
 of life. They plied hammer and chisel, but found not a 
 scale, not a plate, nor even the stain of an imperfect 
 fucoid. 
 
 On the following day the brother geologists wandered 
 along the shore of Thurso "West, Dick pointing out the 
 boulder clay between the Bishop's Castle and Scrabster 
 Harbour. They ascended Holborn Head, went along 
 the precipices to the Clett, after which Hugh Miller 
 chiselled out with his own hands the fossil fish that 
 Eobert Dick had set apart for him. He did not cut his 
 hands as Dick had done, for Hugh was an accomplished 
 mason before he became a geologist. There was one 
 particular sight that struck Hugh very much while stand- 
 ing on the top of the rocks at Holborn Head, and looking 
 down with Dick into the deep sea-green water, underlying 
 the lofty cliff called " Slater's Leap." Hugh Miller 
 afterwards described it splendidly in his Lectures on 
 Geology. He says : 
 
 " Perhaps the most striking scenic peculiarities of the 
 Old Eed Sandstone are to be found in its rock-pieces. 
 The Old Man of Hoy, with its rural rampart of rock-
 
 CHAP. xr. HUGH MILLER'S DESCRIPTION. 145 
 
 pieces, not unfurnished with turret and tower, and wide 
 yawning portals that rise a thousand feet over the waves ; 
 the tall stacks of Duncansby, Canisbay, ornately Gothic 
 in their style of ornament, with the dizzy chasms of the 
 neighbouring headland, in which the tides of the Pentland 
 Firth for ever eddy and toil, and the surf for ever 
 roars ; and the strangely fractured precipices of Holborn 
 Head, where, through dark crevice and giddy chasm, the 
 gleam of the sun may be seen reflected far below on the 
 green depths of the sea, and venerable and grey, like 
 some vast cathedral, a dissevered fragment of the coast 
 descried rising beyond, are all rock scenes of the Old 
 Red Sandstone. 
 
 " When I last stood on the heights of Holborn there 
 was a heavy surf toiling far below along the base of the 
 overhanging wall of cliff which lines the coast, and deep 
 under my feet I could hear a muffled roaring amid the 
 long corridor-like caves into which the headland is 
 hollowed, and which, opening to the light and air far 
 inland by narrow vents and chasms, send up at such 
 seasons, high over the blighted sward, clouds of impal- 
 pable spray, that resemble the smoke of great chimneys. 
 As I peered into one of these profound gulphs, and 
 dimly marked, hundreds of feet below, the upward dash 
 of the foam, grey in the gloom, as I looked, and ex- 
 perienced with the gaze that mingled emotion natural 
 amid such scenes, which Burke so well analyses as a 
 consciousness of great expansiveness and dimension, 
 associated with a sense of danger, my eye caught on 
 the verge of the precipice the outline of part of an old
 
 146 REFLECTIONS ON HOLBORN HEAD. CHAP. xi. 
 
 reptile fish traced on the rock. It was the cranial 
 buckler of one of the hugest ganoids of the Old Ked 
 Sandstone, the Asterolepis. And there it lay, as it had 
 been deposited, far back in the bypast eternity, at the 
 bottom of a muddy sea. But the mud existed now as a 
 dense grey rock, hard as iron, and what had been the 
 bottom of a palaeozoic sea had become the edge of a 
 dizzy precipice, elevated more than a hundred yards 
 over the surf. The world must have been a very differ- 
 ent world, I said, when that creature lived, from what 
 it is now. There could have been no such precipices 
 then; a few flat islands comprised, in all probability, 
 the whole dry land of the globe ; and that emotion 
 of which I had just been compassed, is it not something 
 new in creation also ? The deep gloom of these perilous 
 gulphs these incessant roarings these dizzy precipices 
 the sublime roll of these huge waves are they not 
 associated in my mind with a certain idea of danger a 
 feeling of incipient terror, which, in all God's creation, 
 man, and man only, is organised to experience ? Is it 
 not an emotion which neither the inferior animals on 
 the one hand, nor the higher spiritual existences on the 
 other, can in the least feel an emotion dependent on 
 the union of a living soul with a fragile body of clay, 
 easily broken ?"* 
 
 While at Thurso, Miller fired his friend's mind with 
 the injustice done to the poor remnant of the Highlanders 
 who still remain in the far north. Many years before, 
 the Celts had been driven out of their homes, such as 
 
 * Hugh Miller s Lectures on Geology, pp. 199, 200. Ed. 1869.
 
 ROCKS AT HOLBORN HEAD : SLATER'S MONUMENT.
 
 CHAP. xi. EXPATRIATED HIGHLANDERS. 147 
 
 they were, to make room for sheep, and afterwards for 
 deer. This was during the time that Sir John Sinclair 
 was so much bent upon introducing the Cheviot breed 
 of sheep into Scotland The Highlanders were thought 
 to be idle, and they were accordingly driven away, or 
 forced to emigrate. It was thought to be "for their 
 good." 
 
 Yet the poor folks did not think it for their good 
 to leave their homes amongst the hills in which they 
 had been born. But the law was against them. The 
 chiefs insisted on their pound of flesh, and the High- 
 landers were expelled, and emigrated in all directions. 
 If they did not leave after their notices had expired, 
 their houses were pulled down, and sometimes they 
 were burnt down, leaving only blackened ruins. One 
 old paralytic woman was actually burnt in her bed. 
 
 In 1795, Sir John Sinclair raised a regiment, the 
 Caithness Highlanders, consisting of 1000 stalwart 
 men. No such regiment could be raised now. The 
 Highlanders are now in Canada, and sheep supply their 
 places. Emigration still continued to go on. In 1841 
 Dick wrote to his sister : " Emigration to America is 
 fast thinning the moors of this cold bare country ; and 
 soon, very soon, it will be bare of population with a 
 vengeance. Two ships have already sailed. A third 
 and a fourth are expected to sail this season. Many 
 hamlets have been pulled down, and those that have 
 not been pulled down are to let!" The flag works at 
 Thurso, and of Mr. Traill of Castletown, gave employ- 
 ment to many of the expatriated clansmen ; but still,
 
 148 HUGH MILLERS LAMENT. CHAP, xi 
 
 there were thousands preparing to set out for Canada 
 and America.* 
 
 The trouble was renewed in another way when the 
 Free Churchmen dissented from the Established Church. 
 They could not find sites for their ch'apels, and sometimes 
 they gathered together on the verge of a loch, where the 
 minister could preach to them from a boat. They also 
 assembled in the open air, along a hill-side, or in a valley 
 surrounded by rocks, where the minister dispensed to 
 them the Word of God and the Holy Sacrament. 
 
 Hugh Miller was editor of the Witness, an outspoken 
 paper, the organ of the Free Church. Hugh was a great 
 power in those days. He was one of the boldest writers 
 of his time. His paper spread far and wide the cruelty 
 and injustice of the Highland proprietors. Here is one 
 of his descriptions, which he wrote while on his way to 
 meet Eobert Dick at Thurso : 
 
 " I have just returned from Helmsdale," he said, 
 " where I have been hearing a sermon in the open air 
 with the poor Highlanders. ... I thought their Gaelic 
 singing, so plaintive at all times, even more melancholy 
 
 * On the 28th August, 1846, an Act was passed enabling a loan of 
 two millions to be advanced to the landed proprietors for the drainage 
 and improvement of their estates. The loan was soon exhausted. 
 The Highland lairds got the lion's share. One of them, Macleod of 
 Macleod, asked for an incredible sum, so that it became necessary to 
 limit the maximum amount of the loan to individuals, to 5000. By the 
 Act 13 and 14 Viet., cap. 91, a further sum of two millions was granted 
 for draining purposes ; but it was found that a quarter of a million of 
 the money had been spent, not in draining the soil of North Britain, 
 but in clearing out the Highland population from theii miserable huts, 
 and transporting them to the British Colonies !
 
 CHAP. xi. DONALD'S FLITT1N ! 149 
 
 than usual. It rose from the green hill-side like a wail 
 of suffering and complaint. Poor people ! There stretched 
 inland, in the background, a long deep strath, with a 
 river winding through it. It had once been inhabited 
 for twenty miles from the sea ; but the inhabitants were 
 all removed to make way for sheep ; and it is now a desert, 
 with no other marks of men save the green square 
 patches still bearing the mark of the plough, that lie 
 along the water-side, and the ruined cottages, some of 
 them not unscathed by fire, with which these are studded. 
 . . . The people had a look of suffering and subdued 
 sadness about them that harmonised but too well with 
 the melancholy tones of their psalms. There is, it is 
 said, a very intense feeling about them. ' We were 
 ruined and made beggars before,' they say, ' and now 
 they have taken the gospel from us.'" 
 
 And again, at Loch Brora, he says : " The Loch 
 stretches out in front for miles, its undulating and wind- 
 ing shores tufted with birch, and here and there mottled 
 with small green spots that, ere the poor Highlanders 
 had been driven from home, kept them in oats and here. 
 ... I doubt not that the thoughts of them live, set in 
 sorrow, in hearts beyond the Atlantic." 
 
 When Hugh Miller had left Thurso for Edinburgh, 
 Robert Dick took his pen in hand, and wrote the fol- 
 lowing stanzas : 
 
 DONALD'S FLITTIN ! 
 Eh, Donald, man, they've served ye sair, 
 
 Yeer Hieland chiefs an' a', 
 They've brought their sheep, an' iiowt, aii' deer, 
 
 And ye maun gang awa !
 
 150 DONALD'S FLITTIN ! ci 
 
 Ye focht for them, ye bled for them, 
 
 Sae lang's a sword ye'd draw, 
 An' though ye got but little for't, 
 
 Now ye maun gang awa' ! 
 
 Puir Donald, man, where is he gaun ? 
 
 His wife and bairnies twa ? 
 " Oh, fient care I," the laird, said he, 
 
 " So that they gang awa' ! " 
 
 The wife sat by her cauld hearth-stane, 
 
 She couldna thole her fa' ; 
 She moaned and sighed, and groaned and grat 
 
 She wadna gang awa' ! 
 
 The licht was set to theek and roof, 
 
 The fire ran up the wa' ! 
 Alas ! the Hieland mother now 
 
 Was forced to gang awa' ! 
 
 Got owre the cot, upon a stane 
 
 She sat, wi' bairuies twa ; 
 Her heart was brak, she could but dee ; 
 
 She couldna gang awa' ! 
 
 He couldna use his dirk the noo, 
 
 The laird was right in law ; 
 Sae Donald gave up house and haine, 
 
 And syne he gaed awa' ! 
 
 Across the seas he dreams o' hame, 
 
 Far off in Canada ; 
 But grim and bitter Donald thinks 
 
 Of when he gaed awa' 1
 
 CHAPTER XIL 
 
 DEATH OF DICK'S FATHER THE BOULDER 
 CLAY. 
 
 IT will be remembered that Thomas Dick, supervisor, 
 loft Thurso in 1834, shortly after his son Robert had 
 begun business as a baker. Mr. Dick was appointed to 
 the office of Collector of Customs at Haddington. He 
 did his duty there in a quiet, unostentatious manner, 
 and gained the respect of everybody who knew him. 
 After his term of service had expired, he removed to 
 Dovecot, Tullibody, where he ended his days in peace 
 and quiet. 
 
 Robert Dick continued to keep up a correspondence 
 with his father, though none of his letters have been 
 preserved. The last letter of his father (22d April 1846) 
 informed Robert of his last illness. "My complaint," 
 he said, " is in the heart. I am sometimes alarmingly 
 ill. At other times, though very weak, I am able to be 
 up. . . . There is no prospect of my recovery. I have 
 been preparing for the last change, and have laid my 
 hope on the Lord Jesus Christ. . . . Dear Robert, pray 
 for me. May the blessing of God attend you through 
 this life, and afterwards receive you into glory." 
 
 This was his .father's last blessing. He died five
 
 152 DICK'S LETTER OF COMFORT. CHAP. xn. 
 
 weeks after. His son preserved the letter. He writes 
 upon it, " I have laid it amongst my mother's hair." 
 
 Eobert was not able to attend the funeral. He was 
 too poor for that. The journey was long and expensive, 
 and there were no railways in Caithness at that time. 
 Besides, he did all his work with his own hands. He 
 had neither journeyman nor apprentice. His only helper 
 was Annie Mackay, his servant. 
 
 His sister Jane, however, went from Haddington to 
 Tullibody, to be present with the family at the time of 
 Mr. Dick's funeral. After her return home for she was 
 then married he thus wrote to her : " I have thought 
 that it may perhaps lighten the distress which you suffer 
 from the decease of our father, if I should write you a 
 few lines, not that a flow of words is the best .source of 
 comfort in a case such as this. Eesignation to the will 
 of God will avail much more. I hope you will see it to 
 be your duty to bow in quiet and patient submission, 
 looking forward with the eye of Faith to that better 
 world, where, after a few years, you will meet your 
 father again. Your mother is also there. Those who 
 remain behind must toil on, and abide their time, 
 neither murmuring nor desponding at the ways of the 
 Supreme Disposer of all events, whether prosperous or 
 adverse. 
 
 "These events create sad blanks. The mind for a 
 time will be hankering after what is gone. But new 
 affections spring up and entwine themselves round the 
 soul, hiding if not healing the wounds. Time will roll 
 on, and then we shall be here no more. This is all that
 
 CHAP. xii. MR. AIKMAN, TULLIDODY. 153 
 
 has been and will be. One generation cometh, and 
 another goeth. The Framer of all things alone is sub- 
 ject to no change." 
 
 Eobert Dick also kept up his correspondence with 
 his old master, Aikman, at Tullibody. In the year fol- 
 lowing his father's death, Aikman told him that he was 
 about to retire from business, "that he had not yet 
 advertised the shop and bakehouse, but intended doing 
 so. It would be a good opening for an active man, as 
 he was now baking about 20 bolls of wheat every week, 
 with three men and a boy." 
 
 This was doubtless intended as a hint to his cor- 
 respondent to buy the business, and thus enter into a 
 thriving trade. But Dick had no money to spare for 
 the purpose. His business at Thurso was only paying 
 expenses. He did not save money. What he could 
 spare from his ordinary wants, he spent on books. 
 
 Competition was also beginning to tell upon him. 
 Although there were only two bakers in Thurso at the 
 time that he commenced business, there were now 
 several. Every new baker served to diminish his trade. 
 No increased exertion could make up for the loss. The 
 town was small, and the people's wants were few. When 
 the bakers amounted to six, Dick said " it was like half- 
 a-dozen dogs worrying over a very little bone." 
 
 Dick's business was also to a considerable extent 
 diminished by his not going to " the Kirk." When that 
 is known of a man in a small town in Scotland, it goes 
 very much against him. The " fear o' the folk " is very 
 great there. Conformity is insisted on. A man must
 
 154 THE DISRUPTION. CHAP. xn. 
 
 be what other people seem to be, or he is looked upon 
 as a sort of reprobate. 
 
 We have been told why Dick abstained from going 
 to church. Miss Dick, his half-sister, says that the 
 singing caused him giddiness, and that he had some feel- 
 ing in his head which prevented him sitting in church. 
 Another says that he considered the sermons which he 
 heard to be only " cauld kail het again ; " * and that he 
 could study the Bible and read his sermons just as well 
 at home. Indeed, his library was full of religious works. 
 He had seven Bibles and a Latin Testament, with vari- 
 ous commentaries on the Scriptures. His library included 
 a set of Bible maps, and the works of Josephus, Mosheim, 
 Locke, Kitto, Hervey, Wardlaw, and others. 
 
 Dick had been a diligent attender of the Established 
 Church until the Disruption in 1843. He had a wonder- 
 ful memory, a large vein of humour, and even a good 
 deal of mimicry. He could, upon occasion, give a head 
 or two of the discourses ; and for that matter, a whole 
 sermon of several of the ministers of the town and 
 neighbourhood, with the gesture, and accent, and pecu- 
 liarities of each, to perfection. His old servant used to 
 say, that if she wanted a sermon she had not far to go to 
 get one. " Tae hear my maister sometimes," she would 
 say, " you wud think you were hearing Mr. Cook of Eeay 
 or Mr. Munro of Halkirk preaching frae the tent on the 
 Thursday o' the Sacrament." 
 
 But we have received another account, from a verit- 
 able person, as to the reasons why Dick ceased to attend 
 * Cold soup re-warmed.
 
 CHAP. xii. THE LOQUACIOUS BARBER. 155 
 
 the kirk on Sunday. When the Disruption occurred, 
 almost all the congregation went out with Mr. Taylor, 
 and set up a church of their own. But Eobert Dick, 
 who cared very little for religious politics, or even for 
 parliamentary politics, remained where he was. " 1 am 
 very well satisfied," he said, "with the church of my 
 fathers." In fact, he " stuck by the waas." * It is even 
 said that at this time, for want of leading men in the 
 church, it was proposed to make Eobert Dick an elder. 
 But a circumstance shortly after occurred which had the 
 effect of sending him away altogether. 
 
 It seems that one day Dick met in the street a man 
 named Geddie, a barber and shoemaker in Thurso. The 
 man was loquacious and locomotive. "Ah!" said 
 Geddie, " that was a fine sermon o' the minister's yester 
 day." " Yes," said Dick, " but he was perhaps a wen 
 thocht indebted to Blair's Sermons and Hervey's Medi 
 tations" " Ay, was he ? " said the barber. Away the 
 little busybody went, and spread the report among the 
 tattle-mongers of the place. The barber's shop is always 
 the centre of gossip. The report about Dick and the 
 minister soon came to be known. Of course, it reached 
 the minister's ears. 
 
 Dick was at that time accustomed, being an early 
 riser, to get up on fine Sunday mornings and take a walk 
 along the sea-shore, with the magnificent prospect of 
 Dunnet Head on one side and Holborn Head on the other, 
 with the Orkney Islands in the distance ; and a glorious 
 
 * A common saying when the members of the Established dim S 
 refused to go out with the Free Kirkers. They stuck by the walls
 
 156 . WHY DICK LEFT THE KIRK. CHAP, xn, 
 
 walk it must have been on an early summer morning. 
 Dick got home by breakfast time, and then he prepared 
 to go to church. But one day he got a sermon which 
 made his ears tingle. It was upon the awful crime of 
 Sabbath-breaking upon going about on the Sabbath 
 day, and wandering in pursuit of "science, falsely so 
 called." 
 
 Dick could not mistake the application of the sermon. 
 He felt that it was at him the minister was preaching. 
 If it was not intended for him as we have been assured 
 at -all events he put the cap on. " Well," he said, " I'll 
 never more be preached at. Eeligion is not The Kirk : 
 neither is it in the preaching of one minister or another. 
 I'll stay at home, and do my religious services myself." 
 
 The person who gave us the above information was 
 one of Eobert Dick's intimate friends. He says Dick was 
 a thoroughly religious man, though he ceased to attend 
 the Established Church. He was invariably kind, 
 benevolent, and helpful. And perhaps he entertained 
 deeper thoughts about religion than anybody in the 
 parish, not even excepting the parish minister himself. 
 
 Dick himself told the same story to Mr. Peach. He 
 said that having been shut up in the bakehouse during 
 the greater part of the week, he thought it was for the 
 benefit of his health that he should take an early 
 Sunday morning's walk ; and that it was an interference 
 with the liberty of the subject to preach at him in that 
 way. Mr. Peach further says that he always kept a 
 solitary service in his own house, reading the Bible, and 
 the somTinentaries thereon.
 
 CHAP. xrr. DICK'S SOLITARY SERVICE. 157 
 
 One Sunday morning Mr. Peaeh called in upon Dick, 
 having walked over from Castletown for the purpose.* 
 He found Dick reading the Bible, with Sharpe's transla- 
 tion of the New Testament from the Greek of Gries- 
 bach, and comparing one with the other. "Ah!" said 
 Dick, on seeing Mr. Peach coming in, " you never had 
 the Shorter Catechism knocked into your head as I had 
 during my youth." After further conversation, he said, 
 " After all the translations of the Bible that have been 
 made, there is none like the old translation. It has the 
 right ring about it. And then, it is so connected with 
 all the associations of our early home life." 
 
 The people of Thurso, however, could never under- 
 stand Dick. They saw him going out at all times with 
 his hammer and chisels, and bringing home loads of 
 stones. What had he been doing ? Had he, like Hugh 
 Miller, been " seekin' siller in the stanes " ? or had he 
 been digging holes in the ground to bury the gold he 
 had made by his trade ?-f- In these respects the people 
 of Thurso were altogether at sea. 
 
 Dick went on with his geological investigations. All 
 his treasures were sent to Hugh Miller. He kept dupli- 
 cates for himself, and by degrees collected a rich 
 repository of fossils. He stored them in his upper room, 
 where he also kept his best books. To help Hugh 
 
 * One of Mr. Peach's duties at that time was to travel round the 
 coast in search of shipwrecks, and also to help the shipwrecked crews. 
 
 t This statement was actually made by a Thurso person, now living 
 In London, who left the place long ago, before Dick had achieved anj 
 local reputation, except that of an eccentric character.
 
 158 THE BOULDER CLA Y. CHAP. XIL 
 
 Miller, he began his researches into the boulder clay* of 
 Caithness. " I had seen the boulder clay," says Hugh 
 Miller, " characteristically developed in the neighbour- 
 hood of Thurso, but, during a rather hurried visit, had 
 lacked time to examine it. The omission mattered the 
 less, however, as my friend Robert Dick is resident in 
 the locality ; and there are few men who examine more 
 carefully or more perseveringly than he, or who can 
 enjoy with higher relish the sweets of scientific research. 
 I wrote to him regarding Professor Forbes's decision on 
 the boulder clay of Wick and its shells ; urging him to 
 ascertain whether the boulder clay of Thurso had not 
 its shells also. And almost by return of post I received 
 from him, in reply, a little packet of comminuted shells, 
 dug out of a deposit of the boulder clay, laid open by 
 the river Thurso, a full mile from the sea, and from 
 eighty to a hundred feet above its level. He had 
 detected minute fragments of shell in the clay about 
 twelve months before; . . . but his dread of being 
 deceived by mere surface shells, carried inland by sea- 
 birds for food, prevented him from following up the dis- 
 covery." j- 
 
 But now that Hugh Miller inquired about the 
 existence of sea-shells in the boulder clay, Dick pro- 
 2eeded to follow up his investigations with the keenest 
 
 * Clay of the Glacial or Drift epoch, usually mixed with large stonea 
 or boulders. The boulders have been dropped in deep water from floating 
 ice, and have settled in the clayey silt. The boulder clay is widely 
 spread throughout Great Britain. 
 
 f Hugh Miller's " Rambles of a Geologist," in Cruise of Ike Betsy, 
 pp. 311-12. Ed. 1873.
 
 THURSO RIVER. 159 
 
 interest. He visited every locality in Caithness where 
 boulder clay existed. He went as far as John o' Groat's 
 and Freswick in one direction ; and to Dunbeath, at the 
 southern limits of the county, in the other. He did the 
 most of his journeys at night ; sometimes walking in the 
 dark, at other times in bright moonlight. He seems Jo 
 have been intensely interested in all that he did. Every- 
 thing was to him new and wonderful. His delight was 
 often like that of a thoughtful child, in seeing further 
 into the mysteries of a piece of fine mechanism. 
 
 "It appears to me," he said in a letter to Hugh 
 Miller (1st September 1848), "that the best way of 
 answering your queries, will be to relate in a plain and 
 simple way the various truths which have dawned upon 
 my astonished mind, during my rambles of the last few 
 weeks. 
 
 " Few are acquainted with the peculiar features of 
 Thurso river. Few are aware that, in many places, as it 
 nears the sea, it has scooped out its course deep in the 
 blue boulder clay. Near the town, on the west or left 
 bank, a bed of this blue clay is seen within a stone's cast 
 of the bridge. On the east you see it at Mill Bank ; and 
 on both sides, after that, an immense mass runs on, 
 almost continuously, four miles inland, until at Todholes 
 it becomes low, and on a level with the surrounding 
 fields. Throughout its whole extent it almost invariably 
 presents the same characteristic marks pieces of blue 
 stones, granite, gneiss, and such like. 
 
 " Not long since, the Thurso East Salmon Fishing 
 Company ran a dyke or wall across the river ; and ID
 
 THURSO RIVER. 
 
 THURSO RIVER: FROM THE BRIDGE. 
 
 consequence of the openings left at the south-west end, 
 the waters of the river, when the rains fell and the 
 floods rose, rushed with great impetuosity and violence 
 on the end of a bank of blue boulder clay, undermining 
 and bringing down large pieces of it. After one of these 
 slippings I found the first fragments of shell. A piece 
 of stout Cyprina was found sticking in the clay ; and 
 various shell fragments, with a considerable sprinkling 
 of pieces like grains of oatmeal or pinheads. 
 
 " At another part of the river, a large piece of boulder 
 clay had fallen, near Juniper Bank House ; and here I 
 detected fragments of shell, and that fragment of Dent
 
 CIIAI'. XII. 
 
 FRAGMENTS OF SHELLS. 1C1 
 
 alium which I sent you. The exposed portion of the 
 boulder clay is here eighty feet in height above the 
 river-level ; and the river here may be about twelve 
 feet above the sea-level. 
 
 " On turning to Brown's Elements of Fossil Conchology, 
 I find a figure of Dentalium ; but in the letterpress 
 description of it, I do not find any mention of its ever 
 having been found in the blue boulder clay. 
 
 " On a future evening I examined the blue boulder 
 clay at Scrabster along the bay. I detected fragments 
 of shell here again, but not so plentiful as up the river." 
 
 In a future letter he says : " On the river-side, right 
 beneath the House of Geise, there is a rather high 
 exposed section of the blue stony clay ; and here again 
 I found shell fragments. I had a good piece to walk 
 through grass, heather, bracken, asphodel, and rushes 
 before I met with another slope ; and here also, again 
 and again, I met with shell fragments. 
 
 " A fine section presenting itself on the eastern side 
 of the river, I stripped and waded through the river. 
 Here again, my now familiar acquaintances presented 
 themselves ; and here what I had not met with before 
 I found a piece of chalk flint. The flint was sticking 
 in the clay. 
 
 " I was now at ease regarding the fact of the shells, 
 but was rather puzzled with the flint. I sounded my 
 savants, as to their acquaintance with this unlooked-for 
 fairy. I showed it to them, and asked them if they had 
 seen such a thing up the country ; when they both 
 the old one and the young one answered 'Yes.' They
 
 162 MORE MARINE SHELLS. CHAP, xn, 
 
 had found them when digging, and the old people told 
 them that fire was in them, and that they were com- 
 manded in all haste to bury them again, for fear lest the 
 cattle should get a shot ! 
 
 " Another thing may be added. I know that farmers 
 hereabout use seaweed as manure, and that shells of 
 Fusus, Littorina, Purpura, Patella, etc., find their way up 
 the country along with the tangles; and that cockles 
 and periwinkles are scattered everywhere. I have even 
 found them far inland, and away from cultivated land. 
 The sea-mews, when hard pressed in winter, eat turnips, 
 sea-shells, whelks, and Purpura lapillus ; and flying far 
 and near, disgorge the shells in a half-digested state. 
 Therefore, I should not attach any importance to marine 
 shells on the surface of the most solitary and unfrequented 
 moor in the county. But when I find marine shells 
 from twenty to sixty feet deep in the boulder clay, the 
 case is completely different." 
 
 On another evening, while searching with his pick 
 among the boulder clay along the river side, he met 
 with an almost entire Turritella* amidst many other 
 pieces of shell. He had been a shell -collector for 
 fourteen years, but had never met with the smallest 
 fragment of a Turritella until the previous spring, when 
 he found a damaged fragment near Castlehill, Dunnet 
 sands. "You may therefore," he says, "judge of my 
 joy in finding one in the boulder clay. They are 
 
 * The living Turritellae inhabit deepish sea water, ranging from one 
 to three hundred fathoms. They are known as screw-shells, from the 
 shell being elongated, many-whorled, and spirally striated.
 
 CHAP. xii. GLACIAL ACTION. 163 
 
 abundant, I know, in the British seas, but somehow, 
 owing to the set of the currents, they are never thrown 
 on Thurso shores." 
 
 On the following evening, he again set out to ex- 
 amine the blue clay, and found a fine section at Thurdis- 
 toft. A large mass of clay and stones had fallen down 
 the bank The stones from the blue clay differed from 
 those of the red. He had before been at Weydale, up 
 the country, and at the quarries on the hill of Forss, to 
 detect glacial action on the surface of the rocks. In 
 both cases he failed. But here, among these fallen 
 stones, he for the first time detected signs of glacial 
 action in four separate instances. 
 
 " I now," he says, " put off my shoes, and, despite the 
 ' water kelpies,' took the ford and pushed on to a fine 
 section on the east side. I again found shell fragments. 
 My pleasure was great. I pushed on, and next found 
 a very high section opposite the Bleachfield, on the east 
 side. I found shell fragments here too. My pleasure 
 was doubled and trebled. ... I was joined by two boys, 
 who thought it capital sport !" 
 
 Dick continued to walk early in the morning and late 
 at night in search of his marine shells. One morning 
 he found an entirely whole valve of Venus casina. He 
 found at one place on the river-bank a black band or 
 belt running diagonally in a waving manner across the 
 boulder clay. Above it, the clay was reddish ; below, it 
 was blue. On taking part of the black belt into his 
 hand and rubbing it, it felt like fine clay and fine sand 
 intermixed. " Am I to infer," he said, " that the wavy
 
 164 CAITHNESS COVERED BY SEA. CHAP. xu. 
 
 band arose from the sea ebbing and flowing alternately 
 over the ordinary boulder clay beneath it ? And then 
 the reddish clay, so different from the clay beneath the 
 black belt. Just as if the abrading or grinding forces 
 had ceased for a time, and then set to work again." 
 
 He was soon able,. by his unintermitting exertions, to 
 determine whether the sea had once washed over the 
 county of Caithness. 
 
 " In these days of hasty revolutions," he says, " my 
 opinions since yesterday have changed. I am now 
 enabled to answer the question which I put to you as 
 to whether there was a sea here before the deposition 
 of the boulder clay. 
 
 " This morning, on clearing away the clay from my 
 shell crumbs from Harpsdale, I found a piece of the 
 Common Mussel and a piece of the Eock Whelk Pur- 
 pura lapillus." 
 
 There was no doubt about it. Not only had the sea 
 covered Caithness, but ponderous ice-rafts had gone 
 grating along the mountain valleys, grinding the rocks 
 into clay, and dropping the boulders which they contained 
 along the sea-bottom as they sailed along. Wherever 
 he went Dick found shells among the boulder clay 
 Cyprina, Venus, Turritella terebra, Mactra, and several 
 species of the genus Tellina, 
 
 One day, towards the end of September 1848, Dick 
 went to Harpsdale, about two miles up the Thurso river. 
 " At Harpsdale," he says, " in the boulder clay, marine 
 shell fragments are to be had in abundance. / lingered 
 by this delightful section for about an hour" He speaks
 
 CHAP. xii. THE GLACIAL THEORY. 1C5 
 
 of the boulder clay as if it was a lover he was lingering 
 for. He went still higher up the river that day to 
 Dale House crossing the river from time to time, 
 startling the wild ducks, and inspecting the boulder clay 
 in all its windings. 
 
 Dick found fourteen shells of the existing races which 
 he had extracted from the boulder clay, and he had no 
 doubt that this number might have been doubled. He 
 says " A list of these shells is necessary, not only to 
 mark my present success, but also to stimulate me to 
 further efforts." He accordingly subjoined a list of the 
 shells he had found, and sent it to Hugh Miller. " Thin 
 shell valves," he said, " such as Tellina, have been found 
 entire. Pieces of Cyprina are by far the most abundant. 
 But I suspect that it will not do to say that it was 
 owing to their superior strength their strong construc- 
 tion that they are found so very abundant. Mactra 
 and Tellina have received slight damage ; small young 
 Crassina (a month old ?) have withstood the fearful 
 shock of mountain waves, of dashing icebergs grinding 
 and pounding, whirling about and reeling like playthings 
 seas charged with mud, and stones of stupendous 
 weight ; all these have been tossing hither and thither, 
 ebbing and flowing, and the earth reeling ; and yet, a 
 diminutive little thing like this now lying before me has 
 been preserved! Amazing! I have met with many 
 stones in the boulder clay grooved and scratched and 
 rubbed in the strangest way imaginable. For the pre- 
 sence of these stones where they now are, I think the 
 glacial theory is the most likely.
 
 166 
 
 DUNCANSBY STACKS. 
 
 " I have found gneiss, light blue kind of grauwacke, 
 oolite, and oolite conglomerate, in the clay. I know of 
 no rocks in situ to the west similar to these. The blue 
 clay and dark clay is undoubtedly derived from the 
 ordinary rocks of the county. It is found in various 
 degrees of purity, but is in general one confused jumble, 
 and as hard rammed as if a giant had used one of the 
 Stacks of Duncansby as a paving hammer." 
 
 STACKS OF DUNCANSBY.
 
 CHAPTEE XIIL 
 
 DICK'S SEARCHINGS AMONGST THE 
 BOULDER CLAY. 
 
 DICK tested the statements of other geologists, no matter 
 how distinguished, by his own observations. Thus, he 
 found that Sir Charles Lyell had stated, in his Elements 
 of Geology, that very few organic remains had been 
 found in the boulder clay, and especially in the till, 
 throughout Scotland. 
 
 " Now," says Dick to Hugh Miller, " you see the 
 results of my observations. Marine shells have been 
 found in nearly all the sections of boulder clay that I 
 have met with. But I thought it better, instead of 
 further searching the clay near Thurso, to try another 
 direction. I accordingly determined to travel to Fres- 
 wick Bay, on the east side of the county, and trace up 
 the burn there." 
 
 This journey from Thurso to Freswick was only one 
 of the many instances of Dick's enthusiastic deter- 
 mination in the cause of science. The distance was 
 twenty-four miles. It took him six hours of unflinch- 
 ing walking to reach the scene of his operations. It 
 was October, and the weather was growing cold. Dick 
 went across the Broad Linns extending from Barwick to
 
 168 MOONLIGHT AT CANISBAY. CHAP, xm, 
 
 Mey and Canisbay, a long sea-exposed road. From near 
 Canisbay church he saw the moon overhead, and the 
 Skerry lights shimmering in the distance at the mouth 
 of the Pentland Firth. 
 
 The man who walks by moonlight travels among 
 enchantments. Everything he sees is different from 
 what it is in daylight. Roadside knolls are mountains 
 along the horizon ; the little cottages by the roadside are 
 palatial ; and the distant sea is full of glory. We tell 
 the story of Dick's journey to Freswick in his own words. 
 They are full of interest : 
 
 " It is a sad drawback to my long rambles," he says, 
 " that I am under the necessity of returning home by 
 four o'clock in the same day. The distance to Freswick 
 is twenty-four miles. It took me six hours to walk 
 there, six hours to walk back, leaving about three hours 
 for investigation on the spot, thus making about fifteen 
 hours in all. 
 
 " To accomplish this I started at midnight. I passed 
 over the town's bridge at a quarter to twelve, under the 
 favour of as lovely a moon as ever blessed an unthank- 
 ful world. Though I walked alone, I walked cheerily. 
 
 " About a quarter to six in the morning I found 
 myself gazing up at the droll windows of the old castle 
 of Freswick, while daylight and moonlight were yet 
 struggling for the mastery. 
 
 " It was too dim, too queer a light to enable me to 
 scrutinise the boulder clay sections, so I passed over the 
 burn and along the shore, on the top of a high ridge of 
 sand and recent shells, blown up, I suppose, by stormy
 
 CHAP. XIII. 
 
 FRESWICK BURN. 
 
 169 
 
 winds at least 100 feet over the sea-leveL I looked 
 round and round the little bay, and thought I could dis- 
 cern, on the Duncansby side, a terrace about thirty or 
 forty feet above the present sea-leveL It was the first 
 terrace I had seen. There are no terraces at Thurso. If 
 they ever existed, the encroachments of the sea have 
 obliterated them. 
 
 CK CASTLE AND HEADLAND. 
 
 ' The daylight was now good. It had obliterated the 
 light of the moon. At six o'clock I turned into the burn, 
 of Freswick, close under the castle ; and had not pro- 
 ceeded above a gunshot, when I found a low section of 
 blue clay, thickly charged with recent marine fragments, 
 chiefly Cyprina. 
 
 " I passed up the burn, from section to section, and 
 extracted shells out of them all 111 some instances entire
 
 170 WADING THE BURN. 
 
 univalves. In the first clay section I examined I found 
 many rolled pieces of what seemed chalk ; it is either 
 chalk, or very pure petrified shell-marl. I also found at 
 another place chalk flints ! 
 
 "As I went up the burn, I found the sections of 
 boulder clay growing higher and higher, up to thirty 
 feet in height. I found them get fuller of stones. It 
 had also a reddish belt a band of sand and clay inter- 
 mixed, running through it horizontally. The marine 
 shells exceeded in numbers my fondest expectations. 
 
 " I reached the bridge carrying the public road over 
 the burn. Though the bridge is only about fifteen 
 minutes' walk from the sea, it took me three hours to 
 reach it, and there I found that my time was exhausted. 
 I had been so busily employed in extracting marine 
 shells from the clay. 
 
 " "Wishing to take the loop out of the road, I struck 
 across the moor. I came to the burn again, and found 
 section after section crowded with shell crumbs thicker 
 than the spots on the leopard. Atop of the sections, a 
 stratum of peat, and over all heather, knee deep. What 
 a reward for my six hours' travel ! What a paradise for 
 the geologist ! 
 
 " I splashed through the burn, first to one side, then 
 to the other; till in an agony I ultimately ran away 
 from the temptation. I found it was half-past ten 
 o'clock ! So away I went post-haste ! " 
 
 Shortly after his return, Dick sent to Hugh Miller a 
 list of the twenty -four marine shells (giving their 
 various names) which he had already found in the
 
 CHAP. xin. REPORT BY HUGH MILLER. 171 
 
 boulder clay of Caithness. Hugh Miller had said 
 that he "had never found in the boulder clay the 
 slightest trace of an organism that could be held to 
 belong to itself," and he "became somewhat sceptical 
 regarding the very existence of boulder fossils. I must 
 now state, however," he says, " that my scepticism has 
 thoroughly given way ; and that, slowly yielding to the 
 force of positive evidence, I have become an assured 
 believer in the comminuted recent shells of the boulder 
 clay, as in the Belemnites of the Oolite and Lias, or 
 the ganoid Ichthyolites of the Old Red Sandstone."* 
 Hugh Miller then refers to the numerous marine shells 
 found by Dick on the banks of the Thurso river, and 
 in the- boulder clay along the burn at Freswick. 
 
 Dick went on with his observations. On the 27th 
 October 1848, he thus began his letter to Hugh 
 Miller: 
 
 "The whole affair is settled. Scepticism may go 
 sneak with the moles and the bats, into holes and 
 corners. It was no mud eruption no temporary flood 
 of ocean brine that laid down the blue clay and 
 marine shells in Freswick Burn. No! It was the 
 ocean itself, wide and broad as poor auld Scotland, 
 when the proudest pinnacles of Dunnet Head lay far 
 beneath its billows. 
 
 " In my last note to you, I said that I must go and 
 see the eastern side of Dunnet Head, chafed by the 
 boisterous waves of the rude Pentland Firth. Monday, 
 
 " Rambles of a Geologist," in Cruise of the Betsy, pp. 311-15. Ed. 1873
 
 172 JOURNEY TO DUNNET CLIFFS. CHAP. xin. 
 
 Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, went by cold, 
 wet, and listless. But I had hopes of Friday. I rose at 
 half-past two o'clock, worked till eight, set out at half- 
 past eight for Dunnet cliffs, and was home again at half- 
 past three in the afternoon. Try that, gentlemen-geolo- 
 gists ; try that, if ye can ! 
 
 " ' But what got ye ? ' 1 hear you say. ' What got ye ?' 
 Well, I will tell you every word about it ; and, believe 
 me, unless I had the opportunity of telling it to you, I 
 would never have gone a footstep in search of auld warld 
 shells. 
 
 "Well! on arriving at the eastern side of Dunnet 
 cliffs, I made direct for a precipitous cliff at least 150 
 feet high ; where, some years ago, I sat on a big bouldei 
 of sandstone, making my breakfast on cold rolls and 
 cheese. In the present instance, I wound along the 
 foot of these breakneck rocks, which, unless the tide had 
 been out, I would not have been able to do, for the 
 tide comes close in under the cliff. 
 
 " I clambered over the fallen stones, dashed by white 
 spray, which went clean over me like a shower-bath. 
 Winding along, creeping my way, I could not help 
 admiring the multitudes of LiUorina rudis which 
 besprinkled the stones. I was as much a child as ever. 
 I filled my vest pocket simply because they were 
 bonnie. 
 
 " I soon found that I was about to be disappointed as 
 regards the first half of the serious work that I had come 
 in quest of. The precipitous cliffs of red sandstone to 
 Hie west of the little haven of Brough are gradually
 
 CHAP. xin. EAST SIDE OF DUNNET HEAD. 
 
 173 
 
 
 mouldering, and as they 
 moulder the earthy mat- 
 ter falls down; but meet- 
 ing with few ledges of 
 rock to arrest it, the 
 whole is swept away by 
 the sea. 
 
 "Here and there, 
 as I went on, I found 
 patches of it, forming a 
 talus at the foot of the 
 cliffs, with green turf, 
 bedecked with withered 
 wild flowers. I found 
 that the sea, at high 
 tides, had cut 
 IT., small sec- 
 tions 
 
 DUJJHET CLIFFS : EASTERN 8IDK. 
 
 9
 
 174 B ROUGH HAVEN. 
 
 out of the end of the slopes. I examined these, and 
 found shell crumbs, but they were not the genuine thing. 
 I found, along with the crumbs, entire shells of Helix, 
 Pupa, Clausilia, etc. This stamped these sandslips as 
 quite modern affairs. 
 
 " Then I went on to the cottage built beside the small, 
 neat, landing-place on the sea-shore, at Brough Haven. 
 The braes above here are at least eighty feet high ; and 
 a fine landslip had, not very long ago, taken place ; but 
 alas ! the Government folks, anxious to have everything 
 tidy, had driven piles of wood into the ground, and laid 
 fresh divots* over the whole of it. Had they only known 
 that I was coming to see the place, they would doubtless 
 have left it bare and raw ! 
 
 " Never mind ! In spite of them, I found a few small 
 landslips, and in the raw face of them I found, what 
 surprised me, my old friend the blue boulder clay, filled 
 with pieces of Cyprina ! I gathered a handful, and 
 passed on to a precipitous cliff of blue boulder clay, right 
 above the cottages on the shore ; and digging steps for 
 my feet up the clay, I found Cyprina and shell crumbs 
 of the sea. On the very top of the brae, just a little back, 
 the Government men have built a very handsome 
 cottage.^ 
 
 " A very little to the west of this cottage there is a 
 small burn. The burn has cut its way down through 
 
 * Plats of grass. 
 
 f It is at the little haven of Brough that the supplies are landed 
 for the men at the lighthouse situated on the northern end of Dunnet 
 Head.
 
 ROCKS AT BROUGH.
 
 CHAP. xni. THE EDGE OF THE PRECIPICE. 175 
 
 the boulder clay. I went into the ravine, and stood 
 looking round me. No sight could give me so much 
 pleasure and surprise. I found, on walking along the 
 little rill, that there was a tiny cascade about eight or 
 nine feet deep, down which the mossy water leapt dash- 
 ingly over a perpendicular wall of real, blue, stony, 
 boulder clay ! 
 
 " I advanced to the brink of the waterfall, and there 
 again I stood, and looked, and wondered ! Never was 
 mortal so enchanted. Boulder clay on each side, all 
 fretted with ' barley mill ' fragments of shells, pieces of 
 Cyprina, and blue stones, pebbly fragments, standing 
 half out, half in, as thick as locusts. And the wide sea 
 immeasurably far away ! 
 
 "I looked down, and saw distinctly shells, commi- 
 nuted shells, studding the clay at the foot of the water- 
 fall, and the steep sides of a section beyond it, to the 
 very edge of the precipice. I wished to jump down, 
 but, like the cautious puddock, I reflected ' how was I 
 to get up again ?' The sides of the small chasm were as 
 perpendicular as a wall, and nearly as hard. I tried my 
 hammer and old knife on the hard clay beside me, and 
 it put me to a swither. 
 
 " Yet I must get down ; and at length I determined tc 
 try. Observing that the bank or section of boulder clay, 
 nearly at the very edge of the precipice, on the east 
 side, was a little lower than the rest, I resolved to go 
 down there. I thought that, by digging steps for my 
 feet, I should doubtless get up again. 
 
 " It was a venture, let me tell you. One false step, and
 
 176 AMONGST THE BOULDER CLAY. CHAP. xm. 
 
 down I should have gone over the precipitous wall of red 
 sandstone down, down, to the sea-washed rocks below. 
 But not so fast ! I am not the man to break my neck 
 for auld-warld shells. No ! So, laying firm hold of the 
 grass, I deposited my legs downwards, quietly over each 
 other, and then slid softly down on my hunkers ! Now ! 
 
 " I walked up to the foot of the little cascade, and 
 stood, and looked, and better looked. The boulder cliff 
 or brae on the west side, was about fifteen or twenty 
 feet high, and rested on polished red sandstone. It was 
 thickly charged with stone fragments, not of red sand- 
 stone, mind you, not one crumb ; but dark, bituminous, 
 claystone fragments, of small size, generally about the 
 size of the heads of harrow teeth, or of old nails in 
 cathedral doors. I found many 'barley mill' shell 
 crumbs, all small, not one large piece, and all of 
 Cyprina. 
 
 " My dear friend Turritella was not there at alL I 
 examined the pieces of stone to see if I could find groov- 
 ing or scratching; but though they were all well polished, 
 1 detected no decided grooving. One or two of the 
 largest and broadest stones had fine scratchings, but not 
 at all so deep, or so continuous, as on the big stones I 
 found at Thurdystoft, on the Thurso river. 
 
 "I brought away a piece of the bituminous clays, 
 and one stone, well polished, with a hollow depression 
 on one side. I took a few of the shell crumbs, but not 
 all. I purposely left a few for the CRITICS ! or the next 
 gentleman who may venture there. 
 
 " There are moments when a real heartfelt pleasure
 
 CHAP. xiii. THE PARADISE OF A GEOLOGIST. 177 
 
 amply repays us poor mortals for years of sorrow. And 
 such a moment was mine now. There I stood with 
 evidences of Old World convulsions and changes 
 environed round about me on every side. And yet there 
 was a living cascade, merrily piping away the sunny 
 hours at my feet, the crystal drops bedecking my clay- 
 soiled boots. Columbus had never cast anchor here. 
 No philosopher had ever entered this paradise. It was 
 all a new world. To me for the moment it was The 
 World. And I triumphed in the felt conviction that a 
 humble individual like myself had, under Providence, 
 ' done the State some service ;' for the evidence that it 
 brings to bear on geological science is not to be gainsaid. 
 
 "Not many yards inland from this fine section of 
 boulder clay, resting on cliffs of red sandstone on the 
 east side of Dunnet Cliffs, high over the Pentland Firth, 
 not many yards inland there lies, over this clay, a 
 black peat moss, which, judging from examinations 
 made in it, is at least seven or eight feet thick. How 
 old is that black moss ? Hundreds, thousands of years ? 
 Yet what is that to the time that has elapsed since the 
 icebergs went thundering over Dunnet Head ? Then 
 the sea, the wide sea, floated and stormed over all. 
 
 " Yes ! there are thousands and millions of grey 
 lichened sandstone boulders scattered over the moory 
 top of Dunnet. There are boulders of grey granite too ! 
 Ay, and there are boulders of gneiss and of clayslate. 
 
 " But, in the midst of these reflections, I forget that 
 I am down in a breakneck ravine, and that it is 
 necessary that I should contrive to get up again. Well !
 
 178 JOURNEY TO HARPSDALE. CHAT. xm. 
 
 I went to the lowest part of the section, and digging 
 *teps for my feet, I clambered up until I reached the 
 green turf; and laying hold of it with my hands I pulled 
 myself up with all my strength. . . . And then I went 
 homewards, full of delight at my morning's work." 
 
 Dick was not yet satisfied. He must investigate the 
 whole subject thoroughly. He was no featherbed 
 philosopher. He was up in the morning early ; did his 
 work, kneaded, worked the dough into loaves, put 
 the whole into the oven, waited until it was baked, drew 
 it out, and then was away on some fresh expedition. 
 
 At the beginning of November he went to Harps- 
 dale, about eleven miles from Thurso. The weather 
 was now cold and wet. It rained heavily during the 
 whole day. He found in the black band, above described 
 a belt of fine sea sand, white and pure, dipping east. It 
 contained sea shells and shell crumbs ; clays of various 
 colours, black, blue, green, and grey ; boulders of red 
 granite; small red granite pebbles; pieces of quartz, 
 gneiss, greenstone, and grauwacke ; chalk and chalk 
 flints ; Portskerra conglomerate ; Caithness flagstones, 
 some of them well rubbed, grooved by ice, all in the 
 boulder clay ! 
 
 He was not yet satisfied with his first visit to Freswick. 
 He determined to make another, though it was so late 
 in the year. He was for some time deterred by the 
 stormy weather. It was blowing from the north, with 
 rain, sleet, and snow alternately. But no sooner did a 
 pause occur than, equipped with stern resolution, he 
 took the road. To show his determination, we quote hia
 
 CHAP. xni. ANOTHER JOURNEY TO FRESWICK. 179 
 
 own words, which are not only full of life but of 
 eloquence. They are taken from his letter to Hugh 
 Miller, dated the 13th November 1848 : 
 
 " The nights are much longer now, and of course the 
 days are much shortened. I knew that I could not 
 discern a piece of shell from a piece of stone before 
 eight o'clock; and I did not wish to stand shivering 
 there waiting for the sun. 
 
 " ' Up, sluggards ! up ! ' 
 
 " At half-past two o'clock I got my parritch ready, 
 gulped it down, and sallied forth. 
 
 "It is a cold damp morning. Black clouds are 
 wheeling and circling along the sky. The moon is 
 somewhere above, but I see it not. Her light is shorn. 
 But, for the little light she sheds, I am thankful. It is a 
 long, long, lonely road to Freswick ; but though alone I 
 have no fears. 
 
 " ' Ghaist nor bogle shalt thou fear ; 
 Thou'rt to Heaven and Science dear ! ' 
 
 " I am not sure, not exactly sure, whether the deduc- 
 tions of scientific men are always such as to merit the 
 approbation of Heaven. Man at best is but an erring, 
 groping, half-blind animal. His reason is often at fault. 
 But hark ! the sleepless one gives warning. One, two, 
 three o'clock, and now across the bridge, and now along 
 the road, encompassed on either side with cultivated 
 fields, once stubborn blue boulder clay, and even yet, 
 after hundreds of years of dibbling and dibbling, drilling 
 and digging, it is still a rough soil.
 
 180 
 
 BOULDER STONES. 
 
 " On now, opposite the Cairn of Murkle, is a green 
 mound on the left hand, where lies a large boulder of 
 Portskerra conglomerate. It is about a hundred feet 
 above the sea-level. There is another of the same stuff 
 on the shore at Cleardane. At East Murkle there lies 
 one of the largest boulder stones I have seen in Caithness. 
 Twenty years ago it lay there amid heather and long 
 
 
 CASTLEHILL HOUSE. 
 
 grass. The field is ploughed now, and we have stubble 
 instead of heath, but the stone is the same. It lies 
 about 300 feet above sea-mark, and when the ice and 
 the flood brought it there, very little of Dunnet Head 
 was dry. 
 
 " The village of Castletown stands on the boulder clay, 
 and there is blue boulder clay in the bottom of the bay 
 beyond. It can be seen right off Castlehill harbour. . . 
 At the south-west angle of Dunnet Sands, beside the
 
 CHAP. xiii. WILD BULLS OF DUNNET. 181 
 
 House of Castlehill, the blue bituminous flagstone crops 
 out, charged with broken fossil fish. The strata dip at 
 low angles nearly flat. Crossing the sands, with a 
 group of dunes or sandhills on our right, we arrive at 
 Dunnet, at the north-east angle of the bay. . . . The 
 blue slate at Brough, and on to Ham, dips very suddenly. 
 Indeed, all the way to Barrogill, one would think that 
 the bottom of the Pentland Firth had fallen in; the 
 strata are all on end. 
 
 " It is a dull, cold, dreary morning. Strange stories 
 are told of wild men and wild bulls to be encountered 
 amid the grassy links of Dunnet ; but with a fearless 
 step we go on our way in hope, remarking that surely 
 the ocean was once farther inland than where we are 
 treading. We are now across the links without any 
 harm or appearance of evil. By and by we have Loch 
 Haellan on our right, and we hear the ' quack, quack ' of 
 ducks and the startled cry of the snipe. The word is still 
 ' On !' Up the hill, along the hill, and down the hill ; 
 and now we are fairly moving across the Moss of Mey. 
 
 " The clouds have now dispersed. Shall we look at 
 the Aurora, or shut our eyes on Mars, on Venus, or 
 Jupiter, or the Moon ; for they all peep out and bid us 
 good morning! Yonder are the twin lights of the 
 Skerries. The wind has died away ; the sky is serene, 
 and the voice of the sea murmurs plaintively along the 
 shore. Oh ! 'tis worth all the trouble, all the toil, all the 
 fatigue, to have the opportunity of lifting up one's eyes 
 and contemplating the beauty, the grandeur, the sublimity 
 
 of such a scene as this. 
 
 9*
 
 182 MOONLIGHT AND DA YLIGHT. CHAP. xm. 
 
 "Daylight is a sure thing. Moonlight is good, but 
 you never feel certain where you are. There is always 
 a hazy uncertainty about it. You may strain your eye- 
 balls as you will, but you can never get a hold of it. 
 But you lay hold of daylight at once. You always 
 know where you are, even when the most imperfect 
 glimmer breaks through the sky. Does not this tell 
 emphatically that Man is the creature of the Day ? 
 
 " How lovely looked Stroma Isle across the waters ! 
 And all the various islands far and near lying encompassed 
 by the sea without a wave, placid as a lake. Below me 
 lay John o' Groat's. Not without reason did De Groot 
 choose his habitation. I admire his sagacity. Old John 
 must have been a true poet. 
 
 "Most of the existing maps are very faulty. The 
 one, the two, before me are eminently so. Never mind ! 
 The road strikes off to Freswick. We wander over a 
 moss ; the land rises ; and then we wind along the 
 Wart Hill * 
 
 " The last time I walked along this road I observed 
 what I thought looked liked boulder clay, but the moon- 
 light prevented my observing it closely. To-day I had 
 daylight. I found that much red sandstone debris lay 
 thick on this side of the Wart Hill. By and by I came 
 to a stream of water pouring in a torrent over the hill 
 I went off the road into the chasm made by the water, 
 
 * When going from Wick to John o' Groat's the author was driven 
 along the side of Wart Hill. The driver said : " It used to be called 
 the Hill of Curses. It was a Fairies' Hill. But the fairies have all 
 gone away now."
 
 THE SKERRY LIGHTS, PENTLAND FIRTH : FROM CANISBAY.
 
 CHAP. xiir. IVART HILL. 183 
 
 and found the underlying strata Hood-red 
 
 Most likely it was a continuation of Duncansby Head 
 
 ' square, red, and ugly ;' so Maculloch says. 
 
 " But what took me into the chasm was to examine 
 the debris lying over the rock. I found it nine or ten 
 feet thick. In its upper portion it seemed a mixture of 
 blue clay and red sand, and the upper portions were 
 very distinctly stratified. The lower portion was red, 
 like the sandstone on which they lay. I found no 
 shells, nor shell crumbs. The stuff contained many 
 fragments of rubbed sandstones. There were a few 
 pieces of quartz and granite. ... A flood of water un- 
 doubtedly brought this red debris to the south side of 
 Wart Hill. Has Duncansby Head felt the 'plaguey 
 knocks ' of icebergs too ? 
 
 " Walking on a little farther, I stood on the little 
 bridge over the Freswick burn, with the fine sections I 
 have come in search of, in all their glory. The burn 
 was in flood, rushing down towards the sea. It washed 
 the base of the section. There was no mode of getting 
 near it, but through the water. 
 
 " ' Darest thou, Cassias, now 
 Leap in with me into this angry flood, 
 And swim to yonder point 1 ' 
 
 Na ! na ! like the Duke o' Buccleuch, we can neither 
 ' flee nor soom ! ' and as for sinking, like Csesar, I find it 
 good stiff clay at the bottom, and just hurdie deep. So 
 in I go, and wade along the base of the section, though 
 indeed the rush of the snow water was very cold at first ] 
 and now ' we get auld stanes in store.'
 
 184 
 
 FRESWICK BURN. 
 
 CHAP. xnr. 
 
 " Well, I found a considerable variety of stones in the 
 clay section ; and they were all rubbed, or grooved, or 
 scratched. I found pieces of flint, .and rubbed pieces of 
 chalk. I found granite, quartz, greenstone, and the 
 
 BOULDER CLAY AT FRESWICK. 
 
 ordinary clay slate of the county. I saw very large 
 boulders. Broken shells were very abundant. I found 
 a small fragment of broken Belemnite ! * I am quite 
 sure of it. It is a piece split down the middle, exhibit- 
 ing a vertical section and two end sections. I give you 
 a sketch of it [a drawing given]. Now, surely this is a 
 
 * An Oolitic fossil, apparently the internal bone or shell of extinct 
 naked Cephalopods allied to the squid and cuttlefish.
 
 CHAP. xin. EXAMINES BOULDER CLAY. 185 
 
 most important fact ; and it is elicited and brought to 
 light through your own request to me to make these 
 examinations. 
 
 " Look at the map. There is a long stretch of country 
 between Harpsdale and Freswick, and yet both contain 
 fossils of the Oolite, chalk and flint, and a great variety 
 of stones common to both. Nor must you suppose that 
 a hundredth part has yet been found. No, no ! What 
 avails a hasty journey of mine ? Comparatively nothing. 
 
 " I looked for my big bone of the first journey, in- 
 tending to send it up to Edinburgh. But it was gone, 
 as I half expected it to be. It has been swept into a 
 deep pool, perhaps carried out to sea. To the best of my 
 skill this section is stratified, and is a mixture of blue 
 and red boulder clay, with the red predominating. 
 
 " After satisfying my curiosity at this section (from 
 twenty to twenty-four feet in height), I left it and went to 
 examine the strata and section at the small bridge. I 
 found that the strata, when wet, looked blood-red ; and 
 the clay resting on it dark blue. The rest of the section 
 seemed to be a mixture of red and blue boulder clay, 
 containing broken shells. I have a piece of the clay and 
 the strata in contact, for the purpose of sending to you 
 at Edinburgh. 
 
 " Observing a small stream joining the main burn, 
 I turned into it ; and found that here too, blue boulder 
 clay lay thicker than the stream had yet cut down to. 
 Shells of Cyprina and Turritella were very abundant. 
 T traced the stream up until it seemed to terminate in a 
 shallow ditch. Eecrossing, in a direct line, to the burn
 
 186 
 
 FRESWICK BRIDGE. 
 
 that I had left, I paused on one of the rising mounds of 
 boulder clay heath-clad and fern-decked and looked 
 around me. I endeavoured to grasp, at one glance, the 
 extent and the amount of the formation. It was too 
 much. The organic remains that the mass contained are 
 immense. Arithmetic is powerful ; but it fails here : it 
 can give no idea of the tons of clay, boulders, stones, and 
 
 shells, that have been deposited throughout the extent of 
 country that lies between here and Dunnet Bay ! " 
 
 In a future letter to Hugh Miller, Dick gives the 
 conclusion of his journey to Freswick. He begins : 
 
 " The whole universe is set to music ! It is har- 
 monious. There is, in truth, no jarring, no discord! 
 None whatever ! And when man thinks that he dis- 
 covers a want of harmony, the fault is in himself. It
 
 CHAP. xin. CAITHNESS SUBMERGED. 187 
 
 is he that is out of tune, and not Nature not the 
 Creator of the universe. 
 
 "Here is a magnificent amphitheatre of heather! 
 One must turn round, and again round, to take in the 
 beauty of the whole. What a marvellous extent of 
 boulder clay formation ! I crossed and recrossed the 
 heath-adorned mounds, and I saw that the stony clay 
 was not confined to a mere central strip in the vicinity 
 of the Mossy Burn. It extends to a great distance on 
 either side of it. Marking the scenery very attentively, I 
 could come to no other conclusion, than that when the clay 
 on which I stood was laid down, the whole of the country 
 was occupied by a sea, wave tumbling upon wave ! 
 
 " It could not have been any trivial outburst of the 
 sea, no rising wave from Dunnet Bay. For the clay 
 copes the red sandstone debris, on the side of Wart 
 Hill, at an elevation of a hundred feet higher than the 
 surface of the beds alongside the bum. It seems to me 
 impossible that a rush of water, sweeping down such a 
 declivity, could go so far out of its course, and climb a 
 hillside. And then, when I reflected that Dunnet Head 
 has its boulder stones, that there is a blue stony clay in 
 deep water in Dunnet Bay, and that on the hillside 
 above East Murkle, there is a granite boulder, many tons 
 in weight, some three or four hundred feet above the sea- 
 level, it seemed like mockery to speak of an eruption, 
 or outburst, or rise of the sea wave, producing these things. 
 No ! The sea then submerged the whole land, on the east 
 and on the west, on the north and on the south. The sea 
 then held dominion over all. Its sway was supreme.
 
 188 HO W LITTLE CAN BE KNOWN. CHAP. XIIL 
 
 " It is just possible for a human being to dig into 
 these sections of boulder clay, and think nothing about 
 them. He is contented to find clay, stones, shells, and 
 sea-sand, far inland. He never agitates his noddle 
 about them. There they are ! It's ' all right ! ' What 
 is it to him how these things came there ! 
 
 " And even when he begins to reflect when he tries 
 to ascertain how shells, and sand, and clay are found so 
 far inland, how far does he get, and where does he end ? 
 After inquiring, and thinking, and guessing about these 
 wonders, he finds he is no nearer the truth than when 
 he began : 
 
 *' ' Well did'st thou say, Athena's wisest son, 
 The most we know is, nothing can be known.' 
 
 "And yet, despite the wisdom of the Greek, Dr. 
 Beattie holds that our Creator has permitted us to know 
 just a very little ; and the sagacious Dr. Paley affirms 
 that what we do not know, need not disturb our belief 
 in what we do know. Though Berkeley will have it 
 that we cannot be sure of anything that there is no 
 such thing as matter or material bodies, yet ordinary 
 people do not usually run their head against a post, 
 under the idea that all that they see is an illusion. 
 
 " Here, for instance, in Caithness, are vast accumula- 
 tions of what we call Clay. On examination, we find it 
 composed of many different ingredients. We perceive 
 it to be a body, unique, distinct, and totally different, 
 as a whole, from every other. Creation holds nothing 
 similar. Slate rocks, ground down, seem its main con- 
 stituent, mixed with sand. Here and there we find
 
 CHAP. xni. HISTORY OF A BOULDER. 189 
 
 ' fine braw troggin frae the banks o' Dee,' or from the 
 plains of Sweden, in the shape of chalk and flint. 
 There, detached fragments of Morven, and the moun- 
 tains of Sutherland ! Yonder, broken Belemnites from 
 the Hebrides ! There, red sandstone fragments from 
 Dunnet Head or Duncansby ! Shells raked up from 
 the bottom of the ocean ! Lime encrusted with pebbles 
 from sea caves! Boiled corallines and fresh water 
 marl! In fact, a hundred years of scrutiny will not 
 exhaust its wonders. These are the facts, which tell of 
 some great catastrophe in the illusory world's history ! 
 
 " What is that History ? What is the History of even 
 one of its rolled pebbles ?* or of its white or blue stones ? 
 No one can tell. And yet, if we glance at them for a 
 moment, one or two little truths can be learnt : 
 
 " First ; those white or blue stones were once soft, 
 and formed part of a much larger mass. 
 
 " Second; they were detached from their parent beds, 
 and tossed to and fro, and thus became irregularly rounded, 
 
 " Third ; they then enjoyed a period of repose, during 
 which some of them became tinged with oxide of iron. 
 
 * Hugh Miller, referring to Dick's observations among the boulder 
 clay, says "Would that they could write their own histories ! The 
 autobiography of a single boulder, with notes on the various floras 
 which had sprung up around it, and the various classes of birds, beasts, 
 and insects, by which it had been visited, would be worth nine-tenths 
 of all the autobiographies ever published, and a moiety of the remainder 
 to boot." Since the appearance of Hugh Miller's works, Mr. Archibald 
 Geikie, of. the Geological Survey, has, to a certain extent, carried out 
 his views, and published a very interesting book, entitled The Story of 
 a Boulder. London, 1858.
 
 190 TIME'S INSTRUMENTS. CHAP. xm. 
 
 "Fourth; they were once more in motion. The 
 abrading time came. The stupendous catastrophe oc- 
 curred, which drove them along to a new abode, and 
 during this period they suffered a diminution of their 
 surface. 
 
 " Is it necessary to say more ? I state facts. Let 
 others theorise. 
 
 "Many persons attribute the changes which have 
 occurred on the face of the earth, to Time. But what is 
 Time without his instruments ? Kain, frost, hail, snow, 
 ice these are his instruments. With these he rends 
 and brings down the mighty rocks even the eternal 
 hills. The Sea also is his one of his most efficient 
 workers. 
 
 " A mighty mass of water must once have covered 
 the Sutherland mountains, and rolled down from them 
 ponderous boulders, tossing them about like playthings, 
 and throwing them far and near over Caithness. Thus, 
 a great boulder from Morven lies at Weydale, not far 
 from Thurso. Another lies at Slater's obelisk, on 
 Holborn Head. In short, I cannot tell how many more 
 there are. 
 
 " But one thing seems evident. The boulder stones 
 owe their removal to the same causes which laid down 
 the blue boulder clay. They lie on its surface ; some of 
 them are embedded in its uppermost tier; others are 
 near the bottom. 
 
 " But a truce ! I am still standing by the Freswick 
 Burn, and must trace it up before I set out homewards. 
 Well, I trace up the burn. I pass section after section,
 
 HOMEWARDS. 191 
 
 finding more broken shells than I can gather. There 
 are numerous rolled white pebbles. Within a bowshot 
 I could have filled a cart with them. And every one 
 now in the burn was once in the boulder clay. I 
 traced up the burn until it ended in a marsh, at the 
 foot of a gently rising eminence. I reached the south 
 end of Loch Scister, and then passed homewards. 
 
 " I hope to make four other journeys to different parts 
 of the county ; but I do not intend to weary you with 
 such long palavers,"
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 THE ICEBERG PERIOD. 
 
 ROBERT DICK continued, during the winter of 1848-9, 
 to investigate the boulder clay in the neighbourhood of 
 Thurso, and to communicate the results to his friend 
 Hugh Miller at Edinburgh. He became more and more 
 convinced of the action of icebergs in grinding down the 
 strata of the various rocks into clay and till. He found 
 bits of Morven mountain scattered over the county, and 
 the largest stones were the deepest grooved. 
 
 Towards the end of December 1848, Dick writes to 
 Miller "Perhaps you are wondering at my silence, 
 though I have not been inattentive to the business in 
 hand. Dogs, you know, when closest in pursuit, give 
 little mouth. I have been as active as the very :vet 
 weather would permit, and owing to the shortness of the 
 days I have been obliged for the most part to confine 
 my explorations to this neighbourhood. Yesterday 
 evening, however, I returned from the last grand 
 boulder clay expedition of this season perhaps, with 
 me, the last for ever !" 
 
 This expedition was to Dunbeath, almost due south 
 of Thurso, on the eastern coast of Caithness. Dick set 
 out a little after twelve o'clock at midnight. He walked
 
 CHAP. xiv. JOURNEY TO DUNBEATH. 
 
 193 
 
 along the public road, by Sordal, Banniskirk, Spittle- 
 hill, and Achavannich, on to Dunbeath. The distance 
 was twenty-eight miles. He walked alone, on foot, and 
 in the dark. It was a long, lone, dreary walk. 
 
 As the light began to dawn he saw Loch Stemster on 
 one side of the road, and Loch Eangag on the other. 
 
 DO.-BEATH t EAST COAST 
 
 Then he crossed the foot of Ben Cheilt, over the road 
 made through the energy of Sir John Sinclair. This 
 was the dividing ridge between the east and the west 
 coasts. Out of this ridge various streams begin to flow, 
 which run down into the North Sea. On searching 
 about, he found that the granitic debris was not confined 
 to the hollow places, but lay at a considerable elevation 
 amongst the moors, if ii did not lie beneath the whole
 
 194 DUNBEATH WATER. 
 
 of them. The sea must once have stood over the whole 
 of these elevations. 
 
 Anxious to make the most of the limited time at his 
 disposal, Dick passed up Dunbeath Water, while daylight 
 was but a mere glimmer, picking his way among the 
 boulders as he best could. Keeping on the right hand of 
 the burn, he came to a magnificent cliff of dark boulder 
 clay containing marine shells. " I stood," he says, " in 
 amazement at the scene, in the dim light of the morning. 
 I would willingly have sat down on a stone and waited 
 the coming of the day. But the whole breadth of the 
 county lay before me, with mires and moors unutterable. 
 To linger here might be fatal, should darkness overtake 
 me. I might never be able to struggle out of these 
 horrible moors. So 'On, on' was the watchword ! 
 
 " But observing many white specks of, I could not 
 tell distinctly what, 'I darklins grapit;' and you will 
 hear with interest, that the first object I got between my 
 finger and thumb was a specimen of Turritella terebra ! 
 That shell is now on its way to you by post. 
 
 " I passed on, and found that there was much of the 
 dark clay in this spot, and of great height. Stopping at 
 another section I picked out another specimen of Turri- 
 tella, a broken hinge of Lutraria, broken Mactra, 
 Cyprina, and other shells. By this time it was nine 
 o'clock; and as the daylight was good I saw almost 
 every variety of granite red sandstone, and abundance 
 of old red conglomerate. 
 
 " To wait and stoop, and minutely scrutinize, was out 
 of the question. I moved on from section to section,
 
 CHAP. xiv. MISERY OF THE MOORS. 195 
 
 admiring as I passed. I saw cliffs of pulverised granite 
 resting on blue boulder clay; and blue boulder clay 
 resting on pulverised red granite. The latter was very 
 fine, and far more abundant than the blue. Section 
 after section stood up sheer as a wall, and the red was 
 blazing like a harvest moon. 
 
 " In two places I saw traces of stratification. I saw 
 blue boulder clay containing marine shells a long way 
 up the burn. . . . The bare boulders are very large. 
 The granite de'bris is amazingly abundant. But why 
 should I linger thus ? Away to the source of the burn. 
 Away to the moors ! 
 
 "And in the name of all that is truly miserable, 
 nothing can be conceived more dreary than those wide- 
 stretching heaths in a cold mid- winter day. The gay 
 cotton-grass flaunts no more, with its white pendent 
 heads rustling in the breeze. The heather bells are dead. 
 Nor bird nor insect is there. Even the hardy club moss 
 has acquired a sallow hue ; and save the wimple of some 
 merry tinkling rill, all is lonely and melancholy. 
 
 " Away through the moors ; and again through the 
 moors! And such moors! Hop, step, and jump is 
 holiday diversion compared to passing over these rude 
 hummocks. One's frame trembles with the concussion. 
 Try it on the hummocks ! Try to pick your way by 
 wading through the pools of water. Try and get round 
 and between them. It is all the same. You sigh in 
 hopeless agony. You get bemired to the knees, and 
 long for a clear pool of water where you may have a 
 satisfactory washing.
 
 196 A REVEREND-LOOKING MAN. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 " Loch More ! who has not heard of the loch ? 
 Yonder it is, tossing lightly its cold blue waves. I see 
 the lofty two-arched bridge crossing the river that flows 
 out of it to join the Thurso on its way to the sea. 
 Acharynie lies yonder. An auld carle is moving over 
 the hill, keeping fast by the track road, and that road 
 shall be mine too by and by. 
 
 " But after leaving the moor, and seeing a farm-house 
 near at hand, I stepped aside to ask the nearest way. I 
 reached the barn-door, and found an old reverend-looking 
 man threshing bere. 
 
 "'Please,' said I, 'how far is it to Dalemore, and 
 which is the best road ?' ' Eh ? Are ye gaun to Dale- 
 more?' 'Yes.' 'And where cam ye frae?' 'Dun- 
 beath.' ' Did ye come frae Dunbeath the day ? 
 'Yes.' 'An' where are ye gaun tae?' 'Thurso.' 
 ' Are ye gaun to Thurso ? ' * Yes.' ' And did ye wide 
 the river?' 'Yes.' 'An' are ye gaun to wide it 
 again ? ' ' Please tell me the best road to Dalemore.' 
 ' Hae ye snuff ? ' ' No, I am sorry I have no snuff.' 
 ' Oo ay ! Haud doon the strath ; doon by the river ; 
 strecht doon ! ' ' How many miles is it to Dalemore ? ' 
 ' Four miles ; ay, just four miles. ' " 
 
 " Candid man ! Oh, the want of sneeshin ! No 
 magic like a snuff-box to get to the heart of a Hieland- 
 man ! 
 
 " I think it is old Daniel Defoe who lays it down as 
 a truth, that a man should never act contrary to his 
 judgment and his conviction as to what is right, more 
 especially if he has a mysterious misgiving about the
 
 CHAP. xiv. LOCH MORE. 197 
 
 matter in hand, for which he cannot account. And yet 
 how often men do so, and how often they find reason to 
 repent ! 
 
 " The ill thief blaw yon carle south, 
 An' never snuff be near his drouth ; 
 He tauld mysel' by word o' mouth, 
 
 The strath was better ; 
 I lippened to the loon in trouth, 
 
 And was his debtor. 
 
 " I went down the strath by the river side ' strecht 
 doon,' in direct opposition to my better judgment. 
 Philosophically musing in mud and mire, I could see 
 that Loch More was once much larger than it is now. 
 The river is fast filling it up with siliceous sand, clay, 
 and peat mud. I walked over a very large piece of 
 alluvium, wrested slowly and in detail from the bed of 
 Loch More by the stream flowing into it. Loch More * 
 will one day become Loch Little, and finally disappear. 
 Such are the changes taking place on the earth under 
 our very eyes ! 
 
 " I had nearly rounded the loch, and was congratulat- 
 ing myself on my expeditious dispatch, when all at once 
 I was startled by a deep broad stream emptying itself 
 into the loch ! To cross it was impossible ; to turn back 
 was maddening. Oh, the reverend-looking man thresh- 
 ing bere ! ' Oh, the confounded scoundrel ! ' said I loud 
 out. But ' forgive us our debts,' I added, and let us 
 begin anew. 
 
 " I turned back, and had to walk and jump over 
 
 * More or Molir, Gaelic for big or large. 
 10
 
 198 TAKEN FOR AN EXCISEMAN. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 moor, mire, and pool. I went in a retrograde line up 
 nearly to the carle's house before I found a spot shallow 
 enough to wade through, which I did. 
 
 " With many musings on the desperate deceit of the 
 human heart, I had some very hard work in getting 
 through a very bad moor, utterly unable to account for 
 the trick played upon me. At last I thought I had hit 
 it. ' He took me,' said I, ' for an exciseman I ' 
 
 " With thankfulness I struck the Thurso river a little 
 above Acharynie. It is accounted fifteen miles from 
 Acharynie to Thurso, and, having a level road, the 
 journey might be said to be at an end. 
 
 " The granitic debris lies in great thickness over all 
 the country there. I saw deep sections of it by the 
 river-side far above Acharynie. The chasm or valley in 
 which the river winds is of considerable depth, exhibit- 
 ing many fine sections of granitic debris. 
 
 " A little past the old church I saw two fine sections 
 of blue boulder clay. But they were not for my exami- 
 nation at present. The old carle had done for me. My 
 time was gone. I had settled in my mind a visit both 
 to Dallmore and Cattack. But I must push on. I was 
 obliged to rest content with seeing them afar off. 
 
 " In this, my last grand boulder clay expedition of 
 the year, I have accomplished a feat in pursuit of 
 rotten shells, which perhaps not many men would have 
 willingly undertaken. I have walked more than fifty 
 miles without once sitting down. Then next morning 
 at five o'clock, I rose to my daily work as if nothing 
 unusual had happened.
 
 CHAP. xiv. FORMATION OF CAITHNESS. 199 
 
 " The historian says of the Eoman Emperor Hadrian 
 that, 'careless of the difference of seasons and of 
 climates, he marched on foot and bareheaded over the 
 snows of Caledonia and the sultry plains of Upper 
 Egypt.' Pshaw! There are thousands of Scotsmen, 
 even in these effeminate times, that would scorn to yield 
 a hairsbreadth to the Eoman Hadrian, even in the best 
 days that he ever saw." 
 
 Dick enclosed in his letter to Hugh Miller, describ- 
 ing the above expedition, an extinct shell, Fusus Hey- 
 woodii, a fossil of the English Crag ; " though," he said, 
 " Captain Brown does not figure it in his quarto volume 
 of Recent Shells" In his next letter Dick says " I am 
 half in doubt whether you would not consider me 
 crazed in my last. Stultus ego. But these journeys 
 are quite exhilarating. To those who live by their 
 labour, ' every inch a man ' is a great deal. I am sorry 
 to hear that you are so weakly. You sit too much at 
 your desk." 
 
 Dick goes on communicating his thoughts to Hugh 
 Miller about the formation of Caithness. " No deluge 
 of water," he said, " could, in my opinion, have ground 
 down granite rocks to the consistency of clay. Nothing 
 so likely to produce what we now see around us as a 
 shallow sea, alternately freezing and thawing, and 
 hampered with icebergs. What is to become of the 
 Mosaic deluge ? My ' supernatural ' is truth. ... I had 
 already fallen in with the notion of a westerly current 
 across Caithness. I have seen much to confirm that 
 view. Keay Bay, Strath Halladale, and Shebster Valley
 
 200 JOURNEY TO ACHARYN1E. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 were, in my opinion, grand inlets to the sea long, long 
 after the hills of Caithness were up and out of it." 
 
 Although Pick had been misled by the" reverend- 
 looking carle, and prevented seeing the sections of 
 boulder clay at Acharynie, Dallmore, and Cattack, on 
 his return from Dunbeath, he nevertheless resolved to 
 return for the purpose of inspecting them. He set out 
 on the 18th January. The weather was severe. Snow 
 covered the ground, but it was hard under foot. " It is 
 a glorious thing," he said, "to feel the keen bracing 
 January winds blowing against your cheek, while the 
 heart beats undaunted hi your bosom." 
 
 He set out from Thurso about three o'clock in the 
 morning, and arrived at Acharynie a little after eight, 
 just as the day was breaking, bright and radiant. In the 
 course of his search he found the usual sea-shells in the 
 boulder clay of Acharynie broken fragments of Turri- 
 tella terebra, Cypriua, and the like. As he passed down 
 the river Thurso, he came to an interesting object 
 
 " As I went down the river-side," he says, " I found 
 that the granite had at some period forced its way 
 through the clay slate; and the slate seems hardened 
 and turned in different directions. The river now 
 assumes a different appearance ; it goes tumbling and 
 plunging along. The bottom was rocky. By and by 
 I came to a place where a small wooden bridge is thrown 
 across, presenting quite an enticing scene for lovers of 
 the picturesque. The place is also well worthy of the 
 attention of the geologist. The granite is here piled in 
 rude shapeless masses ; and along the side of one mass.
 
 CHAP. xiv. IGNEOUS ROCKS. 201 
 
 the footpath leading to the bridge has been cut. The 
 wandering geologist approaches, and just as he is about 
 to step on to the bridge, to look down upon the raging 
 torrent below, his attention is arrested by the interesting 
 phenomenon of the primary or igneous rock lying in con- 
 tact with the slate or secondary rock. The molten 
 matter seems to have forced its way up through the 
 clay slate, bending it as easily as the potter does his 
 clay ; and the heat has fused it into mica slate. 
 
 " Not only are the strata in contact with the granite 
 altered to gneiss and mica slate, but about the centre of 
 the mass a piece of black mica is seen, with a vein of 
 different-coloured granite leading to and beside it, 
 suggesting the idea that this black mica had at one 
 period been a piece of ordinary schist, which had got 
 entangled in the molten matter as it rose, and thus 
 assumed the appearance which it now exhibits. I broke 
 a piece right out of it, and will find an opportunity of 
 sending it to you. I also took a piece of red granite for 
 you, and a piece of gneiss. The gneiss is most interest- 
 ing in situ : it is bent into a beautiful curve. Such and 
 such is the fact, if the metamorphic theory be the correct 
 one ; indeed, the metamorphic men could hardly find a 
 better argument than in this case. 
 
 " After the river passes this bridge its channel becomes 
 rugged in the extreme. Then you come to Dirlot Castle 
 a picturesque ruin on a granitic rock, about thirty feet 
 over the river's channel a very romantic spot !"* 
 
 * Some of the scenes through which the river Thurso passes, especi- 
 ally in the upper pails of the parish of Halkirk, are full of romantic
 
 DIRLOT CASTLE. 
 
 RUINS OF DIRLOT CASTLE. 
 
 On this occasion Dick was forced to return home 
 before he could examine the boulder clay at Dallmore 
 and Cattack. A fortnight later he paid his intended 
 visit. He explored the boulder clay found marine 
 
 beauty. The view near Dirlot is particularly striking. Here the banks 
 on each side are steep, and richly clothed with brushwood. Dirlot 
 Castle is the oldest in the county. It stands in ruins on the summit of 
 a precipitous rock. It is said at one time to have been surrounded by 
 the river, and accessible only by a drawbridge. At the end of the 
 fifteenth century, it was inhabited by a chief of the name of Suther- 
 land ; and local traditions state that it was often the scene of revelry 
 and slaughter. The castle afterwards became the possession of the 
 Mackays. The Gunns and the Mackays were the great clans of the 
 north of Sutherland and south of Caithness, and fought many ferocious 
 battles in the district. The Gunns were of Scandinavian origin.
 
 CHAP. xiv. OOLITIC CONGLOMERATE. 203 
 
 shells ; chalk flints ; a piece of petrified greenish marl, 
 with a small organism on its surface. He was occupied 
 a long day in exploring the clay, but the result was 
 comparatively nil. 
 
 " As I was going along by the side of the stream," 
 said he, "a large boulder of oolitic conglomerate pre- 
 sented itself to my delighted vision. It had evidently 
 been washed out of the clay by the slow undermining of 
 a mossy rill, and there it lay, all unnoticed, telling its 
 own pathetic tale to the gnats and midges which were 
 dancing over it. 
 
 " I had uniformly met with pieces of oolitic strata in 
 these cliffs of boulder clay, but this piece far exceeded 
 all that I had previously encountered. It was like a large 
 snowball, such as boys roll together in winter. It con- 
 tained a great abundance of broken shells, and broken 
 Belemnites not a few. I hammered at it a long time 
 until fairly wearied. Then I left it, and in a section ot 
 boulder clay beside it I found broken shells of Cyprina, 
 and one stout Turritella terebra" 
 
 He next went across the county to Strathbeg Water. 
 " There are conical mounds," he says, " of granitic debris 
 all along its south side. I ascended to the top of one 
 of them, and looked along the Strath. As far as I could 
 see, the mounds stretched almost continuously, like the 
 ruins of some ancient Eoman dyke; and they spoke 
 emphatically of contending seas in times long gone by. 
 
 "I waded Strathbeg "Water knee-deep, thinking of 
 poor Mungo Park fording the tributaries of the Niger 
 in the deserts of Africa. Ah ! true. But then it wa*
 
 204 ANOTHER LONG JOURNEY. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 not to find decayed shells. No! But to please Sir 
 Joseph Banks and the African Association. And then 
 there were the golden-roofed houses of Timbuctoo !" 
 
 Dick had many more excursions to make before he 
 could satisfy himself as to the extensive existence of the 
 boulder clay throughout Caithness. For instance, in 
 March 1849, he made a long ramble between Dunnet 
 Bay on the one side of the county and Sinclair Bay on 
 the other. The weather at that time was horrible 
 frost, snow, snow-drift, wind, rain, and sleet. Then his 
 journey of forty miles had for the most part to be made 
 through lonely moors and marshes, where the wanderer 
 sank up to his knees at almost every step. He was wet 
 to the skin all the way. And all to find the relative 
 extent of the boulder clay ! 
 
 He rose at midnight and did his morning's work. 
 The bread was all ready for sale when he set out at four 
 o'clock. He first made for Castleton, tramped across 
 the sands at Dunnet, and steered south-east for Sinclair 
 Bay, with rain, snow, or sleet accompanying him the 
 whole way. He passed many boulders of the old red 
 conglomerate. He passed along the verge of four lakes, 
 the moss and heather beside them all saturated with 
 water elush, slush, slush ! At length his ears were 
 greeted by the sounds of old ocean thundering along 
 the beach of Sinclair Bay, with Noss Head in the dis- 
 tance. 
 
 Every step of the road was full of observation. 
 Dick noted the evidences of the sea having at one time 
 been dashing its waves far inland. He saw the remains
 
 SINCLAIR BA Y. 
 
 205 
 
 of an old sea-beach far up the shore. It took him ten 
 minutes to walk from there to high-water mark on the 
 present sea-beach. He concluded that the sea once 
 covered all the land between Dunnet Bay and Sinclair 
 Bay, and that it was gradually retiring from the land. 
 
 BINOLAIB l:\V ASP NnSS HEAD. 
 
 He set out on his homeward journey by "Wester 
 Loch. The shores of the loch weie composed of marsh, 
 peat, sour grass, and mire. As he approached, he 
 startled the sea-birds which frequented it. There were 
 sea-mews, sea-ducks, wild geese, and wild swans. He 
 counted thirty-six ducks rise in rapid succession. At 
 the head of the loch he found a travelled stone a mass 
 of grey granite several tons in weight moored just 
 within the dry laud. Two large boulders of the same 
 mat -rial lay on the opposite side of the water, 
 lu*
 
 206 WALK THROUGH THE MOORS. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 On he went, observing many high braes of undoubted 
 boulder clay, though covered with grass and heath. He 
 observed also sections of granitic debris similar in every 
 respect to those he had seen at Dirlot and Dallmore. 
 And then he came upon a mass of blue boulder clay 
 filled with marine shells Cyprina, Crassina, and Turri- 
 tella terebra. " At this moment," he says, " I cannot 
 tell how I felt. Here, at last, was abundant reward for 
 my day's journey. 
 
 " On I went, hoping that my luck was in the 
 ascendant. But no. The soil along the bottom of the 
 Bower valley is wholly sandy alluvium. I was 500 
 years too late ! The river has done for this locality 
 what Thurso river is busily doing for the boulder clay, 
 namely, tumbling and rolling it about from side to side, 
 sweeping it away, and laying down alluvium in its place, 
 till at length, imprisoned in its own toils, it rolls away, 
 a sleepy, despised, obscure thing. 
 
 " On and on. Floods have been here, and see ! here 
 on the river banks is something new shells of the 
 Alosmodon margaritiferus lying open, and the dead 
 animal in them. And see ! pieces of broken Cyprina 
 from the boulder clay lying cheek -by -jowl. Do you ask 
 me how I knew them to be from the boulder clay? 
 Simply by the family likeness. There is no mistaking 
 one's old friends. 
 
 " On and on, through marsh and mire, ankle-deep, 
 and deeper. On to the confluence of the water of 
 "Wester. Boulder clay and shell fragments are found 
 all the way. I traced up the river of Bower until it was
 
 CHAP. xiv. MARINE SHELLS. 207 
 
 only a stride across. Shortly after I entered the Bower- 
 madden road from Castletown to Wick. I went on to 
 Castletown, and saw that there was a continuing hollow 
 by Duran Loch on to the very south corner of Dunnet 
 Bay. 
 
 " Eaise the sea a hundred feet at Dunnet Bay and a 
 hundred feet at Sinclair Bay, and, in my opinion, their 
 waters would unite. The evidence of marine shells is 
 also nearly continuous from Dunbeath to Thurso. The 
 evidence of marine shells is also continuous from Fres- 
 wick up as far as Brabster mire. I have no doubt that 
 during the boulder clay epoch the whole of Caithness 
 was under the sea." 
 
 Dick continues to send Hugh Miller various fossils 
 found during his journeys. On the 22d of March he 
 sends a fish jaw (of the Asterolepis), with an excellent 
 drawing of it, carefully done. The drawing afterwards 
 appeared in Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator. 
 Three months later Dick tells him that he has found 
 a hyoid bone of the Diplopterus, "another victory 
 over the unknown." He made numerous excursions for 
 the purpose of enabling Miller to illustrate the Pleisto- 
 cene formation. He went to Harpsdale in the south, to 
 Freswick in the east (starting at midnight), and to Ben 
 Shurery in the west. The Ben consists of granite and 
 granitic gneiss, but near the top of the hill he found two 
 boulders of red conglomerate, of vast size. 
 
 " No Oolitic or Liassic strata, in my opinion, exist ia 
 Caithness, so you must account for the great abundance 
 of fragmentary strangers in some other manner. How
 
 208 VIEW FROM BEN SHURERY. CHA*. xiv. 
 
 mysterious the whole becomes ! How much are we still 
 in the dark ! However, thank heaven, the FISH were, 
 before the mountains of Shurery, Braalnabin, or Dorery 
 had any existence ! Were I to tell some people this, 
 they would not believe me." 
 
 " The view from the mountain top," he adds, " is very 
 grand. And though the wind blew rather cold for one 
 bathed in sweat, I tried to look abroad. To the north 
 the Orkneys and all the intervening lands lay tabled 
 before me. Turning round to the south-east, Morveii 
 towered aloft, wreathed in snow. From the little loch 
 underneath me, stretched a low wide country covered 
 with brown heather and dotted with lochs." 
 
 Another of Dick's rambles was an extraordinary one. 
 He walked from Thurso to Strath Halladale in Suther- 
 landshire, then up the dale and round to Thurso by the 
 Dorery Hills, a night's walk of more than sixty miles. 
 Here is his own account : 
 
 "I left Thurso," he says, "at eight o'clock in the 
 evening ; went on to Eeay ; from Reay to Portskerra ; 
 then ten miles up the deep Strath Halladale ; then to 
 Eumsdale; then turned down to Loch Shurery; then 
 over the top of Dorery mountain, down on Braalnabin ; 
 rounded the loch of Calder, and along the public road 
 to Thurso again, a delightful amount of labour cer- 
 tainly. 
 
 " I travelled all night alone, simply to test the fact 
 of the sea finding its way over Caithness, and covering 
 the lands towards the sea. 
 
 " At midnight, twenty minutes to one, I was standing
 
 STRATH HALLADALE.
 
 STRA TH HALLADALE. 209 
 
 by the finger-post, at the lower end of Strath Halladale k 
 reading the directions to weary travellers ; but the un- 
 grateful Highlanders had so pelted it with stones, that, 
 save the word Trantlebeg, the finger-post gave me no 
 information whatever. 
 
 " It was a lovely night. The scene was most im- 
 pressive. The full moon shone clear on all around me. 
 Not a zephyr was astir. The drowsy sheep slumbered" 
 on the hills. The sea scarcely broke along the shore. 
 The river ran clear and sparkling, but without a mur- 
 mur. The silence that enveloped the granite peaks 
 was sublime and solemn. My heart beat happily. 
 ' My vera een ' were enriched ; for all my musings, all 
 my expectations, were more than realised. 
 
 " There is a good hard road up the strath, and it 
 winds along the river side. The granitic debris lies 
 thick on the hill-sides, and boulders by the million. 
 Above all, the bottom of the valley lies delightfully 
 low. The bed of the river, where it enters the sea, is 
 scarcely, if at all, above high-water level. For many 
 miles up the strath the water scarcely runs. Now, 
 there is a deep pool, hemmed in with rolled pebbles, 
 over which the stream straggles. It runs on a little, 
 and then there is a pool again. 
 
 " A considerable number of black cottages still grace 
 the sides of this valley, of a better cast than the com- 
 mon run of cottages in Caithness. But this strath, by 
 the way, is in Sutherland. 
 
 " About nine miles up, 1 found the full reward of 
 my labours in the fact that there was no impediment,
 
 210 LOCH HAELLAN. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 but indeed every facility for the sea entering the country 
 and drowning Caithness, were there only some upheav- 
 ing agency to hitch it up some 100 feet or so. It was 
 simply to test this, that had brought me thus far. The 
 road winds up among the hills hollow, all hollow : 
 
 MOUTH OF STRATH HALLADALE RIVER. 
 
 hence, I suppose, the name Strath Hollowdale, or 
 Halkdale half Highland and half Norse. The strath 
 was, in my opinion, once an outlet of the sea, just as 
 Loch Tongue and Loch Erriboll are now." 
 
 His sixth exploratory ramble was one of the most 
 interesting of all. He set out a little before two o'clock 
 in the morning, and went towards Loch Haellan, about 
 ten miles east of Thurso. He observed how small an
 
 CHAP. xiv. HA VEN OF ME Y. 211 
 
 elevation of the sea, or a depression of the land, was 
 sufficient to enable the land to be covered with water, 
 and unite Dunnet Bay with the Pentland Firth. 
 
 He went north to the Burn of Ratter, and found the 
 boulder clay thickly charged with marine shells He 
 next went in the direction of Barrogill Castle, on towards 
 the sea, to the Haven of Mey, where he found a bed of 
 boulder clay 60 feet thick, charged from top to bottom 
 with marine shells. 
 
 " Here then," said he, " is the grand key to the whole 
 mystery ! When the sea stood sixty feet high at 
 Barrogill and its vicinity, the whole of the eastern parts 
 of the county, round to Wick, were drowned ! " 
 
 " Where the Burn of Ratter enters the sea, the coast 
 ia very low, and there is a continuous valley on to Loch 
 Scister. 
 
 " The bitterest opponent of geological deductions could 
 hardly fail to be converted by an examination of the 
 boulder clay precipices at the Haven of Mey. He 
 would find that the boulder clay was a distinct forma- 
 tion a generic production, differing entirely from 
 every other thing on the earth's surface. It is not a 
 conglomerate. It would never, though consolidated, 
 form a bed of rock similar to conglomerate. It is not a 
 production of the Mosaic Deluge. It is not, strictly 
 speaking, a production of the sea. It is not the sweep- 
 ings of a sea-shore. No ! nothing of the kind. No 
 Mosaic Deluge could have produced those beds of dark, 
 bituminous, sandy, tenacious, stony clay. No ocean 
 waves alone, by the friction of ten thousand years on
 
 212 BOULDER PRECIPICES. CHAP. xiv. 
 
 rocky strata, could have done it. No ! Tens and hundreds 
 of millions of steam-mills, grinding stones night and day 
 for a thousand years, could not have done it. No sea 
 casts up anything like it. It is a distinct generic pro- 
 duction, fairly entitled to a place by itself. An observer 
 at Barrogill could not fail to see all this. He could 
 not fail to see that the shore beneath, and along the foot 
 of these clay cliffs, contained a bed of sand, broken 
 shells, and rolled fragments of stones ; and yet this bed 
 is entirely different. 
 
 "Along the shore, in some places, there is a newer 
 formation than the boulder precipices atop a forma- 
 tion laid down at the foot of the cliffs, at unusually high 
 tides. It is thickly charged with broken shells, in some 
 places nearly consolidated to stone ; yet this formation 
 is much newer. It is, in comparison with the other, a 
 thing of yesterday. The deep ditches dug through the 
 Moss of Mey exhibit no section similar to the genuine 
 boulder clay. They are too marly. These low-lying 
 grounds seem to have been, for a long period ere the 
 peat grew over them overspread with shallow pools 
 and lochs of fresh water, in which Limnsea and Cyclas 
 had lived, multiplied, and died, by millions leaving 
 their empty dwellings to crumble down and mix with 
 the sands over which they had crawled. Apt emblem 
 of man ' in his best estate ' ! Surely we all walk in tho 
 same vain show. 
 
 " A beautiful illustration of this is to be seen in the 
 littl^loch of Mey. It is a very shallow pool of fresh 
 water, nearly flat, but deepening a little towards its
 
 CHAP. xiv. THE CADDIS-WORM. 21S 
 
 lower end, where a stream goes off to drive the mill of 
 Mey. Its eastern shore was strewn with sand, and not 
 long ago, the mimic waves had dashed across it, leaving, 
 in the circles of its upper reaches, straws, sticks, aiid 
 bits of peat. Stooping down on my knees to scrutinise 
 the sands, I was surprised to find innumerable multi- 
 tudes of Limnsea and Cyclas, the whole mingled with 
 the Old Houses of a small Caddis-worm.* The sight 
 was impressive. Here was a miniature representation 
 of geologic fact. Thousands of organic existences sud- 
 denly terminating their little span of life, through no 
 fault of their own, but by the seeming accident of a 
 sudden shower!" 
 
 * Caddi#-worm. or Cure-twrm,
 
 CHAPTEE XV. 
 
 END OF CORRESPONDENCE WITH 
 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 HUGH MILLER corresponded regularly with Eobert Dick 
 during the preparation of his later works on geology. He 
 sent him the proof sheets of his forthcoming books for the 
 purpose of having Dick's corrections. Even as regards the 
 Old Red Sandstone Miller's first geological work Dick 
 furnished him with many additions and corrections. For 
 instance, he sent him the first specimen of the gigantic 
 Holoptychius found under the lower beds of the Old 
 Eed Sandstone, which enabled Hugh Miller to correct 
 the theory set forth in the two previous editions of his 
 book.* Dick also enabled Hugh Miller to determine 
 positively that Dipterus and Polyphractus were one and 
 the same fish.-f- Dick also furnished his friend with 
 numerous specimens of the Diplopterus, Osteolepis, and 
 Asterolepis, accompanied by drawings of these fossil 
 fishes. When sending them, Dick said, " I am far from 
 attaching any value to these drawings. To me labour 
 is its own reward. You can cut and carve out of them 
 as you please." 
 
 * See Miller's Old Red Sandstone. Note to the third edition, ;tad 
 note to p. 176. Ed. 1875. 
 
 t Letter to Charles Peach, 12th August 1859.
 
 CHAP. xv. HELP TO HUGH MILLER. 215 
 
 Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator was published 
 in 1849, and here also we find numerous indications of 
 the assistance which he had received from Eobert Dick. 
 Professor Agassiz, in his preface to the last edition of 
 the hook, says, "Many points respecting this curious 
 fossil (the Asterolepis or Star-scale) remained to be 
 determined ; and it was fortunate for science that Mr. 
 Miller was enabled to accomplish this object by means 
 of a variety of excellent specimens which he had 
 received from Eobert Dick." "The remains of an 
 Asterolepis found by Mr. Dick at Thurso indicate a 
 length of from twelve feet five to thirteen feet eight 
 inches. ... A specimen of Asterolepis discovered by 
 Mr. Dick among the Thurso rocks, and sent to Mr. 
 Miller, exhibited the singular phenomenon of a quantity 
 of thick tar lying beneath it, which stuck to the fingers 
 when lifting the pieces of rock. What had been once 
 the nerves, muscles, and blood of this ancient ganoid, 
 still lay under its bones. The animal juices of the fish 
 had preserved its remains by the pervading bitumen, 
 greatly more conservative in its effects than the oil and 
 gum of an Egyptian undertaker."* 
 
 The first cranium of the Asterolepis figured by Hugh 
 Miller was imperfect. Eobert Dick furnished him with 
 a perfect one. There was a gap in the print which 
 struck Professor Sedgwick as being unnatural. He said 
 it was " not of the proper finish." But after Dick had 
 furnished his specimen with the keystone-shaped plate 
 in its proper place, Miller says he referred the professor 
 
 * Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator, p. xxvii. Ed. 1876.
 
 216 DICK'S GEOLOGICAL FINDINGS. CHAP. xv. 
 
 to the geologist at Thurso " as the true authority for 
 determining how nature had given the last finish to the 
 cranial buckler of the Asterolepis. ' Ay,' he exclaimed, 
 as he eagerly knelt down to examine the specimen, and 
 passed his fingers over the keystone-like plate, 'Ay, 
 this is a finish of the right kind! This will do!'"* 
 Dick also furnished Mr. Miller with a well-defined jaw 
 of the Asterolepis, and with a drawing of a section of its 
 tooth, which appeared among the illustrations of the 
 book. 
 
 Dick found for Mr. Miller apropos of a conversation 
 which the latter had with Professor Owen a specimen 
 of the Diplopterus, which fully confirmed the professor's 
 views as to the prolongation of the brain of that fish. 
 In fact, there was scarcely a subject on which Hugh 
 Miller wanted further information, but Eobert Dick was 
 ready to supply it. It was a delight to him to labour 
 night and day for the benefit of his friend, and also for 
 the benefit of science. In one of his letters to Hugh 
 Miller he says "Your letter found me asleep, knee- 
 deep in fern howes. But now I am awake, and busy 
 night and day." 
 
 Hugh Miller, on his part, was ready to acknowledge 
 the obligations which he owed to his friend. At a lecture 
 delivered by him before the Physical Society of 
 Edinburgh " On a Suite of Fossils, illustrative of the 
 relations of the Earlier Ganoids," he said, "There are 
 several rare and a few unique fossils on the latter, illus- 
 trative of various points in the structure of the first 
 Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator, pp. 73, 325. Ed. 1876,
 
 CHAP. xv. CORRESPONDENCE WITH MILLER. 217 
 
 ganoids, to which I can only refer the members of the 
 Society as worthy of their examination. They are in 
 part the fruits of a leisure fortnight spent this autumn 
 among the rocks of Thurso ; but in still greater part I 
 owe them to the kindness of my indefatigable friend 
 Mr. Robert Dick, of whom I may well say that lie, has 
 robbed himself to do me service" 
 
 The same lecture is full of the obligations which he 
 owed to Eobert Dick. He pointed to the Homocanthus 
 arcuatus, which, though found in Russia, had only 
 recently been discovered in Scotland by his friend. To 
 him also he owed the Hbplacanthus marginalia, another 
 Russian placoid of the Old Red. There was also a 
 magnificent specimen of the Asterolepis, which had 
 enabled him to determine the place and form of a thickly- 
 tubercled, well-marked place on the middle of the palate. 
 This also had been sent to him by Robert Dick.* 
 
 In sending this fine specimen to Hugh Miller, Dick 
 says " I give it you most cheerfully. Your kindness 
 deserves it. To any other I would not have parted 
 with it." At the same time he sends him the jaw of a 
 fossil fish, showing the outer row of teeth. " Looking 
 at them with the glass," he says, "they show a very 
 beautiful star-like arrangement of the channel through 
 which nourishment flowed to the tooth." 
 
 Dick continued to correspond regularly with Hugh 
 
 Miller. He spoke to him very freely. He thought 
 
 that he was sometimes twisting geological facts to suit 
 
 a religious theory. Dick thought very little of " authori- 
 
 * Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator, pp. 334, 341. Ed. 1876.
 
 218 GEOLOGY TESTED BY FACTS. CHAP. xv. 
 
 ties," but he greatly valued facts tested and re-tested. 
 " It is not," he said, " by driving along the public roads ; 
 strolling along the sea-shore ; taking a distant view of 
 Morven through a spy-glass, that the depth of the 
 Caithness schists is to be ascertained. No ! The very 
 fact that the schists dip in almost every direction might 
 have led ' authorities ' to suspect that the granite was 
 not confined to primary hill a but, like the stately oak, 
 sent out its branching roots far and wide. You, Mr. 
 Miller, rule solely by ' authorities.' Your humble 
 servant has often found them sleeping, and has no 
 reverence for them." 
 
 Indeed, Dick had no hesitation in correcting the very 
 highest authorities. " Nothing," he said to Miller (26th 
 September 1850), " is more at fault than the idea sought 
 to be established by Sir Eoderick Murchison's section in 
 the front of your volume on the Old Red Sandstone, that 
 the general dip of Caithness rocks is all in one direction. 
 No such thing ! I candidly tell you that ' my masters ' 
 must revise their views before I can feel the smallest 
 respect for what they say about Caithness. I cannot 
 resist the evidence of my senses. Take, for instance, the 
 Hill of Buckies,* which -you saw. The dip there is 
 north-east, whereas at Thurso the dip is north-west. 
 
 " Of course, I am very far from wishing you to meddle 
 with the findings of men driving along the public road 
 and viewing the country from gigs ! No ! But it is 
 my misfortune to laugh outrageously during my rambles 
 
 * TLe Hill of Buckies, so called from the large quantity of marin* 
 shells found there. It is not far from Thurso.
 
 CHAP. xv. DIP OF CAITHNESS ROCKS. 219 
 
 to find the Caithness rocks dipping in every airt* of the 
 compass, whereas it is stated in geological books that 
 they dip in only one direction ! " 
 
 Kobert Dick was not afraid of correcting Hugh 
 Miller himself. In one of his letters he says : " You 
 have fallen into error in your Old Red Sandstone. You 
 have described Caithness as a vast pyramid rising per- 
 pendicularly from the bases furnished by the primary 
 rocks of Sutherland, and presenting newer beds and 
 strata as we ascend, until we reach the apex. 
 
 " Now, Mr. Miller, this is not only incorrect but cal- 
 culated to deceive. But you are not to blame. It is the 
 getters-up of the geological maps who are to blame. 
 You work by the geological maps. Geological maps and 
 treatises are got up by men in red-hot haste, on data 
 proved to be erroneous years ago. New books, with 
 nothing new in them but the paper and ink! The 
 public are gulled, and the poor student, panting for 
 knowledge, fills his belly with husks, and by and by he 
 regards his new books with derision ! 
 
 " I am working very hard sometimes seeking new 
 fossils but finding none ; sometimes rambling far over 
 the hills and finding a junction of the Old Eed very 
 different indeed from the respectable ' authorities ' in 
 Edinburgh. As for the maps, I have handed them over 
 to the devil as the most detestable pieces of imposture 
 ever obtruded on a discerning public. 'Discerning' 
 indeed ! 
 
 * Direction." Of a' the airts the wind can blaw, 
 I dearly lo'e the west." Burns.
 
 220 GEOLOGICAL MAPS. CHAP. xv. 
 
 " Your Edinburgh Professors can put on their spec- 
 tacles next time they travel north. If they wish to be 
 respected, they must be a little more particular." 
 
 Dick himself had bought one of the best maps of the 
 time. He used it for travelling purposes. He noted 
 down on it the direction of his journeys. He marked 
 the dips of the strata in nearly every part of the county. 
 He noted the disturbances, the faults, the beds in con- 
 fusion, the sites of the boulder clay, the flagstones, the 
 red sandstone, the gneiss, the conglomerates, and the 
 various geological formations of Caithness. The map is 
 full of his marks. In some places, where a river or a 
 loch is put, he marks " nonsense " or " stuff," meaning 
 that there is no such thing. This map must have been 
 his pocket-companion for many years. Underneath it 
 he writes : " I have been rambling over Caithness since 
 1830, and anything more unlike the truth than the 
 above picture I have never seen. There is no pleasure 
 in marking anything on it. I have made an attempt to 
 put in roads. The dip is often seen by the road-sides." 
 
 Writing to Hugh Miller about the geological maps of 
 Caithness, he said : " It would be easy to construct such 
 
 a plaything as those maps of Messrs. , , and 
 
 , but when you had done so, would the toy meet 
 
 the felt necessity ? . . . brave gentlemen ! bold men 
 and daring ! how gallantly you have set the truth aside ! 
 here laying down your fancy ovals, there your half- 
 moon patches ! just as if Nature were strictly bound 
 down to mathematical figures, squares, and circles. How 
 inimitably you have run your Old Red in Caithness
 
 CHAP. xv. A NEW MAP WANTED. 22\ 
 
 sheer up to the root of Morven, in defiance of every inter- 
 vening obstacle. Outbursts of granite are nothing. No ! 
 Their iron-pointed crests (stubborn facts) standing up 
 here and there are only trifles, yet they riddle in rotten 
 holes your pretty pictures ! . . . For on such things men 
 now-a-days found their Deep Philosophy. 
 
 " Seriously, if any junction of Old Red with the 
 granitic rocks be as irregular and complicated as that 
 in Caithness, it will be no easy task to delineate it cor- 
 rectly ; and unless it be correctly done it will be of no 
 value. It would require such an amount of time and 
 patience, such a crossing and re-crossing of the county, 
 as few private individuals could venture on. 
 
 " For my own part, though I grumble at toil as little 
 as any man, I have, so far as regards any serious inten- 
 tion of doing such a thing, given it up. At the same 
 time, as I ramble now and then, I will have an eye to 
 it, and that is all. Let the Government do it; they 
 only can order it to be done properly." 
 
 Then, about the new-fashioned ideas about geology 
 he said : " ' Since the fashions,' to use your own words, 
 ' have not passed away,' how provokingly strange will 
 you deem it, if you and the rest of your scientific 
 brethren settle down at last to the conviction that this 
 earth never saw a creation but ONE. . . . Though diffi- 
 culties and doubts innumerable stand in the way, they 
 may yet be brushed aside like morning mists, and the 
 simple truth shine forth clear and luminous as the sun. 
 . . . See ! says some observer, the dreams of our wise 
 
 men ! They tell us that the dead animals entombed in 
 11
 
 222 THEORY OF DEGRADATION. CHAP. xv. 
 
 the solid rocks do not belong to one creation! and 
 behold, they still exist. The animal whose shell they 
 name Nummulite still lives in the Mediterranean. The 
 Pentacrinite lives in the West Indian seas and in the 
 bay of Dublin. . . . Your ' Theory of Degradation ' is 
 at least a very ingenious piece of pleading ; but if I am 
 right in supposing that it rests mainly on the idea that 
 no reptiles existed during the period that the lowest 
 fossiliferous strata were accumulating, then I say you 
 may yourself live to re- write that part of your story, 
 [n the progress of discovery, the whole series of geologic 
 speculations may change. From the very nature of the 
 investigations, an element of uncertainty must for a 
 long time mingle in all your most valued performances. 
 That stern, startling fact of ferns in the Orkney schists 
 must in no small degree tend to unsettle all fixed belief 
 in the findings of the stone, philosophers, if, indeed, any 
 belief can really belong to them." 
 
 At Miller's request, Dick again went out to do his 
 biddings. " Eeferring you," he said (24th December, 
 1849), to a promise I made to you when down at Thurso, 
 to examine the groovings and polishings, by removing a 
 little of the soil in the locality in which you detected 
 those marks, I wish to remark that the work is done. 
 You might think me dilatory and slothful, but I could 
 not accomplish it sooner. In the first place, the business 
 was retarded by a severe frost. Winter held his iron 
 rule ; and could you have seen the place over which you 
 rambled in July last, you would have beheld a strange 
 metamorphosis. The strata were wholly covered witi
 
 CHAP. xv. WORKING AGAIN AT THE ROCKS. 223 
 
 sheets of ice, with long fantastic icicles hanging from 
 every precipice. The air was still, and the sea with- 
 out a ripple. Of course nothing could be done ; it was 
 too icy, too cold. 
 
 " The scene changed to another phase, not a whit 
 more endurable. A cold, ' blae, eastlin ' wind, accom- 
 panied by driving sleety showers, whistled along the 
 watery turmoil. This was followed by a close, dense, 
 foggy drizzle. Bogs and mires were impassable to ordi- 
 nary folk. Patience said ' Wait.' 
 
 " Well, I waited. Winds and rains are but a tide. 
 The eastern sky at length frowned, and stormed, and 
 wept itself into sheer good humour. The air became 
 dry and mild, and a delightful morning at length dawned. 
 I took up my spade and went off to the spot, in order to 
 solve your query." 
 
 " I remember that I was much struck by the pheno- 
 menon, when you pointed it out to me on the top of yon 
 dizzy precipice. I was no less astonished on seeing it 
 a second time. To me these wonders are never old. 
 Their edge never dulls. They always stir me. 
 
 " I laid bare the rock for about two feet. I did not 
 feel entitled to do any more. I felt I had no right to 
 strip the soil off any man's property, so I desisted. But 
 it was quite enough. The rock, beneath the soil, was 
 polished and grooved, in even a more beautiful manner 
 than when you saw it. The bearings of the groovings 
 and scratches were, as near as could be determined 
 without a compass, west and east. 
 
 "On coming homewards, I noted, at a spot where
 
 224 HEAD PL A TE OF AN ASTEROLEPIS. CHAP, xv, 
 
 Lady Sinclair had caused a small runnel of water to be 
 diverted in order to form a mimic cascade, a good piece 
 of the rock laid bare of the soil ; and the surface of that 
 rock was grooved and polished similar to the other." 
 
 This unmitigated hard work injured Dick's health. 
 He did not sustain himself properly. On his long 
 journeys of forty or fifty miles he had only a little 
 biscuit to eat. He drank from the nearest spring. 
 There were not only no public-houses along the districts 
 which he travelled through ; but no houses of any kind. 
 There were only moors, and mosses, and mires. 
 
 On the 28th of January 1850, he sent Hugh Miller 
 the head plate of an Asterolepis. He found the heavy 
 stone in which it lay concealed, five long miles from 
 Thurso. He hammered and chiselled, and took out the 
 stone himself ; but he could not carry it away. He hid 
 it until he could get some help. He hired a man, and the 
 two went out in the dark with a wheelbarrow to bring 
 it home. It was a very heavy stone. They carried it 
 " up the brae at the shore," and placed it carefully in 
 the wheelbarrow. The two trundled it home, turn and 
 turn about, until they reached Dick's house in Wilson 
 Lane, late at night. In a future letter to Hugh Miller 
 he says : " Truly the labour of digging it out has nearly 
 finished me. I worked too hard, caught cold after- 
 wards, and I am no better yet." 
 
 On Miller's asking him to go out and further 
 observe the groovings on the hill-sides, he says : " The 
 thing shall be attended to. But, Mr. Miller, I have not 
 been to the hills this winter, not since October. Not
 
 CHAP. xv. DICK'S POLISHING BENCH. 225 
 
 that I am forgetful or unmindful of such affairs. But 
 many conflicting cares will be creeping in and annoying 
 one. Thus the course of stone, love, cannot run smooth. 
 For three weeks and more I have been grinding the few 
 stones I have into something of a neater shape, rendering 
 them less cumbrous and more trim and smooth. Truth to 
 say, it is hard work, and requires enthusiasm. Geologists 
 should be all gentlemen, with nothing else to do." 
 
 The means by which Dick sawed and polished his 
 stones, were very simple. An old cask about the size of 
 a herring barrel set on its end, and supporting a board 
 or flat stone, was his bench. He had a short portion of 
 the common hand-saw, fitted by himself with a rough 
 wooden handle. With this, and the addition of a little 
 sand and water, he trimmed the stones containing the 
 fossils, and afterwards polished them by rubbing the two 
 surfaces together. This work is generally done by 
 machinery ; but Dick did it all by the strength of his 
 arms. It occupied a great deal of time, and was often 
 very heavy labour. 
 
 Hugh Miller plied Dick very hard. He was con- 
 stantly writing to him, asking for further information. 
 Mr. Miller was then contemplating his new book The 
 Testimony of the Rocks for the purpose of reconciling 
 geology with the Mosaic account of creation. The 
 matter of the book was first delivered as lectures. 
 " You ask me," said Dick, " what good news I bring 
 you from the shore, from the quarries in the hills, and 
 from the quarries in the plains ?" I answer, simply nc 
 uews at all.
 
 226 SEA-SHORE AT BARROGILL. CHAP. xv. 
 
 "Since February last, I sauntered east, I sauntered 
 west ; in fact, I am almost as familiar with every rocky 
 ledge sixteen miles on every side of this place as you 
 are with the desk before you. I have peered into them 
 all, and still there is no news. Old Boniface ate his 
 ale, drank his ale, and slept upon his ale. So may I 
 say, I have ate on the strata, I have hammered the 
 strata, and sometimes I have sat down and fallen asleep 
 on the strata; and, after all, I am not one whit the 
 wiser. 
 
 "One sunny morning I found myself on the sea- 
 shore at Barrogill. I had been there before, but I was 
 never so sure of achieving wonders as I was on this 
 occasion. The Pentland tides had receded to the lowest 
 ebb, and the whole range of stratified schists lay dry and 
 inviting. I set gallantly to work, and charged along 
 one ledge and down another ; up a third, and across a 
 fourth ; retreating, advancing, wheeling, kneeling, poking, 
 poring ; now to the right, now to the left ; then the last 
 tremendous assault, and all is over, save ' Try again.' 
 
 " Well, I found a bed of very dark bituminous schist, 
 very dark whilst wet by the sea. It almost seemed of 
 a coal colour, though the stone, when dry, is brownish. 
 In fact, the strata differ in nothing essential from similar 
 bituminous beds at Brims and near Thurso. In those 
 strata I found nothing, save detached scales of Diplo- 
 pterus, droppings, detached spines of Cheiracanthus, and 
 bits of broken bones of Coccosteus. Here and there, in 
 those beds, lay roundish and irregularly shaped dark- 
 coloured pellets, of what looked like bituminous nodules.
 
 NEAR SKARSKERRY. 227 
 
 ... I turned away, and wound my way Dunnet-wards, 
 examining every accessible ridge on my way up. There 
 is a wondrous similarity among the rocks of Caithness 
 everywhere, though from the Haven of Mey up to 
 Scarskerry they are charged with iron to a greater 
 extent than in any other spot. At the little Mill of 
 Mey they are literally red as 'keel, and, tilted up at a 
 high angle, dipping north-east. ... As I passed on, 
 looking down from the rocks, I could identify the dark 
 Barrogill bed, buried deep beneath those rough red 
 strata. And in some gyoes I exclaimed, as I looked 
 down, ' There's Thurso beds ! and there, and there !' 
 
 "Near Scarskerry, at a jutting promontory, the 
 dark bituminous beds, and grey limy beds, many feet 
 in thickness, are seen tilted up at an acute angle, thin, 
 slaty, rugged, and hard, and across their sharp edge the 
 chafing waves roll twice every day.* I had marked 
 them often as I passed along at former visits ; but the 
 white surf had debarred me of the pleasure of a reeon- 
 naisance. But this time 'twas all right, and I plied the 
 hammer where hammer had never been plied before. 
 ... I found a few broken fragments of Asterolepis, 
 scales of the same, and a few scales of Diplopterus. 
 
 * In another letter to Hugh Miller, Dick says : " You know 
 Nichol's Architecture of the Heavens, and his plates of the Nebulae ? 
 Well ; many of the ends of our flagstones resemble them a series of 
 star-like forms, set upon a jet-black ground. Is it not extraordinary 
 that upon the end of a stone there should be resemblances to a series 
 of forms traced by telescopes in immensity ? Indeed no ! All Nature 
 is alike. The ripple-mark may any day be seen in the clouds, as welj 
 as on the sea-shore, or in the rocks."
 
 228 GILL'S BURN. 
 
 Not another article did I find, although I tried until 
 the incoming tide threatened to cut off my retreat to 
 the land. And then I fled." 
 
 Dick went on with his ramblings, and sent, as usual, 
 the results to Hugh Miller. He went to Barrogill and 
 Gills Bay on the Pentland Firth, marking the dips of 
 the flags and red sandstone. At the junction of Gills 
 Burn with the Firth he found several beds of bituminous 
 shale, containing fossil coprolites and large seaweed 
 plants not unlike a stout bough. This was afterwards 
 engraved in Hugh Miller's Testimony of the Rocks. Dick 
 found the beds of clay slate interlacing with the huge 
 mass of red sandstone before him, and up Gills Burn he 
 saw a beautiful section of boulder clay. ' No less than 
 three little streams have cut their course through the 
 boulder clay, laying bare their internal structure most 
 beautifully. In one of those little streams you walk 
 up into the very bowels of the earth, with a perpendi- 
 cular wall on each side of you, picking out at your leisure 
 Crassena, Mactra, Cyprina, Turritella, Dentalium, chalk, 
 flints, pieces of Oolite, and such like. 
 
 " Freswick Burn is nothing, Harpsdale is nothing, the 
 Haven of Mey is nothing to a geologist, compared with 
 this. I wish you no higher gratification than an hour 
 spent among the clay and shells at Gills Bay. This 
 section is noticeable because it exhibits at the base, 
 just where it rests on the red sandstone, a bed of 
 gravel and shells broken and intermixed together 
 a thing I never saw in connection with any other sec- 
 tion. I have seen, here and there, small gravel nests of
 
 CHAP. xv. RAMBLE TO BENCHEILT. 229 
 
 various shapes, but never at the hase line. In truth, I 
 do not remember ever seeing the base line of a section 
 of boulder clay until I saw this one." 
 
 From Gills Bay, Dick went westwards to the bay of 
 Scotland Haven, where he found various remains of the 
 Asterolepis. He brought away a few of them, more by 
 way of memorial than because of their value. "The 
 slates from this locality on to Dunnet," he says, " dip 
 east-north-east, and in many places they are in com- 
 plete confusion. As I passed homewards, my thoughts 
 reverted to the ignorance of those who imagine that 
 Caithness strata have in general one particular dip one 
 'general dip.' A greater delusion never entered the 
 brain-box of mortal man." 
 
 Dick's next ramble was to Bencheilt, about twenty- 
 five miles south of Thurso. His wish was to examine 
 the granitic de'bris, and to correct the observations made 
 during his midnight journey to Dunbeath about three 
 years before. He went by Sordal and Spittle Hill, 
 where the strata dipped east. At the thirteenth mile- 
 stone, he found the granitic de'bris, and it continued to 
 Stemster Hill. Passing a Druidical pillar, nine feet 
 high, he went on to Bencheilt. He was twenty miles 
 from home. His time was nearly up ; yet he determined 
 bo ascend the mountain. Observing, however, that the 
 Loch of Stemster was close at hand, and that a Druid's 
 temple stood on its side, he resolved to go over and see 
 the great antiquarian monument. 
 
 " The Druidical temple," he says, " is not a circle. 
 
 It is shaped like a horse-shoe like an old-fashioned 
 11*
 
 230 DRUIDICAL TEMPLE. CHAP, xv 
 
 reticule basket, or rather like an old wife's pocket 
 pardon the simile. The stones are from the hills around. 
 The highest stone may be six feet high ; their average 
 height about four feet. They are grey, moss-grown, and 
 lichened ; and upon some of their points the hammer of 
 the antiquarian has hit very hard. At the north-east 
 corner is a small space, outside the circle, at the foot of 
 a large stone the second stone in the end row, at 
 which some person has been digging for relics, and has 
 left it half open. The small space looks a grave, as if 
 some one had been buried there after sacrifice. 
 
 " Eeturning to the west end of Stemster Loch, you 
 observe a small stream runs out of it down to Loch 
 Rangag. This little stream I traced from the one loch 
 to the other. I traced it very patiently, and was 
 rewarded and delighted. 
 
 " Where the burn runs out of Loch Stemster, there 
 has been dug a sort of watercourse, and a sluice-gate 
 has been put in. They have cut through the strata, 
 hard clay stone, and bituminous stone, with the same 
 abrupt dip to the east. You go down the stream, over 
 the edges of the strata, still dipping east. On and on, and 
 still the dip is east. Going on, over their edges, you 
 are arrested by a bed tilted south ! Dip south. Close in 
 contact, you find a bed on end! broken fragments, 
 angular, gneiss-looking, hard, bound together by three 
 seams of lime crystallised. Disturbance and even tritu- 
 ration have been at work. On a little. The strata wheel 
 round again to an easterly dip. Down, down, and down 
 down even to the Mill, and even below the Mill j and
 
 CHAP. xv. DIVERSITY OF DIP^. 231 
 
 the same beds, bed over bed ; what a pile ! The dis- 
 tance between the two lochs is about a mile on the map. 
 During half of that mile, you descend the strata, bed 
 upon bed, stair-like ; about 2625 feet. Then up above 
 Loch Stemster another hill overlies all this thickness of 
 rocks ! You are perfectly safe in estimating the thick- 
 ness of the Slate beds." 
 
 After he had made his observations, he returned 
 home with all speed. The bread must be made and 
 baked, and the bread must be sold. His hard day's 
 work in the mountains was followed by a hard day's 
 work in the bakehouse. 
 
 "A long period elapsed before Dick again corre- 
 sponded with Hugh Miller. The latter was editing the 
 Witness, and preparing his admirable book entitled 
 My Sctwols and Schoolmasters. Dick had again returned 
 to his study of botany. But the correspondence seems 
 to have been resumed towards the end of 1854. In a 
 letter written by Dick to Hugh Miller, he says, " When 
 Satan once appeared where he ought not to have been, 
 and was asked ' Whence comest thou ? ' his answer was, 
 ' From going to and fro in the earth, and walking up 
 and down in it.' Now, what could you expect from any 
 deil's bairns but only a reflex of their father's conduct ? 
 I too have been going to and fro in the earth, and 
 walking up and down in it ; with this difference, how- 
 ever, that I have had the very best intentions. And 
 though Satan's palace chambers are said to be paved 
 with such, I hope he shan't have any of mine for flag- 
 stones more particularly as my acts h^ve been of tlie
 
 232 LABORIOUS JOURNEYS. CHAP. xv. 
 
 most innocent kind, scorning to mock, the use of any 
 living thing, not even rudely crossing the stray ideas 
 of any fellow-geologist. 
 
 " I have been admiring the fashion of the grass of the 
 field ; not only admiring but collecting it ; not only 
 collecting but studying it. In the prosecution of the 
 study, I have made hundreds of laborious journeys. I 
 have ransacked the coast, rambled inland over moor, 
 niire, and meadow up hills and across valleys peeped 
 into running streams and stagnant pools, goose-dubs 
 and dismal lochs. Finally, I have been twice on the 
 pinnacle of Morven the Mont Blanc of Caithness. 
 
 "Nor has the peculiar study that you favour been 
 forgotten. I have made many journeys expressly in 
 search of fossils, or to examine some particular stratum, 
 I have regularly visited the boulder clay after rains and 
 storms kept a keen eye after all the slate quarries 
 and even spent days in scrutinising Dunnet cliffs. 
 True, in March 1854, 1 clambered down the West Front, 
 more than two hundred feet, and examined, searched, and 
 hammered for hours ; and my only reward was a curious 
 thing, which is still a problem. Splendid sections are 
 those cliffs. How strange one feels, crawling along their 
 feet, and looking up their perpendicular height ! What 
 mites, what trifles we are amidst the might of earth and 
 the vastness of ocean !" 
 
 Hugh Miller was at this time very much annoyed 
 at the leaders of the sect of which his newspaper 
 was the organ. "I see," says Dick, "that you are 
 not in heaven as to peace any more than I am. Yet
 
 DUKNET HEAD : WEST FRONT NEAR THE LIGHTHOUSE.
 
 CHAP. xv. GOSPEL THEORIES. 233 
 
 I candidly say that it is very hard that you cannot 
 enjoy yourself for one day among the rocks, without 
 being assailed for it by ignorant W. W.'s be they clerical 
 or not. Great stir about tyrannical Popery at present ; 
 but query may there not be among ourselves Moderate 
 Popes, Free Popes, and such like? Plenty, I guess. 
 The divine right of ruling is worth ten times the 
 stipend." 
 
 In acknowledging the receipt from Hugh Miller of 
 some papers containing an account of the meeting of the 
 British Association at Edinburgh, Dick says " These 
 papers are not thrown away. They shall be duly 
 pondered and considered ay, on mountain tops, even 
 at early dawn, or sober eve, when the twinkling stars and 
 the soothing winds tell their own tale of nature's happi- 
 ness in their own dear way. 
 
 " It is a blessed thing that creation smiles or frowns, 
 laughs or is sad, just as we are -content or otherwise. 
 Every man according to his ' gift.' Sooth to say, I am 
 one of those whose faith is too weak to see every one of 
 the many twinkling orbs that bedeck the vault of heaven 
 the abodes of beings who suffer and of beings who 
 rejoice of beings who are saved, and of beings who are 
 lost. No, no ! I have thrown Calvin's theory to the 
 winds. There are as many Gospel theories as there are 
 geological ; and all are at liberty to behold their own 
 likeness in their own mirror. Only one thing. If 
 divines have for centuries been preaching nonsense 
 about the creation of the world and of man, what con- 
 fidence can an ignorant man have in their findings and
 
 234 HUGH MILLERS DEATH. CHAP. xv. 
 
 interpretations of other parts of the same writings, 
 equally full of interpretations, corrections, and amend- 
 ments ? I know what I say." 
 
 The correspondence proceeds at intervals, until the 
 death of Hugh Miller, which took place on the 24th 
 December 1856. He was then preparing the last sheets 
 of the Testimony of the, Rocks, which was published at 
 the beginning of 1857. Dick was of opinion that Hugh 
 Miller published the book quite as much to please the 
 dominant religious party in Scotland, as to satisfy the 
 convictions of his own mind. Indeed, he traced the 
 beginnings of Hugh Miller's insanity to the over-stimula- 
 tion of his brain, for the purpose of meeting the 
 exigencies of his position as a scientific man and a 
 religious journalist. Some time before the sad cata- 
 strophe of Hugh Miller's death, he mentioned to Pro- 
 fessor Shearer a curious symptom, indicative of com- 
 mencing insanity in this gifted man. 
 
 The following are Professor Shearer's words : " I 
 had an interview with Mr. Dick in the inner shrine of 
 his daily labours his bakehouse. This was considered 
 a high mark of his consideration ; and indeed his manner 
 was perfectly cordial and natural. Our conversation 
 naturally turned upon his friend Hugh Miller, then not 
 long dead, and to his books. His powerful and bril- 
 liant effort to reconcile the scriptural account of creation 
 with geological science, Mr. Dick considered a failure. 
 At the same time, he strongly maintained the doctrine 
 of successive creations of animated beings, though he 
 appeared to have no confidence in the Darwinian doc-
 
 THE FAIRIES." 235 
 
 trine of development. Pointing to the sketches of the 
 Greek boy and the ape on the walls, he asked, ' whether 
 that could come out of this ?' 
 
 " Returning to Hugh Miller, I naturally expressed my 
 sorrow that a life so brilliant and valuable as that 
 described in his Schools and Schoolmasters, should have 
 ended so sadly. ' Ah, poor Hugh !' said he, ' I knew him 
 well. His life, as he could write it, would be as interest- 
 ing as a romance. But I am not at all astonished at the 
 way it ended. His mind was touched somehow by 
 superstition. I mind,' he continued, ' after an after- 
 noon's work on the rocks together at Holborn Head, we 
 sat down on the leeside of a dyke to look over our spe- 
 cimens, when suddenly up jumped Hugh, exclaiming, 
 ' The fairies have got hold of my trousers ! ' and then 
 sitting down again, he kept rubbing his legs for a long 
 time. It was of no use suggesting that an ant or some 
 other well-known ' beastie' had got there. Hugh would 
 have it that it was ' the fairies ' ! " * 
 
 " When the news of Hugh Miller's death came," said 
 Dick to his sister, " I thought it was the end of all 
 things. I was more shocked than I could tell to 
 anybody. Poor Hugh ! I knew him so well ! I shall 
 always remember him. Indeed, he is now, and almost 
 always, with me. I cannot look on a stone without 
 thinking of him. I am not likely ever to forget him. 
 He was sorely afflicted with his head while he was 
 
 * Hugh Miller wrote a good deal about the fairies in his works. 
 See his description of the Fairies of the Ravine of Eathie, in Old 
 Red Sandstone, pp. 221-2, Ed. 1875.
 
 236 " TESTIMONY OF THE ROCKS." CHAP. xv. 
 
 here, and to such a degree that neither you nor I can 
 form any idea of his sufferings. Peace to him! He 
 will live long over all the earth." 
 
 Again writing to his sister, he says, " Mrs. Miller has 
 sent me Hugh's last Testimony of the Hocks. I have 
 read it frequently. It contains a great deal of good 
 writing ; but it leaves the great point as far from being 
 settled as ever. I am surprised at his mode of handling 
 the two records the account of creation in Genesis, 
 and the facts as we actually find them; for it is an 
 undeniable fact that all our present dry lands are full 
 of dead animals. But don't mistake me. Mr. Miller 
 has produced an unmistakably clever book, which will 
 sell fast and become popular. But it does not solve the 
 great problem ; neither is it in harmony with the 
 account of creation recorded in the oldest book extant. 
 Nor will it convert geologists, and satisfy those who 
 know anything about rocks and organic remains. 
 
 " Possibly the business cannot be settled in the 
 present stage of discovery, and friend Hugh had rather 
 too much veneration for sundry great living men, to strike 
 out a new path amid such an entangling forest of con- 
 flicting opinions. Of one thing you may be sure. The 
 earth, as we have it, was not made in six ordinary days. 
 The earth is making yet. It is still in course of creation." 
 
 Strange to say, when the Life of Hugh Miller came 
 out, not a word was said about Eobert Dick. The 
 two had been in communication for more than ten years. 
 Dick returned to Mrs. Miller all the letters he had 
 received from her husband, for the purposes of the bio-
 
 CHAP. xv. BIOGRAPHY OF HUGH MILLER. 237 
 
 graphy; and more than a hundred of Dick's letters 
 were in the possession of the biographer. Dick had 
 given all his best fossils to Miller. " He robbed him- 
 self," said Hugh Miller, "to do me service." Dick 
 worked night and day to enable him to illustrate his 
 works by new specimens. One would have thought 
 that these services were worthy of some mention in 
 Hugh Miller's biography. But not a word is said there 
 ts to Hugh's greatest helper.
 
 CHAPTEE XVI. 
 
 CHARLES W. PEACH, A.L.S. 
 
 WHILE Bobert Dick was searching for organic remains 
 among the rocks at Thurso during his leisure hours, 
 another scientific labourer was occupied in the same 
 manner at the opposite end of the island, among the 
 rocks of Cornwall. Eobert Dick had discovered numer- 
 ous remains of fossil fishes in Caithness, where distin- 
 guished geologists had stated that no fossil fishes were 
 to be found ; and Charles William Peach had discovered 
 fossil fishes in Cornwall, though it had also been stated 
 that the rocks there were non-fossiliferous. While the 
 one was disturbing the echoes of Pudding-gyoe, the other 
 was hammering in Heady-Money Cove. The two were 
 working simultaneously amongst rocks of the same 
 epoch, and the results of their labours were in a remark- 
 able degree alike. 
 
 The Cornish worker in science was then but a private 
 in the mounted coastguard service. Like Dick, in his 
 hours of leisure he found time to add materially to the 
 facts upon which geology is based. Thus, at the same 
 time, Hugh Miller, originally a stonemason, Eobert 
 Dick, a working baker, and Charles William Peach, a 
 private in the coastguard service, were all engaged
 
 CHARLES W. PEACH, A.L.S.
 
 STORY OF MR. PEACH. 239 
 
 in like pursuits. " It is one of the circumstances of 
 peculiar interest," said Hugh Miller, " with which geology 
 in its present state is invested, that there is no man 
 of energy and observation, who may not rationally in- 
 dulge in the hope of extending its limits, by adding to 
 its facts." 
 
 While engaged in their respective pursuits, Dick and 
 Peach were quite unknown to each other. They worked 
 on quietly and unostentatiously, without any thought of 
 fame. It might be said that theirs was " the pursuit of 
 knowledge under difficulties." But this is a mistake. 
 The pursuit of knowledge is always accompanied with 
 pleasure, and the pleasure is only enhanced by the diffi- 
 culties with which it is surmounted. 
 
 But circumstances shortly occurred which led to Mr. 
 Peach's promotion in the service, and to his removal to 
 the north first to Peterhead and afterwards to Wick. 
 Then it was that Dick and Peach became the most inti- 
 mate of friends. For this reason it is perhaps appropriate 
 to couple the portrait of the one friend with that of the 
 other, not only because their pursuits during their 
 leisure moments were in a great measure the same ; but 
 because it serves as an introduction to the correspond- 
 ence which follows. 
 
 Mr. Peach has told us the story of his life. We 
 think it full of interest. It shows what a man in even 
 the humblest ranks of life may do, to accumulate know- 
 ledge and to advance science for the benefit of his 
 fellow-creatures. 
 
 Mr. Peach was born in September 1800, at the village
 
 240 
 
 WANS FORD, NO'l TS. 
 
 of Wansford in Northamptonshire. At the time of his 
 birth, his father was a saddler and harness-maker, but 
 he afterwards gave up the business and took a small 
 inn in the village, and also farmed about eighty acres of 
 land. The time came when young Peach had to be sent 
 to school. He first went to a dame's school, where he 
 speedily learned the ABC. After that he was sent to 
 
 WANSFORD, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE. 
 
 the village school, the master of which had been an old 
 sawyer. The man could no longer saw, but it was thought 
 he might teach. In those days any worn-out broken- 
 legged man was thought good enough to be a school- 
 master. The old sawyer knew very little about spelling. 
 There was not a grammar-book about the school. 
 
 But as old Mr. Peach was anxious to make his son a 
 scholar, Charles was taken from the old sawyer's school 
 at twelve years old, and sent to a school at Folkingham, 
 in Lincolnshire. There he made better progress. He
 
 CHAP. xvi. A RIDING OFFICER. 241 
 
 learnt to read and write well ; and he laid the founda- 
 tions of the ordinary branches of education. He re- 
 mained at this place for three years, and at the age of 
 fifteen he left school altogether. 
 
 He returned to his father's house to help in the work 
 of the inn, and to assist in the labours of the farm. It 
 was not a very good training for a lad. Peach was 
 brought into contact with the people who frequented 
 his father's inn. Wansford was then a very drunken 
 village. Peach was often invited to drink, but always 
 refused, a proof of moral courage at an early age. He 
 was consequently called "the milksop" of the house. 
 Perhaps from what he daily saw before him, he deter- 
 mined to abstain from drink. In this way the Spartans 
 taught their children. At all events, though reared 
 in an inn, Peach abstained from liquor for the rest of 
 his life. 
 
 Not liking his position at home, Charles applied for 
 the position of riding officer in the Eevenue Coast- 
 guard. He was appointed in January 1824, and 
 directed to proceed to Southrepps, in the county of Nor- 
 folk, and report himself to the commanding officer there. 
 After approval, he was directed to take up his station 
 at Weybourn, in the port of Cley, Norfolk. 
 
 At that tune Peach knew nothing of Natural History. 
 He had never seen the sea. What a sight, and hov/ full 
 of wonders, it was to him ! He was struck with every- 
 thing connected with it. He wandered along the shore, 
 and found brilliant seaweeds and zoophytes innumer- 
 able, the names of which he did not yet know. He
 
 242 IMPRESSED BY A ZOOPHYTE. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 was particularly impressed by a splendid specimen, 
 which was placed on the parlour chimney-piece of 
 the little inn where he stayed at.* The appearance 
 of the zoophyte strongly excited his curiosity. He 
 determined to know what it was, and where he could 
 find a specimen for himself. This little object had the 
 effect of turning his attention to the study of Nature. 
 
 He began to make a collection. He had no book on 
 the subject. He collected, more for the beauty of the 
 forms and the colours of the agates. He would know 
 more by and by. Men in the Coastguard service were 
 in those days turned rapidly about from place to place, 
 for no particular reason, but generally at considerable 
 expense to themselves. After being at Weybourn for 
 a year, Peach was removed to Sherringham, also in 
 Norfolk. 
 
 It was while at this station that he met the Eev. J. 
 Layton, then living at Catfield. The reverend gentle- 
 man, finding that Peach was an enthusiastic collector of 
 zoophytes, asked him if he should not like to know the 
 names of the objects he collected. " Certainly," was the 
 reply. The clergyman then invited him to his house, 
 and showed him a book containing the history of British 
 zoophytes. He was delighted with the book ; but, as it 
 was expensive, and he could not purchase it, he went 
 boldly to work, and copied out the greater part of the 
 
 * It proved to be the Antennularia antennina. The description of 
 this zoophyte is accompanied by a brief sketch of Mr. Peach's career, 
 in the second edition of Dr. Johnston's work on The British Zoophytes, 
 p. 86, Ed. 1847.
 
 CHAP. xvi. CHANGES OF STATION. 243 
 
 letterpress. Although he had never had a lesson in 
 drawing, he also endeavoured, to the best of his power, 
 to copy out all the engravings. By this and other 
 means, he laid the foundations of a great deal of know- 
 ledge of the lower forms of marine life, while carrying 
 on his humble office of mounted guard in the Eevenue 
 service along the northern coast of Norfolk. 
 
 His business was to look after smugglers, and pre- 
 vent them landing their illicit goods at any part of the 
 coast. His work was done partly at night and partly 
 by day. He must be constantly on the alert. The 
 mounted guard were not allowed to remain long in one 
 place. After remaining at Sherringham for about two 
 years, Peach was removed to Hasboro. After a year's 
 service there, he was sent to Cromer ; then from Cromer 
 back to Cley, where he remained for two years. Here 
 he married, and entered upon a new career, that of 
 bringing up a family on small wages. But he met 
 every difficulty cheerfully. He was fond of home life, 
 and his wife helped to make his home happy. 
 
 At Cley he was placed in charge of the station. He 
 superintended the look-out after smugglers, and he 
 did his duty carefully. Notwithstanding this, he was once 
 charged with having neglected it. A jack-in-office, an 
 Irish naval captain in command of the coast service 
 there, assembled the Coastguard before him, and charged 
 them all with being bribed by the smugglers. Peach 
 was justly indignant. He protested for himself and on 
 the part of his men that they were loyal and honest 
 servants of her Majesty, and he challenged the captain
 
 244 GORRANHA VEN. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 to prove his words. The captain could not ; and accord- 
 ingly, after a little hard swearing, he drew in his horns, 
 and said no more on the subject. 
 
 It may here be mentioned that Mr. Peach was a 
 handy man at everything. He learnt to draw with cor- 
 rectness. He cultivated mechanics. When he went into 
 the Coastguard, he spent part of his spare time in making 
 a turning-lathe. With this he turned jet earrings, jet 
 boxes, and other things. He afterwards made a com- 
 pound slide-rest, and turned things in iron and brass. 
 
 After two years' service at Cley, Peach was sent to 
 Lyme Eegis in Dorset, at the south-western part of the 
 island. He then lived at Charmouth, but he remained 
 there only four or five months, when he was removed to 
 Beer, at the mouth of the Axe, in Devonshire. He 
 remained there for about two years, always working in 
 his leisure hours at zoology and natural history. 
 
 He was then removed to Paignton in Tor Bay, farther 
 down the coast. He was not allowed to rest there, 
 but was shortly after removed to Gorranhaven, near 
 Mevagissey, in Cornwall. It was here that he indefati- 
 gably pursued his studies in zoology. He collected 
 some of the most delicate specimens of marine fauna. 
 Many of these he sent to Dr. Johnston when preparing 
 his history of the British Zoophytes. Others were sent 
 to the most distinguished writers on zoology, and 
 several of them were called after his name.* 
 
 It was while living at Gorranhaven that Peach 
 
 * The Isodictyia Peachii, Membranipora Peachii, Lipralia Peachi\ 
 Cellularia Peachii, Peachii hastata, and Eolis Peachii.
 
 CHAP. xvi. THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 245 
 
 applied himself to a new subject, the geological forma- 
 tion of the coast. It had been stated by well-known 
 geologists that no relics of ancient life existed in the 
 Cornish rocks. "We have no exuviae," said Pryce, 
 " of land or sea animals buried in our strata." " The 
 rocks of Cornwall and of Scotland are non-fossiliferous," 
 said Dean Conybeare. The same statement was repeated 
 by many writers, and amongst others by Sir Eoderick 
 Murchison, who took the statement on trust. In fact, 
 geology was then in its infancy. During the last fifty 
 years, nearly everything has been changed. 
 
 The private in the mounted Coastguard service did a 
 great deal to alter the then state of geology. He was 
 not satisfied with the statements of others. He examined 
 for himself. He had the quick eye and the keen judg- 
 ment. He possessed the gift of careful observation. 
 Nor was he ever daunted by difficulties. In fair weather 
 and in foul, he worked among the Cornish rocks, and 
 found fossils where no fossils were said to have been 
 fossils innumerable ! 
 
 Mr. Peach was not the man to let his light lie hid 
 under a bushel. A meeting of the British Association 
 was about to be held at Plymouth. Plymouth was not 
 far from the place where he lived, and he determined to 
 put his facts together, and read them before the associa- 
 tion. He never wrote a paper before, nor had he ever 
 read one. He had only heard one scientific lecture. But 
 with his ready mother wit he prepared his paper, and 
 it proved to be a thoroughly original one. He read it 
 himself at the Plymouth meeting in 1841. It was 
 
 entitled, On the Organic Fossils of Cornwall 
 12
 
 246 READS MANY PAPERS. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 " It is impossible," he writes in 1847, " to describe 
 the feelings under which I then rose. That is over long 
 since. The only beating of my heart now about the 
 British Association is, that of gratitude towards its 
 members, and of affection for their great kindness. I 
 feel my love of scientific pursuits strengthen every day. 
 I have taken hold of that which every day affords ' a 
 feast of reason and a flow of soul.'" 
 
 In the following year (1842) he attended the meeting 
 of the British Association at Manchester, where he read 
 a paper before the Zoological section on his discoveries 
 and observations of the marine fauna on the Cornish 
 coast. In 1843 he attended the meeting at Cork, and 
 in 1844 he was at York. He never went without a 
 paper. Sometimes he read several. Men of distinction 
 began to notice this remarkable coastguardsman. He was 
 acknowledged to be one of the most original discoverers 
 in geology and zoology. Such men as Murchison, De 
 la Beche, Buckland, Forbes, Daubeny, and Agassiz, 
 took him by the hand and greeted him as a fellow 
 labourer in the work of human improvement and scien- 
 tific development. 
 
 Dr. Eobert Chambers was present at the York meet- 
 ing. He wrote a very interesting article on the subject, 
 which appeared in Chambers's Journal of November 
 23, 1844. Here is his description of Mr. Peach: 
 "But who is that little intelligent-looking man in a 
 faded naval uniform, who is so invariably seen in a 
 particular central seat in this section ? That is perhaps 
 one of the most interesting men who attend the associa-
 
 CHAP. xvi. DR. CHAMBERS' 1 ACCOUNT. 247 
 
 tion. He is only a private in the mounted guard 
 (preventive service) at an obscure part of the Cornish 
 coast, with four shillings a day, and a wife and seven 
 children, most of whose education he has himself to 
 conduct. He never tastes the luxuries which are so 
 common in the middle ranks of life, and even amongst 
 a large portion of the working classes. He has to mend 
 with his own hands every sort of thing that can wear or 
 break in his house. Yet Charles Peach is a votary of 
 natural history not a student of the science in books, 
 for he cannot afford books ; but he is a diligent investi- 
 gator by sea and shore, a collector of zoophytes and 
 echinodermata strange creatures, many of which are 
 as yet hardly known to man. These he collects, pre- 
 serves, and describes ; and every year he comes up to 
 the British Association with a few novelties of this 
 kind, accompanied by illustrative papers and drawings 
 thus, under circumstances the very opposite of such 
 men as Lord Enniskillen, adding, in like manner, to the 
 general stock of knowledge. 
 
 " On the present occasion he is unusually elated, for 
 he has made the discovery of a holothuria with twenty 
 tentacula, a species of the echinodermata, which Edward 
 Forbes, in his book on Starfishes, had said was never 
 yet observed in the British seas. It may be of small 
 moment to you, who perhaps know nothing of holo- 
 thurias, but it is a considerable thing to the fauna of 
 Britain,* and a vast matter to a poor private of the 
 
 * About thirty years after the meeting at York, the Neill Prize 
 Gold Medal was presented to Mr. Peach by the Royal Society of Edia-
 
 248 BUYS A MICROSCOPE. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 Cornwall Mounted Guard. And accordingly he will go 
 home in a few days, full of the glory of his exhibition, 
 and strung anew by the kind notice taken of him by 
 the masters of science, to proceed in similar inquiries, 
 difficult as it may be to prosecute them under such a 
 complication of duties, professional and domestic. 
 
 " But he has still another subject of congratulation ; 
 for Dr. Carpenter has kindly given him a microscope,* 
 wherewith to observe the structure of his favourite 
 animals, an instrument for which he has sighed for 
 many years in vain. Honest Peach ! humble as is thy 
 name and simple thy learning, thou art an honour even 
 to this assemblage of nobles and doctors ; nay more, 
 when I consider everything, thou art an honour to 
 human nature itself; for where is the heroism like that 
 of virtuous, intelligent, independent poverty ? and such 
 heroism is thine ! " 
 
 burgh. On that occasion, Professor Geikie said "Somewhere about 
 twenty species of marine fauna, and several genera of sponges, were 
 first made known by him as denizens of British seas. He has consider- 
 ably augmented our list of native hydrozoa and polyzoa. The naked- 
 eyed Medusae owe not a little to his attention, and one genus of them 
 (Staurophora) was first introduced by him to the naturalists of this 
 country. The Echinodenns, too, are under similar obligations to him, 
 for, besides bringing several new species to light, he found the huge 
 Echinus mtlo of the Mediterranean on the coast of Cornwall, and sup- 
 plied the twenty-armed Holothuria nigra to fill up the blank pointed 
 rut by Edward Forbes among the British Holothuriae. " Proceedings 
 v/the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 5th April 1875. 
 
 * This is a mistake. The microscope was not given by Dr. Car- 
 penter, but he kindly superintended its fitting up. Mr. Peach obtained 
 the money to purchase it, by superintending and adding to the col- 
 lections of Natural History at the Polytechnic Institution of Falmouth
 
 CHAP. xvi. LANDING WAITER AT FOWEY. 249 
 
 Some of the gentlemen who attended the meeting at 
 York, and especially Dr. Buckland, in their admiration 
 for the character of Mr. Peach, proposed to do some- 
 thing for his promotion in her Majesty's service. Dr. 
 Buckland wrote to Sir Robert Peel on the subject. The 
 reply was, that there were no openings at the time, but 
 that the application of Dr. Buckland on behalf of Mr. 
 
 CHARLES PEACH'S HOUSE, FOWEY. 
 
 Peach should be kept in mind. At length the pro- 
 motion came. A position of Landing Waiter was 
 vacant at London, and another at Fowey. Mr. Peach 
 preterred the latter, though the salary was 50 less. 
 He desired to remain in his quarters by the sea-coast, 
 to carry on his investigations among the zoophytes, and 
 to further examine the rocks of Cornwall at his leisure. 
 His salary was now 100 a year ; and the advance of 
 pay greatly helped him and hi family. He removed
 
 250 ENRICHES CORNISH COLLECTIONS. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 to a pretty house overlooking the river Fowey and the 
 English Channel, and at this house Mr. Tennyson, the 
 Poet Laureate, was a frequent visitor. 
 
 While residing at Fowey, Mr. Peach became an 
 honorary member of all the scientific societies in Corn- 
 wall. But he was far more than an honorary member. 
 He greatly enriched their collections. He added many 
 organic remains of the Devonian Eocks to the admirable 
 collection of the Eoyal Geological Society of Cornwall. 
 Indeed, the collection seems to have remained as Mr. 
 Peach left it, some thirty years ago. The President of 
 the Society, at the meeting in 1877, thus referred to the 
 museum at Penzance : " Our collection contains Devon- 
 ian forms from the lower, middle, and upper series, in 
 most of those areas in the counties of Cornwall and 
 Devon, where the rocks are exposed. It must be allowed 
 that it is essential to the credit and future history of the 
 Society that this, of all groups of rocks and associated 
 fossils, should be well, if not perfectly, represented in the 
 museum. The collection, as it now stands, is in the 
 main due to the energy and industry of Mr. Charles 
 Peach, A.L.S., one of our oldest living naturalists, who 
 for many years resided on the south coast of Cornwall, 
 there making a special study of the coast sections, and 
 who extensively collected from them, especially at East 
 and West Looe, Polperro, Polruan, and Fowey. This 
 truly great collection is now displayed in the cases of 
 our Society, and has been but little added to since, a 
 circumstance especially to be regretted, when we take 
 into consideration the great amount of work and re-
 
 CHAP. xvi. KKMOWZS TO PETEKHEAD. 251 
 
 search that has been done and carried on in foreign 
 countries."* 
 
 As constant movement from place to place seems tc 
 be the rule of the Bevenue Service, Mr. Peach left Fowey 
 in 1849; and this time he was sent to a far-distant 
 place to Peterhead, in the north-east of Scotland. The 
 removal cost him a great deal of money. His own 
 expenses were paid, but he had to remove his wife and 
 family at his own expense. Yet it was a promotion in 
 the service. He was now Comptroller of Customs. The 
 dignity of the appellation was much greater than the 
 advance of salary, which was only 20 a year. Still 
 it was a promotion, and it might lead to better fortune. 
 
 At Peterhead, as in Norfolk, Devonshire, and Corn- 
 wall, Mr. Peach went on with his study of zoology 
 and geology. He added to the list of British fishes, 
 Yarrell's Blenny, Eay's Bream, and the Anchovy, 
 which had not before been known to inhabit the seas 
 which wash the north-eastern coast of Scotland. He 
 also devoted much attention to the nest-building habits 
 of certain sea shells and fishes. " At Peterhead," says Pro- 
 fessor Geikie, " he made himself intimately acquainted 
 with the family arrangements of that rather fierce- 
 looking little fish, the fifteen-spined stickle-back (Gaster- 
 osteus spinachia). In a rocky pool he discovered a 
 colony of them, and learnt how they built their nests 
 and deposited their ova. He watched the hatching 
 and growth of the young until the whole colony, young 
 
 * Sixty -Fourth Annual Report of the Royal Geological Society yf 
 Cornwall. President's Address, p. xix. Plymouth, 1877.
 
 252 REMOVES TO WICK. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 and old, took to the sea. As he used to visit them 
 five or six times a day, the parents grew so familiar 
 that they would swim round and touch his hand, 
 though on the appearance of a stranger they would 
 angrily dash at any stick or incautious finger that 
 was brought near them. The same habit of close and 
 cultivated observation was shown by his study of the 
 maternal instincts of the female lobster in its native 
 haunts."* 
 
 Mr. Peach's next removal was to Wick, the greatest 
 fishing town in the North, Though an ardent lover of 
 nature, he never neglected his duty. He was as accurate 
 and quick-sighted in business as in science. He was alike 
 shrewd, wise, and observant in both. He was the model of 
 a Comptroller of Customs, as he was of a true coEector 
 and naturalist. His removal to Wick was a promotion. 
 His salary was advanced to 150 a year, though his 
 duties were to a certain extent enlarged. Part of his 
 work consisted in travelling round the coast of Caithness 
 in search of wrecks, and reporting them to the Board of 
 Trade. This led him to travel to the rocky points of 
 the coast, where the wrecks principally occurred ; and 
 he made good use of his spare time by hammering the 
 rocks in search of fossils, and more particularly the fossil 
 plants with which the dark flagstones of the district 
 abounded. 
 
 His removal to Wick occurred in 1853. One of the 
 first things that he did was to travel across the county 
 
 * Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Session 1874-5, p 
 511.
 
 CHAP. xvi. VISITS DICK AT THURSO. 253 
 
 to pay a visit to Kobert Dick at Thurso. While he 
 resided in Cornwall, the name of Eobert Dick had been 
 a household word with him. He knew what he had done 
 from Hugh Miller's writings, and he had no doubt that 
 he would find Dick to be a man after his own heart. 
 Kor was he disappointed. When he first called at 
 Dick's shop in Wilson's Lane, on the 19th October 1853, 
 he found that the " maister," as his servant called him, 
 was in the bakehouse. The caller sent in his name, and 
 the baker speedily appeared in the front shop, his shirt 
 sleeves rolled up, and his arms covered with flour. 
 
 " I'm Charles Peach of Ready Money Cove in Corn- 
 wall ; and you are Robert Dick of Pudding Goe." That 
 was Mr. Peach's first introduction. "How are ye?" 
 answered Robert Dick, with a firm grasp of the hand ; 
 " come into the bakehouse !" That was an honour 
 accorded to few, but in the case of a renowned geolo- 
 gist it was readily granted. Dick went on with his 
 work at the oven mouth, or at the side of the dough, 
 while the two talked together. It was an interesting 
 conversation, which Mr. Peach long remembered. The 
 latter observed on the wall of the bakehouse a full-sized 
 sketch of the Greek boy taking the thorn from his foot, 
 with an Egyptian god on each side, all accurately done 
 in pencil or charcoal by the Thurso baker. 
 
 Mr. Peach called again in the evening, and again 
 found Dick at the oven in the bakehouse. After he had 
 done his evening's work, he had a fire lighted in his 
 parlour, and took his new friend upstairs to see his 
 collection. Mr. Peach was first attracted by the fine 
 12*
 
 254 REPEATED VISITS. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 busts of Sir Walter Scott and Lord Byron, and a large 
 plaster figure of the Venus of Milo, which the apartment 
 contained. Dick then showed his collection of fossils, 
 plants, ferns, and entomological specimens. Mr. Peach, 
 in an entry in his diary, written the same evening, 
 says " He is a very diffident man, but an enthusiast in 
 natural history pursuits. He is unmarried, and lives 
 most retired. In fact, he is very little known in Thurso. 
 He has a nice collection of Caithness ferns, beetles, and 
 insects. He is deeply interested in botany. His 
 researches in geology have been great, especially in the 
 Old Eed Sandstone; and some of his specimens have 
 added new links to the history of these ancient rocks." 
 
 Mr. Peach soon repeated his visit. He called again 
 at the beginning of the following May, and again found 
 Dick very busy in his bakehouse. The fire was not 
 again lighted in the parlour. Peach was now regarded 
 as a friend. All the subsequent interviews between the 
 two occurred at the mouth of the oven, or in the kitchen, 
 or in the fields, or among the rocks. All ceremony and 
 formality were laid aside ; and although they had many 
 differences of opinion and stout debates, these were, like 
 lovers' quarrels, soon made up. 
 
 Mr. Peach entered the following passage in his diary, 
 descriptive of his second visit to Dick : " 2d May 1854. 
 Rose early; called upon Mr. Dick; found him at his 
 oven, and very busy ; had a nice chat with him. ... In 
 the evening I saw him in his bedroom. What an 
 industrious man he is. He is through nineteen volumes 
 of plants, and hopes soon to finish his herbarium. He
 
 CHAP. xvi. WALKS WITH DICK. 255 
 
 has heaps upon heaps of specimens, and appears to 
 thoroughly understand his subject. After two hours' 
 chat I left him to go to his bed, to which, if possible, 
 he retires at 9 P.M., to rise again between 3 and 4 A.M. 
 I have often been up and with him at that time, not 
 willing to lose time when I had an opportunity of enjoying 
 his society. His conversation was too precious to lose." 
 
 During the ensuing summer, when the grasses and 
 plants were in bloom, the two took a long walk up the 
 Thurso river. Dick pointed out to his friend the habi- 
 tat of the Holy Grass (Hierochloe borealis), which he had 
 long known; and also what was then called Drum- 
 mond's Horsetail (Equisetumpratense). Dick also pointed 
 out the Baltic rush (Juncus balticus), which Mr. Peach 
 had never before seen. Mr. Peach says of this walk, 
 that "Dick's cheerful manner, his sparkling wit, and 
 frolicsome playfulness, added to the other beauties of 
 the excursion, made it a treat indeed." 
 
 " My next visit to Thurso," says Mr. Peach, " occurred 
 in connection with a wreck, happily unattended with 
 loss of life. On this occasion, our first difference broke 
 out. The Old Eed Sandstone period was said to be one 
 of seaweeds and cartilaginous fish. That I felt to be 
 unstable, from specimens which I had picked up in my 
 spare minutes snatched from duty. We both defended 
 our views. He was strenuous in his defence of Hugh 
 Miller's and his own opinions, and although I felt a sad 
 heretic, I warnily, b,ut I hope modestly, suggested that 
 I might be right. Time has since proved that I was so, 
 and dear Dick set to working out the problem for him-
 
 256 LOVERS' QUARRELS. CHAP. xvr. 
 
 self as usual, and at last he came to the same conclusion 
 that 1 had done. I have just found a note in reply to 
 one of mine. After saying that he is ready to be my 
 pupil in seaweeds, zoophytes, and in every other depart- 
 ment of natural history, he adds, and ' even in fossil 
 wood ' * a jocular allusion to our discussion on this 
 point." 
 
 Mr. Peach, in a recent letter, referring to the many 
 happy hours and tough battles fought in Dick's bake- 
 house, says that old Annie, the housekeeper, would 
 sometimes interfere, and say, " Eh, maister, ye're awfu' 
 hard wi' Mr. Peach ; he'll never come back again after 
 sic rough usage." But Peach came back as before. The 
 lovers' quarrels soon healed, and they were more affec- 
 tionate than ever. " I had the advantage," says Mr. 
 Peach, " in having read all that Hugh Miller had done, 
 and also many of Dick's letters on the same subject. 
 Besides, I had had lots of experience in Devonian and 
 Old Eed rocks in more places than Scotland. I had also 
 a mode of my own for collecting. I got all the weathered 
 and detached portions of fishes and plants, studied them, 
 and fitted them into more perfect specimens. But Dick 
 did much good service. He was fortunately in time to 
 
 * Hugh Miller, in his Testimony of the Rocks, refers to this fossil 
 wood as a " curious nondescript vegetable creation." He adds : " I 
 have not hitherto succeeded in finding for myself specimens of this 
 organism, which has been named provisionally by Dr. Fleming Stroma 
 ^biCKea ; but it seems not improbable that certain (supposed) fragments 
 of wood, detected by Mr. Charles Peach in the Caithness flagstones, 
 but which do not exhibit the woody structure, may have belong*^ 
 to it"
 
 CHAP. xvi. FOSSILS AT DURNESS. 257 
 
 reap the harvest. I only got his gleanings. But I 
 found for myself new fields of un worked rocks in Suther- 
 landshire, and got new fishes there, and also new ones 
 in the old fields that Dick had so long been working in. 
 I was very fortunate. My duties led me so far about, 
 and gave me many opportunities that I should not 
 otherwise have had ; whereas Dick was confined to the 
 neighbourhood of his bakehouse in Thurso. All this I 
 took advantage of, after duty had been done. By rising 
 early in the morning and working until late at night ; by 
 often giving up my meal times, and satisfying myself with 
 a crust of bread and butter, and at night with a Highland 
 tea and something to eat, I fortunately contrived to fill 
 up my leisure hours with a good deal of useful work." 
 
 The principal new field to which Mr. Peach refers, 
 was the limestone of Durness in Sutherland. The spot 
 was too far from Caithness to enable Dick to investigate 
 it. But it was in the Comptroller's way. He went to 
 Durness to visit a wrecked ship, and he did not neglect 
 his opportunity. He was the first to find fossils in the 
 limestones of Durness. Obscure organic remains had 
 before been detected by Macculloch in the quartz rocks 
 of Sutherland ; but they had gradually passed out of 
 mind, and their organic nature was stoutly denied even 
 by such geologists as Sedgwick and Murchison. Mr. Peach, 
 however, brought to light, in 1854, a good series of shells 
 and corals, which demonstrated the limestones containing 
 them to lie on the same geological horizon as some part 
 of the great Lower Silurian formations of other regions.* 
 
 * When Sir Roderick Murchison heard of this discovery, he wrote
 
 258 RESULTS OF PEACH'S DISCOVERIES. CHAP. xvi. 
 
 The discovery remained without solution for some 
 years, the principal geologists still doubting its reality. 
 But about five years after, Sir Eoderick Murchison again 
 visited the spot, and the discovery was confirmed. 
 Professor Judd, of the Eoyal School of Mines, Jermyn 
 Street, London, said in the Geological Society's Quarterly 
 Journal that " Charles Peach's discovery in 1854 of 
 Silurian fossils at Durness, Sutherland, has already 
 borne the most important fruit ; and, in the hands of 
 Murchison, Eamsay, Geikie, Harkness, and Jamieson, has 
 afforded the necessary clue for determining the age of the 
 great primary masses of the Highlands of Scotland." 
 
 We have thus described the origin of the friendship 
 between Charles Peach and Eobert Dick. It strength- 
 ened as it grew. Charles Peach shared all Dick's 
 enthusiasm, and bore a warm and constant friendship 
 for the solitary student. They communicated to each 
 other, as all true labourers in science do, the results of 
 their respective discoveries. They kept up a regular 
 correspondence, and many of their communications with 
 each other will be found referred to in the following pages. 
 
 to his friend Professor Sedgwick : " Yon have no doubt heard of the 
 discoveries of fossils in the Durness limestone of Sutherland by Peach. 
 He has corresponded with me on the point, and has sent me some of 
 the fossils. I have had them polished. The forms, rude and ill-pre- 
 served as they are, look more like Clymenise and Goniatites than any- 
 thing else, with corals ; and, if so, the calcareous masses which I saw 
 from Assynt to Durness, interstratified in the quartz rock, are high in 
 the Devonian. I would like to hear what you say to this tclairvisse- 
 ment I I see great difficulty in understanding it." Professor Geikie'* 
 Life of Sir Eoderick I. Murchison, vol. ii. p. 195.
 
 CHAPTER XVIL 
 ROBERT DICK AND CHARLES PEACH 
 
 A SUCCESSION of visits from Peach to Dick, and a long 
 correspondence between them, followed their first intro- 
 duction. Peach travelled a great deal, especially during 
 the shipwrecking season ; and when in the neighbourhood 
 of Thurso it was his invariable practice to call upon his 
 friend Dick. They communicated to each other all that 
 they had found since their last meeting, and they often 
 sent parcels of shells and fossils by the carrier's cart, 
 with numerous communications, to ask each other's 
 opinion about their special findings. 
 
 Shortly after Peach's first visit to Thurso, he found a 
 specimen of a new fossil fish which he thought allied to 
 the Dipterus. It was a bony fish. He consulted Dick 
 on the subject. Dick thought it very unusual ; and 
 " from the resemblance (he said) which it bears to the 
 vertebral column of the Coccosteus, fragments of which 
 are commonly attached to its buckler, I should, for my 
 part, have no hesitation in pronouncing it what you take 
 it to be.* Cartilage becomes petrified, and in some for- 
 mations cartilaginous fish are found. But your speci- 
 
 * For description of this bony fish see Decade X. Geological Survey, 
 Parts iv. v. p. 51.
 
 260 EXCHANGE OF SHELLS. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 men shows as decidedly bony a structure as Coccosteus. 
 Your specimen is altogether new to me. I will take 
 good care of the fossil. ... I am in a tremendous hurry 
 of business to-day, but feel your kindness very much. 
 . . . Since you saw me here I have walked to Morven 
 top and back again to Thurso with little inconvenience. 
 I have since been at Scrabster hills, and intend being 
 at Duncansby Head very soon." 
 
 Dick and Peach also interchanged shells with each 
 other, though Dick said in one of his letters " I do not 
 think that you require any information from me on 
 matters pertaining to this or any other study or research. 
 You are a bred veteran, and I am but a greenhorn." 
 Still, Dick would not give way on any point on which 
 he thought that he was right and Peach wrong. He 
 insisted that he was entitled to have his say, especially 
 where his own eyes were concerned. He did not believe 
 so much in books or in theories, but he believed in facts. 
 
 In one of Peach's enthusiastic letters he expresses 
 the hope that Dick is " revelling in the midst of the 
 beauties he has collected." To this Dick replies, " I 
 dinna ken. . . . You perhaps know the story of the 
 gentleman who returned from India with a black ser- 
 vant. One frosty morning the master went a-shooting, 
 and took the dark Oriental to beat the bushes. He was 
 rendered powerless by the cold. The master impatiently 
 demanded why he did not cry ' Hush, cock, hush.' ' Ah, 
 massa,' he tremulously replied, ' me wish hush cock had 
 never been born.' And so, Massa Peach, sometimes I 
 wish beauties had never been born. Not that there is
 
 CHAP. xvii. THE MONK OF CAMERA Y. 261 
 
 too much loveliness in Nature ; but that the hunting for 
 objects of interest squeezes me so very confoundedly 
 that the wonder perhaps is, not that I do so little, but 
 rather that I manage to beat the bushes at all. 
 
 " The monk of Cambray ! Yes, I think 'twas he, 
 The monk of Cambray was a wonderful man ! 
 
 He turned his face to the northwards, 
 And, mutt'ring a prayer with Amen ! he began 
 
 Reading backwards instead of forwards ! 
 
 " Exactly so ! And dull disciples in the school of Stones 
 too much resemble him. Whether from the effect or 
 defect of early training, when too much left to them- 
 selves, they soon fall back to their first ideas, and 
 monkishly read backwards. Our friend Hugh Miller 
 knew that I never fell in love with his peculiar views 
 on the order of creation ; and how he did me the 
 honour of enrolling me among the geological gods re- 
 mains a mystery to this day. I suspect that, just before 
 pushing me in, he had been consulting the Apostle 
 Paul, who says ' Him that is weak in the faith receive 
 ye ; ' but then he adds, ' Not to doubtful disputations.' 
 Ah ! there's the rub ! I am a sad mule. What then ? 
 Every one according to his gift. Conviction must pre- 
 cede conversion. 
 
 " All that lived during the deposition of the Old Eed 
 Sandstone has not been preserved. What has been pre- 
 served has not been found. What has been found is 
 understood very imperfectly. No geologist has said that 
 all that lived during the deposition of the Silurian, the 
 Old Ked, Carboniferous, and other formations, has been
 
 262 A PATCHWORK CREATION. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 preserved. They rather allow that not a tithe, not a 
 fractional part, has been petrified and preserved. And 
 how do they know that this earth had not once a habit- 
 able surface capable of accommodating the whole of 
 them ? all that has become extinct, and all that still 
 survives ? . . . I have not the least doubt that had Sir 
 Charles (Lyell), Sir Roderick (Murchison), Agassiz, or 
 Hugh Miller, taken a fancy to work out the notion, they 
 might have given us a habitable surface capable of 
 accommodating all that lives with all that is extinct, 
 and thus saved us the necessity of swallowing that, to 
 me at least, unpalatable thing, a patchwork creation a 
 system of odds and ends, of clippings and parings. I 
 cannot believe that this earth ever saw a creation but 
 one. Much has become extinct I allow, but much is 
 supposed to be extinct which is not extinct. 
 
 " I grant that chronology is corrupt. I grant that the 
 earth is much older than was at one time thought ; and 
 that our habitable surface was not made in a day, or in 
 a week, or by a word ; but I cannot accept the order ot 
 creation that geologists have carved out for me. The 
 arguments of geologists, like disturbed strata, have a 
 peculiar dip, and a strike, by which you can easily dis- 
 tinguish the school of the reasoner. 
 
 "And what means all this palaver? I am simply 
 provoked by the old monkish trick of reading backwards 
 instead of forwards. This is a land of liberty, and I 
 nvail myself of the privilege of resting and waiting for 
 further light." 
 
 Such were Dick's views at the beginning of 1854
 
 CHAP. xvn. FOSSIL WOOD. 
 
 About the same time, he wrote to Hugh Miller, " Do 
 you know, I am often accused of bearing an ill-will to 
 geologists ! When I think them at fault, and am asked 
 to speak, I merely speak what I think to be the truth. 
 Mr. John Miller here has got Murchison's thirty- 
 shilling book, and handed it to me to look at. Well, 
 unfortunate fellow that I am, I saw that Sir Roderick 
 was entirely wrong in saying that Cyclas was confined tc 
 the uppermost beds of the Old Eed. I told him so, and 
 he, as usual, thought that I was doing injury, and what 
 not, to geology ! Poof ! poof ! In what respect was I 
 a gainer or Murchison a loser ? Instead of being angry, 
 you geologists should be pleased, as it shows that we 
 pay attention to what you say." 
 
 Mr. Peach went to the meeting of the British Associa- 
 tion at Liverpool in September 1854 ; and there he 
 read his paper as usual. On this occasion he recorded 
 his observations on " The Eemains of Sand Plants and 
 Shells in the Old Eed Sandstone of Caithness." On his 
 return to Wick, Dick wrote to him, and asked, " What 
 did you say about the fossil wood ? Tell me also about 
 the shells." It may be mentioned that there was a long 
 discussion between the two geologists about fossil wood. 
 Dick was of opinion that the stuff which Peach had 
 found in Caithness was "concretionary bituminous 
 matter, and not organic." " But I am anxious," he says, 
 " that my opinion about the matter should not retard the 
 progress of discovery. I may be wrong, as I have been 
 before. Professor Forbes described the fossil wood to 
 be 'chert/ and 'masses without structure.' If I an
 
 264 BOTANICAL COLLECTION. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 wrong," said Dick, " men of mark have been wrong men 
 of repute, though I am of none." 
 
 In the meantime, Peach sent Dick specimens of 
 fossils and plants. One of these was found near Wick, 
 the Tectura testudinalis a mollusc. Another was a 
 Cornish heath the Erica vagans. Of the latter Dick 
 said, " I am very much obliged to you for it; and 
 as my plants and I do not mean to separate while 
 life lasts, I shall have a memorial of you, and I hope a 
 proper sense of your kindness, each time that I examine 
 it. ... 'Tis a pity I have no other rarity, but I will 
 give you a few grasses a little brownish, and not so 
 good as your last one." 
 
 Dick again refers to his botanical collection. 
 " Every moment of my spare time is devoted to the 
 labelling of my papers, and attaching dried plants to 
 them. Thanks be praised, it is nearly over, and the 
 roughest work is done. All the plants are gummed 
 down, and the craving for a completion stirs me anew. 
 How they are to come is a mystery, but then hope 
 never fails me. . . . Your first favour of a mistletoe is 
 in its appointed place, and the present addition you have 
 sent is equally welcome. You may rely upon it, you 
 bestow the specimen on one whose very life is bound up 
 with those things ; and I can in all sincerity say : 
 
 " For them I panted, them I priz'd 
 For them I've gladly sacrificed 
 Whate'er I lov'd before ; 
 And shall I see them sacrificed ? 
 
 *Na, na, man. Many thousand thanks to you. My
 
 CHAP. xvii. EXCHANGE OF SPECIMENS. 265 
 
 friends are few, and I get on slowly. However, that 
 English gentleman spoke, not long ago, very kindly tc 
 me ; and if all goes well with him and me for a short 
 time, ' I'll cock my bonnet fu' braw.' He is a thorough 
 botanist." 
 
 The English gentleman referred to was Mr. W. L. 
 Notcutt, then residing at Fakenham, Norfolk. He had 
 asked Dick to send him a collection of the Old Eed 
 fossils of Caithness ; offering his botanical services in 
 return. Dick cheerfully complied with his request, and 
 Mr. Notcutt acknowledges "most cordially his noble 
 suite of fossil fish from the Old Eed Sandstone." " There 
 are no fossils I more wished for," he says, " than some 
 specimens from your ancient strata, and your kindness 
 has indeed furnished me with a magnificent collection. 
 ... I fancy your creed in natural history is somewhat 
 akin to my own. I make very free in asking help from 
 brother naturalists, and I am never better pleased than 
 to be made quite as free use of in return. Indeed, I 
 think the very character of our pursuits almost claims 
 the free interchange of such help ; for, unless one is 
 possessed of an independent property, the amount of 
 travelling necessary for the examination of the produc- 
 tions or geological deposits of distant parts of our land 
 is otherwise an impossibility." 
 
 Mr. Notcutt accordingly added largely to Eobert 
 Dick's botanical collection. He sent him additions from 
 year to year, until he had almost finally completed his 
 collection ; Dick, at the same time, furnishing him with 
 examples of the grasses and plants growing in the 
 county of Caithness.
 
 266 DICK'S CORRESPONDENCE. CHAP. xvu. 
 
 Robert Dick received numerous letters from men of 
 distinction, requesting specimens of the Holy Grass which 
 he had discovered on the banks of the river Thurso. 
 Professor Balfour wrote to him in 1854, requesting roots 
 of the plant for the Botanical Garden at Edinburgh. 
 Dr. Allman, then professor of Natural History at Edin- 
 burgh, and now president of the Linnean Society, 
 requested specimens of the fossil fish for the University 
 Museum. Letters flowed in from Perth, from Aberdeen, 
 from Glasgow, from various places in England and 
 Ireland, requesting specimens of the Holy Grass, of shells, 
 and of fossil remains. Among his correspondents 
 we find the names of the Rev. Mr. Brodie, of the 
 Vicarage, Rowington, near Warwick; Mr. Backhouse, of 
 York ; and Professor Babington, of Cambridge. Many 
 of these were made known to Dick through his friend 
 Charles Peach. 
 
 The correspondence with Mr. Peach continues : " I 
 am sold," says Dick, " body and soul, to dried plants, not 
 fossil ones; no breaking of stones or anything else for me, 
 but the drudge of self-denying determination. . . . Who 
 was it that wished he was a tailor, for then he might 
 sometimes get a holiday? Ay, Mr. Peach, plants are 
 plants, and stones are stones indeed, to those who gape 
 and gasp to get a mouthful of fresh air. But man was 
 born to struggle and to endure." 
 
 Unfortunately, Dick's health began to fail. He 
 complained of a rasping cough, and of rheumatism. 
 Though a strong-looking man, and in the prime of life 
 (for he was not yet fifty), he complains of pain daily
 
 CHAP. xvn. HIS COUNTRY WALKS. 267 
 
 pain. He says to his friend Peach that he is " suffering 
 the punishment of over-fatigue and confinement to the 
 house." He had no assistant in his daily labour no 
 journeyman, no apprentice. All his work was done by 
 himself. And yet he continued his walks. " Like all 
 confined animals," he said, "when snuffing the caller 
 air, I become quite uproarious. A walk of twenty-six 
 miles is such a very fine thing." 
 
 But it is an awful thing in the North to take a walk 
 on a Sunday. The Thurso folks saw him going out and 
 coming in on that day, and they were very much shocked. 
 What could come of such a person? They began to 
 belabour him with tracts. These accumulated on his 
 hands so much, that he went to the oven one day, drew 
 the fire to the front of the grate, put in the bundle of 
 tracts, and pushed the burning coals back, thus con- 
 suming them to ashes. 
 
 A few years later, when Dr. Macleod raised such a 
 stir in the North by his observations as to the Judaical 
 observance of the Sabbath by his countrymen, Robert 
 Dick observed to his brother-in-law : " I have got the 
 newspaper containing the uproar about Dr. Macleod, 
 and am much amused at what their reverences said. 
 They would, if they could, shut out the light. ' Donald, 
 man, Donald ! what is it that ye'll aye be shutting out 
 ta light ?' ' If ta tail pe brak, ye'll find that ! Very 
 good ; and all the noise, I fancy, is for fear that 'the tail 
 pe brak.'"* 
 
 * The allusion is to an anecdote of two expatriated Highlaudmen in 
 Canada, who went out to hunt for wild pigs. They found a litter in
 
 268 A SUNDAY WALK. CHAP. xvii. 
 
 One Sunday morning, when wearied out with his 
 week's work, he went out to take a walk. He described 
 it in a letter to his friend Peach, written in the month 
 of July. He begins with the quotation : 
 
 " ' God blames not him who toils six days in seven, 
 Where smoke and dust bedim the golden day, 
 If he delight beneath the dome of heaven 
 
 To see the clouds and hear the winds at play.' 
 
 "To-day," he said, "the wind blew hard, and as I 
 had been wearied with heat, sweat, and confinement 
 during the week, it struck me that a walk of about eight 
 miles up the country would do me good in every way. 
 
 "Well, I had got about eight miles out. Some 
 beautiful tufts of Erica Tetralix grew temptingly a few 
 paces off, along the high road. So, without a moment's 
 hesitation, I stepped aside among them, and, stooping 
 down, began pulling at them admiringly. From my 
 reverie of delight, amidst beauties blushing crimson, I 
 was suddenly startled by a rough voice accosting me in 
 Gaelic. I looked round, and saw one of the ugliest- 
 faced Highlanders that ever ' cam doon' staring wildly 
 at me. 'A blowy day,' said I. 'Ach, ach,' said he. 
 A brief silence ensued. 'Why are ye no at sermon?' 
 
 a cavern with a very .small entrance. The mother was out. One 
 Highlandman went in to slay the pigs ; the other kept watch outside. 
 The mother-pig, hearing the screams of her family, came up suddenly 
 and rushed into the hole. The Highlandman outside took fast hold 
 of the animal's tail, and held hard, occasionally using his dirk. 
 Hence the noise from the inside : " Donald, man, Donald ! what is it 
 that ye'll aye be shutting out ta light ? " and the answer from the out. 
 tiide was, " If ta tail pe brak, ye'll find that !"
 
 CHAP. xvn. THE HIEtANDMAN. 269 
 
 he growled. ' Why are ye no at sermon yoursel?' I 
 replied. 'Eh?' said he; 'oo, ye see I maun mind the 
 beasts.' ' Well,' said I, ' we are very much alike. You 
 mind your beasts, and I mind this (holding up a piece 
 of the beautiful plant I had plucked). We have both 
 our reasons for what we are about.' 'Man!' he said 
 fiercely, 'ye're nae better than a beast, tae be looking 
 for grass on the Sawbath. The cattle there want reason, 
 which maybe you have.' ' Stop, my good fellow,' said 
 I ; ' the cattle look at the plants without seeing the 
 least beauty in them ; they pick out the grass here and 
 there to fill their bellies ; but I look at them for the 
 improvement of my mind.' 'Ach!' he grunted; and 
 then he roared, ' It's a sad thing for a man who has got 
 one wife already, to go a after another.' At this 
 coarse outburst I laughed loudly ; and after telling him 
 that I had got no wife at all, I suddenly walked away 
 and left the man with his beasts. I wonder what this 
 blind zealot would have done to me if he had the power. 
 The less we know, the more intolerant and tyrannical 
 we become. All the religious persecutions that we read 
 of are merely the result of ignorance, and of the cruelty 
 that comes of ignorance. I wonder whether that man 
 ever thinks of the words the Master he pretends to 
 serve once said to His disciples ' Consider the lilies of 
 the field, how they grow ; they toil not, neither do they 
 spin ; and yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all 
 his glory was not arrayed like one of these.'" 
 
 Amongst the numerous scientific men who sought 
 the acquaintance of Dick was the late Sir Eoderick 
 13
 
 270 SIR RODERICK MURCHISON. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 Murchison. He was appointed Director-General of the 
 Geological Survey and of the School of Mines in 1855, 
 and having been informed of the remarkable discoveries 
 made by Mr. Peach in the Durness limestone, he pro- 
 posed to make a journey in the north-west of Scotland 
 in the course of the same year. He started in August, 
 accompanied by Professor Nicol. They went by Inver- 
 ness, to Applecross, Gairloch, and Assynt. They went 
 northward to Durness and Tongue. It does not appear 
 that Sir Eoderick made any new discoveries on this 
 occasion ; field-geology was in the meantime at fault. 
 Professor Geikie, in his Life of Murchison; says that 
 " so far as respected any new light on the geology of 
 the north-west of Scotland, his excursion to Assynt 
 left matters very much as they were."* 
 
 When at Tongue, Sir Eoderick and Professor Nicol 
 drove across the country by the north coast to Thurso. 
 They were not then personally acquainted with Eobert 
 Dick, though they had often heard of him by name. 
 Professor Nicol first sought him out, and then he 
 took Sir Eoderick to his shop in Wilson's Lane. The 
 latter wished for some information from Dick as to the 
 localities where he had found certain Old Eed fossils. 
 Dick, however, was very busy with his batch at the 
 time ; he could not leave his bread to burn in the 
 oven, in order to give the necessary information. The 
 travellers were also in a hurry, as Sir Eoderick had 
 many other places to visit before the next meeting of 
 the British Association, which was to be held at Glasgow 
 in the beginning of September. 
 
 * Vol. ii. r. 205.
 
 CHAP. xvir. REQUEST FOR FOSSILS. 
 
 271 
 
 Sir Roderick, however, did not forget the Thurso 
 baker-geologist and botanist. In May 1857 he wrote 
 to him from the Museum of Practical Geology in Jermyn 
 Street as follows : " Dear Sir Aware of the talent you 
 have evinced in collecting rare and good specimens of 
 the fossil fishes of the Caithness flags, and finding that 
 this establishment is very poor in such remains, I venture 
 
 DICK'S HOUSE, WILSON'S LANE. 
 
 to ask you to taKe some steps to supply us with a few 
 really good things in the ichthyic line. All cost of 
 extraction, as well as the full value of the fossils, would 
 be paid thankfully to the finders. Pray excuse the 
 freedom I use. I have no other means of endeavouring 
 to secure this desirable object." 
 
 Robert Dick acceded to the baronet's request. He 
 did not sell any of his fossils, but he sent the donation
 
 272 DICK'S MAP OF CAITHNESS. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 of " a very fine specimen of Asterolepis," for which their 
 Lordships of the Committee of Privy Council of Educa- 
 tion sent Mr. Dick their best acknowledgments. 
 
 Sir Roderick Murchison was much more fortunate in 
 finding Dick at liberty on his next visit to Thurso. 
 Besides, he had Charles Peach with him, who soon made 
 everything smooth between the baronet and the baker. 
 They were both introduced to the bakehouse. It was 
 only Dick's intimate friends who were introduced to 
 that sanctum sanctorum. Dick was still in his working 
 clothes. A conversation took place about the dip of 
 certain rocks in Caithness. Sir Roderick complained of 
 the want of any sufficient map of the county. Here 
 Dick could chime in with him. In fact, he had wandered 
 over the whole length and breadth of the county, and 
 found that the existing maps were mere " bosh." " But if 
 you will permit me," he said, " I will endeavour to show 
 you a map of Caithness." "By all means," said the 
 baronet. 
 
 Taking up a few handfuls of flour, and spreading it 
 out on the baking board, Dick proceeded to mould a 
 model in relief of the geological structure of Caithness. 
 He showed all the principal features of the county the 
 hills and dales, the rocks and cliffs, the dislocations and 
 fractures, the watersheds and the drainage, and, in fact, 
 an outline of the entire geography of the county. To 
 quote the words of Sir Roderick Murchisoii, "Mr. 
 Robert Dick directed my notice to the presence of 
 numerous powerful fractures and dislocations in the 
 flagstones ranging over Caithness, and which, to the
 
 CHAP. xvn. A MAP MOULDED IN FLOUR. 273 
 
 superficial observer, seem to lie simply in undulations. 
 But to whatever extent these dislocations have occurred, 
 they never can be accurately defined until a correct map 
 of the county be executed, it being a melancholy fact, 
 that though easily capable of examination owing to the 
 slight elevation of the greater part of the county, 
 Caithness is probably the worst mapped county in 
 Scotland."* 
 
 Mr. Peach has also a pleasant recollection of the 
 interview. He says : " I felt it to be a great privilege 
 indeed to be present at the meeting of the baronet and 
 Dick in the bakehouse. It was a treat to me to see the 
 hills and dales, the rocks and cliffs, made up with flour, 
 and a likeness of Caithness moulded in relief by his 
 nimble fingers. He seemed to be familiar with every 
 foot of the county, every hill and dale, every movement 
 and flexure, every fracture and dislocation, and the 
 readiness and ease with which he communicated the 
 information greatly pleased and surprised the renowned 
 geologist ; and when he left the place he expressed his 
 delight and astonishment at the amount of information he 
 had received from the wonderful, though comparatively 
 unknown, baker of Thurso." 
 
 The conference between Sir Eoderick Murchison and 
 Dick lasted so long, that Peach says " he was so much 
 overcome by sleep, that he had a long nap while they 
 talked together." For Dick took the baronet up to his 
 museum, and showed him his collection of plants. Sii 
 Eoderick was as much surprised at his knowledge of 
 
 * Sir Roderick Murchison's Siluria. Fourth edition, p. 269.
 
 274 THE OLD CHURCH. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 botany as of geology. He found that Dick had almost 
 exhausted the plants of Caithness, and that he was en- 
 gaged in making up a complete Herbarium, principally 
 by exchanging plants with other botanical collectors. 
 
 When the two geologists left Dick's shop, they went 
 to the flag yards over the river, for the purpose of obtain- 
 ing pieces of the Banniskirk flags for analysing. " We 
 
 THTJRSO KIVEB : THE OLD CHURCH. 
 
 got a boat," says Peach, " passed over the harbour, looked 
 at the Old Church, and felt much disgusted with the 
 Thurso people for leaving it roofless and allowing it to 
 go to decay." 
 
 Before he left Thurso Sir Koderick addressed Dick 
 in the following letter : * 
 
 " My dear Mr. Dick I cannot leave Thurso for the 
 Ultima Thule without thanking you sincerely for the 
 
 * 31st July 1858.
 
 CHAP. xvn. MURCHISON AND PEACH. 275 
 
 information I have received from you respecting the 
 structure and succession of the Caithness deposits, and 
 for your very agreeable conversation, which was so 
 instructive as to the physical geology of these parts of 
 Scotland. Pray do not forget the old geologist who 
 wTOte upon Banniskirk fishes thirty-two years ago, and 
 who much desires to make a decent show of them in 
 the great National Museum of the Survey ; and in return 
 I promise you all the rarer British plants, which are to 
 be had by the zealous endeavours of Yours most faith- 
 fully, EODERICK I. MURCHISON." 
 
 On the following day, Sir Eoderick and Mr. Peach 
 left Thurso for Stromness in the Orkneys, on the other 
 side of the Pentland Firth. They went to Kirkwall, 
 passing on their way the Standing Stones of Stennis, 
 the Orkney Stonehenge. On their way north, they 
 visited Sumburgh Head, and saw the Old Eed Sand- 
 stone of Caithness prolonged into the southern limb of 
 the Shetland Islands. Then to the northernmost island 
 of the group ; and finally the two geologists were 
 dropped by the steamer " Pharos," on its way south, on 
 the bleak headland of Cape Wrath. They proceeded to 
 visit the Durness limestone, where all that Peach had 
 already discovered was confirmed by the personal obser- 
 vation of Sir Eoderick. It was not until the end of 
 September that Mr. Peach reached Wick. 
 
 In the meantime, Sir Eoderick proceeded to Leeds, 
 where the next annual meeting of the British Association 
 was to be held. There he laid before the geological
 
 276 SJK RODERICK'S PAPER. CHAP, xvu 
 
 section " The Results of his Researches among the older 
 rocks of the Scottish Highlands." He did full justice 
 to Mr. Peach's discovery of organic remains of the 
 Lower Silurian age in the crystalline limestone of 
 Sutherland ; similar to those which occur in the Lower 
 Silurian rocks of North America. Sir Roderick also said 
 in his paper, that as regarded the ichthyolitic flagstones 
 of Caithness, " he had made various interesting additions 
 to his former knowledge, particularly as derived from 
 the researches of Mr. Robert Dick of Thurso."* 
 
 But Sir Roderick made further mention of Robert 
 Dick at the public meeting held in the Leeds Town Hall 
 on the 29th of September 1858. In fact, his eulogium 
 of Dick constituted the principal part of his address. 
 We have already given part of it in the preface to this 
 book, and need not here repeat it. Sir Roderick con- 
 cluded his speech by saying that he had referred to the 
 facts relating to the marvellous knowledge acquired by 
 this humble working baker of Thurso, "in order that 
 the audience might deduce a practical application." 
 
 Mr. Peach immediately sent to his friend at Thurso 
 the newspaper in which the report of Sir Roderick 
 Murchison's speech appeared, and he also congratulated 
 Dick upon the cordial manner in which the baronet had 
 referred to his scientific knowledge. Dick, as we shall 
 afterwards find, did not think so much of the speech as 
 Peach did ; but, after about fifteen minutes' deliberation, 
 he scribbled off the following stanzas, and sent them to 
 Charles Peach as his answer. Peach sent the verses to 
 
 * See Leeds Meeting of the British Association, 1858.
 
 CHAP. xvn. SONG OF A GEOLOGIST. 277 
 
 the Wick newspaper, where it was printed under the 
 title of the " Song of a Geologist." * 
 
 Hammers an' chisels an' a', 
 
 Chisels an' fossils an' a ; 
 Sir Rory's the boy, o' the right sort o' stuff, 
 
 Hurrah ! for the hammers sae braw. 
 
 It's good to be breaking a stone, 
 
 The work now is lucky an' braw ; 
 It's grand to be finding a bone 
 
 A fish-bone the grandest of a'. 
 
 Hammers an' chisels an' a', 
 
 Chisels an' fossils an' a ; 
 Resurrection's our trade ; by raising the dead 
 
 We've grandeur an' honour an' a'. 
 
 May labour be crown'd wi' success 
 May prudence promulgate the story 
 
 May scoffers grow every day less, 
 
 Till the rocks are a mountain o' glory. 
 
 Hammers an' chisels an' a', 
 
 Chisels an' fossils an' a' ; 
 The deeper we go, the more we shall know 
 
 Of the past an' the recent an' a'. 
 
 Here's freedom to dig and to learn 
 Here's freedom to think an' to speak ; 
 
 There's nane ever grumbled to look at a stone, 
 But creatures baith stupid an' weak. 
 
 Hammers an' chisels an' a', 
 
 Chisels an' fossils an' a' ; 
 In spite of the devil we'll dig as we're able 
 
 Hurrah ! for the hammers sae braw. 
 
 AMYGDALOID. 
 
 * It is said that these verses so pleased Sir Roderick 
 13*
 
 278 AMYGDALOID. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 Dick was amazed to find himself in print for the first 
 time. In writing to his friend Mr. John Miller, then 
 "esiding in London, he said : " If there be Amygdaloid 
 u mong the fossiliferous rocks of Thurso, or in your 
 native county, your humble servant has hitherto failed 
 to detect it. Charles Peach has a wonderful talent 
 that way, and I remember his bringing me some pieces 
 of supposed trap from the neighbourhood of Wick. But 
 when I sent him these scribblings he thought for certain 
 that he had found an eruptive rock at last. He clapped 
 them into the paper and stuck Amygdaloid at the end. 
 Charlie had found trap again. If the matter had 
 depended upon me, the printers in Wick would have 
 been saved the trouble of setting the verses up in print." 
 To Peach he wrote : " The rhyme was merely meant 
 to make you laugh, and, that purpose served, to burn it. 
 Time was when I used to scribble songs by the dozen, 
 though I dare say no one would give a bawbee for a 
 bagful of them. ... I never was free enough of care 
 and trouble to cultivate the gift. . . . Sentimental folk 
 want fine feeling and fine language, and I canna be 
 fashed. And you laughed, did you ? So much laughter, 
 so much life enjoyed. You are very dowie, you say. 
 Well, Charles, if you gain by that, you'll lose by 
 nothing. 
 
 So, you sit by the fireplace, 
 
 And moping away, 
 
 and the eminent band of geologists belonging to the " Ed Lion Club," 
 that they were inserted in their records and sung at their annual 
 meetings. John o' Groat's Journal.
 
 CHAP. xvii. SONG OF THE FOSSIL-HUNTER. 279 
 
 To field or to sea-side 
 Want courage to stray. 
 When fernies are withered, 
 And field flowers are gone, 
 Oh ! who would go hunting 
 Starfishes alone ? 
 
 After that, Dick confesses that he himself feels very 
 dowie he says he is very unwell, still feverish, with 
 cough, cough, cough ! Nevertheless he appends another 
 bit of rhyme, to make Charlie laugh again ! 
 
 Oh, gin ye was a fossil fish 
 
 Long petrified in Auld Red Stanes, 
 
 An' I a wanderin' found the rock 
 
 That held the remnant of yeer banes ! 
 
 How I would try to dig ye out, 
 
 And send ye up to Lon'on fair, 
 Weel pack't and sealed, ye needna doubt, 
 
 To rest at Rory 's * evennair ! 
 
 Oh, gin ye were an Alpine plant 
 
 That grew upon 'Jie mountains high, 
 
 An' I a wanderin' found the plant 
 The little mossie burnie by ! 
 
 How I would joy, if ye did 'scape 
 
 The wintry winds and storms severe 
 
 I'd pu' and put ye in my cap, 
 An' dry ye, for -a thousand year ! 
 
 When Sir Roderick Murchison next visited Suther- 
 land, in August 1859, he was unable to call upon 
 Bobert Dick ; but he sent him the following letter : 
 
 * Sir Roderick Murchison.
 
 280 MURCHISON'S LETTER. CHAP. xvn. 
 
 "My dear Mr. Dick I send you by this mail a 
 copy of my memoir on ' The Geological Structure of the 
 North of Scotland.' It is a Great Eeform Bill which I 
 am endeavouring to pass ; and it is hard to induce old 
 mineralogical and bit-by-bit geologists to enter into my 
 views. But if the grand superposition of strata be not 
 set aside, nothing can be so clear (nothing at least that 
 I have ever seen in any county) as the A B C D ot 
 the great steps by which the geologist ascends, in pro- 
 ceeding from the west to the east coast of the north 
 of Scotland. 
 
 " I deeply regret not to be able in my conscience to 
 go and shake hands with you this summer. The fact 
 is, that the general succession in Caithness, under the 
 administration of Peach and yourself, is quite secure. I 
 must therefore look to tracts never explored by me; 
 and being satisfied myself that the statements printed 
 in my memoir are substantially correct, I wish to test 
 them by exploring the tract between Melvich and 
 Helmsdale, which I have never yet visited. 
 
 " The workers had very nearly completed all your 
 Herbarium before I left London, and you will have it 
 soon. Professor Ramsay is with me, and is delighted 
 with the clearness of the order of succession. He is to 
 sing ' Hammers an' Chisels an' a' ' at our next anni- 
 versary dinner. Yours very faithfully, 
 
 " RODERICK I. MURCHISON." 
 
 The remainder of the herbarium promised by Sir 
 Roderick reached Thursp shortly after the date of his
 
 CHAP. xvir. RHYME OF THE BLUE BELLS. 281 
 
 letter. Dick again exercised his rhyming faculties on his 
 friend Peach. " As for mysel," he said, " should any- 
 body speer for me at Aberdeen, you may say that I am 
 quite merry, singing like a cricket over those dried 
 plants that Sir Koderick has sent me. Listen a minute : 
 
 0, will ye gang oot owre the moor ? 
 
 0, will ye gang wi' me, Rory ? 
 To while awa' a weary hour ; 
 I'm sure I'd gang wi' ye, Rory. 
 
 We'll wander 'mang the heather knowes, 
 
 Their bonnie bells to pu', Rory ! 
 An' where the purple fox-glove grows, 
 
 His stately grace to view, Rory ! 
 
 0, will ye gang oot owre the moor, etc. 
 
 How lightly would I clim' the hills 
 
 To gather thyme wi' ye, Rory ! 
 And seek the wild flowers by the rills, 
 
 As blithely as a bee, Rory ! 
 
 0, will ye gang oot owre the moor, etc. 
 
 See what it is to get a good crop of hay ! I'm just as 
 happy as a beggar ; and, like Tarn o' Shanter, ' owre a' 
 the ills o' life victorious ! ' "
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 LION-HUNTERSFERNS AND MOSSES. 
 
 AFTER Sir Eoderick Murchison had made his speech at 
 Leeds, Robert Dick's name was carried far and wide on 
 the wings of the press. He was spoken of as one of the 
 most extraordinary instances of the pursuit of knowledge 
 under difficulties. Even the Thurso people began to 
 look upon him in a different light. "They had long 
 regarded him as partially insane," said the editor of a 
 Wick newspaper. " But as time rolled on opinions 
 gradually changed. By and by it began to be whispered 
 that men of great influence were visiting the mad 
 Thurso baker; and when it was found that at the 
 meetings of the British Association he was named as 
 one of the highest authorities on certain scientific 
 questions, and that even Sir Roderick Murchison had 
 been sitting at his feet and receiving lessons from him, 
 the Thurso people took pride in naming the great 
 scientific baker of their town." 
 
 The change of opinion was not, however, quite 
 unanimous. When the joking rhyme about " Hammers 
 an' chisels an' a' " was published in the Wick newspaper, 
 Dick wrote to Mr. Peach that " some people here view 
 the matter quite seriously. One says, ' Sir Roderick will
 
 CHAP. xvin. LION-HUNTERS. 283 
 
 regret having extolled me so highly : the verses are 
 more like what a half-drunk Burns would write than 
 anything they know.' A weak but well-meaning bodie 
 at Cromarty sends me a pious bookie about the state of 
 my souL He says ' the spades, perhaps, are made that 
 will dig my grave/ He need not have had any ' perhaps ' 
 about the matter. Kirk-yard spades bury three or four 
 generations. A Dublin divine has sent me a letter that I 
 have put in the fire, with ' There goes Balaam's ass, No. I/ 
 Indeed you know that the rhyme was solely made to 
 make you laugh, while you were dowie." 
 
 The lion-hunters then came upon him. Point/tmt a 
 man who has done something out of the ordinary way, 
 and immediately a tribe of nobodies flock to see him. 
 If they cannot get introduced to him, they will look at 
 him through his window, and try to see the lion through 
 the bars of his cage. Dick hated all this nonsense. 
 He would not be lionised. Every scientific man was 
 made welcome to his shop, his bakehouse, and his 
 parlour; but when persons, who knew nothing about 
 science, merely called to see him as a show, he was 
 shy and unapproachable. Some thought him rude. 
 Yet he was exceedingly attached to those who were his 
 genuine friends. 
 
 A gentleman called upon him one day and sent in 
 his name. Dick was at work in the bakehouse. " Tell 
 him/' he said to Annie Mackay, " that I am very busy, 
 and cannot see him at present." Another message was 
 sent in: "Tell Mr. Dick that I am the editor of so 
 and so." The reply was, " I have no time for editors ;"
 
 284 CALLS OF STRANGERS. CHAP. xvin. 
 
 [Aside, "They only thresh straw a thousand times 
 threshed."] The editor afterwards stuck a prong into 
 his back after he was dead. 
 
 Dick detested sneakingness and dishonesty. One 
 day a person called upon him and proceeded to say that 
 a gentleman, well skilled in botany and physical science, 
 then in Orkney, wished to call upon him, and that he 
 had come beforehand to tell him so. It immediately 
 flashed upon Dick's mind that this was the very person 
 himself. He said, " It's of no use for your friend to 
 call: I have no time for new acquaintances." The 
 stranger then tried to obtain an interview through a 
 third person, who was instructed to say that he was the 
 person of whom he had spoken. " No, no," said Dick ; 
 " tell him not to come here, for if he do I'll say what I 
 don't want to say to anybody." " What's that ?" " I'll 
 tell him to go to the !" was the reply. 
 
 Many strangers, said a writer in the Northern 
 Ensign, visited Thurso without being able to see his 
 collections, although they had come for the express 
 purpose. In this list we believe we can include a 
 member of the reigning dynasty in France [Prince 
 Lucien Buonaparte ?] whom Mr. Dick refused to see, 
 greatly to his disappointment. But when once, he adds, 
 Mr. Dick had got the real measure of a man, and found 
 him what he thought he ought to be, all was right, and 
 the introduction of a stranger by such a person was the 
 unfailing open sesame to his house and his curiosities. 
 
 Dick's servant and housekeeper, Annie Mackay, has 
 said of .him, that many people called to see her maister
 
 CHAP, xviii. " THE DUKE " CALLS. 286 
 
 some on business, but most from curiosity. He was 
 polite to everybody. In business no man could be more 
 civil. Sometimes people called when he was busy in 
 the bakehouse. His arms and hands were covered with 
 flour ; and when the batch was in, he could not leave 
 the oven. "You see," she said, "he had pounds and 
 pounds worth o' bread i' the oven. Had he left that and 
 come out to attend the visitors, the bread wud ha' been 
 burnt, and he wud ha' lost it a'. Wha wud ha 1 paid 
 him for that ? 
 
 " The Duke o' Argyll ca'd ae day to see the maister. 
 He was thrang wi' his batch. The maister said to the 
 Duke that he couldna see him the noo, but if he wad 
 ca' again he wad show him the fossils. The maister 
 fix'd the time. He put oot the fossils and waited for a 
 hoor ayont the time. He tell't me, ' If the Duke come, 
 take him up ta the parlour ; I've taken oot the fossils 
 and laid them on the table.' The Duke cam after the 
 maister gaed oot, and looked at the fossils, but he didna 
 stop lang. The maister was aye very particular about 
 the time he fixed for visitors to see the fossils." 
 
 Sir George Sinclair of Thurso Castle usually brought 
 his distinguished visitors to see Dick. Sir George had 
 a great admiration for the baker. When speaking of 
 his first visit to him, Sir George said : " I had myself 
 attended many courses of lectures at the Edinburgh 
 University, and had acquired some knowledge of the 
 various departments of Natural History ; but, in con- 
 ferring with my friend Dick, I soon discovered that all 
 my acquirements were shallow and superficial. On
 
 286 
 
 SIR GEORGE SINCLAIR. CHAP. xvm. 
 
 those to which I had devoted attention I found myself 
 completely eclipsed by my acute and ardent friend, who 
 was always as ready as he was able, to correct my mis- 
 takes, to guide my inquiries, and to add to my scanty 
 stock of general information. The extent and variety of 
 his scientific acquirements were incredible and almost 
 
 OLD THURSO CASTLE. 
 
 uviexampled. He knew as much about many sciences 
 as some professors know about one." 
 
 Amongst the numerous persons introduced by Sir 
 George to Dick, were Thomas Carlyle and the Baroness 
 Burdett Coutts. With the former he had but little 
 conversation. They shook hands together across the 
 counter, and exchanged a few words of congratulation. 
 With the Baroness he discussed the discoveries of Mr. 
 Pengelly of Torquay, another eminent votary of science. 
 
 Sir George often invited Dick to meet his distin-
 
 CHAP. xvin. MR. PEACH AT ABERDEEN. 287 
 
 guished guests at the Castle, and to dine or breakfast 
 with them. He also invited him to meet Hugh Miller 
 there alone. But no ! Dick would not leave his own 
 house. He felt that he should be out of place in a 
 Castle, served by footmen. " His unassuming modesty," 
 .said Sir George, " was as conspicuous as his wonderful 
 knowledge." Lady Sinclair even proposed to change 
 her baker, and buy her bread from him. " No, no," he 
 replied ; " I am the last person to take the bread from 
 any honest man's mouth. Eemain where you are ; you 
 cannot be better served." 
 
 When Mr. Peach proposed to visit Aberdeen in 1859, 
 for the purpose of attending the meeting of the British 
 Association, he asked Eobert Dick if he would not send 
 a paper, or communicate some facts through his friends. 
 " No ! " said Dick ; " when you go to Aberdeen I hope 
 you will not speak of me at all. People bothered me 
 so much last year after Sir Eoderick made his speech at 
 Leeds, that I have no desire for any repetition. Tell 
 Mr. Cleghorn also (a geologist at Wick) not to speak of 
 me. I wish to be let alone." 
 
 But he was quite ready to sing a triumphant song 
 to welcome Charlie home again : 
 
 O welcome Charlie hame again, 
 O welcome Charlie to your nain ; 
 The toon o' Wick has been in pain 
 For want o' her ain Charlie. 
 
 When Charlie went to Aberdeen, 
 
 The like before was never seen ; 
 
 His coat was brown, his breeks were green, 
 
 His buckles shining rarely. 
 
 welcome Charlie, etc.
 
 288 MEDICAL STUDENTS. CHAP. xvui. 
 
 Upon his back a bag o' stones, 
 His pouches fa' o' fossil bones ; 
 An' tangles lang as pipers' drones 
 Hang ower his shoulders rarely. 
 
 O welcome Charlie, etc. 
 
 When Charlie spak, the great were dumb. 
 They felt they micht nae fash their thumb : 
 For Charlie's logic was a drum 
 That did its business rarely. 
 
 welcome Charlie, etc. 
 
 When Charlie sat in committee 
 The darkest doubts began to flee ; 
 A touch ! a word ! at once they see ! 
 For wha can match wi' Charlie ? 
 
 O welcome Charlie, etc. 
 
 Among those who regularly called upon Dick at his 
 bakehouse, were the medical students of the town and 
 neighbourhood. These were always made heartily wel- 
 come. When Dick had done his day's work, he went 
 out with them and pointed out the plants in their native 
 habitat. Dr. Shearer informs us that there was hardly 
 a medical student belonging to Caithness, who did not 
 at one time or other make Mr. Dick's acquaintance. 
 Amongst these were Dr. Meiklejohn, afterwards of her 
 Majesty's ships "Illustrious," "Harrier," and "Asia;" 
 Dr. Brown, a well-known botanist, afterwards author of 
 A Manual of Botany, Anatomical and Physiological ; 
 and Dr. Shearer himself. 
 
 Dr. Meiklejohn has told us of his first introduction 
 to Dick. Being a native of Caithness, he had long 
 hear<f of his devotion to natural science, and of the
 
 CHAP, xviii. DR. MEIKLEJOHN. 289 
 
 value of his researches into the palaeontology of the 
 Caithness rocks. When Dr. Meiklejohn went to Thurso 
 in 1850, he sought an introduction to Dick through 
 Miss Eussell, bookseller, who had long supplied him 
 with books. "We at once called upon him," he says, 
 " and found him in his bakehouse, having just finished 
 his day's work. I was much struck with his appear- 
 ance. His massive forehead and fine features betokened 
 a man of great intelligence. I regretted that he was 
 not in a position to follow his scientific pursuits, free 
 from the cares of arduous daily labour. 
 
 " On being informed that I wished to know the best 
 places for procuring specimens of fossils which abounded 
 in the rocks of the district, he said he would at once 
 accompany me to some good fossiliferous spots. We 
 walked out to Holborn Head, where, on an exposed 
 surface of the rock, a magnificent cranial buckler of the 
 Asterolepis was imbedded. This was the first example 
 of that fine fossil which I had ever seen, and I examined 
 it with the greatest interest. On our way back, he took 
 me to the bed of a small stream near the Bishop's 
 Palace, where numerous fossil fishes were to be seen. 
 During my stay, we had many walks together. His 
 acquaintance with the Fauna particularly with the 
 insects and shells and the Flora of the district, was 
 very great. I got much information from him on thost; 
 subjects." 
 
 Their acquaintance continued. When Meiklejohn 
 returned to Thurso after his six months' study of sur- 
 gery and medicine at Edinburgh one of the first things
 
 290 DR. BROWN. CHAP. xvm. 
 
 he did was to call upon Dick. They saw much of each 
 other during the three years that the young surgeon's 
 studies continued. He accompanied Dick in his walks. 
 " I remember," he says, " that he took me one day to a 
 small pond, where he had found that curious little crus- 
 tacean, with a bivalve shell, the Cypris. This little 
 animal was of great interest to us both, as it is supposed 
 to be allied to Estheria a fossil not uncommon in the 
 Caithness flagstones. It was formerly thought to be a 
 bivalve mollusc related to the little Cyclas of our 
 rivers." 
 
 Dr. Meiklejohn took his degree in 1854, immediately 
 after which he was appointed to H.M.S. " Harrier," which 
 was about to sail for the Baltic, during the war with 
 Russia in the same year. While in the Gulf of Bothnia, 
 Dr. Meiklejohn sent Dick a long account of the Natural 
 History of Finland. "I cannot," he said, "give you 
 any elaborate details, as my only opportunities of in- 
 vestigating the coasts were, when I accompanied par- 
 ties of armed men in boats, looking for ships, fre- 
 quently with a live shell by my side, and in danger of 
 being picked off by a Russian rifleman." After the war, 
 the " Harrier " left Portsmouth for Rio Janeiro and 
 Perriambuco, cruising along the coast ; and Dr. Meikle- 
 john again furnished Dick with a long account of the 
 botany and zoology of the lands which he had visited. 
 
 Dr. Brown first made the acquaintance of Dick while 
 on his way from the Orkneys to Edinburgh, where he 
 was studying medicine. He called upon Dick at his 
 bakehouse, and the two had much pleasant conversation.
 
 CHAP. xvni. CAITHNESS BOTANY. 291 
 
 Dick supplied his young friend for he was then only 
 seventeen with a list of the plants of Caithness. The 
 list was a long one. The student read a paper on the 
 subject to the Botanical Society of Edinburgh. He gave 
 several of the plants on Dick's authority. The professor 
 of Botany jeered at the idea of such plants growing in 
 Caithness, and declared that Dick was all wrong ! Dick 
 was appealed to. He insisted that he was all right. He 
 had seen the plants growing with his own eyes. What 
 better evidence could there be of their existence in 
 Caithness ? Speaking of the affair to a friend, Dick 
 said, "I doot the folk that objected were fireside 
 botanists." 
 
 The correspondence, however, continued. In one of 
 his letters, Dick said, " I am sorry that my doubly- 
 marked list of plants should have annoyed you so much. 
 It is impossible for me to send my dried plants to Edin- 
 burgh for examination by your Professors. The plants 
 are bulky, and besides, I value them too highly to 
 allow any person to touch them, except very tenderly. 
 How can I forstand your Professors, when they dinna 
 forstand themselves." 
 
 " Saxifraga tridactylites : Dunnet Links. Query 
 Why do your Professors doubt my word about so com- 
 mon a plant as that ? Is it because I said it might be 
 had in millions ? . . . Arbutus alpina : native. . . . 
 Luanda Forsteri : my nainsel fand him. . . . Osmunda 
 regalis. Eh ? Weel, man, were Dr. Johnson of Berwick 
 alive, he would roar so loud that they would hear him 
 at Morven. Osmunda regilis has just as good a right to
 
 292 WILD ROSES. CHAP. xvm. 
 
 be considered native as Calluna imlgaris. . . . You will 
 please give all this news to Professor Balfour. Tell him 
 I am just as jealous of my rights as he can be himself. 
 
 " I truly grant, a hundred times, 
 
 My skeel may weel be doubted, 
 But facts are chiels that winna ding, 
 And needna be disputed." 
 
 Another letter from the medical student follows, in 
 which he offered to assist Dick with specimens of plants ; 
 to which the baker, perhaps tired of the subject, said 
 " I hope you will dismiss from your mind the idea of 
 hunting out dried plants for me. Attend to your studies, 
 and leave me to find plants for 'mysel.' . . . Those 
 plants exist in Caithness some way. How can I tell 
 how they got there ? " 
 
 The correspondence was not yet over. The student, 
 on his way home to the Orkneys, called upon Dick 
 again, made up all differences, and got from him some of 
 the wild Caithness roses, the whole of which Dick 
 had tracked to their lonely haunts among the hills and 
 the straths. In a subsequent letter, Dick says, " I could 
 pick three or four roses of different ' varieties ' from one 
 wild rose bush in various stages of transformation. I 
 don't consider myself beat on that point yet. Nor 
 will I rest satisfied until I get the decision of some 
 authority. I'll wait, even for twenty years. Spes 
 in/racta. What's that ? Gaelic ? May be so may be 
 no. It's all the same. I'll wait ! . . . Thanks to you 
 for giving me the Goat Honeysuckle, and the Woodsia 
 from Dumfriesshire. I'll thank you quietly ilka time I
 
 CHAP. xvm. WILD ROSES. 293 
 
 look on them, and that's better than noise. . . H. C. 
 Watson most certainly has me on the hip about Potamo- 
 geton plantagineus ; but I have as certainly floored him 
 about the Buckbean (Menyanthes). . . . The season of 
 wild flowers is over once again (September 1860), and I 
 am not likely to wander far this year. I have never 
 walked less in all my life than this summer. Wishing 
 you all the happiness in this world, I am," etc. 
 
 In the following month, Dick writes to his young 
 friend, " You are all right ; and we are sworn friends ;" 
 and again, " I can't quite make out your hieroglyphics 
 They are a mystery to me. You can write better than 
 I ; only don't drive quite so furiously. I was never at 
 college !" Then he goes on to the Caithness roses again. 
 " Along with this you will receive your catalogue, which 
 I have gone over very carefully, and made some notes 
 thereon. You have omitted some which are very com- 
 mon, and others, which, though less abundant, are found 
 here. I have marked no roses save Rosa spinosissima, 
 Rosa canina, and Rosa micrantha. They are abundant 
 on the braes, by Thurso river, for miles inland. In dry 
 seasons, the leaves appear almost white from their hairi- 
 ness. On a hill six miles away, there grows a rose ; 
 another fourteen miles away; another twelve miles 
 away; another six miles away, on the edge of a cliff' 
 overhanging the sea, and exposed to the full sweep of 
 the northern tempests. I had intended to have sent you 
 specimens of all these roses. But the heavy rains forbid : 
 
 " ' The best-laid plans o' mice and men 
 
 Gang aft aglee.' 
 H
 
 294 HEATHS AND FERNS. CHAP. xviu. 
 
 "But what ails Dr. Balfour ? I am wearying to 
 hear what these roses are. He need not hesitate to sa} 
 what he thinks. I lay traps for no one. 
 
 " How comes it, that of all the Scotch heaths, Erica 
 Tetralix only should be given to the habit of putting out 
 varieties. I have watched Calluna vulgaris and Erica 
 cinerea, and never yet, among thousands of thousands, 
 found a notable variety. But with Erica Tetralix, the 
 loveliest of the three, the case is very different. It is 
 subject to strange shiftings and changings, and I have 
 some delightful varieties from it. If Erica Tetralix was 
 sent to some Darwinian academy, wonderful results 
 would undoubtedly follow ! 
 
 "Your society doubted whether the variety of the 
 lady fern, known as Athyrium molle, was really native 
 to Caithness. Since I saw you, I have got two speci- 
 mens of the fern from England ; but Dunnet Cliffs pro- 
 duce far finer specimens of the same fern. Take my 
 word for it. I have got two specimens of the variety 
 rhceticum from England ; the same fern is also here. 
 
 " In your catalogue, I observe that you have marked 
 Poa aquatica as a native of Caithness. That is serious. 
 The red Poa does not grow in Caithness." 
 
 " I'll not write to you again for three months. Attend 
 to your studies." 
 
 We have quoted these extracts to show howthoroughly 
 Dick had mastered the botany of Caithness. He wan- 
 dered over the country far and near in spring, summer, 
 autumn, and whiter, and collected all that grew during 
 those seasons.
 
 CHAP. XVIII. 
 
 MOSSES. 295 
 
 Strange to say, he missed an object that he had 
 long been looking for. It was the Juncus sguarrosus, 
 which is usually found growing on boggy earth. He 
 searched for it along the banks of the river, but though 
 there, it had been cropped down by the beasts which 
 grazed along the grassy plat. At length he found the 
 plant growing to perfection not a hundred yards from 
 his own door, on a piece of land called " The Island " 
 a place devoted to the bleaching of clothes, and con- 
 sequently sacred from the intrusion of cattle. 
 
 During the later years of his life, Dick again returned 
 to the study of botany. He searched all the country 
 round, for grasses, ferns, and mosses. What an insigni- 
 ficant thing a Moss seems ! Yet, when a friend was 
 complaining to Linnaeus, that Sweden did not afford 
 scope enough for the study of Nature, the sage laid his 
 hand upon a bit of Moss on which they were reclining, 
 and said, " Under this palm is material for the study of 
 a lifetime !" 
 
 Every one remembers how Mungo Park, when lost in 
 the desert, was delighted with the sight of a tuft of Moss. 
 The little living jewel, growing amongst endless wastes 
 and arid rocks, melted the traveller's heart. " If God 
 cares for the moss," he said, " surely He cares for me ; " 
 and Park went on his way with an uplifted heart. 
 
 Dick searched the whole county of Caithness for the 
 mosses which it contained. He was the first local 
 botanist who had investigated the subject. Writing to 
 Peach in April 1856, he said : " The club-mosses are 
 very interesting plants. I have found five out of the
 
 296 THE ROYAL FERN. CHAP. xvm. 
 
 six British species growing in the county, and probably 
 I may also find the sixth. The club-moss which strikes 
 you, is alpinum, which is found in great abundance on 
 the steep sides of Morven. Selago, or fir club-moss, 
 seems an exception. Selagirurides too, bears spores 
 everywhere. ... I am scarcely master of a single 
 spare moment." 
 
 " I am going off to the moors," he again says, " for a 
 back-burden of moss. If you were here you would go 
 too, but you would have to rise at five. If you will 
 visit quarries, my man, it will not do to be snoozing in 
 your bed until eight o'clock. I was up at one this morn- 
 ing, hence this epistle." This, however, was a piece of 
 banter ; for Dick knew that Peach was an early riser, 
 and did much of his geological work early in the morn- 
 ing, or late at night. " His letters," said Peach, " even 
 if bantering me, always brought sunshine." 
 
 Dick also continued his search for ferns. He often 
 wandered along the foot of Dunnet Head, when the tide 
 was out, and climbed up the rocks into some shady 
 nook where the ferns grew. They did not grow on the 
 eastern side of the cliffs, but on the west, where the 
 Gulf Stream washes along the headland. Sometimes he 
 descended the western cliffs, where a fall of the red 
 sandstone had taken place, and there he found the ferns 
 of which he had come in search. It was a glorious day 
 for him when he found the Eoyal Fern Osmunda regalia 
 growing there in its native beauty. " I can yet 
 recollect," he says, " how happy I was when I found the 
 first Osmunda. I was wearied, and sore, and sick, and
 
 DUNNET HEAD : WEST FRONT.
 
 CHAP, xviir. FERNS ON DUNNE T HEAD. 297 
 
 nearly tired of this world, and all that's in it, when I 
 caught sight of that glorious Fern, large, radiant, and 
 flourishing, among the reft sandstone cliffs of Dunnet. 
 What a beauty ! Almost approaching to the size of a 
 tree fern!" 
 
 Dick also found among the rocks on Dunnet Head, 
 Lastrea dilatata, Lastrea fcenisecii, the Asplenium mari- 
 num, Asplenium filix-fcemina (lady fern), and numerous 
 other ferns. Morven mountain was also one of his 
 haunts, and there he found Polypodium Phegopteris, P, 
 calcareum, and Lastrea Oreopteris. Braalnabin and Dirlot 
 also furnished him with many specimens. The com- 
 moner specimens he found all over the county. He 
 collected many of the seeds and plants, and sowed them 
 and planted them broadcast over the county, to be living 
 when he was dead. He planted scions of the maiden 
 hair and the royal fern in the gorges of the Dorery 
 hills, at Morven, and in his fernery at Reay. 
 
 Mr. Peach helped Dick in his inquiries as to ferns. 
 He often sent him seeds or plants, so that they might be 
 planted in favourite spots. He also sent him some Cornish 
 heaths. " Many thanks ! " said Dick, " for Erica vagans 
 and Erica ciliaris. To me they are a world of pleasure." 
 
 Having been informed by Mr. Peach that he 
 had found Asplenium marinum at Strathmore,* Dick 
 says, "Nothing that you ever mentioned to me has 
 struck me so much as what you say about Asplenium 
 
 * Mr Peach says this must be a mistake. Still Dick's letter was 
 written on the supposition that he had found the plant, and it shows 
 how thoroughly he was acquainted with the plants along the coast.
 
 298 FKNS SEARCHED FOR. 
 
 CHAP. XVIII, 
 
 marinum. ... I have examined every accessible sea- 
 cliff from Portskerra to John o' Groat's, and never yet 
 found a trace of it. A. marinum on the slaty rocks ! 
 How is that to be accounted for ? Certainly not owing 
 to the exposed nature of the coast, nor to the sea spray. 
 I have clambered down the north-western point of 
 Dunnet Head, where the northern storms waste their 
 fury on the cliffs, and the sea spray is lifted in vapoui 
 high over their loftiest pinnacles, and even there As- 
 plenium marinum loves to nestle among its crevices ? 
 The distribution must be a mystery." 
 
 Peach sends Dick many plants for him to name. 
 He sent the Polygonum viviparum. " It is a rare 
 alpine plant," was the reply. " It is not a fern at all, 
 though it is nearly as rare as your treasured Dryas 
 odopetcda, in search of which I have spent many a 
 long day. Your orchis is Hdbenaria chlorantha; your 
 fern Cystopteris dentata: it is decidedly rare. Thanks 
 for allowing me to rob you of Scolopendrium (Hart's- 
 tongue). ... A plant I have gathered here," he 
 says, " I have dried and submitted to an English pro- 
 fessor (Babington). He has pronounced it to be one of 
 the very rarest in Britain. The plant is rare, but not 
 so rare as the professor kindly wished to make it. 
 
 " Not content with the specimens of the fern which 
 I had got beside me, I set out (July 23) for a mountain 
 nine miles away, where I knew the plant grew ; and in 
 due time I got there, and saw, or thought I saw, many 
 different species. On one sloping brae grew Polypodium 
 Phegopteris, and I sat me down beside it. I remarked
 
 CHAP. xvni. SIGHT FROM A HILL TOP. 299 
 
 that, though of all sizes, from an inch up to twelve 
 inches, every one was true to the type. Passing on to 
 a rocky ledge, I saw a cluster of the fern I had gone in 
 quest of. Down I sat, in admiration wrapt, the world 
 forgot ! What was the world to me, with its pomps, 
 and pleasures, and nonsense ? Away with printed books 
 and dried specimens ! Nature, ever enduring and capti- 
 vating Nature, is the best of all books to study from. 
 That, said I, is the Polypodium Dryopteris of learned 
 men. More than fifty of the fern were growing before 
 me, not one of them agreeing in any particular with 
 the Dryopteris of the books. 
 
 " When I had gathered the plants, I sat and looked 
 around. The day was warm and delightful. A thin 
 haze was dancing through the air. The effect was 
 charming, tempting one to dream. Through the mists 
 of Mirza I could see a human figure at the hill foot, 
 stooping low to the ground. Probably, thought I, some 
 broken-hearted pilgrim is providing for futurity. I 
 turned round, and after a while I looked again. Alas ! 
 it was a half -naked woman filling her stomach with cold 
 water. The spell was broken. It was time to be gone. 
 Adieu, old boy !" 
 
 In this way was the pleasant correspondence of the 
 two geologists carried on. There was no envy, but 
 every kind of helpfulness between them. Peach told 
 his discoveries to Dick, and Dick told his to Peach. 
 There were many discussions between them, more 
 particularly as to Peach's fossil wood. Dick said that 
 under Peach's supposition " a stone quarry becomes a
 
 300 THE OLD MAN'S SONG: CHAP. xvin. 
 
 buried forest." Yet Mr. Peach held that he was right. 
 And Dick also worked hard to get at the right meaning 
 of things. 
 
 On one occasion he writes to Peach as follows : " A 
 few days since I found myself standing by the sea- 
 shore on the east side of Dunnet Head. I was scanning 
 with delighted soul the overturned strata, and musing 
 on the Past, on the Beginning, on Eternity ! 
 
 " I am again bothered with rheumatism, and neither 
 an enthusiastic love of stones nor fossils can delude me 
 into the belief that pain is an illusion, and not a stern 
 reality intended no doubt for good, and yet I had as 
 lief be without it 
 
 " ' Oh ! age has weary days 
 
 An' nights o' sleepless pain ; 
 The gowden time o' youthful prime 
 Can never come again ! ' 
 
 That's the old man's song, Charlie. But it is all owing 
 to temperament or constitution, or to stamina at the 
 outset. 
 
 " I felt considerable chagrin when you returned from 
 the West, and brought no root of Scolopendrium with 
 you. I did not want it for myself, but for science and 
 Nature. I wished to plant it on Dunnet cliffs, or on the 
 slate hills to the south of Thurso. I know favourable 
 spots where I think it would live, and gratify the weary 
 souls of lonely pilgrims, long after you and I are singing 
 hallelujah with the angels. If you don't send that 
 Scolopendrium, your monument in the North will have 
 no garland hung around it."
 
 CHAP, xviii. THE HART'S-TONGUE FERN. 301 
 
 A little later lie again complains of illness. He 
 says, " I can't bear mental fatigue. I am weary and 
 sore. The buzzing of a fly is a burden to me. I slept 
 only three hours last night. My head is sore, and I 
 am not 'i' the vein.' You compliment your humble 
 servant, and ask assistance to your list of queries. I 
 know a little just a little, and am daily making the 
 little more the mark of a true Scot ; yet in the im- 
 perfect knowledge of the Caithness strata I would not, 
 for crowns, or robes, or kingly globes, put my unhallowed 
 hands to a fancy section of Caithness strata." * 
 
 At length Peach sent him the Scolopendrium. His 
 sickness had fled, and he was quite jubilant in his reply. 
 " I have planted it," he said, " among the magnificent 
 crags of Dunnet Head. A bronze pillar should reward 
 the person who introduces into a county such a lovely 
 plant as the Hart's-tongue fern, ever verdant, ever gay. 
 What beautiful green fronds ! How handsome and 
 picturesque ! My only regret is that I cannot sow it 
 broadcast over the whole land." 
 
 A little later Peach sent him another lot of the 
 Hart's-tongue ferns from Sutherland. Dick proceeded 
 to plant them far astray, so that they might not be 
 huddled together into one corner, " I prefer," he said, 
 
 * Sir Eoderick Murchison had requested Mr. Peach to furnish him 
 with & section of the rocks between Morven and the Orkneys. 
 " What ?" said Dick, " a section of Caithness strata without previous 
 examination ? It would he a mere fancy section of the whole county's 
 hard crust, to the delusion of all and sundry." He adds, that he 
 Dejected Hugh Miller's " section of Caithness strata, as based on defect- 
 ive data and misleading calculations." 
 14*
 
 302 PLANTED OVER THE COUNTY. CHAP. XVIH 
 
 "the fatigue of planting them as widely apart from 
 each other as possible, so that they may scatter their 
 colonies. In long years, after you and I are dead, and 
 perhaps making ' a bung for a beer-barrel,'* they will 
 be fresh and flourishing. ... It was not for vanity that 
 I begged them from you. No. It was the certainty 
 that in generations yet unborn the feeling that ' vanity 
 of vanities, all is vanity,' would weigh down and 
 oppress, and that some wanderer sad might be made 
 happier by seeing them. For is not a ' thing of beauty 
 a joy for ever' ? Bless and thank you, my dear Charlie! 
 They'll never thank you. That's my duty ! One cannot 
 but admire the Wisdom which gave and gives a feeling 
 and a sense of the beautiful even to the ignorant. Were 
 it otherwise, Beauty would not exist; and to the All- 
 knowing how small is the difference between the sage 
 and the savage!" 
 
 A little later Dick says : " I have planted the Eoyal 
 Fern inland many miles. I have planted it at Eeay 
 and Dorery. There I can see the hills of Sutherland 
 far in the distance. Aided by my zealous friend Charles 
 the Sassenach, I have adorned and beautified Caith- 
 ness. I write this in the midst of care and trouble. 
 I have a bad cough, and no more romance at present. 
 
 * " Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, 
 till he find it stopping a bunghole ... Alexander died, Alexander 
 was buried, Alexander returneth unto dust ; the dust is earth ; ol 
 earth we make loam ; and why, of that loam, whereto he was con- 
 verted, might they not stop a Deer-barrel ? 
 
 " Imperious Csesar, dead and aimed to clay, 
 Might st.ip a. hole to keep the wind away." Hamlet.
 
 CHAP, xviii. LETTER TO PEACH. 303 
 
 Eobin's head's sair. It's a desperate thing to fill up a 
 page with a bad headache. I am glad that you are in 
 spirits at least, if not altogether in health. So many 
 people are going that I began to be apprehensive that 
 you were seriously ill. . . . Charles, old boy, go when 
 you may (unless I go first), I shall seriously miss you. 
 
 ROBERT DICK'S SEAT : VIEW INTO 8CTHEBLAND8HIRE. 
 
 I miss Hugh Miller as much as ever I did, and 'tis 
 likely I will ever do so." 
 
 Mr. Peach says that Dick had so thoroughly examined 
 the botany of the county, that for some years before his 
 death he could discover nothing that he had not before 
 met with. " I well remember," he says, " when asking 
 him ' what there was new,' his eye brightened up, and he 
 answered, ' Just this one plant new to the county. I 
 was giving up my botanical search, and returning home
 
 304 DARWIN'S JOURNAL. CHAP, xvm, 
 
 after a long evening walk from Dunnet Links, when I 
 lighted upon this pretty umbelliferous plant hedge 
 parsley ; and here it is ! ' Thus, so closely had he looked 
 up the plants of the county that for some years he could 
 scarcely discover another. Had he been persuaded to 
 give his thoughts to the world, he would have stood very 
 high in the ranks of scientific authors. But he never 
 could be induced to publish his observations and dis- 
 coveries. He could not get over his bashfulness." 
 
 Many discussions about geology occur in the course 
 of the correspondence. Peach sent Dick Darwin's 
 Journal to read. Dick replies : " Though the book was 
 never in my hands before, yet I found that I was already 
 familiar with most of the facts it contains. Sir Charles 
 Lyell draws upon it rather freely. And in various other 
 works I have met with his craft. He is a fine fellow. 
 . . . He traverses the widespread Pampas of Buenos 
 Ayres and Patagonia, rides over their accumulated sand 
 and pebbles and their sepulchres of dead bones, and he 
 is overwhelmed and bewildered at their magnitude. 
 But why should he be astonished ? The sands are many, 
 it is true, and the boulders and stones innumerable ; but 
 the sea, the million-handed ocean, that rounded them in 
 his palm, is vastly more extensive. The sea is a work- 
 man that never wearies, never rests, never slumbers ! 
 Thanks to you and Mr. Darwin, the perusal of the book 
 has confirmed nie in all that I told you long ago. . . . 
 Humboldt half guesses that the living and the fossil 
 animals belong to the still existing creation, but it seems 
 to be convenient to withhold the avowal
 
 CHAP. xvni. DEXTEROUS GEOLOGISTS. 305 
 
 " Nobody knows when this earth was made, how it 
 was made, or how long it was in making. 
 
 " Of one creation part we ken, 
 
 Wi' mair we dinna meddle ; 
 A nee dream o' twa, ye'll dream o' ten, 
 An' fancies endless diddle ! 
 
 " Don't think that I do not value Mr. Darwin. I 
 have read his observations most carefully; but with my 
 own spectacles. Geologists have led me such a dance 
 during the last twenty-five years, that I prefer that way 
 of reading books. 
 
 " This earth on which we move may have been 
 created very long ago, but certainly most of the regions 
 visited by Mr. Darwin exhibited very few signs of a 
 hoar antiquity ; and despite previous teachings and their 
 influence, the very recent nature of many of the deposits 
 forced itself upon his attention." After quoting from 
 Humboldt, Professor Sedgwick, and others, he continues 
 the argument in favour of his own views. He concludes 
 thus : " I remember that when friend Hugh set down 
 in print that all that lived previous to and during the 
 chalk died out with the chalk, and not one existence was 
 spared ; yet when, after a time, a species of shell was 
 found in tertiary and chalk strata, the geologists very 
 dexterously clapped those tertiary strata alongside and 
 with the chalk, just to make things tally ! How will 
 they manage now ? " 
 
 Dick deprecated the idea of explaining the universe 
 and how it was formed, but he threw out the following 
 idea of the greatness of the thing attempted to be ex-
 
 306 THE CUPFUL OF SAND. CHAP. xvm. 
 
 plained, and the littleness of the things attempting to 
 explain it : 
 
 " Take a cupful of sand and strew it over the floor. 
 It is a mere sprinkling, scarcely discernible. A fly 
 settles down on it, walks over and across it, and regard 3 
 it as hi no way remarkable. A smaller creature than 
 the fly comes and walks over it To him it is a very 
 great matter, quite a Sahara ! Now, were the whole of 
 the formations of geologists, by some superhuman power, 
 let loose particle from particle, and the whole strewed 
 over the floor of the ocean, would they form more than 
 a mere sprinkling ? 
 
 " Brush the cupful of sand together again. It forms 
 a little hill, or, if of a lengthened form, a mountain 
 range. The fly from your window comes again and 
 settles down beside it. He looks up. ' How magnifi- 
 cent ! ' says he. He walks round it and over it. ' How 
 vast ! millions and millions of years must have been 
 consumed in their formation ! ' Ignorant, simply igno- 
 rant, all the while, of the means by which a body of 
 matter so apparently formidable to his puny ideas was 
 brought together. The fly will not understand it, but 
 he'll buzz and buzz, and make a noise ; and his fellow 
 flies, hearing the noise, will exclaim, ' What a long- 
 headed fellow ! ' " 
 
 George Shearer of Thurso, then a student at Edin- 
 burgh, was a great admirer of Dick. He got from him 
 a great deal of his first knowledge of botany. As in 
 the case of Dr. Meiklejohn, Dick took him to see the 
 plants growing in their native habitats. They had con-
 
 CHAP, xviii. DR. SHEARER. 307 
 
 versations on many subjects. But there was one subject 
 on which George Shearer was particularly anxious to 
 know Dick's opinion ; and that was his views as to the 
 Mosaic Cosmogony. 
 
 Accordingly, he wrote to him from Edinburgh on the 
 subject. But Dick was not to be " drawn " by a person 
 so much his inferior in years and knowledge. He re- 
 plied : " As to your religious queries, my answer is 
 On religious matters we are not equal. I am within 
 three months of being fifty-three years of age. Wait 
 until you are as old, and wearing spectacles, and then 
 we will discuss those matters. Meantime, as you can- 
 not rest, you will probably be writing a commentary on 
 the Eomans. My advice to you is, 'Tak' tent; let 
 sleepin' dogs lie ! ' " 
 
 This reminds one of a story told of the late poet 
 Rogers. When asked by a lady what was his religion, 
 he replied, " I am of the religion of all sensible men." 
 "And what is that?" asked the lady. "All sensible 
 men," replied Rogers, " keep that to themselves." 
 
 Dr. Shearer, many years after, when grown to man- 
 hood, said that Dick must then have thought him some- 
 what of a prig. " I took his reply," he says, " in excellent 
 part. I felt that, when he wrote it, he thought that the 
 unthinking may easily be orthodox, and that the loudest 
 professors were sometimes the shabbiest actors in the 
 drama of life." 
 
 Dick was of opinion that dogmatism in interpretation, 
 was equally out of place in geology as in divinity. He 
 thought that man's proper work at present was to search
 
 308 DR. MEIKLEJOHN. CHAP, xvin 
 
 and acquire new facts and materials for the formation of 
 further knowledge. Theories might wait. Certainly the 
 time had not yet arisen for harmonising the Testimony of 
 tlie Rocks with the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. 
 
 Dr. Meiklejohn again resumed his correspondence 
 with his friend Dick on his return to England, while 
 surgeon of H.M.S. "Asia." Dick replied to him at 
 once. He began his letter to the doctor with a little 
 bit of censure : " If I were to plead busy, as you do, as 
 an excuse for not writing, I think I would never scribble 
 a word at all. I rise generally at three o'clock, and am 
 for the most part engaged all the day until I go to roost 
 at nine o'clock in the evening. Nothing but thirty 
 years' practice could have enabled me to endure such a 
 galley-slave life. 
 
 " I have not seen Sir Charles Lyell's book on the 
 Geological Age of Man, and should I see a review of it I 
 must be on my guard, for I fear I am too straightfor- 
 ward in expressing my notions on these and other 
 fashionable speculative dreams. I have seen Darwin's 
 book on Orchids very coolly reviewed in the Athenceum. 
 I have no wish to meddle with Mr. Darwin's peculiar 
 notions. . . . One thing, indeed, I'll grant Mr. Darwin 
 that hundreds of so-called species may have sprung 
 from one stock. I have been lately looking at grasses, 
 and would not care though Mr. Darwin made all the 
 species of Poa and Festuca to have grown from one 
 plant. And so of many more of them." 
 
 In a future letter Dick says : " I am sorry you think 
 that I do an injustice to Mr. Darwin, as I would not
 
 CHAP. xvni. MR. DARWIN'S VIEWS. 309 
 
 knowingly do an injustice to any one. It is quite pos- 
 sible that, in my ignorance of what that gentleman's 
 true views really are, I may have spoken rashly and 
 hastily. That you can pardon, for in truth I have never 
 read one of his books, and the reviewers of them mry 
 have twisted his meaning to serve their own purposes. 
 
 " If what Mr. Darwin means be, that the various ani- 
 mals and plants we see around us are not exactly first 
 creations that is, are not now what they were when 
 made by the hand of the Almighty, but have since that 
 act been changing continually, so that it is now difficult 
 to say from what particular stock the various forms have 
 come if that be all, if not pushed too far, it does not 
 seem dangerous doctrine ; in fact, it looks rather playful, 
 and at the same time it may have much truth in it. I 
 can myself see that it is and must be difficult to deter- 
 mine from what particular stock many species of plants 
 have sprung. For that every species, made such by man, 
 was a particular act of God's workmanship, is out of the 
 question. That idea I cannot admit at all. Cuvier's 
 definition of a species may be the right one, but surely it 
 is rash and presumptuous. How can I or any man, 
 while looking at a plant, say that it has maintained all 
 its particular characteristics unchanged since it came from 
 the hands of its Maker ? 
 
 " Since I have looked at Scotch roses for example, 
 the very small lot of them to be met with in Caithness 
 I have found much to correct my earliest ideas on 
 creation, such as my teachers (knowing as little as I did 
 myself) instilled into me. I thought, even since I read
 
 310 EXTERNAL INFLUENCES. CHAP. xvin. 
 
 books on plants, and looked on the coloured figures, that 
 the various species were well marked, and must have 
 had a distinct origin. I confess that that notion is fast 
 leaving me. All my simpler ideas are giving way. 
 Whether the result will be to make me happier or better 
 I cannot say. Certainly they cannot hurt me, for, after 
 all, first stocks must have had a Creator. They could not 
 spring up out of the ground unbidden, and that is enough 
 for me. There is an over-ruling Hand everywhere. 
 
 " External influences such as soil, situation, climate, 
 and such like exercise a powerful effect on wild roses. 
 Take, for instance, the Rosa spinosissima. You know its 
 peculiar characteristics, and how very unlike the 
 common dog rose (R. canina) it is. Would you 
 believe that one bush of it on the boulder clay here, 
 has put forth flowers hardly distinguishable from dog- 
 roses. The leaves large, the flowers white, the prickles 
 hooked, and so on. You have seen roses in country 
 gardens ? White roses in a corner, with double flowers, 
 and very large unsightly leaves. Well, would you 
 think or expect Rosa spinosissima to have such large 
 unsightly leaves growing wild on hard boulder clay ? 
 Some stocks of R. spinosissima have pink petals; in 
 dry years, red petals and excessively hairy leaves ; in 
 wet seasons, white petals and smooth leaves ; in short, 
 the leaves and the whole plant vary excessively. And 
 suppose the plant changed to another soil, and favoured 
 by shelter, its improved appearance is hardly credible. 
 
 " I have seen something worth noting. Some plants 
 of Rosa spinosissima grew on the face of a brae of blue
 
 CHAP. xvin. VARIETIES IN ROSES. 311 
 
 boulder clay. Drains and improvements on the soil atop 
 of the clay sent a perpetual stream of water over the 
 roots of the plants. In two years they have so altered 
 that I can hardly believe my eyes. . . . All the roses 
 growing wild in Caithness may have come from one 
 stock ; but from what particular stock I cannot tell." 
 
 We merely quote these remarks from Dick's letters 
 to show the acuteness and accuracy of his observations. 
 He never missed any peculiar characteristic of a plant. 
 He had also a wonderful memory about it, and could 
 contrast its appearance during one season with its 
 appearance in another. It was the same with all his 
 natural history observations. In one of his letters to 
 Dr. Meiklejohn he refers to the mischief done to the 
 fields of Caithness by a particular grub. " Speaking of 
 grasses," he says, " reminds me of the crops of Caithness. 
 They are desperately cut up by a worm, of what par- 
 ticular species I'll not say, but the grub of 'Daddy 
 Longlegs ' (Tipula oleracea) has certainly the predomi- 
 nance. It has drawn after it whole flocks of starlings, 
 who are driving a brisk trade. But it would require 
 millions of them to stay she plague. Indeed, the work 
 of ruin is already done. It is pitiful."
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 ROBERT DICK IN ADVERSITY. 
 
 FLOWERS, ferns, and mosses, must for a time disappear, 
 and give place to troubles, disappointments, and sorrows. 
 It is a hard work-a-day world in which we live. Mis- 
 fortunes follow close upon pleasures, however innocent ; 
 and we must set ourselves to bear them as best we may. 
 Dick was never a rich man. The most that he could 
 do was to make both ends meet and keep out of debt. 
 He could even spare a little money to buy books. Be- 
 fore 1860, we find him buying from the Thurso book- 
 seller the History of British Lichens, the Coloured Ferns 
 of Britain, Sowerby's Ferns, and the Handbook of British 
 
 But after that time his business fell off rapidly, and 
 he had to be more sparing in his book-buying. It must 
 be said of Dick that he closely attended to his business. 
 Only once do we find him confessing that he had stolen 
 a morning from his daily work ; and that was when he 
 went on his long journey to Freswick, to search for shells 
 among the boulder clay for his friend Hugh Miller. 
 
 Though he often left the town at midnight, his bread 
 for the following morning had been baked before he left. 
 It was sold during the day by his housekeeper. And
 
 CHAP. xix. LOSES HIS BUSINESS. 313 
 
 he was always back to Thurso to resume his work on 
 the same evening. During the interval, he had been 
 rambling over the county, and sometimes walking from 
 fifty to eighty miles wandering under the red sand- 
 stones on Dunnet Head or travelling to Reay, the 
 Dorery Hills, or Strath Halladale. His journeys to 
 Morven were usually made on the fast days, which 
 gave him a day extra. 
 
 He lost his business principally through excessive 
 competition. When he first went to Thurso, there was 
 only another baker besides himself. He was then com- 
 fortable enough, though he did all his work himself, 
 never employing either a journeyman or an apprentice. 
 Two more bakers commenced business in 1856. Each 
 of these took a certain share of his trade ; and, of 
 course, his business fell off. Writing to his sister in 
 May 1856, he said: " The mischief done me can never be 
 repaired here. I've lost much, and am still losing ; and 
 what is worst of all, I am losing my health. I have 
 not had a day's health since February last, and good- 
 ness knows that if I had to take to my bed all would 
 be over. And is it not very hard, and a poor reward 
 for the twenty-five years of toil and privation that I 
 have had ? Very hard indeed ! I wish I could get 
 away ; but where to, or what to labour at, I know not. 
 To go abroad seems ridiculous in every way, as I would 
 either have to try to be a shepherd or a day-labourer. 
 Sometimes I think I might contrive to work in a malt- 
 kiln, but perhaps I could not get that even if I tried. 
 
 " And thus my existence is embittered. Years, many
 
 314 GETS DOWN-SPIRITED. CHAP. xix. 
 
 years ago, I saw the dark clouds gathering close about 
 me ; and now it has all come true. Often was I on the 
 point of leaving. But infatuated procrastination always 
 whispered, ' Try again.' I did ' try again,' but it was of 
 no use. It only led to further loss. And losing, and 
 losing slowly though surely, in spite of all my toil and 
 care, until my small means are so reduced that I hardly 
 now dare to look into the future. if I had only gone 
 away four years ago ! If I had gone then, I should 
 have been stronger in Means, stronger in Health, and, 
 above all, stronger in Will and determination. Alas ! 
 I feel that by and by I shall be as soft as a piece of 
 boiled fish ! " 
 
 Though still engaged in finding fossil fishes for Hugh 
 Miller, and collecting botanical specimens from the 
 grasses, ferns, and mosses of Caithness, the thought was 
 constantly in his mind of how he could get away from 
 his losing business. At one time he thought of getting 
 admitted to the Coastguard service ; but he found that 
 he was too old for the position. But could he not yet 
 remove from Thurso, and set up as a baker elsewhere ? 
 Muckart, a village near Kinross, was mentioned to 
 him ; but he said, that " no man in his senses would 
 set his foot there." Then Bannockburn, near Stirling, 
 was mentioned : would that do ? " No," said he ; "I 
 have a dread of weaving places. "Weavers often suffei 
 great misery, and a stoppage of trade is clean ruin." 
 Another place was mentioned, where a business was for 
 sale. But he had not the means of buying or carrying 
 on the trade. And thus he was left at Thurso, to " try 
 again " !
 
 INCREASE OF BAKERS. 315 
 
 Matters became worse and worse. Mo're bakers ap- 
 peared in Thurso, and his trade again diminished. Some 
 of them sold whisky and groceries, besides carrying on 
 the baking business. Whisky was a great competitor ; 
 for Caithness folks are very drouthy. The Eeverend 
 William Smith of Bower, whose members, and even 
 whose elders, were much addicted to the use of spiritu- 
 ous liquors, once addressed his congregation as follows : 
 " My brethren, we are told in the Scriptures that the 
 ciders of old were filled with the Holy Spirit ; but now- 
 a-days, they're filled with John Barleycorn ! " One 
 may guess the wind-up of his sermon. 
 
 Dick was thus very heavily handicapped, as he 
 lived by baking alone. He then thought of carrying 
 on a tea business, and thus adding to his income. But 
 the idea was abandoned. One of the whisky and gro- 
 cery bakers determined to undersell all the bakers in 
 Thurso. He did so, and afterwards became a bank- 
 rupt. But Dick gained nothing from that. In the 
 contest he was nearly ruined. 
 
 "How many bakers, think you," he writes to his 
 sister in 1862, " are now in Thurso ? Six master bakers, 
 and thirteen apprentices ! All doing well, they say ! 
 Who rises earliest ? Dick. Who is the oldest ? Dick. 
 And yet Dick has not made a fortune ! I wish I had 
 left here in 1843, that is, eighteen years ago. There 
 is no use in repining. Yet how manfully I have battled, 
 no one knows. You see, from one of the papers you 
 sent me, that a baker's wife at Alva drowned herself in 
 Devon river, r^nd that a baker at Cupar-in-Fife baa 
 hanged himself. It did not surprise me."
 
 316 IMPROVEMENTS IN THURSO. CHAP. xix. 
 
 His sister offered to send him money and clothing. 
 Kobert refused the help. " Things have not come so far 
 as that yet," he said. " If they had, I should need a 
 strait jacket. To those who have to struggle by their 
 labour for a living, the prescription of coddling and nurs- 
 ing is about the worst treatment imaginable. It is neither 
 good nor profitable in any way. When any man or 
 woman consents to receive such things as you spoke of, 
 and for such a purpose, then adieu to all self-dependence 
 and self-respect. Then, ten to one, the individual would 
 become degraded and useless. You have no idea how 
 injurious it is, both to soul and body, to wear next 
 your skin what one never toiled for. Besides, your 
 income is little enough for yourself." 
 
 And yet Thurso was improving. Many new in- 
 habitants were added to the town, but very few of 
 them came to Dick's counter for bread. Pavement- 
 cutting had superseded herring-fishing. Many new 
 flag quarries had been opened out, and those who had 
 fished for herrings now cut flags for pavement. Many 
 of the old Highland cottars, who had been driven from 
 their homes, also resorted to Thurso for the same pur- 
 pose. 
 
 " In fact," said Dick, " the flag-trade here is every- 
 thing ; * and the town increases from day to day, chiefly 
 by additions from the surrounding country. The 
 
 * When the author was in Thurso he was introduced by name to an 
 eminent flag-cutter. " You will know this gentleman by his works ? " 
 "Ay; where are they? I never heard o' them." "I mean his 
 literary works." " Ou, is that it?" Thus flags, not books, rule tha 
 Thurso world.
 
 CAITHNESS COTTARS 
 
 317 
 
 town is all new-streeted and new- 41 
 roaded. No dirty water runs along ^ 
 them now. There are three policemen to keep down 
 dunghills. We have three new churches, two new 
 banks, and a gaswork. There is a fine statue of Sir 
 John Sinclair in front of the Moderate Kirk, alias 
 the Establishment. We have a new hotel, a new 
 court-house, and new shops. Whole rows of new 
 houses have been built. We have a steamer to Orkney, 
 a steamer to Leith, and a din about a railway.* In 
 fact, nearly everything has been changed, except the 
 fields round the town. These remain very much the 
 same, being fenced with flagstones set on end. When 
 I came first to the county, many of the poor people 
 never saw the sun until they came out and sat down at 
 the ends of their cots. But now, there are very few 
 houses without windows to be seen, though there are as 
 many swine as ever. Poor cottars are now dressed like 
 
 The railway has smoe been made. 
 15
 
 318 ANNIE MACK AY. CHAP. xix. 
 
 ladies and gentlemen nothing but silks and parasols. 
 ' Jack's as good as his master,' and sometimes he thinks 
 himself a good deal better. A dreadful place for money- 
 gathering, all coupled with a tremendous thirst for ser- 
 mons and prayer-meetings. Notwithstanding this, we 
 have scraping and lying all the week through." 
 
 None of this prosperity affected Dick. His business 
 was steadily falling off. And yet "the weary siller" 
 must be worked for. He was now getting old, and felt 
 himself unfitted for entering upon any new occupation. 
 He would have emigrated, but he had not the means. 
 Nor could he remove to any other place, for the same 
 reason. He was bound like a limpet to its rock. But 
 for his love of nature, it must have been a lonely life 
 that he led. He seems to have had few friends to 
 whom he could communicate his joys or his sorrows. 
 At least he never mentions them in his letters to his 
 sister, in which he mentioned all that he knew, and all 
 that he was doing. The principal person about him 
 was his old housekeeper, Annie Mackay, whose half- 
 Highland, half-Scotch conversations, he sometimes men- 
 tions to his sister. Here, for instance, is a specimen : 
 
 "Och hane! I'm thinkin' it's yeersel that's in the star- 
 vation countrie, wi' yeer eggs at saxteen pence the dizzen, 
 and yeer coos' butter at twenty pence the new pund ! 
 Och a nee, the like o' that's a farlie ! Fat gars ye 
 spike that waa, and consither a firlot little when she's 
 muckle ? Eh-a ? I dinna see yeer mistaaks, and hoo 
 ye read yeer paper upside doun. Fan yeer wark is 
 cleen, ye gang oot by an' kill yeersel and no be sorrin
 
 CHAP. xix. DICK'S GENEROSITY. 319 
 
 at the fyre. That's fat ye sud dee, an' if ye dinna, 
 ye kenna fat's the consequence, nor hoo a' study wearies 
 the flesh. Forbye, ye tak cauld, and get giddy in yeer 
 head, loss understanding and coup ower, an' mistaks, 
 damage things, and brak. Fat wye ? Fat sense's that ? 
 I dinna see ony intill't. 
 
 " I canna see hoo ye see, I canna mak oot hoo ony 
 Christan genlm is to gang oot in mires, brakin stanes 
 amang snaw, and seekin' whistles in a moor hill-side. 
 Na, na ; he's fustlin' eneugh in Lonon [this must refer 
 to Sir Roderick Murchison], sittin in a chair toastin' his 
 taes, and lookin at Africa wye two thousin lochs amang 
 mountains. Forbye ye mistak sair a' the warl's wyes, 
 an hoo anither thing says one thing is meant. An' foo, 
 unless yeer astonishmen' is greet, yeer need to spike is 
 little." 
 
 Dick seems to have been much amused by the con- 
 versation of his housekeeper. She was a very careful 
 woman. She never wasted a farthing's worth of her 
 master's goods. When beggar children came to the 
 door, she was firm in her resistance to their entreaties. 
 " The breed wuna hers, but the maister's." The bairns 
 waited until the maister was at home, and then they had 
 their serving. For Dick was always generous to hungry 
 children. " My kin' maister," said Annie, " was very fond 
 o' bairns that wud be clean an' tidy. Mony a time he 
 gaed a piece ta ony poor bodie that cam to the door." 
 
 Another thing that kept Dick poor was his honesty. 
 He gave full weight full measure and running over. 
 He never scrimped any poor person of his bread. His
 
 320 HONESTY THE BEST POLICY. CHAP. xix. 
 
 quarter-loaf always contained four pounds full; whereas 
 the loaves of many of the other bakers were short by 
 about four ounces. Their two-pound loaves were short 
 by about two ounces. Thus, cheating had the advan- 
 tage over honesty, of six per cent on every loaf of 
 bread sold. That was a profit by itself; but few people 
 had the means of weighing their bread, to detect the 
 honesty or dishonesty of their baker, and therefore the 
 cheating went on to Dick's ruin. Yet he never 
 relaxed his principle of giving full weight. " Honesty's 
 the best policy," continued to be his maxim. He felt 
 that it was better to die than be dishonest. 
 
 In a letter written to his sister at this disconsolate 
 period of his life, he says : 
 
 " I have not much of a hopeful kind around me, and 
 yet, as I have a sun and moon of my own, I am gener- 
 ally very cheerful. I often take some hearty laughs 
 when no one is near me. I am nearly indifferent to the 
 whole world. But that won't do either. I keep always 
 moving never indulging in idleness or lying in bed in 
 the morning. Up at four o'clock, or half-past four at 
 latest ; sometimes at three o'clock. 
 
 "There is a baker here that lies in his bed till seven 
 or eight, and his two apprentices keep knocking at his 
 door until he rises. He goes dabbling on till eight or 
 nine at night. Besides parridge, wife, and bairns, he 
 knows no more. That's not worth living for. People 
 came into the world for something better. 
 
 "I am working at my plants perseveringly ; and 
 whatever is to be the end, I keep moving. . . . Nor am
 
 CHAP. xix. MOSSES BY MOONLIGHT. 321 
 
 I ignorant that all my toil is vanity, in one sense, and 
 perhaps in every sense. I am indifferent nearly to 
 everything. Hope of any real happiness in this world 
 is out of the question." 
 
 " I have been poring every spare minute over dried 
 mosses. I have been so engaged during the last 
 month. Not long since, I had the eager curiosity to 
 walk out one night, when I picked up a very nice moss 
 by the light of the moon ! You may ask, how could I 
 do that ? Thanks be praised, I've got my eyesight, my 
 feelings, and I can- grape* too. It was a very frosty 
 night, and hailstones lay thick upon the bog ; but I 
 knew the exact spot where the mosses grew. I had 
 taken a look at them some six weeks before, and found 
 them in prime condition. The world was asleep. 
 Mosses, not Moses. I often consult Moses' writings. 
 How fine that is about the scapegoat sent into the wil- 
 derness, with the cord about his horns, bearing a burden 
 that he did not feel. Splendid Bible that ! 
 
 " If any friend asks you about your brother Eobert, 
 you may say that he inherits the blessing of Jacob's 
 son. If they inquire which son, you may say the one 
 who was likened to an ass ' stooping down between two 
 burdens' with this difference, that instead of two, 
 your brother has a score or two of burdens. He knows 
 by sad experience that 'rest is good.' But he is at 
 times so wearied and sore that he cannot find rest. 
 And further, the person who said that ' the harder the 
 * Grape Search with the hands in the dark.
 
 322 LOSING HIS EYESIGHT. CHAP. xix. 
 
 work the sweeter the rest,' never toiled hard in his life. 
 But there is nothing for the machine that has been 
 long in use but to keep it going, otherwise it would fall 
 to pieces. So I always keep in motion, though the 
 battle is not half won yet." 
 
 One of his troubles was that his eyesight was 
 becoming defective. " You see," he said to his sister, 
 " that I am on the decline not in bodily strength, 
 for I can walk sixty miles without a rest but in 
 eyesight. I have to use spectacles with candlelight, 
 either in reading or writing. I am employing my spare 
 time in working at my plants. I have arranged four- 
 teen hundred specimens, but I may say that I have 
 three thousand specimens altogether, because of the 
 varieties." 
 
 His sister sent him a new pair of spectacles, bought 
 expressly for him at Edinburgh, but they did not suit 
 his eyes. " It is a sad annoyance to me," he said 
 in reply, "that I cannot read with them the more 
 especially as I can hardly live without books, and my 
 time for reading is principally in the evening. As it is, 
 I must endure the drawback. Tew and scanty are my 
 pleasures ; indeed they are such as are usually despised 
 by thoughtless people. I will surely try to live an 
 inoffensive life, though I'm no favourite with anybody. 
 I have a great deal of unknown grief. This world's 
 people have almost left me, and I struggle hard, very 
 hard." 
 
 His sister at once sent him a new pair of spectacles, 
 and they suited him better ; but he said, " It is rheu-
 
 GROWING OLD. 323 
 
 matism that has been troubling me, and giving me that 
 dreadful pain in the eyes. . . . Your petting is not 
 good for me. I've been so long accustomed to rough 
 usage, that your kindness seems quite unnatural. I 
 have laid my own specks aside, and am trying your 
 pair, but there is no abatement in the rheumatism not 
 one hair. I pay for reading as dear as ever. It is 
 certainly rather hard that there should be any tax 
 whatever on the means of acquiring knowledge. 
 
 " I am pretty indifferent to the thought of growing 
 old, if I could only read as freely as I used to do. 
 Nothing like the natural eyesight. I never wearied 
 then. I did not need to squeeze my eyeballs or my 
 eyelids, to get relief. If the pain were constant, I 
 should be truly miserable. But as yet the infliction 
 merely comes and goes." 
 
 In the autumn of 1862, Professor Wyville Thomson, 
 then of Queen's College, Belfast, called upon Mr. Dick 
 at his bakehouse, and had some conversation with him 
 as to the fossil fishes of the Old Red Sandstone. The 
 Professor was introduced by Charles Peach, and was 
 therefore made cordially welcome. After some conver- 
 sation about fossils, Dick turned to the subject of 
 Botany, and the Professor promised, so far as he could, 
 to furnish him with the specimens of dried plants of 
 which he was still in want. On his return to Belfast, 
 he sent Dick a list of British plants, and asked him to 
 mark those which he required for his herbarium. 
 
 Sir Wyville Thomson has favoured us with the fol- 
 lowing recollection of his visit :
 
 324 SIX WYVILLE THOMSON CHAP. xix. 
 
 "My acquaintance with Kobert Dick was very 
 slight, but I was greatly struck with all I saw of him, 
 I had been working at the Old Eed beds in Orkney 
 with William Watt, another very remarkable man, 
 somewhat of the same character ; and crossing over by 
 Thurso, I spent two or three hours with Dick, whom I 
 knew about through my old friend Peach. I was 
 specially interested at the time in the structure of 
 Coccosteus, and had got some fine specimens in Orkney, 
 with all the outer armour plates capitally preserved; 
 but I remember Dick showing me some curiously 
 preserved examples from beds of a different character 
 near Thurso, which threw a good deal of light upon the 
 form of the cartilaginous part of the skeleton. 
 
 " Dick was a singular man very shy and retiring, 
 and not very easy of access in his bakehouse. Peach 
 had a very great regard for him. He was intelligent, 
 and fairly well read on all matters. One fancy he had 
 was for Egyptian antiquities, and his bakehouse was 
 all over with Egyptian hieroglyphs. He was a good 
 botanist, and a very intelligent geologist. He did not, 
 however, believe in the succession of species, and would 
 never have done for a Darwinian. His firm conviction 
 was, that all living creatures had been on this earth at 
 the same time." 
 
 The result of the visit was, that Dick promised to 
 resume his researches into the fossil fish beds near 
 Thuiso, and to send the result of his findings to Pro- 
 fessor Wyville Thomson at Belfast. Winter was 
 approaching, and the days were shortening. Thus
 
 CHAP. xix. CORRESPONDS WITH DIC&' 325 
 
 some time elapsed before he could further communicate 
 with the Professor. He thus described the result of 
 his labours to his sister : 
 
 "My spare time," he said, "is very limited; and 
 seeking fossil fish in stones at this season (February 9, 
 1863) is like playing at Blind Man's Buff all a-groping 
 in the dark ; and it is at the same time attended with 
 the severest labour. As yet, I have found nothing 
 extraordinary. I am fairly in for a search amongst the 
 rocks until the first of April. While the weather is 
 cold, I don't mind smashing away with a hammer on 
 the rocks ; but when the air grows mild, the toil 
 becomes too much and all for amusement ! " 
 
 In the meantime, a letter arrived from Professor 
 Thomson (February 18, 1863) congratulating Dick upon 
 recommencing his labours among the rocks. "I will 
 try to be careful," he said, " but there is great pleasure 
 in change. An old fact looks so fresh when you look 
 at it through a nice new green theory ! At all events, 
 I am right glad that you have taken to the old fishes 
 again. I never saw in my life a little set from which 
 such a lot of information could be extracted as from 
 yours. I think I must come north again for a longer 
 look at them. 
 
 " You have one specimen which could throw a deal 
 of light upon a question I am working at just now a 
 dorsal plate of Coccosteus, which has a sort of double 
 appearance, as if there had been a thick plate of 
 cartilage below the bone. I was more taken up at the 
 time with Asterolepis; so I just glanced at it. But 
 15*
 
 326 RESEARCHES AMONG THE ROCKS. CHAP, xix 
 
 now, when I am writing about Coccosteus, it comes 
 back to my memory. I do not remember the size 
 of the specimen, but it would be a great favour if 
 you could lend it to me for a few days. I do not know 
 if you ever do such a thing, but it is a common practice 
 among us working men." 
 
 " Can you tell me anything new about Coccosteus ? 
 All information would be most thankfully received at 
 present. The next set I mean to take up is Astero- 
 lepis." 
 
 Encouraged by this letter, Dick proceeded with his 
 researches among the Thurso rocks. After the lapse of 
 a month, his sister wrote to him to inquire what new 
 fossils he had found; and he thus (March 10, 1863) 
 described the results of his labours : 
 
 "When I promised," he said, "to look out for speci- 
 mens for Professor Thomson, I had faint hopes of 
 finding anything. I had overhauled almost every 
 accessible rock from Portskerra to John o' Groat's 
 House ; and that too so very patiently, that I knew, or 
 thought I knew, that very little presented itself on the 
 external surface worthy of the toil of digging. I 
 resolved, however, to try the sea-shore. I there noted 
 all the changes that had occurred since the date of my 
 last visit. 
 
 "A furious storm had been hammering upon the 
 rocks since then. Storms make havoc of stronger 
 things than ships. What power a stormy sea has ! Its 
 incessant- thunderings upon the shores often make a 
 new section of the land. It washes away the bitumen.
 
 CHAP. xix. NEW STRATA EXPOSED. 327 
 
 and leaves new strata exposed, so that they may be 
 traced in layers, one above the other. I now found many 
 large blocks of rock, which a hundred men could not 
 move, tossed about as a strong man would toss a foot- 
 balL 
 
 "As the sea had gone thundering along over the 
 rocky ledges, the waves had torn up and removed many 
 of the lesser masses, thus exposing to the curious eye 
 numerous fresh surfaces. I ran eagerly to examine 
 them ; for there, if anywhere, I knew that I might have 
 a chance of finding fossils. My luck was, however, very 
 ordinary. I found many scales of the size of half- 
 pennies ; bits of bones ; bits of fins ; and little sea-shells. 
 I found, also, bits of plants, hard and black. In one 
 spot, a large stone had been driven along, and by its 
 weight, as it grated on the rocks, had exposed what, to 
 the inexperienced eye, would seem a trifling bit of bone. 
 I saw it, and laughed aloud. / knew it ! I knew it, 
 though not more than the breadth of a penny-piece lay 
 exposed ! The rest was under the stone. 
 
 "I returned home, but not without marking many 
 wonders. On the following day I returned to the 
 stone, with my hammer and chisels. After fully an 
 hour's hard kbour, I dug out the bone, and carried it 
 home with me. I afterwards cut it neatly with a saw. 
 It now awaits Professor Thomson. No one can give 
 him such another bone. A truth ! I have a few small 
 fishes, fish-heads, plants, shells, and sundry other things, 
 for the Professor, and I expect more ; but 'tis awful hard 
 work."
 
 328 HAMMERING IN A SNOWSTORM. CHAP. xix. 
 
 Dick also gave the following account of Professor 
 Thomson's visit to a geological friend in London : " The 
 Professor very kindly offered to assist me with a few 
 of my desiderata in dried British plants. I thought I 
 would try to get a fossil or two for him in return, 
 before I drew upon his kindness ; and this notion sent 
 me with renewed zeal to all my old haunts by the 
 shores. . . . Since two weeks after New Year's day, 
 I have been working at intervals. My hardihood 
 has been put to a severe enough test. Only think of 
 my hammering at the rocks for fossils in a snowstorm ! " 
 
 Unfortunately, the fossils which Dick had intended 
 for Professor Thomson were not sent to him. The 
 reason of that omission will be explained in the next 
 chapter.
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 DICK COMPELLED TO SELL HIS FOSSILS. 
 
 AT the very time that Dick was writing the pre- 
 ceding letter to his sister, a circumstance occurred 
 which brought him almost to the verge of ruin. 
 
 He had ordered from his flour merchants at Leith 
 twenty-three bags of fine flour. They were shipped by 
 the steamer " Prince Consort " in the month of March 
 1863. The steamers from Leith to Thurso usually call 
 at Aberdeen and Wick on their way northward. On 
 entering the harbour of Aberdeen, the " Prince Consort " 
 struck the platform, and ran along the North Pier, 
 where the passenger 5 * were taken off. It must have 
 been a lubberly affair, as there was no heavy sea on at 
 the time. It was said that the person who steered the 
 ship was half-drunk. 
 
 When the passengers were taken off, it was 
 attempted to float away the vessel, but as the tide 
 was ebbing, that could not be done. The sea eventually 
 broke her in two. The water entered the hold; and, 
 though part of the cargo was saved, Dick's flour was 
 thoroughly drenched.* 
 
 * The front part of the ship was floated oft some weeks after. The 
 hull was got together again. It was patched up and lengthened ; but 
 the " Prince Consort " finally came to grief, and was totally wrecked.
 
 LOSS OF DICK'S FLOUR. 
 
 The ship was insured, but Dick's flour was not. 
 Though the bill of lading intimated that the flour was 
 to be delivered in good order " the act of God, the 
 Queen's enemies, fire, and all and every other dangers 
 and accidents of the seas excepted " yet it was found 
 difficult to prove that the disaster occurred through the 
 negligence of those who managed the vessel. Those 
 whose goods had been lost or damaged had therefore to 
 sustain the loss. To Dick it was ruinous. 
 
 The cost of the flour was only 45 : 13 : 6 ; but, small 
 though the sum was, Dick had not the money at his com- 
 mand. What was he to do ? He had never been in debt 
 in his life. And yet, not only must this debt be paid for, 
 but he must order more flour in order to carry on his busi- 
 ness. He had been slowly going to ruin for years past. 
 He had lost 120 of his former savings ; and now, to use 
 his own words, the loss of 45 made him " next thing 
 to a beggar." His only property consisted in his books, 
 his collection of fossil fishes, his botanical specimens, 
 his slender stock of furniture, his old-fashioned clothes, 
 'and his little store of linen. These were of little value. 
 They could not be sold in time to save him. He must 
 turn to some one else. Then he bethought him of his 
 affectionate, generous-hearted sister. She had offered 
 him money a few years before, which he had refused, 
 because "coddling and nursing was about the worst 
 treatment imaginable." 
 
 But alas ! the time had come when he could no 
 longer refuse her generous offer. He wrote to her, 
 pouring out his griefs, and telling her how he had been 
 reduced almost to the brink of ruin.
 
 CHAP. xx. BORROWS MONEY. 331 
 
 " Have you still," he asked, " that spare money ? 
 Would you be willing to lend it to me in hope of getting 
 it back again ? Should you wish it, I would pay you 
 interest for it. I have long felt the necessity of getting 
 away out of this miserable place. There is no trade, and 
 the risk is very great. I have had a sore struggle, and 
 have often been sadly grieved ; but this is the saddest ill 
 that has ever come to me. ... I am injured for ever. 
 I'll never make an extra farthing by my trade here. 
 The bakers are in swarms now. I am old, and my 
 strength and sight fail me. Before, I had hardships 
 quite enough ; but now, this crowns everything. I am 
 stupid with grief." 
 
 Dick's sister earnestly sympathised with him. She 
 told him to cheer up to put his shoulder again to the 
 wheel, and that all might yet go well with him. She 
 sent him 20 of her spare money. She did so at consi- 
 derable sacrifice, as she required the money at that 
 time for special purposes. But she could not stand the 
 piteous entreaties of her brother, and sacrificed her own 
 requirements for his good. 
 
 Dick plucked up heart again. He replied to his 
 sister : " I am not easily put down. I am neither in- 
 active nor desponding. I am trying a way of recover- 
 ing my loss. Your brother Robert is the most active 
 and laborious person in the county, and could not live 
 in idleness for one week. He does not entertain a single 
 thought of being beat." 
 
 The "way of recovering his loss," to which Dick 
 alluded, was by selling his fossils. He had now a very
 
 332 JOHN MILLER, F.G.S. CHAP. xx. 
 
 fine collection ; but when such things are offered in the 
 market, they are likely to bring very little indeed. Still, 
 he was of opinion that if his collection was offered to 
 some scientific man, he might be able to realise enough 
 to pay his debts. 
 
 One of Dick's geological friends was Mr. John 
 Miller, F.G.S., a gentleman of independent property. 
 He belonged to Thurso, but lived for the most part in 
 London. He had a great respect for Dick, and took a 
 deep interest in his fossil researches. When at Thurso, 
 Mr. Miller was a frequent visitor at the bakehouse, and 
 had many keen discussions with Robert Dick and 
 Charles Peach about geological subjects. He was him- 
 self a collector, and employed a Mr. Budge to obtain 
 for him new specimens of fossil fishes. He often con- 
 sulted Dick as to their interest and value. 
 
 When the thought occurred to Dick of selling his 
 fossils to Mr. Miller knowing that he was buying them 
 from Budge he addressed to him the following letter : 
 
 " Some years since you saw that I was distressed, 
 and you offered to relieve me. I put your proffered 
 kindness aside. Since then you have had many oppor- 
 tunities of knowing and seeing me; and I think you 
 will allow that anything like complaining was very far 
 from me. A recent event, however, has ruined me. 
 The ' Prince Consort,' on attempting to enter Aberdeen 
 Harbour, has become a total wreck. I had flour on 
 her, uninsured, to the amount of 45 : 13 : 6. 
 
 "Enclosed is a note to Sir Roderick Murchison, 
 stating the matter, and promising to send him every
 
 CHAP. xx. DICK'S INDEPENDENCE. 333 
 
 Old Bed fossil in my possession, if he would in pity 
 undertake to do anything among the London geologists 
 by way of making up my loss. Will you in kindness 
 hand my note to him in a quiet way, and I will 
 be ever grateful to you ? If you dislike handing my 
 note to Sir Roderick, put it in the fire, and also this 
 one to yourself." 
 
 We have not Mr. Miller's reply to Dick's letter. 
 Very likely it may have been intended to cheer him 
 up. At all events it seems to have contained some 
 reference to Dick's " independence," for here is Dick's 
 reply, 27th March 1863 : 
 
 " It is all very good to talk to me aboat ' independ- 
 ence.' I have laboured among flour bags for the last 
 thirty-eight years, but I never yet knew an empty bag 
 to stand upright. 
 
 " An honest well-meaning man once kept his horse 
 on short allowance, and boasted that he had brought 
 him to live on a straw a day. But when he had 
 accomplished his object, the horse died. 
 
 " A very kind and a very discerning public have, for 
 the last eighteen years, set me down as independent, 
 and fed me with chopped straw; and now those 
 drunken blackguards of the steamer have ruined me. 
 I am a beggar, not in word, but in fact. 
 
 " Previous to writing to you, I applied to my sister 
 at Haddington. She at one time offered me 48. I 
 would not take the money. I thought that she might 
 still have it. She wrote at once, saying that she had it 
 yet, but was about to use it. I told her never to mind
 
 334 SIR RODERICK MURCHISON. CHAP, xx 
 
 me, and just to use it in the way intended. She 
 replied again, and sent me 20. 
 
 " The steamer people have sent me twelve bags, out 
 of twenty-three bags of my flour. I have laboured 
 hard and sifted it out, and made out six bags of spoilt 
 flour I With my sister's 20, and with what the flour 
 may do, and perhaps other resources, I will try and 
 manage to pay my bill. 
 
 "You will please to give orders to the National 
 Bank accordingly. Reverse your order.* I have not 
 gone to the bank, and do not intend to go on the errand 
 you speak of. 
 
 " As to my relations with Sir Roderick Murchison, 
 I am already his debtor for two hundred dried plants, 
 and rather than be turned out on the wide world, I 
 would not hesitate one moment in being indebted to his 
 goodness still further." 
 
 He followed this letter with another written on the 
 next day: 
 
 " On trial," he said, " I find that the flour saved, after 
 much labour, is mixed with sand ; consequently it will 
 have to go for little or nothing. 
 
 " In my last to you, I thought that I would get on 
 without troubling any one ; but now I find it all 
 hopeless. 
 
 " I have written to Sir Eoderick Murchison offering 
 to sell my fossils. I have asked his permission to send 
 
 * We infer from this, that Mr. Miller had directed the National 
 Bank to pay Dick a certain sum on his account. The italics are 
 Dick's.
 
 CHAP. xx. SELLS HIS FOSSILS. 335 
 
 them up to Jermyn Street Museum, that he might give 
 for them whatever he thinks them worth. 
 
 " Surely there is no degradation in this idea.* It 
 was altogether out of the question to allow the amount 
 of my loss to fall upon you. No ! I will not do that. 
 But if you put in a good word for me with Sir 
 Eoderick about these fossils, I shall feel grateful to 
 you. 
 
 " The fossils are not many, but they are such as Sir 
 Eoderick has not in his Museum. 
 
 " P.S. If Sir Roderick Murchison declines to pur- 
 chase my fossils, I'll not be beat, but will offer them to 
 some other person." 
 
 At last the matter was pleasantly settled. Mr. 
 Miller at once agreed to purchase the fossils, and sent 
 Dick an order on the National Bank for 46, the 
 amount of his loss by the shipwrecked flour. Dick 
 cordially acknowledged the receipt of Mr. Miller's 
 letter : 
 
 "I thank you most sincerely. I have to-day (4th 
 April) received a note from Sir Roderick Murchison. 
 He will take the fossils ; but I have settled it in my 
 mind to give them to you. I am afraid that I grieved 
 you by refusing your gift, but I could not, poor as I am, 
 take so much money for nothing. I will give all my 
 fossils to you every one of them shells of the boulder 
 clay and all. There are two or three which Hugh 
 
 * Sir Roderick had asked Dick several years before to sell come of 
 his rarer fossils to the Museum, but Dick preferred making a present 
 of them.
 
 336 HIS HEAVY HEART. CHAP. xx. 
 
 Miller gave me, and these I will add to my own collection 
 of fossils. I will also give you all those which I had got 
 for Professor Thomson, and my blessing along with them. 
 
 "Of course 46 is too much for them; but the 
 fossils are worth what they are worth; and I must 
 just be contented to stand indebted to your friendship 
 for the rest. I will label on the fossils the localities in 
 which they were found, and also pack them carefully. 
 
 " I am to write to Sir Roderick by this same post, 
 telling him that you had heard of my distress, that you 
 had made a most liberal offer to me for the fossils, and 
 that I had given them to you. I know at least 1 
 trust that Sir Roderick will see meet not to be 
 offended at me for giving you the preference. Sir 
 Roderick will get plenty, and so will you. But one 
 thing you know, that some of my fossils are altogether 
 rare, and not in the possession of any other person." 
 
 And thus ended the sale of Dick's fossils. He 
 parted with them with a heavy heart. But he was now 
 enabled to pay his bill for the lost flour, which he did 
 on the 29th of April following. How he regretted the 
 loss of his fossils may be inferred from a letter to his 
 brother-in-law: "Unhappily," he said, "I have now 
 no fossils. I have given them all away. Alas! how 
 often has my heart beat proudly, when looking over the 
 figures of jaws in Duff's and Dr. Buckland's books, and 
 saying, ' yes, these are very fine, but humble as I am, 
 I have finer than either.' But that is over, and they 
 are all away. They exist only in remembrance, and I 
 never hope to find the like again."
 
 CHAP. xx. PREACHING AND STIPEND. 337 
 
 Again he felt his business falling off. Unfortunately, 
 he had tried to make bread of the sifted flour saved from 
 the wreck ; but the bread was not good, and more 
 customers left him. " They might have borne with me," 
 he said, " a little longer, if they had only known of my 
 suffering and distress." Afterwards, he said, " If I had 
 only half as much work as I could do, I should be the 
 happiest of men. I have more biscuit beside me than I 
 shall be able to sell in three months. I would toil 
 willingly, but all is overdone here. It is very difficult 
 to get work at all. He is a happy man who can make 
 his living. Shoals of masons and house-wrights are 
 leaving here by steamer. 
 
 " Men are failing rapidly. One is said to have failed 
 for 3000. He hasn't preached according to his stipend. 
 You know the story. An elder went to his minister, 
 and said, ' that his preaching was rather poor ; that's 
 what people said.' ' Of what do they complain ?' asked 
 the minister. ' Weel, sir, they're saying that ye dinna 
 preach half weel.' ' So,' said the minister, ' but ye dinna 
 consider that ye dinna pay half weel. I preach 
 according to my stipend. P#y me better, and I'll preach 
 better ! ' And so, had the people bought better, the 
 merchant would have sold better, and not a breath would 
 have been heard about his failure." 
 
 Though Dick said that his customers were leaving 
 him, and that he was thought less of than ever, there 
 was still some comfort left him. " Nobody heeds me," 
 he said ; " and yet Nature is as kindly as ever." The 
 spring was approaching. Fine balmy days wooed him
 
 338 THE SPRING FLOWERS. CHAP. xx. 
 
 to the fields, or led him along the sea-shore. He watched 
 nature with the eye of a lover. He longed for the coming 
 of spring ; and when she came he was unspeakably glad. 
 He looked anxiously for every favourite plant, and knew 
 it at once as it put its first stem above the ground. 
 
 The spring was later in 1863. At the end of April 
 the fertile stems of the common Field Horsetail were not 
 yet above ground. He had seen only one rumpled 
 straggler. Neither Drummond's Horsetail, nor the Wood 
 Horsetail, had made their appearance. It was not until 
 about the middle of May that he found them above 
 ground, excepting Drummond's Horsetail, which was 
 always late. 
 
 " I went out last Sabbath morning," he said, " up the 
 river-side, and found the common Field Horsetail and 
 Wood Horsetail. The Water Horsetail was by the river- 
 side. The prevailing flowers are dog-violets and yellow 
 primroses. I found about six specimens of a rare plant 
 peculiar to the north. It is Ajuga pyramidalis a plant 
 I have sent alive, as well as dried, to the south. It is 
 a great prize with botanists. Of course, I look on them 
 now with very different feelings from what I once did. 
 I found also the early Purple Orchis by sixes and sevens. 
 Also a species of chickweed which I never saw before. 
 It is a larger and showy species. No other flowers have 
 come up as yet. But they will come. And when they 
 come, short will be their stay, and all will be again 
 desolate." 
 
 A few days later, he again goes up the river-side, and 
 found and plucked numerous specimens of the far-famed
 
 CHAP. xx. THE DAISY. 339 
 
 grass Hierochloe borealis. By this time Dick had 
 received communications from botanists in nearly every 
 part of the country, asking for dried specimens of the 
 grass. He also went to the cliffs on Dunnet Head, to his 
 ferneries on Ben Dorery and the Eeay hills, to see how 
 the ferns were growing that he had planted ferns that 
 would still be growing when he and his friend Peach 
 " were both out of time." 
 
 " I have discovered," he says one day, " another plant 
 wonder ! Some time ago I found a new daisy. I have 
 now found another. It has twenty-four little heads, 
 and the stalks are longer than the other. I sought all 
 over the grass field on which it grew, and could not find 
 another. I never read of such a daisy being found wild. 
 A daisy with thirteen heads, and another with twenty- 
 four heads, are most extraordinary. But ' little things 
 are great to little minds/" 
 
 To his brother-in-law he said : " So you have been 
 amongst gardeners, and found a daisy. Still, the wild 
 one is, I think much finer. It is tall, and being single, 
 it makes a more natural show. I have hastily pencilled 
 it off [giving a drawing of the wild daisy]. I could have 
 done it much better, only it is Saturday afternoon, and 
 I am busy. 
 
 " The daisy is a great favourite with the poets ; Burns 
 speaks of it as the ' wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower.' 
 Another says of it, ' the bright flower, whose home is 
 everywhere.' Another 
 
 " ' The rose has but a summer reign, 
 The daisy never dies.'
 
 340 MARINE PLANTS. CHAP, xx 
 
 And still another : 
 
 " ' Not worlds on worlds, in phalanx deep 
 Need we, to prove a God is here ; 
 The daisy, fresh from winter's sleep, 
 Tells of His Power in lines as clear.' " 
 
 As far on as the month of June, the weather was cold 
 and wet. There was a good deal of hail, and one day of 
 almost continuous snow. It is true, the snow melted 
 as it fell, and did no other harm than giving the grass a 
 brownish colour ; though the country folks said the dis- 
 tant hills were covered with snow. 
 
 Dick went to Loch Duran, some seven miles off, to 
 see the Bullrush, rather a rare plant in the far north ; 
 and besides the Lake Bullrush he found a much rarer 
 plant, the Lapland Eeed. He could find the plant no- 
 where else. Six miles inland he also found the Baltic 
 Rush. " How it got there," he said, "I cannot make out." 
 
 He was recommended to try his hand among the 
 marine plants. "I have little doubt," he observed, 
 "that something new might be discovered among the 
 weeds along the sea-shore. Solomon says, ' All things 
 are full of labour.' But I'm ower auld for the labour, 
 and as for the honour, if I get a splitting headache and 
 a sweating cough for my pains whilst dabbling in a salt- 
 water pool, perhaps the cost to me would be greater 
 than the honour. The poor animal is overladen already, 
 and to put on more weight would probably squeeze the 
 life out of him altogether." 
 
 " In fact," he says to Mr. John Miller, " I fear that in 
 pursuing researches among the rocks I have not been
 
 CHAP. xx. NA TIVE ROSES. 341 
 
 half cautious; for during June I have been suffering 
 severely from rheumatism, to an extent greater than 
 ever I did before. ' The vengeance ' has got hold of both 
 my feet, so much so that I have a difficulty in walking. 
 That, you may be sure, was gloomy for me. I grumbled 
 to be compelled to walk slow, especially when the spirit 
 within said, Forward" 
 
 And yet, when sufficiently well, Dick immediately 
 went to the fields again to gather ferns, grasses, plants, 
 and wild roses. One day he says to his brother-in-law, 
 "I have had a ramble sixteen miles out and sixteen 
 miles home again for a small fern not so long as your 
 little finger. I would not have gone so far, but that the 
 fern would not come to me. I had another ramble 
 twelve miles away and twelve miles home again, and all 
 for nothing. The plant I went to get was not growing 
 for want of moisture." 
 
 Dick had many applications for native roses. He 
 sent a number of them to Professor Babington of Cam- 
 bridge ; but he thought that the professor's opinion as 
 to the species to which they belonged was not quite 
 correct. Writing to a friend he said, " The genus Rosa 
 is a difficult one, even for the most experienced botanist. 
 It is hardly possible to tell the different species by their 
 leaves alone. Their fruit is a far better test. For 
 example, the leaves of the spiny or thorny rose may be 
 found of various sizes from an eighth of an inch to 
 more than an inch long. They differ so much in their 
 hairiness and smoothness that it would almost puzzle a 
 
 conjuror to define which was which. Some years since 
 16
 
 342 A SPERM WHALE. CHAP. xx. 
 
 I sent a packet of dry roses and leaves to Professor 
 Balfour, who sent them to Professor Babington in 
 England. The latter gave the best verdict he could, 
 and yet I have no faith in it. For example, he told me 
 that he believed one of them to be Rosa involuta. 
 Now, Rosa involuta is found in the Western Isles, and 
 a stranger might conclude readily enough that the plant 
 grew in our neighbourhood. I have ever since been 
 watching the bush from which I took the specimen ; but 
 I cannot form any other opinion than that it is a variety 
 only of the Rosa spinosissima, or the Thorny Eose. The 
 leaves of the said bush might pass for the leaves of Rosa 
 involuta, but the fruit will not. The fruit is invariably 
 the fruit of the Thorny Eose." 
 
 In September 1863, Dick received a letter from 
 Professor Owen, stating that he had been informed that 
 a large sperm whale had been cast ashore near Thurso, 
 and that, as he should like to secure the bones, he would 
 feel obliged to Mr. Dick if he would make the necessary 
 inquiries about the nature of the whale whether it was 
 a sperm whale or not. He added that Sir Eoderick 
 Murchison had informed him that Mr. Dick was the 
 most likely man in Thurso to help him on the occasion. 
 
 It seems that the whale was cast ashore at Sandside, 
 about thirteen miles from Thurso. Dick worked all 
 night with the object of starting on foot next morning. 
 But at two o'clock it began to rain, and it rained con- 
 tinuously for about a fortnight. What with his pains 
 and his rheumatism, he could scarcely go out of doors 
 during the interval. " Even if I went there," he said,
 
 CHAP. xx. DICK'S CORRESPONDENTS. 343 
 
 " it would only have been to guess. But I gathered 
 all the information I could get about the whale, and sent 
 it to Professor Owen." 
 
 Dick still kept up a considerable correspondence, 
 though it was for the most part forced upon him. He 
 was indisposed, amidst his troubles, to open new corre- 
 spondence; though those who had corresponded with him 
 once, would not allow him to forget them : his letters 
 were so interesting, humorous, and instructive. He was 
 often invited to pay visits far from home ; but that was, 
 of course, impossible. Few of his correspondents knew 
 of his poverty. Very likely, many of them thought him 
 to be a man of independent position. Mr. Notcutt of 
 Cheltenham thought that Dick wished the correspondence 
 with him to cease. But he wrote to him again and 
 again, until he replied. "I shall ever feel grateful to 
 you," said Mr. Notcutt, " for the noble series of Old Eed 
 fossils which, through your liberality, I possess. I 
 append a list of most of the things (dried flowering 
 plants) which I have for you." And at length Dick 
 was thawed into continuing the correspondence. Of 
 course Mr. Notcutt knew nothing of the pecuniary 
 struggles that Dick was then passing through. 
 
 Numerous requests were made to Dick for exchanges 
 of plants and fossils. Amongst his correspondence we 
 find letters from Dr. L. Lindsay, lichen ologist, Perth; 
 Mr. John Sim, botanist, Perth ; Mr. Roy, botanist, 
 Aberdeen ; Mr. Alfred Bell, Bloomsbury Street, London ; 
 Mr. John Backhouse, York ; Mr. Henry Coghill, Liver- 
 pool ; Mr. George Henslow, son of Professor Henslow
 
 344 MR. PRINGLE'S LETTER. CHAP. xx. 
 
 and from Mr. Tarrison of the Eegistrar-General's Office, 
 Melbourne. The principal applications made to him 
 were for fossils from the Old Bed Sandstone, and for 
 specimens of the Hierochloe 'borealis which Dick had 
 discovered so many years before on the banks of the 
 river Thurso. Mr. Pringle of the Farmer's Gazette, 
 Dublin, in acknowledging the receipt of a specimen, 
 addressed Dick in the following letter : 
 
 "I gave the specimens of the Holy Grass to Dr. 
 Moore of the Botanic Gardens. He expressed himself 
 much gratified with the same, and stated that he would 
 like to correspond with you. I send by book-post a 
 copy of his Notes of a Botanical Tour in Norway and 
 Sweden, which will likely interest you. I must repeat 
 what I said to you that I think it is a great pity, nay 
 more, a shame, that a man of your abilities and research 
 should be buried alive, as you are and have been. Why 
 not come out as an author on those subjects with which 
 you are so conversant ? I hope yet to see Robert Dick's 
 name taking its proper place among the list of British 
 scientific men far above the names of some who oc- 
 cupy a large share of public attention, but whose chief 
 claim to notoriety consists in an unbounded com- 
 mand of cheek, and of a still more unenviable gift of 
 the gab." 
 
 But it was too late for Eobert Dick to give his 
 thoughts to the world in writing. For one thing, he 
 was too modest. He was about the last person to wish 
 to see his name in print. He was always complaining 
 of the smallness of his knowledge, even about subjects
 
 LAST VERSES. 345 
 
 that lie had studied the most. " The more I know," he 
 said, "the more I feel my ignorance. Knowledge 
 seems to retreat before me." He often quoted the 
 words of Athena's wisest son " The most I know is, 
 nothing can be known." And yet he said, " There is a 
 satisfaction in getting on in knowledge, which those 
 only can imagine who have risen early in searching for 
 it." 
 
 He still continued to write verses, probably as a 
 relief from business troubles. Mr. Peach says that he 
 wrote verses down to the end of his life. The following 
 are extracted from some verses written in 1863, when 
 in the midst of his sorrow and poverty. The verses 
 commence, " waft me, o'er the deep Hue sea I " and pro- 
 ceed to the seventh stanza, which thus begins : 
 
 " O waft me o'er, and let me roam 
 
 Her untilled plains, her fertile soil, 
 Where weary wanderers find a home, 
 
 And live by honest, manly toil! 
 By manly toil they rear a home 
 
 Nor curst with want, nor crushed by care; 
 Nor grasping greed, nor grinding down, 
 
 Nor sad and weary struggle there. 
 
 " waft me o'er ! waft me o'er ! 
 
 In yon fair land there's peace and rest, 
 And toiling-room for thousands more, 
 
 With blissful Hope to soothe the breast. 
 With grief, with care, by sorrows prest, 
 
 Of fruitless toil, my heart is sick. 
 O endless dreams, in horrors drest, 
 
 Of cruel want, when old and weak!
 
 346 THE SLEEPLESS MAN. CHAP. xx. 
 
 " O waft me o'er ! O waft me o'er ! 
 
 Yon ship is strong ; the sea is still ; 
 Nor care I though a tempest roar, 
 
 And every billow rolls a hill ! 
 Let swelling sea-waves roar their fill, 
 
 And dash till crested white with foam, 
 "Tis sweet as murmuring mountain rill, 
 
 To soothe a weary spirit Home." 
 
 During his troubles Dick was a sleepless man. He 
 wandered up and down the little town at night, looking 
 in at the little burying-ground of St. Peter's, where the 
 fathers of Thurso lay buried. The town was asleep. 
 Not a footstep was to be heard, save those of the sleep- 
 less man plodding round the graveyard, and from thence 
 to his neighbouring bakehouse in Wilson's Lane. Night 
 was always a time of thought for Dick. " It is so 
 pleasant," he says in one of his letters, " getting up at 
 nights to see the stars. Last night was beautiful, and 
 the moon was a great pleasure. It is impossible, when 
 looking at it, to prevent oneself falling into a dream of 
 a far better world than ours." 
 
 "Do you know," he said to his brother-in-law, 
 " that I am a firm believer in the unseen world ? Mil- 
 lions of spiritual creatures walk the earth unseen, both 
 when we wake and when we sleep. I have no doubt 
 that they exercise a watching care over us, and often 
 warn us of coming evil. Since my sister Jane died, I 
 never dreamt of this but once. What people think 
 often about, they commonly dream of. On that occa- 
 sion, my sister, I thought, came to me, clothed from 
 head to foot with roses ! I smiled when I saw her, with
 
 THE UNSEEN WORLD. 
 
 347 
 
 pleasure, and awoke with the reflection that my sister, 
 knowing my taste for flowers, had chosen that way of 
 expressing her happiness. . . . You may smile at 
 this, and set it down as Eobert's silly superstition ; but 
 of one thing you may be assured, that unseen beings 
 care for you, and that nothing can happen to you with- 
 out the permission of our heavenly Father." 
 
 KUl.N.S OF ST. PETERS, THUl
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 DICK RECOMMENCES A COLLECTION OF FOSSILS. 
 
 " I AM not beat yet!" said Dick. " I have resolution, 
 will, and ability to work. Let me try again." 
 
 His flour was wrecked on the 9th of March. A 
 few months later (May 18th), we find him by the sea- 
 shore, about six miles east of Thurso, where he had found 
 his last fossil fish. He had to a certain extent got rid 
 of his rheumatism. " I have got the use of my feet," he 
 says, " and am blest in comparison. It was terrible to 
 be hampered like a hen with a string round its leg. 
 
 " Though I did not discover much, yet I am sur- 
 prised that I found so much. I have dug out of the 
 rocks what no one else ever got out of them. It is 
 cheerless, cold work. Lonely work too. But no good 
 work can be done in company." 
 
 He next visited a hill near Thurso, from two to three 
 hundred feet high, where at one spot the fossil fish lie 
 by the score, fish over fish, packed like herrings in a 
 barrel. With the insight of the poet, he saw the 
 sepulchres of the past beneath his feet. 
 
 " Tell me, thou dust beneath my feet, 
 
 Thou dust that once had breath, 
 Tell me how many mortals meet 
 In this small hill of death.
 
 CHAP. xxi. THE WORLD A GRAVEYARD. 349 
 
 " By wafting winds and flooding rains, 
 
 From ocean, earth, and sky, 
 
 Collected here, the frail remains 
 
 Of slumbering millions lie. 
 
 " Like me, thou elder-born of clay 
 
 Enjoyed the cheerful light ; 
 Bore the brief burden of a day, 
 And went to rest at night." * 
 
 " For my own part," he says, " I would never have 
 sought after these fish, did not a feeling of wondrous 
 astonishment take possession of me. Every time I 
 think of them, I can scarcely understand how they are 
 there." And again, " I often feel very much puzzled 
 about those dead fish. I mean as to whether they lived 
 before or since the creation and fall of man. Did 
 Death exist before man's disobedience ? . . . One thing 
 is certain : the present habitable world is a graveyard ! " 
 
 The fossil fish heretofore discovered had for the most 
 part been broken. Bucklers, scales, bits of fish of 
 various kinds, had been found fossilised, and from these 
 drawings had been made; but parts of the drawings 
 were guess-work. Dick determined to find, if he could, 
 an entire fossil fish, and proceeded to make many 
 searches for it. He thus picturesquely describes one of 
 his journeys for this purpose : 
 
 " On Monday I made a large day's work (that is, of 
 bread and biscuit making and baking), intending to set 
 out early on Thursday morning. The morning was 
 rainy, but by eleven o'clock I was able to set out on 
 
 * Montgomery. 
 16*
 
 350 A PLATFORM OF DEATH. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 my two hours' walk to the neighbouring hill-top. After 
 a brief interval I cleared off the rubbish, and began to 
 turn up dead fish. They were all rotten. Many 
 thousands had died and been buried here a long time 
 ago. The mud had choked them, and buried up their 
 
 DISTANT VIEW OF MORVEN AND MAIDEN PAP. 
 
 bodies, fish over fish, in whole myriads. Thousands of 
 thousands must have died at the same time. ' This 
 platform of death,' as Hugh Miller phrases it, extends 
 for many miles. 
 
 " Standing upright and looking round, I can see 
 "VVeydale some miles away; and there is reason to 
 believe that the beds of fish on this hill and Weydale
 
 CHAP. xxi. A DISTANT VIEW. 351 
 
 are one and the same. It is true, they have been cut 
 across, and the rocks have been disturbed and lifted up 
 twisted, broken, bent, and what not in a thousand 
 different ways ; and yet I have no doubt they were once 
 continuous. What numbers ! I turned them up, rotten, 
 by twos and threes. . . . 
 
 " I stood up to rest me, and looked around. It 
 was a beautiful day. The sun was shining brightly. 
 Far south I saw Skerry Ben and Morven. Skerry Ben 
 had hardly any snow wreaths on it, and thin vapour 
 seemed to be rolling away from its summit. Looking 
 over all the intervening space, the country seemed very 
 bare. Nothing broke the uniformity of the prospect 
 until the eye rested on the Dorery Hills, and these 
 seemed black and uninteresting. 
 
 " Seaward, all was in motion. The Orkney hills on 
 the north were capped by clouds, which rolled along 
 their summits. Not very far west frowned a dark 
 precipice, at least 200 feet high, at whose base the sea 
 waves were toiling and grinding. 
 
 " I went to work again, raising up thin layers of 
 rock, and turning out rotten fish ; but nothing of any 
 worth. As I got down the stone got firmer, and the 
 fish were sounder. But where was my dream ? I had 
 fancied that I should find the big fossil. I knew that 
 part of it indeed two parts of it were found in this 
 neighbourhood; and I thought that perhaps I might 
 alight on a whole one. But no ! There was no fossil 
 for me, such as I wanted ; and having raised up a stone 
 with three tolerably good fishes on it, I thought that I 
 had better wend my way home."
 
 352 DEAD FISH. CHAP. xxr. 
 
 Disappointed but not baffled, Dick continued his 
 researches. " On Monday morning, after my work was 
 over, I walked out some two miles to a quarry by the 
 side of the road, where I knew fish bones abounded. 
 It is not a regular quarry, but a hole out of which stone 
 for road-metal had been taken. 
 
 " ' Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay, 
 Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.' 
 
 Who knows ? One thing is certain it is so with 
 the poor fish. Nearly all the houses in Thurso are 
 built of dead fish. All the ploughed fields are fields of 
 the dead. The living plants feed on the dead, and so it 
 is everywhere. Was it ever otherwise ? Once I believed 
 in a world without death hideous death. . But it is a 
 sad thought that death exists over all creation. Some, 
 however, say that death is necessary and a blessing; 
 because, without it, there could be no progress. Alas ! 
 is death then a necessity ? 
 
 "I went to the quarry by the road-side, and was 
 grubbing away for old bones, to the no small amusement 
 of the passers-by. No doubt they thought me mad. 
 Some looked curious ; some looked pitiful. At last one 
 of them came and planted himself opposite me. 
 
 "'Hae ye lost onything there?' 'No.' 'Then 
 what are ye seeking?' 'Auld banes.' 'Auld banes? 1 
 ' Ay, auld fish-banes.' ' 0, there's none o' them there : 
 I'm the man that quarried the hole : there's nae fish- 
 banes there.' ' If ye like to believe me, gudeman, the 
 banes are abundant.' 'Na!' 'Oh yes; it's an auld 
 bury ing-ground.' 'Eh!' ' Yes ; look at that.'
 
 CHAP. xxr. ANCIENT BURYING-GROUND. 353 
 
 " At this the man came running up the brae, and I 
 handed him a stone all covered with scales. ' Eh !' 
 said he, and then he took the stone. He looked at it. 
 'Weel,' he at length observed, 'that's trash nothing 
 but trash.' ' It's an auld burying-ground, I assure ye/ 
 said I; 'it's of great antiquity.' He threw down the 
 stone and walked away solemnly. I have no doubt he 
 thought me crazy perhaps something worse. 
 
 " I got so many heads, jaws, Coccosteus bones, and 
 such like, that I nearly killed myself in carrying home 
 the stones. My arms are still sore, and my breast is 
 sore. For all that, I would carry as heavy a load to- 
 morrow." 
 
 A few days later he says : 
 
 " I have again been to the limestone quarry on the 
 hill, and have brought thence one fossil fish and some 
 half-dozen of broken bits of other fossils, and only one 
 moss from the waterfall. 
 
 I half filled my hat with the Fern Blechnum, boreale, 
 or Northern Hard Fern, which I found growing in beauty 
 in sheltered spots. 
 
 " I saw tree stumps in peat banks, molehills, muir- 
 fowl, and lapwings, and snow wreaths on hill-sides 
 and around lochs. I had a long, long, beautiful walk. 
 
 " Hugh Miller, to his dying day, insisted that nothing 
 organic lived in the north of Scotland previous to the 
 deposition of the Old Red conglomerate. The Old Bed con- 
 glomerate was to him the fossiliferous base in the north. 
 He knew and acknowledged the Silurians of the south of 
 Scotland; but he argued that Durness limestone was of
 
 354 HUGH MILLER'S " BASE." CHAP, xxi, 
 
 Old Eed age. Professor Nicol said it was of mountain lime- 
 stone. Sir Roderick Murchison has classed it Silurian. 
 
 " When Hugh Miller was in Orkney he saw the Old 
 Eed conglomerate at Stromness, and followed the fos- 
 siliferous rocks along the sea-shore upwards, until he 
 found a fossil bone, which he termed the " Nail," and 
 he counted how many feet this "nail" was above the 
 Old Red conglomerate. He considered this " nail " the 
 oldest bone in Scotland. So he said. He knew of none 
 older at that time. The Durness fossils being all shells 
 and molluscous animal remains, Hugh probably thought 
 that nothing of a bony nature existed in Scotland older 
 than his Stromness " nail." And this bone was a fish 
 remain, many hundred feet above the Old conglomerate. 
 
 "But what would Hugh have thought of fish 
 underlying Old Red conglomerate? Fish remains older 
 than conglomerate ? Alas, poor Hugh ! such is actually 
 the case. The other day I turned up and brought 
 home with me to Thurso the remains of fish that had 
 lain buried below the Old Red conglomerate ! But 
 Hugh had seen the ' Base ' in many places, and pre- 
 ferred retaining the old opinion. 
 
 " I believe the opinion entertained by our highest 
 geologists is, that there is Old Red conglomerate of 
 many ages ; whereas Hugh Miller considered it as of 
 one age one great formation. He says that it extends 
 from the Grampians to Orkney, and from Peterhead to 
 the Western Isles ; that it lies in a continuous stratum 
 of variable thickness; and that no fish lived then in 
 what is now Scotland. A great mistake !
 
 STILL FINDING FOSSILS. 
 
 " I have found pieces of clay slate in the Old Red 
 conglomerate; that is, the slate was in existence before 
 the other was formed. 
 
 " Those fish I found the other day lived before the 
 Old Eed conglomerate was wholly made. A bed with 
 rolled granite ground down into sandy gravel overlies a 
 bed of limestone, and the limestone deposit overlies a 
 bed of limy clay, which contains the fish remains. 
 
 " It is a beautiful spot where the dead fish he buried. 
 All is quiet and still. No sound of any kind, but the 
 wind whistling along the heather. In summer time the 
 royal eagle comes to build beside the waterfall, and to 
 prey upon the muirfowl. Death's doings are still 
 about us, and who knows how long it is since they first 
 began?" 
 
 A few days later, he says : " Some time ago, one of 
 the flagmen showed me a fossil which he did not under- 
 stand. It was a fine one, and only your humble servant 
 knew what it was. I had, twenty years ago, furnished 
 Hugh Miller with such a fossil, and this was the only 
 instance of another turning up anywhere. This was 
 found in the quarries. I sent word to London, and Mr. 
 John Miller bought it. It gave me pleasure to find 
 Hugh's word corroborated. I have not the least doubt 
 that the entire fish will some day turn up, and then it 
 will be seen who was speaking truth." 
 
 Dick also searched the rocks at Murkle Bay, where 
 he had found the big fossil buckler. One day he dis- 
 covered a rather large bone sticking out of the mass, 
 He went at it with his hammer and chisel. He laboured
 
 356 AN ENTIRE FISH WANTED. CHAP. xxr. 
 
 for nearly four hours, and then he left it to return 
 again on the following day. To get it out, required 
 several weeks of hammering and chiseling. He had to 
 go to the bottom of the bone to get it out. He did not 
 mind the amount of labour he gave to a fossil, provided 
 he could get it out whole. He once worked at a parti- 
 cular bone for six months. The fossil, on this occasion, 
 was a prize. It measured one foot two inches long, by 
 six inches across. 
 
 " At the same time," he said, " I don't neglect my 
 employment. Whether I get out the bone or not, I 
 always make sure of doing my day's work first. I never 
 yet trifled a moment for anything. If I want playing 
 at fossils, I merely rob myself of my rest and sleep. 
 
 "It is now twenty years in March last (his letter 
 was dated 7th September 1863) since I found a bone so 
 large. And not only have I got so large a bone, but 
 what is a step in advance, something new. ... I 
 have sawn the four sides of the stem, and also taken 
 four inches off the bottom thickness. It is now 
 portable. It can be lifted. Before, it could not be 
 moved without taking with you the immense rock in 
 which it was imbedded. 
 
 " It is very odd, that in twenty years I have never 
 found an entire fish. At that time I found two of those 
 fishes, but much broken up. Hugh Miller was satisfied 
 that they were the same as he figured in his book. 
 That idea is doubted now by some London men ; and 
 here am I laughing at them and wishing that I could 
 find another fossil fish. Amen ! may it come soon."
 
 CHAP. xxi. DIGGING AMONGST THE ROCKS. 357 
 
 Two months later he wrote to his brother-in-law : 
 
 " Perhaps you are thinking that I am busy with 
 those bones on the rocks here; but no! the last bone 
 nearly killed me with fatigue and cold. Besides, I cut 
 my hands, and cut my little finger. Qf all the labour I 
 ever tried, there is none like digging on the sea-shore 
 crouching down on one's knees in a hole, bothered with 
 incoming water, and hammering, and picking, and 
 sawing all the while. 
 
 " I have got another curious evidence about that fish, 
 which Hugh Miller never saw. Perhaps he dreamt of 
 it. Most certainly he spoke of a time when the bone 
 which he figured would yet be found. 
 
 " After all, there will be no satisfying of those men's 
 doubts, until a whole fossil fish, of that particular kind, 
 turns up. I wish I was the lucky finder of it ; then I 
 would laugh ! 
 
 ''Indeed, I don't think I understand the fossil 
 myself. How little do we really know ; above all, how 
 little do we know accurately ! No entire fish has turned 
 up yet; only broken and disjointed pieces. And such 
 pieces ! Bones a foot and four inches across. No one 
 can credit it, unless he sees them. Perhaps I'll yet 
 turn up a whole fish! . . . Similar bones to these 
 two bones beside me no human eye ever looked upon 
 until August 1863." 
 
 Dick continued at his digging. On the 31st October 
 he writes : " During the bypast week I have been 
 unexpectedly no less than three different times digging 
 amongst those dead fish and plants in the rocks on the
 
 358 SEARCH FOR A BONE. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 shores here. I had no intention of being there more 
 than once ; but once at it, I could not get off without 
 suffering a great deal. ... I can walk for miles 
 upon miles over these dead fish, almost without drawing 
 a sigh ! Once I .felt differently. I was then lost in 
 wonder and mute astonishment. Now 'it is quite an 
 everyday affair. If I think at all, I think they are 
 part of the still existing creation. 
 
 " Many years ago, when Hugh Miller was alive and 
 in his glory, I had seen in a pool of water, bound fast 
 in the rock, a bone. It was a broken bone. The pool 
 was connected with three other pools of salt water. 
 To get at the bone at the bottom of the pool it was 
 necessary to throw out the water from all the pools. I 
 boggled at the labour. . . . On Monday last I got 
 up at midnight, toiled at my work, and was off by 
 midday to the sea-shore. After half an hour's walking, 
 I arrived at the place, took off my hat, my coat, my 
 neckcloth, tucked up my sleeves, and with the assist- 
 ance of a flat stone I threw out the water. This took 
 me an hour's incessant work. 
 
 "Well, I cut out the fossil bone, and another frag- 
 ment of bone. Strange to tell, under that bone I 
 found indications of another bone. I toiled away and 
 cleared off the stone saw that the bone was a good 
 bone, and hoped that it was something new. Beturned 
 to it a second day; cut deep round the bone; got 
 wearied out; tried to force it up, and broke my pick 
 handle. 
 
 " I returned to it two days after, and spent about an
 
 CHAP. xxi. DIGGING IN DECEMBER. 85'J 
 
 hour in throwing out the salt water. I was awfully 
 tired. I had to go down upon my knees on the hard 
 stone, and was bothered with the salt water, and the 
 wind and rain too. Well, I dug, and dug, and dug, and 
 at last the stone and the bone rose up of themselves. 
 I could hardly convey them home. I was tired and 
 sore ; but I am as well as ever again." 
 
 He still went on digging among the rocks as late as 
 the month of December. " The weather," he says, " has 
 been very stormy and wet. I have been fretting rather 
 impatiently. I had settled it in my mind to go out and 
 get a fossil out of the rocks in order to vindicate the 
 truth told by Hugh Miller, or rather, my own truth ; 
 for it was from me that Hugh got his fossils. It is true 
 that I did not name them. Hugh Miller did. He 
 called this fossil Asterolepis, a fish intermediate between 
 Glyptolepis and Holoptychius. 
 
 " Since Hugh died, some cantankerous people have 
 printed and made known that the scales figured by 
 Hugh belonged to Glyptolepis, and the head bones 
 belonged to Coccosteus thus plainly intimating that 
 Hugh had blundered, or that I had misled him ; not 
 knowing that in so doing they proclaimed their own 
 ignorance, that the head, bones, scales, and fin-rays 
 were found together stuck together ; and thus proving 
 indisputably that they belonged to one fish. It is 
 amazing what ignorance these London men exhibit. 
 They get their views from books. They should study 
 nature on the spot. They did not know that Hugh 
 came to Thurso and examined and saw the fossils in
 
 360 ORDER OF CREA TION. 
 
 their beds for himself. He saw one of those fish lying 
 in a rocky ledge, but boggled at the toil necessary to 
 raise it up. However, after he went to Edinburgh he 
 wrote to me and asked me to raise it up, which I did ; 
 and he tells it in his Book. And yet ignorance says 
 that Hugh's scales belonged to one fish, and the head 
 bones to another ! 
 
 " Four days ago I read in an Edinburgh paper a 
 paragraph in which it was said that a Mr. Salter had 
 been lecturing 'on the Order of Creation.' Towards 
 the close of the paragraph Mr. Salter is represented as 
 saying : ' Notwithstanding what had been said by the 
 lamented Hugh Miller, no true evidence of the existence 
 of a fish, or any vertebrate animal, was to be found in 
 rocks below the level of the Old Eed Sandstone.' Now, 
 this was not fair. All that Hugh said was on the 
 authority of those who said they knew. The bones I 
 found in August vindicate the truth as stated by Hugh, 
 and also the bones I found in October. I sent Sir 
 Roderick, in May 1863, one of the same bones with the 
 same kind .of scale sticking on it. I sent him also two 
 jaws, with many scales sticking on them." 
 
 A few days later he says : " I am not satisfied 
 with that paragraph in the Edinburgh paper. It surely 
 could not be Mr. Salter that inserted it. No one is 
 better acquainted with geological matters than he is. 
 Sir Roderick's right-hand man ! What am I to think ? 
 Has Agassiz been imposed upon ? Has Sir Eoderick 
 published a dream ? ' No true evidence of a fish or any 
 vertebrate animal in rocks at a lower level than the Old
 
 CHAP. xxi. WORKING AMONGST ICE. 361 
 
 Red Sandstone!' Has some reporter erred? Or is 
 there an error in the classification of the rocks ? There's 
 the point. 
 
 " Well, in vain did poor Hugh toil, and believe in 
 many creations. How sad to think that he ruined his 
 health for a shadow. And yet, three thousand years 
 ago, all was said to be Vanity. 
 
 " I am anxious for a trial for a fossil fish to elucidate 
 the point called in question ; but I am not sheep enough 
 to strike a single blow in wind and rain. And yet I 
 am very anxious to get out at the rocks. I shall have 
 to carry a weighty hammer and wedges, and to work 
 hard besides." 
 
 So soon as the storm abated, Dick resumed his 
 researches among the rocks. He went out with 
 " hammers and chisels and a'." He began on the 4th 
 of January 1864. It was hard frost. The rocky ledges 
 were covered with thick ice, while long ice-pillars hung 
 from every cliff. The sea was hushed and smooth, its 
 ripples quietly laving the shore. Dick worked for three 
 hours at the place where he had settled down, but he 
 got nothing important only three fish snouts, some half- 
 heads of fish, jugular plates, gill covers, and fish scales in 
 any quantity. All these he had known twenty years 
 before. 
 
 Two days after he returned to the rocks. It was 
 still hard frost. He found nothing new, only fish jaws, 
 a half-head, and scales innumerable. He returned on 
 the 12th and 14th of January, changing his ground 
 from time to time ; but the results were the same. He
 
 362 STILL SEARCHING. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 found the smiddy hammer very heavy, especially after 
 working with it for some hours. But still he went on. 
 
 On the 20th of January he made his fifth trial. He 
 was on the rocks before daylight. It was still hard 
 frost. " I had chosen," he says, " new ground. I had 
 great expectations. The tide was ebbing fast; and 
 thundering, great, long, high rolling breakers, were dash- 
 ing themselves on the rocks. And then what foam ! I 
 was obliged to wait until the sea had gone down. In 
 the meantime I tried a new place. I raised three large 
 lumps of rock. I split them, and found three rusty, 
 ugly heads of Dipterus and scales. Nothing new. 
 Then I went back to the real place. 
 
 " When I got there, I laid down my weights and 
 reconnoitred. Alas ! I saw no hope. The ledges were 
 rotten. I worked until one o'clock at midday, and got 
 only scales, two rotten heads, a bit of plant, and a bit 
 of bone. On my way home I tried another and a very 
 hard spot. I worked there until two o'clock, but found 
 only scales, fin-rays, and gill-covers. I was now 
 chagrined, tired, and hungry! So I returned home, 
 weary and heavy laden." Next morning he was up at 
 four, working at his trade. 
 
 In this way did Dick go on, trying to perfect the 
 knowledge with which he was already partially 
 acquainted, and also trying to acquire new knowledge 
 by his persevering labour among the rocks, with hammer, 
 and pick, and chisels, from day to day. He thus 
 gradually accumulated a new store of fossils. The 
 Asterolepis which he discovered, and which afterwards
 
 CHAP. xxi. ARRANGEMENT OF ROCKS, 363 
 
 became the property of Mr. John Miller, F.G.S., was 
 the finest that was ever found * 
 
 Dick continued to read the papers on geology which 
 appeared in the newspapers, and particularly in the 
 Athenceum. He could no longer afford to huy books, 
 but he was not a man to believe passively in the views 
 of others, especially when they seemed to be contrary 
 to his own observation of facts. He had a keen eye, 
 and believed what he saw rather than what he read. 
 He had many a hard fight with Peach and Mr. Miller 
 of London, as to the order of creation. 
 
 " There has been no new arrangement," he says, " of 
 the rocks in which the fossil fish have been found. Sir 
 Eoderick has figured the new fish as Silurian fossils, -and 
 the Silurian rocks are older than Old Eed Sandstone; 
 that is, they exist at a lower level. ... It is true that, 
 after the Durness discoveries, Hugh Miller for a time 
 resisted the views of Sir Eoderick as to a new classi- 
 fication of the rocks of the north-west of Scotland. 
 Hugh could not bear the idea of his favourite Old Eed 
 giving way to the Cambrian a deposit older even than 
 the lower Silurian. 
 
 " For my own part, I care not much what name or 
 names geologists may give to the various rocks, or the 
 time that was occupied in the accumulation of their 
 respective strata. They were, doubtless, made in suc- 
 cession, after longer or shorter intervals of time. About 
 eleven miles from Thurso there is a small precipice 
 which clearly illustrates the subject. Standing in front 
 * We state this fact on the authority of Dr. Traquair.
 
 364 ROLLED PEBBLES ON MORVEN. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 of it, I can see with my eyes and handle with my hands 
 the successive strata of which it was originally com- 
 posed. First, close at my feet, is a bed of rolled pebbles. 
 That is the lowest exposed formation. Next, over that, 
 is a bed of limestone. Then a bed of the ordinary 
 Caithness flagstone; and over that a bed of boulder 
 clay. 
 
 " Now, on looking attentively at the rolled pebbles, 
 I find that they are similar to the rock on which they 
 rest. Consequently the hills hereabout were as much 
 stone as they are now before the pebbles were rolled. 
 Next, we can see that these pebbles were rolling about 
 in the lime, for they are crusted with lime just as almond 
 sweetmeats are with sugar. Consequently the lime- 
 stone was once soft and loose, and the pebbles had sunk 
 amongst the lime, which now lies above them. Then a 
 soft muddy clay was brought by water, and laid above 
 the lime. The whole was hardened into stone. Was it 
 beneath or above the water ? That is a question ; but 
 stone it became. 
 
 "And then another change occurred. Some great 
 power came into action, breaking up the rocks, and 
 making clay out of them, in some places a hundred feet 
 thick. We know that the clay had become stone, foi 
 we often find great lumps of stone amongst the boulder 
 clay, which forms the surface soil of the county." 
 
 There was another thing that excited Dick's observa- 
 tion. When at the top of Morven, 2331 feet above the 
 sea, he was much struck by the bed of rolled pebbles that 
 graces its top and north front. "How long had they
 
 -HAP. XXT. CLIFFS OF STONY CLA YS. 365 
 
 been there ? How high the sea must once have stood 
 if they were rolled up by it yonder! Otherwise, the 
 hill must have got a great lift since it was at sea- 
 level!" 
 
 All these things surprised and astonished Dick. He 
 pondered them over in his mind. They spoke of a long- 
 past era, when the sea had washed its billows over 
 Caithness, and tossed about the rocks as if they were 
 playthings. Morven had been submerged, or its summit 
 had formed but a little island, along which the sea had 
 laid down its bed of rolled pebbles. 
 
 " I have examined attentively," he said, " the cliffs of 
 stony clays along the valley in which the river Thurso 
 runs. They are so stern-looking, so bare, so densely 
 compacted, that a man working with pick and shovel 
 could make but small progress there. Indeed, they are 
 almost as hard as solid rock. Hence it is that fossil 
 shells still exist undecayed in those clays. They are 
 perfectly impervious. No moisture penetrates them. 
 No decay goes on. And then every stone, and piece of 
 stone, is all grooved and scratched, and furrowed and 
 polished, in a way that running water alone could never 
 have done. No tossing of waves, though ever so violent, 
 could do it. No ! If ice and icebergs did not do it, what 
 did ? None can tell. One thing is certain, that those 
 clays are formed out of the rocks on which they lie. 
 And many pieces of rocks are found among them that 
 have travelled far, rocks from as far as Skye ! " 
 
 A lecture having been delivered at Haddington on 
 geology by Mr. Finlayson, a copy of the newspaper con-
 
 866 METAMORPHIC ROCKS. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 taining the report was sent to Dick, on which he made 
 the following observations : 
 
 " I fear that he does not hit the assertors of ' the 
 development hypothesis ' so very hard as he imagines. 
 He must know that no geologist says or imagines that 
 all the metamorphic rocks * were so formed at one and 
 the same period of time. Though life may be oblite- 
 rated over wide areas, when the fiery tempest was over 
 in one sea or part of a sea, the organisms would again 
 find their way back to their old abodes. The meta- 
 morphic rocks are of many ages ; and no one can say 
 that, though the mud was changed and became siliceous, 
 the overlying water was unfit to support life. It was 
 the dead they are supposed to have obliterated; the 
 living might have lived on, either in that locality or in 
 some other. 
 
 " Hugh Miller tells us of a ship-captain who sailed 
 for days through a shoal of dead floating haddocks ; but 
 haddocks are still caught and sold. Hugh Miller was 
 a splendid writer, but he was so highly imaginative as 
 to be rather unsafe to rely upon. Besides, one soon gets 
 tired of all geological reasoning. There is nothing on 
 which the mind of the reader can lay hold upon and 
 rest. 'What is truth?' is an old question; but no 
 man in his senses would seek for it in the books of 
 
 " Metamorphic action has arisen from many produc- 
 
 * Metamorphic, literally changed in form ; applied to rocks and rock 
 formations which seem changed from their original condition by some 
 external or interna 1 agency. PAGE'S Handbook of Geology.
 
 CHAP. xxi. CHANGES OF SUBSTANCE. 367 
 
 ing causes. There have been changes from the action of 
 heat, and changes without heat. To understand changes 
 from the effects of heat, I suppose we must go to Ice- 
 land. To understand changes without heat, we have 
 only to look around us. 
 
 " Last summer, I went one evening down to Murkle 
 Bay. At one corner of the shore, at the west side of the 
 bay, was a pile of sand. It had been accumulated, and 
 lay on the land in a mass, blown up gradually in old 
 times no one knows how old. The sand was mixed 
 with broken shells and small pebbles. Water had been 
 finding its way through and amongst the sand. The 
 shells had partly decayed. The lime [of the shells] had 
 set, and bound the sand and pebbles, in some places, 
 into a solid mass. In fact, it had became a stone a 
 rock. It required a smart blow of a hammer to break 
 it. And in much the same way many a deposit of sand 
 has thus become sandstone or freestone. 
 
 " Some years ago, I saw in the hands of Dr. Robert 
 Chambers of Edinburgh a piece of siliceous quartzite. 
 It had been taken from one of the metamorphic hills of 
 Sutherland. It had evidently at one time been a mass 
 of loose sand. In fact, it still resembled sandstone 
 more than typical quartz. How it became a mass of 
 flinty stone I know not; but evidently not from the 
 effects of heat. 
 
 " Some years ago there was a great talk of liquid 
 silica, or liquid flint flint, in fact, as thin as water. 
 Many public buildings, it was said, had been built of a 
 material so loose that under weather influences they were
 
 C8 FLINT FOSSILS. 
 
 falling to pieces.* It was proposed to wash their fronts 
 with this siliceous white wash, and thus preserve them from 
 further decay. Be that as it may, it is a fact that they 
 can render the softest stone, even soft sand, as hard as 
 flint. They do, in fact, manufacture stones. There is 
 actually such a thing as liquid flint. Man makes it, 
 and nature makes it. Now, you have only to suppose 
 an irruption of liquid flint into soft strata, and very 
 soon after the rock becomes metamorphic. 
 
 " I saw, with Mr. Peach of Wick, many of his Dur- 
 ness Silurian fossils both from the limestone and 
 quartzite. Hugh Miller knew of fossils in quartzite, 
 found to the west of Thurso, such as Worm Holm. The 
 hard metamorphic quartzite had once been loose sand, 
 and under the action of the weather had become sand 
 again. 
 
 "Many of Mr. Peach's limestone fossils were of 
 flint. Indeed, all that I saw were flint casts. The shell 
 had decayed ; silica had gradually filled up the place of 
 the shell ; and you saw a form like it. Others were 
 interior casts. But' the limestone was not equally hard. 
 Now these were from metamorphic rocks rocks changed 
 without fire, or any heat. 
 
 "No doubt there have been outbursts of fiery or 
 molten matter. The gneiss, or metamorphic rocks, to the 
 south of Caithness have all veins of quartz and veins 
 of red granite. These veins are thought to have been 
 molten or hot, and injected into them. Of course, their 
 action was to change the nature of the rocks into which 
 * The Houses of Parliament form an instance.
 
 CHAP. xxr. DESTRUCTIONS AND CREATIONS. 369 
 
 the veins of molten matter were driven. But how, no 
 one can tell. There is a slow metamorphic action, as 
 well as a rapid one. 
 
 "Yet no one has any reason to think that such a 
 thing as a universally destructive action ever occurred 
 since life began. There might be death from irruptive 
 forces in the sea at Norway or Iceland, yet none at 
 Caithness or Leith. No one supposes that, though all 
 fossils may have been obliterated in metamorphic strata, 
 all life was destroyed at the same time in the over- 
 lying waters. 
 
 "Agassiz and Hugh Miller believed in many de- 
 structions of life, and in many new creations. But 
 Hugh, before he died, knew that it was not so. In his 
 Testimony of the Hocks, he traced existing forms 
 backwards, through all the various deposits, and found 
 no break until he came to the Chalk. ' If even then, 
 he said. By the expression ' If even then,' he referred 
 to the microscopic animals of the chalk, found to be still 
 alive in the North Sea, and in the seas between America 
 and Britain. 
 
 " In dredging for a platform for the submarine cable, 
 microscopic shells, with flesh on them, were brought 
 up from a depth of a mile and a half. Ehrenberg, 
 Humboldt, and Sir Eoderick Murchison have said, that 
 those shells brought up from the deep sea bottom are 
 the same animal as those found entombed in chalk 
 hills in millions. 
 
 " All metamorphic rocks are not of the same age ; 
 neither are all Silurian. Neither are Old Eed Sandstone,
 
 370 DICK'S LETTERS. CHAP. xxi. 
 
 Coal, or any other of the great deposits. life, in my 
 opinion, was never wholly obliterated since it first began. 
 Some creatures have died out ; but there are no proofs of 
 any new creation." 
 
 It should be mentioned that the letters in which 
 these observations occur, were written without the 
 slightest idea of their ever coming under the notice of 
 the public. They were mostly written for the information 
 and amusement of his sister and his brother-in-law at 
 Haddington. He required of his eldest sister, that his 
 letters to her should be burnt as soon as read. They 
 were therefore destroyed. Fortunately, the letters to 
 his youngest sister have been preserved. They have 
 furnished us with some of the best descriptions of the 
 scenery of Caithness. They have described much of 
 Dick's scientific investigations, and also some of his 
 domestic history.
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 DICICS FRIENDS FOSSILISING AND 
 MOSS-HUNTING. 
 
 THE Thurso people surrounded Dick with a considerable 
 degree of mystery. But the mystery was very much of 
 their own making. They could not understand what 
 " the man " was about. What could he mean by walk- 
 ing to Morven and Dorery, and bringing home only a few 
 tufts of moss ? What could be the reason of his digging 
 with a pickaxe in old quarries, or pounding on the rocks 
 by the sea-shore with a smiddy forehammer ? Ordinary 
 people were grinding away for a living, working hard at 
 flagstones, or competing with each other for increased 
 trade, whereas the half-daft baker was wandering about 
 Caithness in his by-hours, gathering stones, ferns, and 
 grasses. The whole thing was a mystery ! 
 
 The boys no longer dogged him about, as if he had 
 been the local idiot of the place. They rather kept out 
 of his way ; for people spoke of him as " uncanny," and 
 "a wee thocht wrang." When he came down the 
 middle of the street, on his way home from Dun net 
 Head or Banniskirk, they merely stood to one side, and 
 looked after him until he turned down Wilson's Lane. 
 He was often bedrabbled about his feet and trousers
 
 372 DICK MISUNDERSTOOD. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 He had been out since one o'clock in the morning ; but 
 his long walk did not seem to have tired him, as he went 
 on his way down the street in his long swinging walk. 
 
 He still dressed himself in his antediluvian garments 
 He still wore his swallow-tailed coat and his chimney- 
 pot hat. He could not afford much money for clothing 
 The only things he renewed from time to time were his 
 trousers and his hob-nailed boots. Dress was very little 
 to him. And yet he was a handsome man too, though 
 he never thought of that. Dr. Shearer says his appear- 
 ance reminded him of another of nature's enthusiasts 
 Mungo Park. He had the same compact round head 
 and face, with "ambrosial clusters" curled; and the 
 same genial, unaffected, and, to the last, remarkably 
 juvenile expression. 
 
 If the Thurso people did not understand Dick's outer 
 man, they still less understood his inner man. What 
 was he ? What occupied his thoughts ? What was his 
 belief? What was his religion? That was a great 
 point in a Scotch town, where everybody knows every- 
 body ; and where men are judged very much according 
 to the kirk that they attend. The opinions entertained 
 about Dick on the latter subject were very unfavourable. 
 Perhaps they had a great deal to do with the falling- 
 off in his business. 
 
 Many a petty inquisition was held about Dick in 
 Thurso. What did he think about the first chapter of 
 Genesis ? What did he think about the Flood ? Was 
 he " soond " in his scriptural views ? Like wiser men, 
 he held his tongue. And, after all, why should thej
 
 CHAP. xxir. HIS INNER THINKINGS. 373 
 
 know anything of his inner thinkings ? Why this per- 
 petual inquisitioning into the things that thoughtful 
 and conscientious men think and believe ? " Wait till 
 you are of my age, and wearing spectacles, and then I 
 will talk to you," was his answer to an inquiring young 
 friend. He might have added "Wait till you have 
 acquired wisdom and experience ; wait till you have 
 laboured and searched as I have done, and waited 
 patiently for more light ; and then we will talk about 
 the mysteries of the by-past world." 
 
 After all, what do we really know ? It is but a mere 
 speck in the infinite of knowledge. " No man can find 
 out the work that God made from the beginning to the 
 end." To use the words of Dr. Parker " We live as in 
 a twilight of knowledge, charged with revelations of 
 order and beauty. We stedfastly look for a perfect 
 light, which shall reveal perfect order and perfect 
 beauty."* 
 
 But whatever the Thurso people might think about 
 Dick's religious belief, there could be no doubt as to his 
 character. He was a kindly, cordial, honest, high-prin- 
 cipled man. Everybody acknowledged that. They 
 might call him what names they pleased, but they 
 could not fail to recognise the dignity and purity of his 
 mind. He did his duty honestly by all men. Hence he 
 enjoyed the friendship of some of the best men in the 
 place. The young students almost worshipped him. 
 He was constantly referred to as an authority on scien- 
 tific subjects; and no one could be more kind and 
 
 * Morphology of the Skull, p. 363. 
 17*
 
 374 HIS THOROUGHNESS. CHAP, xxit 
 
 obliging when consulted, or more lavish in communi- 
 cating the results of his careful observation and gar- 
 nered thought of so many studious years. 
 
 Men who did not know him, thought him to be a 
 morose man strange, abstracted, and rather unsociable. 
 But those who did know him, and were admitted to the 
 sanctum of his bakehouse, found him the very reverse. 
 There he was kindly, sociable, humorous, full of infor- 
 mation, sometimes full of fancy, and always ready to 
 communicate everything that he knew about the fossil- 
 bearing strata, the botany, and the natural history of 
 Caithness. 
 
 " On one occasion," says Dr. Shearer, " a point was 
 raised and settled rather dubiously on Mr. Dick's own 
 ipse dixit. Without giving us any reason to suppose 
 that he suspected any incredulity, he made his appear- 
 ance at my father's house in his baker's dress within a 
 quarter of an hour afterwards, bringing with him an 
 armful of books, from which he proceeded to quote in 
 rapid succession, and then went away, leaving us 
 amazed at his zeal and thoroughness. For it was one of 
 his peculiarities as it is with most enthusiasts to 
 believe that every person must be as deeply interested in 
 his subject as he was himself." 
 
 It was not often, however, that Dick went into any 
 person's house in Thurso. He declined invitations to 
 breakfast with Sir George Sinclair, when he had dis- 
 tinguished men with him; and he declined all other 
 invitations. When a public breakfast was given in 
 honour of Hugh Miller, during one of his short visits tc
 
 CHAP. xxn. DICK'S ONLY EXTRAVAGANCE. 375 
 
 Thurso, Dick did not make his appearance. On that 
 occasion it was suggested that a geological museum 
 should be established in Thurso, and Dick, though 
 absent, was suggested as the only person likely to obtain 
 and to classify the specimens. But Dick was unwilling, 
 perhaps he had not the time necessary to undertake 
 the work ; and he declined the offer. 
 
 As he did not accept the entertainments of others, 
 neither did he entertain others in his own house. The 
 only exception was in the case of Mr. Peach. The fol- 
 lowing extract is from Mr. Peach's diary : " Rose at 5 
 A.M. After disposing of many matters, I went to see 
 Dick. What pleasure it is to meet him ! This day, 
 for the first time, I ate and drank with him. I asked 
 him for a cup of tea. ' By all means,' he said. I was 
 much amazed with him and his housekeeper, Annie 
 Mackay. There was no cloth on the table. The poor 
 body was sadly put about. Dick, manlike, laughed at 
 her dismay. This is the first time that I partook of 
 food with him. He would often have asked me. He 
 was dashed, because the first time I saw him he asked 
 me to take wine; and because I refused (being a 
 teetotaller), he thought I was above eating and drinking 
 with him. He was much mistaken. He did not then 
 know me." 
 
 Throughout his life, Dick was careful and abstemious. 
 He lived frugally, spending very little upon himself. 
 His only extravagance if such it can be called, was 
 books. These he would have of the best editions, beauti- 
 fully bound. His brother-in-law once offered to
 
 376 DICK'S COMPANIONS. CHAP. xxii. 
 
 him some prime whisky. " No " said he in reply, " but 
 I thank you all the same. Spirits never enter this 
 house, save when I cannot help it." His brother-in- 
 law then offered to send him some money. " God 
 grant you more sense!" was his reply. "I want no 
 sovereigns. It is of no use sending anything down 
 here. Nothing is wanted. Delicacies would only 
 injure health. Nothing like hard fare in going through 
 the world. My old woman neither smokes, snuffs, nor 
 drinks. She is just as tough as a rigwoodie, and can 
 almost do without sleep. I must not pamper myself. 
 ' Hardy ' is the word with working people. Pampering 
 does no good, but much evil. No, no ! no pampering." 
 
 We have said that Dick was a solitary man. He 
 delighted in the companionship of books, and enjoyed 
 with them the solitude of his own thoughts. He never 
 married. He had no family enjoyments, nor family 
 cares. His only inmate was his Highland housekeeper, 
 with whom he could have little mental communion. 
 His only companion was his sister, though she was far 
 away. With her he corresponded regularly to the close 
 of his life. He told her his joys and sorrows, his dis- 
 coveries among the rocks, his finding of ferns at Dunnet 
 Head and among the Eeay hills, and all the little 
 events of his daily life. 
 
 Here, for instance, is a little bit of one of his letters 
 to her, written on the 26th December 1863 : 
 
 " As the weather wore a fair face, I got up and away 
 off to a spot, nearly five miles off, to gather ferns ! 
 What ? Ferns at the end of December ? Yes, ferns. I
 
 CHAP. xxn. THE FERNS PERI! 377 
 
 walked to a rocky precipice, and gathered about a dozen 
 ferns. They must have been Peri ? Yes, they were 
 Peri I The longest was about fifteen inches. Three oi 
 them were beautiful and green finely cut and lobed. 
 In fact, I never saw prettier plants, and I was very 
 proud of them the more so, as I gathered them at the 
 end of December. I knew that the Sea Spleenwort was 
 green all the year round at the cliffs of Dunnet Head, 
 as I had gathered it there in winter, but I did not know 
 that the inland ferns were green at the end of Decem- 
 ber." 
 
 Here is another extract from a letter to his sister : 
 " I observe that your husband is a rifleman. Tell 
 him that I never fired off a gun in my life, and scarcely 
 ever handled one. There are a great many riflemen 
 here. They have two targets. Not long since I was 
 nearly shot. I was on the shore, and some green hands 
 had come out to practise. They stood aslant, and not 
 hitting the target, their balls came pinging through the 
 air repeatedly. At length, one ball hit a ledge near me, 
 raising smoke and dust. I thought it time to be off, 
 and got out of the way." 
 
 His sister was then lying on her deathbed, but he 
 continued to write to her, endeavouring to cheer her up. 
 He sent to her husband a long account of his digging 
 up a fossil, at the end of 1863. He said, "Tell my 
 sister that I have written all this, hoping that it may 
 amuse her." His sister died about two months later. 
 It need not be said how much he lamented her. She 
 was the last of his family his nearest, dearest friend.
 
 378 DEA TH OF HIS SISTER. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 And he was soon to follow her. When informed of her 
 death, he wrote to her husband : 
 
 "My sister's death affects me much. I miss her 
 now, and feel a want. I'll feel it more by and by. I 
 know that all must die ; but we have the hope that, 
 though we die, yet we will live for ever. Yes ! we hope 
 to meet again." Three months later, he again wrote : " I 
 have not lifted a hammer since Jane died. I think of 
 her every day. . . They venerate the dead the most, who 
 live as they desired." 
 
 Amongst those who sought the acquaintance of 
 Dick in later years was a young gentleman connected 
 with a bank in Thurso. He knew of Dick's solitariness, 
 and of his dislike for new acquaintanceships. He 
 wished much to meet him, but feared a repulse. At 
 length he determined to make the attempt. After 
 Dick's day's work was over, he looked in at the window, 
 and then he entered the baker's shop. The scene he 
 saw was characteristic. The only light in the house 
 proceeded from a candle placed on a chair in the side 
 room, where Robert Dick was deeply engaged in reading 
 a book. He was in his working clothes; his shirt 
 sleeves were tucked up ; and his appearance indicated 
 that he had been at his baking bench only a few moments 
 before. What first filled the spectator's eye was the 
 shadow of his massive head thrown upon the wall. The 
 particular way in which he happened to be sitting 
 caused the shadow to be very large, and, being well 
 defined, and showing some of his features, it looked a 
 striking object.
 
 CHAP. xxii. INTERVIEW WITH DICK. 379 
 
 Dick, hearing the sound of footsteps, rose up with 
 the candle, and taking it with him entered the shop by 
 the back way. The visitor, scarcely knowing what to 
 say, asked for some of his biscuits. He said that, being 
 a stranger, he had heard that Mr. Dick's biscuits were 
 the best in town. The biscuits were given, and still the 
 stranger hung about. He entered into conversation 
 with Dick, and he asked whether he could not see some 
 of his specimens. Dick said that he had at that time 
 little that was worth seeing in fact, he had already 
 sold his fossils to Mr. Miller but, if he would call 
 again, he would with pleasure show him all that he had. 
 Dick fixed the hour, stating that his visitor must be 
 punctual to the minute. He explained that he had to 
 stick to rigorous rules in that way, as he had to support 
 himself by his business, and also because he was at 
 times interrupted by persons calling for their own plea- 
 sure while he was engaged at his work. 
 
 The introduction being thus successfully accom- 
 plished, the visitor again called on Eobert Dick to 
 inspect his treasures. He was taken upstairs to the 
 museum a little bedroom or parlour of which Dick 
 carefully kept the key. Its appearance indicated that 
 no duster or broom was plied there without his special 
 permission. The chairs were laden with books, or 
 specimens of plants or fossils. In a corner was laid 
 his herbarium consisting of numerous books in which 
 his dried plants had been preserved. One part of the 
 room might be likened to a quarry bed, because of the 
 specimens of rocks lying there.
 
 380 DICK'S HERBARIUM. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 Pointing to a board laid across a chair, and bearing 
 a considerable number of stone slabs, cut and polished to 
 an equal size, he said, " Now, that's Caithness." " How 
 is that ? " said the visitor. " These are the specimens of 
 all the rocks of the county, from the most ancient :: 
 the most recent, and they are arranged accordingly." 
 The localities were indicated from which the rocks 
 had been taken, from Portskerra to Duncansby, from 
 Morven to Dunnet Head. Dick then proceeded to 
 show his collection of ferns, and a beautiful sight they 
 were. 
 
 Dick was most careful in preparing his herbarium. 
 Not a single imperfect specimen was admitted. The 
 way in which they were attached to the leaves of his 
 books showed the artistic turn of his mind. The fine 
 natural curves of the plants, grasses, and ferns, were 
 carefully preserved. The very hairs about the stalks 
 and leaves were spread out at the correct angle ; and 
 the whole presented, as much as possible, the living 
 character of the plants. All indicated an immense 
 amount of labour, care, and observation. He wished to 
 preserve them as he found them, in a state of nature. 
 All their habitats were carefully attached to the Caith- 
 ness plants. 
 
 To resume the visits of his friend. On one occasion, 
 when he passed through the shop and entered the 
 bakehouse behind, he found the occupant merrily singing 
 " The Soldier's Eeturn." He immediately joined in the 
 song. " Ah," said Dick, suddenly looking up from his 
 dough, " you've caught me." " I did not know you could
 
 CHAP. xxn. HIS INTEREST IN EGYPT. 381 
 
 sing, Mr. Dick." " Sing ! " said he, " I believe I was 
 born singing." 
 
 The visitor proceeded to inspect the walls of the 
 bakehouse. Like many others, he was struck by the 
 firm, correct drawing of the figures on the walls. 
 Though Dick had never studied drawing, he had a great 
 love for the fine arts. He cultivated his taste, and was 
 able not only to delineate plants with delicacy and 
 neatness, but to draw in spirited outline the figures of 
 men, and animals, and gods. He thus converted his 
 bakehouse into a chamber of imagery. 
 
 The smooth plaster was his canvas, and on it he 
 portrayed the creations of his fancy. At one time 
 the walls would be resplendent with Cherubim and 
 Seraphim and the angelic host. At another for he 
 often varied his drawings they would exhibit the 
 strange and weird-like forms of the animals that 
 inhabited the ancient world. Sometimes there was a 
 medley of figures Egyptian kings and hieroglyphics 
 winged bulls and Assyrian gods from the sculptures of 
 Nineveh and in the midst of them, happy children 
 " disporting nude." 
 
 Dick was intensely interested in Egypt and the old 
 Eamesian period. He read every book he could find on 
 the subject. In one of his letters, he says " I am much 
 delighted and fairly lost in Egypt wandering in imagi- 
 nation amongst those 
 
 " ' Temples, palaces, and tombs stupendous, 
 Of which the very ruins are tremendous.' 
 
 " It was a rainy morning, and I had to be content with
 
 382 THE GODS OF EGYPT. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 staying at home. I turned to and sketched in an 
 outline of one of the gods of Egypt. It had a ram's 
 head on a human body. I worked away from eight 
 o'clock in the morning until two o'clock in the after- 
 noon, when I got it finished. I passed the rest of the 
 evening in reading. In the midst of this evil weather, I 
 have been reading a number of books. I have read a 
 volume on the Polar Seas and regions, another on 
 Africa, another on Egypt, another on Nubia and 
 Abyssinia, and I propose to go on with Palestine, 
 Arabia, Persia, India, and New Zealand." 
 
 But amidst all his multifarious reading, ancient 
 Egypt stood first in point of interest. " It seems," he 
 said, " that these old people are not yet properly under- 
 stood by our wisest men, and we fall into many mistakes, 
 and put many constructions on their ancient works. 
 They seemed to have recognised an Evil One or prin- 
 ciple, which they named Typhon a god, Osiris a 
 goddess Isis, and a whole multitude of ' gods many and 
 lords many ' 
 
 " ' Every garden was o'errun with gods.' 
 One, or rather two of the figures which I have stuck up 
 on the wall, exhibit a representation of the union of 
 the Brute and the Human that is, a cat's head on a 
 human body. Cats were venerated in Egypt long ago. 
 There may have been something satirical in this god. 
 Very probably cat-witted people loved then as well as 
 now. Then again, they had their ram-headed gods, and 
 their hawk-headed gods; and, by your leave, we 
 all those sort of living people yet."
 
 CHAP. xxn. DICK'S BAKEHOUSE. 382 
 
 The visitor to Dick's bakehouse saw the numerous 
 figures occupying the walls. Amongst them was a 
 spirited and well-executed figure of the beautiful Greek 
 boy drawing the thorn from his foot. This was over 
 the fireplace. Beside it were two figures of Egyptian 
 idols. On the side of one of the windows there was the 
 figure of an ape, excellently drawn. What Dick thought 
 of the development hypothesis may be understood from 
 his figures of the Greek boy and the ape. They could 
 be seen at the same glance from the door of the apart- 
 ment, and presented a striking contrast, quite irrecon- 
 cilable with the idea of even a remote identity. When 
 questioned on the subject, Dick humorously indicated 
 the presence of the two drawings. He pointed to them, 
 but said nothing. 
 
 With respect to the Egyptian idols, he said of a 
 friend who had called upon him and looked at them, 
 " Perhaps he did not understand my Egyptian mytho- 
 logical divinities. Strange figures are these gods of 
 Egypt, and yet they had a hidden meaning which no one 
 nowadays rightly understands. Egypt was once the 
 first of the nations, but the glory of its palaces has gone 
 for ever. And all must perish but Truth. That alone 
 is eternal ! " 
 
 When the weather was fine, Dick again went to the 
 fields or to the sea-shore. He was still anxious to find 
 his whole big fish. Hence he continued to dig away at 
 the rocks. Towards the end of 1864, Mr. George 
 Henslow, son of the late Professor of Botany in Cam- 
 bridge, wrote a letter to Dick, asking if he could send
 
 384 THURSO HARBOUR. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 him some specimens of fossil fish in exchange for 
 botanical specimens. To gratify his request, Dick 
 searched along the shore ; and, after an hour's labour 
 with his heavy hammer, his wedges, and his chisels, he 
 found a good fossil fish quite whole. Whether this was 
 sent to Mr. Henslow we know not, as no further refer- 
 ence is made to the subject. 
 
 MOUTH OF THUBSO KIVER. 
 
 About the same time Dick discovered another singular 
 object. " A recent spate," he says, " laid bare part of 
 the skeleton of a whale, which apparently had been 
 buried many hundreds of years. It was very much 
 decayed. It lay near the mouth of the river. Most 
 probably some of the old Caithness cannibals feasted on 
 the monster." 
 
 A Society for the study of Natural History was
 
 CHAP. xxn. * NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 38J 
 
 established in Thurso in 1865. Dick refers to it in the 
 following terms : 
 
 " Macculloch said that an uglier country than Caith- 
 ness was hardly to be seen. God save the mark ! is 
 that true ? A fine natural history society has been got 
 up here, and in their wisdom they have thought proper 
 to dub me an ' honorary member.' They go to-day on 
 an excursion to Dunnet Hills. I wish they may not 
 drown themselves." 
 
 On the following day he says : " I am very glad that 
 I did not consent to go a-gowking to Dunnet Hills. The 
 party went off in gigs, single and double ; and what they 
 saw, in crossing the sands, I know not. Certes, no one 
 ever heard of objects in natural history being collected 
 in gigs ! The Society went to the inn and had dinner, 
 and they did not rise until it was late. In coming back 
 across the sands, they drove their gigs into the sea ! . . . 
 One lady was heard to lament that Mr. Dick was not 
 with them, were it only to keep them in order. Depend 
 upon it, if Dick the baker had been there, the Society 
 would have returned home before midnight ! A fine 
 ' honour ' indeed ! 
 
 " ' A countra lad is my degree, 
 
 An' few there be that ken me, ! ' 
 
 "Thurso had its museum party once before, but it 
 went to smoke chiefly through a want of funds, and also 
 through a total want of zeal amongst the people for 
 things of that sort. A love for those studies cannot 
 be forced, hardly even nursed into existence. But this 
 attempt at a Museum bids fair to prosper."
 
 MANY CORRESPONDENTS. CHAP. xxn. 
 
 Dick seems to have had a dislike for men who went 
 out geologising or botanising in gigs ! After a hard 
 morning's work, and a long ramble round the coast, with 
 hammer and chisel, he returned, and entered the follow- 
 ing remarks : " On arriving at home, I found Dr. Hunt, 
 from London, had called. I met him on the road, in a 
 gig of course. I did not know him, nor he me." 
 
 Dick continued to have many correspondents. They 
 addressed him from far and near, asking him for fossil 
 fish, and specimens of the Holy Grass. He provided 
 the Rev. Mr. Brodie, geologist, with some fossils, and 
 through his introduction several other geologists asked 
 for the same. Mr. George Roberts, secretary to the 
 London Geological Society, asked him to send some 
 typical specimens of the oil-bearing shales for analysa- 
 tion. " Some influential city people," he said, " are 
 quite willing to take the matter up, if the yield of 
 bituminous oil promises to be a paying one." Mr. 
 Roy, of Aberdeen, wrote to him stating that he would 
 propose him as a member of the Aberdeen Natural 
 History Society, provided he would supply him with a 
 paper on the natural history of Caithness. Mr. Alfred 
 Bell, of London, wrote him asking for a paper on the 
 Hierochloe borealis, for insertion in his Natural History 
 Circular. 
 
 Another of his correspondents was Mr. Jamieson of 
 Ellon, who sent him an abstract of his paper on the 
 geology of Caithness. " I make mention," he said, " on 
 your authority, of the gravel hillocks near Dirlot, as 
 being the only ones that I had heard of. With regard to
 
 CHAP. xxn. MR: JAMIESON'S LETTER. 387 
 
 the valley gravel, it seemed to me to be less developed, 
 even in proportion to the size of the rivers, than it is 
 in other districts. There is some of it, however ; and I 
 agree with you in saying, as I do in my paper, that what 
 does occur, appears to be the product of the rivers and 
 streams cutting through the drift. 
 
 " I wish you would take a run, some time, along the 
 northern seaboard of Sutherlandshire, and note the 
 appearances presented by the valleys of the various 
 mountain streams that join the sea. It would be desir- 
 able to ascertain whether any moraine-like heaps 
 present themselves in such places, where you approach 
 the mountains. On going along the east side of Suther- 
 land, I noticed that the features of the county differed 
 from those of Caithness. Great piles of gravel, arranged 
 in mounds and abrupt hillocks, present themselves at 
 the entrance of the valleys, and come down close .upon 
 the sea, as is well seen at Brora. Now, it would be 
 interesting to know if similar phenomena also occur 
 along the north coast. 
 
 " The meeting of the Caithness plains with the high 
 hills of Morven, the Pap, and the Scarabens, should also 
 be investigated, in order to see whether any drift from 
 north or north-west overlaps their base, or whether, on 
 the other hand, the de'bris of these mountains protrudes 
 in the form of moraine-like ridges. Foreign boulders 
 should also be searched for on these hills. P^ach tells 
 me he saw hardly any. I walked along the Berridale 
 glen from the base of the Scarabens to the sea, but did 
 not manage to get round the northern base. I will
 
 388 CONTINUES HIS WALKS. CHAP, xxu 
 
 send you a copy of my paper when it is printed, which 
 will probably be some time this year. 
 
 " The valves of the Leda I got from you are pro- 
 nounced by Mr. Gwynn Jeffreys to be Leda buccata of 
 Steenstrup, which he seems to consider a variety of Leda 
 parmula" 
 
 Here was a large stroke of work cut out for Robert 
 Dick. But he was too poor, too rheumatic, too much 
 overborne by troubles, to undertake it. 
 
 Nevertheless he continued his walks to within a 
 reasonable distance of Thurso. He preferred walking 
 along the shore. Sandside Bay was one of his favourite 
 resorts. There he found old fishes in store, but none of 
 them were of the best kind. In passing thither, he 
 crossed the Forss Water by the bridge; and in the 
 lower grounds he found a specimen of the Hierochloe 
 borealis growing. He sought for it again, but he never 
 found another. Besides, there were plenty along the 
 Thurso banks, quite enough to satisfy his numerous 
 correspondents. Forss Water was one of his favourite 
 spots. It rises in Shurery Loch, and comes tumbling 
 down from rock to rock until it reaches the sea. The 
 last fall is at Forss Mill, near where he found the speci- 
 men of the Holy Grass. 
 
 Robert Dick continued his correspondence with 
 Charles Peach to the end of his life.* The two had a 
 
 * In 1859 the Geological Society of London unanimously granted 
 the WolUston Medal to Mr. Charles Darwin, F.R.S. ; but a balance 
 remained, which was awarded to Mr. Charles Peach, for his discoveries 
 in Geology. The president, Professor .1. Phillips, on his handing the
 
 MILL AT FORSS.
 
 CHAP. xxn. DICK'S LAST VERSES. 389 
 
 hearty, cordial, fellow-feeling. They communicated to 
 each other everything that they found which was new. 
 There was never the slightest feeling of jealousy between 
 them. The last verses that Dick wrote to Peach were 
 as follows : 
 
 ; ' Ye lang hae toddled roun' the land, 
 An' hammer'd far and near ; 
 But feint a fossil ye hae fand 
 Your drooping heart to cheer ! 
 
 " A broken wee bit fish or twa, 
 . A doubtfu' bit o' stane, 
 
 Ye carried south, wi' muckle blaw, 
 To chiels, wha skeel had nane. 
 
 " A puff they whispered in your lug, 
 And ye came laughin' name, 
 Weel drooked wi' the Hieland fog, 
 And fand the whole a dream." 
 
 But Mr. Peach did find more fossils. In 1863, 
 while working at Sarclet, on the Wick side of the 
 county, he found part of a fossil crustacean in the Eed 
 Sandstone, rising from beneath the flag-beds.* Sir 
 
 sum in a little purse to Sir Roderick Murchisoii, requested him " to 
 assure Mr. Peach of the pleasure which the Council and Society had in 
 thus publicly acknowledging the perseverance, acumen, and love of 
 Natural History pursuits evinced by Mr. Peach, and especially the 
 advantages accruing to geological science from his researches among 
 the oldest palaeozoic rocks, both at the southern and northern extremi- 
 ties of the island, he having been the first to tiud fossil remains in 
 the old altered rocks of Sutherlandshire and Cornwall." 
 
 * Mr. Pe:iuh says that the first specimen of this fossil was found by 
 Mr. R. Shearer, but that he afterwards found two other body segment) 
 ft short distance from the same place. 
 18
 
 390 MR. PEACHES DISCOVERIES. CHAP. xxir. 
 
 Roderick Murchison, on the authority of Professor 
 Huxley, stated it to be part of a Pterygotus or lobster- 
 like crustacean. Mr. Peach also discovered some speci- 
 mens of the Tristichopterus alatus at John o' Groat's, 
 which threw much light on the previously unknown 
 points of its structure as well as on its affinities. 
 
 It would, indeed, be difficult to tell how much Mr. 
 Peach found during his residence in Caithness. Among 
 his other findings, he discovered a sea-snake. It was 
 cast ashore in Sinclair's Bay, a few miles north of Wick. 
 The length of the snake was fifteen feet six inches ; its 
 width about three and a half inches. Its head displayed 
 a sort of mane or pendulous tuft. Its skin was of a 
 beautiful silvery colour, with fine dark bands passing 
 from the head to the tail. It was found to be a large 
 specimen of the Gymnetrus, better known by the name 
 of riband-lath or deal-fish. A similar sea-snake has 
 since been found by Mr. Trail at Dunnet Bay, near 
 Thurso. 
 
 In 1863 Mr. Peach obtained from the rocks in the 
 neighbourhood of John o' Groat's a fragment of a small 
 Pterichthys. As this genus had not before been found 
 in Caithness, he resolved, although the locality was 
 more than eighteen miles from his residence at Wick, 
 to follow up the discovery ; and he succeeded in finding, 
 at different times, four or five pretty good specimens. 
 At the meeting of the British Association at Dundee, in 
 1868, Mr. Peach read a short description of it to the 
 Geological Section, and named it after his valued friend,. 
 Pterichthys Dicki. But we anticipate.
 
 CHAP. xxii. PEACH'S JOURNEYS. 391 
 
 We return to Charles Peach's history. We have 
 already stated that he was stationed at Wick as Comp- 
 troller of Excise. Part of his business was to inspect 
 the coast of Caithness from Wick round Noss Head, 
 Duncansby Head, John o' Groat's, and Dunnet Head, to 
 Thurso, and from thence to Cape Wrath and Rhu-Stoir 
 in Sutherlandshire. The east coast, from Dornoch 
 Firth north to Wick, was also within his beat. 
 
 When he travelled by land, he went by mail-coach, 
 mail-gigs, or carts, whichever was most convenient. 
 Sometimes he went by boats along the coast. He was 
 often very much exposed, especially in winter, to wind, 
 frost, and snow always bitter cold. When he heard of 
 a wreck having taken place, he was off at once ; his 
 object being to save the ship and the crew, and to 
 reward those who had been instrumental in saving life. 
 He communicated with the Wreck Department of the 
 Board of Trade, and recommended those who had acted 
 gallantly. "I proposed," he said, "that medals and 
 money should be publicly given, and I am proud and 
 happy to say that the Board almost always attended to 
 my recommendations. I always pushed hard for 
 decorations ; and many a man has been made proud of 
 his bravery for life." Amid such harassing, distressing, 
 and dangerous scenes, did Charles Peach carry on his 
 researches into the Geology and Natural History of the 
 northernmost counties of Scotland. 
 
 Peach was now getting an old man not old in 
 spirits, but old in years. He was constantly subject to 
 attacks of cold and bronchitis. Indeed, he was often
 
 392 PEACH RETIRES FROM OFFICE. CHAP. xxii. 
 
 very ill. Dick wrote in one of his letters that he 
 scarcely expected that he would recover. Nevertheless, 
 he cheered liini up as usual : " I am glad to hear you 
 are in spirits at least, if not in health. So many people 
 are going that I began to get apprehensive that you 
 were seriously ill. Hope on for ever, dear Charlie." 
 Peach had also many troubles connected with death 
 and illness in his own family. 
 
 At length, in 1861, he was under the necessity of 
 retiring from the service. He was now sixty-one. He 
 had worked long and hard for his retiring allowance. 
 Besides, a change was about to be made. The office of 
 Comptroller, with a view to economy in the Customs, 
 was to be done away with in all the ports of the 
 United Kingdom. "Mr. Gladstone's long range," he 
 said, " is about to ruin me." The older men were to be 
 placed on the redundant list, and the younger ones were 
 to be reduced to subordinate offices. Though Peach was 
 at the top of the list for promotion to 200 a year, 
 he refused to be reduced, and he therefore retired upon 
 a comparatively small amount, which lasts only during 
 his lifetime, and leaves nothing for his widow. His hopes 
 were thus dashed. The change had such a depressing 
 effect upon him that he fell seriously ill, and for 
 weeks was expected to die. But in course of time he 
 recovered, and set to work again upon his favourite 
 studies. 
 
 Mr. Peach accompanied Mr. Gwynn Jeffreys in his 
 dredging expeditions along the shores of the Shetland 
 Islands, and he there made a collection of British
 
 CHAP. xxii. PEACH'S SCIENTIFIC PAPERS. - 393 
 
 corals (Polyzoa), which would otherwise have 
 thrown away as waste. He never forgot what his keen 
 eyes had detected, and he never threw away what he 
 considered might be turned to some future account. 
 The last time we saw Mr. Peach * he was engaged in 
 preparing a paper on these waste objects, to be read 
 before the Linnean Society. The paper was entitled 
 " On Cellepora cervicomis of the British Seas." 
 
 Mr. Peach left Wick in May 1865, and took up his 
 residence at a house in Leith Walk, where he still 
 lives.t He says, " I must work ; I should soon die if 
 idle. Work is life to me." He has consequently sent 
 many papers to the Linnean and other scientific 
 societies. One of these was on the British Polyzoa; 
 another (read at the Royal Institution of Cornwall) on 
 Zoophytes from the Cornish coast. 
 
 Among his various honours he was elected Presi- 
 dent of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh, and 
 in his opening address he discoursed of the history of 
 the Fossil Mora of the Old Red Sandstone of the North 
 of Scotland. He was also presented by the Royal Society 
 of Edinburgh with the Neill prize for the period 1871- 
 74, in acknowledgment of his extensive contributions to 
 geological science. In fact, so long as Mr. Peach lives 
 he is now seventy-nine his name will be heard of. 
 And yet he says he is not " an old man." He is still 
 an "old boy." That is what his wife calls him. For 
 he is cheerful, communicative, bright, and lively as 
 ever. 
 
 * April 1878. f 30 Haddington Place, Edinburgh.
 
 394 . PEACH'S PHOTOGRAPH. CHAP xxn. 
 
 In May 1866 Mr. Peach sent Dick a photograph of 
 himself, which had been taken at Edinburgh. Dick 
 replied to his letter as follows : 
 
 " I scarcely needed such a memento of you, I would 
 always have remembered you. And indeed, should my 
 memory have proved fallacious, still your plants would 
 have unceasingly suggested an idea of you. I was 
 amongst the Eeay hills in March last, and was pleased 
 to see the fern (Scolopendrium) growing beautifully, and 
 both there and at Dunnet Hills the plant will endure 
 and astonish some lonely wanderer, long after we are 
 both out of time. Charles ! you have thus reared an 
 undying memento, and it was no vain thought which 
 prompted you to bring to me so lovely an object. 
 
 " ' A thing of beauty is a joy for ever.' 
 
 It will be a joy to some who will remain ignorant of 
 its history."
 
 CHAPTEE XXTTL 
 DICK'S LAST YEAR HIS DEATH. 
 
 LIFE was becoming sad, and dreary, and full of sorrow, 
 to Robert Dick. He was a victim to rheumatism. 
 Sometimes he could scarcely move. " I am plagued," he 
 says, " with rheumatism in my shoulder-blades ; I can 
 scarcely lift my arm." The rheumatism also affected 
 his loins and feet. He could not walk ; he could only 
 "hirple." To one who had been so full of life and 
 activity, this was a great trouble. 
 
 He was also much affected by his business. Competi- 
 tion was mining half the bakers in Thurso. One man, 
 who afterwards became a bankrupt, was underselling 
 everybody, in bread, in tea, in groceries and everything. 
 " Campbell," he says, " even sent the bell round forbid- 
 ding people to drink milk, and recommending them to 
 patronise his ale and porter. He sells most things 
 under cost price, to the great injury of his fellow-trades- 
 men." 
 
 Dick's business again fell off more rapidly than 
 before. " I am in a state of galloping ruin," he says to 
 his brother-in-law. " I have nothing to do, I have made 
 no loaf-bread for several weeks. My trade is suspended. 
 To tell the truth, I have worked hard for my living for
 
 396 LOSES HIS BUSINESS. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 so very long, that I am nothing save when I am working 
 regularly ... I was within a hairsbreadth of being off 
 yesterday by steamer for Leith. Idleness will never do. 
 If a man like me, after thirty-five years' hard work, is 
 compelled to work as a day-labourer, I will try if possible 
 first to get out to Brisbane or New Zealand. . . . My 
 sister Jane was a good friend to me. But the world 
 runs round ; and I was a fool for not being off in time 
 from this starvation hole. Lord help us !" 
 
 But Dick was still the best biscuit-maker in Thurso. 
 Surely he could sell his biscuits ! No; competition again 
 beset him. Campbell planted touters at the end of 
 Wilson's Lane, and pressed the Highlanders, when on 
 their way home from "Wick to the Western Islands, to 
 take their biscuits from the general competitor. " On 
 Saturday," he says, "the Highlandmen came up from 
 Wick to go by a steamer from Scrabster ; and they con- 
 tinue to come all day, all yesterday (Sabbath), and kept 
 coming until one or two this morning. I used to sell 
 them on such occasions some thirty or forty stones of 
 biscuit. This time I did not sell them more than 
 twenty stones. So I'll take a run up to the hills, to 
 complete my number of county ferns." 
 
 In fact, Dick could scarcely earn the wages of a day- 
 labourer by working at his trade. The men who worked 
 at flag-cutting by the river-side made from half-a-crown 
 to three shillings a day. But Campbell had lessened 
 Dick's earnings by ten and sixpence a week ; and that, 
 said he, " is a very great deal to take from a poor man 
 like me. However, I must try and starve it out, hoping 
 July for a rcduot^n in the price cf f.cur.
 
 CHAP. xxin. REFORM AND MOSSES. 397 
 
 His brother-in-law having wished him a " good new 
 year," Dick replied : " So far as I am concerned, I have 
 not the smallest hope of seeing a good new year any more 
 in this world. That is all over long ago. You are young, 
 and hope is strong in you ; but you will yet learn that 
 nothing satisfactory exists here below. The world is 
 turned all over since I first knew it. Patience is best" 
 
 Yet Dick never lost his good temper, his charity, or 
 his hope. To his brother-in-law, when in trouble, he 
 said : " Never lose heart. Always look on the bright 
 side of every cloud ; and perhaps you may see the bow 
 of hope beyond." He still went on collecting grasses, 
 ferns, and flowering plants, working, in the evenings, 
 at the completion of his herbarium. In the meantime 
 he went on collecting mosses. 
 
 "Some people," said he, "talk about Reform. I 
 observe that the Franchise is to be reduced to 6 and 
 10. I wish the new voters may derive all the pleasure 
 they expect. I never dabble in politics. It does not 
 suit my nature. But other folk must be tickling them- 
 selves with straws, or grasping at shadows, not knowing 
 that they are themselves to blame for the unhappiness 
 that befalls them. 
 
 " ' Dear Nature is the kindliest' 
 
 "By nature I mean plants, flowers, and flowerless 
 mosses. I am still looking after and prying into these 
 things. I think myself blest if I can find one moss in 
 the week. By that you will understand that the pur- 
 suit of mosses is quite a new study to me. And yet 
 twenty years ago I was looking at them, and picking 
 
 18*
 
 398 FOSSILS AND SHELLS. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 them up, and putting them aside wrapt in paper, with 
 the locality where found marked upon them. 
 
 "So I have got great numbers to overhaul. Last 
 winter I turned to them in good earnest, and tired 
 myself a hundred times over, putting them to one side, 
 and then turning to them again. I will get on slowly, 
 slowly ; but perseverance will do it." 
 
 He went out to the hills again. But the rain often 
 stopped him, ceaseless, pitiless, pelting rain. "The rain," 
 he once said, "is killing me." But so soon as the 
 weather cleared, he was out again. "I have made a ten 
 hours' journey," he said in April 1866, "across the hills, 
 but I got no new mosses. I sought for sea-shells about 
 nine miles inland. I only got some little broken bits ; 
 but I found an entire half of the shell Astarte borealis. 
 It was something to find even that so far away from the 
 sea. Many, many changes have taken place since that 
 shell was deposited. A wood of trees afterwards grew 
 there. The wood perished, and peat moss, many feet 
 thick, covers it up. And underneath that, the shell was 
 found." 
 
 At the beginning of the following month he was 
 again searching for fossils. "I have got," he says, 
 " some large and very strong fossil bones from the rocks. 
 I have seen nothing similar for twenty-three years. 
 The outlines of the larger bone I have tried to trace out 
 on this leaf" [gives a drawing of a fossil bone, about 
 twelve inches across]. 
 
 A fortnight later he says " As I cannot be idle, I 
 have turned over again to break stones. I have nearly
 
 CHAP. xxin. NOTHING NEW. 399 
 
 killed myself several times by over-exertion ; and after 
 all, I have found nothing new. The days of great things 
 are over for ever with me. And yet I am ' first fiddle,' 
 in all that relates to the Old Fish. If you look at the 
 latest edition of Hugh Miller's Footprints of the Creator, 
 you will see figured there many things of mine, which 
 I never hope to see again. The sea must wash down 
 the rocks for five hundred years first, and by that time 
 we shall all be resolved into dust and ashes. 
 
 "Alas for the old days! They are gone for ever. 
 Well, I will return to my plants. But even there, I 
 fag and limp listlessly. Nothing new! With mosses 
 I still get up the steam. But they are so comparatively 
 trifling, that I sometimes weary of them. 
 
 " To tell you the truth, I am perfectly tired of this 
 insipid, tasteless, dull, motionless kind of existence. I 
 would willingly change, if I only knew where to change 
 for the better. All is dull and tasteless. 
 
 " On going over the old fossil ground again, there is 
 much need for enthusiastic steam. The dreams of old 
 will not return. All is in vain. Yet I will try again, 
 yes, with the aid of spectacles. For my eyesight is not 
 so sharp as it once was." 
 
 He again went out to the hills, to gather more ferns. 
 But he had exhausted the subject. " I have overhauled 
 so much of the county before now, that very likely I 
 may find only a repetition of former things. A county 
 holds comparatively few of the British Flora ; and a 
 Northern county fewer than a Southern one. For, 
 however vain dreamers may blow and puff, heat is
 
 400 BOULDER FROM HELMSDALE. CHAP. xxui. 
 
 required for all vegetation. The wise man said, thou- 
 sands of years ago, that 'nothing is hid from the heat 
 of the sun,' and the wise man was right." 
 
 One morning, after he had got his work done, he 
 went out at four o'clock, to revisit for the last time a 
 selection of boulder clay by the river-side, about nine 
 miles from Thurso. His object was to ascertain whether 
 the late rains had exposed some shell or other fossil 
 worthy of being collected. He had before found shells 
 in the same place. It was moonlight, bright moonlight; 
 and he had a delightful walk by the river-side. When 
 the moon became clouded, the stars came out, and they 
 were extremely lovely. 
 
 During his walk, he recognised a boulder stone which 
 had been brought by the ice from Helmsdale, Suther 
 iandshire, on the other side of the Morven hills. 
 
 " And dost thou still, thou mass of breathing stone, 
 Thy giant limbs to night and chaos hurled, 
 Still sit as on a fragment of a world, 
 Surviving all ? " 
 
 . These were the lines of Eogers that floated through 
 nis imagination. " Poor creatures that we are," he said, 
 "speculating about things that we know so little of. 
 And look at these stars, so far off in the infinite. What 
 do we know about them ? Are they also suns, each the 
 centre of a planetary system? Do the beings who live 
 there, enjoy and suffer and die as we do ? Alas ! how 
 little we know of the world we live in." 
 
 Towards the end of his life, Dick read Colenso's 
 Pentateuch, and the book of Joshua. It was the work
 
 BISHOP COLENSG. 401 
 
 of a bishop of the Church of England, who must surely 
 know something about the Bible and its origin. Dick 
 was very much struck by its cleverness and its mockery. 
 He likened the book to Samson pulling down the 
 temple of the Philistines. " It is very clever," he said ; 
 * but what do we gain by it ? Nothing whatever ! 
 Rather we have lost. A little more unhappiness is all 
 the immediate result. Some of our dreams have fled, 
 and left us groping in uncertainty. Is there nothing 
 sure ? And yet there must be such a thing as truth. 
 But who is to decide, and tell us what truth is ? The 
 books of the Bible may be full of errors, but what would 
 become of mankind without it ?" 
 
 Dick's letters show that his mind was much 
 depressed about this time. He seems to have had fewer 
 friends than ever. He sometimes speaks severely about 
 the Thurso merchants; "but," he adds, "it all arises from 
 a want of business. Indeed there is only one merchant 
 in Thurso who has anything like full employment." 
 Dick may possibly have become embittered through his 
 own want of success in life. 
 
 "I have got," he said to his brother-in-law, "Mr. 
 Carlyle's fine oration at Edinburgh. Many thanks. I 
 have seen the same gentleman, and have talked to him. 
 Sir George Sinclair brought him to me, so that I might 
 see him, and he cojild look on me. Mr. Carlyle said in 
 his speech that labour was a cure for every human 
 malady. He was right so far ; and if Thurso folks had 
 more and better-paying employment, there would be 
 less spite and malice among them. And yet, mark yon,
 
 402 PHOTOGRAPHIC LIKENESS. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 they are about the most religious and professing people 
 on the face of the earth. 
 
 " You have been speaking of our railway projects. 
 Just as usual a barking and bickering affair. Thurso 
 and Wick cannot agree. Very lately they were burning 
 here an effigy of a man of straw, which they named the 
 editor of the Northern Ensign. And the Wick folk 
 burnt our John George Sinclair, son of Sir George 
 Sinclair, all because they differed in their notions of 
 what was what." 
 
 His brother-in-law having sent him his photograph, 
 Dick said: "Of course, I ought in return to send you 
 'mysel,' but there is no one here but a watchmaker who 
 does anything that way; and some people have got 
 themselves made so very unlike life, that I prefer not 
 trusting to be made a mock of. 
 
 " Yet you may some time or another see me ; and in 
 the meantime, to assist your imagination, you can just 
 fancy a round-faced, grey-whiskered, laughing fellow. 
 Indeed, so much is that my character, that a young 
 man, now in New Zealand, used to say of me that I 
 was always laughing. In fact, that young man often 
 came to me sad and sad enough, and I always sent him 
 away laughing too. He still remembers me, and sends 
 me the New Zealand papers." 
 
 Dick was still working at his grasses in order to 
 complete his herbarium : " I am anxious," he said, " to 
 complete my British grasses no very easy matter, as 
 botanists generally despise grasses. Why they should 
 do so is a mystery to me, for grasses are very interest- 
 ing plants.
 
 CHAP. xxin. DICK'S LAST WALK. 403 
 
 " A gentleman in Aberdeen wrote to me about the 
 Holy Grass. I put in a word for two grasses I wanted. 
 He sent me those two, and in return for them I sent 
 him fifty specimens of Caithness grass. 
 
 "Another gentleman in London has asked me for 
 shells from our shores, and I have supplied him as far 
 as I could on condition of receiving grass for grass." 
 
 Again he says (20th August 1866) : 
 
 " I have not got many rambles this summer, and I 
 blame that as the cause of the weakness in my stomach. 
 I used to be such a great walker, and the change is 
 telling on me," 
 
 Nine days after this letter was written, Dick took his 
 last walk. He had for some time been complaining of 
 his health. At first he thought that it was indigestion 
 that troubled him. " If I eat I choke," he says. Then 
 he complained of his want of breath. Indeed, few con- 
 stitutions could have stood the amount of toil, labour, 
 and privation, which he had endured during his long 
 course of inquiry into the fossils, plants, grasses, and 
 mosses, over the length and breadth of Caithness. He 
 had often walked from fifty to eighty miles between 
 one baking and another, with little more in his scrip 
 than a few pieces of biscuit. Youth can endure many 
 privations, but when a man becomes comparatively 
 old and Dick was now fifty-five he cannot evade 
 with impunity the requirements of nature. 
 
 Dick took his last journey on the 29th of August 
 1866. He thus describes it : 
 
 " A week ago I went to a quarry at noon to search 
 for a fossil, if I could possibly find such a thing.
 
 404 FIGHTS HIS WA Y HOME. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 " I felt a burning pain under my breast-bone, in my 
 stomach ... I was not well at all Scorning to yield, 
 I pushed on, but only grew worse. 
 
 " I reached the quarry, but only to become conscious 
 that I might as soon think of dancing on my crown as 
 to look among the stones for the dead or the living. 
 
 " After sitting down a little, I felt that my wisest 
 way was just to go home again if I could. I was 
 hardly able to get out of the quarry; I had become 
 so giddy. 
 
 " I got out though, and staggered up a hill, and sat 
 down. I then became terribly sick. ' Ha ! ha !' said I, 
 ' surely I must be better now.' No ; I tried to rise up, 
 but was so giddy that I could scarcely stand ; I could 
 not balance myself. But I got up and went a little, 
 and sat down. Up again, went on, sat down. I got up 
 and sat down nearly a dozen times in succession ; all 
 the while the burning pain in my breast was cruel 
 
 " After I had battled on for two miles I got sick 
 again. c This won't do,' said I ; ' I don't fancy dying 
 amongst the heather.' So I tried to run. I got on a 
 bit, in a zigzag way, and then threw myself down. I 
 got up and off again, and at length found myself on the 
 public road. I moved on in a drunken sort of fashion 
 half-blind too and threw myself down on a dyke 
 beside the river. 
 
 " After resting a little, I got up and made a dash for 
 the river Thurso, through which I waded, just as I was, 
 bran deep. There's a bleaching-green by our river, and 
 many old wives were there. I grew sick again in the
 
 CHAP. xxm. DICK'S ILLNESS. 405 
 
 midst of them dreadfully ! No doubt they wondered, 
 as Dick the baker never drank whisky. 
 
 " At length I got home and went to bed. I have 
 slept none for nearly a week, but the terrible burning 
 pain has left me. My head is still so giddy that I can 
 hardly go up stairs. " 
 
 This was the beginning of the end. Ill though he 
 was, he continued to go on with his daily work. His 
 legs began to swell, until, as lie said, they were like to 
 burst. And then his breath was so bad that he 
 added, " I am like a broken-winded horse." This was 
 extraordinary to him, as he used to pride himself on his 
 " long wind." 
 
 He slept very little, but when he slept at all, he 
 woke " gasping for breath." Then he got up and sat on 
 a chair, sometimes all night occasionally with his head 
 on a table. He tried hunger and cold water. Indeed, 
 he had no appetite. And yet he did his day's work, 
 though with much difficulty. 
 
 One night he prepared his work for the following 
 morning. He wished to have four hours' sleep, but he 
 soon got up, gasping. He took hold of the bed-post " to 
 blaw." He tried to sleep again. It was of no use. 
 "Nothing but suffering." Then he got up and went 
 down to the kitchen fire, laid his head on a table, and 
 tried to sleep, but he could not. He accordingly got up 
 at one in the morning and began his day's work. 
 " Though want of breath and want of strength weiv luml 
 on me," he says, " I battled away, and ultimately filled 
 my oven with capital bread, and my breathing got a
 
 406 CONTINUES AT HIS WORK. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 little easier. And there it stands. I am not at all 
 well, but Hope 
 
 " ' Hope springs eternal in the human breast.' 
 
 " I have sent you," he said to his brother-in-law, " a 
 Thurso paper full of holes holes out of which I have 
 cut words such as ' Thurso,' ' Caithness,' ' Dunnet,' etc., 
 for my plants." For he was still working away at 
 intervals on his herbarium. 
 
 He got no better. Sometimes he was relieved, and 
 then he grew worse again. He thought it was an 
 internal fever burning him up, and causing an enormous 
 drinking of cold water. " I do not say I will go this 
 time," he says, " but my symptoms are much the same 
 as Jane's, my father's, and Ann's." In fact, it was 
 disease of the heart under which he laboured, and 
 perhaps of the liver. Hence his dropsical symptoms. 
 
 He still continued his correspondence, though his 
 writing became weak and shaky like that of a sick 
 man. He also continued his daily work. On the 1st 
 of October he writes: 
 
 " ' See the wretch, who long has tossed 
 On the thorny bed of pain, 
 Recruit his health and vigour lost, 
 And live and walk again. 
 
 The blooming earth, the sun, the skies, 
 
 To him are opening paradise/ " 
 
 " A solemn truth ; and none but those who have been in 
 some measure afflicted, and tossed, and racked, and 
 wearied out of all patience, can know anything of the
 
 CHAF, xxin. THE DOCTOR. 407 
 
 blessedness of the relief one feels when the disease from 
 which he has been suffering is passing away. 
 
 " The fever has got a check, and from this time forth 
 a new life will dawn upon me. I have got relief in my 
 gasping for breath, and I can now lie in my bed at night 
 until I choose to rise. I still moan and complain a great 
 deal in my sleep, but I don't get outrageous and wild, 
 frightening the old woman, puir body ! Indeed, I am 
 a good deal better, and though quite impatient under 
 this dire affliction, and at times almost hopeless, I still, 
 upon the whole, cherish the hope of ultimate recovery." 
 
 But he hoped against hope. Death had laid hold of 
 him. Dr. Shearer says the disease of which he died was 
 aneurism, leading to cardiac complication and dropsy 
 a disease to which his laborious calling and extraordinary 
 exertions in travelling and climbing rocks and mountains 
 would particularly predispose him. 
 
 His housekeeper pressed him to send for the doctor. 
 " No," said he, " no doctor. If I am to die, then I must 
 die." In fact, he did not care very much for doctors. 
 He thought their " cures " were very much the result 
 of happy guessing. " If it has taken me," he said, " a 
 lifetime to ascertain the nature of plants and animals, 
 is it likely that a four years' curriculum can fit any man 
 to comprehend the mysterious processes of the living 
 human body?" Besides, there was the expense of 
 calling in a doctor ! 
 
 At length, after he had been seriously ill for about 
 two months, his friend, Mr. John Miller of London, came 
 down to Thurso and called upon Dick. He was amazed
 
 408 PROGRESS OF HIS DISEASE. CHAP. xxin. 
 
 to find the great change that disease had made in his 
 appearance ; and he insisted upon Dr. Mill being sent 
 for. As for the expense, he would cheerfully pay the 
 doctor's bill. Dick expostulated, but it was of no use. 
 The doctor was sent for. He put Dick under a course 
 of treatment for the purpose of reducing the swelling in 
 his limbs. Writing to his brother-in-law on the subject, 
 he said : " A good deal depends on the way in which we 
 take these things. I keep up my heart, and struggle 
 bravely against all my troubles." 
 
 When the doctor urged him to give up work and 
 engage a journeyman, he said: "All buff! my only 
 chance is to continue at my daily work." He therefore 
 continued at his work, although his legs were fit to 
 burst. Indeed, they did burst. But he still kept at his 
 work. About a fortnight before his death, his brother- 
 in-law, knowing the hard straits to which he was reduced, 
 offered to send him some money. Dick answered : " I 
 am no better. The swelling is steadily moving upward. 
 You offer to send me a present ? No, no ! But I will 
 take a present from you of a pair of spectacles. My 
 present ones are too weak." His friend, nevertheless, 
 sent him four sovereigns and a pair of spectacles. 
 
 He was scarcely able to write when he received his 
 brother's kindly gift. But he did write, with a very 
 straggling restless hand. He was now in bed, and never 
 got up again. He said : " Your kind favour of 4 came 
 duly, and not the spectacles as I had expected, for which 
 I return you many thousand thanks. I am no better. 
 My legs are running water, and very disagreeable." In
 
 CHAP, xxiir. LAST LETTER TO PEACH. 409 
 
 a postscript, written the day after, he said : " The spec- 
 tacles are here this morning, but I am no better. Many 
 thousand thanks. Long life to you. Adieu!" 
 
 He had still one more letter to write. It was to his 
 dear friend Charles Peach. Mr. Peach did not know of 
 Dick's illness, but a few days before his death he wrote 
 him a long letter. " Dear fellow," says Mr. Peach, " what 
 could he do more to show the respect that he bore for 
 me, than by writing in his agony the subjoined letter ? 
 Oh ! how it cut me to know that we were so soon to 
 part. Although the most mournful letter that I ever 
 received, it is comforting to me to find that I was not 
 forgotten by him, even in his entrance to the dark valley." 
 
 Dick's last letter was as follows : " Thurso, 15th 
 December 1866. My dear Sir Instead of sending you 
 a long letter in return for your kind one, I fear that I 
 cannot write to you at all. I have been for four months 
 unable to do anything by swollen limbs water on the 
 chest in fact ; and lest I should die, I only notice you. 
 I am very poorly, so you will excuse me. I am not 
 able. No rest night or day. Believe me ever yours 
 very truly, ROBERT DICK." 
 
 Mr. John Miller continued his kindness to Dick to 
 the end of his days. He sent his housekeeper, Mrs. 
 Harold, to nurse him. She attended carefully to his 
 wants. When she first dressed his legs, he felt much 
 relief. He ejaculated, "That's a blessing. It's just 
 like an angel sent from heaven." 
 
 He knew that he was dying. Mrs. Harold said to 
 him, " You may yet get better." " No !" said he ; " the
 
 410 ROBERT DICK'S DEA TH. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 days of miracles are past." His mind occasionally wan- 
 dered. Once, in his agony, he exclaimed, " Oh mother ! 
 mother !" He thought he was grasping her hand. 
 
 One night he thought that a batch was in the oven. 
 He was convinced that it was there, and that the bread 
 must be taken out. He insisted on being carried into 
 the bakehouse to see it. He was taken to the front of 
 the oven. The door was opened, and it was all black 
 inside. The bread was not there. The oven was never 
 more to be lighted. He looked round the walls, and 
 recognised his old drawings. He was now ready to 
 faint, and was taken back to his bed. 
 
 Amongst those who visited Dick towards the end of 
 his illness were his excellent friends Mr. John Miller, 
 Sir George Sinclair, Mr. Wallace the coast missionary, 
 Mr. Brims, procurator-fiscal, and Mr. Miller the respected 
 minister of the parish. Mr. Miller prayed with him, and 
 read to him the fourteenth chapter of St. John. Christ's 
 words were a great consolation to Dick on his bed of 
 death. Mr. Miller says of him that " he was the most 
 humble believer that he ever met." 
 
 Dick was ready to depart. He was wearied of life. 
 It was better that he should die. He had been oppressed 
 with poverty, and now he was oppressed with agony. 
 Why should he remain a little longer ? He had done 
 his appointed work, and was now more than resigned to 
 leave it. He longed to be at rest. 
 
 In the morning of the 24th of December, Robert 
 Dick's spirit returned to Him who gave it. Towards 
 the end, his sufferings left him, and he died quietly and
 
 CHAP. xxm. SYMPATHY FOR DICK. 411 
 
 peacefully. He was left in the hands of the Wise and 
 Loving. 
 
 Towards the end of his life, much sympathy was 
 expressed for Dick and his condition. The few people 
 who continued to deal with him, had long known of his 
 illness. Four months elapsed between the time when he 
 was struck by death in the quarry, and the day of his 
 death. His customers saw him growing feebler and 
 feebler, panting for breath, and yet continuing at his 
 daily work. It was only during the last fortnight of his 
 life, that he finally dropped from their sight. Then they 
 heard of his intense sufferings, and of the unwearied 
 resignation and indomitable fortitude with which he 
 bore them. The sympathy which his illness excited was 
 almost intense. The Thurso people felt that a great 
 though comparatively unknown man was about to pass 
 away. At his death there was an almost universal sob 
 throughout the town. 
 
 He was also mourned by others who had known him 
 intimately, and valued him for his kindliness, his noble- 
 ness, and his love of science. Amongst these was 
 Charles Peach, of Edinburgh. "After many years of 
 close friendship for him," he said to Sir Roderick 
 Marchison, " I had come to love him. He was such 
 a cheerful and intelligent companion. At the same 
 time, he was as fond of my pursuits as I was myself; 
 and thus a bond of brotherhood existed between us." 
 
 Sir Roderick was then issuing the fourth edition of 
 his Siluria to the public. He there says "Alas! whilst
 
 412 MURCHISON ON DICICS DEATH. CHAP. xxin. 
 
 these pages are printing, I have to record the death of 
 this remarkable man. Eobert Dick was unquestionably 
 gifted with genius, and possessed of great original 
 strength of mind. That he had a strong poetic verve 
 was proved by his having purchased fine editions of the 
 works of Burns, Scott, Byron, and other poets, out of his 
 scanty earnings ; for he was a baker, ever much engaged 
 in hard manual labour. On one of my visits to Thurso, 
 when we were lamenting over the want of a map of 
 Caithness, he prepared for my instruction a model in 
 flour, which he manipulated into hills, valleys, and 
 watercourses, and thus brought into relief all the sur- 
 rounding country. He was as well acquainted with 
 every living British plant as he was with all the Caith- 
 ness fossils. Admiring, as I did, such energy and ability 
 in a modest working man, I rejoice to know that it has 
 been resolved to erect a monument to his memory at 
 Thurso." * 
 
 On the day of his death, Mr. James Mill, chief 
 magistrate of Thurso, issued the following announce- 
 ment : " Mr. Eobert Dick died at his house here this 
 morning at half-past six o'clock. Through his vigorous 
 and energetic study of the Geology and Botany of 
 Caithness, he has been instrumental in developing the 
 natural history of our county, and in attracting the 
 attention of the Scientific World to its resources in no 
 ordinary degree ; and when we look back on his labours 
 in the field for the last thirty years, we feel that Robert 
 Dick merits from the people of Caithness a Public 
 
 * Siluria. Fourth Edition, p. 269.
 
 CHAP. xxin. A , PUBLIC FUNERAL. 413 
 
 Funeral, as the most suitable way in which they can 
 express their gratitude for what he has done, and their 
 sorrow for his removal from amongst us. We accord- 
 ingly invite all who wish to testify their respect for our 
 departed friend to assemble at his house in Thurso on 
 Thursday, the 27th current, at one o'clock p.m., to 
 accompany his remains to the New Burial Ground oi 
 Thurso." 
 
 Of all the things that Eobert Dick could have desired, 
 the very last would have been a public funeral. He was 
 so modest in all that he did, so unwilling to be talked or 
 written about, so retired and self-sacrificing in everything 
 that carrying his remains to the grave amidst the 
 sound of drums and trumpets would have been alto- 
 gether revolting to him. But all this was done by the 
 Thurso people in respect for his memory, and that it 
 might be known that a great though modest man had 
 gone out from amongst them. 
 
 The funeral was largely attended. Men came from 
 Wick and Castlehill, and from the country far and near, tc 
 be present. All the shops and places of business in the 
 town were closed during the funeral. The procession was 
 led by the bands of the Thurso rifles and artillery playing 
 the Dead March in Saul. After them were the Volun- 
 teer Eifle Corps and the Volunteer Artillery Corps. 
 Then came the coffin carried shoulder-high ; pall-bearers, 
 Sir George Sinclair, Bart., James Mill, Esq., Chief Magis- 
 trate, and William Bremner, Esq. The Clergy ; the 
 office-bearers of the Thurso Scientific Society ; the 
 various trades, including the bakers, masons, tailors, 
 19
 
 414 THE NEW CEMETERY. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 seamen and fishermen, shoemakers, merchants, pavement- 
 cutters, and the general public ; followed the remains 
 to the cemetery. It was one of the largest, most impres- 
 sive, and remarkable funerals, that had ever been seen 
 in Thurso. 
 
 The new cemetery, in which Eobert Dick's remains 
 were laid, is about a mile from the town. It overlooks 
 the banks of boulder clay on which the geologist had 
 spent so much of his time. The place where he had 
 discovered the Hierochloe borealis is near at hand, on the 
 sward by the river-side. Far off is seen the entrance to 
 the river Thurso, the ships in the offing, Dunnet Head, 
 and in the distance the island of Hoy in the Orkneys. 
 He was laid in the midst of the scenes which he knew so 
 well, and where he had spent so many nights of patient 
 and toilful plodding, while so many others were enjoying 
 their peaceful repose. 
 
 After the funeral came the winding up of Dick's 
 affairs. We have said that he was a poor man. At 
 his death he owed a considerable sum over 72 to his 
 flour-merchant in Leith. His mind was much troubled 
 before he died about how this amount was to be paid. 
 There were,however,the flour in his bakehouse, the books 
 in his library, and his furniture, such as it was, as security. 
 He was never able to repay his sister the sum of money 
 which he had borrowed from her on the shipwreck of his 
 flour ; but he had the sum in his clothes-chest, in sove- 
 reigns of many coinages, which his brother-in-law thinks 
 he intended to repay. But he never found himself in cir- 
 cumstances sufficient to enable him to return the amount,
 
 CHAP. XXHI. SALE OF DICK'S LIBRARY. 415 
 
 If he had been able to leave anything to anybody, he 
 would have done so to his housekeeper, Annie Mackay, 
 a worthy, independent-minded woman, who had served 
 him faithfully for thirty years. But he died without 
 making any will, as he had nothing to leave. 
 
 The flour, the books, and the furniture were sold by 
 "public roup," and they realised sufficient to pay his 
 ordinary debts. The furniture of one room was given 
 to Annie Mackay, who still lives, to laud, amidst tears, 
 her kind and good "maister." How she contrives to 
 live is a mystery. 
 
 Dick's library was extensive. It consisted of 
 twenty-seven volumes on Geology, eighteen volumes on 
 Botany, eight volumes on Conchology, nineteen volumes 
 on Entomology, thirty-three volumes of the Naturalist's 
 Library, twenty-seven volumes of the Penny Cyclopedia, 
 thirty-eight volumes of the Edinburgh Cabinet Library, 
 and two hundred and twenty-nine volumes on miscella- 
 neous subjects, many of which were of a scientific cha- 
 racter, in all, three hundred and eighty-nine volumes. 
 The whole of these were sold for 32 : 12s., or at less than 
 two shillings a volume. But second-hand books never 
 sell well, even when they are the property of a genius ; 
 and especially when they are of a scientific character. 
 
 While Dick lay ill, his kind friend Mr. Miller asked 
 his consent to apply to the Queen for a pension for his 
 geological discoveries. Mr. Miller's intention was to ask 
 Sir Eoderick Murchison to use his influence with scien- 
 tific men in London, to sign and support the necessary 
 memorial to her Majesty with that object. Dick, when
 
 416 A PENSION TO BE ASKED FOR. CHAP. xxm. 
 
 writing to his step-sister on the 7th November, said : 
 " I am not so sanguine on that point as Mr. Miller is ; 
 but I gave my consent to allow him to get a pension 
 little or muckle ; it will be a great matter to me." 
 
 But it was too late. Before the Queen's mercy could 
 be appealed to, a pension was no longer needed. Dick's 
 spirit had left its frail tenement of clay.
 
 MONUMENT TO ROBERT DICK IN THURSO CEMETERY.
 
 CHAPTER XXTV. 
 
 CHARA CTERISTICS. 
 
 ROBERT DICK died early. Yet he had lived mote than 
 most men. He had worked hard to obtain knowledge. 
 He had worked hard for the love of science. He did 
 not work for his honour and glory. He gave freely to 
 others, without any thought of reward. In this respect 
 he was entirely self-sacrificing. 
 
 We have said that his youth was unhappy. His 
 mother died when he was a boy, yet he remembered 
 her to the day of his death. After that he suffered 
 injustice which threw a shadow over his future life. 
 There was no gentleness about his bringing-up. For 
 relief he went to the fields and the mountains, and fell 
 in love with the beauties of nature. The taste never 
 loft him. 
 
 The tears of childhood soon dry up, and then begin 
 the sighs of manhood. But Dick, though brought up to 
 a life of hard work, was never daunted. He tried to 
 make the best of his life, such as it was. When he 
 settled at Thurso, he again threw himself into nature. 
 Though baffled in his affections, he forgot his sorrow in 
 his strivings after knowledge. His natural disposition, 
 though thwarted, was never soured.
 
 418 GEOLOGY A MYSTERY. CHAP. xxiv. 
 
 The sea was his delight. He wandered along the 
 shores, and found things rich and beautiful and full of 
 wonder. Though he wandered about solitary, he had no 
 time for melancholy dreams. Every flower melted him, 
 every star touched him, even every beetle engraved 
 itself upon his mind. He was a reverent man. Un- 
 belief is blindness, but his mind was all eyes, and his 
 imagination was full of light, and life, and being. 
 
 The earth became to him, in a measure, transparent. 
 It drew him out of the narrow sphere of self-interest. 
 Everywhere he saw significancies, laws, chains of cause 
 and effect, endlessly interlinked. He could not theorise 
 about what he saw. He wanted the true foundation 
 facts. "Let us have facts," he said, "real, certain, 
 unmistakable facts ; there can be no science without 
 them." 
 
 Geology was at first a great mystery to him. It 
 seemed to him, as it really was, a revelation of the 
 physical conditions of the by-past world. The rocks 
 near Thurso spoke to him of a time when the Coccos- 
 teus, large and small, covered with berry bones the 
 Osteolepis, with enamelled bony scales the wrinkled 
 ganoid Holoptychius, the gigantic Asterolepis, covered 
 with star scales had ranged at will over the length and 
 breadth of Caithness. 
 
 All these had, at some remote period, been destroyed 
 by violent death, either by a sudden retirement of the 
 sea, or by a sudden uplifting of the land. Platforms of 
 death rose one above another, story above story, the 
 floor of each bearing its record of disaster and sudden
 
 CHAP. xxiv. CHANGES OF SEA AND LAND. 419 
 
 confusion. Wide areas of seas were depopulated, but 
 the dead fish remained. They were left in the mud. 
 The mud and fish became Caithness flag now the 
 support of a large population. " Thus Thurso itself," said 
 Dick, " is built of dead fish." 
 
 But that time passed away, and the sea went rolling 
 over Caithness. Ponderous glaciers went grating along 
 the mountain sides of the Scaraben range, grinding its 
 rocks down into clay, and strewing the deep-sea bottom 
 with gigantic boulders. Amongst the boulders and 
 boulder clay, which forms a large part of the county of 
 Caithness, Dick found the numerous marine shells which 
 have been described in the previous pages. 
 
 All this was very mysterious to Dick. The preoccu- 
 pancy of the seas by the fishy tribes, and the present joint 
 tenancy of the land by man and the lower creation, 
 were two striking facts which strongly impressed his 
 imagination. Might not this be the first cycle of the 
 geological manifestation of the globe; or rather the 
 first of a series of cycles, at whose close the existing 
 races of living beings, and the gorgeous fabrics of 
 national vanity, shall yield their haughty relics to the 
 sport and desolation of the elements, when new heavens 
 and a new earth shall replace the ruins of a world ? 
 
 Although Dick devoted a great part of his spare time 
 to botany, it was to geology that he devoted so large a 
 share of his attention. It was MantelTs Wonders oj 
 Geology that first attracted him to the subject; then 
 Buckland's Bridgewater Treatise, and after that Hugh 
 Miller's Old Red Sandstone. He had already found
 
 420 ASSISTANCE TO HUGH MILLER. CHAP. xxiv. 
 
 the fossil bones of the Holoptychius, the gigantic ganoid 
 fish of the Old Red, before he became acquainted with 
 Hugh Miller. He sent the specimen to Edinburgh, and 
 received Hugh's warm acknowledgments. The corre- 
 spondence between them at length ripened into a warm 
 intimacy, and Dick continued to send to Miller, as long as 
 he lived, the best of his findings among the fossil fish of 
 Caithness. " Indeed," says Mr. Peach, " Dick was 
 Hugh's greatest benefactor, and gave him more solid 
 assistance than any other person." 
 
 Dick was one of the most unselfish of men. He 
 made every one free to his stores of knowledge. He 
 gave freely, without any hope of reward. He had no 
 jealousy, no mean rivalry. Though he hammered and 
 chiseled for fossils, sometimes at the risk of his life, he 
 sent everything that was valuable to Hugh Miller 
 everything that was calculated to establish his views, 
 and to turn his gathered treasures to account in the 
 establishment of scientific truth. " But for him," says 
 one of his friends, "and his sedulous and faithful 
 attachment to Hugh Miller, in the capacity of 'lion's 
 provider ' (as was sometimes jocularly remarked between 
 themselves), the Footprints of the Creator might never 
 have been written ; or at least, being written, the great 
 culminating points in the argument would have been 
 shorn of their force and power ; and the principal facts, 
 and the greater portion of the descriptive geological 
 groundwork of the volume, would have been wanting." 
 
 By Mr. Dick's specimens of the then unknown fish, 
 Hu^h Miller was enabled to identify the great Russian
 
 CHAP. xxiv. DICK'S DISCOVERIES. 421 
 
 Chelonichthys with the Asterolepis of the Caithness 
 beds, and to reconstruct to a certain extent this monster 
 of the primeval seas. Agassiz says that the remains of 
 the Asterolepis found by Mr. Dick at Thurso indicate a 
 length of from twelve feet four to thirteen feet eight 
 inches. It was the occurrence of this monster among 
 the vertebrates at such an early period of the world's 
 history, that gave Hugh Miller the key-note to that 
 elaborate argument, by which he endeavoured to con- 
 trovert the development theory of Oken, Lamark, and 
 the author of the Vestiges of Creation. 
 
 Mr. Dick not only provided the fragments by means 
 of which the structure of the Asterolepis was wrought 
 out especially the small medium plate in the cranial 
 buckler, immediately over the eyes, which Professor 
 Sedgwick immediately recognised as " the true finish," 
 but he discovered the peculiar dental apparatus of the 
 palate of the Dipterus,and he detected the ichthyodorulite 
 of the Homocanthus, which, though already found in the 
 Old Eed, were not previously known to exist in Scotland. 
 
 Hugh Miller was always most ready to acknowledge 
 his obligations to Eobert Dick. "He has robbed himself 
 to do me service," said Hugh Miller. And yet Dick was 
 so modest and unassuming, that he shrank with the 
 utmost sensitiveness from everything like publicity. 
 He had no idea of making himself famous. On the 
 contrary, he " blushed to find it fame " that he had gone 
 out of the ordinary track and done anything worthy of 
 being recorded in scientific books. He was willing, like 
 Keats, that his name should be " writ in water." " T 
 19*
 
 422 DICK'S MODESTY AND SHYNESS. CHAP. xxiv. 
 
 am a quiet creature," lie said to Hugh Miller, " and do 
 not like to see myself in print at all." When Sir Eoderick 
 Murchison made the eulogistic speech about him at 
 Leeds, he said, " That speech has got me into a great 
 deal of trouble." And when Mr. Peach went to the 
 British Association at Aberdeen, Dick said to him, 
 " Pray, do not mention me ; if anybody asks about me, 
 say that I am well ; I want to be let alone." " His 
 unassuming modesty," said Sir George Sinclair, " was as 
 conspicuous as the wonderful amount of his knowledge." 
 
 It would be hard to imagine a more devoted lover of 
 science, or a more ardent and unselfish seeker-out of 
 knowledge for its own sake. His success in this respect 
 lay in his earnestness, his enthusiasm, and his persistent 
 perseverance. Though a solitary man, the ardour and 
 purity of his devotion to science saved the health of his 
 moral and mental nature, and enabled him to live to the 
 end of his days, cheerful, happy, and human -hearted. 
 His pursuits elevated his nature, and bore him up 
 against the petty annoyances of the world. 
 
 The amount of voluntary labour which Dick imposed 
 upon himself, in pursuit of his favourite sciences, is 
 something incredible. Every nook and cranny of the 
 county was familiar to him. The bleak bluff rocks of 
 Dunnet Head were as familiar to him as the shores of 
 Thurso Bay. The hills of Morven and Scaraben were 
 his playgrounds. In summer time, and even in winter, 
 he wandered far and near, always alone. He walked by 
 night to Freswick and Dunbeath in search of the boulder 
 clay and its marine shells. He wandered up Strath
 
 CHAP. xxiv. LABOUR A NECESSITY. 423 
 
 Halladale in the moonlight, and came home, across the 
 hills, by Braalnabin, to Thurso. Or he would walk 
 across the country, over bog and mire, to Morven top, 
 and be back in time for his day's baking. He hammered 
 among the rocks at Murkle Bay until the moon shone 
 clear in the water. He clambered up and down the 
 rocks at Dunnet Head in search of ferns. In the early 
 mornings, in spring, he went up the banks of the Thurso 
 river to see the flowers unveiling themselves before the 
 light of sunrise. The hills about Eeay were among his 
 favourite haunts. There he transplanted the ferns which 
 he had brought from Dunnet Head, so that they might 
 be cheering the wandering botanist when he himself, as 
 he said, was " out of time." 
 
 Labour was an absolute necessity for him. " I find 
 it utterly impossible," he said, " to be idle. There is 
 nothing for me but regular labour. If I cannot find 
 any ordinary work to do, I must invent some extraordi- 
 nary work. I could not be, and would not be, what the 
 world calls a gentleman that is, standing idle even 
 though I were paid for it. The mind must be employed, 
 even though what occupies it is doomed to come to an 
 end and pass away into nothingness, and we ourselves 
 with it." 
 
 The intellectual labours of men such as Dick are 
 often spoken of as the pursuit of knowledge under diffi- 
 culties ; but they are also the pursuit of knowledge 
 under pleasure. "We forget the delight which accom- 
 panies the discovery of a new fact, and the enlighten- 
 ment of a mind thirsting for knowledge. This was one
 
 424 HIS CAREFUL OBSERVATION. CHAP, xxiv 
 
 of the greatest pleasures of Dick's life. We forget also 
 the elevating and purifying effects of searching after 
 truth. In pursuing knowledge, he was merely serving 
 his higher nature. 
 
 Nor did he ever make a parade of what he knew. 
 He was modest and retiring. Others sought him, not 
 he them. He thought, like Newton, that all that we 
 know was as but mere shells on the sea-shore, compared 
 with what must ever remain unknown. And yet those 
 who were admitted to his intimacy were surprised at 
 the amount of knowledge he had acquired. 
 
 "It was impossible," says Dr. Shearer, " for one 
 coming into the merest casual contact with him not to 
 catch up some portion of his own vivid enthusiasm in 
 natural science ; and no man was ever better fitted by 
 nature as a luminous and gifted expounder of scientific 
 truth. His conversation was so rich that one always 
 came away surfeited." 
 
 "He combined in himself rare powers of original 
 research, and an amazing industry in the pursuit of 
 truth, with a sweet and winning eloquence which was 
 all his own. His collection of the British Flora is 
 almost unique in its completeness. Looking at the 
 difficulties he encountered in collecting it, his herbarium 
 is an extraordinary tribute to his diligence, skill, and 
 long-continued perseverance." 
 
 Dick diligently applied himself to the study of all 
 that lay around him. He noted with wonderful accu- 
 racy the He of a country. He marked upon the map 
 that he carriM. about with him the faults, and dips, and
 
 CHAP. xxiv. HIS FOSSILS, 425 
 
 dislocations of the strata ; thus correcting the statements 
 of previous geologists. He was not satisfied with accept- 
 ing the statements and adopting the conclusions of 
 others. He would not take anything for granted that 
 he could see and observe for himself. When his views 
 as to the nature of the fossil fish, as explained by Hugh 
 Miller, were disputed by scientific men, he said, " Why 
 can't they leave their books, and come here and see for 
 themselves ? " 
 
 Nor was he in a hurry to connect himself with those 
 who traced a harmony in all respects between the cos- 
 mogony of the Hebrew Scriptures and the indications 
 of geological science. " We think," he said, " that we 
 have deciphered the writing on the selvage of the great 
 volume of the earth ; and, lo ! we proceed to erect our 
 fragmentary knowledge into a science, and to show its 
 correlation with all the other departments of truth." 
 Again, " Let us watch for facts, and wait." Knowing 
 that Nature herself must ever harmonise with truth, he 
 endeavoured to trace out the workings of the Almighty 
 in the little spot of earth to which he was confined, 
 with lowly and reverent adoration, and with simple, 
 childlike delight. 
 
 The number of fossils that he collected was very 
 great. With his usual generosity, he made over a con- 
 siderable part of them to Hugh Miller. Another 
 portion, containing some of his best specimens, was 
 sold to Mr. Miller of London, for the purpose of paying 
 his debts after the shipwreck of his flour. The remain- 
 ing fossils were found in his museum after his death.
 
 42G 
 
 HIS HERBARIUM. 
 
 CHAP. XXIV. 
 
 The fossils sent to Hugh Miller are now to be found 
 in the Museum of Science and Art at Edinburgh. The 
 collection is marked, " Fossils used by the late Hugh 
 Miller to illustrate his works." The whole of those 
 marked " Thurso" were found by Robert Dick, though 
 his name does not appear on any of them. 
 
 TOWN HALL, THUKSO. 
 
 But his herbarium also exhibits the best proofs of 
 Eobert Dick's industry, judgment, and tenacity of pur- 
 pose. The collection was made over to the Thurso 
 Scientific Society, by Mr. Alexander, of Dunfermline, 
 Eobert Dick's nearest surviving relation. To tell the 
 truth, this extraordinary collection has been very much 
 neglected. The herbarium consists of about two hundred 
 folios, full of botanical specimens. The grasses and ferns, 
 and in fact all the plants, are beautifully preserved. They
 
 CHAP. xxiv. DICK'S CHARACTER. 427 
 
 are carefully gummed on to their respective sheets, and 
 in the case of the Caithness plants, the habitat is always 
 given. The manner in which they are arranged shows 
 the eye of the artist. The mosses are unfinished. We 
 have by us the book which he carried in his side-pocket, 
 still full of the mosses which he was collecting and 
 gumming on at the time of his death. 
 
 The herbarium seems to have been thrown into a 
 corner, and laid on the floor. It is full of living moths, 
 and their grubs have already made sad havoc with the 
 collection of grasses in which Dick took so much pride. 
 The Scientific Society of Thurso ought surely to do 
 something to put the collection in proper order. The 
 respect which they entertain for Eobert Dick requires 
 this to be done. They will never again possess such 
 another botanist to collect and arrange the plants and 
 grasses, and ferns and mosses, of Caithness. 
 
 A few more words about Dick's character. "We 
 have said that he was a solitary man. He was for the 
 most part alone with himself. He communed much 
 with his own thoughts. He always made his long 
 journeys on foot alone. "No good work," he said, 
 " could be done in company." He had few real friends ; 
 and his relatives were far distant. 
 
 Under such circumstances, and with such a nature, 
 Dick was in imminent danger of losing the health of his 
 spirit and the just balance of his character. Such a 
 man is often driven to brood on himself ; or sell his life 
 to miserable, miserly money-making ; perhaps to drink 
 or self-indulgence. But Dick did none of these. Hi3
 
 428 CHEERFUL AND SOCIAL. CHAP, xxiv 
 
 love of knowledge and science saved him. Besides, he 
 was childlike in his nature. He had the wonder of a 
 child ; he had the feelings of a child. He was always 
 merciful to children. He was blameless, simple, cheer- 
 ful, in all that he did. 
 
 Though he was naturally a man of retiring manners, 
 he was by no means unsociable. He had a great deal 
 of human nature in him. To those who knew him 
 besv. he was cheerful and social. He had a vein of 
 inno^nt fun and satire about him ; and he often 
 turned his thoughts into rhyme. Sir George Sinclair 
 said of Mm, " His temper was naturally cheerful, and 
 even facetious. His comely and animated countenance 
 beamed TMth intelligence and good humour. His 
 estimable a^.-l faithful attendant, who resided with him 
 for the long period of thirty-three years, never heard a 
 hasty word drop from his lips, or saw his bright coun- 
 tenance clouded by an angry frown. The grateful tears 
 which she has so plenteously shed attest the kindly 
 tenor of his domestic life." 
 
 Professor Shearer also adds " He was held in 
 honour for his scientific attainments by a growing num- 
 ber of the inhabitants, and by the small number of 
 young men whom the little town used to send to the 
 universities ; while, by the working men generally, the 
 purity of his life and the independence of his character 
 secured for him a respect, which, to my own knowledge, 
 was never once broken. His moral character was never 
 called in question." 
 
 Charles Peach, who knew him so well, said of him,
 
 CHAP. xxiv. LIVING BY HIS LABOUR. 429 
 
 " His character was thoroughly without blemish. He 
 never said an ill word of any one ; and never repeated 
 anything to another's discouragement. I regret," he 
 adds, "that so many of his curious and original discoveries 
 have been lost, because he made no communication of 
 them to others, and had a special aversion to what he 
 called ' blowing his own trumpet.' " 
 
 Dick continued poor to the close of his life. He was 
 content to be poor, so long as he was independent, 
 and free to indulge his profound yearnings after more 
 knowledge. Though he attended carefully to his 
 business, he was not successful. He was ruined by 
 competition. The shipwreck of his flour reduced him 
 almost to beggary. But he never told his Thurso friends 
 of his losses. He was the last man to " send round the 
 hat." Like Burns, he was "owre blate to seek, owre 
 proud to snool." When his customers left him, he said 
 to one of his friends " Well, they might not have done 
 it. I have wrought long for them, and I have served 
 them well ; but it cannot be helped now." 
 
 Charles Peach, not knowing of his losses, once said 
 to him, that "he would soon be able to save enough 
 money to retire, and give himself up wholly to scientific 
 pursuits." A gloom fell over his countenance. " Oh 
 no !" said he, " I shall never do that." But he added, 
 " Notwithstanding the opposition that has destroyed my 
 trade, I am still here a baker after all !" And he smiled 
 at the efforts which had been made to strangle him. 
 
 Sir George Sinclair, perhaps not knowing his struggles 
 to live, said after his death "Mr. Dick's honourable
 
 430 ANNIE MACK AY. CHAP. xxiv. 
 
 I 
 
 desire to earn his livelihood by his own exertions, 
 and the unremitting diligence with which he attended 
 to matters of business, without allowing scientific 
 pursuits to interfere with his daily and respectable 
 calling, have long since attracted my cordial admiration. 
 He was always at hand when wanted ; and, like 
 Johnson's estimable friend Lovatt, 
 
 " ' No summons mocked by chill delay 
 No petty gains disdained by pride ; 
 The modest wants of every day 
 The toil of every day supplied.' " 
 
 It was fortunate for Dick's memory that he left no 
 debts unpaid. Everything that he owed was paid in 
 full ; though little was left for his faithful friend Annie 
 Mackay. 
 
 When I went to Thurso, I expected to obtain a good 
 deal of information from her about her old master. 
 But she could give me very little. She could not speak 
 for tears. " He was my good and kind maister ! " that 
 was nearly all that she could tell me. But she showed 
 me Dick's house and the bakehouse behind, now 
 divided into separate tenements. 
 
 Little more need be said about Eobert Dick. The 
 " unco guid " said hard things of him. They drew a 
 religious moral from the painfulness of his death. Poor 
 self-satisfied creatures ! One of Dick's sayings might 
 apply to them. " Some men," he said, " make an image 
 of God after their own hearts, and not after the image of 
 their Maker." 
 
 Yet all who knew Dick intimately spoke of him as a
 
 CHAP. xxiv. DICK A RELIGIOUS MAN. 431 
 
 thoroughly religious man. His was one of those deeply 
 reverent natures that are essentially religious, though 
 not cumbered about with forms or ceremonies or sec- 
 tarian differences. Indeed, one of the things that drove 
 him from the church was the quarrels of those who 
 were ministers in it. Professor Shearer, of Bradford, 
 says, "My own opinion is strongly that in this man 
 were combined singular powers of thought and the 
 greatest devotion to natural science ; and at the bottom 
 of all, a truly devout and earnest spirit." 
 
 Another says, " I had a conversation with him on 
 this solemn subject; and I believe 'his right hand 
 touched God's ' to others it might be in the dark ; but 
 Robert Dick knew it. He studied his Bible diligently, 
 and, like all his other studies, his whole soul went into 
 it. He held his Sabbath worship in his own house alone. 
 Whether we look to his upright, frugal, temperate 
 character as a man, or to his wonderful labour and per- 
 severance in his favourite studies, it is difficult to say 
 which most to admire. But I admire above all his 
 loving and reverent spirit." 
 
 Robert Dick's life tells its own moral. His manful 
 perseverance in encountering the difficulties of life ; his 
 steadfastness, his honesty, his purity ; his highminded- 
 ness in carrying on his business affairs ; his energy and 
 devotedness in cultivating his higher nature ; all these 
 command our admiration. 
 
 Thus the man of the humblest condition may at the 
 same time do honour to his calling and elevate the con- 
 dition of his class. By the diligent use of his spare
 
 432 MORAL OF DICK'S LIFE. CHAR xxiv, 
 
 time, he may even add many new facts to the con- 
 stantly enlarging domain of science. In the case of 
 Dick, how little time was misspent, how much know- 
 ledge was gained and communicated, and all with so 
 much humbleness, modesty, and unselfishness ! It is 
 by men such as he that the character of a country is 
 elevated to the highest standard, and raised in the scale 
 of nations. 
 
 " Whilst the institutions and customs of men," says 
 Professor Sedgwick, " set up a barrier, and draw a great 
 and harsh line between man and man, the hand of the 
 Almighty stamps His first impress upon the soul of 
 many a person who never rises above the ranks of com- 
 parative obscurity and poverty. Hence arises a lesson 
 of great importance, that we should learn in our walks 
 through life, in our mingling with the busy scenes of 
 the world, a lesson of practical wisdom, of kindness, of 
 humility, and of regard for our fellow beings."
 
 INDEX, 
 
 AJBBCROMBY family, 7. 
 
 Acharynie, 198, 200. 
 
 Aikman, Mr., Tullibody, 17, 40, 48, 
 
 193. 
 
 Agriculture in Caithness, 33. 
 Allman, Professor, 266. 
 Alva, 2. 
 Al-wick, 81. 
 Amygdaloid, 277. 
 Argyll, Duke of, 285. 
 Asterolepis, 207, 215, 224, 272, 
 
 289, 362, 421. 
 Atlantic at Thurso, 24. 
 
 BABINGTON, Professor, 266, 341. 
 
 Bakehouse, Dick's, 272, 323, 381. 
 
 Baker, life of a, 19 ; bakers in 
 Thurso, 315. 
 
 Balfour, Professor, 74, 266, 291, 294. 
 
 Baltic rush, 255, 340. 
 
 Banniskirk, 138. 
 
 Barrogill Castle, 28, 211. 
 
 Bencheilt, 37, 193, 229. 
 
 Bencleuch, Ochil Hills, 3. 
 
 Biscuits, Dick's, 49, 396. 
 
 Bishop's Palace, Thurso, 111, 121. 
 
 Botany, Dick's first acquaintance 
 with, 19 ; study of, 50 ; his col- 
 lection, 254, 264, 426. 
 
 Boulder clay, formation of, 133, 158; 
 at Freswick, 169, 184 ; at Thurso, 
 159 ; at Dunbeath, 192. 
 
 Boulders, 180, 190, 400. 
 
 Brims, geology at, 125. 
 
 British Association, 245, 263. 
 
 Brough, 83, 95, 174. 
 
 Brown, Dr., 288, 290. 
 
 Buckland, Dr., 99, 106, 249. 
 
 Busby's oook, 99. 
 
 CAITHNESS, description of, 26. 
 Cambuskenneth, 5. 
 Carlyle, Mr. T., 286, 401. 
 Castles, old, in Caithness, 31, 44, 201. 
 Castle Campbell, 1. 
 Castlehill, 29, 180. 
 Castletown, 87, 180. 
 Chambers, Dr. R., 246, 367. 
 Character of Dick, 373, 427. 
 Clett, Holborn Head, 43, 124. 
 Cley, Norfolk, 241, 243. 
 Coast scenery of Caithness, 30. 
 Coccosteus, 100, 107, 127, 139/325, 
 
 359. 
 
 Colenso, Bishop, 400. 
 Competition in Thurso, 153, 313. 
 Conybeare on fossils in Caithness 
 
 and Cornwall, 98, 245. 
 Cornish geology, 245, 250. 
 Correspondence with Hugh Miller, 
 
 100-159. 
 
 Coutts, Baroness Burdott, 286. 
 Creation, one, 305. 
 
 DAM'S BURN, 10. 
 
 Darwin, Mr., 304, 309. 
 
 Deil's Brig, Holborn Head, 123. 
 
 Devon River, 1. 
 
 Dick, Robert, birthplace, 8 ; scho- 
 lar, 9, 11 ; son of nature, 12, 18 ; 
 treatment at home, 13 ; his self- 
 control, 15 ; apprenticed to a 
 baker, 17 ; acquaintance with 
 Botany, 19 ; a great reader, 20 ; 
 becomes a journeyman, 22 ; re 
 moves from Greenock to Thurso 
 23 ; begins trade as a baker, 40 , 
 Conchology, 41 ; Botany, 42 ; 
 Entomology, 44 ; the boys aud
 
 434 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 the baker, 45 ; attends lectures, 
 
 Dick, Thomas, Excise officer, 8 ; 
 
 47 ; Astronomy and Phrenology, 
 
 second marriage, 10 ; made Super- 
 
 47 ; studies Botany, 50 ; buys 
 
 visor, 20 ; made Collector el 
 
 books, 52 ; buys a microscope, 52 ; 
 
 Excise, 43 ; his death, 151. 
 
 walks in the country, 56, 60 ; 
 
 Dips of Caithness rocks, 131, 218. 
 
 hunting for ferns, 61, 78 ; journey 
 
 227, 230. 
 
 to Morven top, 65 ; taken for a 
 
 Diplopterus, 137, 144, 204. 
 
 poacher, 67 ; the " Holy Grass," 
 
 Dipterus, 137, 214. 
 
 73 ; Dorery hills, 78 ; Dunnet 
 
 Dirlot Castle, 201. 
 
 Head, 83 ; descends the Head, 
 
 Don, the botanist, 73. 
 
 88 ; studies Geology, 98 ; reads 
 
 " Donald's Flittin," 149. 
 
 " Old Red Sandstone," 99 ; cor- 
 
 Dorery Hills, 78. 
 
 responds with Hugh Miller, 100 ; 
 
 Druidical temple, 229. 
 
 discovers a Holoptychius, 108 ; 
 
 Dunbeath, 193. 
 
 journey round the Thurso coast, 
 
 Duncansby Head, 30 ; Stacks, 16d. 
 
 111 ; the west coast, 119 ; visited 
 
 Dunmyat, 3. 
 
 by Hugh Miller, 141 ; death of 
 
 Dunnet Head, 23, 81 ; lighthouse, 
 
 his father, 151 ; why he left "the 
 
 85 ; cliffs, 144, 172, 296. 
 
 Kirk," 154 ; his solitary service, 
 
 Dunnet Loch, 96. 
 
 196 ; journey to Freswick, 167 ; 
 
 Dunnet Sands, 77, 143. 
 
 to Brough, 172 ; to Dunbeath, 
 
 Durness, 257. 
 
 192 ; to Dirlot, 200 ; to Sinclair 
 
 Dwarwick Head, 84. 
 
 Bay, 204 ; to Strath Halladale, 
 
 
 208 ; to Haven of Mey, 211; Dick's 
 
 EGYPTOLOGY, 381. 
 
 assistance to Hugh Miller, 214 ; 
 
 Emigration from Caithness, 147, 
 
 the map, 220 ; journey to Gill's 
 
 381. 
 
 Bay, 228 ; to Bencheilt, 229 ; Dick 
 
 
 mourns Hugh Miller's death, 
 
 FERN- HUNTING, 61, 76, 78, 89, 296, 
 
 234 ; becomes acquainted with 
 
 341, 376. 
 
 Mr. Peach, 253 ; interview with a 
 
 Finlayson's lecture, 365. 
 
 Highlander, 268 ; interviews with 
 
 Flagstones, Caithness, 132, 316. 
 
 Sir R. Murchison, 270; Dick's 
 
 Flint, liquid, 367. 
 
 Rhymes, 277 ; shyness, 283 ; 
 
 Folkingham, 240. 
 
 friendship for medical students, 
 
 Forss, 27, 121 ; Water, 388. 
 
 288 ; illness, 300 ; plants ferns 
 
 Fossil-hunting, 100, 110, 118, 131, 
 
 throughout the county, 297, 301 ; 
 
 214, 285, 323 ; fossils sold, 335 ; 
 
 decline of business, 312 ; his hon- 
 
 new collection, 348, 359, 398. 
 
 esty, 319 ; Sir Wyville Thom- 
 
 Free Church, 148, 155. 
 
 son. 323 ; wreck of his flour, 329; 
 
 " Fresh herring," 139. 
 
 compelled to sell his fossils, 335 ; 
 
 Freswick Castle, 168 ; boulder clay 
 
 "0 waft me o'er the deep blue 
 
 at, 169-191 ; bridge at, 190. 
 
 sea," 345 ; a sleepless man, 346 ; 
 
 Freswick, journeys to, 167, 178. 
 
 recommences a collection of fos- 
 
 
 sils, 348 ; his temperance, 376 ; 
 
 GAELS in Caithness, 27. 
 
 Dick at home, 378 ; correspond- 
 
 Geography of Caithness, 35. 
 
 ence with Peach, 387 ; in gallop- 
 
 Geology Dunnet Head, 90 ; Dick's 
 
 ing ruin, 395 ; his last walk, 403 ; 
 
 beginnings of, 99, 102 ; not yet 
 
 his illness, 405 ; his death, 410 ; 
 
 a science, 130 ; formation of 
 
 public funeral, 413 ; winding-tip 
 
 Caithness, 132 ; boulder clay, 
 
 tf his affairs, 414 ; his library, 
 
 133-154. 
 
 415 ; a pension proposed, 415 ; 
 
 Gilchrist, Margaret. 9. 
 
 Dick's character, 417. 
 
 GUI's Bay, 228.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 435 
 
 Giniigo Castle, 31. 
 
 Maps of Caithness, 35, 219, 272. 
 
 Glaciers, 133, 165. 
 
 Medical students, 288. 
 
 Gorranhaven, Cornwall, 244. 
 
 Meiklejohn, Dr., 288, 308. 
 
 Gulf Stream, 24, 296. 
 
 Menstrie, 2, 4. 
 
 Gyoes in Caithness, 30, 32, 44, 85, 
 
 Metamorphic action, 366. 
 
 116. 
 
 Mey, Haven of, 211. 
 
 
 Microscopic shells, 369. 
 
 HAELLAN, Loch, 210. 
 
 Miller, John, F.G.S., 330, 355, 363, 
 
 Halie Loch, 96. 
 
 407. 
 
 Halley's comet, 47. 
 
 Miller, Hugh Old Red Sandstone, 
 
 " Hammers an' chisels," 277. 
 
 99 ; correspondence with Dick, 
 
 Harold, Mrs., 409. 
 
 100 ; on working-men Geologists, 
 
 Harpsdale, 164, 178. 
 
 105 ; visits Thurso, 141 ; de- 
 
 Hart's-tongue fern, 298, 301. 
 
 scription of the coast, 144 ; cor- 
 
 Harvieston, 2. 
 
 respondence with, 100, 159-191, 
 
 Herbarium, Dick's, 254, 274, 280, 
 
 214-234 ; the fairies, the bio- 
 
 380, 426. 
 
 graphy, 236. 
 
 Highlanders, emigration of, 147, 
 
 Monk of Cambray, 261. 
 
 381. 
 
 Moraines, 122, 387. 
 
 Hills in Caithness, 33, 65. 
 
 More, Loch, 196. 
 
 Holborn Head, 24, 43, 81, 123, 
 
 Morven, 33, 65. 
 
 144. 
 
 Moss-hunting, 295, 321, 397. 
 
 Holoptychius, 101, 104, 110, 139, 
 
 Mountains of Caithness, 32, 65. 
 
 214. 
 
 Mnrchison, Sir B., 218, 257, 270, 
 
 Holothuria, Peach's, 247. 
 
 332, 411. 
 
 Holy Grass, 73, 255, 344. 
 
 
 Homocanthus, 217. 
 
 " NAIL " at Stromness, 354. 
 
 Honesty of Dick, 319 
 
 Natural History Society, Thurso, 
 
 Hoplocanthus, 217. 
 
 384, 486. 
 
 Hoy, Old Man of, 24, 115. 
 
 Nichol, Professor, 270. 
 
 
 Nesses of Caithness, England, etc., 
 
 ICEBERGS, 133, 163, 165, 192. 
 
 26. 
 
 
 Noss Head, 204. 
 
 JAMIESON, Mr., Ellon, 386. 
 
 Notcutt, Mr., botanist, 265, 343. 
 
 John o' Groat's, 23, 182. 
 
 
 Johnson, Dr., 291. 
 
 OCHIL Hills, 1, 2, 12. 
 
 
 Old Red Sandstone, 86, 91, 99, 114, 
 
 KIRK, attendance at, 153, 267. 
 
 177, 219, 261. 
 
 Knox, John, 6. 
 
 Ord of Caithness, 35. 
 
 
 Orkney Islands, 24. 
 
 LAPLXND flora, 340. 
 
 Osteolepis, 106, 214. 
 
 Layton, Rev. J., 242. 
 
 Owen, Professor, 216, 342. 
 
 Lighthouse, Dunnet Head, 85. 
 
 
 Linnaeus and mosses, 295. 
 
 PARK, MUNOO, 295, 372. 
 
 Lion-hunters, 282. 
 
 Peach, Charles W. his birth, 239 ; 
 
 Lochs in Caithness, 32 ; on Dunnet 
 
 education, 240; Riding Officer in 
 
 Head, 83, 95. 
 
 the Coastguard, 241 ; studies 
 
 
 zoology, 242 ; his various re- 
 
 MACCULLOCH, Dr. 257. 
 
 movals, 243; Gorranhaven, Corn- 
 
 Mackay, Annie, 43, 318, 415, 430. 
 
 wall, 244 ; collects marine fauna, 
 
 Macleod, Dr. Norman, 267. 
 
 and studies geology, 245 ; reads 
 
 Maiden Pap, 65. 
 
 a paper at British Association.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 245 ; at York, 246 ; his micro- 
 
 Sea, description of the, 24, 30, 41, 
 
 scope, 248 ; promoted to Landing 
 
 81, 119. 
 
 Waiter at Fowey, 249 ; promoted 
 
 Sedgwick, Professor, 215, 257, 432 
 
 to Comptroller at Peterhead, 251; 
 
 Shearer, Dr., 306, 372, 374, 421. 
 
 removed to Wick, 252 ; inter- 
 
 Shearer, Professor, 234, 428. 
 
 views with Robert Dick, 252 ; 
 
 Shells, marine, 160, 163, 170, 184 
 
 researches at Durness, Suther- 
 
 194, 207. 
 
 landshire, 257 ; finds new fossils, 
 
 Shurery, Ben, 207. 
 
 258-9 ; Sir Roderick Murchison, 
 
 Sinclair, Sir George, 285, 410, 42L 
 
 272 ; rhymes sent to Peach, 277- 
 
 Sinclair, Sir John, 37. 
 
 287 ; limestone fossils, 368 ; en- 
 
 Sinclair Bay, 204. 
 
 tertained by Dick, 375; finds 
 
 Skerries, Pentlaud, 28, 168. 
 
 more fossils, 389 ; his labour, 391 ; 
 
 Skerry Ben, 65. 
 
 retirement, 392; continues his 
 
 Slater's monument, 124, 144. 
 
 researches, his honours, 393; his 
 
 Spring in the North, 56. 
 
 photograph, 394 ; last letter from 
 
 Standing Stone, Tullibody, 5. 
 
 Dick, 409. 
 
 Stratlibeg, 203. 
 
 Pension proposed for Dick, 415. 
 
 Strath Halladale, 208. 
 
 Peutland Firth, 27, 86. 
 
 Stemster, Loch, 230. 
 
 " Peri," the, 377. 
 
 Stroma, island of, 39, 182. 
 
 Perichthys Dicki, 390. 
 
 Sunday in Scotland, 155, 267. 
 
 Peterhead, Charles Peach at, 251. 
 
 
 Phrenology, 48. 
 
 TEMPERANCE of Dick, 55, 376. 
 
 Picts, the, 4, 28. 
 
 Thomson, Sir Wyville, 323. 
 
 Poacher, Dick taken for a, 67. 
 
 Thurdistoft, 163. 
 
 " Prince Consort," 328. 
 
 Thurso, Dick goes to, 23 ; trade at, 
 
 Pringle, Mr., Farmer's Gazette, 344. 
 
 34; fossiliferous beds near, 112; 
 
 Pterygotus, 390. 
 
 old church, 274 ; improvement o j 
 
 Public funeral, Dick's, 413. 
 
 316. 
 
 Pudding Gyoe, 116. 
 
 Thurso Bay, 23, 41, 111, 118. 
 
 
 Thurso Castle, 37, 54, 432. 
 
 RANGAG, Loch, 230. 
 
 Thurso River, 59, 159, 365. 
 
 Ratter, Burn of, 211. 
 
 Thurso East, 111. 
 
 Religion, Dick's, 372, 431. 
 
 Trees in Caithness, 29, 87. 
 
 Revenue service, 241, 392. 
 
 Tullibody, 1, 17, 21. 
 
 Rhyming faculties, 277, 287. 
 
 
 Roads in Caithness, 34. 
 
 VERSES, Robert Dick's, 277-89, 345 
 
 Roses, Caithness, 292, 309, 341. 
 
 
 Rough Head, 85. 
 
 WALKING, Dick's, 55. 
 
 Royal Fern, the, 296. 
 
 Wansford, 240. 
 
 
 Wart Hill, 182. 
 
 SALMON at Thurso river, 23. 
 
 Weydale, 125, 134, 136, 350. 
 
 Salter's lecture, 360. 
 
 Wick, 30, 252. 
 
 Scandinavians in Caithness, 27. 
 
 Wilson's Lane, Thurso, 5J3, 271. 
 
 Scarskerry, 227. 
 
 Witness newspaper, 99, 135. 
 
 Scrabster Burn, 118, 122. 
 
 
 Scrabster Roads, 82, 121. 
 
 ZOOLOGY of Cornwall, 244; of Petal 
 
 Sea bird, crj of the, 25. 
 
 head, 251.
 
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