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JVotice of a Submarine Forest in Largo Baijt in the Frith of 

 Forth. By the Rev. Dr. Fleming, Flisk, 



Nearly eight years have elapsed since I transmitted, to the 

 Royal Society of Edinburgh, the description of a submarine 

 forest, "which could be traced for several miles along the 

 southern margin of the estuary of the Tay, and on the north 

 side of the county of Fife. The paper referred to occupies 

 a place in the ninth volume of the Transactions of that asso- 

 ciation. Last autumn, 1 was successful in detecting a second 

 example of a submarine forest, at the opposite side of the 

 same county, and on the northern margin of the Frith of Forth. 

 It may be readily met with in walking along the sands during 

 ebb-tide, from the village of Lower Largo, to Corn-cockle-burn, 

 on the west side of Kincraig or Ely-ness. 



The rocks on which the strata, connected with the submarine 

 forest, rest, belong to the carboniferous epoch ; and, though 

 occupying a high place in the series, and abounding with coal, 

 they exhibit, in many of their beds, that reddish-brown colour 

 which has procured, for the lower portions of the formation, 

 the denomination '^ old red sandstone." They are intimately 

 connected with the several varieties of trap. The soft bed, 

 on which the forest more immediately rests, consists of firmly- 

 laminated clay, of a brown colour, similar to the hue of many 

 of the rocks in the neighbourhood. With the exception of the 

 roots of the trees, to be mentioned afterwards, I was not suc- 

 cessful in detecting in it any traces of organic remains ; but, 

 judging from the thinness and continuity of its laminae, and the 

 absence of marine exuviae, it might probably be referred, with 

 considerable propriety, to lacustrine silt. Over the surface of 

 this silt, there is a thin covering of sand and fine gravel, irre- 

 gularly distributed, and not continuous. This, too, is probably 

 of fresh-water origin. Over these the bed of peat reposes, 

 which serves in a more definite manner to indicate the changes 

 which have taken place on this part of the coast. 



The peat is composed exclusively of the remains of land 

 and fresh-water plants, such as commonly occur in such 

 deposits. Along with these, however, appear, and rather 



