fi4 THE TAY BRIDGE GALE OF DECEMBER 28, 1879, AXD THE 



wood, forcing a clear pathway through it for its triumphant 

 career, uprooting some, and in its wild freaks snapping others 

 across at various heights varying from six to forty feet above 

 ground, in the most fantastic and indescribable manner. Many 

 fallen specimens girthed from nine and ten feet to twelve and 

 fifteen feet in circumference at three feet from the ground, and 

 included all species of mixed hard wood and fir and larch. One 

 beech tree, growing at a point within two miles of the ill-fated 

 bridge, and fully fifteen feet in girth at four feet from the ground, 

 was torn out of its site, and its heavy limbs, six in number, 

 springing from a short bole of about fifteen feet, each girthing 

 from eight to nine feet, were literally twisted round and round, 

 their fibrous wood split up, and the limbs rendered more 

 like huge ropes, spun by some giant power, than mere tree 

 branches. The losses in Perthshire are wellnigh incalculable, 

 and many reports, which we should have been able to embody in 

 this paper from correspondents in various localities, have not 

 been forthcoming, from the sheer inability of the foresters to 

 estimate aright the extent of the damage sustained. The 

 distance from facilities of transport in many instances is so 

 great, that the enormous quantity of fallen timber, especially 

 when twisted and wrenched across, is almost unmarketable, and 

 not worth the heavy cost it would entail for removal for sale in 

 such quantities. Mr Barbour of Bonskied reports that on his 

 beautiful property on the Tummel he has lost over 4000 trees, 

 many being fine old well-grown larch; while on the Athole estates 

 of Dunkeld, Kinnaird, and Blair, Mr. M'Gregor, the intelligent 

 forester at Ladywell, informs us that no fewer than 83,003 trees, 

 and all of large size, have been blown down, and many thousands 

 rendered useless for constructive purposes, being so shaken and 

 twisted in their best " cuts " by this memorable storm. In 

 Torfarshire, during January, and in other districts, the ordinary 

 forest work had to be suspended to enable the workmen to clear 

 away the debris and blown-down trees. In some localities in 

 Scotland the work of destruction in young plantations was 

 extremely severe, the ground being naturally damp, and with 

 the previous wet summer's rains to increase the softness of the 

 ground, the wind was enabled to get a better hold of the more 

 sheltered trees, by having had easy work in forcing gaps here 

 and there through the outskirts of the woods, thus, besides laying 

 waste large tracts of plantation, reducing at the same time, 

 amongst the survivors, the temperature of the whole interior of 

 the woods. In exposed sites in the country the damage done 

 has been unusually severe, large park trees have fallen in all 

 directions, woods have been thrown over on their broadsides, 

 and the tops of many healthy j)romising young trees of position 

 have been snapt across. The large trees blown over in the 



