GEOLOGY, 



L~wi.E*i» , M*l 



THE EAEN VALLEY. 

 By F. SMITH. 



FOR nearly two years I have devoted occasional spare 

 hours to observation of the river Earn, and its geological 

 surroundings. Its winding appearance and variable conditions 

 were as soon as observed sufficient to make me inquisitive about 

 its history and present being as a river. My cottage is situated 

 some 300 feet above the stream, whence I have watched its 

 fluctuations — now swelling out of all proportion, and spreading 

 far and wide upon the fields, and now sinking down to a gentle 

 burn, wending its way among pebble-beds and sands. 



To watch a river for a length of time may appear to many to 

 be a strange, not to say a trivial occupation. It has been to me 

 a labour of thought, and a labour of love, for which I can show 

 no " hard cash," but a coin of another stamp, and of another 

 value. Mine is a medium of Old Time's manufacture, which is 

 exchanged for a knowledge indescribably interesting, ennobling, 

 and engrossing to the man of leisure, and comforting and exalting 

 to him who plods his way. To look upon my river, and the 

 valley through which it wanders, one might imagine that its 

 channel were fixed, and the valley unalterable, but this is by no 

 means the truth. That the river when it has rushed down and 

 spread across the fields, invariably sinks into its old channel 

 again is true so far as one generally cares to know. But we did 

 not see the mass of boulders and pebbles hurrying along with the 

 water, and the hundreds, perhaps thousands of tons of sediment, 

 borne hither and thither on the angry tide. These are best 

 seen by those initiated into the river's secret, but the secret will 

 out to any inquisitive mind, for the "book in the running brook" 

 is a page of nature open alike to all. Seen from above, the river 

 presents the most astonishing serpentine windings. In the 

 distance of about 3 }£ miles, between the gardens of Dupplin 

 Castle and Bridge of Earn, the stream follows all the points of 



