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ADDRESS
BY
SIR CHARLES LYELL, Bakt., LL.D., D.C.L., F.R.S., &c.
Gentlemen of
the
British Association,—The place where we have been
invited this year to hold our Thirty-fourth Meeting is one of no ordinary
interest to the cultivators of physical science.
It might have been selected
by my fellow-labourers in geology as a central point of observation, from
which, by short excursions to the east and west, they might examine those
rocks which constitute, on the one side, the more modern, and on the other
the more ancient records of the past, while around them and at their feet lie
monuments of the middle period of the earth’s history. But there are other
sites in England which might successfully compete with Bath as good sur
veying stations for the geologist. What renders Bath a peculiar point of
attraction to the student of natural phenomena is its thermal and mineral
waters, to the sanatory powers of which the city has owed its origin and
celebrity.
The great volume and high temperature of these waters render
them not only unique in our island, but perhaps without a parallel in the rest
of Europe, when we duly take into account their distance from the nearest
region of violent earthquakes or of active or extinct volcanos.
The spot
where they issue, as we learn from the researches of the historian and anti
quary, was lonely and desert when the Romans first landed in this island,
but in a few years it was converted into one of the chief cities of the newly
conquered province. On the site of the hot springs was a large morass from
which clouds of white vapour rose into the air; and there first was the
spacious bath-room built, in a highly ornamental style of architecture, and
decorated with columns, pilasters, and tessellated pavements. By its side
was erected a splendid temple dedicated to Minerva, of which some statues
and altars with their inscriptions, and ornate pillars are still to be seen in
the Museum of this place. To these edifices the quarters of the garrison, and
in the course of time the dwellings of new settlers, were added; and they
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were all encircled by a massive wall, the solid foundations of which still
remain.
A dense mass of soil and rubbish, from 10 to 20 feet thick, now separates
the level on which the present city stands from the level of the ancient
Aquae Solis of the Romans. Digging through this mass of heterogeneous
materials, coins and coffins of the Saxon period have been found; and lower
down, beginning at the depth of from 12 to 15 feet from the surface, coins
have been disinterred of Imperial Rome, bearing dates from the reign of
Claudius to that of Maximus in the fifth century.
Beneath the whole are
occasionally seen tessellated pavements still retaining their bright colours,
one of which, on the site of the Mineral-water Hospital, is still carefully pre
served, affording us an opportunity of gauging the difference of level of ancient
and modern Bath.
On the slopes and summits of the picturesque hills in the neighbourhood
rose many a Roman villa, to trace the boundaries of which, and to bring to
light the treasures of art concealed in them, are tasks which have of late years
amply rewarded the researches of Mr. Scarth and other learned antiquaries.
No wonder that on this favoured spot we should meet with so many memo
rials of former greatness, when we reflect on the length of time during which
the imperial troops and rich colonists of a highly civilized people sojourned
here, having held undisturbed possession of the country for as many years as
have elapsed from the first discovery of America to our own times.
One of our former Presidents, Dr. Daubeny, has remarked that nearly all
the most celebrated hot springs of Europe, such as those of Aix-la-Chapelle,
Baden-Baden, Naples, Auvergne, and the Pyrenees, have not declined in
temperature since the days of the Romans; for many of them still retain as
great a heat as is tolerable to the human body, and yet when employed by the
ancients they do not seem to have required to be first cooled down by arti
ficial means. This uniformity of temperature, maintained in some places for
more than 2000 years, together with the constancy in the volume of the
water, which never varies with the seasons, as in ordinary springs, the
identity also of the mineral ingredients which, century after century, are held
by each spring in solution, are striking facts, and they tempt us irresistibly
to speculate on the deep subterranean sources both of the heat and mineral
matter.
How long has this uniformity prevailed? Are the springs really
ancient in reference to the earth’s history, or, like the course of the present
rivers and the actual shape of our hills and valleys, are they only of high
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antiquity when contrasted with the brief space of human annals ? May they
not be like Vesuvius and Etna, which, although they have been adding to
their flanks, in the course of the last 2000 years many a stream of lava and
shower of ashes, were still mountains very much the same as they now are
in height and dimensions from the earliest times to which we can trace back
their existence ?
Yet although their foundations are tens of thousands of
years old, they were laid at an era when the Mediterranean was already
inhabited by the same species of marine shells as those Vith which it is now
peopled; so that these volcanos must be regarded as things of yesterday in
the geological calendar.
Notwithstanding the general persistency in character of mineral waters
and hot springs ever since they were first known to us, we find on inquiry
that some few of them, even in historical times, have been subject to great
changes. These have happened during earthquakes which have been violent
enough to disturb the subterranean drainage and alter the shape of the
fissures up which the waters ascend. Thus during the great earthquake at
Lisbon in 1755, the temperature of the spring called La Source de la Reine
at Bagneres de Luchon, in the Pyrenees, was suddenly raised as much as
75° F., or changed from a cold spring to one of 122° F., a heat which it has
since retained. It is also recorded that the hot springs at Bagneres de
Bigorre, in the same mountain-chain, became suddenly cold during a great
earthquake which, in 1660, threw down several houses in that town.
It has been ascertained that the hot springs of the Pyrenees, the Alps, and
many other regions are situated in lines along which the rocks have been
rent, and usually where they have been displaced or “faulted.”
Similar
dislocations in the solid crust of the earth are generally supposed to have
determined the spots where active and extinct volcanos have burst forth; for
several of these often affect a linear arrangement, their position seeming to
have been determined by great lines of fissure.
Another conn acting link
between the volcano and the hot spring is recognizable in the great abundance
of hot springs in regions where volcanic eruptions still occur from time to
time. It is also in the same districts that the waters occasionally attain the
boiling-temperature, while some of the associated stufas emit steam consider
ably above the boiling-point.
But in proportion as we recede from the great
centres of igneous activity, we find the thermal waters decreasing in fre
quency and in their average heat, while at the same time they are most con
spicuous in those territories where, as in Central France or the Eifel in
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Germany, there are cones and craters still so perfect in theii- form, and
streams of lava bearing such a relation to the depth and shape of the existing
valleys, as to indicate that the internal fires have become dormant in com
paratively recent times.
If there be exceptions to this rule, it is where
hot springs are met with in parts of the Alps and Pyrenees which have been
violently convulsed by modern earthquakes.
To pursue still further our comparison between the hot spring and the
volcano, we may regard the water of the spring as representing those vast
clouds of aqueous vapour which are copiously evolved for days, sometimes for
weeks, in succession from craters during an eruption.
But we shall perhaps
be asked whether, when we contrast the work done by the two agents in
question, there is not a marked failure of analogy in one respect—namely a
want, in the case of the hot spring, of power to raise from great depths in the
earth voluminous masses of solid matter corresponding to the heaps of scoriae
and streams of lava which the volcano pours out on the surface. To one who
urges such an objection it may be said that the quantity of solid as well
as gaseous matter transferred by springs from the interior of the earth to its
surface is far more considerable than is commonly imagined. The thermal
waters of Bath are far from being conspicuous among European hot springs
for the quantity of mineral matter contained in them in proportion to the
water which acts as a solvent; yet Professor Ramsay has calculated that if
the sulphates of lime and of soda, and the chlorides of sodium and magnesium,
and the other mineral ingredients which they contain, were solidified, they
would form in one year a square column 9 feet in diameter, and no less than
140 feet in height. All this matter is now quietly conveyed by a stream of
limpid water, in an invisible form, to the Avon, and by the Avon to the sea;
but if, instead of being thus removed, it were deposited around the orifice of
eruption, like the siliceous layers which encrust the circular basin of an
Icelandic geyser, we should soon see a considerable cone built up, with a crater
in the middle; and if the action of the spring were intermittent, so that ten
or twenty years should elapse between the periods when solid matter was
emitted, or (say) an interval of three centuries, as in the case of Vesuvius
between 1306 and 1631, the discharge would be on so grand a scale as to
afford no mean object of comparison with the intermittent outpourings of a
volcano.
Dr. Daubeny, after devoting a month to the analysis of the Bath waters
in 1833, ascertained that the daily evolution of nitrogen gas amounted to no
�i)
less than 250 cubic feet in volume.
This gas, he remarks, is not only cha
racteristic of hot springs, but is largely disengaged from volcanic craters
during eruptions. In both cases he suggests that the nitrogen may be
derived from atmospheric air, winch is always dissolved in rain-water, and
which, when this water penetrates the earth’s crust, must be carried down
to great depths, so as to reach the heated interior. When there, it may
be subjected to deoxidating processes, so that the nitrogen, being left in a
free state, may be driven upwards by the expansive force of heat and stc am, or
by hydrostatic pressure. This theory has been very generally adopted, as best
accounting for the constant disengagement of large bodies of nitrogen, even
where the rocks through which the spring rises are crystalline and unfossiliferous.
It will, however, of course be admitted, as Professor Bischoff has
pointed out, that in some places organic matter has supplied a large part
of the nitrogen evolved.
Carbonic-acid gas is another of the volatilized substances discharged by
Dr. Gustav Bischoff, in the new edition of his valuable
work on chemical and physical geology, when speaking of the exhalations of
the Bath waters.
of this gas, remarks that they are of universal occurrence, and that they
originate at great depths, becoming more abundant the deeper we penetrate.
He also observes that, when the silicates which enter so largely into the
composition of the oldest rocks are percolated by this gas, they must be con
tinually decomposed, and the carbonates formed by the new combinations
thence arising must often augment the volume of the altered rocks.
This
increase of bulk, he says, must sometimes give rise to a mechanical force of
expansion capable of uplifting the incumbent crust of the earth; and the
same force may act laterally so as to compress, dislocate, and tilt the strata
on each side of a mass in which the new chemical changes are developed.
The calculations made by this eminent German chemist of the exact amount
of distention which the origin of new mineral products may cause, by adding
to the volume of the rocks, deserve the attention of geologists, as affording
them aid in explaining those reiterated oscillations of level—those risings
and sinkings of land—which have occurred on so grand a scale at successive
periods of the past.
There are probably many distinct causes of such
upward, downward, and lateral movements, and any new suggestion on this
head is most welcome; but I believe the expansion and contraction of solid
rocks, when they are alternately heated and cooled, and the fusion and sub
sequent consolidation of mineral masses, will continue to rank, as heretofore,
as the most influential causes of such movements.
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The temperature of the Bath waters varies in the different springs
from 117° to 120° F.
This, as before stated, is exceptionally high, when we
duly allow for the great distance of Bath from the nearest region of active
or recently extinct volcanos and of violent earthquakes.
The hot springs of
Aix-la-Chapelle have a much higher temperature, viz. 135° F.-, but they are
situated within forty miles of those cones and lava-streams of the Eifel
which, though they may have spent their force ages before the earliest
records of history, belong, nevertheless, to the most modern geological period.
Bath is about 400 miles distant from the same part of Germany, and 440 from
Auvergne—another volcanic region, the latest eruptions of which were geolo
gically coeval with those of the Eifel.
When these two regions in France
and Germany were the theatres of frequent convulsions, we may well suppose
that England was often more rudely shaken than now; and such shocks as
that of October last, the sound and rocking motion of which caused so great
a sensation as it traversed the southern part of the island, and seems to have
been particularly violent in Herefordshire, may be only a languid reminder
to us of a force of which the energy has been gradually dying out.
If you consult the geological map of the environs of this city, coloured by
the Government surveyors, you will perceive that numerous [lines of fault or
displacement of the rocks are there laid down, and one of these has shifted
the strata vertically as much as 200 feet. Mr. Charles Moore pointed out to
me last spring, when I had the advantage of examining the geology of this
district under his guidance, that there are other lines of displacement not yet
laid down on the Ordnance Map, the existence of which must be inferred from
the different levels at which the same formations crop out on the flanks of the
hills to the north and south of the city. I have therefore little doubt that
the Bath springs, like most other thermal waters, mark the site of some great
convulsion and fracture which took place in the crust of the earth at some
former period—perhaps not a very remote one, geologically speaking. The
uppermost part of the rent through which the hot water rises is situated in
horizontal strata of Lias and Trias, 300 feet thick; and this may be more
modern than the lower part, which passes through the inclined and broken
strata of the subjacent coal-measures, which are unconformable to the Trias.
The nature and succession of these rocks penetrated by the Bath waters was
first made out by the late William Smith in 1817, when a shaft was sunk in
the vicinity in search for coal. The shock which opened a communication
through the upper rocks may have been of a much later date than that which
fractured the older and underlying strata; for there is a tendency in the
�earth’s crust to yield most readily along lines of ancient fracture, which con
stitute the points of least resistance to a force acting from below.
If we adopt the theory already alluded to, that the nitrogen is derived
from the deoxidation of atmospheric air carried down by rain-water, we
may imagine? the supply of this water to be furnished by some mountainous
region, perhaps a distant one, and that it descends through rents or porous
rocks till it encounters some mass of heated matter by which it is converted
into steam, and then driven upwards through a fissure.
In its downward
passage the water may derive its sulphate of lime, chloride of calcium, and
other substances from the decomposition of the gypseous, saline, calcareous,
and other constituents of the rocks which it permeates. The greater part of
the ingredients are common to sea-water, and might suggest the theory of a
marine origin; but the analysis of the Bath springs by Merck and Galloway
shows that the relative proportion of the solid matter is far from agreeing
with that of the sea, the chloride of magnesium being absolutely in excess, that
is, 14 grains of it per gallon for 12 of common salt; whereas in sea-water
there are 27 grains of salt, or chloride of sodium, to 4 of the chloride of mag
nesium. That some mineral springs, however, may derive an inexhaustible
supply, through rents and porous rocks, from the leaky bed of the ocean, is
by no means an unreasonable theory, especially if we believe that the con
tiguity of nearly all the active volcanos to the sea is connected with the
access of salt water to the subterranean foci of volcanic heat.
Professor Roscoe, of Manchester, has been lately engaged in making a
careful analysis of the Bath waters, and has discovered in them three metals
which they were not previously known to contain—namely copper, stron
tium, and lithium; but he has searched in vain for caesium and rubidium,
those new metals, the existence of which has been revealed to us in the
course of the last few years by what is called spectrum analysis.
By this
new method the presence of infinitesimal quantities, such as would have
wholly escaped detection by ordinary tests, are made known to the eye by
the agency of light.
Thus, for example, a solid substance such as the
residue obtained by evaporation from a mineral water is introduced on a
platinum wire into a colourless gas-flame.
The substance thus volatilized
imparts its colour to the flame, and the light, being then made to pass
through a prism, is viewed through a small telescope or spectroscope, as it is
called, by the aid of which one or more bright lines or bands are seen in the
spectrum, which, according to their position and colour, indicate the presence
of different elementary bodies.
�8
Professor Bunsen, of Heidelberg, led the way, in 1860, in the application
of this new test to the hot waters of Baden-Baden and of Diirkheim in
the Palatinate.
He observed in the spectrum some coloured lines of which
he could not interpret the meaning, and was determined not to rest till he
had found out what they meant.
This was no easy task, for it was neces
sary to evaporate fifty tons of water to obtain 200 grains of what proved to
be two new metals. Taken together, their proportion to the water was only
as one to three million. He named the first caesium, from the bluish-grey lines
which it presented in the spectrum ; and the second rubidium, from its two
red lines. Since these successful experiments were made, thallium, so called
from its green line, was discovered in 1861 by Mr. Crookes; and a fourth
metal named indium, from its indigo-coloured band, was detected by Pro
fessor Richter, of Freiberg, in Saxony in a zinc ore of the Hartz. It is
impossible not to suspect that the wonderful efficacy of some mineral springs,
both cold and thermal, in curing diseases, which no artificially prepared
waters have as yet been able to rival, may be connected with the presence
of one or more of these elementary bodies previously unknown; and some of
the newly found ingredients, when procured in larger quantities, may furnish
medical science with means of combating diseases which have hitherto baffled
all human skill.
While I was pursuing my inquiries respecting the Bath waters, I learned
casually that a hot spring had been discovered at a great depth in a copper-
mine near Redruth in Cornwall, having about as high a temperature as that of
the Bath waters, and of which, strange to say, no account has yet been
published.
It seems that, in the year 1839, a level was driven from an old
shaft so as to intersect a rich copper-mine at the depth of 1350 feet from
the surface. This lode or metalliferous fissure occurred in what were for
merly called the United Mines, and which have since been named the Clif
ford Amalgamated Mines.
Through the contents of the lode a powerful
spring of hot water was observed to rise, which has continued to flow with
undiminished strength ever since.
At my request, Mr. Horton Davey, of
Redruth, had the kindness to send up to London many gallons of this water,
which have been analyzed by Professor William Allen Miller, F.R.S., who
finds that the quantity of solid matter is so great as to exceed by more than
four times the proportion of that yielded by the Bath waters. Its compo
sition is also in many respects very different; for it contains but little sul
phate of lime, and is almost free from the salts of magnesium. It is rich in
the chlorides of calcium and sodium, and it contains one of the new metals—
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caesium, never before detected in any mineral spring in England: but its
peculiar characteristic is the extraordinary abundance of lithium, of which a
mere trace had been found by Professor Roscoe in the Bath waters; whereas
in this Cornish hot spring this metal constitutes no less than a twenty-sixth
part of the whole of the solid contents, which, as before stated, are so volu
minous. When Professor Miller exposed some of these contents to the test of
spectrum analysis, he gave me an opportunity of seeing the beautiful bright
crimson line which the lithium produces in the spectrum.
Lithium was first made known in 1817 by Arfvedsen, who extracted it
from petalite; and it was believed to be extremely rare, until Bunsen and
Kirchhoff, in 1860, by means of spectrum analysis, showed that it was a most
widely diffused substance, existing in minute quantities in almost all mineral
waters and in the sea, as well as in milk, human blood, and the ashes of some
plants.
It has already been used in medicine, and we may therefore hope
that, now that it is obtainable in large quantities, and at a much cheaper rate
than before the Wheal-Clifford hot spring was analyzed, it may become of
high value. According to a rough estimate which has been sent to me by Mr.
Davey, the Wheal-Clifford spring yields no less than 250 gallons per minute,
which is almost equal to the discharge of the King’s Bath or chief spring of
this city. As to the gases emitted, they are the same as those of the Bath
water—namely carbonic acid, oxygen, and nitrogen.
Mr. Warington Smyth, who had already visited the Wheal-Clifford lode
in 1855, re-examined it in July last, chiefly with the view of replying to
several queries which I had put to him; and, in spite of the stifling heat,
ascertained the geological structure of the lode and the exact temperature of
the water. This last he found to be 122° Eahr. at the depth of 1350 feet;
but he scarcely doubts that the thermometer would stand two or three
degrees higher at a distance of 200 feet to the eastward, where the water is
known to gush up more freely.
The Wheal-Clifford lode is a fissure varying
in width from 6 to 12 feet, one wall consisting of elvan or porphyritic
granite, and the other of killas or clay-slate. Along the line of the rent,
which runs east and west, there has been a slight throw or shift of the rocks.
The vein-stuff is chiefly formed of cellular pyrites of copper and iron, the
porous nature of which allows the hot water to percolate freely through it.
It seems, however, that in the continuation upwards of the same fissure
little or no metalliferous ore was deposited, but, in its place, quartz and other
impermeable substances, which obstructed the course of the hot spring, so as
to prevent its flowing out on the surface of the country.
It has been always
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a favourite theory of the miners that the high temperature of this Cornish
spring is due to the oxidation of the sulphurets of copper and iron, which are
decomposed when air is admitted. That such oxidation must have some
slight effect is undeniable; but that it materially influences the temperature
of so large a body of water is out of the question.
Its effect must be almost
insensible; for Professor Miller has scarcely been able to detect any
sulphuric acid in the water, and a minute trace only of iron and copper in
solution.
When we compare the temperature of the Bath springs, which issue at a
level of less than 100 feet above the sea, with the Wheal-Clifford spring found
at a depth of 1350 feet from the surface, we must of course make allowance for
the increase of heat always experienced when we descend into the interior
of the earth. The difference would amount to about 20° Fahr., if we adopt
the estimate deduced by Mr. Hopkins from an accurate series of observations
made in the Monkwearmouth shaft, near Durham, and in the Du kinfield
shaft, near Manchester, each of them 2000 feet in depth.
In these shafts
the temperature was found to rise at the rate of only 1° Fahr, for every
increase of depth of from 65 to 70 feet. But if the Wheal-Clifford spring,
instead of being arrested in its upward course, had continued to rise freely
through porous and loose materials so as to reach the surface, it would
probably not have lost anything approaching to 20° Fahr., since the re
newed heat derived from below would have warmed the walls and contents
of the lode, so as to raise their temperature above that which would naturally
belong to the rocks at corresponding levels on each side of the lode. The
almost entire absence of magnesium raises an obvious objection to the hypo
thesis of this spring deriving its waters from the sea ; or if such a source be
suggested for the salt and other marine products, we should be under the
necessity of supposing the magnesium to be left behind in combination with
some of the elements of the decomposed and altered rocks through which the
thermal waters may have passed.
Hot springs are, for the most part, charged with alkaline and other highly
soluble substances, and, as a rule, are barren of the precious metals, gold,
silver, and copper, as well as of tin, platinum, lead, and many others, a
slight trace of copper in the Bath waters being exceptional. Never
theless there is a strong presumption that there exists some relation
ship between the action of thermal waters and the filling of rents with
metallic ores. The component elements of these ores may, in the first
instance, rise from great depths in a state of sublimation or of solution
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in intensely heated water, and may then be precipitated on the walls of a
fissure as soon as the ascending vapours or fluids begin to part with some of
their heat. Almost everything, save the alkaline metals, silica, and cer
tain gases, may thus be left behind long before the spring reaches the earth’s
surface.
If this theory be adopted, it will follow that the metalliferous por
tion of a fissure, originally thousands of feet or fathoms deep, will never be
exposed in regions accessible to the miner until it has been upheaved by a long
series of convulsions, and until the higher parts of the same rent, together
with its contents and the rocks which it had traversed, have been removed
by aqueous denudation.
Ages before such changes are accomplished ther
mal and mineral springs will have ceased to act; so that the want of identity
between the mineral ingredients of hot springs and the contents of metal
liferous veins, instead of militating against their intimate relationship,
is in favour of both being the complementary results of one and the same
natural operation.
But there are other characters in the structure of the earth’s crust more
mysterious in their nature than the phenomena of metalliferous veins, on
which the study of hot springs has thrown light—I allude to the metamor
phism of sedimentary rocks. Strata of various ages, many of them once
full of organic remains, have been rendered partially or wholly crystal
line. It is admitted on all hands that heat has been instrumental in
bringing about this re-arrangement of particles, which, when the meta
morphism has been carried out to its fullest extent, obliterates all trace
of the imbedded fossils.
But as mountain-masses many miles in length and
breadth, and several thousands of feet in height, have undergone such
alteration, it has always been difficult to explain in what manner an amount
of heat capable of so entirely changing the molecular condition of sedimen
tary masses could have come into play without utterly annihilating every
sign of stratification, as well as of organic structure.
Various experiments have led to the conclusion that the minerals which
enter most largely into the composition of the metamorphic rocks have not
been formed by crystallizing from a state of fusion, or in the dry way, but
that they have been derived from liquid solutions, or in the wet way—a
process requiring a far less intense degree of heat. Thermal springs, charged
with carbonic acid and with hydro-fluoric acid (which last is often present in
small quantities), are powerful causes of decomposition and chemical reaction
in rocks through which they percolate. If, therefore, large bodies of hot water
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permeate mountain-masses at great depths, they may in the course of ages
superinduce in them a crystalline structure; and in some cases strata in a
lower position and of older date may be comparatively unaltered, retaining
their fossil remains undefaeed, while newer rocks are rendered metamorphic.
This may happen where the waters, after passing upwards for thousands of
feet, meet with some obstruction, as in the case of the Wheal-Clifford spring,
causing the same to be laterally diverted so as to percolate the surrounding
rocks. The efficacy of such hydro-thermal action has been admirably illus
trated of late years by the experiments and observations of Senarmont,
Daubree, Delesse, Scheerer, Sorby, Sterry Hunt, and others.
The changes which Daubree has shown to have been produced by the
alkaline waters of Plombieres, in the Vosges, are more especially instructive.
These thermal waters have a temperature of 160° F., and were conveyed by
the Romans to baths through long conduits or aqueducts.
The foundations
of some of their works consisted of a bed of concrete made of lime, frag
ments of brick, and sandstone. Through this and other masonry the hot
waters have been percolating for centuries, and have given rise to various
zeolites apophyllite and chabazite among others; also to calcareous spar,
arragonite, and fluor spar, together with siliceous minerals, such as opal,__
all found in the interspaces of the bricks and mortar, or constituting part of
their reananged materials. The quantity of heat brought into action in this
instance in the course of 2000 years has, no doubt, been enormous, although
the intensity of it developed at any one moment has been always incon
siderable.
The study, of late years, of the constituent parts of granite has in like
manner led to the conclusion that their consolidation has taken place at
temperatures far below those formerly supposed to be indispensable. Gustav
Rose has pointed out that the quartz of granite has the specific gravity
of 2'6, which characterizes silica when it is precipitated from a liquid
solvent, and not that inferior density, namely 2-3, which belongs to it when
it cools and solidifies in the dry way from a state of fusion.
But some geologists, when made aware of .the intervention on a large
scale, of water, in the formation of the component minerals of the granitic
and volcanic rocks, appear of late years to have been too much disposed to
dispense with intense heat when accounting for the formation of the crystal
line and unstratified rocks. As water in a state of solid combination enters
largely into the aluminous and some other minerals, and therefore plays no
�13
small part in the composition of the earth’s crust, it follows that, when rocks
are melted, water must be present, independently of the supplies of rain
water and sea-water which find their way into the regions of subterranean
heat.
But the existence of water under great pressure affords no argument
against our attributing an excessively high temperature to the mass with
which it is mixed up.
Still less does the point to which the melted matter
must be cooled down before it consolidates or crystallizes into lava or granite
afford any test of the degree of heat which the same matter must have
acquired when it was melted and made to form lakes and seas in the interior
of the earth’s crust.
We learn from Bunsen’s experiments on the Great Geyser in Iceland, that
at the depth of only seventy-four feet, at the bottom of the tube, a column of
water may be in a state of rest, and yet possess a heat of 120° Centigrade, or
248° F. What, then, may not the temperature of such water be at the depth
of a few thousand feet ?
It might soon attain a white heat under pressure;
and as to lava, they who have beheld it issue, as I did in 1858, from the
south-western flanks of Vesuvius, with a surface white and glowing like
that of the sun, and who have felt the scorching heat which it radiates, will
form a high conception of the intense temperature of the same lava at the
bottom of a vertical column several miles high, and communicating with a
great reservoir of fused matter, which, if it were to begin at once to cool
down, and were never to receive future accessions of heat, might require a
whole geological period before it solidified. Of such slow refrigeration hot
springs may be among the most effective instruments, abstracting slowly
from the subterranean molten mass that heat which clouds of vapour are
seen to carry off in a latent form from a volcanic crater during an eruption,
or from a lava-stream during its solidification.
It is more than forty years
since Mr. Scrope, in his work on volcanos, insisted on the important part
which water plays in an eruption, when intimately mixed up with the com
ponent materials of lava, aiding, as he supposed, in giving mobility to the
more solid materials of the fluid mass. But when advocating this igneoaqueous theory, he never dreamt of impugning the Huttonian doctrine as to
the intensity of heat which the production of the unstratified rocks, those
of the plutonic class especially, implies.
The exact nature of the chemical changes which hydrothermal action may
effect in the earth’s interior will long remain obscure to us, because the
regions where they take place are inaccessible to man; but the manner in
�14
which volcanos have shifted their position throughout a vast series of geolo
gical epochs—becoming extinct in one region and breaking out in another—
may, perhaps, explain the increase of heat as we descend towards the interior,
without the necessity of our appealing to an original central heat or the
igneous fluidity of the earth’s nucleus.
I hinted, at the beginning of this Address, that the hot springs of Bath
may be of no high antiquity, geologically speaking,—not that I can establish
this opinion by any positive proofs, but I infer it from the mighty changes
which this region has undergone since the time when the British seas,
rivers, and lakes were inhabited by the existing species of Testacea. It is
already more than a quarter of a century since Sir Roderick Murchison
first spoke of the Malvern Straits, meaning thereby a channel of the sea
which once separated Wales from England. That such marine straits really
extended, at a modem period, between what are now the estuaries of the
Severn and the Dee has been lately confirmed in a satisfactory manner by
the discovery of marine shells of recent species in drift covering the water
shed which divides those estuaries. At the time when these shells were
living, the Cotswold Hills, at the foot of which this city is built, formed one
of the numerous islands of an archipelago into which England, Ireland,
and Scotland were then divided.
The amount of vertical movement which
would be necessary to restore such a state of the surface as prevailed when
the position of land and sea were so different would be very great.
Nowhere in the world, according to our present information, is the
evidence of upheaval, as manifested by upraised marine shells, so striking as
in Wales. In that country Mr. Trimmer first pointed out, in 1831, the
occurrence of fossil shells in stratified drift, at the top of a hill called Moel
Tryfaen, near the Menai Straits, and not far from the base of Snowdon.
I visited the spot last year, in company with my friend Mr. Symonds, and we
collected there not a few of the marine Testacea. Mr. Darbishire has obtained
from the same drift no less than fifty-four fossil species, all of them now
living either in high northern or British seas, and eleven of them being
exclusively arctic.
The whole fauna bears testimony to a climate colder
than that now experienced in these latitudes, though not to such extreme
cold as that implied by the fauna of some of the glacial drift of Scotland.
The shells alluded to were procured at the extraordinary height of 1360 feet
above the sea-level, and they demonstrate an upheaval of the bed of the sea
to that amount in the time of the living Testacea.
A considerable part of
�15
what is called the glacial epoch had already elapsed before the shelly strata
in question were deposited on Moel Tryfaen, as we may infer from the
polished and striated surfaces of rocks on which the drift rests, and the occur
rence of erratic blocks smoothed and scratched, at the bottom of the same
drift.
The evidence of a period of great cold in England and North America, in
the times referred to, is now so universally admitted by geologists, that I
shall take it for granted in this Address, and briefly consider what may have
been the probable causes of the refrigeration of central Europe at the era in
question. One of these causes, first suggested eleven years ago by a celebrated
Swiss geologist, has not, I think, received the attention which it well deserved.
When I proposed, in 1833, the theory that alterations in physical geography
might have given rise to those revolutions in climate which the earth’s surface
has experienced at successive epochs, it was objected by many that the signs
of upheaval and depression were too local to account for such general changes
of temperature.
This objection was thought to be of peculiar weight when
applied to the glacial period, because of the shortness of the time, geologically
speaking, which has since transpired. But the more we examine the monu
ments of the ages which preceded the historical, the more decided become the
proofs of a general alteration in the position, depth, and height of seas, con
tinents, and mountain-chains since the commencement of the glacial period.
The meteorologist also has been learning of late years that the quantity of ice
and snow in certain latitudes depends not merely on the height of mountain
chains, but also on the distribution of the surrounding sea and land even to
considerable distances.
M. Escher von der Linth gave it as his opinion in 1852, that if it were
true, as Ritter had suggested, that the great African desert, or Sahara, was
submerged within the modern or post-tertiary period, that same submergence
might explain why the Alpine glaciers had attained so recently those colossal
dimensions which, reasoning on geological data, Venetz and Charpentier had
assigned to them. Since Escher first threw out this hint, the fact that the
Sahara was really covered by the sea at no distant period has been confirmed
by many new proofs. The distinguished Swiss geologist himself has just
returned from an exploring expedition through the eastern part of the
Algerian desert, in which he was accompanied by M. Desor, of Neuchatel,
and Professor Martins, of Montpellier.
These three experienced observers
satisfied themselves, during the last winter, that the Sahara was under water
�16
during the period of the living species of Testacea. We had already learnt in
1856, from a memoir by M. Charles Laurent, that sands identical with those
of the nearest shores of the Mediterranean, and containing, among other
recent shells, the common cockle (Cardium edtdd), extend over a vast space
from west to east in the desert, being not only found on the surface, but
also brought up from depths of more than 20 feet by the Artesian auger.
These shells have been met with at heights of more than 900 feet above the
sea-level, and on ground sunk 300 feet below it; for there are in Africa, as
in Western Asia, depressions of land below the level of the sea. The same
cockle has been observed still living in several salt-lakes in the Sahara; and
superficial incrustations in many places seem to point to the drying up by
evaporation of several inland seas in certain districts.
Mr. Tristram, in his travels in 1859, traced for many miles along the
southern borders of the French possessions in Africa lines of inland sea
cliffs, with caves at their bases, and old sea-beaches forming successive
terraces, in which recent shells and the casts of them were agglutinated
together with sand and pebbles, the whole having the form of a conglomerate.
The ancient sea appears once to have stretched from the Gulf of Cabes, in
Tunis, to the west coast of Africa north of Senegambia, having a width of
several hundred (perhaps where greatest, according to Mr. Tristram, 800)
miles. The high lands of Barbary, including Morocco, Algeria, and Tunis,
must have been separated at this period from the rest of Africa by a sea. All
that we have learnt from zoologists and botanists in regard to the present fauna
and flora of Barbary favours this hypothesis, and seems at the same time
to point to a former connexion of that country with Spain, Sicily, and South
Italy.
When speculating on these changes, we may call to mind that certain
deposits, full of marine shells of living species, have long been known as
fringing the borders of the Bed Sea, and rising several hundred feet above its
shores. Evidence has also been obtained that Egypt, placed between the
Red Sea and the Sahara, participated in these great continental movements.
This may be inferred from the old river-terraces, lately described by Messrs.
Adams and Murie, which skirt the modern alluvial plains of the Nile, and rise
above them to various heights, from 30 to 100 feet and upwards.
In what
ever direction, therefore, we look, we see grounds for assuming that a map
of Africa in the glacial period would no more resemble our present maps of
that continent than Europe now resembles North America.
If, then, argues
�17
Escher, the Sahara was a sea in post-tertiary times, we may understand why
the Alpine glaciers formerly attained such gigantic dimensions, and why they
have left moraines of such magnitude on the plains of northern Italy and the
lower country of Switzerland. The Swiss peasants have a saying, when they
talk of the melting of the snow, that the sun could do nothing without the
Fohn, a name which they give to the well-known sirocco. This wind., after
sweeping over a wide expanse of parched and burning sand in Africa, blows
occasionally for days in succession across the Mediterranean, carrying with it
the scorching heat of the Sahara to melt the snows of the Apennines and
Alps.
M. Denzler, in a memoir on this subject, observes that the Fohn blew
tempestuously at Algiers on the 17th of July 1841, and then crossing the
Mediterranean, reached Marseilles in six hours.
In five more hours it was
at Geneva and the Valais, throwing down a large extent of forest in the
latter district, while in the cantons of Zurich and the Grisons it suddenly
turned the leaves of many trees from green to yellow. In a few hours new-
mown grass was dried and ready for the haystack; for although in passing
over the Alpine snows, the sirocco absorbs much moisture, it is still far
below the point of saturation when it reaches the sub-Alpine country to the
north of the great chain. MM. Escher and Denzler have both of them
observed on different occasions that a thickness of one foot of snow has dis. appeared in four hours during the prevalence of this wind. No wonder,
•therefore, that the Fohn is much dreaded for the sudden inundations which
it sometimes causes.
The snow-line of the Alps was seen by Mr. Irscher,
the astronomer, from his observatory at Neuchatel, by aid of the teleseope,
-to rise sensibly every day while this wind was blowing. Its influence is by
no means confined to the summer season, for in the winter of 1852 it visited
Zurich at Christmas, and in a few days all the surrounding country was
stripped of its snow, even in the shadiest places and on the crests of high
ridges. I feel the better able to appreciate the power of this wind from
having myself witnessed in Sicily, in 1828, its effect in dissolving, in the
month of November, the snows which then covered the summit and higher
parts of Mount Etna. I had been told that I should be unable to ascend to
the top of the highest cone till the following spring; but in thirty-six hours
the hot breath of the sirocco stripped off from the mountain its white mantle
of snow, and I ascended without difficulty.
It is well known that the number of days during which particular winds
c
�18
prevail, from year to year, varies considerably. Between the years 1812 and
1820 the Fohn was less felt in Switzerland than usual; and what was the
consequence ? All the glaciers, during those eight or nine years, increased in
height, and crept down below their former limits in their respective valleys.
Many similar examples might be cited of the sensitiveness of the ice to slight
variations of temperature.
Captain Godwin-Austen has lately given us a
description of the gigantic glaciers of the western Himalaya in those valleys
where the sources of the Indus rise, between the latitudes 35° and 36° N.
The highest peaks of the Karakorum range attain in that region an elevation
of 28,000 feet above the sea.
The glaciers, says Captain Austen, have been
advancing, within the memory of the living inhabitants, so as greatly to
encroach on the cultivated lands, and have so altered the climate of the
adjoining valleys immediately below, that only one crop a year can now be
reaped from fields which formerly yielded two crops. If such changes can
be experienced in less than a century, without any perceptible modification
in the physical geography of that part of Asia, what mighty effects may we
not imagine the submergence of the Sahara to have produced in adding to
the size of the Alpine glaciers ? If, between the years 1812 and 1820, a mere
diminution of the number of days during which the sirocco blew could so
much promote the growth and onward movement of the ice, how much
greater a change would result from the total cessation of the same wind!
But this would give no idea of what must have happened in the glacial
period; for we cannot suppose the action of the south wind to have been sus
pended : it was not in abeyance, but its character was entirely different, and
of an opposite nature, under the altered geographical conditions above con
templated.
First, instead of passing over a parched and scorching desert,
between the twentieth and thirty-fifth parallels of latitude, it would plenti
fully absorb moisture from a sea many hundreds of miles wide. Next, in its
course over the Mediterranean, it would take up still more aqueous vapour;
and when, after complete saturation, it struck the Alps, it would be driven
up into the higher and more rarified regions of the atmosphere.
There the
aerial current, as fast as it was cooled, would discharge its aqueous burden
in the form of snow, so that the same wind which is now called “ the
devourer of ice ” would become its principal feeder.
If we thus embrace Escher’s theory, as accounting in no small degree for
the vast size of the extinct glaciers of Switzerland and Northern Italy, we
are by no means debarred from accepting at the same time Charpentier’s
�19
suggestion, that the Alps in the glacial period were -2000 or 3000 feet higher
than they are now. Such a difference in altitude may have been an auxiliary
cause of the extreme cold, and seems the more probable now that we have
obtained unequivocal proofs of such great oscillations of level in Wales within
the period under consideration. We may also avail ourselves of another
source of refrigeration which may have coincided in time with the submer
gence of the Sahara, namely, the diversion of the Gulf-stream from its present
course. The shape of Europe and North America, or the boundaries of sea
and land, departed so widely in the glacial period from those now established,
that we cannot suppose the Gulf-stream to have taken at that period its
present north-western course across the Atlantic. If it took some other
direction, the climate of the north of Scotland would, according to the calcu
lations of Mr. Hopkins, suffer a diminution in its average annual temperature
of 12° F., while that of the Alps would lose 2° F.
A combination of all the
conditions above enumerated would certainly be attended with so great a revo
lution in climate as might go far to account for the excessive cold which was
developed at so modern a period in the earth’s history. But even when we
assume all three of them to have been simultaneously in action, we have by
no means exhausted all the resources which a difference in the geographical
condition of the globe might supply. Thus, for example, to name only one of
them, we might suppose that the height and quantity of land near the north
pole was greater at the era in question than it is now.
The vast mechanical force that ice exerted in the glacial period has been
thought by some to demonstrate a want of uniformity in the amount of
energy which the same natural cause may put forth at two successive epochs.
But we must be careful, when thus reasoning, to bear in mind that the power
of ice is here substituted for that of running water. The one becomes a
mighty agent in transporting huge erratics, and in scoring, abrading, and
polishing rocks; but meanwhile the other is in abeyance. When, for example,
the ancient Bhone glacier conveyed its moraines from the upper to the lower
end of the Lake of Geneva, there was no great river, as there now is, forming
a delta many miles in extent, and several hundred feet in depth, at the
upper end of the lake.
The more we study and comprehend the geographical changes of the glacial
period, and the migrations of animals and plants to which it gave rise, the
higher our conceptions are raised of the duration of that subdivision of time,
which, though vast when measured by the succession of events comprised in it,
�20
was brief, if estimated by the ordinary rules of geological classification. The
glacial period was, m fact, a mere episode in one of the great epochs of the
earth’s history; for the inhabitants of the lands and seas, before and after the
grand development of snow and ice, were nearly the same.
As yet we have no
satisfactory proof that man existed in Europe or elsewhere during the period
of extreme cold; but our investigations on this head are still in their infancy.
In an early portion of the postglacial period it has been ascertained that man
flourished m Europe; and in tracing the signs of his existence, from the
historical ages to those immediately antecedent, and so backward into more
ancient times, we gradually approach a dissimilar geographical state of
things, when the climate was colder, and when the configuration of the
surface departed considerably from that which now prevails.
Archeologists are satisfied that in central Europe the age of bronze weapons
preceded the Boman invasion of Switzerland; and prior to the Swiss-lake
dwellings of the bronze age were those in which stone weapons alone were
used.
The Danish kitchen-middens seem to have been of about the same
date; but what M. Lartet has called the reindeer period of the South of
France was probably anterior, and connected with a somewhat colder climate.
Of still higher antiquity was that age of ruder implements of stone such as were
buried in the fluviatile drift of Amiens and Abbeville, and which were mingled
in the same gravel with the bones of extinct quadrupeds, such as the elephant,
rhinoceros, bear, tiger, and hyena.
Between the present era and that of
those earliest vestiges yet discovered of our race, valleys have been deepened
and widened, the course of subterranean rivers which once flowed th rough
caverns has been changed, and many species of wild quadrupeds have dis
appeared. The bed of the sea, moreover, has in the same ages been lifted up,
in many places hundreds of feet, above its former level, and the outlines of
many a coast entirely altered.
MM. de Verneuil and Louis Lartet have recently found, near Madrid, fossil
teeth of the African elephant, in old valley-drift, containing flint implements
of the same antique type as those of Amiens and Abbeville. Proof of the
same elephant having inhabited Sicily in the Postpliocene and probably
within the Human period had previously been brought to light by Baron
Anca, during his exploration of the bone-eaves of Palermo.
We have
now, therefore, evidence of man having co-existed in Europe with three
species of elephant, two of them extinct (namely, the mammoth and the
Elephas antiquus), and a third the same as that which still survives in
�21
Africa,.
As to the first of these—the mammoth—I am aware that some
writers contend that it could not have died out many tens of thousands
of years before our time, because its flesh has been fcrund preserved in
ice, in Siberia, in so fresh a state as to serve as food for dogs, bears, and
wolves; but this argument seems to me fallacious. Middendorf, in 1843,
after digging through some thickness of frozen soil in Siberia, came down
upon an icy mass, in which the carcase of a mammoth was imbedded, so
perfect that, among other parts, the pupil of its eye was taken out, and is
now preserved in the Museum of Moscow.
No one will deny that this
elephant had lain for several thousand years in its icy envelope ; and if it had
been left undisturbed, and the cold had gone on increasing, for myriads of
centuries, we might reasonably expect that the frozen flesh might continue
undecayed until a second glacial period had passed away.
When speculations on the long series of events which occurred in the glacial
and postglacial periods are indulged in, the imagination is apt to take alarm
at the immensity of the time required to interpret the monuments of these
ages, all referable to the era of existing species. In order to abridge the
number of centuries which would otherwise be indispensable, a disposition
is shown by many to magnify the rate of change in prehistoric times, by
investing the causes which have modified the animate and inanimate world
with extraordinary and excessive energy. It is related of a great Irish orator
of our day, that when he was about to contribute somewhat parsimoniously
towards a public charity, he was persuaded by a friend to make a more liberal
donation. In doing so he apologized for his first apparent want of generosity,
by saying that his early life had been a constant struggle with scanty means,
and that“ they who are born to affluence cannot easily imagine how long a
time it takes to get the chill of poverty out of one’s bones.” In like manner,
we of the living generation, when called upon to make grants of thousands of
centuries in order to explain the events of what is called the modern
period, shrink naturally at first from making what seems so lavish an
expenditure of past time. Throughout our early education we have been
accustomed to such strict economy in all that relates to the chronology of the
earth and its inhabitants in remote ages, so fettered have we been by old
traditional beliefs, that even when our reason is convinced, and we are per
suaded that we ought to make more liberal grants of time to the geologist, we
feel how hard it is to get the chill of poverty out of our bones.
I will now briefly allude, in conclusion, to two points on which a gradual
��
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hshed. by Mach
�CT73
Highland Route.
No.11.
OBAN TO Staffa & Iona
by
The Sound of
Mull and Tobermory
With Notices of the Geology and Natural History of the District and Authentic information for Tourists as to Conveyances, etc.etc.
BY
"WILLIAM
KEDDIE
Secretary to the Philosophical Society of Glasgow and Lecturer on Natural Science in the Fre Church Col ege, Glasgow
WITH MAP AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS.
Enteredin
Glasgow
Lithographers to the Queen
Stationer's Hall
�/& N T E N T
Oban to Staffa & Iona
page 5
...... .8
Staffa ...
Iona ........................................................................................................
26
Mull................................................................................................................... 36
Duart & Ardtornish Castles- ............ .
...
37
APPEND IX -Note of Conveyances to and from Oban........................... . .43
Index
*LU
'X
I
II
STRATI 0 N5
a
~ -
Map of Route from Oban to Staffa 3cIIona
Staffa..........................f.................
in Fingal’s Cave, Staffa.........................
IV Staffa, from the summit...........
(Iona,from the landingplacel
V (MllII, from Staffa
j
VI
............
W
„ ...25
Cathedral of Iona............................. ............. „... .32
vn Carsaig Arches, Island of Mull....... ............. ... 38
�I
��HIGHLAND ROUTE,
No. II.
OBAN TO STAFFA AND IONA.
“--------- And led
To where a turret’s airy head,
Slender and steep, and battled round,
O’erlook’d, dark Mull, thy mighty Sound,
Where thwarting tides, with mingled roar,
Part thy swarth hills from Morven’s shore.”—Scott.
“ Tradition, be thou mute! Oblivion, throw
Thy veil in mercy o’er the records, hung
Round strath and mountain, stamped by the ancient tongue
On rock and ruin darkening as we go,—
Spots where a word, ghost-like, survives to show
What crimes from hate or desperate love have sprung;
From honour misconceived or fancied wrong,
What feuds, not quenched but fed by mutual woe!
Yet, though a wild, vindictive race, untamed
By civil arts and labours of the pen,
Could gentleness be scorned by those fierce men,
Who, to spread wide the reverence they claimed
For patriarchal occupations, namedYon towering peaks, Shepherds of Etive Glen ? ” *
Wordsworth, Sonnet on Sound of Mull.
All tourists in the Highlands, whether coming from the south or
returning from the north, pass through Oban ; and many of them,
attracted by its charming bay, picturesque shores, and mild climate,
make this their temporary rendezvous, or their summer quarters.
It is a favourable centre for all who intend to make excursions
whether by sea or land—to the famed islands of Staffa and Iona, which
no tourist in the Highlands leaves unvisited—to Skye and Lewis, to
Fort-William and Inverness, to Glencoe, Loch Awe, and the other
parts of the Highlands and Islands resorted to on account of their
romantic scenery or their historical interest and traditional asso
ciations.
In a sketch of a tour in the Hebrides, by Mr. William Chambers
of Glenormiston, published in Chambers's Journal, occurs the fol
lowing merited tribute to the enterprise of Mr. David Hutcheson,
* Buachaille Etive.
A
�6
HUTCHESON’S STEAMERS.
to whose taste in planning, and energy and skill in maturing the
system of steam navigation which has opened this region to
travellers, the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, and all who
frequent them for pleasure or business, are under lasting obligations.
There is an obvious propriety, and we feel a peculiar gratification,
in transferring the remarks of Mr. Chambers to these pages :—
Of course this immensely convenient system of steaming attained comparative
perfection in the Clyde before it was extended to the western islands; and but for
the enterprise of one individual, to whom the world owes something, it would in all
probability not have yet gone that length—at least to an extent worth speaking of.
I allude to David Hutcheson, one of the remarkable men of his time, who lives to
enjoy the reputation of having opened up the Hebrides to a course of modern
improvement. Mr. Hutcheson’s life, like that oi Bianconi in Ireland, shows in a
particular manner what one thoughtful and energetic man may do to advance the
interests of his country. A notice of his projects embraces little else than an
account of the existing Hebridean organisation of steamers.
Beginning his commercial life about forty years ago as a junior clerk to one of
the earlier steamboat companies on the Clyde, Mr. Hutcheson was afterwards for
many years connected with the firm of J. & G. Burns, a large shipping concern
in Glasgow and Liverpool, and principal proprietors of the Cunard ocean steamers.
Among other places on the coast, Messrs. Burns sent steamers to the western isles;
but this branch of their trade, it seems, did not pay, and was willingly resigned to
David Hutcheson, who had formed his own opinions on the subject. With an
enthusiastic, and we should almost say a poetic, admiration of the West Highlands
and Islands, and desirous not only to make tourists acquainted with their scenery,
but to develop the resources of their immeasurable solitudes, he entertained the
notion, that by giving large and finely-appointed steamers, and doing everything
on a liberal scale, the intercourse with the Hebrides might be established on a solid
and prosperous basis. Animated with this idea, he began his operations about
1851, assisted by his brother, Mr. Alexander Hutcheson, and Mr. David
MacBrayne, a nephew of the Messrs. Burns, under the firm of David Hutcheson
and Company.
Passing over Mr Hutcheson’s initiatory attempt to establish an enlarged traffic
between Glasgow and the Highlands, we come to what more immediately concerns
tourists—the present arrangement of his steamboats, which is in peculiar adaptation
to the nature of the waters to be traversed- Looking at the map of Scotland, we see
that the long peninsula terminating in the Mull of Cantyre cuts off the lower part
of the Clyde from any ready access to the western coast, butthat to accommodate
the transit of small vessels, the Crinan Canal has been formed across the neck of
the peninsula—this very useful canal, about nine miles in length, commencing on
the east at a place called Ardrisliaig, on Loch Fine. Carrying the eye northward
on the map, we perceive that, having got into the western sea and as far as the
top of the Linnhe Loch, a transit can be made by the Caledonian Canal to Inverness.
Now, independently of sea-going vessels to go round the Mull, here are several
kinds of vessels in requisition to sustain the intercourse of a line of route which is
awkwardly broken into distinct parts. All, however, is provided for. The
Hutchesons possess altogether fourteen vessels of different classes, consuming in the
aggregate per annum 24,000 tons of coal, which for convenience are placed in
depots at various leading ports.
To begin with the largest in this effective fleet, we have the Clansman and
Clydesdale. These are strongly built for sea, broad in the beam, and with power
ful engines. Both are fitted for carrying goods and passengers; and as a night
has .to be passed on board, they can each make up fifty sleeping-berths in
sep&rate cabins and on sofas. One of them leaving Glasgow every Monday and
Thursday, proceeds round the Mull of Cantyre, calls at Oban, Tobermory, Portree,
and other places, their regular destination being Stornoway in the Lewis. They
�nUTCHESON'S STEAMERS.
7
however, make more extended calls beyond Stornoway; as, for example,
Lochinver on the mainland, a favourite residence of the Duke of Sutherland and
family, likewise Ullapool, and Gairloch in the western part of Ross-shire. Over
this wide range they ply unitedly from March till November, and one alone plys
once a week in winter. Twice a year, for the special accommodation of herring
fishers, they go round the North of Scotland to Thurso. Unless one were to
visit the strangely indented west coast and islands, he could scarcely realise the
importance of these voyages of the Clansman and Clydesdale, which, after passing
Islay and Jura, pursue first a sinuous course through the Sound of Mull; then
rounding the extremity of Ardnamurchan, enter that narrow and intricate channel
between the mainland and Skye called the Sound of Sleat; lastly issuing into the
more open Minch, they take a route direct for Stornoway—throughout their long
and devious course among the islands, landing and taking in passengers and
goods, and, as it were, sowing the seeds of civilisation and prosperity in places
which, but for their periodical visits, would be as difficult to reach as if situated
in another hemisphere.
The next class of vessels described by the writer have undergone
several improvements since the period of Mr. Chambers’s tour, which
render a supplementary statement necessary. These are the vessels
designed exclusively for passengers on the route from Glasgow by
Ardrishaig and the canals to Inverness. They are all remarkable
for their handsome structure, light draught of water, rapid sailing,
and comfortable accommodation. The Iona, first in order, is un
rivalled in the fleet of Clyde steamers for elegance and speed. The
first part of the voyage from Glasgow to Ardrishaig is performed in
the Iona. This beautifully moulded steamer was built in 1861, by
Messrs. J. & G. Thomson of Glasgow, at a cost of about .£19,000 ;
she measures 255 feet in length, with 25 feet breadth of beam, and
draws only 4 J feet of water, along the surface of which she skims
with a speed of nearly twenty-one miles per hour. This vessel has
repeatedly run between the Cloch and Cumbrae light-houses on the
estuary of the Clyde (the distance usually selected for testing the
speed of steamboats, and measuring fifteen miles and two-thirds) in
less than 46 minutes ; and it may be doubted if a like velocity has
been attained by any steamer of the same dimensions in Europe.
Her spacious and luxurious accommodations are such as ro secure a
comfortable passage in all conditions of the weather. From the Iona
the passengers are transferred at Ardrishaig to a handsome little
steamer on the Crinan Canal, in which they proceed across the
country to Port Crinan, where they embark for Oban in the
Chevalier, one of the powerful sea-going steamers of the Company’s
fleet. In noticing the arrangements made by the Company for
the convenience of travelling in the West Highlands, it is only
due to add that the persons in charge of the different vessels are
uniformly characterised by their civility, courtesy, and attention to
their passengers.
�8
THE QUEEN’S ROUTE.
In obedience to the necessities of time if not of tide, the tourist
sojourning in Oban for the night, and meditating an excursion on
the morrow, behoves to practise the virtue of early rising. Betwixt
six and seven o’clock the spacious bay resounds with the ringing
of steam-boat bells. Two of Hutchesons’ steamers are roaring and
panting at the pier with their steam up, and tourists are pouring
from the Great Western and Caledonian, straggling out of the
minor hotels, and hurrying on board in their strangely diversified
costumes, in which one seldom fails to detect the modes, even
before he hears the speech, of different nations. One of the vessels
has just arrived from the north, with the Inverness passengers, and
on receiving a fresh accession at Oban, proceeds on her voyage
southward. The other is destined, on alternate days, to carry
excursionists to Glencoe, and to Staffa and Iona. We join the
last expedition, and respectfully offer our humble but not
inexperienced services as cicerone on the truly interesting and
delightful excursion round the Island of Mull, trusting to be able
to furnish, in the smallest practicable space, the quantity of
information which the tourist may be supposed to desiderate at the
moment, leaving him, if so disposed, to seek for further details from
other sources, when he is more at leisure.
And now, “ Dark
Mull,” for “ thy mighty Sound I”
The course of the steamer round Mull is determined by the state
of the wind. Sometimes she steers by the outer passage, leaving
Oban bay by the Sound of Kerrera, and sailing south-west along
the rugged ironbound coast of Mull, visiting Iona first and then
Staffa, returning by the Sound of Mull. When the wind is
favourable, the vessel ploughs her way directly through the Sound,
in which case she arrives first at Staffa and then visits Iona,
returning by the southern coast. The latter route brings us
without delay into contact with an unrivalled succession of
picturesque objects, and when the weather is suitable is greatly
to be preferred. This was the Queen’s route in the autumn of ’47.
The steam-boat emerges from the land-locked bay, at the portal
where Dunolly Castle proudly holds watch and ward “ ’mid sylvan
pomp and rocky majesty.” The space closed in here by a little
rocky islet betwixt the point of Kerrera and the promontory of
Dunolly may be noted as excellent dredging-ground, having yielded
the largest portion of the Mollusca catalogued in Part I. of this
series of publications.
On clearing the coast and crossing the
entrance to Linnhe Loch, a prospect of unequalled variety and
magnificence opens to the view. Sir Walter Scott describes it as
�CASTLED CRAGS.
9
one of the most striking scenes which the Hebrides afford to the
traveller. The rugged and mountainous shores of Mull rise to the
left; on the right extends the lofty range of “ dark Morven,”
with its coast line successively indented by lochs or arms of the
sea running inland for several miles.
A scene of alpine grandeur
closes in the view to the north-east, pre-eminent amidst which
springs the granite bulk of Ben-Cruachan. The lofty and fretted
peaks of the Ardnamurchan hills terminate the vista in the north.
“ In fine weather (says Sir Walter) a grander or more impressive
scene, both from its natural beauties and associations with ancient
history and tradition, can hardly be imagined.” From another
point of view, Christopher North, in a poetical mood, exclaimed—
“ Morven and morn, and spring and solitude,
In front is not the scene magnificent ?
* * Beauty nowhere owes to ocean
A lovelier haunt than this.”
The shores are studded with picturesque old castles, which give a
human interest to the scene, although that interest is derived from
the “wild tales of Albyn’s warrior day.” Dunolly the bold we
have left behind.
Dunstaffnage the regal is seen where Loch
Etive joins the Linnhe Loch. Glimpses may also be caught in
the same direction of Castle Stalker, situated on a small rock, in
the channel that separates Lismore from Appin; and of Castle
Shuna, on the island of that name, to the north-east of Lismore.
On the opposite coast of Kingairloch, perched upon the summit of
a conical rock close to the shore, is the Castle of Glensanda.
Tirefoor Castle, in Lismore, the most ancient of these structures,
is seemingly of Scandinavian origin, being built of dry stones without
mortar, and in a circular form, and was probably intended for a
watch-tower or beacon, as it commands a most extensive view.
The boat is bearing down upon Duart Castle ; and Ardtornisli
Castle, the most picturesque and poetical of them all, will speedily
appear, along with the Castle of Aros; and if we could diverge
from the Sound, and enter the inviting waters of Loch Aline, on
the Morven shore, we should find its copsy banks overlooked by
the old tower of Kin-Loch-Aline, esteemed by Dr. Macculloch
“one of the most picturesque of the Highland castles ;”* and the
geologist would be delighted to discover amidst the birches and oak
* This castle, tradition says, was built by Dubh-Chal, an amazon of the Clan
MTnnes, who paid the architect with its bulk in butter! The keep was occupied
by the celebrated Colkitto and his detachment of Irish troops in 1GG4, by whom
it was set on fire.
�10
THE LADY’S DOCK AND ITS LEGEND.
and rank equisetums which clothe the shores of the loch, beds of
Lias limestone, literally crammed with the characteristic Gryphoea
incur?a.
Lismore lighthouse is passed where the green slopes of the
“ great garden,” as the name of the island imports, terminate in a
dangerous reef at its southern extremity ; and before descending to
the cabin for breakfast, the tourist should look out for the Lady’s
*
Rock, which is left bare and black at ebb tide, but over which the
waves break at high water. This wild-looking islet was the scene
of a meditated act of cruelty in the early part of the sixteenth
century, upon the basis of which Joanna Baillie constructed the
tragedy of the “ Family Legend. The story also gave rise to Campbell’s
poem of “ Glenara." It is less poetically and tragically related by
the late 3Ir James Wilson (the brother of “Christopher North ’), in
his entertaining “Voyage round the Coast of Scotland and the
Isles“Lauchlan Catenach Maclean of Duarthad married a daughter
of Archibald, Second Earl of Argyll, with whom it may be pre
sumed he lived on bad terms, whatever may have been the cause,
although the character of the act alluded to depends, in some
measure, on that cause. No man has a right to expose his wife,
in consequence of any ordinary domestic disagreement, upon a
wave-washed rock, with the probability of her catching cold in the
first place, and the certainty of her being drowned in the second;
but some accounts say that she had twice attempted her husband’s
life, and so assuredly she deserved to be most severely reprimanded.
Be this as it may, Lauchlan carried the lady to the rock in ques
tion, where he left her at low water, no doubt desiring that at
high water she would be seen no more. However, it so chanced
that her cries, ‘ piercing the night’s dull ear,’ were heard by some
passing fishermen, who subduing their fear of water-witches, or
perhaps thinking that they had at last caught a mermaid, secured
the fair one, and conveyed her away to her own people, to whom,
of course, she told her own version of the story. We forget what
legal steps were taken (a Sheriff’s warrant probably passed for little
in those days, at least in Mull), but considerable feudal disorders
* Mr. Chambers, not unmindful of the art of living by the way, as studied in the
arrangements of Hutchesons’ Highland fleet, says—“ I may here add once for all,
that in all Hutchesons’ vessels, particular attention is paid to the alimentary depart
ments. These, indeed, are conducted by the respective stewards on their own
account, but according to certain terms as to quality and charge; and the good
principle is followed of allowing no gratuities to be asked or taken by any one
whatever. The usual charge is 2s. for breakfast, and 2s. 6<Z. for dinner: at each
meal, besides the ordinary fishy delicacies, there being a profusion of dishes, and
water with ice.”
�ARDTORNISH CASTLE.
11
ensued in consequence, and the Laird of Duart was eventually
assassinated in bed one night [in Edinburgh], by Sir John
Campbell of Calder, the brother of the bathed lady. We hope
that this was the means of reconciling all parties.”
Duart Castle crowns a green but rocky promontory at the
easternmost point of Mull commanding the entrance to the Sound.
It consists of a strong square tower, the walls of which are ten and
fourteen feet thick, with a prolongation of buildings overhanging
a precipitous cliff, rendering it inaccessible on the side next the
sea. The tower is the most ancient part of the edifice. Some of
the accompanying buildings, which were preserved for the accom
modation of a garrison till a not remote period, bear the date of
16G3, with the crest of the Macleans, of which warlike clan this
was in ancient times the principal stronghold.
The present
proprietor is Campbell of Possil and Torosay, whose modern
mansion is snugly ensconced in the shelter of a wooded recess at
some distance.
Ardtornish Castle is the next relic of Highland antiquity,
occupying a headland on the Morven or mainland shore of the
Sound. Its position is most romantic, having on one side a lofty
and precipitous chain of rocks overhanging the sea, and on the
other the narrow entrance to Loch Aline (Anglice, “ the beautiful
loch”). Sir Walter Scott says:—“ The ruins of Ardtornish are
not now very considerable, and consist chiefly of the remains of
an old keep, or tower, with fragments of outward defences. But
in former days it was a place of great consequence, being one of
the principal strongholds which the Lords of the Isles, during the
period of their stormy independence, possessed upon the mainland
of Argyleshire. Here they assembled what popular tradition calls
their parliaments, meaning, I suppose, their cour plcniere, or assembly
of feudal and patriarchal vassals and dependents.” Sir Walter
adds an incident of historical interest:—“From this Castle of
Ardtornish, upon the 19th day of October, 14G1, John de Yle,
designing himself Earl of Ross and Lord of the Isles, granted, in
the style of an independent sovereign, a commission to his trusty
and well-beloved cousins, Ronald of the Isles, and Duncan, Arch
Dean of the Isles, for empowering them to enter into a treaty
*
* It is difficult to trace in the records and remains of those turbulent times any
indication of ecclesiastical influence being employed otherwise than in political
transactions of the nature here referred to. Mr. Wilson observes—“ In regard to
the County of Argyll, it has been remarked that the only kind of Tories not
found here are ora-tories, there being no chapels attached to the strongholds of the
Hebridean chieftains ”
�12
LOCH ALINE—MULL MOUNTAINS.
with tlie most excellent Prince Edward, by the grace of God, King
of France and England and Lord of Ireland.” The result was a
treaty by which the Lord of the Isles became a vassal to the
crown of England, and agreed to assist Edward IV. and James,
Earl of Douglas, in subjugating Scotland.
*
On the right the steamer passes Loch Aline House (Mrs. Madeline
Patterson); and on the opposite shore the opening up of the
Bay of Aros discloses the little village of Salen, with the Castle of
Aros, another fortress of the Island Chieftains, pitched in a pictu
resque manner on the summit of a rocky hill. The village is the
property of Lord Strathallan. From this point an imposing view
is obtained of the two loftiest hills in the interior of Mull, namely,
Bentallach, distinguished by its saddle-shaped summit, 2800 feet
above the level of the sea; and Benmore, 3000 feet. Further
onwards, on the Morven shore, amongst young plantations, is
descried the estate of Drimnin (Lady Gordon), where there is a
Roman Catholic Chapel, built by the late Sir Charles Gordon,
Secretary to the Highland Society. This edifice occupies the
site of the old Castle of Drimnin, which was pulled down by the
* The sight of the beautiful ruin of Ardtornish Castle recalls to every reader of
the “ Lord of the Isles” the animating lines in which Sir Walter Scott celebrates
that ancient seat of feudal power:—
“ Wake, Maid of Lorn!” the minstrels sung.
Thy rugged halls, Ardtornish! rung,
And the dark seas, thy towers that lave,
Heaved on the beach a softer wave,
As ’mid the tuneful choir to keep
The diapason of the Deep.
Lull’d were the winds on Inninmore,
And green Loch-Aline’s woodland shore,
As if wild woods and waves had pleasure
In listing to the lovely measure.
*
*
* “ The turret’s airy head,
Slender and steep, and battled round,
O’erlook’d, dark Mull! thy mighty Sound,
Where thwarting tides, with mingled roar,
Part thy swarth hills from Morven’s shore.”
And again, where the vessel containing the Bruce is described approaching the
castle through a dark and tempestuous sea, and the festal radiance of Ardtornish,
“ ’Twixt cloud and ocean hung,” is set in contrast to the terrors of the night—
“ Beneath the castle’s sheltering lee,
They staid their course in quiet sea.
Hewn in the rock, a passage there
Sought the dark fortress by a stair
So straight, so high, so steep,
With peasant’s staff one valiant hand
Might well the dizzy pass have mann’d,
’Gainst hundreds arm’d with spear and brand,
And plunged them in the deep.”
�TOBERMORY.
13
late proprietor to make room for the chapel. (Statistical Account.)
In the neighbourhood is seen Killundine Castle, a place of little
note, and evidently of comparatively modern origin. On the
Mull side, the coast now becomes lofty and precipitous, and is
enveloped in natural woods. Nothing on the voyage exceeds the
approach to Tobermory in sylvan beauty and maritime grandeur.
When the tide is favourable, the steamer enters the bay by a
narrow channel, opening between the wooded beach and a sweet
little island named Calve or Colay. This green island land
locks the bay. The town, with its white houses, curves round the
shore, and straggles with picturesque irregularity up the verdant
braes behind. The steeps and terraces to the left are adorned with
copsewood, and studded with the plantations of Drumfin, a charm
ing residence of M'Lean of Coll. The waters of Mary’s Lake are
precipitated over a lofty cliff, and descend in a shining torrent,
which disappears amongst the umbrageous woods below. Ranges
of lofty mountains all around close in a scene of exquisite loveliness.
Tobermory, or “ The Well of Mary,” is so called from a well
near the town, named in honour of “ Our Lady.” The place was
commenced in 1788 by the British Society for Extending the
Fisheries. At that time it consisted but of two houses. The popu
lation at the census of 1861 was 1,566, being chiefly employed not
in fishing but in the coasting trade. The County Buildings occupy
a prominent site overlooking the lower part of the town ; a branch
of the Clydesdale Bank presents another conspicuous feature in the
principal street. A commodious quay, completed in 1864, has been
constructed by F. W. Caldwell, Esq., the proprietor of that part of
the town where it is situated. Another chief proprietor in Tobermory
is Captain Campbell of Aros. The terraced walks seen stretching
along the face of the heights behind the town, and extending to the
northern extremity of the bay, were formed by the townspeople
during a period of famine, when the benevolence of the Lowlanders
was invoked on their behalf, and the money contributed was
judiciously expended in providing productive labour. An extensive
view, including some of the remoter islands of the Hebrides, is obtained
from the heights overlooking the bay. Tobermory is the metropolis
of Mull; law and justice are here dispensed by the Sheriff-Sub
stitute to Ulva, Iona, Tiree, Coll, and misty Morven; and the
Parliamentary voters resident in these distant localities also repair
thither on the occasion of a county election. One of the vessels of
the Spanish Armada was blown up and sunk off the harbour of
Tobermory, under the direction of Maclean of Duart. Several of
B
�14
MINGARRY CASTLE—POINT OF CALLIOCH.
her guns have been brought up. About two miles north from
Tobermory is Bloody Bay, the scene of a great sea-fight about the
year 1480, betwixt two contending factions in the isles.
The
lighthouse, named Buna Gal (Ruenagael), completed iD 1857, is
built upon a dangerous part of the rocky coast in this quarter.
When Dr. Johnson and Boswell visited Mull, in 1773, they landed
at Tobermory, took up their quarters at the inn, and thence pro
ceeded to Dr. Maclean’s, about a mile from the village. They
afterwards rode across the island on little Mull horses.
The steamer now reaches the mouth of Loch Sunart, at the north
point of Mull; and the tourist, if he has not made the discovery
earlier, now finds himself vaulting over the long rolling waves
of the Atlantic. On the right is the Point of Ardnamurchau, the
westernmost extremity of the mainland of Scotland. About five
or six miles from the Point, on the same shore, is observed the
Castle of Mingarry, the ancient stronghold of Mac Ian. It is of
irregular shape, being broadest on the land-side, where it is protected
by a fosse, over which a drawbridge was thrown ; its narrowest
part fronts the sea, which it overhangs, the rock here having been
scarped and rendered perpendicular. The Castle thus skilfully
constructed, and
* * * “ sternly placed,
O’erawed the woodland and the waste.”
So lately as 1644 it was held by the garrison of Sir Donald Camp
bell, who surrendered to Montrose’s general, Alaster Macdonald,
by whom the place was threatened with fire. Alaster had on his
voyage captured a vessel in which were three Covenanting ministers,
who, after preaching in Ireland, weye returning to Scotland, and
whom he shut up in Mingarry Castle, where their sufferings were
terribly aggravated by the Marquis of Argyle’s unavailing attempts
to liberate them. Two of the three perished in consequence, and
the third regained his liberty after a dismal imprisonment of ten
months.
The Point of Callioch is here seen on the north-eastern shore of
Mull. The house of Sunipol stands out conspicuously upon the
beach, occupying the centre of a bay immediately before doubling
the stormy headland where Staffa first comes into view. It was
at Sunipol House that Thomas Campbell, the poet, lived for some
time as a tutor, in his College days, when he was seventeen years
of age. Writing to a friend, he said, “ The Point of Callioch
commands a magnificent prospect of thirteen Hebrid islands, among
which are Staffa and Icolmkill, which I visited with enthusiasm.”
�CAMPBELL THE POET—TRESHINISH ISLES.
15
The impressions produced upon his youthful imagination and feelings
by
“ The white wave foaming to the distant sky,”
and
“ The sounding storm that sweeps the rugged isle,
The dark-blue rocks in barren grandeur piled,”
the poet has embodied in his Elegy written in Mull. “ I had also
now and then,” says he, in the letter quoted, “ a sight of wild deer
sweeping across that wilder country, and of eagles perching on its
shores. These objects fed the romance of my fancy, and I may
say that I was attached to Sunipol before I took leave of it.
Nevertheless, God wot, I was better pleased to look on the kirk
steeples and whinstone causeways of Glasgow, than on all the eagles
and wild deer of the Highlands.”
The steamer is now full in sight of the Treshinish Isles, disposed
in a ridge extending for five miles in a north-easterly direction, and
forming a sort of breakwater on the north-west for the island of
Staffa and the bay of Loch Tua in Mull. The principal islets are
Fladda, Linga, Bach or the Dutchman’s Cap, and the two Cairn
burgs. They are seldom and not easily approached. They are all
formed of trap rocks, sometimes passing into basalt, but destitute
of the columnar form. The larger Cairnburg was fortified by the
Norwegians, and stood a siege by a detachment of Cromwell’s
army, but was at length taken and burnt. It is fancied that many
of the books and records which had been rescued from Iona were
lost during this siege. The place was garrisoned by the Macleans
in 1715, and more than once taken and retaken during the rebellion
of that year. A wall with embrasures for ordnance still remains,
skirting the edge of the cliff of the larger Cairnburg. On the
smaller island are the remains of the barrack. Macculloch says—
“ The appearance of a modern battery in such a situation may well
puzzle an antiquary who is unaware of its recent history, and whose
ideas ascend to the times of Haco or perhaps of Fingal; a modern
engineer will only wonder at the choice of such a position for a
fortress.” Away to the west of the Treshinish Isles are dimly
descried “ the sandy Coll” and “ the wild Tiree.”
The islands of Gometra, Ulva, and Colonsay (the latter not to be
confounded, as in several of the guide-books, with the Colonsay of the
M'Neills), lie betwixt Loch Tua and Loch-na-Keal, in the northern
part of the great embayment which, as a reference to the map will
show, forms a conspicuous feature in the outline of the west side of
Mull. The channel which separates Ulva from Gometra is so
narrow that at a distance they appear to constitute one island
�16
INCHKENNETH—DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.
Ulva is celebrated for its basaltic pillars, which are compared to
those of the Giant’s Causeway, although confessedly inferior to
those of Staffa. Dr Johnson visited Ulva in his Hebridean Tour,
and a writer in the “ Statistical Account” says “ the room where
the Doctor spent the night, indulging his bile against the then
unclothed appearance of the landscape, is yet to be seen in the
*
old Macquarrie mansion-house.” The island is now adorned with
plantations. Some years ago the little island of Colonsay possessed
only one family, or six souls ; and its soil being described as less
fertile than that of the other two islands, it may be supposed to
offer a fair instance of the economical problem of a population
treading upon the heels of the means of subsistence.
Inchkenneth, or Inniskennetli, a fertile little island at the
mouth of Loch-na-Keal, and separated from the peninsula of
Gribon by a channel half a mile in breadth, is interesting as having
been the place where Dr. Johnson and his friend Boswell were so
hospitably and agreeably entertained by Sir Allan Maclean and
his two daughters, the remains of whose cottage are still to be seen.
The Doctor and Bozzy landed at Tobermory from Coll, where they
had been detained for some time by unfavourable weather. “ I
want to be on the mainland, and go on with existence,” said Johnson
impatiently—adding, “this is a waste of life.” The kindness and
courtesy of his reception in Mull reconciled him to his island life.
Near Tobermory he was entertained at the house of Dr. Maclean,
author of the History of the Macleans. Miss Maclean read and
translated to him Gaelic poetry, and played the spinnet for his
delectation ; although the Doctor’s perception of music was not
of the acutest, as may be inferred from the circumstance
that when in Skye he had become so fond of the bagpipe as
frequently to stand for some time “ with his ear close to the great
drone.” “ She is the most accomplished lady that I have found
in the Highlands,” said Dr. Johnson, speaking of Miss Maclean,
“ she knows French, music, and drawing, sews neatly, makes shell
work, and can milk cows ; in short, she can do everything. She
talks sensibly, and is the first person whom I have found that can
translate Earse poetry literally.”! At Macquarrie’s in Ulva, on
* Dr. Johnson lost his large oak-stick while he was riding across Mull on a
Highland sheltie, and vowed to Boswell that the people had stolen it. “ Consider,
Sir, the value of such a piece of timber here! ”
t The history of Miss Maclean has a mournful sequel. She married unhappily
and resided at Tobermory with her husband, till his death, in reduced circumstances.
She then became dependent upon the bounty of Maclean of Coll, and died in 1826.
(Boswell’s Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Dr. S. Johnson. Edited by
Kobert Carruthers, Esq. of Inverness.)
�ULVA—JOHNSON AND THE MACLEANS.
17
their way to Inchkenneth, the travellers were not less hospitably
treated. In their host they found a polite and well-informed High
land gentleman, and much a man of the world. Speaking of him,
when by themselves, and employing Latin, that they might not be
understood by the Highlanders—“Aspectum generosum habet,”
remarked Boswell; “ Et generosum animum," responded the oracle.
At Inchkenneth the Doctor received another Highland welcome,__
“ was cheered by the sight of a road marked with cart-wheels,
as on the mainland —found a parcel of Edinburgh newspapers,
books, cultivated society, and home comforts. Miss Maclean,
Sir Allan’s daughter, read prayers on Sunday, and the Doctor one
of Ogden’s sermons.
*
The Doctor declared it had been the most
agreeable Sunday he had ever passed. The piety and tranquillity,
the grace, the accomplishments, and the ancestral dignity which he
witnessed under the roof-tree of Maclean, Johnson celebrated in
Latin verse. He was here contented and happy. What did he
need more, even in the Highlands ?
“ Quo vagor ulterius? quod ubique requiritur hie est?
Hie secura quies, liic et honestus amor.”
“ Then wherefore further seek to rove,
While here is all our hearts approve—
Repose, security, and love ?”
It was from Inchkenneth that Dr. Johnson and Mr. Boswell
proceeded to visit Iona, on the 19th of October, 1773. “ We saw
the Island of Staffa, at no very great distance,” says Boswell,
“ but could not land upon it, the surge was so high on its rocky
coast.” On the northern shore of Mull, and commanding a view
of the Ulva north loch, is Torloisk, the beautiful seat of the late
Mrs. Maclean Clephane (now Earl Compton’s), a capacious-looking
mansion, placed on a wide semicircular inclined plane, surrounded
by thriving plantations, and backed by lofty hills.
* They were shown a ruined chapel near Sir Allan’s house. In a letter to
Mrs. Thrale, Johnson wrote—“ Boswell, who is very pious, went into it at night
to perform his devotions, but came back in haste, for fear of spectres!"
�18
STAFFA.
STAFFA.
“ Compared to this, what are the cathedrals or the palaces built by man? mere
models or playthings, imitations as diminutive as his works will always be when
compared to those of Nature. Where is now the boast of the architect? regularity,
the only part in which he fancied himself to exceed his mistress Nature, is here
found in her possession, and here it has been for ages undescribed.”—Sir Joseph
Banlcs.
“ Thanks for the lessons of this spot—fit school
For the presumptuous thoughts that would assign
Mechanic laws to agency Divine;
And, measuring heaven by earth, would over-rule
Infinite Power. The pillar’d vestibule,
Expanding yet precise, the roof embowed,
Might seem designed to humble man, when proud
Of his best workmanship by plan and tool.
Down-bearing with his whole Atlantic weight
Of tide and tempest on the structure’s base,
And flashing to that structure’s topmost height,
Ocean has proved its strength—and of its grace
In calms is conscious, finding for his freight
Of softest music some responsive place.”
Wordsworth.
Staffa* was unknown as an object of scientific interest and
picturesque natural grandeur till the year 1772, when it was
visited by Sir Joseph Banks, on his voyage to Iceland. His
drawings and description of the island were communicated to
Mr. Pennant, by whom they were published in his “ Tour to the
Hebrides,” in 1774. A careful and accurate survey of the island
was made by Dr. John Macculloch, the geologist, and published in
his “ Description of the Western Islands of Scotland,” in 1819.
The first aspect of Staffa as seen from the steam-boat is not such
as to awaken a responsive sympathy in the mind of the visitor with
the sentiments of the naturalist and the poet quoted as the mottoes
to this chapter.
The island is not remarkable for its height,
and is only about a mile aud a half in circumference ; its outline
is irregularly oval, and its surface an undulating table-land.
The privilege of visiting Staffa is secured to the public by
Messrs. Hutcheson and Co., who have leased the island, and
sublet it for feeding sheep. Formerly black cattle were kept
on the island, but they became so wild in their insular
solitude as to render it difficult to remove them; and on
one occasion an Irish tourist who had strayed from his party
into the vicinity of the herd, found his intrusion resented by a
* A Scandinavian word meaning, “ The Island of Columns.’
�THE QUEEN AT STAFFA.
19
long-horned ox, which pursued him with fell intent to the shore,
where the breathless fugitive was fain to seek security in the
steamer’s boat. When Dr. Garnett visited Staffa in 1798, it was
inhabited by a herd and his family, who had resided there summer
and winter for three years. Subsequently they took up their
quarters on the island in summer only, having found their condi
tion during the storms of winter somewhat disquieting; for the sea
broke upon the shores with such impetuosity, and rushed into the
caves which penetrate its interior with such noise, that the hut
shook to its foundation, and they could get no sleep. This sleep
less rocking a-nights they ascribed not to the spirit of the storm,
but to the “evil spirit.” The dilapidated walls of the herd’s
shieling remain, but the island has long been tenanted only by
sheep and sea-fowl.
When Queen Victoria visited Staffa, on the 19th of August,
1847, the wind was so gentle and the tide so low as to admit of
the royal barge, containing her Majesty, Prince Albert, and the
royal children, being rowed into Fingal’s Cave. Prince Albert
afterwards landed on the Bouachaille, or Herdsman, and along
with several members of his suite clambered for a while over its
piles of basaltic columns. It is seldom, indeed, that in these
turbulent seas tourists visit the island in such favouring circum
stances as were vouchsafed on this interesting occasion to our
gracious Monarch; but the landing is nevertheless effected with
safety, and even with comfort—all things considered—by boatmen
from Ulva, hardy, skilful, and vociferous, who conduct their powerful
boat with great dexterity through the surf which breaks incessantly
upon the shore, and then act as guides in the great cave—steady of
head and hand as cragsmen. The usual landing-place is on the
eastern shore, in the lee of the prevailing winds, and where the
rocks are low and accessible.
The first object which claims attention on landing is the
Clamshell Cave, where a mass of basaltic pillars opens upon the
shore in a curved form, which has not unaptly been compared tt
the ribs of a ship. The wall on the opposite side of the cavity
consists of the projecting ends of horizontal columns, having the
honeycomb appearance which will be observed developed on a still
larger scale as we proceed in our survey of the basaltic rocks along
the shore.
Proceeding over the rugged causeway formed by truncated
columns, we pass on the left, Bouaciiaille, Boosiiala, or the
Herdsman, a conical islet of basaltic pillars, about 30 feet high, and
�20
CAVE OF FINGAL.
resting upon a series of horizontal columns which are only disclosed
at low water. This beautiful islet is separated from the causeway
by a narrow channel, through which a current of green and most
transparent water rushes with startling impetuosity, dashing itself
upon the rocks into foam and spray, which often glistens in the
sunshine with the brilliant hues of the iris. “ This lesser isle,”
Mr. Wilson remarks, “is itself a perfect gem in respect to its
beauty of basaltic structure, being composed entirely of the most
symmetrical columnar forms, several of them bent in a peculiar
manner, and the generality lying on their sides.”
From this point forward the pillars supporting the tabular portion
of the island gradually increase in magnitude and grace of proportion,
forming a continuous colonnade along the vertical face of the cliff.
A broken column about two feet in height, with another behind
it somewhat higher, at the base of the cliff, present the rude
appearance of a seat, which has accordingly obtained the name of
Fingal’s Chair, and “ a sublime though rocky throne it really is
for such a hero, in the midst of Nature’s unmatched magnificence.”
The pillars whose crowns form the grand causeway are generally
hexagonal, some are pentagonal, and a few have only four sides.
Near the entrance to the cave they acquire their greatest diameter
and altitude. The side of one of the hexagonal columns near the
entrance measures about two feet, the average breadth of the side
of the hexagon in the greater number of pillars being about fifteen
inches. On the Herdsman the hexagonal sides of the pillars do
not on an average exceed four inches.
On rounding a projecting part of the cliff, the august vestibule
of the Cave of Fingal is presented to the view. The exquisite
symmetry of the arch at the entrance is seen to most advantage
from the steam-boat at a little distance, and such an opportunity
of viewing it is usually afforded to visitors on the vessel’s quitting
the island. The pure green wave surges into the recesses of the
cave with a ceaseless resonance which early obtained for it the
Gaelic name of Uaimh Bliinn, the Musical Cave. The access
to the interior is by means of a rugged and precarious pathway
formed by the moist and slippery tops of broken pillars, along
which the visitor secures his footing by the aid of a strong rope
fastened by iron bolts to the rock. In this way the innermost part
of the cave may be reached by the more adventurous, although
most people are well content to take up a position where they can
contemplate the marvellous spectacle midway between the entrance
and the further extremity,—that is to say, if contemplation is
�-■ii
H
j
�i
�FINGAL’S CAVE-MACCULLOCH’S DESCRIPTION.
21
possible amidst the singing and shouting which the great majority
of tourists appear to consider as indispensable to the true enjoyment
of the scene. Wordsworth, in one of his noble Staffa Sonnets,
laments the necessity of seeing without being able to feel the “ farfamed sight” amidst a motley, hurrying, loud, and volatile group of
tourists; and expresses a wish which, many a visitor must cherish
but few can hope to realise:—
“ 0, for those motions only that invite
The ghost of Fingal to his tuneful cave,
By the breeze entered, and Wave after wave,
Softly embosoming the timid light!
And by one votary, who at will might stand
Gazing, and take into his mind and heart,
With undisturbed reverence, the effect
Of those proportions where the Almighty hand
That made the worlds, the Sovereign Architect,
Has deigned to work as if with human art!”
Sir Joseph Banks and Dr. Macculloch both took measurements
of the dimensions of the cave, but those of the latter are here
preferred as being more deliberate and accurate:—
Feet.
Height from the water at mean tide to the top of the arch,... 66
Do. from the top of the arch to that of the cliff above, .... 30
Do. of the pillars on the western side,.......................... 36
Do. of the pillars on the eastern side,.......................... 18
Breadth of the Cave at entrance,................................. ........... 42
Do. near the inner extremity,............................................ 22
Length of the Cave,................................................................... 227
“ The sides of this cave (says Macculloch) are, like the front,
columnar, and, in a general sense, perpendicular. The columns
are frequently broken and irregularly grouped, so as to catch a
variety of direct and reflected tints, mixed with unexpected
Shadows, that produce a picturesque effect which no regularity
could have given. The ceiling is various in different parts of the cave.
The surfaces of the columns above are sometimes distinguished
from each other by the infiltration of carbonate of lime into their
interstices. It would be no less presumptuous than useless to
attempt a description of the picturesque effect of that to which the
pencil itself is inadequate. But if this cave were even destitute
of that order and symmetry, that richness arising from multiplicity
of parts, combined with greatness of dimension and simplicity of
style, which it possesses, still the prolonged depth, the twilight
gloom, half concealing the playful and varying effects of reflected
light, the echo of the measured surge as it rises and falls, the
c
�22
FINGAL’S CAVE—WILSON’S DESCRIPTION.
transparent green of the water, and the profound and fairy
solitude of the whole scene, could not fail strongly to impmsg a
. mind gifted with any sense of beauty in art or in nature.”
“ Fingal’s Cave,” says Mr. James Wilson, “is indeed a most
magnificent example of nature’s architecture. A vast archway of
nearly seventy feet in height, supporting a massive entablature of
thirty feet additional, and receding for about 230 feet inwards,—
the entire front as well as the great cavernous sides being composed
of countless complicated ranges of gigantic columns, beautifully
jointed, and of most symmetrical though somewhat varied forms,—
the roof itself exhibiting a rich grouping of overhanging pillars,
some of snowy whiteness, from the calcareous covering by which
they have become encrusted,—the whole rising from and often seen
reflected by the ocean waters,—forms truly a picture of unrivalled
grandeur, and one on which it is delightful to dwell even in
remembrance. How often have we since recalled to mind the
regularity, magnitude, and loftiness of those columns, the fine o’erhanging cliff of small prismatic basalt to which they give support,
worn by the murmuring waves of many thousand years into the
semblance of some stupendous Gothic arch,
‘ Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault,’
the wild waters ever urge their way,—and the receding sides of that
great temple, running inwards in solemn perspective, yet ever and
anon, as ocean heaves and falls, rendered visible in its far sanctuary,
by the broad and flashing light reflected by the foaming surges
sweeping onwards from below! Then the broken and irregular
gallery which overhangs that subterranean flood, and from which,
looking upwards and around, we behold the rich and varied hues
of red, green, and gold, which give such splendid relief to the deep
and sombre coloured columns,—the clear bright tints which sparkle
beneath our feet, from the wavering yet translucent sea,—the whole
accompanied by the wild yet mellow and sonorous moan of each
successive billow, which rises up the sides, or rolls over the finely
formed crowns of the lowlier and disjointed pillars:—these are a
few of the features of this exquisite and most singular scene, which
cannot fail to astonish the beholder. Neither can they fail, while
thus exciting his unfeigned admiration of the wonderful works of
nature, to call most vividly to mind the character and attributes of
their Great Creator; and so ever blending a lowly spirit and a
grateful heart with the wise pursuit of knowledge, the student of
mysteries such as these will escape the entangling mazes of a false
and feeble, because a godless philosophy.”
�FINGAL’S CAVE—SCOTT’S DESCRIPTION.
23
Bishop Van Troil, who visited Staffa along with Sir Joseph
Banks, thus notices the cave in his “Letters on Iceland” :__ “ How
magnificent are the remains of the porticoes of the ancients ! and
with what admiration do we behold the colonnades which adorn the
principal buildings of our times ! and yet every one who compares
them with Fingal’s Cave, formed by nature in the isle of Staffa,
must readily acknowledge that this piece of nature’s architecture
far surpasses everything that invention, luxury, and taste ever pro
duced among the Greeks.”
In the same spirit, a French author, Faujas de St. Fond, con
trasting Staffa with other superb basaltic causeways that he had
seen, says—“ But I have never found anything which comes near
this, either for the admirable regularity of the columns, the height
of the arch, the situation, the form, the elegance of this production
of nature, or its resemblance to the master-pieces of art. It is
therefore not at all surprising that tradition should have made
it the abode of a hero.”
While quoting descriptions of Staffa, which with all their power,
*
still convey but a feeble impression of the reality, it would be
unpardonable to omit the well known graphic verses of Sir Walter
Scott in “ The Lord of the Isles” ;—
“The shores of Mull on the eastward lay,
And Ulva dark, and Colonsay,
And all the group of islets gay
That guard famed Staffa round.
Then all unknown its columns rose,
Where dark and undisturbed repose
The cormorant had found,
And the shy seal had quiet home,
And weltered in that wondrous dome,
Where, as to shame the temples decked
By skill of earthly architect,
Nature herself, it seemed, would raise
A Minster to her Maker’s praise!
Not for a meaner use ascend
Her columns, or her arches bend;
Nor of a theme less solemn tells
That mighty surge that ebbs and swells,
* “I have stood on the shores of Staffa; I have seen ‘ the temple not made with
hands;’ I have seen the majestic, swell of the ocean, the pulsations of the great
Atlantic, beating in its inmost sanctuary, and swelling a note of praise nobler far
than any that ever pealed from human organs.”—Sir Robert Peel, in his Glasgow
Speech, 1837.
�24
BOAT CAVE—MACKINNON’S CAVE, &c
And still, between each awful pause,
From the high vault an answer draws,
In varied tone prolonged and high,
That mocks the organ’s melody.
Nor doth its entrance front in vain
To old Iona’s holy fane,
That Nature’s voice might seem to say,
‘ Well hast thou done, frail child of clay!
Thy humble powers that stately shrine
Tasked high and hard—but witness mine !’”
There are several other caves in the island which the steam-boat
tourist has no opportunity of inspecting, and which can only be
visited by taking advantage of the ready and efficient services of
the Ulva or the Iona boatmen. Every person who revisits Staffa
will concur in the testimony that its grandeur and interest become
enhanced the more its wonders are scrutinised.
The Boat Cave has been compared to the gallery of a mine, being
excavated in the lowest stratum, on a level with the sea, by which
alone it is accessible. Between it and the Great Cave the columnar
cliff attains its greatest altitude, the upper surface being about 112
feet above high-water-mark. The interior of this cave is without
interest, but in magnificence and symmetry the range of its over
hanging pillars excels the facade of Fingal’s Cave. The height of
this cave is about 15 feet above high-water-mark; its breadth
12 feet; its length 150 feet.
Mackinnon’s, the Scart, or Cormorant’s Cave lies to the south
of the former, and is comparatively easy of access, being tunnelled
out of the lower bed of rock, where it terminates in a gravelly beach.
The interior is spacious but rugged and irregular. In height it is
about 50 feet; in breadth 48 feet; in length 224 feet. The crevices
of the rock are resorted to by the Cormorant (Phalacrocorax
carbo).
At the north-east end of Staffa are several small caves into which
the waves dash with violence, producing by the condensation of the
air in the cavity a sound like the discharge of a mortar. When
Dr. Garnett visited Staffa he was for some time, he says, under the
impression that the reports proceeded from vessels firing signals of
distress.
Returning to the landing place, we ascend to the grassy summit
of the island by a wooden flight of steps constructed by the
Messrs. Hutcheson close to the Clamshell Cave. The surface of
the island presents few objects of interest. It possesses no rare
plants. Rhodiola rosea and Cotyledon Umbilicus abound on the
�S V A F m , FR©®] TME SMEBKBOT.
���From, a P h otograp h .
0©K)Ao
Machire
&
.
Macdonald Lit} i
�PLANTS AND BIRDS OF STAFFA—VIEW FROM SUMMIT.
25
cliffs. Orobanclie rubra has occasionally been found growing here
as elsewhere amongst disintegrating basalt. Erythrcea latifolia,
set down in the books as having been found in Staffa, has been
sought for in vain; E, Centaurium is common. Salix Lapponum
(S. arenaria) abounds in Staffa and Iona. There are no trees
on the island. The surface is covered with rich grass, forming
excellent pasture. Among the birds frequenting Staffa are the
Barnacle Goose, Common Sheildrake, Black Guillemot, Puffin,
Cormorant, Solan Goose, Ivittiwake, Stormy Petrel, Gulls of various
species, Great Northern Diver, &c. Kittiwake Gulls in great
numbers, together with the Razor-billed Auk, rear their young in
the Great Cave.
*
The prismatic or columnar form impressed upon the cliffs of
Staffa and the neighbouring islands is characteristic of basalt; and
the tendency to assume this shape appears with more or less
distinctness in the basaltic trap rocks abounding on the west coast
of Scotland. Mr. Gregory Watt showed by his experiments on
basalt, in 1804, that in the gradual cooling of a molten mass of that
rock, spheroids were produced, the union of which resulted in the
prismatic form. This concretionary or globular structure is often
visible in the decomposition of trappean and volcanic rocks. In
mineral character, succession, and thickness, Dr. James Bryce, of
Glasgow, has observed a remarkable resemblance between the
basaltic cliffs of the Giant’s Causeway and those of Staffa. The
Staffa rocks consist of three distinct beds—the lowest, a mass of
trap tuff; the next, the great columnar range ; and the uppermost
an irregular mixture of bent and broken pillars and amorphous
basalt. On the western side of the island, these different kinds of
rocks are indiscriminately commingled.
The view obtained from the summit of Staffa of the columnar
ranges of the cliffs below, and of the rugged grandeur of the shores
of Mull, with the lofty mountains of the interior, amply compensates
for the absence of objects of interest on the surface. The appearance
of Mull, as viewed from this point, is happily represented, in the
accompanying print. Gometra and Ulva are distinctly descried
to the north and north-west. Inchkenneth is seen at the mouth
of Loch-na-keal, with Little Colonsay in the same direction, but
nearer to Staffa. The group of the Treshnish Islands is also
* A list of the birds frequenting Staffa and the neighbouring islands, prepared
by Mr. H. D. Graham, will be found in “ Staffa and Iona Described and Illustrated,”
published by Messrs. Blackie & Son.
�26
IONA.
readily distinguished, more especially the Dutchman’s Cap and the
two Cairnburgs, one of the latter surmounted by a lofty natural
arch. The peaks of the Skye mountains are visible in the distant
north, and Tiree and Coll bound the western horizon. While the
eye is contemplating the varied aspects of this magnificent archi
pelago, the ear evei’ and anon is filled with the sound of the waves
as they break in white surf on the cliffs, or roll with solemn
cadence into the caves, causing the superincumbent mass to vibrate
beneath one’s feet. Flocks of gulls wheel round the cliffs, or soar
high above them, with wings rivalling the summer cloud in their
snowy whiteness, as their forms are seen sharply defined far up
against the clear blue sky, or hovering over the water and swooping
down in rapid and graceful gyrations, skimming or dipping under
the surface in quest of prey, and mingling the while their sharp
half-screaming, half-laughing cries with the hollow sounds of the
surging shore.
IONA.
“ We were now treading that illustrious island which was once the luminary of
the Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians derived the
benefits of knowledge and the blessings of religion. To abstract the mind from all
local emotions would be impossible if it were endeavoured, and would be foolish if
it were possible. Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses, whatever
makes the past, the distant, or the future, predominate over the present, advances
us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me, and from my friends, be such
frigid philosophy as may conduct us indifferent and unmoved over any ground
which has been dignified by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is little to be
envied whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plains of Marathon, or whose
piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Iona! ”—Dr. Samuel Johnson.
“ On to Iona!—What can she afford
To us, save matter for a thoughtful sigh,
Heaved over ruin with stability
In urgent contrast? ”
Wordsworth.
The hill of Dun-ii, the highest land in Iona, is distinctly visible
from Staffa. From the entrance to the Cave of Fingal is seen the
distant tower of the Cathedral, rising from the lowly shores of the
Blessed Isle. A century has not yet elapsed since the pilgrim to
the great temple of Nature first felt his heart rising with instinctive
reverence to Nature’s God, as he stood awe-struck under its
vaulted roof. But centuries before human ear had listened to the
“diapason of the deep” pealing in the solemn recesses of Naimh
Binn, the humble fanes of Iona were the resort of pilgrims from
�APPROACH TO THE VILLAGE.
27
many lands ; and from its green shores went forth the messengers
of the Cross to spread the light of Christianity and the benefits of
civilisation over the benighted mainland of Britain, whence a pure
faith was radiated to the Continent of Europe. Its ecclesiastical
remains, however interesting in an archaeological point of view, are
monuments of the declining period of Iona’s history. Nothing
remains to commemorate the Scriptural simplicity and apostolic
zeal of Columba and the Culdees, but the lowly little island itself,
whose green fields and shining white shores are for ever consecrated
by the memory of the piety, the labours, and the sufferings of men
of whom the world was not worthy. But why, says the poet,
“ Even for a moment, has our verse deplored
Their wrongs, since they fulfilled their destiny ?
And when, subjected to a common doom
Of mutability, those far-famed Piles
Shall disappear from both the sister isles,
Iona’s Saints, forgetting not past days,
Garlands shall wear of amaranthine bloom,
While heaven’s vast sea of voices chants their praise.”
*
Iona lies to the south of Staffa about seven or eight miles, and
is separated from the Ross of Mull, a prolonged low peninsula of
granite forming the southern extremity of that island, by a Sound
a mile in breadth. The prevailing rock in Iona is gneiss, but the
geological connection of the island with the Ross of Mull is indicated
by the occurrence on the shore of several rocks (in si7w) of the same
ruddy-coloured granite which forms the round hummocky knolls
of the opposite coast. Veins of granite also traverse the gneiss
in various parts of Iona.
The shore first approached is white
with accumulations of shell-sand, which impart to the adjoining
fields the bright verdure peculiar to calcareous soils.
The
appearance of the square tower of the Cathedral, rising bleak
and bare above the crumbling walls, is the first object which strikes
the observer on approaching the village. The general aspect of
the Cathedral and village of Iona, with Dun-ii in the background,
is faithfully rendered in our first view of the island. The second
represents the village, (JBaile Mor, the Great Town!) as seen from
the landing-place. The passengers by the steamer are landed from
small boats upon a rude pier, formed of huge masses of gneiss, and
* I, pronounced Ee, the old name of Iona, denotes pre-eminently The Island;
Shona (the s silent and the h dropped for euphony) means blessed or happy; hence
I-ona, the Blessed or Happy Isle. Icolmkill, the Isle of Columba’s Cell.
�28
THE NUNNERY.
granite boulders drifted from the opposite shore. The visitors no
sooner set foot on shore than they are beset by groups of children
offering for sale collections of shells (generally Cyproea Euvopcea,
Trochus umbilicatus, and Nerita littoralis'), and water-worn frag
ments of serpentine, marble, and quartz. This practice is said to
have had its origin in the ancient custom of pilgrims carrying away
relics from the island as charms. Wordsworth commemorates in
a sonnet the greetings of the youthful shell-gatherers, who, sooth to
say, drive a hard bargain with the Sassenach, and it is to be feared
are somewhat neglectful of school so long as the season for this not
unprofitable merchandise lasts :—
“ How sad a welcome! To each voyager
Some ragged child holds up for sale a store
Of wave-worn pebbles, pleading on the shore
Where once came monk and nun with gentle stir,
Blessings to give, news ask, or suit prefer.”
The island is about three miles in length by one and a half in
breadth, and is estimated to contain a superficial area of 2,000
imperial acres, 600 of which are in occasional cultivation, the rest
being hill pasture, morass, and rock. The Duke of Argyll is the
sole proprietor. The population has of late years been reduced by
emigration, and numbers about 300.
*
The village consists of a row of about forty cottages, forming the
“ Sraide ” or Street.
It contains an Established Church (Rev.
Mr. M‘Gregor) and a Free Church (Rev. Mr. M‘Vean). The Free
Church minister being about to remove his residence to the opposite
coast of Mull, his Manse (Parsonage), is to be converted into an
Hotel, thus, by permission of the Duke of Argyle, supplying a want
which has long been felt by strangers visiting Iona,
The Nunnery is usually first visited. Nothing remains of this
institution but the chapel. As monastic establishments for females
constituted no part of the system of Columba and the Culdees, the
Nunnery probably dates no farther back than the beginning of the
13th century. The style of architecture is Norman. The nuns
followed the rule of St. Augustine. The tombstone of the Princess
Anna, the last prioress, is still preserved, although much defaced
* For particulars of the ancient history and present condition of the Island, the
compiler of these pages takes leave to refer to his little work, entitled “ Staffa
and Iona Described and Illustrated,” published by Blackie & Son, Glasgow,
Ike proJits being applicable to Educational Purposes in Iona.
�MACLEAN’S CROSS—REILIG ORAIN.
29
by being trodden upon by tourists. It bears date 1543, with an
inscription in the Saxon character as follows :— “ Hie jacet
Domina Anna Donaldi Terliti, filia quondam Priorissa de Iona,
quae obiit anno m° d3 xliii3, ejus animam Altissimo commendamus.
Sancta Maria, ora pro me.” The figure of the prioress is sculp
tured on the stone, with angels supporting her pillow. In accordance
with early Greek and Roman art, the mirror and comb are intro
duced as the symbol of the female sex, which emblem Pennant
mistook for a “plate and comb!” Part of the stone which has
been destroyed represented the Virgin Mary. Another mutilated
stone is inscribed “ Hie jacet Mariota filia Johannis Lauchlani
Domini de------ .”
Maclean’s Cross occupies a conspicuous place on the rude
causeway along which the visitors now proceed on their way to
the Cathedral. The original number of the Iona crosses is said to
have been 360. According to tradition, the Synod of Argyle
caused sixty of the number to be thrown into the sea at the
Reformation, when the ecclesiastical edifices in the island were
ruthlessly demolished. One of the Iona crosses adorns the town
of Campbelton, another that of Inverary. The fragments of several
lie scattered in the ancient place of sepulture. Maclean’s is con
sidered to be of great antiquity, its form being unique amongst
Hebridean crosses. The crosses, which were chiefly of the nature of
votive offerings, generally consist of a single slab of mica schist, and
the success with which this intractable material has been sculptured
is not one ot the least curious features of these graceful memorials.
The crucifixion is represented on one side of Maclean’s cross.
Reilig Orain, the burial-place of St. Oran, is perhaps the most
interesting spot in Iona, and is unquestionably the most solemnizing.
The reputed sanctity of the island obtained for it in a rude age the
preference over all other burial-places in Scotland as a place of
sepulture, a choice which was doubtless determined also in many
instances by the common belief in a Gaelic prophecy of which
Pennant furnishes the following English version:—
“ Seven years before tlie end of the world
A deluge shall drown the nations.
The sea at one tide shall cover Ireland
And the green-headed Islay, but Columba’s Islo
Shall swim above the flood.”
Forty Scottish kings are said to have been interred in Iona, from
Fergus II. to Duncan I. and his murderer Macbeth; two Irish
kings ; one French king ; two Irish princes of the Norwegian race,
D
�30
THE BURIAL-PLACE—DECAY OF THE MONUMENTS.
besides innumerable chieftains and ecclesiastics. Donald Monro,
Dean of the Isles, who visited Iona in 1594, and describes Reilig
Grain, “ quliilk is a very fair kirkzaird, and weill biggit about
with staine and lyme,” concludes an enumeration of the kings and
princes “ eirdit” in Colmkill as follows :—“ Within this Sanctuary
also lyes the maist pairt of the Lords of the Iles, with their lynage.
Twa Clan Lynes, with their lynage, M'Kynnon and M'Quarie,
with their lynage, with sundrie uthers inhabitants of the haill iles,
because this Sanctuary wes wont to be the sepulture of the best
men of all the iles, and als of our kinges as we have said; because
it wes the maist honorable and ancient place that was in Scotland
in tliair dayes, as we reid.”
The tombstones of Reilig Orain are scattered over the islands and
neighbouring mainland, having been plundered to cover the narrow
dwellings of the dead, as the materials for half the houses of the living
in the “ Baile Mor”of Iona itself were quarried out of the walls of the
ecclesiastical edifices. To quote a remark from “ Staffa and Iona
Described and Illustrated”—“ If it be true, therefore, as Dr. Samuel
Johnson observed, that some of the numerous graves in this place
‘ undoubtedly contain the remains of men who did not expect to be
so soon forgotten,’ it is not less certain that, elsewhere, the dust of
many a humble Hebridean, whose ambition never ventured to prompt
the hope of being remembered beyond the first generation, now
sleeps in unconscious dignity, in his island sepulchre, under a
monument sculptured with the panoply of the potentate or the stole
of the ecclesiastic.” It is sad to observe, as' the present writer has
had ample opportunities of doing within the last 20 years, that
many of the monuments are becoming defaced in consequence of
being habitually trodden upon by visitors. Some of the inscriptions
which were legible a few years ago are now completely obliterated.
Several sculptured stones of a fissile nature, and which might have
been preserved by being placed under shelter, have been split up
and destroyed by exposure to the weather, to say nothing of the
injury sustained by others, at the hands of relic-hunters and
destructives. Many years ago the writer suggested the simple
expedient of lifting some of the sculptured stones on end, in the
Nunnery and Burying-ground, so as to render it impossible to stand
upon them, and of authorising the guide absolutely to prohihit
persons from walking over those lying flat on the ground. All
warnings of this nature have been disregarded, and the public should
know that the interesting sepulchral and ecclesiastical monuments of
Iona are hastening into irretrievable decay.
�ST. ORAN’S CHAPEL—ST. MARTIN’S CROSS.
31
St. Oran’s Chapel stands within the inclosure of Reilig Orain,
a roofless ruin, 60 feet in length by 22 in breadth within the walls.
This edifice bears traces of a higher antiquity than any of the other
ecclesiastical buildings. Its arched doorway, the soffit of which is
ornamented with chevron moulding, and a triple arch in the interior,
both of freestone, are of a more recent date than that of the Chapel
itself, which is in the Norman style. The triple arch forms a
graceful canopy to a tomb whose history is lost, but in which
tradition places the remains of St. Oran. The lower part of the
cross of Abbot Mackinnon (whose tomb and monument are in the
Cathedral) lies below the triple arch, dated 1489, and bearing the
figure of a galley with unfurled sails, the emblazonment of a
descendant of the ancient Norwegian kings of Man. In the centre
of the Chapel is the tomb of M'Quarrie of Ulva, marked by an
elaborately decorated stone. The tomb of Macdonald, Lord of the
Isles, is also in this sacred spot. The tracery on the stone is
designed and executed with great freedom. In this instance the
figure of a galley is introduced, with sails furled. The following
scroll is inscribed in antique characters:—“Hie jacet corpus
Angusii, Filii Domini Angusii MacDomnill de Ila.” “ Here lies
the body of Angus, son of Sir Angus Macdonald of Ilay.” This
chieftain, who was known by the name of Angus Og, or Young
Angus, is Scott’s Lord of the Isles, and his genealogy is given in
the notes to the poem, where he is more euphoniously designated
Ronald—
“ The heir of mighty Somerlcd,
Ronald, from many a hero sprung,
The fair, the valiant, and the young,
Lord of the Isles, ■whose lofty name
A thousand bards have given to fame,
The mate of monarchs, and allied
On equal terms with England’s pride.”
There are many curious old monuments (says Mr. Wilson) within
and around St. Oran’s Chapel. One of these was found inscribed
with the most ancient Irish characters, which a learned clergyman
deciphered as a Latin inscription—“ MacDonuill fato hie,”—as
much as to say that “ Fate alone could lay Macdonald low
while
another equally learned Theban reads it simply in the Celtic
vernacular, “ Cros Domhail fatusich,” or in plainer English, “the
Cross of Donald Longshanks!”
St. Martin’s Cross (next to M‘ I ean’s the only perfect surviving
specimen of the 360 crosses which contributed so much to the
�32
THE CATHEDRAL—ST. COLUMBA.
monumental grandeur of ancient Iona,) stands at the entrance to
the Cathedral inclosure, and consists of a solid column of mica
schist, fourteen feet high, eighteen inches broad, and six inches
thick, and fixed in a massive pedestal of red granite three feet in
height. This magnificent column is beautifully carved in high
relief with Rhunic knotting, and acquires a still more venerable
appearance from its being covered with grey lichens. The west
side of the pillar is sculptured with a series of emblematic figures
and devices, the circle in the centre of the cross representing the
Virgin Mary and Child, surrounded by four rude figures of cherubs.
The fragment of a second cross, named St. John’s, lies nearer the
Cathedral, overthrown from its pedestal; a little to the north there
is a broken shaft of a third; and the socket of a fourth crowns the
green knoll, named the Abbot’s Mound, in front of the Cathedral.
Tiie Cathedral is the most conspicuous and imposing of the
ruins of Iona. From whatever point it is seen at a distance—
whether from the solid and enduring pile of Staffa, reminding us
of the poet’s contrast between “ruin and stability,” or when it is
suddenly descried rising bleak and weather-beaten on the view of
the voyager on doubling one of the rugged promontories of Mull, it
never fails to fill the mind of the beholder with a solemn and
mournful interest. The architecture of the edifice is of different
styles, and has been subjected to so many additions and alterations
as to render it difficult to assign it to any particular period, although
most archaeologists concur in regarding it as upon the whole the
most recent of the ecclesiastical monuments. Its proportions and
appearance are delineated with photographic accuracy in the
accompanying picture.
No part of the ecclesiastical relics, as has already been remarked,
is traceable to the age of the Culdees.
*
St. Columba and his
twelve companions settled in Iona in the year 563, having crossed
the sea from Ireland in a corracle or currach, or boat of wicker
work, and landed at the south end of the island, in a bay still
bearing the name of Port a' Churraich, or the Bay of the Wicker
boat. A huge mound of stones, having a rude resemblance to a
* The early records of Iona speak of Columba as sending forth his monks to
gather “bundles of twigs to build their hospice.” The “Cathredal” of the
Culdees appears, in fact, to have been constructed of the same materials as the
currach in which its founders voyaged from Ireland. Wigwams were superseded
by log-houses, and in the progress of improvement stone replaced wood as a building
material; but the Culdees had taken their final departure from Iona long before
tbo foundation of the present Cathedral, which is believed to date from the 12th or
1 3th century.
�(P & ‘Tf KI E
© D&aiL OF 0 © KJ /A
.
��CELL OF THE CULDEES—THE CATHEDRAL
33
boat, indicates the place where the missionaries first set foot on the
shores of Iona. The keeping up of the cairn is said by Pennant
to have been a penitential service in subsequent and degenerate
times. Tradition places the original “cell” or “corner” of the
Culdees (Gaelic, Cuil, “corner, “retirement,” and Culdeach or
Cuildich, “the people who retire to corners,”) in an obscure part of
the western side of the island, known from time immemorial as the
Carn Cuildich, or “ Cairn of the Retired People,” a place too
remote to be visited by the ordinary tourist. Vestiges of an ancient
edifice are distinctly discernible in this sequestered nook, where no
sound is heard save the querulous cry of the sea-bird chiding the
intrusion of the wandering pilgrim upon its rocky solitude, and the
voice of many waters as it swells and sinks in mournful cadences on
the fitful breeze. In this secluded valley the Culdees first planted
the standard of the Cross, and set up a tabernacle for the worship
of the Most High, preserving as in a casket the purity and simplicity
of the faith, till low and lonely Iona, “placed far amid the
melancholy main,” became illustrious as “the luminary of the
Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians
derived the benefits of knowledge and the blessings of religion.”*
The Cathedral, or as it is variously called St. Mary’s Church
and the Abbey Church, is a cruciform building, with a square
tower at the intersection. The length from east to west is about
160 feet, and that of the transept about 70. The tower is about
70 feet high, and is lighted on one side by a window consisting of
a slab perforated with quatrefoils, and on the other by a Catherinewheel or marigold window, with spirally-curved mullions. The
tracery of the windows is by some held to indicate their date to be
in the “ Decorated period.” The transept is entered by ah opening
in a partition wall of modern origin, and the chancel by another
modern wall or screen open at the top, both being coarsely con
structed, and very much impairing the effect of the spacious
dimensions of the edifice. The aisle (if that part of the ruins so
called did not originally constitute one or more small chapels) is
* “ The family of Iona,” characteristically so called by early writers, suffered
grievously from the incursions of Danes and Norwegians. In 801, Iona was
burned, and many of the Culdees were barbarously slain. In 805 their foes
returned, and “ reduced the family of Hij to sixty-four.” The island was again
invaded in 877, when the Culdees fled to Ireland. Their monastery was anew
pillaged in 985, and in 1059 it was destroyed by fire. Still the Culdees clung to
a spot consecrated to them by many tender memories. At length the Church
of Rome, coveting a place so sacred, erected a monastery in 1203, and then the
Culdees departed from Iona never more to return.
�34
THE CATHEDRAL—THE BLACK STONES OF IONA
separated^from the body of the church by plain cylindrical columns,
surmounted by short capitals, sculptured with grotesque and illexecuted figures, which are still well defined, although in several
instances marred by knavish relic-hunters. Three sedilia remain
in the walls, “ formed with trefoiled ogee arches, under connected
dripstones, which run out afterwards into a horizontal tablet, and
have at each apex the remains of what seems to have been a
sculptured head.” Dr. Sacheverell saw the principal altar in 1688 ;
it measured six feet by four. Martin, in his tour in 1702, speaks
of the beauty of its marble. Pennant acknowledges that when he
visited the Cathedral in 1772 he and his companions helped to
diminish the fragments of it that remained. No vestige of it now
exists.
On the north side of the altar is the tomb of Abbot Mackinnon
of Iona, who died in the year 1500. The hollow spaces of the
letters composing the inscription on the tombstone are said to have
been originally filled with silver. The figure of the ecclesiastic is
sculptured in high relief, and the workmanship does credit to the
art of the period. The monument has been grievously mutilated
by tourists. On the opposite side of the chancel is the tomb of
Abbot Kenneth Mackenzie, also much defaced. Lightfoot, who
accompanied Pennant, found Byssus purpurea growing on the
tomb of Abbot M'Kinnon. This minute alga, under its modern
name of Ca^iiAamnion Rothii, stains the lower part of both the
tombs mentioned, and also the adjacent walls, with its purple
patches. In the centre of the chancel is the tomb of Macleod of
Macleod, being the largest sepulchral monument in Iona. The
figure, an uncouth outline, is sunk into the rock, and was evidently
filled up with metal. The great eastern window was a beautiful
object, some years ago, even in its dilapidated state. It has lately
been built up in the worst possible taste, and is rendered contemptible.
The celobrated “ Black Stones of Iona,” upon which the High
land chieftains swore an oath in confirmation of contracts and
alliances, have long since disappeared. Few relics of ancient times,
apart from the ruins, are ever found in the island. Not a vestige
of wood employed in the construction of the ecclesiastical and
monastic buildings can now be traced, every particle of timber, in
an island destitute of trees, having long ago been abstracted by the
inhabitants. There being no mill in the island, nor a stream to
drive one, and half of the only millstone extant being built into
a wall in the north transept, the poorer inhabitants still employ
the ancient quern or hand mill, named in Gaelic Muilean bradh.
�BAY OF MARTYRS—BOTANY, Ac.
35
The Bay of Martyrs, a little to the south of the landing place,
deserves a passing notice before leaving the island. This was for
ages the landing place of the dead brought to Iona for sepulture.
The bay retires upon a green mound, where it was the custom of
yore to rest the bier and arrange the ceremonial—observances which
are not yet entirely done away. The knoll is known in the native
tongue as the “ Mound of Burden,” or the “ Hill of Bearers.”
In the olden time, when princes and priests, chieftains and lords of
the isles were conveyed, like “ the gracious Duncan,” to Iona for
interment,—that “ after life’s fitful fever” they might. “ sleep well”
in its hallowed mould,—it was here that the funeral pageant was
marshalled ; and the shores resounded with the melancholy wailings
of the coronach, and the lamentations of the clansmen for the loss
of their chief, as they bore his coffin through the “ Street of the
Dead” and along the “ Narrow Way,” to his cell in the consecrated
soil of Reilig Orain.
On the occasion of her Majesty’s Hebridean voyage, Prince
Albert and his suite alone landed at Iona, the Queen remaining on
board the royal yacht, which afterwards proceeded to Tobermory
Bay, and lay at anchor during the night.
Lists of the birds frequenting Iona, prepared by Mr. H. D.
Graham (who also published a series of accurate drawings of the
ruins), and lists of the more characteristic plants, by the present
writer, are given in the little book already referred to, viz.: “ Staffa
and Iona Described and Illustrated.” Fern-collectors will find
on the walls of the ancient buildings Asplenium Ruta-muraria,
A. Trichomanes, A. Adiantum-nigrum, and on the rocks A. marinum.
Only one Hawthorn bush is known in the island! and a dwarf
variety of the Oak occurs sparingly. The mosses abound with
the remains of ancient trees.
Amongst the plants observed
in the island may be noted Pinguicula Lusitanica, Cotyledon
Umbilicus, Tlialictrum minus, Viola lutea, Drosera longifolia,
Cakile maritima, Lythrum, Salicaria, Anagallis tenella, A.arvensis,
Rhodiola rosea, Eryngium maritimum, Menyanthes trifoliata,
Ligusticum Scoticum, Lycopsis arvensis, Lithospermum maritimum,
Salix Lapponum, Habenaria viridis, Scilla verna, Rosa spinosissima, Ammophila arenaria, Triticum junceum. Osmunda regalis
occurs amongst the ferns.
The Stormy Petrel breeds in the little isle of Soy, near the south
end of Iona, and also in Staffa. The Seal (Phoca vitulina) and
the Otter (Mustela lutra) frequent Iona and Staffa.
�36
GEOLOGY OF IONA AND MULL.
The gneiss of Iona is alternated with various schistose rocks,
including clayslate and hornblende slate. No mica slate has been
found in the island; but slabs of this rock, brought from Mull or
the mainland, have been plentifully used in building the Cathedral
and adjoining edifices. Near the south end of the island there may
be descried from the steamer’s deck a broad band of white rock,
which is an irregular mas3 of compact felspar; contiguous to which
are the remains of the marble quarry. The marble of Iona is a
species of dolomite, or double carbonate of lime and magnesia.
MULL.
The geological interest of the opposite coast of Mull has been
much enhanced of late years by the discovery of the Tertiary
Leaf-beds at Ardtun Head, first described by his Grace the Duke
of Argyll, at the second Edinburgh meeting of the British
Association. The island of Mull, as will be observed on the map,
forms naturally three great divisions, which Macculloch has described
as the northern, middle, and southern trappean districts. The
northern consists of terraces of trap rock rising to no great height
and possessing no feature of interest. The middle district is that
in which the lofty summits of Bentallali and Benmore are con
spicuous, rising above the highest level attained by the trap, and
consisting, in the case of Benmore at least, of syenite. From the
base of Benmore a succession of terraces of trap stretches to the
lofty and striking headland of Burg, which rises from the ocean in
a succession of horizontal lines in a pyramidal form, till it reaches
a height of 2000 feet. The southern division exhibits some of the
most magnificent coast scenery in the Hebrides, The cliffs present
a continuous line of mural precipices of great elevation, generally
resting upon or surmounted by ranges of basaltic pillars of greater
or less regularity of form, and including extensive strata of the
Oolite and Lias.
But on the coast opposite Burg, the trap
terminates, an interval of mica-slate succeeds, and the remainder
of the promontory forming the Ross of Mull consists of fine red
granite, which is quarried for economical purposes.
The headland of Ardtun projects betwixt Loch Scriden and
Loch Laigh. Ardtun is mentioned by Dr Johnson as having
afforded a resting-place to himself and his fellow-voyagers, when
coasting along the shore of Mull from Inchkenneth, on their way
to Iona, and the Doctor says that the broken columns of basalt on
�LEAF-BEDS OF ARDTUN.
37
which they sat were pointed out to him by Sir Allan M‘Lean as
being scarcely less deserving of notice than those of Staffa. The
scene of the Duke’s discovery is a wild ravine, sloping down to the
sea, and bearing the expressive name of Slochd an Uruisg, the
Goblin’s Dell. Macculloch when he visited the place observed
only a thin stratum of coal under the trap. Other geologists had
also overlooked the leaf-beds. It was reserved for this accomplished
nobleman to disclose the important geological fact of these pre
cipitous cliffs inclosing a deposit of the remains of plants belonging
“to species and even families which have long ceased to be indigenous
in that country, and indicate the occurrence of changes since the
period of their growth, not less great in climate than in the
geographical forms of land and sea.” The cliff yielding these
instructive vestiges of an extinct flora, is about 130 feet high, the
series of which it consists standing as follows, as measured in feet:
—Uppermost basalt, 40; first leaf-bed, 2; first asli-bed, 20 ;
second leaf-bed, 2J; second asli-bed, 7; third leaf-bed, 1J;
amorphous basalt, 48; columnar basalt, to level of low tide, 10=
131. The character of the fossil flora determines the geological
epoch to which all the beds above the amorphous basalt belong.
The leaves are of considerable variety, and all allied to existing
families of Dicotyledons. They are therefore remains of the
tertiary period, a conclusion further confirmed by the position of
chalk flints in the tuff conglomerate with which they are associated.
(Vide Duke of Argyll’s paper on Ardtun Leaf-beds, in Geological
Society’s Journal.) The late Professor Edward Forbes was of
opinion that the assemblage of leaves might probably be referred
to the miocene stage of the tertiary epoch. The more character
istic of the species are allied to the yew, the plane, and certain
ferns. We may mention from personal observation that the diffi
culty of obtaining specimens from the cliff is almost insurmountable,
without means and appliances such as few geologists can carry
along with them to the shores of Mull. But the magnificent
development of basaltic columns on this coast will alone repay a
visit to the wild ravine of the Hobgoblins of Ardtun.
On losing sight of the low green shores of Iona, with their
memorable associations, the rugged and dreary point of the Ross of
Mull is first passed, and the island of Colonsay, Ornsay, Islay,
and Jura come in sight.
The steamer now coasts along the
southern shores of Mull, where new features of this part of the
island appear. However pleasing the coast here may seem to the
eye of the passing voyager, when viewed from the steamer s deck in
�38
GEOLOGY—THE CARSAIG ARCHES.
the sunshine of summer, it may be readily imagined that it will
present many a wild scene amidst the storms of winter. A writer
in the Statistical Account says that during rain storms, a thousand
streams descend from the cliffs of Burg and Gribon, on the other
side of the island, and from Inimore and Carsaig which now become
conspicuous features of the southern coast.
The streams are
precipitated from their summits in magnificent cascades, and
should a high wind be blowing against them, the water is whirled
up in columns like smoke toward the skies, and presents a scene of
uncommon sublimity.”
Leaving behind the granite of the Ross, as we course along the
southern shore, the rocks betwixt Ardnishker and Shiha assume a
schistose character, passing into gneiss. At the latter-mentioned
point the trap recurs and continues along the coast. Betwixt the
lofty cliffs of Inimore and Carsaig the trap overlies a bed of oolitic
limestone and sandstone, including coal, the latter, at Carsaig,
acquiring a thickness of three feet, although all attempts to work
it have proved fruitless. Between Carsaig and Loch Buy the trap
is seen underlying as well as overlying the mass of limestone, which
between Loch Buy and Loch Spelvie attains a thickness of from
200 to 400 feet, and then forms the entire vertical face of the
cliffs, with the exception of a thin layer of trap spread along the
upper surface.
But the most curious objects on this part of the coast are the
Carsaig Arches , first described by the late Marquis of Northampton,
when Earl Compton, and whose drawing is here copied from the
Geological Society’s Transactions. The larger arch is called in
Gaelic, Uamh-uill, or the Perforated Cave, from its being open at
both ends. It is about 60 feet high and between 50 and 60 broad,
running east and west for about 150 feet. Over the arch is a
stratum of basaltic columns of irregular height; and a small grassy
knoll of a few feet rises above the columns. The portion of the cliff
to which the arched rock is attached, is of basalt, about 400 feet in
height, and at about half that elevation it exhibits irregular ranges
of columns inclining in different directions. The smaller arch is
named Bidda vich Be Lochlin, from a Norwegian Prince having
perished here. The rock is isolated, narrow, and lofty, standing to
the west of the larger arch. It is about 120 feet in height, the
arch being about 70 feet high, and only a few feet in length. The
direction of the cave is north and south. The rock is surmounted
by a solitary basaltic pillar. The sea washes through both these
arches at high water, and they are seen to most advantage when
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�DUART AND ARDTORNISH CASTLES.
39
left dry by the tide. The coast scenery here becomes truly
majestic—till passing from the frowning headlands of Mull into
the romantic windings of the Sound of Kerrera, with its sweet
recesses and picturesque homesteads amidst the shelter of sur.
rounding trees, we hail at last the venerable pile of Dunolly, and
sweep into the bay of Oban.
DUART AND ARDTORNISH CASTLES.
The following historical notices of the two most notable Castles in the
Sound of Mull, have been obligingly furnished by Mr. J. B. Simpson,
Glasgow:—
DUART.
Duart is laid down in the ancient parochial map of Scotland as Dowart,
and like many other fastnesses of the same character has a sad tale to tell
of oppression and cruelty. Time kindly throws a mantle of softened
oblivion over those ruthless strongholds, and enables us to forget their
former lawlessness in their present picturesque decay.
One of those cruel tales is told in connection with Duart in a little volume,
published in 1764, from a MS. written in the reign of James VI.
The story is of Sir Lachlan Maclean who occupied the family castle of
Duart in 1586. Sir Lachlan appears to have coveted other possessions
besides the family residence of Duart and the property in Mull connected
with it.
Might was considered right in those rude days. An unfortunate Hebridean
islander who might stray from that portion of the archipelago which called
him Lord, had much more to dread than the dangerous narrow channels or
sounds by which the islands are divided. Let him land and he must take the
chance of reprisals for some old feud, or sad to say, as in the present
instance, a treacherous disregard of hospitality and the ties of kindred.
But to our story. At the above date the laird of Duart, who was the chief
of Maclean, had determined to acquire property so far away from his
patrimony as the south-west portion of the Island of Islay, the old document
calls it the “ Kinnes of Ila,” and in order to possess this distant territory
he seized his brother-in-law who came for the purpose of trying to bring
about a reconciliation regarding a feud with another kinsman.
�40
DUART CASTLE.
Maclean does not appear to have violated the laws of hospitality on
account of the praiseworthy errand upon which his brother-in-law visited
him, but solely to possess himself of the Islay property, and a most summary
proceeding he made of it, seizing upon the person of his friend and confining
him in Duart Castle “ there to end his days," unless he made over the pro
perty to this determined Duart despot.
This was accordingly done by the luckless proprietor, who left his two
brothers prisoners in Duart Castle as hostages for the fulfilment of his
doubtless very unwilling bargain.
We need not follow the story through all its cruel details, what we have
given will serve to show how much more comfortable it is to see the old
Castle of Duart in its present state than we might have found it had we
lived in the time of the lawless Sir Lachlan, with all his varied ways of
makin his freends sicker, in this now tottering stronghold.
Another account states, that Maclean married the daughter of the Islay
proprietor, who agreed to give the disputed property as her portion. But
this does not make the matter much better, the Duart captive would have
as little chance of escape from the fortress whether his daughter or his
6ister were the spouse of its lawless lord.
Islay and Mull appear in ancient times to have been convenient objects of
transfer wherewith the reigning sovereign might reward or purchase the
services of dominant chieftains, and the laird of Islay, presuming upon
ancient right, might have seized the person of the Duart castellan had he
found him in his insulated territory, seeing that about the year 1314 King
Robert Bruce granted the Island of Mull to Angus of Isla. I suspect this
is the first literary document bearing upon the Island of Mull. It would be
needlessly circumstantial to go over all the succeeding well authenticated
matters connected with it, more particularly as it is with its stout Castle
of Duart to which our present enquiry is confined.
The castle is said to have been of Danish origin, but whether this is the
case or not, we have only the tradition (so far as I am aware) to rely
upon. In 1390 we step upon sure ground, for then, upon the authority
of the Great Seal Register, was the Castle of Duart granted “ by Donald
of lie, Lord of the Isles, to Lachlan Makgillean.” Dundoward is the
name which the castle bears in the Forduni Scotichronicon. It appears
to have been possessed by the family of Maclean before they acquired the
larger properties in the island. They are called the Makilanes of Dowart,
in 1517, when the Regent of Scotland grants them an increase of their
possessions; and in 1542, Hectoure M'Clane of Dowart gets permission
from James V. to visit him at Edinburgh, “ vnhurt, vnharmit, vnattechit,
vnarrestit, vniornait, vncallit, vnpersewit, vnvexit, vandistrublit.”
This most secure salvus conductus was doubtless very necessary to the
chieftain of Duart, whose rather unauthorised proceedings, like that of
many a Highland neighbour, would always keep a plentiful sprinkling of
enemies afloat, who would deem it a perfect windfall to seize and retaliate
upon such an active and vexatious chieftain as the laird of Duart.
�ARDTORNISH CASTLK.
41
ARDTORNISH.
In regard to Ardtornish you will observe what an important place it was
about 400 years ago (1461), when the possessor of it “ John of Yle,” with
all the pomp of sovereignty, enters into an agreement with the King of
England to assist him in the subjugation of Scotland. We lowlanders
would have had little cause to remember with anything like gratitude the
Ardtornish chief had he succeeded in carrying out his intentions, which
curiously enough come down to us in an English record. The charter
chest of Ardtornish has doubtless seen many a vicissitude since 1461, but
the Rotuli Scotice, preserved in the Tower of London and the chapter
house of Westminster, have retained for us the account of the singular
intended undertaking. Had it succeeded the men of Morven might have
exercised their highland hospitality in Dirleton, Borthwick, or Tantallan,
any lowland baronial residence, in short, which suited their fancy might
have been exchanged for the storm-begirt Ardtornish.
I am afraid it will not be possible to fix anything like a date for the
building of Ardtornish Castle. So early as 1390, however, the Great Seal
Register records a charter granted by “ Donald of He, Lord of the Isles, at
his Castle of Ardthoranis,” and succeeding documents continue to exhibit
vitality in the old house till the 17th century when the place becomes the
property of our old friends the Macleans of Duart
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�INDEX.
Cjuries "MF
*
'<r____
__________ 14
______ 9
_____
9
______ 9
Cad~ec~sl CE
..
Care of ± r~.gd. ———————-20
C~3—d--~ Cave, ———————19
CtOs&cS Z CZZZZOciSOQ
*
ALrrerirv. 29
Dssrz Cassie,—_ ———......11,39
T>rrrA r-sm' Cap,—.——— — — — 15
*
uFsmIy Legend’ and “Gjslsts.'IO
FhiCs Cave,—————............ 20
--------- MsceuBoch's Deasiptkc— 21
. r*3".— ^^eserzpQCEi, ........ .—^»
Cazz.z2eZ the Poet, ——————1-4
--------- Wiiscn’s Dem';cart,——22
Carsaig Arches,... .————...38
Fingals Chair,________________ 20
Casde Arizcmish................11. 41
------ --------------- 1 9
Faad, Fasjas da St. on StaZa.___ 23
______ .Dzstt._____________ 11, 39
Geology,———————27, 36, 38
--------- Dundly,-——————. 8
Gods
--------- DocsaS^ge,___________ 9
G-~'~~~'~ Ds..........------------- ...37
Dnnmmj -
I:es,
—27
Gratis of Eos of 11zZ...........—27
Grfbcn,....... —............
16
�INDEX.
48
page
Herdsman,.......................................... 19
Mull, Ross of,.....................................27
Hutchesons’ Steamers,..................... 6
Nunnery of Iona,............................ 28
Inimore,............................................. 38
Ohan,................................................ 5
Inniskenneth or Inchkenneth,........16
Oolite and Lias,............................... 36
Iona,.................................................. 26
Peel, Sir Robert, on Staffs,........... .23
------ Cathedral,................................. 32
Port a’ Churraich,............................ 32
........ Extent and Population,........... 28
Queen’s Route,................................. 8
........ Nunnery,............. ..................... 28
Queen Victoria at Staffa,................. 19
------ Botany,---------------------------- 35
Reilig Orain,..................................... 29
------ Geology,.................................... 36
Ross of Mull,..................................... 27
Johnson and Boswell at Inch
kenneth, &c.,..........................
Buna Gal Lighthouse, .................. 14
Shell-gatherers of Iona,................. 28
} 17
Lady’s Rock,..................................... 10
Sound of Mull,.................................. 8
Lias of Loch Aline,.......................... 10
---------------View from the opening, 9
Linga,................................................ 15
Spanish Armada,.............................. 13
T.ismore Lighthouse,........................ 10
• Staffa,................................................. 18
Loch-Aline,................................ 11, 12
------ Plants and Birds,...................25
Lord of the Isles,............................. 11,31
------ View from,............................. 25
Loch-na-Keal,................................... 15
St. Martin’s Cross,............................ 31
Loch Tua,...........................
St. Oran’s Chapel,............................ 31
15
Mackinnon’s Cave,........................... 24
Sunipol House,................................... 14
Maclean’s Cross,............................... 29
Treshinish Isles,............................... 15
Maclean, Dr........................................16
Tobermory,....................................... 13
Maclean, Miss,................................... 16
Tories and Ora-tories,......................11
Maclean of Duart and his Lady,....10
Torloisk,............................................. 17
Maclean, Sir Allan,.......................... 16
Troil, Bishop Van, on Staffa,.........23
Mingarry Castle,.............................. 14
Ulva,.................................................. 15
Mull, Geology,.................................36,38
Wordsworth on Staffa,.................... 21
�{(Ml
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�
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Series title: Maclure & Macdonald's Illustrated Guides to the Highlands
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index. Maclure & Macdonald's Illustrated Guides to the Highlands, Series Highland Route, No II. Annotations in pencil on series list. and pages 40-43. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
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Text
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE GEOLOGY
AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
I
*.
PART
BY
WM.
PMGEILY,
F.R.S.,
F.9.S.
(Read at Teignmouth, July, 1874.)
[Reprinted from the Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the
Advancement of Science, Literature, and Art. 1874.]
��NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE GEOLOGY
AND PALÆONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
PART I.
BY WM. PENGELLY, F.R.S., F.G.S.
(Read, at Teignmouth, July, 1874.)
[Reprinted from the Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the
Advancement of Science, Literature, and Art. JS74-]
A slight experience suffices to show how very difficult it is
to keep errors out of printed matter; and when it is re
membered that, to say nothing of imperfections in the original
manuscript, such matter has to pass through the hands of
transcribers and compositors, who, though conscientious and
anxious to be correct, lay no claim to infallibility, the fact,
instead of causing any surprise, should teach us the great
lesson that verification is necessary. Indeed, were it not that
it might perhaps be open to the charge of cynical affectation,
it might be prudent to inscribe “With a grain of salt” on
the title-page of every book in our libraries.
As it seems desirable that our members should record and
correct in our Transactions, from time to time, such errors
respecting our own county as they have detected in the course
of their reading, 1 have, in this communication, brought
together a few Notes on Recent Notices of the Geology and
Palaeontology of Devonshire.
The following are the topics “ noticed ” in these “ Notes—
1st. The Devonian Rocks of Mudstone and Slapton, South
Devon.
2nd. Fossil Fish in the Devonian Rocks of Devonshire.
3rd. Devonian Trilobites of Devon and Cornwall.
4th. The Source of the White Clays of Bovey Heathfield,
Devon.
5th. The Granite Boulder of Saunton, Barnstaple Bay.
6th. Brixham Cavern.
7th. Keut’s Cavern.
8th. The Submerged Forests of Torbay.
A
�2
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
I. THE DEVONIAN ROCKS OF MUDSTONE AND SLAPTON, SOUTH
DEVON.
The Rev. W. S. Symonds’s “Records of the Rocks” con
tains the following passages respecting the older rocks of
South Devon, on which a few remarks seem called for:—
“Here [Mudstone Bay, immediately west of Berry Head]
he [the geologist] will see a series of Silurian-looking shales
faulted against the Plymouth and Middle Devonian Lime
stones. Mr. Pengelly has found remains of fish in these
faulted rocks............ These rocks cross the river Dart, and run
by Corn worthy westward in an anticlinal axis. I think that if
well examined they would yield fossils, but hitherto hardly
any have been found
*
Again, “ The slates of Slapton. Sands, between Dartmouth
and Start Point, are middle Devonian, and of a green colour.
.... I am not aware that they have yielded any fossils.”!
The points in the passages just quoted, which would fasten
on the attention of the geologist acquainted with the district
are :—1st. The alleged occurrence of a fault at Mudstone Bay.
2nd. The very small number of fossils said to have been
yielded by the beds supposed to be faulted. 3rd. The ques
tion of the occurrence of fossils in the Slapton slates.
1st. Having accompanied Mr. Symonds to Mudstone Bay
in 1868, I was not unprepared for his statement that there is
a fault there, inasmuch as he expressed and maintained that
opinion on the spot. Nevertheless, I was surprised to hear
the statement at the time, and nothing has since occurred
to diminish that feeling. The phenomena which the fine
cliff section presents were interpreted in the following
manner by Messrs. Sedgwick and Murchison, in their paper
“ On the Physical Structure of Devonshire, and on the Sub
divisions and Geological Relations of its older stratified
Deposits, &c.,’ read to the Geological Society of London,
June 14th, 1837J: “The great limestone at the south end of
Torbay, after exhibiting a number of contortions, and spread
ing out into a succession of mural precipices at Berry Head,
is finally (at Mudstone Sands) bent into a great arch which
brings up the lower calcareous slates on which it rests, and
causes the southern flap of the great limestone saddle to dip
under the slate formation which is expanded towards the
south along the shores of Start Bay. The same order of
. * “ K,ol?,rdS °f tllC Rocks-” Bv tbe Kcv' W- S- Symonds, f.g 8., London,
1872; p. 281.
f Ibidt p 295
‘
+ Trans. Geol. boc. ’ bond , 2nd serie©, vol v. part iii. pp. 633-687.
�GEOLOGY AND PALÆONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
3
superposition is also indicated at Galmpton Creek on the
eastern shore of the Dart, as well as at intermediate spots
along the southern boundary of the limestone.”*
The same view is expressed by the authors, at p. GG9, in
the description of their “ Section from Berry Head to Start
Point,” Pl. li., fig. 6.
The following passage from his Palœozoic Fossils of Corn
wall, Devon, &c., shows that Professor Phillips interpreted the
Mudstone Section in exactly the same way
“ Mudstone Bay
—Here, between the promontories of Berryhead and Shark
ham Point, an anticlinal axis (its steepest dip being north,
under Berryhead) brings to view the schistose rocks below
the limestone. The horns of the bay being limestone, the
hollow is schist. The series of strata is nearly thus :—
Precisely the same opinion is given by Dr. Harvey B. Holl,
in his paper “ On the Older Bocks of South Devon and East
Cornwall,” | read to the Geological Society of London, April
22, 18G8, in which the following passage occurs:—
“ The great mass of limestone of Berry Head, which
stretches inland to Walton [?Waddeton], and of which the
Yalberton and Stoke Gabriel limestones are but detached
portions, forms an arch, which is depressed in its central
portions between Walton and Fishcombe Point: while its
southern margin is thrown over an anticlinal axis at Mudstone
Sands, and is seen at Sharkham Point and [Higher] Brixham,
dipping under the higher beds on the south.Ӥ
I fully concur in the opinions just quoted, that there is an
anticlinal axis, but not a fault, at Mudstone Bay.
2nd. It may be doubted whether any rocks in South Devon,
with the exception, perhaps, of the limestones quarried near
Newton, have been more thoroughly and frequently examined,
during the last forty years, than those very beds at Mudstone
*
t
and
+
§
Op. cit., p. 652.
“ Figures and Descriptions of the Palmozoric Fossils of Cornwall, Devon,
West Somerset.” By John Phillips, f.r.8., f.g.s, &c., 1841, p. 203.
“Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.” Lund., vol. xxiv. pp. 400-454.
Op. cit., p. 431.
A 2
�4
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
Bay ; and that the labour has not gone unrewarded every
local collection of fossils will show. In the beds under
notice, Corals are by no means rare; Crinoideal remains,
including those of Gyatliocrinus pinnatv s, Goldf., are abundant;
Pctepora repisteria, G(Ad~ Goryonia ripistcra, is occasionally
met with ; Brachiopoda, now and then, are detected, including
Atliyris conccntrica, V. Buch, in my collection, identified and
figured by Mr. Davidson ; and the beds are famous fortheir
*
Devonian Cephalopoda, of which Cyrtoccras bdellalitcs^XAW.,
and a remarkable nautiloid shell have attracted much atten
tion. Somewhat recently, moreover, as Mr. Symonds remarks,
the remains formerly known as the “ Polperro Sponges ” have
been met with in the same beds— a fact which I placed on
record in 1861.f In 1868 these so called sponges were identi
fied, by Air. Symonds himself, as the remains of fish, and Air.
E. Bay Lankester read to the Geological Society of London,
June 17, 1866, a paper in which he announced that the same
fossils had been found in the Lower Devonian slates of
Aludstone Bay by the late Lieut. AVyatt Edgell also. J
As stated by Messrs. Sedgwick and Alurchison in the
passage quoted above, these Lower Devonian slates extend
from Aludstone Bay to Galmpton Creek, on the left bank of
the Dart; and here too they are fossiliferous, for in June 1861,
I found many small Brachiopods projecting in places from
the edges of the layers of slate, and amongst them Air.
Davidson identified Athyris conccntrica.§
If Dr. H. B. Holl has correctly regarded the slates near
Black Hall on the Avon in South Devon as the westerly
prolongation of the Aludstone beds,|j and of this I have no
doubt, there is a third locality in which they have yielded
fossils, and in considerable numbers. The late Air. J.
Cornish, on whose property the Black Hall slates occur,
made a collection of fossils from them ; and was so good as
to accompany me to the quarry, and to supplement the
specimens I found with several from his own cabinet. Aly
collection contains from this locality the Trilobite Phacops
latifrons, Broun ;5T the Brachiopods, Strophoniena rliomboidalis,
AVahl; Striptorhynchns crcnistria, Phill; Lcptama intcrstrialis,
Phill; and Chonetcs hardrcnsis, Phill;
**
and numerous Cri-*
§
* See “ British Fossil Brachiopoda.” By Thomas Davidson, f.k.s., f.O.s.,
&c , (Pal. Soe.) vol. iii. p. 16, Pl. iii., figs. ¡3, 14.
+ See “The Geoglogist,” 1861, p. 310.
+ See “Quart. Journ. Geol. Soo. Lond.,” 186S, vol. xxiv., pp. 546-7.
§ Op cit. p. 16.
|| Op. cit. Table i., pp. 432-3.
U See “A Monograph on British Trilobites.” By J. W. Salter, a.l.s., f g s.
(I al. Soc.) Part i p 20.
** See Davidson, Op. cit. pp. 76, 85, and 94.
�GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
.)
noideal stems, some of them of great length and otherwise
of interest.
3rd. By “the slates of Slapton Sands between Dartmouth
and the Start,” spoken of by Mr. Symonds, I understand the
entire series of Devonian beds from Dartmouth harbour to
the commencement of the Metamorphic Schists, some dis
tance north of the Start Point. Mr. AV. Vicary, F.G.S., and I
have examined these rocks with some care, but with very
slender additions to our collections of fossils. Nevertheless
we did find, in October 1864, a few remnants of encrinites
near Torcross, at the southern end of Slapton Sands ; and on
the same day, a small number of corals at the point of land
dividing Bee Sands and Hall Sands, still further south. In
1866 also, we found, at a spot known as Finister or Finisterre,
on the left of the road between Bee Sands and the village of
Beeston, unmistakable, though imperfect, remains of Brachiopoda in a quarry of quartzite, strikingly resembling some of
the constituents of the famous Pebble-bed near Budleigh
Salterton. The best specimens were sent to Mr. Davidson,
who pronounced them too imperfect for specific identification.
There can be no doubt that these Upper Devonian beds,
lying between Dartmouth Harbour and the Metamorphic
Schists are prolonged westward to Bigbury Bay, where they
are by no means destitute of fossils, though a careful
examination of them has not been rewarded with any
specimens of much interest.
II.
FOSSIL FISII IN TIIE DEVONIAN ROCKS OF DEVONSHIRE.
There is in my collection a fine scale of the Devonian,=
Old Red Sandstone, fish, Phyllolepis concentricus, Ag., which
has been mentioned by Mr. Etheridge, Mr. Beete Jukes, and
Dr. FI. Holl in the following passages
The first says, “ The 113 described species [of fish] in the
three recognised divisions of the Old Bed Sandstone of
England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, until lately had no
known or well authenticated representative in the British
marine Devonians. We now know of three species:—
Phyllolepis coneentricvs from the Lower Devonian slates of
Cornwall,” &c., and as authority for the statement he refers
*
to a paper by me.
Mr. Jukes’s statement is as follows:—“Hearing from
* “On the Physical Structure of West Somerset and. North Devon, and
on the Palaeontological Value of the Devonian Fossils.” By Robert
Etheridge, Esq , f.g.s , f.k.s.e. Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. of London, vol.
xxiii. p. 677- ls67.
�6
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
Professor Huxley that he had just received from Mr. Pengelly
a specimen of Ptcraspis of a larger size than any species
previously known ; I wrote to Mr. Pengelly for information
respecting its locality. He informs me that it was procured
at Old Mills, Looe, Cornwall................. The Phyllolepis concentricus and the other fish previously found by Mr. Pengelly
were from the same beds.”*
According to Dr. Holl, “In the cliff between Meadfoot
sands and the Thatcher rock [Torbay} two fine scales of
Phyllolepis concentricus, Ag., have been found by Mr. Pengelly,
and are now in his collection.” +
From the foregoing passages, the reader would probably
feel safe in concluding that two scales of the fish had been
found by me, and that I had subsequently found a specimen
of Ptcraspis; but he would of necessity be puzzled about the
locality, it being the shore of Torbay according to Dr. Holl,
and Cornwall according to Messrs. Etheridge and Jukes —
the latter, indeed, specifying “ Old Mills, Looe,” as the exact
spot.
In truth, however, only one scale was found, and that
several years after the specimen of Ptcraspis was met with.
The locality, as stated by Dr. Holl, was the northern shore
of Torbay, between Meadfoot beach and the Thatcher rock,
at the base of the cliff, almost immediately under the house
known as Kilmorie. To be perfectly correct, it may be as
well to add that the scale was found, not by me, but by my
son in my presence. For the History of the Discovery of
Fossil Fish in the Devonian Rocks of Devon and Cornwall,
see Trans. Devon. Assoc, vol. ii. pp. 423—142. 1868.
III.
DEVONIAN TRILOBITES OF DEVON AND CORNWALL.
Sir Charles Lyell has greatly enriched his “ Student’s
Elements of Geology” by adding, in the second edition, pub
lished early in the present year (1874), a diagrammatic
“ Table of British Fossils, illustrative of the successive
Appearance and Development in Time of the different Orders
of Animals and Plants,” drawn up by Mr. Etheridge, F.R.S.,
F.G.S., of the Geological Survey. A' cording to the table the
* “Notes on Parts of Sooth Devon and Cornwall with Remarks on the
True Relation' of the Old Red Sandstone to the Devonian Formation. By
J. Becte Jukes, m.a , f.r.s. Read before the Royal Geological Society of
Ireland, November 13, 1867,” p. 4'2.
f “On the Older Rocks of South Devon and Fas' Cornwall. By Harvey
I>. Holl,
f o s.” Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. of London, vol. xxiv. pp.
42s-9. 1868.
�GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
7
“Group” Trilobita includes 14 British Families, all dating
from pre-Devonian times, to which 10 of them are restricted.
The remaining 4 appear among British Devonian fossils:
the Calymenidce, extending apparently not beyond the very
lowest Devonian beds; the Harpedidce and Bronteidce,
reaching Middle Devonian times; and the Proteidce, passing
through to the Carboniferous period.
*
The late Mr. Salter, in his monograph on “ British Trilo
bites,” f which he unfortunately did not live to finish, also
divides the “ Group” into 14 “ Families.” When collecting
materials for his work, he had access to the principal collec
tions of the Devonian fossils of Devon and Cornwall, in
addition to the national collection in Jermyn Street, London,
including those of Messrs. Champernowne, Hall, Lee, Valpy,
Vicary, and myself, and named all the Trilobites he found in
them. I have thus been enabled, with the aid of my brother
collectors, to include in the following table a few particulars
not found in the parts of the Monograph which have been
printed:
* Op. cit. pp. 630-2.
t “ A Monograph of British Trilobites.” By J. W. Salter, a.l.s., f.g.s.
Four Parts only have appeared. They were printed by the Paheontographical Society in 1864, i860, 1866, and 1867.
�TABLE showing the Families, Genera, and Species of the Devonian Trilobites of Devonshire and Cornwall, as deter
mined by the late Mr. J. W. Salter, a.l.s., f.g.s., with their Localities and Horizons, and the Collections in which they
are lodged.
8
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
9
It appears from the first two columns that the known
Devonian trilobites of Devon and Cornwall belong to 7
families, 8 genera, and 14 species. In short, exactly one half
of the British families are represented in the Devonian fauna.
It may be well perhaps to give a brief description of the
localities named in the third column.
Barton, a village about three miles northward from Torquay
harbour, contains Middle Devonian limestone.
Black Hall is about six miles south-west from Totnes, and
has fossiliferous slates near it, probably of Lower Devonian
age.
Braunton is a village about five miles north-west from
Barnstaple. The beds are Upper Devonian.
Brushford is a village about one mile and a half south of
Dulverton, and three and a half north-west of Bampton.
The beds are Upper Devonian.
Ghircombe Bridge crosses the Itiver Lemon, in the Bradley
Valley, about one mile and a half west from Newton Abbot.
There are several Middle Devonian limestone quarries near
it. The trilobites, all of the genus Pliillipsia, are found in
that known as Ivy-Green quarry, on the right bank of, and
adjacent to, the river.
Croyde Bay is an inlet on the northern shore of Barnstaple
Bay. The beds are of Upper Devonian age.
Goodleigh is a village about three miles east of Barnstaple.
The beds are Upper Devonian.
Great Tressel quarry is in the parish of St. Keyne, about
two miles south-south-west from Liskeard. The deposits are
Lower Devonian.
Hope’s Nose is the northern horn of Torbay. The fossil
iferous beds are Middle Devonian limestone.
Knowl Hill, in the parish of Highweek, may be termed a
suburb of Newton Bushell. The hill consists mainly of trap,
and has a volcanic ash on its flanks, in which the trilobite
Phacops Icevis occurs. The exact horizon of this ash is diffi
cult of determination, as scarcely any other fossil occurs there,
and it is not known with certainty that the trilobite has any
other British locality. Mr. Salter supposed the ash to be of
Upper Devonian age, but does not appear to have stated on
what evidence he came to this conclusion.
Lummaton limestone quarry is very near that at Barton,
already described. The beds are Middle Devonian.
Meadfoot Bay, a portion of Torbay, is adjacent to Torquay,
and lies between it and Hope’s Nose. The fossils occur in
gritty Lower Devonian slates.
�10
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
For “Newton Busliell” may be understood any of the
Middle Devonian limestone quarries near it.
South Petherwin, or, more correctly, Landlake Upper
Devonian limestone quarries are about two miles south-west
from Launceston.
The parish of Pilton, adjacent to Barnstaple, contains
several Upper Devonian localities, including Frankmarsh,
Bradiford, and Top Orchard quarries.
Roseland Vale quarry, about a mile and a half south-east of
Liskeard, is worked in Lower Devonian beds.
By “ Torquay ” may probably be understood any fossiliferous locality near it. Fossils so labelled may be of either
Middle or Lower Devonian age.
Wolborough limestone quarry, on the left of and adjacent
to the road from Newton Abbot to Totnes, about a mile from
the former, and very near the parish church, is famous for
the great number and variety of fossils it yielded to the
researches of Mr. God win-Austen.
*
Mr. Salter supposed
this mass of limestone to be of Upper Devonian age, but
there can be little or no doubt that it is Middle Devonian.
Yeolm Bridge, about one mile and a half north-north-west
from Launceston, is an Upper Devonian locality.
Under the heading of “ Horizons,” L., M., U., denote Lower,
Middle, and Upper Devonian respectively, and the asterisk
indicates that the fossil named on the same horizontal line
has been found in the “ horizon ” stated at the head of the
column in which it stands. It is obvious that the Middle
Devonian beds are richest in Trilobites, as they are in fossils
generally.
The column headed “ References ” is intended to set forth
in what part of his Monograph Mr. Salter described and
figured the several species. The entry “ Not figured” simply
signifies that the species was not figured in the Monograph,
and is not intended to intimate whether or not it has been
figured elsewhere.
The “ Collections ” mentioned in the last column are, in
addition to that in Jermyn Street, those of Messrs. A.
Champernowne, M.A., f.g.s., Dartington Hall, Totnes; T. M.
Hall, f.g.s., Pilton Parsonage, Barnstaple; J. E. Lee, F.G.S.,
f.s.a., Villa Syracuse, Torquay; W. Vicary, F.G.S., The Priory,
Colleton Crescent, Exeter; and my own, Lamorna, Torquay.
A single example will suffice by way of explanation:—
We learn from the table that the Devonian Trilobite, Phacops
* See “Memoirs of the Geological Survey of Great Britain,” &c., vol. i.,
1846, p. 88.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
11
latifrons, has been found at Barton, Black Hall, Braunton,
Brushford, Croyde, Goodleigh, Hope’s Nose, l’ilton, Roseland
Vale, Wolborough, and Yeolm Bridge; that it occurs in
Lower, Middle, and Upper Devonian beds ; that Mr. Salter
described it on pages 18, 19, 20 of his Monograph on
“ British Trilobites,” published by the Palæontographical
Society, and figured it in plate i. figures 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14,
15, and 16 of the same work ; and that specimens of the
fossil, found in one or more of the foregoing localities, are in
the collections of the Geological Survey, Jermyn Street; Mr.
Hall, Pilton ; Mr. Pengelly, Torquay ; and Mr. Vicary, Exeter.
IV.
THE SOURCE OF THE WHITE CLAYS OF BOVEY
HEATHFIELD, DEVON.
In a paper “On the Sources of the Materials composing
the White Clays of the Lower Tertiaries,” by George Maw,
Esq., F.G.S., F.L.S., &c., read to the Geological Society of
London, June 19, 1867, the author says “ Messrs. Pengelly
*
and Heer, at p. 9 of their Memoir ‘On the Lignite formation
of Bovey Tracey,’ .... make reference to the probable
derivation of the deposit from the degradation of the Dart
moor granite. This inference seems to be due more to the
geographical proximity of the granite to the clays of the
Lignite formation than to any more certain evidence.
“ The present areal outline of the deposit, and the surface
contour of the country, may perhaps give the Lignite-forma
tion a more local aspect than it really possesses ; and the
occurrence of beds of similar physical character and age, far
removed from the source of granite materials, would seem to
throw doubt on the suggested local origin from the granite
of Dartmoor.
“ At the time of the white Tertiary clays the chalk must
have more completely covered the older formations than at
present, and shrouded them from being sources of supply for
the Tertiary deposits ; and the geographical distribution of
the white Tertiary clays, which are either superimposed on,
or in close proximity to the chalk, suggests a derivation from
it rather than from the granite rocks.”
Another point to be noticed is, that Kaolin (the result of
the decomposition of felspar) is perfectly implastic, a feature
opposed to the character of the white Tertiary clays, the
* Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. 23, pp. 387-394. 1867.
�12
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
chemical composition of which favours a derivation from the
chalk rather than from the decomposition of the felspar of
granite.”*
In a previous paragraph the author says, “In testing the
state of division of the Bovey Tracey . . . . clays, 1 found
that, after mixing them with water to the consistency of
cream, and passing them through fine silk lawn, containing
10,000 perforations to the square inch, no appreciable
quantity of coarse matter remained behind from most of the
examples, not even to the weight of a grain out of several
pounds of clay.”f
On entering on the consideration of the paragraphs just
quoted, it is but fair to my colleague, the Bev. Professor
Heer, to state that the passage in “ The Lignite Formation of
Bovey Tracey,” referred to by Mr. Maw, occurs in the
geological portion of the Memoir, for which I alone am
responsible, Dr. Heer having undertaken the botanical por
tion only. Having shown, in the Bovey Memoir, that in the
three sections taken in the “ Coal Pit” and described in detail,
certain beds “ thin out” or entirely disappear eastward, whilst
others become gradually thinner in the same direction,
that is, as the sections are prolonged from Dartmoor, it is
remarked, in the passage alluded to by Mr. Maw, that “This
attenuation, like the thinning out of the beds previously
mentioned, .... is probably an indication, were one needed,
that the detrital layers were formed at the expense of the
Dartmoor granite.”!
The first fact which presents itself is that whilst Mr. Maw
spoke of “ White Clays,” I was speaking of clays which
were “rather light, light drab, buff, lead-colour, light leadcolour, dark lead-colour, brown, blue, very dark blue, very
dark, or approaching to black,” but none of them white.
There are beautifully white clays on the Heathfield; but
instead of being Tertiary they are of more modern age, overlie
unconformably the Tertiary series, and are not the beds I
was describing or referring to.
Again, Mr. Maw was speaking of clays having a com
mercial value, whilst those I had under notice are incapable
of being utilized.
Further, though there is no doubt that “the geographical
proximity of the granite ” was not without influence in lead* Op. cit. pp. 392-3.
t Ibid, 388.
I See “The Lignite Formation of Bovey Tracey, Devonshire.” By
William Pengellv, r n.s., f./;.s., ¿¿c., and the Rev. Oswald Hee., Doctor of
Philosophy, &c., London, 1863, p. 9. See also Phil. Trans., part ii. 1862,
p. 1027.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
13
ing to the conclusion that the clays were derived from the
degradation of the Dartmoor rocks, it was by no means the
only, or the most important evidence. Indeed, the very
passage in question calls attention to the attenuation and
“thinning out” of beds in an easterly direction, as indicating
a granitic derivation.
In each of the Coal Pit sections there were two great
divisions of Miocene beds ; the upper, from the 2nd to the
27th bed inclusive, made up of lignite, clay, and sand, whilst
the lower consisted of lignite and clay only. The following
descriptions of some of the beds in the first section, near the
western end of the pit, are copied from the “ Bovey Lignite
Formation,” and are calculated to throw light on the origin
of both the sand and clay.
“ 3rd Bed ; 6 feet 3 inches in thickness. Sand.—Quartzose,
with a ferruginous clay at the base.”
“8th Bed; 5 inches in thickness. Clay.—Dark . . . .
Graduates into sand at the base.”
“ 10th Bed; 2 feet in thickness. Clay.—Tough, light leadcolour. Contains lenticular patches of sand.”
“11th Bed; 8 inches thick. Sand .... in some cases
cemented into a coarse grit or very fine conglomerate ;” [the
materials being quartzose without trace of Hint].
“ 14th Bed ; 2 feet 9 inches in thickness. Clay.—Sandy
and brittle.”
“ 27th Bed ; 11 feet 1 inch in thickness. Sand.—Quartzose.
Very coarse in the uppermost part [where angular and subangular fragments of crystals of felspar were prevalent], but
becomes gradually finer towards the base. Contains some
what large lenticular patches of clay.”
“ 28th Bed; 5 feet 9 inches in thickness. Clay. Light
colour. Near the top it is somewhat sandy.” *
To the foregoing may be added the description of a bed in
the second “ Pit” section, 460 feet eastward from the first:—
“ 4th Bed ; 10 feet 5 inches in thickness. Clay.—In some
parts sandy, f
From the descriptions just quoted it will be seen—
1st. That the Sands, and notably the 27th bed, consisted
of materials such as, amongst the rocks of the district, granite
alone could supply, mixed with such as granite could but
chalk could not furnish ; but without a trace of such as
could have been derived from chalk.
2nd. That the felspar crystals occurring so plentifully in
the 27th Bed, show conclusively that during the period of
* “The Lignite Formation,” pp. 4, 5.
f Ibid, p. 7.
�14
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
the Bovey Lignite formation, the chalk did not, as Mr. Maw
supposes, shroud the Dartmoor granite from being a source
of supply for the Tertiary deposits.
3rd. That the clays, sometimes distributed throughout the
mass of the sand, and at others taking the form of lenticular
patches in it, are, at least, as indicative of a granitic as of a
calcareous origin; and, in all probability, were, like the sands
in which they occurred, derived from the granite.
4th. That it was unnecessary to resort to such experiments
as those adopted by Air. Maw to detect the presence of coarse
matter in the clays, for sand was so obviously distributed
through their general mass in some of the beds as to entitle
them to the epithet of “sandy,” whilst others graduated
into sand, and some contained it in the form of lenticular
patches.
Whilst most readily acknowledging the intimate acquaint
ance with clays which Air. Alaw necessarily possesses, it
seems a sufficient reply to his statement, “that Kaolin, the
result of the decomposition of felspar, is perfectly implastic,”
to remark that the St. Austell clays, artificially prepared from
disintegrated granite, are largely used in the manufacture of
china and the tine kinds of earthenware, where “ perfect implasticity” would scarcely be a recommendation. Whether
the clays lying between the beds of lignite in the Bovey Coal
Pit are or are not plastic, I am not prepared to state.
In short, whilst abstaining from the expression of any
opinion respecting the derivation of the white clays to which
Air. Alaw calls attention, but of which I was not writing, my
opinion that the detrital layers in the Pit on Bovey Heath
field were formed at the expense of the Dartmoor granite,
remains unchanged and unshaken.
Before dismissing the Bovey deposits, it may be as well to
call attention to the following brief notices of them in Bev.
W. S. Symonds’s “Record of the Rocks”: —
“It [the clay at Fremington, near Barnstaple, North Devon]
may be a glacial till like that of Bovey Tracey, which there
covers the Aliddle Tertiary Lignite, and which afforded Arctic
plants such as Betula nana and Salix herbacea, to the re
searches of Air. Pengelly.”*
“Close to the village [of Bovey Tracey] is a Pottery in
which the upper clay, which consists principally of decom
posed granite, is used while the baking of the pottery is
carried on by means of the coal or lignite.” f
“It is not uninteresting to note that Air. Divett’s pottery
* Op. eit. p. 278.
f Ibid, p. 287.
�GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
15
[at Bovey Tracey] should be fabricated of glacial clays, and
baked with the brown coal that underlies it.”*
Air. Symonds states the total thickness of the two Bovey
formations to be “ 66 feet.” f
The foregoing passages may be said to contain statements
respecting the following topics, all requiring notice: —
1st. The plants found in the Clays covering the Lignite.
2nd. The Clay used in making the Bovey pottery.
3rd. The Coal used in baking the pottery.
4th. The aggregate thickness of the Bovey formations.
1st. The Arctic plants found in the White Clay overlying
unconforinably the Lignite series, were identified by Professor
Heer as Betula nana, Linn.; Salix cincrea, Linn.; and &
repcns (?), Linn.t Salix herbacea was not found, as the author
supposes. It may be as well to add that this error is of very
little moment, the climatal indications being much the same
as those of the species which really occurred. It may be
also stated that Professor Heer now considers that the
leaves which he doubtfully referred to Salix repens really
belong to S. my rtilloidcs, Wild., at present a native of Sweden.
Mr. Alfred Nathorst, of Lund, in Sweden, on whose authority
the foregoing correction is made, visited Bovey Tracey in
1872, and found leaves of Bctula nana very common, at
depths varying in different localities from 1 to 10 feet, and
with them seeds and catkins of the same species. They were
deposited with leaves of Salix cincrea and several others of
the same genus not yet specifically determined, remains of
Cunces, a Potamogcton or Pondweed, and leaves of Arctostaplrylos uoa-ursi, Adan., or the Bed Bearberry (- Arbutus
uva-ursi, Linn.)§ ; the last being, according to Smith, a native
of stony, barren, alpine heaths in the North of England, and
in Scotland and Ireland. ||
2nd. There is no doubt that, as Mr. Symonds states, the
upper or “glacial” clay is used at the Bovey Pottery, but a
very small amount only is obtained from this source. Clays
of other localities, and perhaps of other eras, are chiefly used.
3rd. The statement that at Bovey the baking of the pottery
is carried on by means of the lignite, though perhaps correct•
§
*
• Ibid, p. 290.
t Ibid, p. 267.
J See “The Lignite Formation of Bovey Tracey, Devonshire,” pp. 26
and 62 4.
§ See a paper entitled “ Cm den Arktiska Vegetationens est bredning ofver
Europa novr om Alperna under istiden.” Af Alfred Nathorst. Stockholm,
1873. p. 17.
|| Sec “ English Botany.” By Sir James Edward Smith, M.n., e.r.s., p.l.s ,
3rd e<l. 1831, vol. iv. p. 5.
�16
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
enough during an early stage of the undertaking, has long
ceased to be so. Ordinary “ sea-borne” coal has for many
years been used to at least a considerable extent; and in
1859, when the lignite in one of the old pit tunnels took fire
and rendered it necessary to discontinue the excavation, in
order tliaf, by allowing the water to accumulate, the fire
might be extinguished, it was, of course, the only fuel em
ployed ; and since that time no use has been made of the
lignite at the pottery. ”
*
4th. The two formations—“ Glacial” and Miocene—have at
the Bovey coal-pit an aggregate thickness of 125 feet, of
which no more than 7'5 feet belongs to the more recent series;f
but good evidence was obtained in 1860-1 that the lignite or
miocene series alone has a total thickness of 218 feet.l Air.
Symonds probably took the figures of the second Pit section,
which was carried to a depth of 66 feet 10 inches only. §
V. THE GRANITE BOULDER OF SAUNTON, BARNSTAPLE BAY.
The Rev. W. S. Symonds, in his “Records of the Rocks,” says,
“The Rev. I). Williams, in his paper ‘On the Croyde Raised
Beach,’ describes a large block of granite which was resting
directly on the fundamental slates, and covered and imbedded
by the base of the beach. It is a true erratic boulder, but
comes only from Lundy Island to the westward.” ||
Whilst agreeing with the author that the block “is a true
erratic boulder,” I am not prepared to accept his unqualified
statement that it “comes only from Lundy Island.” It is
true that Lundy is mainly composed of granite, and is nearer
than any other mass of that rock to the spot where the boulder
now lies ; but these are the only facts in favour of the hypo
thesis, against which there are two formidable objections.
1st. There is no reason to suppose Lundy capable of fur
nishing such a block. Air. T. AL Hall, f.g.s., who has care
fully studied the geology of the Islet, and lias been so good as
to write me on the subject, says, “The main body of rock on
Lundy differs in every respect from that which forms the
Saunton boulder, but I have seen some altered granite, ad
joining one of the numerous dykes on the eastern side of the
Island, which very nearly approximates it in colour and
texture. Where the dykes occur, there peat and ferns gene
rally cover the rock ; but as far as I know there is no vein
capable of producing a block of such magnitude.”
* “The Lignite Formation,” pp. xvi. xvii.
t Ibid, p. 14.
§ Ibid, p 7.
f Ibid, pp. 5, 6.
|| Op. cit p. 276.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
17
2nd. I have shown elsewhere that, come whence it may, the
*
block must have been ice-borne; and that though it is im
possible that the spot it now occupies could have been higher
than at present above the level of mean tide, there is nothing
to show that it was not lower. The ice-buoy to bring it from
Lundy must therefore have been of the nature of a berg, which
it is at least difficult to believe so small a spot could have
furnished. Should it be suggested that the Islet may have
been larger when the boulder was transported than it is at
present, it may be safely replied that, respect being had to
the relative levels of land and sea at that time and at present,
to the very bold coast which Lundy presents, and to the great
depth of water close to it, there is little or no probability that
the difference of area was noteworthy.
In short, I am satisfied that Lundy could neither have fur
nished the boulder nor the ice-buoy to float it.
VI. BRIXHAM CAVERN.
In the third edition of his Physical Geology and Geography
of Great Britain, Professor Ramsay gives a list of the mammals
whose remains were found in Brixham Cavern in 1858-9, and
places Rhinoceros leptorhinus, but not R. tichorhinus, amongst
them.f He states that the list was taken from a well-known
paper by Mr. Boyd Dawkins in the Journal of the Geological
Society of London, for 1869 (vol. xxv., p. 194). On turning
to the Journal, a clear and elaborate table presents itself,
having, on the same horizontal line with “ R. leptorhinus
Ow.” and in the same vertical column with “ Brixham Cave,”
an asterisk justifying Ramsay’s statement. On page 200 of
the same journal, Mr. Boyd Dawkins says, “ I have to thank
Mr. George Busk, F.R.S., for a perfect list of species from this
[Brixham] Cave.” As Mr. Busk had been entrusted by the
Brixham Cave Committee with the identification of the re
mains found in the Cavern, it is clear that Mr. Boyd Dawkins
got his information from head quarters, and there seems every
reason for accepting it as perfectly trustworthy. Nevertheless,
“ a grain of salt” is never a thing to be treated with indifference.
In 1870, Mr. Busk read to the Geological Society of London
a paper “ On the Species of Rhinoceros whose remains were
found in a Fissure Cavern at Oreston in 1816.” This paper,
printed in the Journal of the Society for 1870 (vol. xxvi.),
contains the following passage :—“ The Oreston collection . . .
* See Trans. Devon. Assoc., vol. vi. pp. 211-22, 1873.
f See “Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain,” by A. C.
Ramsay, ll.d., f.r.s., third edition, 1872, p. 186-7.
B
�18
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF TIIE
acquires very great interest, not only as adding another to the
as yet scanty instances of the occurrence of that species
[Rhinoceros leptorhinus] anywhere, in Britain, but more espe
cially as affording the only recorded example of its discovery
in a cavern of any kind—a fact the more remarkable, perhaps,
since no vestige of its remains has occurred in the Brixham
Cave.”*
It is not enough therefore to be sure that we read Professor
Ramsay correctly, not enough to find that he quoted Mr.
Dawkins accurately ; so long as there is yet another step in
the process of verification by all means let it be taken. On
going to Air. Busk, it proves that there is a mistake some
where ; there should have been no asterisk opposite “ Rh.
leptorhinus” and under “Brixham Cave.” Its place is op
posite Rh. tichorhinus.
But let us recur to Air. Busk’s paper. It states, it will be
remembered, that with the exception of Oreston, there is no
recorded instance of the occurrence of Rhinoceros leptorhinus
in a cavern of any kind. Yet, whilst this is still ringing in
our ears, Air. Boyd Dawkins’s table ascribes this very species
to no fewer than eleven British Caves—Coygau Cave in Caermarthenshire, Cefn Cavern in Denbighshire, Durdham Down
near Bristol, Kirkdale Cavern in Yorkshire, AVokey Hole in
Somersetshire, and Bacon’s Hall, Crawley Rock, Crow Hole,
Long Hole, Alinchin Hole, and Raven’s Cliff, all in Gower in
South Wales. The table is followed by a long list of authori
ties, to which it would be delightful to proceed in pursuit of
further game, were it not beyond our present limits.
There can be no doubt that this apparent conflict between
the two eminent authors originated in the printing office,
through a misplacement of the asterisks in Air. Boyd Dawkins’s
table, and much to his annoyance, of course.
Be this as it may, the error is by no means of slight im
portance, inasmuch as the climatal indications of the two
species of Rhinoceros are believed to differ greatly.
Mention having been made above of the Oreston Caverns,
it may be as well to state that the word which the Rev. W.
S. Symonds, no doubt, wrote “ Oreston,” when speaking of
the Caverns “ a little east of Plymouth,” in his “ Records of
the Rocks,” has unfortunately been printed “ Preston.” The
error has crept in no fewer than five times.f Though he
places the “Irish Elk” in the Oreston list, I am not aware of
any authority for doing so.
The late Dr. Falconer identified amongst the remains found
* Op. cit. p. 4.56.
+ See pp. 296-7, and “Index” p. 130.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
19
in Brixham Cavern, a fragment of the cranium, including the
entire maxilla and all the teeth but one, of Lagomys spelams,
Owen = Cave Pika = Tailless Hare. Professor Prestwich men
tions it at least four times in his “ Report on the Exploration
of Brixham Cave,” presented to the Royal Society of London,
and printed by that body in the Phil. Trans. Twice he uses
*
the names “Lagomys spelceus” and “ Lemming” jointly—the
former as the scientific name and the latter as the popular
one,—and once he employs the latter only. In short he
seems to treat Lagomys as a Lemming.
I was much surprised at the fact on reading the Report,
but concluded that possibly some discoveries of which I had
not heard had rendered it necessary to remove Lagomys from
the Hares and place it among the Voles.
No 153 of the “ Proceedings of the Royal Society,” which
has just reached me (July 1874), contains a “Note on the
alleged Existence of Remains of a Lemming in Cave deposits
in England,” by Professor Owen, C.B., f.r.s., who, after quoting
as his text the passages just alluded to in Professor Prestwicli’s
Report, states that no fossil evidence of a Lemming had come
to his knowledge when in 1846 he published his “ British
Fossil Mammals and Birdsthat he has since obtained such
evidence from a deposit of brick-earth near Salisbury asso
ciated with Elcphas pri/migenius; that the Lemmings belong
to the family of Voles (Mnhco/icZ«?), not of Hares (Lcponz/ic);
that the fossil from Brixham appears from the figures to be
rightly referred to Lagomys and to the species he had deter
mined and named in 1846, from a specimen submitted to
him by Dr. Buckland, which had been found by the Rev. Mr.
MacEnery, in Kent’s Hole, Torquay; that it is evidently a
tailless Hare, not a Lemming; that the first evidence of
Lagomys spelccus had led him to remark that “ it unquestion
ably attested the former existence in England of a species of
rodent, whose genus is not only unrepresented in the present
day in our British fauna, but has long ceased to exist in any
part of the Continent of Europe;”! and that the Lemmings
still disturb by their multitudinous migratory swarms, the
husbandmen of Scandinavia. +
vii. rent’s cavern, Torquay.
In a paper entitled “ Observations on the Rate at which
Stalagmite is being accumulated in the Ingleborough Cave,”
* Sec Phil. Trans, vol. clxiii. part ii. 1873, pp. 556, 560.
t See “British Fossil Mammals,’’ &c., p. 213.
t Op. cit. pp. 364-5.
B 2
�20
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
by W. Boyd Dawkins, F.R.S., F.G.S., the author states, on
*
what appears to be most satisfactory evidence, that the apex
of a boss of stalagmite, known as the Jockey's Cap, in that
cave, rising from the crystalline pavement to a height of
2'5 feet, was found, by careful measurement, on March 13th,
1873, to be 87 inches from the roof, whilst, when measured
by Mr. James Farrer, on October 30th, 1845, it was 95’25
inches from it; so that the upward growth has been 8 25
inches in 27’37 years, giving an average vertical growth of ’3
inch per year.
On the strength of this fact, the author remarks that “ all
the stalagmites and stalactites in the Ingleborough Cave may
not date further back than the time of Edward III. if the
Jockey cap be taken as a measure of the rate of deposition.”
“ It is evident,” he continues, “ from this instance of rapid
accumulation, that the value of a layer of stalagmite, in
fixing the high antiquity of deposits below it is comparatively
little. The layers, for instance, in Kent’s Hole, which are
generally believed to have demanded a considerable lapse of
time, may possibly have been formed at the rate of a quarter
of an inch per annum.”
It is but fair to state that Mr. Dawkins admits that “it
is very possible that the Jockey Cap may be the result, not
of the continuous, but of the intermittent drip of water con
taining a variable quantity of carbonate of lime, and that,
therefore, the present rate of growth is not a measure of its
past or future conditionbut it may be doubted whether in
his reasoning he has been sufficiently influenced by his own
admission.
But waiving all this, and assuming that the upward growth
of the Jockey Cap, that is its approach to the roof, has been
uniform, the following questions present themselves :—
1st. Is the accumulation of stalagmite equally rapid in all
caverns ?
2nd, If not, why must the rate of accumulation in Ingle
borough Cave be taken as the measure for other caverns ?
3rd. Has there been an undue tendency to trust to the
thickness of the Kent’s Hole stalagmites in fixing the anti
quity of deposits below it ?
1st. It is probably doubtful whether useful observations on
the rate at which stalagmite accumulates have been made in
many caverns; the well known Cheddar cavern, however,
furnishes information as trustworthy and as significant as
* See “ Proceedings of the Philosophical Society of Manchester,” March
18, 1873, pp. 83-6.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
21
that obtained from Ingleborough. When the late Mr. George
Cox, in 1838, discovered that cavern he noted the case of a
stalactite and stalagmite which had approached so near to
one another that a single drop of water suspended from the
point of the former just touched that of the latter. When
this fell off, its place was taken by a second drop, which as
completely filled the interspace; and this has gone on ever
since without bringing the points perceptibly nearer. In
short, to use the words of Mr. J. Streatfield Cox, the present
proprietor of the Cavern, who has been so good as to write
me on the subject, “In 35 years there has been no appreciable
growth in any of the formations.”
2nd. Should it be remarked that there may be in other
parts of Cheddar Cave examples of perceptible or even com
paratively rapid increase, it may be replied that, though this
may perhaps be true, it cannot be admitted without admitting
also that it is probably as true that in other parts of Ingle
borough Cave there may be rates of increase very slow as
compared with that of the Jockey Cap, and that it is unsafe
to use the rate at which stalagmite accumulates in one branch
of a cavern to measure the time represented by the stalag
mite in any other branch of the same cavern ; and that, con
sequently, even if it has been uniform, the rate of the growth
of the Jockey Cap of Ingleborough Cave cannot be applied
as a chronometer in the case of any other cavern. Speaking
for myself, and after an experience in numerous caverns and
extending over very nearly 30 years, I may say that it ap
pears to be just as reasonable to use for the same purpose
the rate at which veritable jockey caps, birds’ nests, wigs,
stuffed rats, &c. are encrusted with carbonate of lime in the
“dropping well” at Knaresborough.
3rd. Mr. Boyd Dawkins tells us that the layers of stalag
mite in Kent’s Hole may have been formed at the rate of a
quarter of an inch in a century. Let us assume that this is
a fact, and see whither it will lead us. I have found teeth
of the Cave Bear, Cave Hyaena, the Mammoth, and the
tichorhine lihinoceros so very little below the surface of the
stalagmite in Kent’s Cavern, that more than an inch and
half, at most, of calcareous matter had not accumulated there
since they were lodged where they were met with, whilst
below them was a floor of the same material a foot, and
sometimes much more, in thickness ; and the situation was
such as to place it beyond all doubt or question that they
had not been dislodged from an older deposit and re-inhumed.
Taking the suggested chronometer of a quarter of an inch for
�22
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
a year, we arrive at the startling but inevitable conclusion
that Rhinoceros ticliorhinus and his contemporaries were
living in the Torquay district about six years ago.
Again, there is in a branch of the Cavern sometimes called
the “Cave of Inscriptions,” a vast boss of stalagmite having on
one of its sides an inscription partially sealed up with a film of
stalagmite not more than -05 inch thick. At the rate of a
quarter of an inch per year this must have been cut some
thing less than three months ago (='05
'25 =‘2 year).
Unfortunately for this conclusion, however, the inscription
was observed in 1825 by the late Rev. J. MacEnery, who
described it in the following words :—“ The letters are glazed
over and partly effaced.”* Hence it is obviously at least 49
years old. Indeed, it is certainly much older, inasmuch as
the description just quoted clearly shows that it had not then
been recently cut. The inscription itself—“ Robert Hedges of
Ireland Feb. 20, 1688,”—claims to be 186 years old, and the
fact that, though the drip is still certainly at work on it,
MacEnery’s description, given very nearly half a century
ago, is still perfectly apposite, shows that this claim is too
well founded to be resisted.
Enough has perhaps been said to show that the application
of the Ingleborough rate to the Kent’s Hole facts leads to
utterly untenable and, indeed, absurd conclusions. It must
be unnecessary to say that Mr. Boyd Dawkins simply meant,
not that tlie layers of stalagmite in Kent’s Hole were actually
or probably formed at the rate of a quarter of an inch per
annum, but that if there were no facts to the contrary, their
formation may have gone on at that rapid rate.
In Kent’s Cavern there are two Stalagmites, about the
relative ages of which there is not the least uncertainty. The
least ancient, which, as already stated, was coeval with the
ticliorhine Rhinoceros and his extinct contemporaries, is of
granular texture, and was formed on, and subsequent to the
introduction of, the mechanical deposit known as the Cave
earth. The more ancient Stalagmite lies below this Cave
earth, and was not only formed, but in many places broken
up by some natural agency, before the deposition of the
Cave-earth commenced. It is commonly much thicker than
the other and differs from it in having a very crystalline
texture. Beneath it and of still higher antiquity is another
and distinct mechanical deposit termed Breccia, in which
undoubted evidences of contemporary man have been found.
The Granular, or less ancient, Stalagmite is of less variable
* See Trans. Devon. Assoc., vol. in., p. 275.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
23
thickness, being in some places upwards of five feet, in others
not more than a mere film, whilst in certain areas there is
none. It has been observed that where this floor is very
thick the drip of water from the roof is at present unusually
copious, where it is thin there is but little drip, and where
there is none the Cavern is at all times quite dry. Again,
where a large stalactite depends from the roof, betokening a
point where the calcareous water has access, there is vertically
beneath it a boss of stalagmite rising from a floor of the
same substance ; and where the more ancient, the Crystalline,
floor of Stalagmite occurs in situ vertically below, there is on
it also another such boss. These facts have been observed
and recorded, not only by the British Association Committee
at present exploring the Cavern, but also by Mr. MacEnery
*
who first made it famous. “ The floor of the Bear’s den,” he
says, “ was studded with pyramidal mounds of spar [stalag
miteJ supporting corresponding pendants from the roof. ....
An irregular crust [of stalagmite] overspread the floor............
This crust was about a foot thick, and was based on a shallow
bed of indurated rubble............ On clearing a considerable
space of which, points of concealed cones were observed to
protrude upwards into this rubbly bed, and as we advanced,
what we had hitherto imagined to be the rocky bottom, dis
covered itself to be a second plate of stalagmite. It is
curious that the cones of this lower crust were seated pre
cisely under those of the upper, denoting [that] they were
successively deposited from the same tubes above .... but
the lowermost set exceeded by double the thickness of the
upper, and the depth of the stalagmite plate around was in
the same proportion.” f
From the foregoing facts it may be safely inferred that
through the entire period of the Cavern history, so far as it is
known, the channels which have introduced the calcareous
water have remained the same in all known cases, and that
at least the relative rates of the accumulation of stalagmite
in the different branches of the Cavern have not altered.
The inscription mentioned above is far from being the only
one, nor is it the oldest in Kent’s Cavern. There are several
of the 17th century, and so far as is at present known the
most ancient of the entire series bears the date of 1604. One
branch, which prior to 1868 was extremely difficult of access,
is so crowded with them as to have received the name of The
Crypt of Dates. In a review of “ Lyell’s ‘ Antiquity of Man,’ ”
* See British Association Report, 1871, p. 13.
f See Trans. Devon. Association, vol. iii., p. 306, also figure p. 311.
�24
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
in “Nature,” October 2, 1873, Mr. A. R. Wallace, speaking of
the Kent’s Cavern stalagmites and the inscriptions in the
Crypt of Dates, says, “ It has been remarked that the varying
thicknesses of the stalagmitic floor, from 16 in. to 5 ft. and
upwards, closely correspond to the present amount of drip in
various parts of the cave.............. But names cut into this
stalagmite more than two centuries ago are still legible, show
ing that, in a spot where the drip is now very copious, and
where the stalagmite is 12 ft. thick, not more than about
one-eighth of an inch, or say one-hundredth of a foot, has
been deposited in that length of time. This gives a foot in
20,000 years, or 5 ft. in 100,000 years............But below this
again there is another and much older layer of stalagmite.
.... This older stalagmite is very thick, and is much more
crystalline than the upper one, so that it was probably formed
at a slower rate............ A fair estimate will therefore give us,
say 100,000 years for the upper stalagmite, and about 250,000
for the deeper layer of much greater thickness, and of more
crystalline texture.”*
For the data on which his calculations and reasoning are
based, Mr. Wallace refers to the British Association Report,
1869, p. 196, for which I am responsible. The following is
the paragraph to which he alludes:—“ In looking at these
dates [in “The Crypt of Dates”], it seems impossible to
abstain from reflecting on the facts that they are cut on the
upper surface of a mass of stalagmite upwards of 12 feet
thick, in a locality where the drip is unusually copious; and
that two and a half centuries have failed to percipitate an
amount of calcareous matter sufficient to obliterate incisions
which at first were probably not more than an eighth of an
inch in depth.”
In the passage quoted from Mr. Wallace two things are
obvious:—(a) That he has taken the rate of deposition at the
rate of the eighth of an inch in 200 years, whereas my state
ment is that 250 years “have failed to precipitate an amount
of calcareous matter sufficient to obliterate incisions which
at first were probably not more than an eighth of an inch in
depth;” not that an eighth of an inch had been deposited in
250 years. In fact, my estimate is, and always has been,
that on no date known to me in the Cavern has there been
deposited more than -05 inch.
(6) Mr. Wallace supposes that the stalagmite 12 feet thick
is entirely of the older, the crystalline, variety ; and that in
addition to this there is a thickness of 5 feet of the less
* Op. cit., p. 463.
�GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
25
ancient, the granular, stalagmite; making for the two thick
nesses a total of 17 feet; which, at tlie rate of -01 foot in
200 years, would give the total of 350,000 years at which he
arrives for the formation of the two stalagmites alone. In
stead of this, however, as is shown by the context of the
passage in the Report of 1869, the two stalagmites lie one
immediately on the other, without any Cave earth between
them, in the Crypt of Dates, and the total thickness of the
two taken together is about 12’5 feet; not 17 feet.
In short, Mr. Wallace has made two errors calculated to
partially, but not entirely, neutralize each other;—he has
taken too high a rate of deposition which of itself would
lead to too small an amount of time, and too great a total
thickness, which, so far as it goes, has the contrary effect.
Taking the correct data, that of the Report of 1869, we have
12 feet of stalagmite, formed, let it be assumed from the
dates on its upper surface, at the rate of ‘05 inch in 250
years, and thereby arrive at the conclusion that the accumu
lation of the whole required 720,000 years.
Without intending to apply the Kent’s Hole chronometer
to Cheddar Cave, it may not be uninteresting to remark that
the rate of accumulation in the former cavern serves to
diminish the surprise with which we learn that the stalactitic
and stalagmitic points of the latter have not appreciably
come nearer to one another in 35 years; for at the Kent’s
Hole rate of ‘05 inch in 250 years, the actual approach of
the points in 35 years would be no more than ’007 inch
(•05 -e 250 x 35 = *07); —a quantity too small to be perceptible
0
by the naked eye.
4th. There can be little or no doubt that most of his readers
would understand from Mr. Boyd Dawkins’s words that there
had been too great a tendency to trust to the thickness of the
Kent’s Hole stalagmite in forming an estimate of the antiquity
of the Cave men; and I shall be agreeably surprised if they
are not thus quoted in many future discussions on the subject.
Be this as it may, it should be added in justice to myself, that
I have always abstained from, and cautioned others against,
insisting that the thickness of the stalagmite is a perfectly
trustworthy chronometer; nevertheless, it seems fair to ask
*
those who deny that it is of any value to state the basis of
their denial; and I fully concur with Mr. Wallace, that though
the estimate arrived at in a solitary case may in itself be loose
and untrustworthy, “such estimates, if sufficiently multiplied,
* See “The Ancient Cave-Men of Devonshire,” Chambers's Miscellany,
p. 16, 1872.
�26
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
are of great value, since they help to form a definite idea of
what kind of periods we are dealing with, and furnish us
with a series of hypotheses to be corrected or supported by
further observation, and will at last enable us to arrive at the
antiquity of man within certain possible limits of error.”*
The question of the antiquity of the Cave men rests, not
on geological evidence merely, but also on palaeontological,
climatological, archaeological, and geographical considerations;
and if the conclusions to which the latter concur to lead us
harmonize better with a slow than with a rapid accumulation
of stalagmite,—that is with a rate which has certainly ob
tained for several hundreds of years—than with a rate of which
there is no evidence whatever, it is surely more philosophical
to adopt the hypothesis of slow accumulation.
But waiving all this, and supposing it to be true that the
actual and clearly ascertained rate during the last 250 years
is not only too small, but, on the average, 100 times below
the truth, the result would be that the Kent’s Cavern stalag
mites represent, not 720,000, but 7,200 years. Are those who
object to the larger estimate prepared to accept the smaller ?
They must bear in mind that unmistakable evidences of
human existence have presented themselves in the Breccia
which the Crystalline, that is the more ancient, Stalagmite
covers, and which is therefore older still; and that, after all,
the total result would give the antiquity, not of man, but of
the earliest known traces of man in Devonshire. It is of no
service to attempt a concealment of the fact, that the real
contention at present is, not whether man has occupied
Devonshire during 70,000 or 700,000 years, or any still
greater number; but whether the old belief that he first
appeared on the Earth some 6,000 years ago is to be retained
or abandoned.
Mr. Wallace’s speculations, mentioned above, appear to
have elicited several letters on “ Stalagmitic Deposits.” One
from Mr. John Curry, which appeared in “ Nature” of Decem
ber 18th, 1873, contains the following statement:—“ Some
thirty years ago I procured a piece of lime deposit from a
lead mine at Boltsburn, in the county of Durham; it measured
about 18 in. in length, 10 in breadth, and fully -75 inch thick;
it was compact and crystalline, and showed distinct facets of
crystals on its surface, over which the water was running. I
had indisputable evidence that the deposits had taken place
in fifteen years. The water, from which it was produced,
* “Nature,” Octobor 2, 1873, pp. 463-4.
�GEOLOGY AND PALÆONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
27
issued from an adit in the Little limestone, which is about
9ft. thick. After leaving the adit, the water ran down the
perpendicular side of a rise, for some fathoms, on to some rock
débris which was lying on the bottom of a hopper, whence it
proceeded from the upper part of the hopper mouth, then per
pendicularly down over two narrowish wood deals, which
were set on edge, and put across the mouth of the hopper to
retain the worked materials. It was from off these deals that
I obtained the specimen above described. On its back side
the forms of the deals were well defined ; on the front one the
crystals were best developed, where the stream was most
active.
“ In accordance with the above rate of increase of deposit,
namely 75in. in fifteen years, 5in. would require 100 years,
4ft. 2in. 1,000 years, and 41ft. 8in. 10,000 years. The data
given to arrive at these results may be relied on as being
accurate. In the case now related, the rate of increase of de
posit was likely to continue tolerably uniform ; as the surface
water could have no appreciable influence in augmenting or
lessening the flow from the adit.”*
Being carefully observed and clearly described, Mr. Curry’s
facts are valuable and interesting ; but his concluding para
graph shows distinctly that they are of no service in the
chronological valuation of the Kent’s Cavern Stalagmites.
In the Boltsburn lead mine the work was continuous; in
Kent’s Hole it was intermittent. In the Torquay Cavern it
was solely performed by the immediate rainfall, whilst in the
Boltsburn mine “the surface water,” we are told, “ could have
no appreciable influence in augmenting or lessening the flow
from the adit in other words, the volume of water constantly
flowing is so great that the rainfall of the district is comparatively nothing, and may be utterly left out of the data.
The conformation of the hill containing Kent’s Hole renders
it certain that the only water entering the Cavern is the rain
which falls on the hill itself, and the only source of stalagmitic matter is the limestone shell of the Cavern ; but nothing
is stated, probably nothing is known, as to the extent of
country contributing the water issuing from the Boltsburn
mine, or how many subterranean streamlets are contributories
to the stream finding its outlet at the adit.
Mr. Curry has been so good as to inform me that there is
no rain gauge at Boltsburn ; that the nearest is that at Allen* “Nature,” vol. ix. pp. 122-3. See also “The Geological Magazine” for
April, 1874, New Series, Decade ii. vol. i. p. 191, where the letter has been
reprinted.
�28
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
heads in Northumberland, about five miles distant in a north
westerly direction, at which the rainfall, he thinks, will closely
approximate that at Boltsburn ; that Alienheads is 1,369 feet
above the sea and Boltsburn 1,100 feet; that there is much
moorland in the vicinity of each place, and a good deal of peat
in the high parts of the moor.
Mr. Symons’s “ British Bainfall ” shows that for the nine
years ending with December 31st, 1872, the rainfall at Alien
heads averaged 51’80 inches per annum, whilst at Torquay
the average was 37’65 inches ; the two numbers being as 138 :
100 ; and yet this heavy rainfall may be neglected, as it can
have no appreciable influence on the permanent flow of water.
Mr. W. Bruce Clarke, writing to the same paper, states
that he visited about ten years ago, a cavern near Brixton,
commonly known as “ Poole’s llole” and observed some
stalagmite, probably | inch in the back [? thickness], had
become deposited upon the gas-pipes, which were used to
light the cave and had been laid down six months before.
*
This rate considerably exceeds that mentioned by Mr. Curry,
but, unfortunately, no information is given respecting the
conditions under which the deposit took place.
Mr. Thomas K. Callard appears to have written about the
same time, and to the same journal, expressing the belief
that the Kent’s Cavern rate of deposit was not uniform; “ for
when the thick forest (the habitat of the animals whose
bones are found in the cave) left an accumulation of decayed
vegetation on the soil, we had the natural laboratory where
the rain would find the carbonic acid, to act as a solvent
upon the calcareous earth, and as this acidulous liquid per
colated through the soil and dripped into the cave, we have
the origin of the stalagmite, but, as by the axe of man, the
forest decreased, in that proportion the chemicals lessened,
and as a consequence the deposit diminished. Besides the
diminution of the solvent, every year that the operation was
going on the material that composed the stalagmite must
have been decreasing in the superjacent soil, so that the
bicarbonate of lime which now takes two centuries to cover
one eighth of an inch [really one twentieth as stated above],
might have been, in days gone by, the work of much shorter
time.”!
It is obvious that Mr. Callard makes the following assump
tions :—
1st. That the Cavern hill was formerly clothed with a
thick forest.
• “Nature,” vol. ix. p. 171, January 1, 1874.
f Ibid.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
29
2nd. That a thick forest is peculiarly productive of car
bonic acid.
3rd. That the amount of carbonic acid being the same, the
Cavern hill was formerly more capable of yielding stalagmitic
material than it is at present.
1st. It must be admitted on all hands that we have no
means of ascertaining what was the condition of the hill in
the early times to which the Cavern points, but according to
the author of “A Guide to all the Watering Places,” pub
lished in 1803, Kent’s Hole was at that time in a coppice, and
the opening was almost hid in bushes.
*
Such, also, was its
condition when I first visited it in 1834, and such it remained
until the house that now crowns its summit was erected a
very few years ago. The thickness of the ancient forest of
Devonshire could produce no effect in Kent’s Hole unless the
Cavern hill bore its full share of such forests, or unless the
configuration of the adjacent district was so very unlike that
which at present obtains as to send a large part of the water
draining it into the Cavern. The latter hypothesis, however,
would probably of itself take us farther into antiquity than
the present slow rate at which additions are made to the
stalagmite.
2nd. If the trees it bore in earlier times were larger than
those which formed the coppice just mentioned, it is certain
that they must have been correspondingly fewer; and, had
we no further data, it might be doubted whether on an area
fully stocked more carbon would be fixed by large old trees
than by small young ones. Fortunately, however, this problem
received the attention of the eminent Liebig, who gives the
following statement on it:—
“Ferule land produces carbon in the form of wood, hay,
grain, and other kinds of growth, the masses of which differ
in a remarkable degree.
“ 2650 lbs. of firs, pines, beeches, &c., grow annually as wood
upon one Hessian acre of forest-land with an average soil.
The same superficies yields 2500 lbs of hay.
“ A similar surface of corn-land gives .... 800 lbs. of rye,
and 1780 lbs. of straw,—in all 2580 lbs.
“ One hundred parts of dry fir-wood contains 38 parts of
carbon; therefore 2650 lbs. contain 1007lbs. of carbon.
“One hundred parts of hay, dried in air, contain 40'73 parts
carbon. Accordingly, 2500 lbs. of hay contain 1018 lbs. of
carbon.
* Op. cit. p 3-57.
See also “Trans. Devon Asso.” vol. ii. p. 474.
�30
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF TIIE
“ One hundred parts of straw, dried in air, contain 38 per
cent, of carbon ; therefore, 1780 lbs. of straw contain 676 lbs.
of carbon. One hundred parts of corn contain 43 parts of
carbon ; 800 lbs. must therefore contain 344 lbs.—in all 1020
lbs. of carbon.”*
The amounts of carbon from the same area—1007, 1018,
and 1020 lbs.—though not identical, are so nearly so, as to
justify Liebig in remarking that “ it must be concluded from
these incontestable facts, that equal surfaces of cultivated
land of an average fertility are capable of producing equal
quantities of carbonthey suffice also to neutralize the
objection urged by Air. Callard.
3rd. Though it must be admitted that the hill is necessarily
somewhat smaller at present than it was prior to the com
mencement of the stalagmitic formations, the diminution
cannot be considerable ; forjudging from the mean thickness
of the stalagmite into which the limestone has been con
verted, and making ample allowance for insoluble matter, it
cannot be supposed that the vertical loss has amounted to five
feet.
But waiving this ; since a given volume of water, at a
given temperature and pressure, can absorb but a definite
and limited quantity of carbonic acid, which in its turn can
dissolve but a limited quantity of carbonate of lime, it may
be believed that the existing limestone roof of the Cavern,
from 30 to 50 feet in thickness, and the walls of still greater
volume, are amply sufficient to give the solvent the oppor
tunity of doing all the work of which it is capable.
The “Popular Science Review” for January 1874, No. 50,
contains an article on the fourth edition of Sir C. Lyell’s
“ Ge (logical Evidence of the Antiquity of Alan,” &c., in which
the following passages occur :—
“ [Sir C. Lyell] has completely recast the chapter on Kent’s
Hole and the Brixliam Cavern, and has added a considerable
mass of novel evidence regarding the former. This part of
his work is of considerable importance, for the vast researches
of Air. Pengelly and his fellow labourers, Air. Falconer and
Air. Prestwich,—assisted by grants from that wonderfully
generous lady Baroness Burdett Coutts and the Royal Society,
and carried on as they were for a considerable number of years
—have only lately been brought to a conclusion.” f
* “Chemistry in its Applications to Agriculture and Physiology.’’ By
Justus Liebig, m.d., ru.D., f.r.s., m.r.i.a. Edited by Lyon Playfair, ph.d.,
f.o.s., and W. Gregory, m.d , f.r.s.e., 4th ed. 1847, pp. 11, 12.
f Op. cit. pp. 62 - 3.
�GEOLOGY ANI) PAL/EONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
31
Again, “There is a deal of important evidence cited in
regard to the exploration of Kent’s Cavern, and some im
portant remarks are made on the subject of the teeth of
Machairodus. Mr. Pengelly is opposed to Mr. Boyd Dawkins
as to the position of this animal. The latter is inclined to
place it in a lower deposit than Mr. Pengelly. That, how
ever, will not much affect the importance of the discovery of
its teeth. Besides, Mr. Pengelly’s idea that the teeth are not
mineralized as the bear’s bones are, does not appear to us a
very formidable objection. For he must remember that the
layers of the enamel do not normally contain more than two
per cent, of animal matter, and that the dentine contains
vastly less than the ordinary bones of a bear. Still, however,
his objection is worthy of attention.” *
The former passage, being not unlikely to allow the reader
to get confused, appears to call for a definite statement re
specting the exploration of the two famous caverns named
in it.
The researches in which I had the pleasure of co-operating
with the late Dr. Falconer and Mr. Prestwich, were those
carried on in the Windmill Hill Cavern, at Brixham, com
mencing in July 1858, and closing, so far as the actual ex
cavation was concerned, at Midsummer 1859. A Deport on
the results obtained was presented to the Royal Society in
1872, and published in the “Philosophical Transactions” for
1873. f The funds were obtained from the following sources :
—The Royal Society of London, £200; The Baroness BurdettCoutts, £50 ; Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, £5 ; and R. Arling
ton, Esq., £5.
The Kent’s Cavern researches have been carried on entirely
at the expense of the British Association, and by a Com
mittee of that body. The Committee was first appointed in
1864, when it consisted of Sir C. Lyell, Bart. (Chairman),
Professor Phillips, Sir J. Lubbock, Bart., Mr. J. Evans, Mr.
E. Vivian (Treasurer), and Mr. Pengelly (Hon. Secretary) ;
Mr. G. Busk was added in I860 ; Mr. W. Boyd Dawkins, in
1868 ; Mr. W. Ayshford Sanford, in 1869 ; and Mr. J. E. Lee,
in 1873. The work was commenced on 28th March 1865,
has been continued without intermission to the present time,
and is still in progress. The Association has already spent
on it the sum of £1,400, in annual grants varying from £100
to £200.
With regard to the Kent’s Hole Machairodus (Jf. latidens,
Owen), 1 have stated elsewhere that Messrs. Boyd Dawkins
• Op. cit. p. 65.
t Vol. ii. Part ii. pp. 471-572.
�32
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
and Ayshford Sanford had suggested a higher antiquity for
the species than that which I had assigned to it, and have
done my utmost to state fully and fairly the grounds on
which their suggestion rested, as well as those which led me
to decline its acceptance.
*
It is therefore unnecessary to do
more than to recapitulate them here.
There are in Kent’s Cavern two mechanical deposits, differ
ing greatly in age, containing remains of extinct mammals.
One of them, certainly the more ancient, and known as the
Breccia, has, up to the present time, yielded remains of Bears
only ; whilst the other, or less ancient, termed the Cave
Earth, was replete with a great variety of the ordinary Cave
Mammals, amongst which the Cavern hyaena (Hyccncc speloea,
Gold.) was by far the most prevalent species. His presence
was attested by his bones and teeth, by his coprolites, by
bones broken after a pattern known to be characteristic of
the genus, and by his teeth-marks on bones which he had
gnawed ; but no trace of any of these evidences of him
occurred in the more ancient deposit. The remains of
Machairodus found in the Cavern are but scanty, and consist
of seven teeth only—five canines met with by the late Rev.
J. MacEnery, in January 1826, one incisor, by the same
explorer subsequently, and one incisor by the British Asso
ciation Committee in July 1872. It is admitted on all hands
that they were all actually found in the Cave-earth, or less
ancient deposit, commingled with remains of species un
doubtedly characteristic of it. Nevertheless, Messrs. Dawkins
and Sanford, impressed with the fact that, whatever its own
era may be, its zoological affinities are undoubtedly Pliocene,
and with the further fact that bones and teeth of bear have
in some cases been dislodged from the Breccia, or more
ancient deposit, and re-inhumed in the Cave-earth, or less
ancient accumulation, have suggested that possibly, and,
indeed, probably, the Machairodus teeth have undergone a
similar dislodgment and redeposition ; that, in short, the
species belonged to the fauna of the Breccia, but not to that
of the Cave-earth.
The following are the facts which appear to me to be fatal
to this hypothesis :—
1st. In some places animal remains formed fully 50 per
cent, of the entire mass of the Breccia, yet not a trace of
Machairodus was found amongst them,—a fact nothing short
of wonderful if the teeth under discussion were derived from it.
* See “Trans. Devon. Assoc.’’ vol. v. pp. 16-5-79; or “Quart. Journ.
Science,” vol. ii. N.S. pp. 204-23,
�GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
33
2nd. The remains of the Breccia were more highly mineral
ized than those of the Cave-earth, and the teeth of Machai
rodus had the mineral condition characteristic of the less
ancient deposit, but not that of the more ancient. It will be
remembered that the Popular Science reviewer reminds me
that in teeth “ the layers of the enamel do not normally con
tain more than two per cent, of animal matter, and that the
dentine contains vastly less than the ordinary bones of bear.”
To this it is only necessary to reply that the teeth of Machairodus were compared, not with the ordinary bones, but with
the tectli, of bear. Indeed, the opinion that certain teeth and
bones of bear found in the Cave-earth had been derived from
the Breccia is based solely, but no doubt securely, on the fact
that they were highly mineralized; that they were identical,
in short, in this respect, with the remains met with in the
undisturbed Breccia, and differed from those usually found in
the Cave-earth. In other words, mineral condition was the
only test by which bones and teeth of Ursus spelccus derived
from the older deposit and redeposited in the less ancient,
could be distinguished from those of the same species pri
marily lodged in the latter.
3rd. It is admitted by all that the canines of Machairodus
have teeth-marks on their fangs,—a character which does not
occur on any tooth or bone found in the undisturbed Breccia
or known to be dislodged from it; a character, moreover,
which in all probability establishes the contemporaneity of
Machairodus and the bone-eating Hyaena spclaea, and thus
makes the former a member of the Cave-earth fauna to which
the latter exclusively belonged.
4th. The delicate denticulations which, as is well known,
characterize the teeth of Machairodus, are beautifully pre
served in all the Cavern specimens,—a fact not calculated to
excite surprise if they were found where they were primarily
entombed, but by no means harmonizing with the hypothesis
of dislodgement, transportation, and redeposition.
The Bev. A. G. L’Estrange’s “From the Thames to the
Tamar,”* contains the following passage on Kent’s Cavern :—
[Kent’s Cavern] “is said to be upwards of 600 feet in
length, and has many branches and ramifications. The en
trance is wild and wooded, such as it probably was when, at
some indefinitely distant period, it was the abode of the wild
animals whose bones are now embedded in the rock. There
are three distinct floors in the cavern ; in the first and latest
* “ From the Thames to the Tamar; A Summer on the South Coast.” By
the Rev. A. G. L’Estrange. London, 1873.
C
�34
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
are Saxon beads, and bones of foxes and badgers; in the next
those of lions, elks, wolves, hyaenas, elephants, and rhino
ceroses ; in the third and lowest those of bears, which, from
the size of their bones, must have been of the most formidable
proportions. There is also a nondescript animal found, some
thing between a lion and a bear. Mr. Evans states that some
remains of tigers have been found here—a rare discovery.
Some branches of the cavern seem to have been favourite
resorts for particular kinds of animals ; on one side lived the
elephants, on the other the wolves. Explorations have been
long carried on here. Before the year 1846 the cave was
open to the public, and the tradesmen of the town were in
the habit of breaking the stalactites and carrying off the
bones. From the year 1831, a Mr. MacEnery, a Roman
Catholic priest, greatly exerted himself in investigating the
locality, and made some valuable discoveries. After 1846 it
was closed, and came successively into the possession of the
Torquay Natural History Society and of the British Associa
tion ; the latter are still continuing the excavations. Our
guide, who was one of the workers, told us that each inch of
the formation represented 10,060 years, showing how much
his scientific occupation had enlarged his views ! There is
no very satisfactory theory with regard to these caves, of
'which there are several on this coast. . . . We can only sur
mise that the carnivorous animals dragged their prey after
them, and then, dying themselves, made way for a new race
of depredators. Flint knives are found intermingled with
the bones of extinct animals, and it is evident that at some
periods the cave was inhabited by men, little superior, perhaps,
to these beasts of prey. The fauna points to a great altera
tion in the climate, and to a very wild state of the country,
probably to the time when woods grew and mammoths ranged
over what is now Torbay, and when this island was connected
with the continent.”*
Though Mr. L’Estrange does not pretend that his is a
scientific work, it would be to be regretted if the numerous
topographical, historical, and archaeological statements which
occupy so great a portion of its 341 octavo pages were found
to be untrustworthy, leading the reader into error instead of
supplying him with interesting information. Without ventur
ing to give any opinion respecting its value on other topics,
it may be safely stated that its description of Kent’s Cavern
and its contents is by no means accurate.
1 hough geologists have no right to object to the statement
* Op. cit. pp. 313-4.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
35
that in the Cavern the “ bones of the wild animals are now
entombed i'n the rock,” seeing that they apply the term “rock”
to all substances which occupy definite spaces in the earth's crust
and exhibit a certain order of arrangement, whether they be
soft or stony there can be little doubt that the statement
*
would lead unscientific readers, those in fact for whom the
book was intended, to the conclusion that the mammalian
remains were emtombed, not in loose mud or loam, but in
coherent masses of rock in the popular acceptation of the term.
With regard to the number of “floors” in the Cavern;
instead of “ three,” they should be stated to be “ five ”—three
of mechanical origin separated from one another by two
chemical deposits ; the first, or uppermost, or latest, being
the Black Mould.; the second, Granular Stalagmite; the third,
Cave-Earth; the fourth, Crystalline Stalagmite; and the fifth,
or lowest, or earliest yet known, Breccia. It is usual, however,
to apply the name “ floor ” to the two stalagmites only. But
waiving this, and assuming that the three mechanical accumu
lations, those in which the osseous remains are chiefly found,
were alone alluded to by the author, it is true that a very few
beads, all of amber, were found in the first “ floor,” or black
mould, but it may be doubted whether the author is justified
in terming them Saxon beads, or referring them to Saxon times
or people.
“ Bones of foxes and badger” were undoubtedly found in
this “first floor,” but it is equally true that they were met
with also in the Cave-earth—the third of the five deposits,
or what the author probably termed the “ second floor.”
The “nondescript animal .... something between a lion
and bear,” mentioned by Mr. L’Estrange, was, of occurs, the
famous Machairodus latidcns, Owen ; but when he asserts
that “Mr. Evans states that some remains of tigers have
been found in the cavern,” there can be no doubt that he has
misunderstood the author he refers to. Air. Evans, after
giving a tabular list of the principal species of animals found
in the Cavern, remarks “To this may be added the Machairo
dus latidcns, or sabre-toothed tiger, of which one incisor and
five canines were discovered.............. by Air. MacEnery.d
There is no other passage to which allusion can have been
made ; but Mr. L’Estrange, misled by the word tiger, has
failed to detect in the great sabre-toothed felis, his “non
descript animal . . . something between a lion and bear.”
* See “Lyell’s Student’s Manual of Geology,” 1871, p. 2.
t “The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons, and Ornaments of Great
Britain. By John Evans, f.k s., f.s.a.” &c., London, 1872, p. 463.
�36
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF TIIE
It is difficult to imagine where he obtained the amusing
piece of information that “some branches of the cavern seem
to have been favourite resorts for particular kinds of animals,
having on one side the elephants and on the other the wolves.”
In the first place, there is no reason to believe that elephants
or any other of the great herbivores ever lived in the Cavern.
I heir remains were probably lodged there through the agency
of hyienas, who dragged into their den portions of such
animals as they found dead in its vicinity. In the second
place, all branches of the Cavern in which remains of ele
phant have been met with, have yielded those of wolf also.
*
Mr. Mac Enery, unaware of the fact that the deposits he
found in different branches of the Cavern belonged to two
distinct eras, and contained remains representative of two
faunae, came to a somewhat similar conclusion; but his two
imaginary unsocial groups were not elephants and wolves,
but bears and hyaenas, f
lhe statement that “before the year 1846 the cave was
open to the public,” is no doubt intended to convey the idea
that it was first closed in that year. It was certainly under
lock and key in 1834 when I first visited it, and it has
remained so from that up to the present time. Mr. Northmore, the first who found bones in the Cavern, writing in
1832, remarks, somewhat complainingly, that in 1824 when
his first visit was made, there were “no bars, no locks, no
bolts, every one might enter the cave, explore if he pleased,
and return according to his will and pleasure
and he adds,
“not that I blame the owner Sir Lawrence Palk (since the
bones have become objects of sale), for closing the entrance.” {
Sir W. C. Trevelyan, Bart., F.G.S., one of the earliest explorers
of the Cavern, has been so good as to favour me with copies
of passages in letters sent him by the Rev. Dr. Buckland.
In one of these, dated “ Oxford, Nov. 14th, 1824,” Dr. Buck
land states his intention to visit Kent’s Hole in the following
January, “which,” he says, “will be soon enough, if in the
mean time Sir L. Palk walls up the cave.” In a later portion
of the same letter he says, “ I hope Sir Lawrence’s wall will
be got up as speedily as possible.” Sir W. C. Trevelyan says,
in his letter accompanying the copies, “ I had written to Sir
L. Palk, recommending him to put a door to the cave, to
prevent the indiscriminate and unscientific ransacking of the
* See
and 27;
f See
+ See
Edition,
Tables in “Reports of the British Association,” 1870, pp. 19, 24,
1871, pp. 4 and 9 ; 1872, pp. 31, 35, and 42.
“ trans. Devon. Assoc.” vol. iii. pp. 255-6.
“ the Panorama of Torquay. . . . By Octavian Blewitt.” Second
1832, p. 116; or “Trans. Devon. Assoc.” vol. iii. p. 483.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
37
contents, which were then going on, previous to Air. MacEnery
having entered on his researches. This I tell you to explain
a passage in one of I)r. Buckland’s letters.” As we know
that Mr. MacEnery began his systematic researches “at the
close of 1825,”* there can be little or no doubt that the door
had been put up by that time, and this receives some support
from the fact that in his subsequent letters, dated May 4th,
1825, May 23rd and Dec. 16th in the same year, Dr. Buck
land makes no mention of a wish to have the cavern closed.
Indeed, evidence of the Cavern being closed in 1825 or the
following year has recently reached me from America. Air.
William Alinifie, Professor of Alathematics, Baltimore, Alaryland, U.S.A., but formerly resident in Torquay, says, when
writing me on the Cavern, in November, 1873, “ Having had
the free use of the Cavern for so many years, people were
much dissatisfied at its being locked up, much grumbling
against Sir Lawrence Palk was the consequence: I believe
the gate was several times broken open. In the summer of
1825 or 26 a party of four of us wished to visit the Cavern.
. . . . I endeavoured to get the key from Air. George Pearce
. . . . Sir Lawrence Palk’s factotum, but could not find him,
so we walked out in hopes to find the gate open.” There can
be no doubt, therefore, that in 1825 or 1826 at latest the
Cavern ceased to be open to all comers, that is fully 20 years
before the date given by Air. L’Estrange.
The author is incorrect also in stating that Air. AlacEnery
commenced his researches in 1831, the real date being 1825,
as already stated.
It is, perhaps, impossible to say whether Air. L’Estrange
misunderstood the guide’s statement respecting the chronology
of the deposits, nor are there any means of ascertaining on
what the statement, if made, was based. “ That each inch
of the formation represented 10,000 years,” is an estimate
greatly exceeding any which has reached me from any other
quarter. For myself, I am content with the modest hypothesis
of 5,000 years for each inch of the stalagmites, and am willing
to suppose the mechanical deposits to have accumulated more
rapidly. It must be admitted that the author had some reason
for supposing that the guide’s “ scientific occupation had en
larged his views.”
VIII. THE SUBMERGED FOREST OF TORBAY.
The Bev. AV. S. Symonds has the following remarks, in his
* See “Trans. Devon. Assoc.’’ vol. iii. p. 444.
�38
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF THE
“ Records of the Rocks,” respecting the Submerged Forest of
Torbay:—“ The waters of Torbay roll over the site of a sub
merged forest which extends seaward for a considerable dis
tance. The remains of the Mammoth, with those of the Bos
longifrons, have been found between Torquay and Torbay in
forest peats. It is very doubtful, however, whether the
Mammoth remains are not derived from some more ancient
deposits. There is no good evidence that this animal lived
up to the period of the submerged forests.”*
The allusion to the Mammoth in the foregoing paragraph,
is to a left lower molar, now in the Museum of the Torquay
Natural History Society, and is the only relic of that animal
which the Torbay forest is known to have yielded. It has
been identified by Professor Owen and the late Dr. Falconer,
and mentioned by several authors. The statements just quoted
render it desirable to bring together, and place on record, all
that is known respecting the locality in which it was found,
the evidence that it belonged to the Submerged forest, and
the era of the species.
1st. As conflicting statements have appeared from time to
time respecting the locality in which this interesting specimen
was met with, and as it is not easy to say what is meant by
“ between Torquay and Torbay,” it may be as well to state the
facts of the case, which are as follow:—Mr. C. E. Parker, of
Torquay, being one day at Brixham harbour, observed the
molar as it was brought ashore by some trawl fishermen, who
informed him that they had dredged it up in their trawl, a
little within and on the southern side of Torbay. From the
situation, it must have been in fully five fathoms water; and
this is confirmed by the depth required for trawl fishing. Mr.
Parker at once purchased the tooth, and presented it to the
Torquay Natural History Society, of which he was a member.
2nd. That it is a true Submerged forest specimen is
admitted by Air. Godwin-Austen, Dr. Falconer, and Sir
Charles Lyell ;f all of whom have studied it and called atten
tion to it. It has been remarked by Dr. Falconer that “it is
exceedingly fresh-looking, with a slight tinge of smut, as if it
had lain in a peat-bed t and that “the surface is entirely
free from any incrustation of marine Polvzoa, with which it
must have got covered had it lain long at the bottom of the
sea.§ To this I would add, that it has not a trace of abrasion,
• Op. cit , p. 292.
+ See “Quart. Journ. Geol Soc’’ Lond. vol. vii. p. 131, 1851; “Nat.
Hist. Rev.” vol. iii. p. 68, 1863;” “Principles of Geology, 11th ed. vol. i.
p. 549, 1872; and “Antiquity of Man,” 4th ed. pp. 398 and 415, 1873.
j “Nat. llist. Rev.” vol. iii. p. 68.
§ Ibid.
�GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY OF DEVONSHIRE.
39
r»*»Fw
which in all probability would not have been the case had it
been a redeposited fossil. Sir C. Lyell observes that its fresh
condition is “probably due to the antiseptic quality of the
peat.”*
3rd. It must be unnecessary to remark that the conclusion
to which we have just been led, is itself a reply to the author’s
statement, that “ there is no good evidence that this animal
lived up to the period of the submerged forests;” and as such
it is understood by all the authors already mentioned : Thus,
I)r. Falconer says, “ This [Torbay] peat-bed indicates a
subsidence of the land in Devonshire, then peopled with
Elephants, of a very modern date, and long subsequent to
the period of the raised beach, which is so boldly developed
along that part of the coast;”} and according to Sir C. Lyell,
“The specimen [the Torbay molar] is interesting as serving
to establish the fact that the Mammoth survived when the
surface of this region had already acquired its present con
figuration, so far as relates to the direction and depth of the
valleys in the bottom of one of which the peat alluded to . . .
was found.”}
Nor is the Torbay molar a solitary “find;” for in 1849 two
perfect heads of the Mammoth were found in a forest at
Holyhead, of which Sir C. Lyell says, “ It is not improbable
that these Mammoths survived most of the lost species which
were their contemporaries in what has been called the Cavern
period.” §
Again, and within our own county, in 1809, 1871, and
1872, Mr. P. 0. Hutchinson laid before the Devonshire
Association, molars of Mammoth cast up by the waves on
Sidmouth beach; in 1872 he also produced an unusually
large molar of the same species, found in the Sid, by a young
man wading up the bed of the river in search of lampreys;
and in July, 1873, he read to the same body a paper on
“ Submerged Forest and Mammoth Teeth at Sidmouth,” when
he described a series of carefully observed facts connected
with a Submerged forest laid bare on Sidmouth beach, by the
gales of the preceding winter, which “had never been seen
before within the memory of living man,” and in which were
found four Mammoth’s molars.||
The foregoing well-established facts render it, at least,
extremely difficult to believe that “ there is no good evidence
*
f
j
II
and
“Principles of Geolo ~y,” 11th ed. vol. i. p. 519.
“Nat. Hist. Rev.” vol. iii. p. 68.
Op. cit. p. 549.
§ Ibid, p. 550.
See “Trans. Devon. Assoc.” vol. iii. p. 143, iv. p 455, v. pp 39-40,
vi. pp. 232- 5.
�40
NOTES ON RECENT NOTICES OF TIIE
that the Mammoth lived up to the period of the submerged
forests.” What may be the era of the forests themselves is a
question on which it seems at present only possible to say
that they are more modern than the mammoth-bearing Cave
earth of Devonshire.
It is almost amusing to find one’s self contending that the
Mammoth had not become extinct before the growth of the
forests now submerged on our coasts, at the very time that
the editors of the “Zoologist”* and of the Standard news
paper are calling attention to an article, by a correspondent
of the New York World, to the effect that an escaped Russian
convict, named Cheriton, has just discovered in a valley,
150 miles long and 50 miles wide, near the River Lena, from
15 to 20 living Mammoths, each about 18 feet long, 12 feet
high, with tusks projecting 4 feet, and measuring from 8 to
10 feet along the curve. They were all aged, very peaceable
animals, and torpid as old oxen; nevertheless one of them
was seen to engage in a battle, of an hour’s duration, with
an aquatic Saurophidian, 38 feet long and armed with scales
as well as horrible fangs, and occupying a blue lake in the
valley. The battle ended in the discomfiture of the Mam
moth, which could hardly limp off after the contest.! Being
myself connected with the continent to which Cheriton, the
Mammoths, and the Saurophidian belong, I cannot but feel
hurt that a newspaper in another continent, in short an
American paper, was selected as the medium for making
known so important a discovery.
* See “The Zoologist,” October 1873, pp. 3731 -3.
f See “The Mammoth still living,” in The Zoologist for October, 1873,
2nd series, vol. viii. pp. 3731-3.
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Notes on recent notices of the geology and palaeontology of Devonshire
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Pengelly, William
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [Torquay]
Collation: 40 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Read at Teignmouth, July 1874. Inscription on front page: 'M.D. Conway with the author's kind regards'. Includes bibliographical references.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature and Art
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1874
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
G5278
Subject
The topic of the resource
Science
Geology
Palaeontology
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Notes on recent notices of the geology and palaeontology of Devonshire), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
Conway Tracts
Devonshire
Geology
Palaeontology