Floods and Forestry. 



The present rainy season has left numerous instances all over these 

 islands to show that here, as well as on the Continent, this is a public 

 question of immediate importance. The ravages on the Ochil hills 

 betwixt Tillicoultry and Dollar may be brought forward as striking 

 instances of our text. But the north-east coast from Yorkshire to 

 Aberdeen might afford many parallel instances ; v,\u\e later, Skye 

 was visited by a flood equally severe. 



The Highland tourist knows that Stirling is the border-land 

 betwixt the rugged scenery of the Highlands, and the plains which are 

 the glory of East Lothian farmers. He is now only about to enter 

 the land of brown heath and shaggy wood. But as he has previously 

 been hurried over the now richly cultivated fields of Bannockburn, 

 the abrupt escarpments of the Ochils, strangely wild amidst abound- 

 ing triumphs of scientific agriculture, must have gladdened his eyes. 

 For here at last are the precursors of those serried crags, rough 

 covries, abrupt peaks, and still lochs, to see which had been the motive 

 of his journey. On the 23rd of August last the numerous little 

 manufacturing towns along the base of the range were in sore 

 anxiety. It had rained heavily the previous night, and in the early 

 morning the oldest inhabitant experienced a new sensation. The 

 hills along an area of about eight miles had a white covering of foam ; 

 it thundered and lightened the while ; the mountain streams enlarged 

 their course, and the water made new channels ; a scalp on the 

 abrupt face of the hills above Harvieston House still remains, where 

 the surface soil to a depth of 5 feet and a breadth of 20 feet 

 was suddenly removed. The torrent of mud, water, and debris was 

 broken by the plantations at the hill's foot ; but ere its force ex- 

 pended it knocked down a well-built wall, and carried away a bridge, 

 thus rendering the turnpike for a while impassable. At Tillicoultry 

 the only fatalities occurred, a mill master being s\\'ept down by the 

 current in attempting in vain to save the lives of two of his female 

 hands. But at Dollar the flood left the most permanent marks of 

 its powers, l)oth in the romantic glen leading up to Castle Camp- 

 bell, and along the dowuM-ard course of the burn through the town 

 till it joins the Devon, a small affluent of the Forth, near the railway 

 station. The ordnance map shows the straight course of this streamlet 

 to be little more than a mile and a half. But the contour lines mark 



