and Flood in August, 1829. 331 



The effects of the storm on the grain crops, excepting where 

 they were overflowed by the streams, were less injurious than 

 its severity might have led one to anticipate. They had not 

 yet passed the full vigour of vegetation, the ears being, in few 

 cases, fully shot out ; and a remarkably fine day with much 

 sun, on the 6th of August, enabled the plants to rise up again ; 

 and, ultimately, a harvest, not very deficient, was reaped in 

 all the more productive districts. 



Being from home, I had no opportunity of observing, 

 myself, the state of the barometer or thermometer at the 

 period of this flood ; but have learnt since, from unquestionable 

 authority, that nothing remarkable was indicated by either. 

 At the commencement of the storm, the barometer was a little 

 above its mean height ; and its fall, during the progress of the 

 storm, was trifling. The thermometer was nearly at temperate 

 all the time. 1 have learnt from Mr. Murdock, at Huntly- 

 Lodge, who registers a rain guage, that the fall between 5 a. m. 

 on the 3d, and 5 a. m. on the 4th, was, at that place, 3 J inches. 

 The larger proportion of this fell between 5 and 9 p.m. on 

 the 3d. 



The effect of running water, in moving stones and heavy 

 materials, has been, in many instances, curiously illustrated 

 by this flood. The River Don has, upon my own premises, 

 forced a mass of 400 or 500 tons of stones, many of them 200 

 or 300 pounds weight, up an inclined plane, rising 6 feet in S 

 or 10 yards ; and left them in a rectangular heap, about 3 £eet 

 deep on a flat ground ; and, singularly enough, the heap ends 

 abruptly at its lower extremity. A large stone, of 3 or 4 tons, 

 which I have known for many years in a deep pool of the 

 river, has been moved about 100 yards from its place ; and 

 an immense collection of small stones, of many hundred tons, 

 gathered from the arable land, and laid down as an embank- 

 ment at a turn of the small river Leochell, has been carried 

 down, and left on the field below, not promiscuously dis- 

 persed, but as if artificially collected into large and deep 

 heaps. 



OCT.— dec 1829. 



